- September 30, 2024
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A Palm Coast man was arrested and charged with child neglect after he and his five children were found living in a home with urine, feces and mold in almost every room.
Flagler County Sheriff’s Office deputies were called to the home in Palm Coast’s B Section when a grocery delivery driver said a young child, around 2 years old, crawled into the backseat of her car as she was delivering an order on Sept. 27. She told the 911 dispatcher that the child would not talk to her, but then got out of the car and walked around unsupervised in the street, according to an arrest report.
The child eventually walked into an open garage on the street, and the driver gave that address to the dispatcher. When an FCSO deputy arrived and looked inside the window, he saw wet spots and garbage on the floor.
Nicholas Robert Carter, 39, answered the door and allowed the deputy to tour the home. Inside, the deputy instantly was met with “warm stagnant air with a very strong and foul odor of feces, urine, mold and mildew,” the arrest report said.
In almost every room, the deputy found “large clumps of fecal matter” and urine, even in the master bedroom, where the youngest children slept. Flies gathered on piles of waste, garbage and dirty clothing that was spread out throughout the house.
Carter’s five children — between the ages of 2 and 16 — were all walking around barefoot and a German Shepherd was also inside the home. The two oldest children began attempting to clean areas of the house as the deputy walked through the home.
Carter also told the deputy that the 2-year-old liked to hang out in the garage, where the garage door was kept open and power tools, exposed wires, sharp objects, a marijuana smoking pipe and a BB gun were all accessible, the report said.
Carter was arrested and the Department of Children and Families was notified.
Carter and the children’s mother, Tiffany Berry, had both previously faced child neglect charges in February 2020 when the family was found living in deplorable conditions at the time, according to the Clerk of Court website. Berry was at work at the time of this incident and notified of Carter’s arrest.
According to the arrest report, deputies have been called out to the home on 16 separate occasions since January 2023. In December 2023, the Palm Coast Fire Department was called to the home when one of the children ingested marijuana and began to have a seizure, the report said.
In a press release, Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly thanked the woman who reported what she saw so deputies could intervene.
"Hopefully, this time DCF will take serious action to turn the home life around for these children, the least of which is to learn how to be a parent and clean up his house," Staly said.
