Inset: Maureen O’Neill (Walton County Jail). Background: Walton County Sheriff’s Office (Google Maps).
A Florida woman faces charges after her 5-year-old child was discovered wandering the streets alone at night while she reportedly shopped for a new phone at Target.
Authorities announced the arrest of 37-year-old Maureen Elizabeth O’Neill on Thursday. She is charged with one count of child neglect without causing great bodily harm, according to the Walton County Sheriff’s Office.
Deputies were dispatched to a residence on North Gulf Drive in Santa Rosa Beach on the night of October 16, after a concerned neighbor called 911. The caller reported that an older couple found a young boy wandering alone on the road and brought him to the caller’s apartment.
The neighbor recognized the child as Elizabeth O’Neill’s son, authorities said.
He mentioned he took the boy back to his home and entered O’Neill’s unlocked residence, only to find she wasn’t there. He texted O’Neill at 6:41 p.m. to inform her that her son had been found attempting to cross the street and urged her to contact him “as soon as possible.”
O’Neill’s alleged reaction was alarming, as she reportedly claimed in a probable cause affidavit that her young son had been threatening her with a knife.
The defendant allegedly wrote:
“He chased me around with a knife and said he was going to chop me into pieces. Every time I turned around he was holding a knife I don’t know who he is.”
The homeowners of O’Neill’s residence were called and they sent O’Neill a message about her son being found in the road at about 6:54 p.m., and she again sent a disturbing response, according to authorities.
This time she allegedly wrote:
“I told him to stay inside while I got help protecting myself. He kept grabbing a knife and was saying very scary things about chopping me up in little pieces. I am reporting him because he needs help I don’t know who that is but it’s not the same kid there is something wrong with him.”
The homeowner replied, “Maureen [O’Neill], call me immediately,” but O’Neill allegedly responded with another bizarre series of messages.
From the affidavit:
“I don’t have service couldn’t connect to police can you please watch him I’m trying to buy another phone” followed by the text, “He took my phone and was holding a knife then my keys and then wouldn’t let me out of the bathroom with a knife had no phone battery and ran out to grab a new phone” and another text saying. “I’m getting help to set up this new phone I can’t answer calls everything ok.”
At about 8:10 p.m. that day, O’Neill called one of the homeowners, who gave the phone to a deputy already at O’Neill’s home. The defendant allegedly told the deputy she was at a Target in Panama City – roughly 40 miles away – buying a new phone.
“She stated she knew [her son] was safe with her neighbors after Paul messaged her about having him, so she went to get a new phone while was in their care,” the affidavit said.
The deputy told O’Neill to come home immediately, according to the affidavit. The defendant returned to the residence about 90 minutes later, claiming she “took a wrong turn coming home” which “caused her to take longer.”
In a post-Miranda interview, O’Neill allegedly told investigators she left her son at home alone at about 5:30 p.m., claiming they had been “talking” and the boy had been “calm.”
O’Neill was then taken into custody on the allegation that she “did willfully and intentionally fail to provide the child with supervision and care that a prudent person would consider essential for the child’s safety.” She was being held in the Walton County Jail in lieu of $2,500 bond.
O’Neill is currently scheduled to appear in court for a plea hearing on Nov. 18.
