Sandra Marie Teague, a 58-year-old resident of Pinto Lane in Palm Coast, is at the Flagler County jail on $150,000 bond and three charges of child neglect after she drove her three children–two girls, ages 13, 14 and a boy, 17–to the hospital and allegedly ordered them out, leaving them there in retaliation for the death of one of her dogs. She blamed the children.
The oldest of the children walked into the emergency room at AdventHealth Palm Coast Parkway at noon last Thursday. He was barefoot: Teague had prevented him and his sisters from putting on their shoes. He told hospital staff that his mother had just abandoned him and his sisters there because she was “done with them,” according to Teague’s arrest report. One of the children had left on her own to walk back to her house and was located by a sheriff’s deputy at Belle Terre Parkway and Whippoorwill Drive.
After authorities secured a search warrant for the house on May 1, they discovered 44 dogs, three pigs, a cat and a snake, all alive, which Palm Coast Animal Control recovered and turned over to the Flagler Humane Society.
As the children described it to deputies and a Department of Children and Families investigator, the two girls had woken up late and rushed to get to work when their mother discovered that “another one of their dogs had died and then went crazy.” One or two dogs had already died previously. When the last dog died, Teague blamed the two girls for starving it.
The boy told investigators that his mother loves the dogs more than she does her children and would rather spend time with the dogs. When she gets mad, he said, she locks him and his siblings out of the house, forcing them to sleep outside. The older boy sometimes tries to stay at a friend’s house. He said their mother locks them out of the house every other day. Teague also put locks on the bedroom doors.
A neighbor provided surveillance footage of one of the frequent arguments he hears at the Teague property. The footage included the sound of what appeared to be Teague yelling at one or more of her children, telling them, with obscenities, that if they went into her house, she’d kill them.
“No child should ever have to live in these disgusting conditions or be treated like this,” Sheriff Rick Staly said. “Not only does she not treat or care for her children properly, but she should never own or be a foster provider for helpless animals ever again.”
Teague herself did not provide a different account. “My daughter killed my dog last night,” she told a deputy who arrived at the house to see Teague on the porch, babysitting a 5-month-old child. She told the deputy she was done with her children. “They deserve someone that they will listen to,” she said. She described them in terrible terms, though much of what she described did not seem different from the typical behavior of teenagers: they don’t listen, they don’t help with chores, they don’t do their homework.
“The front door area reeked of garbage, feces, and possibly the deceased pet inside the residence,” the deputy reported. Teague had to go into the house to calm the dogs, which had been getting rowdy while she spoke with the deputy.
“Upon exiting the residence, [her] foot was covered in what appeared to be animal or human feces,” the deputy reported. “I was unable to determine due to the number of animals inside, or due to [Teague] consistently stating that her daughters like to ‘shit’ all in the house. Sandra then wipes her foot up her leg to remove the feces.” One of the dogs, a German shepherd, walked out. The dog was missing a leg, was panting, sounding exhausted. The deputy asked Teague if the dog had water. Teague pointed to a conch shell with algae-laced rainwater in it.
Teague and her husband divorced in 2017. They have a shared custody agreement, though the children’s father lives in New Jersey. DCF contacted him so he would be in charge of the children, as a judge ordered Teague not to have any contact with the children until the case is resolved. She was also ordered to surrender all firearms to the Sheriff’s Office, if she were to post bail.
Each charge is a third-degree felony, each carrying a maximum penalty of five years in prison, though first-time offenders, as Teague appears to be, generally are sentenced to lesser penalties, if found guilty. The Sheriff’s Office noted that the case remains under active investigation and additional charges are likely.
Michael Cocchiola says
Ugg… either she is seriously mentally ill, or the depravity of some subhumans is without limits.
I hope the father stands up for his kids and gives them a normal life.
How young says
And the age of the children is ?
FlaglerLive says
The ages are listed in the article’s first paragraph.
Missed it says
So sorry I missed that. I was so upset with the circumstances described
R.S. says
And this benighted culture will respond with more pain inflicted on an already painfully demented person, I suppose. That’s what we get by cutting out social services and assistance for people in poverty and on the brink of sanity while maximizing profit for the wealthy and corporate US.
PCs finest says
Boy Palm Coast sure has it’s finest residents on display this week. One guy’s choking his chicken in the chicfila drive thru, and now this lady who is obviously mother of the year material .. Can we get any lower than this? Wait I think we can .. I take that back.
Rick says
And nobody noticed this was going on ?
The neighbors, the schools, the parents of the 5 month old baby she was babysitting on the porch. Unfreaking believeable.
NO One….. So, so sad.
Put her out in the HOT sun and on a chain with no water.
JimboXYZ says
This seems to be a theme with the human race for disappointing results. Self inflicted over extended for resources. And it doesn’t help that 3 kids don’t do the chores to even have a remote chance of making it work for a relative cleanliness with +/-44 animals. Noble to foster pets, not that many. Those children are pretty much worthless really when they don’t help out in the zoo that was created from most likely the abandonment of other pet owners throughout the community. The pass is that they are children, doing what children do ? Really ? not doing their chores, their homework ? Be productive or find somewhere else for them ? Sounds harsh, maybe tough love ? But in that situation, helping out a 58 year old ? Is tat too much to ask, maybe even expect. The poop in the house, with 44 pets, it was human feces, unless the children are that lazy and they poop around the place as teens ? At a certain point in animal fostering, she had to have learned to say “No” ? If the children are watering the dog’s bowls, it’s not hard to imagine they wouldn’t feed them, if they even had the food ? The humane society has a budget that is inadequate for the volume they have as an inventory of abandonment. Any of us are that neighbor moving in as a renter up & down the street. Welcome to Alfinville with Bidenomics of inflation for unaffordable. Not that any era of the decades that I’ve been alive was ever going make 44 animals & 3 children work on USA economics & growth. Sad to see she will be the only poster parent for a community that has abandoned more pets than she could attempt to take in & care for.
Atwp says
Why were the girls going to work, they are school age. Were all these animals in the same house? I can only imagine the filth in that house. Is this the first time authorities knew about this? Where is the dad to these children? The world we live in. Wow!
Amazing Christian President says
Okay this woman is in serious need of mental health care. Hoarding animals, disregarding gross accumulation of fecal matter in the home, neglect .. taken in context with the abusive behavior towards her children indicates untreated mental illness. Hopefully she will be ordered into treatment instead of rotting away in jail.
Wow says
I hope these poor children find a safe place to live and the help they need. I hope the dogs will be removed too and taken care of. This lady needs to be in a protective environment.
Me says
After reading this it sounds like there will be many animal neglect charges. Living in a residential area we always hear if you see something say something.
If it weren’t for the mother dropping her children off at the hospital no one would have known about it which is weird. All those dogs, no one heard loud barking. No neighbor, no mail service, Amazon something? Maybe I am missing something.