Mom admits she gave kids beer, cocaine

Daniel Tepfer

Staff Writer

Updated 09:05 a.m., Thursday, October 20, 2011

BRIDGEPORT -- A city woman pleaded guilty Wednesday to allegations that she forced her 4-year-old son to chug a bottle of beer and then gave her 10-month-old daughter beer and cocaine.

Juliette Dunn, 29, of Success Village, pleaded guilty under the so-called Alford Doctrine to two counts of risk of injury to a child. A female companion, 33-year-old Lisa Jefferson, pleaded guilty to the same charges.

Superior Court Judge Frank Ianotti told both women they could each face up to two years in prison when he sentences them Dec. 9, but that their lawyers could seek lesser terms.

According to police, on June 28 officers were patrolling Success Village when they were waved down by a neighbor who complained that a mother was feeding her children beer on the playground.

Police said they spotted Dunn and Jefferson sitting in folding chairs at the playground, the young children on the ground next to them. As officers approached them, police said they spotted an empty 40-ounce bottle of Steel reserve beer on the ground beside the boy. They said a baby bottle next to the baby contained a dark liquid that smelled strongly of an alcohol beverage. Dunn was identified as the childrens' mother.

Police said witnesses told them that Jefferson had handed the bottle of beer to the boy and ordered him to chug it. When he had finished it police said Jefferson called the boy an alcoholic.

Both children were taken to Bridgeport Hospital where police said both the boy and girl tested positive for alcohol and the 10-month-old also had cocaine in her system. While being examined police said the 4-year-old told a social worker he likes, "Natural Ice beer, Budweiser beer, but didn't like the taste of Dog-Bite beer."

Police continued that Dunn told them Jefferson gives her son a bottle of beer every day but she didn't know how her 10-month-old daughter tested positive for cocaine since she doesn't breast feed her.

The children were turned over temporarily to the Department of Children and Families after Dunn's arrest, but their long-term custody has not been decided.