A Lake County man was arrested when an unattended child in his care was found trying to get into a pool at an apartment complex.
An officer responded to a call regarding an unattended child, later found to be in the care of 20-year-old Michael Anthony Fullard, at an undisclosed apartment complex in Lady Lake on Wednesday, Aug. 27, according to an arrest report from the Lady Lake Police Department. The child was trying to get into the locked pool but was found by the community director of the property.
A resident of the complex recognized the child belonged to a neighbor who was called to the front office. She stated Fullard was left to temporarily supervise when she left for work at 7:15 a.m., which was common for them, the report said.
The resident also shared a front door area with the neighbor, and she accessed her Blink doorbell camera to send videos of movement at the front door. The videos created a timeline for that day, with the first being 7:30 a.m. when Fullard walked children to a bus stop. At 10:51 a.m., the resident told Fullard the “baby” was at the pool. Fullard left the apartment with pink bags of his belongings at 11:54 a.m., the report said.
During the investigation, the officer learned that a resident was told by her daughter that she ran to the complex pool and took the child. One of them knocked on Fullard’s door and told him the baby was out at the pool trying to get in. She also informed him that a child recently drowned at the pool, the report said.
He did not seem to care and went back into the apartment. The resident went to the pool and stayed with the child until another resident got to the office around 12 p.m., the report said.
Officers checked Fullard’s apartment and found the door ajar with no one inside. He did not answer calls to his phone, the report said.
Additionally, the apartment camera system showed the child trying to open the locked gate of the pool and squeeze between the bars in the fence. The child navigated the private roads in the complex for at least 1,000ft to get to the pool alone, the report said.
Fullard was found the next day near Subway, located at 208 W Guava St., and arrested on charges of child neglect (domestic) and possession of marijuana (more than 20 grams). The Pennsylvania native was transported to Lake County Jail with bond set at $7,500.