Police found four kids, including a 2-month-old, hiding in a bathroom while their Florida mom was allegedly on a Bahamas cruise

Nathalie Belizaire, a 29-year-old from Florida, is facing four counts of child neglect after allegedly leaving her four children home alone to go on a cruise. The children include a 2-month-old infant and a 2-year-old, according to Law&Crime. Police say the children were left without adult supervision while Belizaire sailed to the Bahamas aboard the Carnival Conquest. The father of Belizaire’s 2-month-old told police he saw a WhatsApp story post that appeared to show a Carnival cruise ticket.

According to the arrest affidavit, Belizaire had told the father that she planned to drop the children off with a relative. However, that relative, the children’s great-grandmother, later told authorities the kids were never dropped off. When the father arrived at the apartment Saturday night, he said he saw the television glowing through the blinds and heard the children talking inside. He called police because the children appeared to be alone. 

North Miami Beach police and Miami-Dade Fire Rescue responded to the apartment in the 1400 block of N.E. 170th Street and forced entry. When the officers entered the apartment, they found all four children hiding in the bathroom. Authorities say the children are safe and have since been placed in foster care. Belizaire’s brother told police she had texted him asking him to check on the kids, but he had not yet arrived at the apartment before police got there.

The cruise ended with police waiting at PortMiami

Investigators reportedly learned that Belizaire left on Friday for a three-day cruise to the Bahamas. Police tried calling her several times, but she never answered, according to the affidavit. When she returned to PortMiami on Monday, the police were waiting for her. U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers took her into custody as she disembarked and turned her over to North Miami Beach police. 

According to the affidavit, she declined to speak with investigators about what happened. She was booked on four counts of child neglect without great bodily harm, a third-degree felony in Florida. Belizaire appeared in bond court on Tuesday, where Judge Mindy Glazer set her bond at $10,000 and ordered her to have no contact with the children, per NBC News. Glazer said in court that she was grateful nothing worse had happened to the kids.

Her attorney said Belizaire denies the allegations, and she was released several hours after the hearing once she posted bond. The Florida Department of Children and Families is also investigating, and the children remain in foster care. The case follows a Massachusetts mother’s guilty plea last week after she left her children home alone and went out drinking. In that case, her critically ill 3-year-old son died while she stayed out overnight.

The no-contact order is expected to stay in place while the children’s case moves through dependency court, where a judge could eventually decide whether the four kids return to Belizaire or stay in foster care.