Kids 'healthy,' family 'shocked' after meth-lab bust
WAKE COUNTY (WTVD) -- Thursday, three small children were found inside a Wake County home that authorities say was used as a meth lab. Five people are now charged.
Wake County Sheriff Donnie Harrison told ABC11 on Thursday that two boys and a girl, between the ages of 4 and 8, were found in the 6200 block of Silver Springs Court near Fuquay-Varina.
On Friday, ABC11 inquired about those young children.
Child Protective Services would not release any information, but Sheriff Harrison said the children were decontaminated at the scene (as reported yesterday) and then taken to a hospital to be checked out. They got a clean bill of health and were reunited Thursday night with a family member - their grandmother - who now has custody.
ABC11 found out Friday after court that they are with their paternal grandmother because Michael Jones' brother, John Jones, spoke on camera afterward and said it is his mother who has the children.
"They are resiliant," John Jones said of the children. "They were a little, a little bit scared of the police coming in, naturally. They just, we got them cleaned up, fed, you know. They are doing as good as can be expected."
He echoed that they are healthy and happy although they were initially frightened by the raid. He further says both his family and his sister-in-law's family (Nunez-Jones) knew something was going on last spring when both parents wound up unemployed. Both families called Social Services repeatedly, he said, (and especially when the water was turned off for three months) but no action was taken.
"She walked away from a really good job. He lost a pretty good job," John Jones said. "That's kind of when we knew stuff was going on. So it just spiraled from there."
He said the families suspected drug use. He said his brother and sister-in-law started hanging with the wrong crowd that included felons and drug addicts.
"You start bringing felons and drug addicts into your home, it's, you know, birds of a feather," John Jones said. "I mean, he's never been this way so this is kind of a family shock. He's never been in trouble, always held a job, you know. It's very shocking."
John Jones told ABC11 there may be a bright side: "It's probably saved his life, maybe the children's lives and I'm just hoping this is a wake-up call for him and maybe he can turn it around."
Michael Curtis Jones, 29, Jessica Jenny Nunez-Jones, 29, Charles Scott Jones, 33, Chelsea Lynn Nye, 28, and Jason Neil Wall, 33, are all charged with manufacturing methamphetamine and possession of methamphetamine, among other charges.
Nunez-Jones and Michael Jones are also charged with child abuse.
"Anytime you are dealing with a meth lab, you've got explosives, you've got chemicals that can kill people," Harrison said Thursday. "With those kids in the house, it really angers me that they are in there - first of all it angers me you got a meth lab in a neighborhood or anywhere - but when you got kids, it's really a no-no for me."
