Mom of kids, ages 4 and 2, arrested after driving without car seats, seatbelts, deputies say

DELAND, Fla. - "Any reason why you were going too fast, with a kid, without a seat belt? Two kids?" a Volusia County sheriff's deputy is heard asking Carolyn Poitier in body camera video. "You were going 91 in a 55!" 

The Volusia County Sheriff's Office said the video shows the moments after a deputy stopped Poitier for speeding with her 4-year-old and 2-year-old children in the car, sleeping without car seats or seatbelts. One was in the front seat.

"I’m absolutely disgusted. I’m appalled," the deputy is head saying.

According to her arrest affidavit, when deputies pulled Poitier over, she told them she chose to take her car without the car seats because she didn’t want to strap in the kids because they were sleeping. 

"Do you understand if you would have gotten in an accident, you probably would have killed both of them?" the deputy can be heard asking the woman in the body camera video.

The Volusia County Sheriff's Office said a deputy stopped Carolyn Poitier for speeding with her 4-year-old and 2-year-old children in the car, sleeping without car seats or seatbelts. 

Experts said that the deputy was right. 

Cher Philio from Healthy Start oversees the Safe Kids program of Flagler and Volusia counties, focused on car seat education. 

"When you don’t even have children that are even buckled in a car at all, let alone a car seat, what will happen is in any type of crash, it doesn’t even have to be that bad, even a bump is going to knock them right off the seat," said Philio.

According to the affidavit, the mother told deputies she didn’t plan to get into a crash.

"Are these your children? Not strapped in, and you’re doing almost 100 miles an hour?"

Deputies also found pills in the car. The mother was arrested.

Her boyfriend picked up the children in a car with car seats. 

FOX 35 News was unable to track down Poitier for comment after she bonded out of jail, but we spoke to her neighbors instead. 

"I can’t understand this. Why bring a child into this world and do such stupid things?" said neighbor Joe Calio. "You should be locked up for years."

The mother was charged with neglect, narcotics possession, and a slew of traffic and seatbelt citations. She is free on bond.