Warren woman pleads not guilty to child endangering

WARREN

Pamela J. Lugones, 21, of Dana Street pleaded not guilty Thursday in Warren Municipal Court to child endangering after police found her 23-month-old son on the street outside her home Wednesday.

An officer said he believes the boy may have dropped 15 feet from a second-story window while Lugones slept.

Ambulance personnel checked the boy, who was wearing a badly soiled diaper, and determined he was not injured. Lugones was released from the county jail two hours later after posting $100 bond.

A driver spotted the boy walking around by himself at 11:28 a.m. and called police, who observed the boy to be wearing dirty clothes and have a diaper "so full it was about the size of a cantaloupe."

The officer noticed an open second-story window at Lugones' home 15 feet up above a concrete driveway and concluded the boy had fallen from the window.

While the officer was checking on the boy, Lugones stuck her head out of a second-story window and screamed for her child, then came outside.

She said she worked midnight turn and leaves the boy and a smaller child in their bedrooms while she sleeps until about noon and had done this for several months.

An officer looked in the boy's bedroom and saw that his mattress was near the open window, which led him to believe the child used it to get out of the window. Children Services was notified.

Lugones' mother came to the scene to care for the children while Lugones was taken to jail.