Homestead mother arrested after police officer encounters homeless, injured young girl

HOMESTEAD, Fla. – A 41-year-old mother is charged with child abuse in Miami-Dade County after a police officer encountered a homeless teenage girl who was injured days after an attack.

According to Miami-Dade inmates, correctional officers held Elizabeth Polo at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center near Doral on Thursday.

According to an arrest report from the Homestead Police Department, an officer encountered Polo’s daughter Wednesday at a Chevron at Southwest 187 Avenue and Mowry Drive.

The police officer reported that the homeless teenager suffered “several scratches on his neck, chest area and right arm” as well as “slight redness on the right side of his face.”

According to police, the teen reported that Polo attacked her on Sunday by “putting both hands around her neck, shaking her and pressing forcefully on her neck.”

The teen also reported that Polo ordered her to leave the Mowry Villas home so she stayed with a friend and tried to ask an aunt for help, according to police.

Homestead police officers reported they arrested Polo at the HPD station on Wednesday around 3:40 p.m., and correctional officers reported they arrested her on Wednesday around 10:20 p.m.

Court records show Polo appeared before a Miami-Dade Bond Court judge on Thursday, who ordered her to stay away from her teenage daughter and set her bond at $5,000.

The prosecution filed a case of domestic assault by strangulation and child abuse without great bodily harm. District Judge Lody Jean was set to preside over the case.