Police explain why stepmother of missing 5-year-old was arrested
Emily Glass told a police detective that the day before her stepson, Lucas Hernandez, disappeared, “she smoked a few bowls” of marijuana, then drove her 1-year-old daughter to Olive Garden for dinner.
That new information is in a police affidavit released Tuesday. The affidavit was used as part of the legal basis for arresting Glass, who is charged with misdemeanor child endangerment of her 1-year-old daughter.
The affidavit mentions 5-year-old Lucas only by his initials and only refers to his disappearance but gives no other information about him.
Part of the affidavit was blacked out.
The court document gives this account: At 6:14 p.m. Feb. 17, Wichita police officers were dispatched to a home on South Edgemoor to a “lost juvenile call.” The child was identified as 5-year-old LH, “who was in the care of Emily A. Glass … at their residence” along with a 1-year-old child.
After police Detective Ryan Schomaker read Glass her Miranda rights, the affidavit says, Glass said that around 3:30 p.m. the day before the 5-year-old disappeared, “she was cleaning then went to the garage to smoke marijuana … she said she smoked a few bowls.”
Glass said she then became hungry and drove the 1-year-old to Olive Garden for dinner, it says. She said she spent about an hour at the restaurant before driving home with the 1-year-old.
Glass “offered consent to search her phone,” the affidavit says. Records showed texts between Glass and someone identified only by initials as “JH” the same day she drove to the restaurant.
She told JH that “she was going to smoke a couple bowls of marijuana and go to Olive Garden and use the gift card JH had sent her,” the affidavit says.
According to the phone records, Glass made two calls the day before she reported the 5-year-old’s disappearance — at 4:53 and 5:43 p.m. The calls came from the area around Central and Rock. Olive Garden is near that intersection, the affidavit notes.
Police announced last month that they had arrested Glass on suspicion of endangering Lucas and a 1-year-old child. But prosecutors charged her with endangering only the 1-year-old.
She faces a court hearing on Wednesday on her request to lower her $50,000 bond and change some of the bond restrictions so she can get out of jail and return to her home and her husband, Jonathan Hernandez, who is Lucas' father.
Hernandez told The Eagle on Monday that he would welcome her home if she can get out of jail. She should be presumed innocent, he said.
This story was originally published March 13, 2018 at 12:17 PM with the headline "Police explain why stepmother of missing 5-year-old was arrested."