Two Augusta boys were hospitalized over the weekend after their mother returned home to discover they had got into their grandmother’s meth stash, authorities said.
The mother found her sons – ages 1 and 3 – had been foaming at the mouth Saturday afternoon when she returned from work to the nasty roach-infested home to Avondale Drive. They were acting funny and having seizures, so they were taken by ambulance to Augusta University Medical Center. A third child, her 6-year-old daughter, was uninjured.
An investigation led to charges against the grandmother, 48-year-old Laura Hutto Burnett, who is a methhead and repeat offender with a long history of shoplifting and drug possession. She was locked up Sunday on multiple counts of child cruelty in the second degree as well as possession of drug-related objects and maintaining a disorderly household.
Richmond County officers found a disgusting house unfit for three children, including “thousands of roaches” in various stages of their life, according to authorities. Two mattresses in the children’s bedroom were covered in mold, old food, urine and feces. Officers also found various drug paraphernalia, including glass pipes, hypodermic needles, and butane torches.
The house, where Burnett lives with her three grandchildren and their mother, is right off Washington Road, just down from the Hyundai dealership.
Burnett was being held Sunday without bond at the Charles B. Webster Detention Center. She is quite familiar with the jails in Richmond, Columbia and Aiken counties. She has multiple arrests for shoplifting in the three counties as well as meth possession in North Augusta and other charges. She usually received probation or credit for several days spent in jail, while some of the charges are pending or never adjudicated in court.
