Hawthorne woman charged with child neglect after 4-year-old was found naked and unsupervised near a road

Staff report

HAWTHORNE, Fla. – Casey Kay McDowell, 38, was arrested yesterday and charged with child neglect after her “medically complex” four-year-old was found naked and unsupervised near a road while she was reportedly unconscious; she was also booked on a warrant for charges from March regarding the same child’s medical treatment.

At about 10:12 a.m. on October 22, an Alachua County Sheriff’s Deputy responded to a home in Hawthorne, where a caller had reported seeing a naked child near the road. The caller reportedly asked a deputy to stay on the phone and knocked on the door, but there was no answer. The caller went to the back door, found it was open, yelled inside, and still did not receive an answer. The caller reportedly feared a medical emergency, went inside, and found McDowell waking up in the bathroom. The witness stayed with the child until help arrived.

The victim is four years old and has multiple medical conditions that require constant monitoring and frequent medical treatments.

McDowell reportedly stated that she takes suboxone and had taken her morning dose. She declined medical treatment.

McDowell was also booked on a warrant from a March 14 incident in which a deputy was trying to locate her then-boyfriend, Sean Burnham, who is a registered sexual offender and had not registered McDowell’s address, although he reportedly stayed there four to five nights a week. On that date, the deputy reported that it was apparent that McDowell did not know where her then-three-year-old was, and she reportedly blamed an older child for not supervising him.

A neighbor reportedly brought the three-year-old child back; the child was reportedly dirty and was only wearing a pair of shorts, and his medical ports were exposed. The deputy also reported that McDowell was told on March 16 that his cast needed to be replaced, and she waited until March 20, leading to wounds on the child’s foot from the wet cast. The child also reportedly had a burn on his hand on March 20, and McDowell reportedly said she did not know how it happened.

The then-three-year-old child was hospitalized after these incidents, and hospital personnel reported that McDowell appeared to be under the influence of intoxicants in the hospital and was found asleep in the bathroom while her child was in a hospital bed without the guard rail pulled up.

Burnham was arrested after the March incident and entered a plea of nolo contendere to two counts of failing to register information required from sexual offenders; he is currently serving a state prison sentence in that case.

McDowell has been charged with two counts of child neglect, one from each incident, and obstructing justice for allegedly lying about her boyfriend’s location in March. She has no local criminal history, and Judge Adam Lee set bail at $50,000.

Articles about arrests are based on reports from law enforcement agencies. The charges listed are taken from the arrest report and/or court records and are only accusations. All suspects are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.