LA VERKIN – A 23-year-old female was arrested Friday night after “putting her kid in the street.”
 
Chief Lloyd Watkins said the woman was arguing with her ex-boyfriend when she was told to leave his home in La Verkin. The woman then allegedly began driving away with her two-year-old in the passenger seat before stopping in the street and leaving her son in the road, stating he was better off without her.
 
“She put him in the road and started to drive away,” Watkins said.
 
Watkins said the ex-boyfriend retrieved the child and officers pulled the woman over. The ex-boyfriend is not the biological father of the child, but the woman and her son lived with the ex-boyfriend for a year, Watkins said.
 
The Department of Child and Family Services were called to take custody of the toddler. Watkins said the woman gave officers a St. George address but could not verify where she and the child were currently living.
 
While speaking with the suspect, the woman allegedly swallowed several pills that belonged to her ex-boyfriend that she had stolen, Watkins said. Officers called an ambulance, but the woman refused treatment and officers had to drive her to Dixie Regional Medical Center.
 
The woman was arrested and charged with theft, child abuse, using a controlled substance, interfering with arrest, disorderly conduct and child endangerment.