Police Locate Dad Of Abandoned Child

SPRING, TX — The father of a 2-year-old boy left on the doorstep of a Spring home Wednesday night has been located, police said. The father of the little boy said that a friend of the child's mother dropped his son off at the house next door, instead of his home.

The child, who is now identified as Royal Prince Simmons, remains in CPS custody.

The incident began with a 911 call to the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office at about 8:30 p.m. Wednesday from a woman living in the 30700 block of Legends Ridge Drive who called about an abandoned child.

The caller told dispatchers that she heard someone knocking on her door. When she answered the door, she found a 2-year-old boy alone on her doorstep with two bags.

Deputies came to the home and viewed surveillance that showed a young African-American woman pulling up to the home in a white sedan, and running to the front of the home with the child.

Lt. Scott Spencer, spokesman for the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office, said the father was found when local media members who were in the neighborhood approached him and asked if he'd heard about the child.

"At that time the father was shown the video and immediately recognized the child as his son," Spencer said.

Detectives spoke with the father and learned that the child's mother had been in the hospital and the child, who was staying with a friend of the mother, was there to visit his mother.

The father told investigators that he'd received a text from the child's mother on Wednesday telling him that her friend would be bringing the child home on Wednesday afternoon.

When the father hadn't heard from the family friend, he assumed plans changed and made alternate plans for the evening.

Spencer said the child's father was not at home when the women went to a neighbor's home, rang the doorbell and left his son alone on the front porch, and he wasn't home when police canvassed the neighborhood trying to identify the child.

"The female left the child without verifying anyone was home or whom she was releasing the child to, which placed the child in grave danger," he said.

Officials are in the process of reuniting the boy with his father and have also identified the woman in the video, Spencer said.

"We have her identity, but are not releasing it at this time," he said. "We are interviewing the mother of the child."

Spencer said the Montgomery County District Attorney's Office consulted and plans to charge the woman with child abandonment, a third degree felony that is punishable of up to 10 years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

The boy will remain in CPS custody until he cam be reunited with his family, Spencer said.

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Image: MCSO

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