Local News in Brief : Deputies Remove 8 Children From ‘Filthy, Unfit’ Home

Eight children were removed from a home in Canyon Country Tuesday after sheriff’s deputies found them living in “filthy, unfit conditions,” a Sheriff’s Department spokeswoman said.

The children, ranging in age from 8 months to 14 years, were living in a house littered with spoiled food, excrement, broken glass and loaded weapons, according to Detective Pam Shrick of the Sheriff Department’s Santa Clarita Valley substation.

The children’s mother, Maryellen Tracy, 42, was arrested on a misdemeanor charge of resisting a police officer, Shrick said.

An anonymous caller had told deputies Monday that the children were living in unhealthy conditions in a small house on Drasnin Drive, near the northeastern edge of Los Angeles County, Shrick said.

Deputies found crowded, grimy rooms with inadequate bedding and a yard littered with broken glass, Shrick said. Deputies also confiscated several loaded guns within reach of the children, she said.

Shrick said the children had been placed in foster homes and at a county child-care facility in El Monte pending a custody hearing later this week in Los Angeles County Children’s Dependency Court.

Tracy, who was released, is to appear March 21 in Newhall Muncipal Court.