A mother has been arrested on child endangerment charges after two young children were found running barefoot alone through a Bronx street Friday afternoon, authorities say.
Startling surveillance video shows the 3-year-old boy and 2-year-old girl darting in and out of the street on Longfellow Avenue at about 12:15 p.m. Adult neighbors try to catch the kids as they dash down the sidewalk, video shows.
Kenneth White was the first to try to corral the children.
"I've been living here quite a while and all the kids on this block are taken care of," he said. "I never seen no kid come out with their Pampers and bare feet coming towards me like they need help."
White gathered up the children, took them to his apartment and gave them milk and crackers, while another woman knocked on doors in search of the children's parents.
"They were just running around everywhere," said the woman. "I went to all the neighbors to see if they had seen them before, nobody had seen them before."
"They didn't have no clean clothes on, no nothing. So I fed them until the officers came," said White.
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The kids were taken to Lincoln Hospital, where the mother showed up about three hours later.
Laschanda Devaughn, 41, was arrested later in the evening, police said. She said nothing to reporters as she was led from the police station Thursday night.
She was set to be arraigned Friday. It wasn't immediately clear if she'd retained an attorney.
"I've got kids and grandkids of my own, and I take care of other people's kids that they're not paying attention to," said White. "I don't know where the mother and father are at."
