SUNRISE, Fla. — Newly released body camera video obtained Wednesday by Local 10 News shows the moments Sunrise police officers confronted a mother who they say deserted her two children inside an Uber for about two hours last Friday night.
“You have two kids? Were you just in an Uber with two kids?” an officer is heard asking in the video. “You just left your kids in an Uber and we were both looking for you.
“You left your kids for two hours,” the officer added. “Your number one priority should be your kids. You just left them and wanted to go home?”
The woman, who police identified as 32-year-old Emily Sabogal, responded, “I don’t have a car. My kids were with me earlier. They were at karate and now they’re in an Uber.”
She also told the officer her “phone died” when asked whether she contacted the Uber driver to change the destination.
“That Uber driver has been waiting with your kids for the past two hours,” the officer said. “Why did you get out of the Uber?”
“I have to make s--- happen for both of them. I know it sounds stupid right now but I don’t have a car,” Sabogal said. “My kids are everything to me.”
According to the report, an officer responded to the 10800 block of Northwest 50th Street at about 11 p.m. Friday after the Uber driver called 911 and reported that Sabogal had deserted her two children in his vehicle.
Police said the driver told officers he picked up Sabogal and her children at a shopping plaza along West Commercial Boulevard. He reported that Sabogal was holding a cup that he believed contained liquor.
“He thinks I’m stupid,” Sabogal kept repeating in Spanish, the report stated.
Investigators said Sabogal reached over the center console, grabbed the driver’s phone and canceled the ride. She then gave the driver $10 in cash and asked him to stop near Northwest 108th Avenue and 50th Street.
According to police, Sabogal exited the vehicle and told the driver she would return in three minutes. About an hour later, after she failed to come back, the driver called her. Police said she told him she would return in 12 minutes before hanging up. When she did not answer additional calls, the driver contacted 911.
Officers said the two children appeared to be in good health and spirits but told police they were hungry and thirsty.
Police later located Sabogal walking outside a McDonald’s about 2.2 miles away. She could not explain why she left her children with a stranger or how she arrived at the restaurant.
Authorities said employees at Bob G’s Wings N’ Things on Commercial Boulevard told officers Sabogal is a regular customer and had been there earlier that night with her children. They told police the children were running around unsupervised while Sabogal consumed multiple alcoholic beverages at the bar.
The children’s father told Local 10 News over the weekend that he is “very concerned for the safety of my children.” He said this is not the first time Sabogal has shown erratic behavior and that he plans to seek full custody.
Sabogal was arrested on charges of child neglect and abandonment. She was later released from jail after posting a $3,000 bond.
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