Police: 10-month-old girl abandoned at gas station
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SAVANNAH, Tenn. — A 10-month-old girl was found abandoned in her stroller Wednesday morning, left sitting in front of a busy gas station in Savannah. Police say those responsible are now behind bars thanks to quick thinking by witnesses. Investigators say the baby’s mother and her friend were under the influence of drugs when the friend purposefully left the baby girl at the store. “They let that child down,” resident Perry Stephens said. “They deserve everything they get, and I don’t feel sorry for them at all.” Officers say they got the call around 8:45 a.m. after a clerk noticed the baby was left and brought her inside. “The plain truth — I just think it sucks,” resident Darrell Ward said. “Someone leaving their child out in a parking lot in a hot stroller, they should get a lot of time out of this.” Police say the baby girl was abandoned by Britney Price, a friend of the child’s mother. She currently has given no reason why. “She only said she was just going down to the store to get cigarettes,” Savannah Police Investigator Sgt. T.J. Barker said. Only a few yards down the road from the store where the woman abandoned the child sits another gas station, and it was there that investigators say a clerk’s quick thinking led them to the arrests. “They described a person they thought was acting suspicious,” Barker said. “So that helped us with catching her that quickly. It put everything in place.” Police say clerks at both stores were influential in the investigation, not only with leads but with giving the 10-month-old girl a bit of love she desperately needed. “The store manager at Cedar Pantry took the child inside,” Barker said. “She took care of her until DCS got there.” The child’s mother, Erica Pitts, is also charged. Investigators said she didn’t even know the baby was gone and that both her and Price were on drugs at the time. “Children don’t ask to be born, so it’s our responsibility as parents,” Stephens said. “If we bring children into this world we must take care of them at whatever cost.” Pitts and Price both are charged with child abuse and neglect. Savannah police say Pitts is also charged with possession of marijuana and morphine. They both currently are held at the Hardin County Jail.
