There’s nothing more disturbing than the death of an innocent child. However, when that death is caused by an adult’s incompetence, it only makes the situation that much worse.
So, when police officers discovered that two dead children had died alone in a house fire while their mother was getting her hair done, well, you can imagine the surprise and disgust the situation causes.
It all started at about 4 p.m. on Monday in Bastrop, Louisiana, where firefighters were called to a house fully engulfed in flames. As it turns out, two children by the names of T’Shae and Clifton Johnson, ages 4 and 3, were inside the house and died as a result of the incident.
Local resident Johnnie Halls said he and his cousin were driving by when they saw the fire and decided to stop to help. At that time, the two ran around the house to assess the situation and saw a trailer behind the home and quickly realized a young lady lived in the trailer along with her own two children.
They were able to rescue the woman with two children from the trailer behind the burning home before the fire spread.
Unfortunately, bad news was right around the corner. The woman from the trailer called Ciarria Johnson, 21, who lived in the house that was on fire. After talking to Ciarria Johnson, she told Johnnie Halls and his cousin that two children were trapped inside inside the home that initially caught fire.
“She got a text message or something on the phone saying that there’s two more kids in this front house, so me and him ran back up to this front house. It was too hot to get in the front,” Johnnie Halls said.
Another Good Samaritan at the scene chimed in and said that they tried breaking a front window in order to enter the premises and save the children, but they weren’t successful. According to the man, smoke and heat from the flames came pouring out the broken window, making it impossible to enter without sustaining serious personal injury.
Police later sent in an investigation team along with a k-9 unit, who determined the cause of the fire to be one of two gas heaters that were used in “close proximity of flammable materials to the space heater,” according to myarklamiss.com.
What’s even worse is that the now deceased children’s mother, 21-year-old Ciarria Johnson, was at a salon getting her hair done when she left them home alone. She then proceeded to lie to police saying that she had arranged for a neighbor to care for her kids – a false truth they easily debunked.
She further lied to police saying that she only learned of the fire when she returned home, when in fact, someone had called to let her know ahead of time. She has since been charged with “two counts of negligent homicide in the death of her children.”
Johnson is set to be arrested as she was initially taken to Brentwood Psychiatric Hospital for evaluation. Arrangements have been made to take the woman into custody and have her properly placed where she belongs — in jail.
Johnnie Hall fully summed up the incident when he said, “It’s really just heart wrenching, you know? I don’t know what else to say.”
