CAIRO — After a routine response to a dispute, alert police officers discovered a filthy two-year old child, surrounded by cockroach-infested garbage, sitting in a hot car.

On Saturday afternoon, according to police reports, Cairo police officers were called to a 9th Ave. NE, Cairo address where two women were having a heated dispute. One said the argument was over pills and the other claimed money was the issue. The officers could not determine which woman was telling the truth and decided the best action was to separate them.

Officers escorted a white woman in her late 30s to her car. As she got into the vehicle, Officer Michael Logue noticed a small child in the back seat surrounded by clothing and garbage.

The report said, “There were roaches crawling all over the garbage and around the child.”

Instead of leaving the scene ,the woman began using profanity in front of the child, who was identified as her son. Logue took the woman into custody for disorderly conduct.

Once she was taken into custody, according to the report, Sgt. Tyron Griffin entered the car to check on the child. He called for the other officers to turn the car off quickly because it was blowing hot air onto the child.

Griffin took the boy and placed him in the officers’ air-conditioned patrol car.

Lt. Wayne Redden arrived on the scene to take him to the Cairo Police Department. He said the child’s hair had been cut and “gapped up” and was full of sand. His feet were dirty. One of his toes had an abrasion on the tip. His nose had two large scabs across the bridge that appeared to be burn marks. He also had a scratch on his chest and what looked like bug bites on his back.

On the way to the police department, Redden realized the little boy was hungry and stopped and bought a meal for him.

The child and his clothes were so dirty, according to Redden, that the officer had to vacuum out his seat after transporting the child.

Griffin called the Department of Family and Children Services and was told someone would get back with him. When no one did, he called back and was told to release the child to a family friend.

That friend, according to the report, had cared for the child on numerous occasions when the mother had dropped him off before, often leaving him for a week at a time. She said the child was often naked when he was dropped off and was surprised that on this occasion he was wearing clothes. The friend said the child’s residence was “filthy and not fit to live in.”

She also told the officer that the mother had signed over custody of a 15-year-old to someone in another county.