Mandy Schlef: Mom Falls Asleep At Wheel With Toddler In Car — Not Even Most Shocking Thing Cops Find


Mandy Schelf is a 33-year-old mom of a 3-year-old toddler, but she is also clearly a mom with a problem — a serious problem that nearly cost her the life of her child earlier this week. For that matter, it could have cost the life of almost anyone near her, or certainly her own.

Here’s what happened. Schelf, who lives in the St. Louis suburb of DeSoto, Missouri, was driving on Interstate 55 when her vehicle suddenly veered off the road and slammed into the median divider.

Police were called to the scene and immediately figured out what had caused the accident. According to media reports, and first revealed by KMOV-TV in St. Louis, Schlef fell asleep at the wheel. To the horror the investigating officers, the woman’s child was in the back seat of the car.

But the scene was made even more horrifying when officers, according to the reports, figured out all too easily why Mandy Schlef nodded out behind the wheel of her car while driving on a major interstate highway. It quickly became clear to the police that she was under the influence of the powerful narcotic drug heroin.

How did they know that right away? Mandy Schlef — who was still dozing when the police and paramedics found her — still had a syringe sticking out of her right arm. Also on the seat of the car, police found capsules of the type used by drug dealers to package their deadly merchandise, as well as a spoon and a mirror, which are both items commonly used by heroin addicts to prepare the drug for injection.

Police did not say whether they believe that Schlef was actually cooking and shooting up heroin while she was behind the wheel of a moving car, but it sure looked that way.

Also not revealed was whether or not the 3-year-old in the back seat was hurt in the crash. But they did say that when paramedics on the scene managed to wake Schlef from her opiate-induced slumber, she commented that it was time for her to kick the habit of shooting heroin.

The St. Louis area has been in the throes of a heroin epidemic for the past several years, with the number of deaths related to use of the drug doubling — about 1,900 in the past 6 1/2 years — as the street price of the drug has dropped. Researchers say that while the problem is concentrated in urban St. Louis, the heroin epidemic has also reached the largely white-populated suburbs.

The Mandy Schlef story comes about two weeks after an incident in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, when another 33-year-old mom, Catherine Durham, was caught attempting to drive while falling-down drunk — with her own 8-month old baby in the car.

[Image: St. Louis Police Department]

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