By ANDREA POTEET
Sunday Times Newspapers
WYANDOTTE – A mother whose children suffered burns after they were left in a scalding hot bathtub was found innocent of two counts of child abuse during a March 1 bench trial before Wayne County Circuit Judge Richard Skutt.
Erica Bohn, 25 and her boyfriend, Brandon Soules, 29, were arrested after a Nov. 7 incident in which their 4-year-old daughter and 2-year-old son were left in scalding water in a bathtub in their house in the 300 block of Kings Highway while the parents were allegedly under the influence of prescription drugs.
Soules was sentenced to up to a year in jail Jan. 30 after pleading guilty to two counts of felony child abuse.
The children, who suffered severe burns to their feet, were treated at Children’s Hospital of Michigan and released.
The children’s maternal grandfather, with whom the couple lived, told police he heard screaming and crying for about five minutes about 4 p.m. that day and yelled for his daughter and her boyfriend to quiet the children down. When no one answered, he ran upstairs and saw steam coming out of the bathroom.
“The children were huddled together in the back corner of the tub unable to get out on their own due to the sliding doors blocking them,” the report said.
He said Soules was sitting on the toilet unresponsive and “not doing anything to help the kids.” The grandfather grabbed the children from the tub.
The grandfather told police the couple had been “on a three-day bender.” Police found 50 Vicodin and 51 Xanax pills both prescribed to Soules in his pockets and in prescription bottles listed as containing 90 and 60 pills, respectively, and filled that day.
The grandmother, who told police she came home after the incident, told police the two are “always high.”
Both parents had slurred speech and were unsteady on their feet while officers interviewed them. Bohn said she did not check on the children because she was getting clothes for them and thought they may have bumped their heads.