Mom Arrested for Leaving Kids in Food Court During Job Interview

(FOX NEWS) -- A woman was arrested for leaving her two children alone at a Houston food court while she interviewed for a job.

Laura Browder, 24, said that she sat her 2-year-old son and 6-year-old daughter at a table in the Memorial City Mall food court while she went on a job interview nearby. Browder claimed that the children were within her line of sight the entire time.

Authorities say that the children were crying when two police officers found them alone at the table.

Browder was arrested just moments after accepting the job. She has been charged with abandoning a child with intent to return.

Browder defended her actions in a statement, explaining that she wouldn't intentionally put her children in harm's way, but that she had an interview with a great company that could offer her career growth.

She acknowledged that she made a "not so smart decision," but added, "I am not concerned with [what] outsiders have to say or what they think."

KHOU published the full statement from Browder:

"This was very unfortunate this happened. I had a interview with a very great company with lots of career growth. I am a college student and mother of two. I would never put my name, background or children in harms way intentionally. I have a promising future ahead of me regardless of what the media tries to portray me as. A judge released my children to me knowing that I was a good mother who just made a not so smart decision. My children weren't even 30 yards away from me, I fed them and sat there with them until it was time to meet with my interviewer. This too will pass and I am not concerned with outsiders have to say or what they think."