Nicholas Carter (Flagler County Sheriff’s Office).
Florida deputies arrested a 39-year-old father after they allegedly found his five children — including three under 10 — living in “deplorable conditions” in a home littered with feces, urine and rotting food.
A woman delivering groceries on Friday evening on Barley Lane in Palm Coast called the Flagler County Sheriff’s Office after a toddler boy entered her car. He then walked into a garage across the street, deputies say. Cops went to the home and knocked on the door. Nicholas Carter answered.
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The deputy could see trash and discarded food through the window, according to a police press release. Carter reportedly said he left the garage door open and the boy, 2, had only been out of the home for a few minutes. The deputy asked if he could look around the home and Carter obliged, the probable cause affidavit said. He told deputies the five kids — ages 2, 4, 8, 15, and 16 — lived in the home with him, the kids’ mother and a roommate.
“Upon entering the kitchen, I was met with a strong putrid and malodorous odor,” the deputy wrote in the affidavit.
The kitchen reportedly was in “complete disarray” with dirty dishes, roaches, flies and discarded food. Cops also noted “several clumps of fuzzy fecal matter” littered the laundry room, indicating it was several days old, deputies said. There were dirty clothes, garbage and urine in the master bedroom where the younger children slept along with two beds and blankets on the dirty floor, according to the affidavit. In the closet, fecal matter covered the ground surrounded by flies, deputies noted.
To make matters worse, deputies reportedly found power tools, a BB gun and a marijuana pipe in the garage, all within reach of the children. Deputies spoke with the roommate who lived in the home for two years and allegedly said the conditions were “frowned upon.” Carter reportedly told deputies that the home was “a little dirty.”
Deputies arrested Carter on a charge of child neglect without great bodily harm. He also allegedly resisted arrest, deputies say, before they took him to the Sheriff Perry Hall Inmate Detention Facility where he has since posted bond. Detectives also contacted the Florida Department of Children and Families.
This was not the first time deputies responded to the home. Cops have been there 16 times since January 2023 including a call in March 2023 about a child wandering the street alone, the press release said. In December, Carter called the fire department after one of his children had a seizure from eating marijuana, police said.
“Five children, three under the age of 10, living in deplorable conditions with an adult who obviously doesn’t care about these children,” Sheriff Rick Staly said in a statement. “On top of it all, FCSO has a history with this guy, in one case a child ate marijuana and had a seizure while under this man’s care. Hopefully, this time DCF will take serious action to turn the homelife around for these children, the least of which is to learn how to be a parent and clean up his house. I also thank the citizen that ‘saw something and said something’ so deputies could intervene.”
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