Police conducting a welfare check at a Colorado day care facility Thursday were stunned to find 26 children hidden behind a false wall in the basement. The center was only licensed to look after six children at a time, but a number of complaints had recently come in recently that it was far exceeding that allowance, according to the Gazette. The children, who were all younger than 3, were safely returned to their parents, but the day care owner is under investigation.
The raid happened November 14 at a day care facility in Colorado Springs known as Play Mountain Place.
The center is run out of a private dwelling owned by Carla Faith, 58 — and police say that when they showed up on her doorstep last week, Faith was less than cooperative.
"However, officers could hear the noises of children coming from her home," Lt. James Sokolik of the Colorado Springs Police Department wrote in a release obtained by the Daily Mail. They entered the home and soon walked downstairs and into a finished basement.
It was there that police discovered the false wall, and found the toddlers huddled together behind it.
"Officers immediately began working with [The Colorado Department of Human Services] to release the children back to their parents," Sokolik continued.
Although Faith was not arrested, three day care workers at the center initially were, charged with misdemeanor child abuse relating to neglect.
Those charges were later dropped, however, pending further investigation, reported KKTV.
In the meantime, the day care's license has been suspended and a second day care center owned by Faith, known as Counterpoint School, has also closed. Although there are no reports that Centerpoint was also in violation, the investigation into Faith and her facilities inevitably caused a domino effect.
Parents say they are shocked after learning what was really going on at the facility, though they previously had nothing but praise for the center.
“I was on a year-long waiting list to get into that place,” Jeanette Conde told the Gazette. “Everybody loved it. We loved it. But apparently it was just too many kids."
Conde's 2-year-old son and 3 1/2-year-old daughter attended both Play Mountain Place and Centerpoint School. Now, she joins dozens of other parents who had no idea the facilities were not in compliance, and will be forced to find a new day care for her children. Considering the steep cost of child care in the United States, that's not exactly an easy task.
“I’m completely betrayed," Conde shared, noting that she chose the center when she decided to go back to culinary school, and now she may have to hit pause on her degree.
"Every parent that we talk to, we all feel it is so hard to trust your children with people and we felt like we could really trust them,” she continued.
It should be noted that police found no evidence that the children were mistreated or at risk, and none of the allegations alluded to that.
Conde told the Gazette she never saw signs of abuse or any activity or behaviors on the part of the day care workers that gave her cause for concern.
The newspaper also spoke with Betsy Murphy, a mother whose 2-year-old son has attended Play Mountain Place for some time.
Murphy admitted to being blindsided by the news, but described Faith as "personable and caring," and that as far as she could tell, the day care facility was always run with professionalism.
“It never seemed chaotic,” Murphy noted. “I’ve been to a hundred day cares, and they are gross. This one wasn’t. It was calm, clean, and wonderful.”
Indeed, news footage of the play center shows what looks to be a beautiful, well-kept home with a literal white picket fence out front. But she does remember one incident that gave her pause.
It came one day out of the blue, when her son — who often professed his love for his teachers and even spoke about them on the weekends — sounded worried.
“Don’t take me to the little house," he told her. "Don’t take me downstairs.”
Only in the last week did she learn what he was talking about.
For now, parents are left scrambling to find child care, and police are struggling to answer their questions and concerns.
“I want to know if there is something going on that my child was exposed to. I think that’s a basic question: ‘Why did you get your license taken away and why are you being investigated?” Rob Francis, a Centerpoint parent, told the Gazette.
As for Murphy and other parents, the struggle to find new child care is also mingled with a newfound sense of fear and apprehension.
“The thought of leaving him again is terrifying because I thought this was a great place,” she told the newspaper. “There’s a huge problem here. This is a person I love, I trusted with my son.”
