An Akron woman has been charged with three counts of fourth-degree felony child endangering after being accused of leaving her three children home alone for a week while she went to Mississippi.
Nichole A. Thigpen, 32, of Albrecht Avenue, was arraigned this week in Akron Municipal Court. The case will heard by a Summit County grand jury.
Police and Summit County Children Services visited the home in late March after hearing that the children had been alone. Authorities reported that the children told them that their mother had gone to Mississippi to visit her boyfriend and no one had been watching them or checking in.
Police said they called Thigpen and she was in Tennessee at the time and on her way home. When Thigpen’s boyfriend’s sister arrived at the scene, she told police that Thigpen asked her to lie and claim that she was checking in on the kids each day, police said.
Officers also said they recovered a plastic bag with white powder residue at the home that Thigpen had asked her boyfriend’s sister to hide.
Children Services has taken custody of the children, who are 8, 11 and 13 years old.
Thigpen was convicted last year in Akron Municipal Court of misdemeanor child endangering.