Octomom Investigated After Kids Alleged To Be Living in Squalor

Social workers who visited the home said there was no cause for concern.

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'Octomom' Nadya Suleman on the Today Show

Being one of the most infamous mothers in the world comes at a price. Orange County Department of Family and Children’s Services workers recently paid a visit to the home of “Octomom” Nadya Suleman after an anonymous tipster reported that her many children were living in sub-standard conditions and “appeared unclean.” Photos of her house in disarray were then leaked to gossip site TMZ. Suleman was fully cooperative in the investigation by the social workers and La Habra police who looked into the complaint. The LA Times reports that police found nothing to merit further investigation.

(MORE: Oh, Baby: Octomom’s Doctor Could Lose His License)

The anonymous individual who filed the complaint said there was only one functioning toilet in the home and that the children went to the bathroom outside, KTLA News reported. (Most reports say the complaint came from her hairdresser, who also allegedly called Suleman out for spending $520 on hair care while receiving government assistance for her large family.) The officials spent about 90 minutes investigating the home, before determining there no reason was no neglect or maltreatment. Lt. Jeff Swaim told the Orange County Register, “The children’s welfare appeared to be fine …. Any time there is an allegation of general neglect, we go out there and investigate the circumstances.” He assured reporters, “There was no need to take the children into protective custody.”

Suleman became a media sensation in 2009 when she was pregnant with octuplets, and the attention only intensified when reports of Suleman’s obsession with fertility came to light. Aided (or perhaps more aptly, enabled) by her doctor, Michael Kamrava, Suleman had been implanted with 12 embryos, which ultimately yielded eight babies. Eight children that the unemployed and single Suleman was hardly in a position to support financially, especially as she already had six children. She has admitted to receiving $4,000 to $5,000 per month in public assistance, according to the NY Daily News. To help defray the cost of raising 14 children, she recently posed topless in British magazine Closer, work she took despite previously saying she would never pose nude. She appeared on Good Morning America yesterday to defend herself against what she called “a set-up” and explaining that the money she paid the traitorous hairdresser was from her own pocket, not welfare. The children are the world’s longest-living octuplets.

MORE: Nadya (Octomom) Suleman – The 2009 TIME 100 Finalists