Girl Turns in Mother in El Cajon Drug Case

In the first reported case of its kind in San Diego County, a 15-year-old girl has turned in her mother for allegedly possessing drugs.

The girl walked into the El Cajon Police Department about 4:35 p.m. on Friday and, expressing concern for the well-being of her 4-year-old brother and herself, told police her mother possessed and used drugs in their apartment, Lt. George Cretton said.

El Cajon Sgt. Tom Gay and Officer Jeff Howell accompanied the girl to the apartment in the 1000 block of Peach Avenue to investigate her claims. The girl’s mother was there with two men, one of whom ran out of the apartment when he saw the officers, Cretton said.

“In the apartment, officers found one bag of marijuana, a marijuana cigarette, an aluminum tray which the marijuana was on, two small jars, one of which contained an undetermined amount of a white powdery substance,” Cretton said. “They also collected for evidence various drug-related paraphernalia, including a mirror, two straws, razor blades, a bong, a coke spoon and another pipe presumed to be used to smoke marijuana.”

Cretton said that when the officers arrived, the woman blew a white powdery substance off the mirror.

The girl’s mother, Debbie Anne Russell, 33, and her boyfriend, Mark Daniel Lingenfelter, 28, also of El Cajon, were arrested on suspicion of unlawful possession of a controlled substance, a felony. Russell was also arrested on suspicion of two counts of child neglect and one count of destruction of evidence.

Russell was held in lieu of $2,100 bail at the Las Colinas Women’s Jail in Santee. Lingenfelter was taken to the downtown County Jail, where bail was set at $2,000. Both arraignments were set for today.

The girl, whose name was not released, and her brother were taken to Hillcrest Receiving Home in San Diego, where they will remain indefinitely, Cretton said.

When asked why the girl decided to turn her mother in, Cretton said that “she had expressed concern for her 4-year-old brother, and believed it was an unfair and unfit environment for the both of them.”

This was the fifth time since Aug. 13 that a California youngster, in each case female, has gone to police and told them of her parents’ drug use.