911 Call Brings Food, Toys for 2 Children

Santa came early for a single dad in South Oxnard, whose two children alerted police by calling 911 to complain of being hungry and alone.

The potentially tragic “Home Alone” situation had a happy ending, when the two officers responding to the call ended up providing the family with a Christmas tree, toys and donated food.

Shortly before 11 a.m. Tuesday, 6-year-old Michelle Fernando and her brother, Michael, 8, made the emergency call from their home in the 1800 block of Lincoln Court.

Officers Felice Epps and Sharon Gerding found bedding on a messy floor where the children slept and an empty refrigerator. A bag of stale potato chips and unopened packets of hot chocolate were on the kitchen table.

“The kids were upset and they just didn’t have anything,” Epps said Wednesday. “The 6-year-old said she hadn’t eaten since a day earlier.”

The officers telephoned the children’s father, Conrado Alcayaga, at his job at a Camarillo insulation company and told him to come home. The officers then notified county social workers.

After Alcayaga arrived he explained that he was a single father who was struggling to afford food and child care. The family emigrated from the Philippines three years ago.

His children, Alcayaga said, had learned to dial 911 from their grandfather, who lives in San Diego.

“He was upset. I truly believe it was an ignorance type of situation, not an intentionally neglectful situation,” Epps said. “He wasn’t aware of the services that are available.”

It is illegal for a child under the age of 14 to be left at home alone, Epps said. Alcayaga, 39, was given a misdemeanor citation and told to appear in court next month. He was also given phone numbers for available county services, such as medical and child care.

It could have been much worse. Alcayaga could have been arrested on suspicion of child endangerment and the children could have been placed with a foster family, authorities said.

After Epps and Gerding returned to their patrol duties, they decided to go shopping.

“We’re both single moms. And I was a teen mom at 16, so I know what it’s like to have to struggle, to find baby-sitters--it’s rough,” Epps said.

Gerding added: “It’s really tough to see kids do without during the holidays, so we decided to do something.”

Epps has two daughters, 17 and 19, and an 18-year-old son. Gerding is raising a 10-year-old girl.

“No one wants to pull kids out of the home during the holidays,” said Nancy Ross, a social services supervisor. “We go to whatever extra lengths to try and keep children with families, even if it means we have to pull stuff together, donations or whatever, and drive it over ourselves.”

The Oxnard Peace Officers Assn., which is selling trees from a lot at Centerpoint Mall to raise money for scholarships, donated a Douglas fir and colored lights. Epps and Gerding used their own money to buy ornaments, tinsel and spray snow at a nearby drugstore.

As the two officers were leaving the mall, Centerpoint General Manager Pat Farrell walked over. After he heard the story, Farrell called mall merchants, who donated two turkeys and several stuffed animals to the family.

“I’ve seen police officers do it time and time again. They go from protecting lives one second to comforting a child the next,” Ross said.

Later that day, the officers returned to the apartment to deliver the tree and gifts and found the children being cared for by a neighbor while Alcayaga finished his workday.

“It was good to find someone watching the kids,” Epps said.

The officers came back again a few hours later to help the family set up the Christmas tree. Turns out the father had made up a story about why there was no tree, according to Epps.

“Michael was excited because he said his father had told him that he had found a tree but that it was too large to bring into the house,” she said.

On Wednesday afternoon, Alcayaga sat and watched his children decorate their tree.

“It’s good because it looks like the spirit of Christmas,” he said.

Both officers and a county social services caseworker will be doing regular checks on the family, Epps said.