Oct. 27, 2026
Mom Arrested Deplaning From Work Trip After Leaving Kids Alone For Days… But Wait Till Your Hear Their Ages
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RSS Feed 50-year-old professional photographer, Irene Miller, was taken away in handcuffs as she deplaned from a work trip to Las Vegas. Police have charged her with 4 counts of child neglect after authorities say she left her 14-year-old, 12-year-old, 11-year-old and 9-year-old home alone for several days. Police were alerted when the oldest daughter called 9-1-1 after her 9-year-old brother dropped a dumbbell on his head. Miller says she hired a babysitter for mornings and afternoons, but allowed her kids to stay overnight unsupervised, and now she’s looking at serious, criminal charges.
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00:00:02
Speaker 1: Hey there, everybody, and welcome to Amy and TJ. It's Tuesday, October 27th, and a 50-year-old mom of four coming off a plane from a five-day work trip in Las Vegas was greeted with handcuffs and charges. Yes, she is being accused and charged with leaving her four children home alone while she was on a work trip However, wait until you hear the ages of her children. That was a bit shocking. Welcome, everyone. I was a little surprised when I saw that the age range was not what I was expecting when you saw the police force waiting for this woman who was taken through the airport in In handcuffs.
00:00:49
Speaker 2: What age should it be that you shouldn't be held responsible for abandoning your kids?
00:00:55
Speaker 1: Correct.
00:00:55
Speaker 2: No, no, I'm saying what age. Before we even tell the audience here what we're talking about exactly, what do you think that cutoff should be that, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, you didn't even go to the store, make a quick grocery run, you left town?
00:01:07
Speaker 1: You left town and you went thousands of miles away because this was in Kissimmee, Florida is where the family lives. Mom was in Las Vegas. Now, I would say I probably would not feel comfortable leaving and I'd still have and she did have someone checking in on her children. We will get into the details in just a bit, but I wouldn't do that before the age of 15 or 16.
00:01:31
Speaker 2: Yeah, leaving for the weekend. And even then, it almost gets scarier the older they get because now they haven't kept boyfriends over and all kinds. Yeah, immediately went to boyfriends.
00:01:42
Speaker 1: Yes.
00:01:42
Speaker 2: But yeah, all that stuff. They throw in a party. You have to worry about something else altogether. So I don't know. And then we've done the story of, hell, it seems like several over the past several months. And different states have different rules.
00:01:53
Speaker 1: Correct.
00:01:54
Speaker 2: But none of them seem to state you shouldn't leave your kids for the weekend and travel across the country. They don't talk about that. They just talk about leaving them alone at home for a little bit. This overnight thing is a little.
00:02:06
Speaker 1: Yes. No, I think that, look, people are weighing in and everyone's going to have their opinions and especially moms. Look, I had to travel all the time for work and I was juggling this a lot. I can't imagine. I know I never left my kids before the age of 16 by themselves and, And I always had someone checking in on them for the party aspect. Also had cameras in and outside the apartment making sure I knew who was coming and going. All of that said, this is a 50-year-old mom. She was on a five-day work trip to Vegas. She's a professional photographer. And she left her four kids home overnight alone for several days. Their ages, 9, 11, 12, and 14. 14 was the girl, and I believe she's in high school now. But is that appropriate? And is it illegal to leave kids as young as nine with a 14-year-old while you are halfway across the country?
00:03:03
Speaker 2: Do we know what it is in Florida, what their breakdown is?
00:03:05
Speaker 1: Yes, it is ambiguous. There is no definitive or clear law that specifies an exact age for when a child can legally be left home alone. The state of Florida says it's up to parents to decide when their children are old enough. However, in this case... They were very quick and swift to arrest this woman and charge her with four counts of child neglect without great bodily harm. Now it's interesting why and how police were even alerted to this situation. So here's what we know. We know that she left on Sunday, October 18th, I believe is when it was. And she was set to return on Friday, October 23rd. That's a long stretch. That's a full.
00:03:53
Speaker 2: Wait, say it again. The date's what?
00:03:55
Speaker 1: She left on Sunday, October 18th, and she arrived back in Florida on Friday, October 23rd. So that's a full school week, a full work week where she was not there.
00:04:08
Speaker 2: I don't know if I need to hear anymore. That's inappropriate. I don't know if I need to hear any more than that. The 14-year-old responsible for getting the others to and from school every day is somebody picking them up every day, dropping them off at school. That was the checking on them that was being done. I would never be gone for five days thinking that a 14-year-old can take care of a nine-year-old. Exactly. And it's just a matter of if there is an emergency, if there is somebody starts choking, if there is somebody breaking into the house. That's just a little bit longer of a stretch that I'm comfortable with now. To this parent, she might know her kids and know them well and think they're going to be okay. I doubt she was rolling the dice. I bet she's done this plenty. I bet she trusts these kids. I don't think she's just taking the chance on this is some desperate trip that came up last minute. I doubt that. She made arrangements for people to see. But for me, at least, that seems to be a stretch.
00:05:00
Speaker 1: Yes. And I think most people would agree with that. Now, you brought up a couple of points that should be made. So the mom hired a babysitter who drove in from Tampa. She was there in the mornings helping the kids get ready and get them to school. And then she was there after school to make sure the kids arrived home and were settled and good to go. The big factor here is she did not spend the night. She didn't spend the evening or the overnight hours with the kids. So she came in the She came in the afternoon, and then she left. And what happened was around 8.30 p.m. on Wednesday, so a couple days into the trip, there was an emergency.
00:05:41
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:05:43
Speaker 1: And that is what the concern always is about leaving. Like, it's not fair, I don't think, to put that on a 14-year-old to know what to do. And who knows if she called her mom first. And dad's in the picture, too, so there's a little twist involved. He doesn't live with them, but it seems like he was nearby. So a dumbbell fell on the 9-year-old brother's head. Older sister freaks out and calls 911 because she's afraid.
00:06:14
Speaker 2: It was the right thing to do, actually. I give the 14-year-old credit.
00:06:17
Speaker 1: Absolutely. Calls 911. So police come to the house and they find these four kids unsupervised. They take the nine-year-old to the hospital. He's treated and discharged. It doesn't seem like there was any major medical issue or certainly nothing permanently awful that went on. But that is when police called mom. Where are you, mom? These kids are here alone. She says she's in Vegas through Friday. They then arrange for the kids to then be taken by their dad. So I was like, wait, what? Dad's close enough to be able to take the kids and bring them over to his place. Why was that not the arrangement in the first place?
00:07:07
Speaker 2: And the answer.
00:07:08
Speaker 1: Is unclear right now.
00:07:09
Speaker 2: Okay, no, that's got to be an answer. This does not make sense. Okay, obviously we don't understand fully the family dynamics here. Something else is going on. So yes, it might be different choices that you and I would have made as parents, but I say this all the time. It's tough to criticize somebody else's parenting. Don't know what's going on in that house and why she was comfortable. Now, it is confusing. It's very confusing, Robes. Four kids. Hey, Dad, is he out of town? Is there a restraining order? I mean, if he's up the street, it doesn't make any sense. You stay with the kids, or you stay with your dad. If he doesn't have enough space... We got to make an arrangement. This doesn't make sense. And 8.30 is fairly early in the evening.
00:07:54
Speaker 1: Yes. And look, and I know we don't know everyone's circumstances. We don't know this woman from her Facebook page. They've pieced it together. She was, I mean, she is a professional photographer. And based on what she was posting that week, she was doing a big shoot with the real estate brokerage network, Better Homes and Gardens. You could see her. It looked like this elaborate setup, like this beautiful Martha Stewart table-like setup where she was taking photos. So she was working. I actually watched some of the local news coverage of this, and they actually said, I went back and watched it a couple of times. The anchors said on it, a woman who had been in Vegas for the past several days was arrested coming off the plane. They literally made it seem like she was partying in Vegas. I take issue with that.
00:08:39
Speaker 2: Even though there are facts, come on, man. Don't click bait us on TV. Babe, that's so unfair to this lady.
00:08:45
Speaker 1: I was disheartened when I saw one of the reputable local news anchors Literally say she was in Vegas coming off a plane. Didn't once say she was there for work. I'm not excusing what she did, but there is a difference when you hear Vegas and you hear mom in Vegas. You're thinking about that mom who went on a cruise ship or the mom who went on vacation and left her kids alone. This mother, it does appear, was legitimately working. It just so happened to be that her job took her to Las Vegas.
00:09:13
Speaker 2: It does make a difference in the story. That is relevant context to what's going on here. And also, this is a woman with four kids. The dad's up the street and is not helping out. You can assume she's doing all this on her own. She needs to go make money. There's all these things.
00:09:25
Speaker 1: I was thinking all those things.
00:09:27
Speaker 2: It's hard to criticize somebody. I think you used that quote not too long ago. It's hard, man, to criticize somebody for their choices when you don't know what their options were. It's such a good point. I mean, we don't know what was going on with this lady. And I leave room for parenting, man. Even that lady that let her five-year-old walk a half mile.
00:09:43
Speaker 1: Yes.
00:09:44
Speaker 2: I leave room for you and your kid. Now, the woman who went on the cruise, that's different.
00:09:49
Speaker 1: That's where we draw the line. And that's the thing. When I saw, I actually, I went back and watched it three times to make sure that I didn't hear it wrong or read it wrong. And that does bother me. I think given what we did for so long and what we're doing now, I think part of our responsibility as journalists is to let folks know, man, sometimes leaving out one little bit of information can make the difference between how you're judging someone and how you're not. And again, not to say that she did the right thing. But you, I was going through my head, like, does she not have a friend who could spend the night? I've definitely in desperate situations asked a girlfriend of mine, Hey, can you just spend the night? Make these, make sure these kids don't wake up in the middle of the night. Something happens.
00:10:31
Speaker 2: I do.
00:10:31
Speaker 1: I would always worry about someone choking, someone getting sick. someone not knowing how to react to an emergency. And maybe this 14 year old girl, maybe she's about to turn 15. Maybe she said, mom, let me have this responsibility. Let me babysit. Maybe she was earning money and she was excited about it. We don't know how or why these four kids ended up unsupervised at night while mom was working. And dad apparently was somewhere nearby. But we do have the sheriff's statement. I'm curious. This was pretty tough. They said, is it Osceola? I'm tough with it. Osceola County Sheriff's Office will not tolerate child neglect. These cases will be investigated and charges will be brought against the parents who are not properly supervising or caring for their children. It almost sounded like he was fed up with parents, period.
00:11:23
Speaker 2: Okay, fine. Say it again.
00:11:27
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was harsh, right? And he was talking to, like, all of you parents. The Osceola County Sheriff's Office will not tolerate child neglect. These cases will be investigated, and charges will be brought against the parents who are not properly supervising or caring for their children.
00:11:44
Speaker 2: Okay, fine. Just, God, can we all take a beat? If she messed up, I mean, I don't know, baby. That's... God, we're hard on people. Do we really think this woman who has, what are the ages? Nine?
00:11:57
Speaker 1: Nine, 11, 12, and 14.
00:11:59
Speaker 2: Did she really raise these kids and get them to this point because she's a bad mom? I don't know. I don't know anything about these folks. Maybe the police know something we don't know. Maybe they went into the house and there's trash piled up in a room. Maybe there's no clean clothes. Maybe, I don't know. But child neglect. Child neglect. Right? Is the dad going to get arrested?
00:12:20
Speaker 1: Well, see, and that's my question. What was dad's role or responsibility in all of this? And right now he's being written in like the hero who came in and saved the day, but where was he in the days leading up to it? No, wait. Why didn't child call dad?
00:12:33
Speaker 2: But babe, why didn't mom call dad?
00:12:36
Speaker 1: Correct.
00:12:37
Speaker 2: I got a trip coming up. Correct. I'm going to be gone five days. This isn't hard stuff.
00:12:41
Speaker 1: He might have said, I have to work and I can't watch the kids. Who knows? At night? At night.
00:12:46
Speaker 2: Maybe, okay, maybe it works overnight. There are so many maybes and stuff we don't know. But, hey, this is the time. No, me, comfortably, wouldn't want to do that with my kids. But robes at the same time, I don't know if the right thing is to charge somebody with a crime.
00:13:06
Speaker 1: And you know what? I will take that and add to it. I feel really like, look, people may disagree with me, but I keep seeing this woman's face everywhere. The video is everywhere. She's walking off the plane. She's got her bag with her and she looks shocked as she is being greeted by officers who have guns in their holsters with handcuffs ready for her.
00:13:29
Speaker 2: She didn't get a heads up?
00:13:30
Speaker 1: I don't know. She seemed a little shocked.
00:13:32
Speaker 2: It didn't look like it, yeah.
00:13:33
Speaker 1: And then there's pictures and videos of her being traipsed through the airport with handcuffs. I mean, this was a public shaming. Shame, shame, shame. Even the way, and maybe like you said, we don't know all of the details, but the way the sheriff even released the statement. They immediately release that body cam footage. We can't get body cam footage released for months when there are serious questions about police activity. But when they want to shame a mom, they'll get that body cam up in no time.
00:14:00
Speaker 2: They seem to have an agenda, you could argue. I don't know. They don't want to give them grace. Maybe they're doing their job. Maybe they think they're doing the right thing. And they think maybe they have victims here, which are those kids. Are they going to take the kids from her now?
00:14:12
Speaker 1: They're with dad right now.
00:14:14
Speaker 2: Which is where the fuck they should have been in the first place. Why now? Is this the thing? I don't know. Maybe she is the worst mom in the world. These kids have been neglected for years. Maybe. But Christ on sale, baby. You know, there's just so much we don't know.
00:14:30
Speaker 1: There is so much we don't know. And when we come back, you alluded to it off the top, Florida law. What does it actually say? And we've talked about this, but my goodness, this is some gray area legally when it comes to state to state parents. Good luck trying to figure out what's legal and illegal. Welcome back, everyone, to Amy and TJ. Yes, we're talking about 50-year-old mom. I don't even know if I gave her name at the top of this. Irene Miller is her name.
00:15:08
Speaker 2: Mom of the year, yes.
00:15:09
Speaker 1: Yes.
00:15:10
Speaker 2: Mom of the year, according to the Osceola Shares Department.
00:15:12
Speaker 1: Look, it's crazy when you look on her social media. I mean, she looks like a working professional. Like, she cares for herself. It looks... It doesn't look like a mom who would typically be under arrest for child neglect. We don't know. Who knows, like you said, what it looks like inside that house, what those kids have told police. We don't know any of the details, but we know that she is now facing some very serious charges. The kids are with dad right now. And yes, we have a lot of questions, but namely, I think a lot of parents have questions. At what age can a child legally be left home alone and for how long and do overnights count?
00:15:50
Speaker 2: I think, oh yeah, the how long in the overnights. Do any of the laws actually specify that? From what I could tell, it was just a matter of when can kids be left alone. Hours? And putting the hours and the overnight on it?
00:16:02
Speaker 1: Yes, it's fuzzy. And the weird thing is, of all the states that have something on the books, Florida is the most nebulous. It doesn't specify an age when children can legally stay home alone.
00:16:14
Speaker 2: So why are they making a determination if there's no age? And why they've made a determination that In their opinion, this was too much, right?
00:16:21
Speaker 1: Yes, I guess by the charges they have. But when it gets a little bit more specific, this is interesting. So we said the ages of her kids were 9, 11, 12, and 14. According to the Florida Department of Children and Families, the National Safe Kids Campaign recommends children should not be left alone before the age of 12. It also notes that older siblings should not supervise younger children until they're 15. This girl was 14. Who knows? She could be 15 next month. She could have just turned 14. We don't know.
00:16:52
Speaker 2: She's a girl. She's more mature than a 14-year-old boy.
00:16:55
Speaker 1: 100%. And look, my daughters were babysitting against my wishes at the age of 11, 12 in some moments, which I was not happy about, younger siblings. But they started babysitting, I believe, Sabine and others around 13. So look, I started babysitting at 13. So I think 15, fine. But my point is these ages of these kids are kind of right on the line. It's interesting that they threw the book at her, it seems, visually with the video released and the charges and waiting for her on the plane. I was thinking she'd have toddlers at home alone or some horrific under the age of 10, all of them. I was a little shocked when I saw that the oldest was 14.
00:17:42
Speaker 2: Um, I think, um, maybe the focus for the sheriff's deputies and maybe the, the, the point is that it was five days and it was overnight.
00:17:54
Speaker 1: That's true.
00:17:55
Speaker 2: That is different. And you talk about, uh, Annalise and Ava babysitting Sabine. It was during the daytime. Correct.
00:18:04
Speaker 1: Or like you were home by 9 PM.
00:18:06
Speaker 2: For a few hours.
00:18:07
Speaker 1: Right.
00:18:08
Speaker 2: I don't actually even remember them being there too often when it was dark.
00:18:10
Speaker 1: Yeah.
00:18:10
Speaker 2: So it was, Yeah, and that part, maybe that is what they are determining is too much. But the law doesn't say, I don't know if this case is going to stick, baby. What, you're going to take this woman to trial? Exactly.
00:18:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, because according to the Florida state statutes, it's a felony of the third degree to deprive a child of food, clothing, shelter, or medical treatment.
00:18:33
Speaker 2: They didn't get any of that.
00:18:33
Speaker 1: That's not, it didn't rise to that level. And then the only states that actually have laws regarding when children can be left home alone... In Kansas, children ages, we've talked about this before, ages six to nine can be left home alone for short periods of time, and children 10 and over can be left alone for somewhat longer periods. But again, what does that mean? How long is a short period of time? How long is a somewhat longer period of time?
00:19:01
Speaker 2: This is just prosecutor's discretion. But I wonder what the prosecutor says when the Osceola Sheriff's Department say, hey, we've got a case for you here. Check this out. You bring charges? I mean, man. And why go make a scene of it at the airport?
00:19:16
Speaker 1: That's my point.
00:19:17
Speaker 2: The guy, the former NYPD detective here in New York, right? He just shot a guy on the bridge.
00:19:26
Speaker 1: Because he cut him off or swerved in his lane.
00:19:29
Speaker 2: They let him turn himself in. What the hell are we doing here? Why make a show of it? Where was she going to go? She was a fugitive.
00:19:37
Speaker 1: She was going to go home.
00:19:38
Speaker 2: She just came home. Why did we have to make a show of her?
00:19:41
Speaker 1: Exactly. That was my point. I thought it was too much.
00:19:45
Speaker 2: Again i don't know babe and people might have the opinion this is an awful mother can't believe she left them and it's not what i would have done just leave some space and some grace but man for all we do and folks we go after and the hell we give people this we gotta be there when that plane lands we got a hardened criminal coming out we gotta put her in handcuffs they put her in handcuffs yes.
00:20:06
Speaker 1: And traipsed her through with video, with body cam footage that they immediately released to the public so everyone on local news could put that everywhere because they knew this would be a talker.
00:20:16
Speaker 2: And a tough statement.
00:20:17
Speaker 1: And they look like the tough guys.
00:20:18
Speaker 2: Firm statement, right?
00:20:19
Speaker 1: And look, she may be guilty and should be facing serious charges. We don't know. But I also know that it's possible this was a hardworking mom who was trying to keep food on the table.
00:20:30
Speaker 2: But that's not what they're supposed to be looking at. They're supposed to be taking care of these kids. And there was neglect. And there was da-da-da-da-da-da. Yes, why didn't the girl, when there was a problem and the dumbbell was dropped, dad?
00:20:39
Speaker 1: Call her dad.
00:20:40
Speaker 2: Dad.
00:20:40
Speaker 1: I had that question first. Because, you know, always, if I did leave my kids for periods of time, I would say, you know, here's the number. Here's you call first, second, and 911. And look, she probably did do the right thing calling 911. But also, why wouldn't you call dad and have him help assess the situation? Or it's just there are a lot of questions that still had to be answered before police, I think, just publicly shamed this woman. Right.
00:21:04
Speaker 2: And we might learn more and we might all be, wow, this is the worst mother in the world. Possibly. Or we might come back and say, give me a break, deputies.
00:21:12
Speaker 1: Exactly.
00:21:12
Speaker 2: Give me a break. These stories are tough. I still, the one, I can't remember what city it was, but the folks who just went downstairs to have a drink at the pool.
00:21:21
Speaker 1: Oh, yes.
00:21:21
Speaker 2: That was in Florida.
00:21:22
Speaker 1: That was in Key West, was it not?
00:21:24
Speaker 2: They were charged.
00:21:25
Speaker 1: They were charged as well for going to have a drink while kids were taking a nap in the hotel room. Right.
00:21:29
Speaker 2: Those were toddlers. They were a little bit.
00:21:31
Speaker 1: They were toddlers. I understand that a little bit more. But anyway, this will certainly be something people will be talking about for some time to come. We always appreciate you listening to us. I'm Amy Robach alongside TJ Holmes.
00:21:42
Speaker 2: We'll talk to you soon.
Speaker 1: Hey there, everybody, and welcome to Amy and TJ. It's Tuesday, October 27th, and a 50-year-old mom of four coming off a plane from a five-day work trip in Las Vegas was greeted with handcuffs and charges. Yes, she is being accused and charged with leaving her four children home alone while she was on a work trip However, wait until you hear the ages of her children. That was a bit shocking. Welcome, everyone. I was a little surprised when I saw that the age range was not what I was expecting when you saw the police force waiting for this woman who was taken through the airport in In handcuffs.
00:00:49
Speaker 2: What age should it be that you shouldn't be held responsible for abandoning your kids?
00:00:55
Speaker 1: Correct.
00:00:55
Speaker 2: No, no, I'm saying what age. Before we even tell the audience here what we're talking about exactly, what do you think that cutoff should be that, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, you didn't even go to the store, make a quick grocery run, you left town?
00:01:07
Speaker 1: You left town and you went thousands of miles away because this was in Kissimmee, Florida is where the family lives. Mom was in Las Vegas. Now, I would say I probably would not feel comfortable leaving and I'd still have and she did have someone checking in on her children. We will get into the details in just a bit, but I wouldn't do that before the age of 15 or 16.
00:01:31
Speaker 2: Yeah, leaving for the weekend. And even then, it almost gets scarier the older they get because now they haven't kept boyfriends over and all kinds. Yeah, immediately went to boyfriends.
00:01:42
Speaker 1: Yes.
00:01:42
Speaker 2: But yeah, all that stuff. They throw in a party. You have to worry about something else altogether. So I don't know. And then we've done the story of, hell, it seems like several over the past several months. And different states have different rules.
00:01:53
Speaker 1: Correct.
00:01:54
Speaker 2: But none of them seem to state you shouldn't leave your kids for the weekend and travel across the country. They don't talk about that. They just talk about leaving them alone at home for a little bit. This overnight thing is a little.
00:02:06
Speaker 1: Yes. No, I think that, look, people are weighing in and everyone's going to have their opinions and especially moms. Look, I had to travel all the time for work and I was juggling this a lot. I can't imagine. I know I never left my kids before the age of 16 by themselves and, And I always had someone checking in on them for the party aspect. Also had cameras in and outside the apartment making sure I knew who was coming and going. All of that said, this is a 50-year-old mom. She was on a five-day work trip to Vegas. She's a professional photographer. And she left her four kids home overnight alone for several days. Their ages, 9, 11, 12, and 14. 14 was the girl, and I believe she's in high school now. But is that appropriate? And is it illegal to leave kids as young as nine with a 14-year-old while you are halfway across the country?
00:03:03
Speaker 2: Do we know what it is in Florida, what their breakdown is?
00:03:05
Speaker 1: Yes, it is ambiguous. There is no definitive or clear law that specifies an exact age for when a child can legally be left home alone. The state of Florida says it's up to parents to decide when their children are old enough. However, in this case... They were very quick and swift to arrest this woman and charge her with four counts of child neglect without great bodily harm. Now it's interesting why and how police were even alerted to this situation. So here's what we know. We know that she left on Sunday, October 18th, I believe is when it was. And she was set to return on Friday, October 23rd. That's a long stretch. That's a full.
00:03:53
Speaker 2: Wait, say it again. The date's what?
00:03:55
Speaker 1: She left on Sunday, October 18th, and she arrived back in Florida on Friday, October 23rd. So that's a full school week, a full work week where she was not there.
00:04:08
Speaker 2: I don't know if I need to hear anymore. That's inappropriate. I don't know if I need to hear any more than that. The 14-year-old responsible for getting the others to and from school every day is somebody picking them up every day, dropping them off at school. That was the checking on them that was being done. I would never be gone for five days thinking that a 14-year-old can take care of a nine-year-old. Exactly. And it's just a matter of if there is an emergency, if there is somebody starts choking, if there is somebody breaking into the house. That's just a little bit longer of a stretch that I'm comfortable with now. To this parent, she might know her kids and know them well and think they're going to be okay. I doubt she was rolling the dice. I bet she's done this plenty. I bet she trusts these kids. I don't think she's just taking the chance on this is some desperate trip that came up last minute. I doubt that. She made arrangements for people to see. But for me, at least, that seems to be a stretch.
00:05:00
Speaker 1: Yes. And I think most people would agree with that. Now, you brought up a couple of points that should be made. So the mom hired a babysitter who drove in from Tampa. She was there in the mornings helping the kids get ready and get them to school. And then she was there after school to make sure the kids arrived home and were settled and good to go. The big factor here is she did not spend the night. She didn't spend the evening or the overnight hours with the kids. So she came in the She came in the afternoon, and then she left. And what happened was around 8.30 p.m. on Wednesday, so a couple days into the trip, there was an emergency.
00:05:41
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:05:43
Speaker 1: And that is what the concern always is about leaving. Like, it's not fair, I don't think, to put that on a 14-year-old to know what to do. And who knows if she called her mom first. And dad's in the picture, too, so there's a little twist involved. He doesn't live with them, but it seems like he was nearby. So a dumbbell fell on the 9-year-old brother's head. Older sister freaks out and calls 911 because she's afraid.
00:06:14
Speaker 2: It was the right thing to do, actually. I give the 14-year-old credit.
00:06:17
Speaker 1: Absolutely. Calls 911. So police come to the house and they find these four kids unsupervised. They take the nine-year-old to the hospital. He's treated and discharged. It doesn't seem like there was any major medical issue or certainly nothing permanently awful that went on. But that is when police called mom. Where are you, mom? These kids are here alone. She says she's in Vegas through Friday. They then arrange for the kids to then be taken by their dad. So I was like, wait, what? Dad's close enough to be able to take the kids and bring them over to his place. Why was that not the arrangement in the first place?
00:07:07
Speaker 2: And the answer.
00:07:08
Speaker 1: Is unclear right now.
00:07:09
Speaker 2: Okay, no, that's got to be an answer. This does not make sense. Okay, obviously we don't understand fully the family dynamics here. Something else is going on. So yes, it might be different choices that you and I would have made as parents, but I say this all the time. It's tough to criticize somebody else's parenting. Don't know what's going on in that house and why she was comfortable. Now, it is confusing. It's very confusing, Robes. Four kids. Hey, Dad, is he out of town? Is there a restraining order? I mean, if he's up the street, it doesn't make any sense. You stay with the kids, or you stay with your dad. If he doesn't have enough space... We got to make an arrangement. This doesn't make sense. And 8.30 is fairly early in the evening.
00:07:54
Speaker 1: Yes. And look, and I know we don't know everyone's circumstances. We don't know this woman from her Facebook page. They've pieced it together. She was, I mean, she is a professional photographer. And based on what she was posting that week, she was doing a big shoot with the real estate brokerage network, Better Homes and Gardens. You could see her. It looked like this elaborate setup, like this beautiful Martha Stewart table-like setup where she was taking photos. So she was working. I actually watched some of the local news coverage of this, and they actually said, I went back and watched it a couple of times. The anchors said on it, a woman who had been in Vegas for the past several days was arrested coming off the plane. They literally made it seem like she was partying in Vegas. I take issue with that.
00:08:39
Speaker 2: Even though there are facts, come on, man. Don't click bait us on TV. Babe, that's so unfair to this lady.
00:08:45
Speaker 1: I was disheartened when I saw one of the reputable local news anchors Literally say she was in Vegas coming off a plane. Didn't once say she was there for work. I'm not excusing what she did, but there is a difference when you hear Vegas and you hear mom in Vegas. You're thinking about that mom who went on a cruise ship or the mom who went on vacation and left her kids alone. This mother, it does appear, was legitimately working. It just so happened to be that her job took her to Las Vegas.
00:09:13
Speaker 2: It does make a difference in the story. That is relevant context to what's going on here. And also, this is a woman with four kids. The dad's up the street and is not helping out. You can assume she's doing all this on her own. She needs to go make money. There's all these things.
00:09:25
Speaker 1: I was thinking all those things.
00:09:27
Speaker 2: It's hard to criticize somebody. I think you used that quote not too long ago. It's hard, man, to criticize somebody for their choices when you don't know what their options were. It's such a good point. I mean, we don't know what was going on with this lady. And I leave room for parenting, man. Even that lady that let her five-year-old walk a half mile.
00:09:43
Speaker 1: Yes.
00:09:44
Speaker 2: I leave room for you and your kid. Now, the woman who went on the cruise, that's different.
00:09:49
Speaker 1: That's where we draw the line. And that's the thing. When I saw, I actually, I went back and watched it three times to make sure that I didn't hear it wrong or read it wrong. And that does bother me. I think given what we did for so long and what we're doing now, I think part of our responsibility as journalists is to let folks know, man, sometimes leaving out one little bit of information can make the difference between how you're judging someone and how you're not. And again, not to say that she did the right thing. But you, I was going through my head, like, does she not have a friend who could spend the night? I've definitely in desperate situations asked a girlfriend of mine, Hey, can you just spend the night? Make these, make sure these kids don't wake up in the middle of the night. Something happens.
00:10:31
Speaker 2: I do.
00:10:31
Speaker 1: I would always worry about someone choking, someone getting sick. someone not knowing how to react to an emergency. And maybe this 14 year old girl, maybe she's about to turn 15. Maybe she said, mom, let me have this responsibility. Let me babysit. Maybe she was earning money and she was excited about it. We don't know how or why these four kids ended up unsupervised at night while mom was working. And dad apparently was somewhere nearby. But we do have the sheriff's statement. I'm curious. This was pretty tough. They said, is it Osceola? I'm tough with it. Osceola County Sheriff's Office will not tolerate child neglect. These cases will be investigated and charges will be brought against the parents who are not properly supervising or caring for their children. It almost sounded like he was fed up with parents, period.
00:11:23
Speaker 2: Okay, fine. Say it again.
00:11:27
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was harsh, right? And he was talking to, like, all of you parents. The Osceola County Sheriff's Office will not tolerate child neglect. These cases will be investigated, and charges will be brought against the parents who are not properly supervising or caring for their children.
00:11:44
Speaker 2: Okay, fine. Just, God, can we all take a beat? If she messed up, I mean, I don't know, baby. That's... God, we're hard on people. Do we really think this woman who has, what are the ages? Nine?
00:11:57
Speaker 1: Nine, 11, 12, and 14.
00:11:59
Speaker 2: Did she really raise these kids and get them to this point because she's a bad mom? I don't know. I don't know anything about these folks. Maybe the police know something we don't know. Maybe they went into the house and there's trash piled up in a room. Maybe there's no clean clothes. Maybe, I don't know. But child neglect. Child neglect. Right? Is the dad going to get arrested?
00:12:20
Speaker 1: Well, see, and that's my question. What was dad's role or responsibility in all of this? And right now he's being written in like the hero who came in and saved the day, but where was he in the days leading up to it? No, wait. Why didn't child call dad?
00:12:33
Speaker 2: But babe, why didn't mom call dad?
00:12:36
Speaker 1: Correct.
00:12:37
Speaker 2: I got a trip coming up. Correct. I'm going to be gone five days. This isn't hard stuff.
00:12:41
Speaker 1: He might have said, I have to work and I can't watch the kids. Who knows? At night? At night.
00:12:46
Speaker 2: Maybe, okay, maybe it works overnight. There are so many maybes and stuff we don't know. But, hey, this is the time. No, me, comfortably, wouldn't want to do that with my kids. But robes at the same time, I don't know if the right thing is to charge somebody with a crime.
00:13:06
Speaker 1: And you know what? I will take that and add to it. I feel really like, look, people may disagree with me, but I keep seeing this woman's face everywhere. The video is everywhere. She's walking off the plane. She's got her bag with her and she looks shocked as she is being greeted by officers who have guns in their holsters with handcuffs ready for her.
00:13:29
Speaker 2: She didn't get a heads up?
00:13:30
Speaker 1: I don't know. She seemed a little shocked.
00:13:32
Speaker 2: It didn't look like it, yeah.
00:13:33
Speaker 1: And then there's pictures and videos of her being traipsed through the airport with handcuffs. I mean, this was a public shaming. Shame, shame, shame. Even the way, and maybe like you said, we don't know all of the details, but the way the sheriff even released the statement. They immediately release that body cam footage. We can't get body cam footage released for months when there are serious questions about police activity. But when they want to shame a mom, they'll get that body cam up in no time.
00:14:00
Speaker 2: They seem to have an agenda, you could argue. I don't know. They don't want to give them grace. Maybe they're doing their job. Maybe they think they're doing the right thing. And they think maybe they have victims here, which are those kids. Are they going to take the kids from her now?
00:14:12
Speaker 1: They're with dad right now.
00:14:14
Speaker 2: Which is where the fuck they should have been in the first place. Why now? Is this the thing? I don't know. Maybe she is the worst mom in the world. These kids have been neglected for years. Maybe. But Christ on sale, baby. You know, there's just so much we don't know.
00:14:30
Speaker 1: There is so much we don't know. And when we come back, you alluded to it off the top, Florida law. What does it actually say? And we've talked about this, but my goodness, this is some gray area legally when it comes to state to state parents. Good luck trying to figure out what's legal and illegal. Welcome back, everyone, to Amy and TJ. Yes, we're talking about 50-year-old mom. I don't even know if I gave her name at the top of this. Irene Miller is her name.
00:15:08
Speaker 2: Mom of the year, yes.
00:15:09
Speaker 1: Yes.
00:15:10
Speaker 2: Mom of the year, according to the Osceola Shares Department.
00:15:12
Speaker 1: Look, it's crazy when you look on her social media. I mean, she looks like a working professional. Like, she cares for herself. It looks... It doesn't look like a mom who would typically be under arrest for child neglect. We don't know. Who knows, like you said, what it looks like inside that house, what those kids have told police. We don't know any of the details, but we know that she is now facing some very serious charges. The kids are with dad right now. And yes, we have a lot of questions, but namely, I think a lot of parents have questions. At what age can a child legally be left home alone and for how long and do overnights count?
00:15:50
Speaker 2: I think, oh yeah, the how long in the overnights. Do any of the laws actually specify that? From what I could tell, it was just a matter of when can kids be left alone. Hours? And putting the hours and the overnight on it?
00:16:02
Speaker 1: Yes, it's fuzzy. And the weird thing is, of all the states that have something on the books, Florida is the most nebulous. It doesn't specify an age when children can legally stay home alone.
00:16:14
Speaker 2: So why are they making a determination if there's no age? And why they've made a determination that In their opinion, this was too much, right?
00:16:21
Speaker 1: Yes, I guess by the charges they have. But when it gets a little bit more specific, this is interesting. So we said the ages of her kids were 9, 11, 12, and 14. According to the Florida Department of Children and Families, the National Safe Kids Campaign recommends children should not be left alone before the age of 12. It also notes that older siblings should not supervise younger children until they're 15. This girl was 14. Who knows? She could be 15 next month. She could have just turned 14. We don't know.
00:16:52
Speaker 2: She's a girl. She's more mature than a 14-year-old boy.
00:16:55
Speaker 1: 100%. And look, my daughters were babysitting against my wishes at the age of 11, 12 in some moments, which I was not happy about, younger siblings. But they started babysitting, I believe, Sabine and others around 13. So look, I started babysitting at 13. So I think 15, fine. But my point is these ages of these kids are kind of right on the line. It's interesting that they threw the book at her, it seems, visually with the video released and the charges and waiting for her on the plane. I was thinking she'd have toddlers at home alone or some horrific under the age of 10, all of them. I was a little shocked when I saw that the oldest was 14.
00:17:42
Speaker 2: Um, I think, um, maybe the focus for the sheriff's deputies and maybe the, the, the point is that it was five days and it was overnight.
00:17:54
Speaker 1: That's true.
00:17:55
Speaker 2: That is different. And you talk about, uh, Annalise and Ava babysitting Sabine. It was during the daytime. Correct.
00:18:04
Speaker 1: Or like you were home by 9 PM.
00:18:06
Speaker 2: For a few hours.
00:18:07
Speaker 1: Right.
00:18:08
Speaker 2: I don't actually even remember them being there too often when it was dark.
00:18:10
Speaker 1: Yeah.
00:18:10
Speaker 2: So it was, Yeah, and that part, maybe that is what they are determining is too much. But the law doesn't say, I don't know if this case is going to stick, baby. What, you're going to take this woman to trial? Exactly.
00:18:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, because according to the Florida state statutes, it's a felony of the third degree to deprive a child of food, clothing, shelter, or medical treatment.
00:18:33
Speaker 2: They didn't get any of that.
00:18:33
Speaker 1: That's not, it didn't rise to that level. And then the only states that actually have laws regarding when children can be left home alone... In Kansas, children ages, we've talked about this before, ages six to nine can be left home alone for short periods of time, and children 10 and over can be left alone for somewhat longer periods. But again, what does that mean? How long is a short period of time? How long is a somewhat longer period of time?
00:19:01
Speaker 2: This is just prosecutor's discretion. But I wonder what the prosecutor says when the Osceola Sheriff's Department say, hey, we've got a case for you here. Check this out. You bring charges? I mean, man. And why go make a scene of it at the airport?
00:19:16
Speaker 1: That's my point.
00:19:17
Speaker 2: The guy, the former NYPD detective here in New York, right? He just shot a guy on the bridge.
00:19:26
Speaker 1: Because he cut him off or swerved in his lane.
00:19:29
Speaker 2: They let him turn himself in. What the hell are we doing here? Why make a show of it? Where was she going to go? She was a fugitive.
00:19:37
Speaker 1: She was going to go home.
00:19:38
Speaker 2: She just came home. Why did we have to make a show of her?
00:19:41
Speaker 1: Exactly. That was my point. I thought it was too much.
00:19:45
Speaker 2: Again i don't know babe and people might have the opinion this is an awful mother can't believe she left them and it's not what i would have done just leave some space and some grace but man for all we do and folks we go after and the hell we give people this we gotta be there when that plane lands we got a hardened criminal coming out we gotta put her in handcuffs they put her in handcuffs yes.
00:20:06
Speaker 1: And traipsed her through with video, with body cam footage that they immediately released to the public so everyone on local news could put that everywhere because they knew this would be a talker.
00:20:16
Speaker 2: And a tough statement.
00:20:17
Speaker 1: And they look like the tough guys.
00:20:18
Speaker 2: Firm statement, right?
00:20:19
Speaker 1: And look, she may be guilty and should be facing serious charges. We don't know. But I also know that it's possible this was a hardworking mom who was trying to keep food on the table.
00:20:30
Speaker 2: But that's not what they're supposed to be looking at. They're supposed to be taking care of these kids. And there was neglect. And there was da-da-da-da-da-da. Yes, why didn't the girl, when there was a problem and the dumbbell was dropped, dad?
00:20:39
Speaker 1: Call her dad.
00:20:40
Speaker 2: Dad.
00:20:40
Speaker 1: I had that question first. Because, you know, always, if I did leave my kids for periods of time, I would say, you know, here's the number. Here's you call first, second, and 911. And look, she probably did do the right thing calling 911. But also, why wouldn't you call dad and have him help assess the situation? Or it's just there are a lot of questions that still had to be answered before police, I think, just publicly shamed this woman. Right.
00:21:04
Speaker 2: And we might learn more and we might all be, wow, this is the worst mother in the world. Possibly. Or we might come back and say, give me a break, deputies.
00:21:12
Speaker 1: Exactly.
00:21:12
Speaker 2: Give me a break. These stories are tough. I still, the one, I can't remember what city it was, but the folks who just went downstairs to have a drink at the pool.
00:21:21
Speaker 1: Oh, yes.
00:21:21
Speaker 2: That was in Florida.
00:21:22
Speaker 1: That was in Key West, was it not?
00:21:24
Speaker 2: They were charged.
00:21:25
Speaker 1: They were charged as well for going to have a drink while kids were taking a nap in the hotel room. Right.
00:21:29
Speaker 2: Those were toddlers. They were a little bit.
00:21:31
Speaker 1: They were toddlers. I understand that a little bit more. But anyway, this will certainly be something people will be talking about for some time to come. We always appreciate you listening to us. I'm Amy Robach alongside TJ Holmes.
00:21:42
Speaker 2: We'll talk to you soon.