EL PASO, Texas—A 28-year-old mother has been charged with abandonment and child endangerment after deputies, alerted by an anonymous tip, found her three young children and her 9-year-old niece alone in a padlocked trailer home.

Ivonne Adriana Vasquez was arrested at the trailer home Tuesday after her daughters, ages 2-month-old, 2 and 8, and their cousin, were found alone in the trailer in Canutillo, El Paso County sheriff’s spokesman Deputy Jesse Tovar said. Vasquez, who was freed on $4,000 bond, faces four counts of abandoning and endangering a child.

Jail records do not show if Vasquez has a lawyer. There was no answer at the only phone number listed for Vasquez.

Vasquez told deputies that she left the children alone in the trailer for about an hour, Tovar said.

When deputies arrived at the trailer they found the front door padlocked from the outside, forcing one deputy to break a window and crawl through it after spotting the children alone inside.

Tovar said the stench of a clogged toilet and dirty diapers inside the trailer, which was strewn with clothes and dishes, caused deputies to gag.

“They were scared, sweating and hot,” Tovar said, adding that the trailer did not have air conditioning. “I don’t want to say they were dehydrated, but they were very thirsty.”

An ambulance crew checked the children at the scene. The sisters were turned over to family members while their cousin returned to her family.

Tovar said it is unclear why the niece was at the house.

Deputies said an investigation by Family and Protective Services is under way.