Shiprock Woman Pleads Guilty to Federal Child Abuse Charge

ALBUQUERQUE – Angela Sloane, 30, an enrolled member of the Navajo Nation who resides in Shiprock, N.M., pleaded guilty today to an indictment charging her with child abuse.

Sloane was arrested in May 2014, on a criminal complaint alleging that on May 9, 2014, she endangered the lives and safety of two children, a nine-month-old infant and a nine-year-old child, by driving under the influence of alcohol while the children were unrestrained in the back seat of her vehicle.  The children did not suffer seriously bodily injury when Sloane crashed the vehicle into a wooden fence and a parked vehicle.  She subsequently was indicted and charged committing child abuse by placing the children in a situation that may have endangered their lives or health.

In entering her guilty plea, Sloane admitted driving under the influence of alcohol, with a blood alcohol content of .23, and losing control of the vehicle in which the two children were unrestrained passengers. Sloane admitted placing the children in a situation that endangered their lives by crashing into fencing and a parked vehicle.

At sentencing, Sloane faces a maximum statutory penalty of three years in federal prison.  Her sentencing hearing has yet to be scheduled.

This case was investigated by the Farmington office of the FBI and the Shiprock office of the Navajo Nation Division of Public Safety and is being prosecuted by Special Assistant U.S. Attorney David Adams.