A mother, who was thrown in jail and charged with endangering the welfare of a child after breastfeeding her baby while drinking, said she didn’t know she was possibly breaking the law.
“I did drink. I did breastfeed,” Tasha Adams told ABC News’ “20/20” in her first on-camera interview. “I didn’t know it was illegal. If I knew it was illegal, I wouldn’t have done it.”
Last week, Chuck Clawson, the deputy city attorney for Conway, Ark., dropped Adams’ child endangerment charge because there wasn’t enough evidence to prove she had one too many drinks to care for her child.
The 28-year-old is a stay-at-home mother to her three children: 6-year-old Cal, 2-year-old Hyd, and 8-month-old Ana. Adams and her family live in Toad Suck, Ark., a small town where alcohol is banned. But unlike Toad Suck, Conway, Ark., is not a dry town.
After the funeral of a family friend, Adams and her parents stopped for dinner at Gusano’s Restaurant in Conway. Adams also brought her baby, Ana, because the 6-month-old was still nursing at the time.
“We had a pizza, and then we had a big old thing of spinach dip,” Adams said. “Then, I had a beer with that, and then I had another one later on after.”
Over the course of an hour and a half, Adams said she had two beers and nothing more. But when Jackie Conners, an off-duty waitress, showed up early for an after-hours staff meeting, she said she saw something very different that disturbed her.
“They looked like they were having a good time, just drinking,” Conners told “20/20.” “Things started getting louder and louder, and then the baby started getting fussy.”
According to Conners, Adams began to breastfeed Ana, but she wasn’t drinking beer.
Conners, who said she was just trying to do the right thing, was fired the week after she called the police on Adams.
“If I was ever in that situation again, I would still do the same thing, because that baby can’t speak up for itself,” Conners said. “No one else was doing anything. Even if I knew my job was on the line and it was right around the holidays, I would still do it again.”
