Police say the mother and grandmother of an 18-month-old Auburn boy were aware he had eaten a large amount of methamphetamine on the morning of March 11 but denied him medical care for more than seven hours.

Because they were afraid that Child Protective Services would take him away if the drug were found in his system.

What’s more, police say, when mother and daughter finally did get the child to a hospital, they lied and tried to fob the responsibility for what had happened off onto another woman.

That’s why the King County Prosecutor recently charged 21-year-old Almesha Dedrick and her mother, Bridgette Jones, 48, with first-degree criminal mistreatment.

“The defendants allowed the victim to suffer through hours of pain and suffering after ingesting methamphetamine in order to protect themselves from system interference and criminal liability, all at the expense of the child victim’s health and safety,” Senior Deputy Prosecutor Cecelia Gregson told the court.

“Almesha stated that (the boy) was ‘screaming, crying, thrashing, and inconsolable,’ ” a detective wrote in the police account. “Even with the knowledge of (his) meth ingestion and the symptoms that he was exhibiting, Almesha denied him medical care for several hours.”

A case setting hearing is May 24 at the Regional Justice Center in Kent.

Here is a summation of what happened, according to the Auburn Police Department’s Certification for Determination of Probable Cause,

Valley Com dispatched two officers to MultiCare Auburn Medical Center at 3:34 p.m. on March 11 because the hospital had “an 18-month old boy who may have eaten methamphetamine.” The mother and grandmother, who had brought him in, told medical staff that “AD” had ingested methamphetamine, and they may have waited a long time before bringing him in.

A test of the boy’s urine screened positive for amphetamines. An ambulance later transported him to Mary Bridge Children’s Hospital in Tacoma.

According to the police account, Dedrick and Jones told varying stories to police, social workers and hospital staff about what had happened, and how long it had taken them to seek medical care for AD.

According to the account, Jones and Dedrick told police that on the morning of March 10, Bridgette had dropped her grandson off with a woman named Tonya — whom she barely knew — and the child had gotten into her meth, and they had waited a long time before taking him to the hospital.

But according to what the attending physician at MAMC told police — in addition to the concern about unknown ingestion — the length of methamphetamine still in the system contradicted every timeline the family had given: AD’s calcium was extremely low, putting him at risk for the rapid destruction of skeletal muscle and kidney failure.

According to the account, the doctor told police that AD’s potassium was “extremely high at 7.7.” When the officer asked him to explain further, the doctor responded, “At 8, you die.”

When police found Tonya days later, her story did not align with those of Dedrick and Jones. She said she had been living with Jones and Dedrick for nearly a week, and that when she awoke that morning, she saw AD with a bottle, and he seemed fine. When she came out of the bathroom 30 minutes later, however, it appeared AD had gotten into something he shouldn’t have, though she didn’t know what it was. At that point, AD was running into walls.

Tonya told police that Dedrick was asleep at that point and his grandmother was aware of what was happening but “did not want to deal with it.” Tonya said she poured cold water over AD and prayed for him as he thrashed about. She said that after a while Dedrick woke up and seemed unconcerned. Tonya told police that she and Bridgette made AD drink milk and eat mustard to induce vomiting.

Tonya said she believed the two women had taken the boy to the hospital the next day because he was still showing signs of having consumed a harmful substance. Tonya also told police that Bridgette had text messaged her to lie about the situation, to support the babysitting claim, and to say the meth had been hers (Tonya’s). Police soon found the text, confirming Tonya’s account.

Bridgette maintained that her grandson had gotten into Tonya’s meth and eaten it. She admitted that she did not call 911 at first or take AD to the hospital because, she said, she was afraid that by finding meth in his system, CPS would take him away. She conceded that she had made up the story about Tonya baby sitting and confessed to sending her the text message as to what the story should be.