Melanie Parada Accused of Abandoning Child to Smoke Crack

Juice reported earlier today that missing person Melanie Parada was found but that she had been charged with child neglect. Fort Lauderdale police just released the probable-cause affidavit in that case, and it claims that Parada disappeared so she could buy crack cocaine.According to the statement Parada gave to police,...

By Thomas Francis

March 17, 2010

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Juice reported earlier today that missing person Melanie Parada was found but that she had been charged with child neglect. Fort Lauderdale police just released the probable-cause affidavit in that case, and it claims that Parada disappeared so she could buy crack cocaine.

According to the statement Parada gave to police, she realized hours after leaving her Las Olas Boulevard apartment on the night of March 11 that her 8-year-old daughter would wake to find her gone. She "assumed the child would be 'fine' because all of her neighbors knew the child."

That morning, witnesses saw the daughter wandering the waterfront property looking for her mother. Eventually, the child boarded the boat of a man named Dave McBride, who tried to help her locate Parada.

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