Abandoned 8-year-old breaks into strangers’ home for food, Texas cops say. Mom arrested

Abandoned and hungry, an 8-year-old boy broke into a strangers’ home and went to their refrigerator for food, according to authorities in Texas.

The home’s residents found the child on June 8, the Cameron County Sheriff’s Office said in a June 27 Facebook post. He had food in his hands, deputies said.

The boy said he was hungry, authorities said, and the San Benito area residents described him as “very weak and malnourished.” They said they did not know the boy.

The residents took the child to his home, where they tried to find his mother, according to the news release. But she was not home.

“After some time, the mother arrived with her boyfriend,” authorities said. “In the initial interview with the Deputies, the mother admitted to leaving the child unattended and home alone.”

Deputies reported the case to Child Protective Services, and the child was taken from his home, officials said.

Investigators said the boy was malnourished and physically neglected, and they gathered enough evidence to arrest his mother.

The 28-year-old woman was arrested on June 20, authorities said. She was booked into the Carrizales-Rucker Detention Center on a charge of abandonment and endangerment of a child with imminent bodily injury.

An investigation is ongoing.

San Benito is in southern Texas, close to the Mexico border.