Bronx mother and boyfriend indicted after two children were found locked in feces-smeared room

A Bronx mother and her boyfriend have been charged after two young children were found locked in a room smeared in feces, naked and eating bits of a dirty foam mattress because they were starving, the authorities said. authorities.

The girls, aged three and four, were rescued from a flat in a social housing complex by police on May 3.

Their mother, Stephanie Grabowski, 40, and her partner, Mark Russell, 45, were charged on Monday with multiple criminal charges, including kidnapping, unlawful imprisonment, child endangerment and burglary.

Bronx District Attorney’s Office officials say New York City police and employees rescued the girls from a ‘house of horrors’ in New York City Housing’s Mitchel Houses Authority and have been abused and neglected.

Grabowski and her boyfriend Russell were squatters in the apartment and they were arrested after officials went to the property to vacate it and discovered the children.

Two girls, aged three and four, were rescued from a flat in a social housing complex by police on May 3. Bronx District Attorney Darcel Clark (pictured) said they had been badly neglected.

The girls were found bruised and naked in a room covered in feces and were so hungry they had to eat bits of foam on a mattress, prosecutors said.

Grabowski and Russell were charged with two counts of second-degree kidnapping, two counts of second-degree unlawful imprisonment, two counts of child endangerment and second-degree burglary.

While Grabowski has also been charged with two counts of first-degree kidnapping in a separate case. It is unclear whether the victims in the kidnapping case are the same as the children in the neglect case.

Bronx District Attorney Darcel Clark said: ‘Defendants allegedly kept these little girls in a house of horrors.

“They illegally occupied the apartment and left the children alone without food or clothes.

“Luckily the police rescued the girls and a nurse found signs of abuse which they are being treated for. The situation is beyond pale. ‘

Grabowski and Russell were arraigned before Bronx Supreme Court Justice Ralph Fabrizio on Monday.

Grabowski’s bail was set at $150,000 cash or $400,000 bail, and his at $100,000 cash or $200,000 bail.

New York Police Department officers and Field Intelligence detectives attended at 10:30 a.m. on May 3 to clear it of squatters.

The apartment was in a terrible state and there was urine and feces all over the house and authorities noted that there was not enough food, equipment, clothing or diapers clean, according to representatives from the Bronx District Attorney’s Office.

The doorknob of one bedroom and the doorknob of an adjacent closet door were tied together with a rope-like lanyard, police said.

Officers broke down the door and found the girls on a sponge mattress on the floor.

The room was reportedly littered with excrement, dirty nappies and rubbish as one of the children was seen eating bits of the mattress.

The girls were seen at Jacobi Medical Center on May 5 and found significant bruising and welts in various stages of healing and rashes all over their bodies, prosecutors said.

Authorities arrested Grabowski and Russell and noticed she had an outstanding family court warrant for running away from the Children’s Services Administration in November 2022 and brought her to the court. family.

Protective orders were issued and the children were taken to the Children’s Advocacy Center on May 4, where a nurse examined them and alerted police from the Bronx Child Abuse Squad.

The girls were then observed at Jacobi Medical Center on May 5 and fto have significant bruises and marks in various stages of healing, rashes all over her body, officials with the Bronx District Attorney’s Office said.

They also reportedly had difficulty walking, standing and speaking.

Grabowski and Russell are due back in court on September 13, 2023.