Mother sings blues about child neglect charge: Says she believed her 9-year-old was in capable hands

By DUANE SHERRILL / Staff Reporter for the Southern Standard

Deborah Brown enjoys her evening at Jack’s Club in this photo taken the night she was arrested for public intoxication and child neglect. Brown said she thought her 9-year-old was in the capable hands of her mother. (Photo provided)

Using lounge singing to help mak ends meet, Deborah Brown said she was actually trying to do a good deed the night she was arrested for leaving her 9-year-old son at the bedside of her sick mother at River Park Hospital.

Brown, 37, who recently completed a 10-day jail sentence, maintains she entered a guilty plea to child neglect and public intoxication charges only because she could not afford to raise bond and that waiting on a trial would have left her in jail for over 60 days.

“If I had money for bond and a lawyer, I would have fought it,” Brown said.

Brown was arrested last month after hospital personnel advised police she had left her 9-year-old son in the care of her mother, who was a patient at the hospital. Brown’s mother, hospital staff say, was too sick to supervise her grandchild. Brown was taken into custody when she arrived at the hospital hours later, with the smell of alcohol on her person.

However, Brown maintains she was not intoxicated and that she would have never left her son with her mother had she realized how sick she was.

“I was never told about her condition and she had been asking for her grandson to come spend time with her there,” Brown said.

“I didn’t feel he was in any danger or I wouldn’t have left him with her,” Brown continued. “He’s good medicine for my mother.”

Brown said she went to Jack’s Club to perform karaoke for a friend’s birthday party, noting she has been a performer and song writer for several years, and uses performances to help pay the bills. However, as terms of her probation from her recent arrest, Brown will not be allowed to enter any club that sells alcohol to perform.

In the case of the night she was arrested, Brown said she was not only performing but she and her fianc? were giving rides home to people who had too much to drink.

“We gave four people rides home because we didn’t want them to drive after they’d been drinking,” Brown said. “That’s why I ran late picking my son up. I told them I’d be back by 10, but it took awhile to take the people home.”

Brown said she was stunned to discover police waiting on her when she returned to the hospital around midnight.

“I’m just glad my son didn’t see them lead me out in handcuffs,” Brown said, noting she had been drinking but was not drunk.

Given the fact she is now banned from clubs, Brown admits she may have a problem making ends meet since she often did shows at various lounges in the Midstate. Even worse, Brown said, is the appearance that she is a bad mother, noting she would never do anything to endanger the safety of her son.