Altamonte Springs police confirm they've found a mother missing from Altamonte Springs and her 7-month-old daughter.
Police said detectives located Jessica McCreery and Penelope out of state.
Attorney Mark O'Mara said he arranged for the Seminole County Sheriff's Office to bring McCreery and Penelope back to Florida.
Penelope "was seen by appropriate medical personnel," O'Mara said. Now Child Protective Services is working with O'Mara on a solution to keep McCreery and her baby together.
Officials were seriously concerned about Penelope's health based on photos O'Mara released Thursday. The medical personnel who saw Penelope made recommendations, but O'Mara did not say what those were.
"We appreciate all the concern and outpouring of support for baby penelope and Jessica during this very trying time, and ask that you please continue to keep them in your prayers as we move forward," O'Mara said in a statement.
Altamonte Springs police spokesman Robert Pelton announced Jessica McCreery, 21, was wanted for child neglect, for not taking in her baby, Penelope Hogarth, for a medical examination by an agreed time Thursday afternoon.
McCreery and baby Penelope were reported missing earlier in the week. Police became additionally concerned with the child's father, David Hogarth, would not cooperate with the investigation, saying they would never find his child or her mother.
O'Mara said the family contacted him, and he immediately acted to get photos of McCreery and baby Penelope, showing both to be OK, to help "calm things down." He also said their next step would be a medical examination for the baby.
In the photos, McCreery holds up a piece of paper with Thursday's date: May 14, 2015.
(PHOTO/Mark O'Mara)
O'Mara said this was a very tangled situation that began on May 5, when police and Child Protective Services visited the family's Altamonte Springs home on a tip that baby Penelope may have been malnourished or abused.
Shortly after the visit, O'Mara said McCreery, fearing her child would be taken away, took off with the baby.
"When DCF gets into the picture, sometimes people get worried, and I think her response to that worry was that she knows she can take care of Penelope. She wasn't too convinced that anybody else — particularly DCF — could," O'Mara explained.
A week after the May 5 visit, police served a search warrant at the family's home Tuesday to find McCreery and baby Penelope missing.
Investigators said they found found a marijuana growing operation inside the home and arrested David Hogarth, McCreery's boyfriend and Penelope's father.
(PHOTO/Seminole County Corrections)
Since bonding out of jail on Wednesday, police said Hogarth had been little help in helping police find the mother and child. O'Mara said he was hired just as law enforcement began to ramp up efforts to find McCreery and baby Penelope, teaming up with the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, which issued a missing child alert.
