Woman finds toddlers smelling like kerosene wandering gravel road

A woman told a Fox affiliate in Missouri she found two toddlers wandering on their own, smelling like kerosene with overflowing diapers. Investigators say the man in charge of watching them was smoking marijuana and fell asleep.

Two little girls wearing diapers and T-shirts were found wandering on a gravel road Monday night, authorities said. 

Dustin Burch, 22, was in charge of watching them, police said. He is charged with two counts of endangering the welfare of a child. Their mother was working. 

"First I was very very emotional and I was about to burst into tears. I was in panic and I had to holler for my daughter who had to catch the other one who was running up the hill. And the other one was right over here just in tears." said Bonita Edwards, who found the girls.

Investigators say the children faced plenty of potential hazards including water and wildlife. They are not sure why the girls smelled like kerosene.

"I wanted so bad to get them in the bathtub right away to get that off of them. The diapers were beyond nasty. The one child she had bowels going down her legs. The diaper was hanging." said Edwards.

Investigators say Birch is the boyfriend of the toddlers' mother. They say he admitted to falling asleep while smoking marijuana.

"When we went into the house, we asked him if we could see the child's room. He let us in there. There was some marijuana laying on the table and there was also a 9mm handgun that was laying where children could have reached it," Sheriff Gary Toelke told Fox-2 St. Louis.

DFS took custody of the children while they agency investigates. 

Burch was jailed on a $15,000 bond. He could also face drug charges for the marijuana investigators say they found.