CHARLOTTE, N.C. (QUEEN CITY NEWS) — The family of Brandon Augustine and Mildred Chestnut has begun to take its heartbreak public with hopes that the couple will turn themselves into authorities and come home.   

CMPD has officially issued arrests warrants for the Charlotte couple for the alleged physical abuse of their four-month-old baby boy.   

The couple was last heard from on March 18 after they admitted their child into Atrium Health for injuries, they claimed, came from a minor traffic accident.   

CMPD was called to Atrium Health because doctors discovered the injuries were not consistent with a traffic accident.   

On March 21, warrants were taken out for their arrests for felony intentional child abuse inflicting serious injury. Later that day, the couple’s vehicle was found abandoned in Georgia.   

Dianna Augustine, Brandon’s mother, said she was kept in the dark on the investigation up until the moment the news conference disclosing the alleged criminal activity began.   

“I, along with the world, learned what was in the press release,” she said. “So, I’ve been crying a whole lot.”  

Dianna spoke with Queen City News 24 hours after CMPD announced its findings. She explained that she last saw the couple when they called her from the hospital March 18. 

She said they called her to come watch over their four-month-old because they had begun to feel sick.   

“They have the flu and they’re throwing up and they leave,” Dianna recalls. “They call me. It’s like six in the morning and say, ‘We are so sick.’”  

Dianna communicated with the pair throughout the day, up until they stopped responding to her messages around 10 p.m. that night.   

“I just knew something was wrong from that point,” she said. “That wasn’t like him. … I can’t see my son running. I can’t see my son. I thought he was dead.”  

The same day CMPD was called to the hospital on March 20, Dianna filed two missing persons reports for Brandon and Mildred.   

On March 21, the couple’s vehicle was found in Georgia.   

Family members said that they were unaware any of this had happened. 

While the shock is still fresh, Dianna begs for people to stop helping the couple and encourage them to come home.   

“They don’t need your help. The help they need is here,” she pleaded. “Your family needs you, your son needs you. You, you know, like in any way, in any way, you know, just come home and do it the right way.”