Taylor Ashley Wendell, 31, of Carson City was arrested on eight counts of alleged child abuse and neglect after deputies searched her home and located multiple children kept in what appears to be make-shift cages created from pack and plays.
On June 8, 2026 Carson City Sheriff’s Office deputies were dispatched to the 1100 block of Ridgefield Drive after a neighbor called stating they’d found a five-year-old child crying outside their home.
Upon arrival, deputies spoke with a man who said he’d been in his home when he’d heard crying coming from outside and saw a small child sitting on the sidewalk crying. He went outside to find out what was going on, then called deputies and stayed with the child until they arrived.
Deputies spoke with the child and attempted to determine where they had come for and who their mother was. They learned the mother had dropped them off, and the neighbor stated there was a daycare down the street.
Deputies went to the home and spoke with Wendell, who confirmed the child had been dropped off at her home to attend daycare. She said she was unaware the child had left. The mother was contacted and asked to come and pick up the child.
Deputies spoke with a mother who said the day before she, the child and her partner did a walk-through of the home, which they described as being clean and organized. She said the only concern they’d expressed was the kids having upstairs access to the home, but Wendell assured the parents that the kids would not go upstairs, and the daycare was only operated in the lower portion of the home.
That morning was the first they had dropped the child off to attend, and they had paid the weekly fee.
While getting ready to clear the call, the other parent arrived on scene, did a walk through with Wendell, then came back to deputies and and showed them a video with the sounds of children in the home, contrary to Wendell’s statement to deputies that no other children were in the home, the report states.
Deputies went back to the home and asked to be let inside to check on the welfare of the children. Wendell “was hesitant,” according to the report, but ultimately let them inside.
She took deputies upstairs and opened the door to a bedroom and wrote the following of the scene:
“When Taylor opened the bedroom door, I observed approximately 11 pack and plays lining the walls of the bedroom,” the deputy wrote. “Each pack and play had fitted sheets over the top, preventing air flow and the kids from exiting the pack and play. I also observed a pack and play in the northwest corner of the bedroom, which had another pack and play on top of it, with a child inside of it. On the northeast side of the bedroom, I observed a pack and play with a kid’s seat on top of it, which also had a kid inside of the pack and play. In the middle of north wall was a third pack and play which had a box on top of it, and another kid inside of that pack and play. It should be noted that the items on top of the pack and plays appears to be placed there to prevent the children from climbing out of them.”
A pack and play is a collapsable combo crib-and-safe-play-area traditionally used for infants. They are typically around 2-2.5 feet high, 3 feet wide and 2-2.5 feet wide.
Deputies further stated that there was a fan in the room, but it was “humid and warm” inside the room, and that some of the children were as old as five years old, who were “too big” for the pack and plays and had been placed in diapers. The room “smelt of fresh poop” and in total there were seven children in the bedroom ages 5 and younger.
Due to the conditions observed on scene, deputies froze the scene and called for detectives to respond. DCFS was contacted, as well as the parents of the other children, who came and took custody of their children.
Wendell was arrested on eight felony counts of child abuse/neglect and transported to the jail without incident.
Wendell wrote Carson Now early Tuesday morning asking for her name not to be used in the arrest report for the privacy of her family. However, it is Carson Now’s policy that the public’s right to know outweighs individual privacy when the naming of the individual does not reveal the identity of victims, and/or if that individual is acting in a public capacity which in this case is taking charge of children other than her own, and placing them in circumstances the parents of those children were unaware of.
All information for the crime log (unless otherwise noted) is public information and supplied by the Carson City Sheriff’s Office through probable cause reports. All subjects are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. View our policy on naming defendants here.
