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Crime & Safety

Waukesha Woman Charged After Leaving Young Kids Home Alone

Suspect, 28, didn't get anyone to take care of her kids after she was up late partying the night before, the criminal complaint states.

A Waukesha woman is facing charges after a mailman delivering a package noticed she had left her two young children home alone while she was at work.

Holly M. Smart, 28, was charged in Waukesha County Circuit Court Friday with one count of child neglect and one count of obstructing an officer. If convicted, she faces up to 18 months in prison and $20,000 in fines.

According to the criminal complaint, at 11:36 a.m. July 11, a mailman was delivering a package to Smart’s residence in the 2000 block of MacArthur Road when a 6-year-old child answered the door. The mailman also noticed a 2-year-old child in the residence as well and when he asked the older child if someone was home, he said he wasn’t sure, but his mom might be at work.

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After an officer arrived at the residence, the complaint states the 6-year-old told him he was hungry and had not eaten because when he woke up his mother was gone. The boy also told the officers that he thought someone else was supposed to be there watching him and his brother, but he didn’t know the person’s name or where they lived.

After Smart came back home an officer asked her who was supposed to be watching her kids, to which she told them someone named Justin, however, she wasn’t able to give a last name or phone number for him, according to the criminal complaint.

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When asked why she would leave her children in the care of someone who she only knew by his first name, Smart didn’t have a logical answer. Officers were able to track a man named Justin who had recently stayed at a home near Smart’s, however, the occupant of the home told them Justin had gone home to Fond du Lac five days earlier because he got in trouble for lighting off fireworks in the house, the complaint states.

Eventually Smart admitted to officers she had been up late partying the night before and woke up late and was therefore unable to take the children to daycare, according to the criminal complaint.

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