Children found with sex offender, surrounded by drugs in local home

ELIZABETH BOROUGH, Pa. — A traffic stop led police to a home where children were surrounded by hundreds of empty heroin stamp bags and a registered sex offender.

Elizabeth Township Police Chief Ken Honick saw a car with tinted windows speed by him and stop suddenly. He watched as it turned into the Dollar General on North 3rd without using its turn signals. Chief Honick ran the vehicle’s license plate, and it came back as being registered to a wanted sex offender.

Police found John and Kristi Phillips in the car. Both had active warrants. Elizabeth Borough Police Chief William Sombo says Kristi told him the owner of the vehicle was at her house with two of her kids.

“I politely informed her that this was a registered sex offender,” said Chief Sombo. “At this point, she became extremely emotional. Knees buckled. So I truly don’t believe she knew.”

Officers found two kids, 2 and 4 years old, inside a home on 6th Avenue. A third child wasn’t home at the time.

“It was deplorable inside,” said Sombo. “Subsequently, we find the basement filled with human waste.”

Sombo says there were hundreds of empty stamp bags of heroin and syringes lying around the house.

“If these kids would have just licked those stamp bags this could have been a very very tragic situation,” said Sombo.

Police say they found the other danger to these children upstairs. Christopher Robinson was in the kids’ bedroom. He was convicted of possessing child pornography in 2015 and is a registered Megan’s Law offender.

Police arrested Robinson, along with John and Kristi Phillips. The trio are currently facing drug charges, but more charges are expected to be filed including child endangerment. The three children are currently with their grandparents.

“We will request a forensic interview of the children based on the situation,” said Sombo. “Apparently, Mr. Robinson has been at that residence for a month so who knows what happened.”

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