Gambling addiction is unfortunate, and it is even worse when children are affected. This week, a Tongan couple have been charged with child neglect after leaving their six children at home while they played pokies at a local pub. The couple, who have name suppression, were gambling out for three hours at a pub in Blenheim. During this time, they had left their children, aged 1 to 11 at home without supervision.
The children were discovered to be alone when a neighbour called the house. The children stated that their parents had gone shopping but the neighbour suspected that they were at the Redwood Tavern. He set out to investigate, and found that they were actually gambling. The police were then called, and the parents were brought up on charges of leaving children under the age of 14 alone without supervision.
The parents had originally left the house to go shopping at a local grocery store. While they were out, they got side-tracked at the Redwood Tavern and decided to play pokies to help pay their rent. The couple appeared in court this week to plead their case.
They told the Blenheim District Court that they had not attempted to make arrangements to hire a babysitter for their time away, and they had skipped out to the grocery store to prepare dinner for the family that night. Aside from being left alone, there were no other signs that they children were in distress. According to Sergeant Graham Single, the house was tidy and the children were nourished.
The couple will appear in court again on June 29, when their sentencing will be decided. This is just one of many cases of children neglect that has occurred in the local gambling market. Last year, a couple was discovered to have left their children locked in a van while they gambled at SkyCity in Auckland. Many more cases were discovered, and SkyCity vowed to implement more security measures to prevent this type of crime from taking place.
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