An Indiana toddler got in her father’s pill crusher and ate fentanyl late last month, leading to the dad’s arrest on neglect charges.
Devin D’rell Rollins, 25, also ignored 19 attempts by the Department of Children’s Services to contact him while the 3-year-old girl was in the hospital, WXIN reported.
Court records say that the toddler was taken to Indiana University Ball Memorial Hospital on June 30 after she had reportedly swallowed Tylenol while she and Rollins were at his aunt’s house.
The aunt called 911, saying the girl appeared lethargic. Emergency medical crews took the girl to the hospital, but after DCS arrived, they could not find her father. From that point, DCS tried 19 times to locate him and the child’s mother, including phone calls and visits to various addresses in Muncie. Neither responded to the calls or turned up anywhere.
Last week, testing at the hospital showed a positive test for fentanyl, and police officers found Rollins at his home and took him into custody.
“Devin advised he just wanted to go to jail and that his daughter is fine,” a police officer wrote in an affidavit. “Devin stated he was withdrawing and I asked him from what. Devin stated ‘You already know from what.’”
When officers told him his daughter had tested positive for fentanyl, he said she must have gotten into an old pill crusher in his backpack.
Rollins told police that he hid from police and refused to answer DCS’s calls or visit is daughter in the hospital because he had had warrants and had been “running from these warrants” for five years.
Court records show that Rollins already had two pending child neglect cases from October 2023 and January 2024.
A family member told WXIN that “people should e a little more compassionare and less judgemental” about addicts.
“It’s ugly,” she said. “It’s a horrible disease, and it destroys lives.”
The little girl is now living with another family member.
“[Rollins] just made some really poor choices, and he’s going to have to live with this the rest of his life,” the family member said.
