She was crying and standing next to a gas pump, alone, holding a receipt. I asked her where her mom was and she told me her mom drove off.
Got her parents names. Phone numbers, unlisted. Called the police. Half hour later the police show up. By now its 45 minutes since the time stamp on the receipt.
Police send a car to girls house and find mom making dinner, totally oblivious to the fact that her daughter wasn't with her.
Mom shows up at the gas station, tears in her eyes......an hour and a half after the time stamp, 7:45.
Unbemake the beast with two backsinglievable!
indeed
You had no spoons?
kids are replaceable. they're practically giving them away at the boarder.
WTF....
It's a good thing that you don't have drive a junky van with blacked out windows.
Thank God that you were there for that little girl.
I was sure you were talking about a new to you bike, and I was all ready with some snarky comment.......but?!?
WOW..
Thank you for being a stand up individual [beer]
Nice job! The idiot mother is proof positive that they should issue birthing licenses prior to breeding.....
I'm single and don't have kids, so maybe I'm missing something, but I just don't see how it's possible to forget you have a kid with you for that long. Sad.
??? ??? ??? [bang]
Way to be a good Samaritan, rgramjet. [thumbsup]
Good job. [thumbsup] I hope anyone would do the same.
I guess the positive is the mother arrived crying, so was seemingly upset. That doesn't make it OK, but hopefully it means she isn't a terrible mother. I can't imagine forgetting my son somewhere, but we don't know the entire situation.
Quote from: Triple J on June 17, 2014, 02:05:51 PM
Good job. [thumbsup] I hope anyone would do the same.
I guess the positive is the mother arrived crying, so was seemingly upset. That doesn't make it OK, but hopefully it means she isn't a terrible mother. I can't imagine forgetting my son somewhere, but we don't know the entire situation.
that's a don't call cps cry
Good for you. [thumbsup]
I'm surprised the police let the girl back in her mother's care.
Quote from: bobspapa on June 17, 2014, 02:36:21 PM
that's a don't call cps cry
I thought the same thing. Still feels surreal. Hope mom learned her lesson.
The officers said to me, "OK we have your information, thanks for your help......you can go now". I laughed and told them I promised the little girl I would be there until her mom showed up and I wasn't going anywhere.
[thumbsup] Good for you and the little girl. I'm willing to bet she was too busy texting to notice she was minus a kid. [bang]
That's some craziness. Where I worked that would have been a priority 1 call, code 3 (lights and sirens) response and we would have been there in less then 3 minutes. Then we would have taken all your info and transported her to our station. CPS would be called and a report would be filed by them and us and forwarded to the DA for review.
That's very upsetting. Poor kid.
Glad there was a responsible adult around.
Quote from: muskrat on June 17, 2014, 04:46:46 PM
[thumbsup] Good for you and the little girl. I'm willing to bet she was too busy texting to notice she was minus a kid. [bang]
Perhaps Dad was just run over by a bus and Mom's not thinking too clearly.
We can speculate to the moon.
I'll agree that it was likely much closer to your scenario than mine.
And it's good that rg was paying attention and helped the girl get home safe.
I'm sure CPS got the memo.
Quote from: Speeddog on June 17, 2014, 05:56:15 PM
Perhaps Dad was just run over by a bus and Mom's not thinking too clearly.
We can speculate to the moon.
I'll agree that it was likely much closer to your scenario than mine.
And it's good that rg was paying attention and helped the girl get home safe.
I'm sure CPS got the memo.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
This.
Still worth a look.
Believe me I was not indicting Mom.
I bet the girls real mother is Toasty, and some douchey drill member is holding her hostage.
The mom may be the worst one on earth.
Or maybe just handles stress poorly.
I've seen atrocious parents.
And I've seen some of my loved ones act as if they'd removed their brains, when things went haywire.
Quote from: Speeddog on June 17, 2014, 06:52:36 PM
The mom may be the worst one on earth.
Or maybe just handles stress poorly.
I've seen atrocious parents.
And I've seen some of my loved ones act as if they'd removed their brains, when things went haywire.
Exactly.
Whatever the reason
The outcome was good.
Good job [thumbsup]
I had a similar experience a few years ago. I saw a 4 or 5 year old girl chasing geese in a park next to our house. Didn't see anyone watching her. I went down to check. She didn't know where mom was and and nobody else knew anything about her. I told a couple in the park that I was going to take her back to our house and call the cops pointing out where I was taking the girl in case mom showed up. Turns out that this tiny girl, who's mom was attending a hearing at the court house, wandered out of the building, across a fairly busy Main Street, then two blocks to the park - by herself. Cops picked her up just shaking their heads.
What suprised me more than the lack of parental (or even bystander) supervision was how easliy I was able to walk off with a small child in a park. I just asked her to come with me so we could find her mom and she took my hand and went with me with complete trust. I doubt anyone would have even been involved if I hadn't made the effort to tell others what I was doing and where we were going. Shocking how easy it was to simply walk off with her.
Did the little girl look anything like this?
(http://www.blakeloosli.com/artwork/art/Joe_Dirt.jpg)
Speculate or make any excuse you want but that is your child. Bottom line, there is nothing more important than your child. Mom failed. Looking ahead, maybe now she can get help for what ever is going on in her life.
Again [beer] to rgramjet for being an outstanding guy.
Quote from: bobspapa on June 17, 2014, 06:32:05 PM
I bet the girls real mother is Toasty, and some douchey drill member is holding her hostage.
This ^^^
Similar thing happened to me a few months ago.
It was late winter and I was walking the dogs on a Saturday evening. I came upon a little boy 5-7ish who had gotten separated from his family at the zoo, which was about 3/4 of a mile away from where I found him. He also had to cross two very busy streets.
I would have walked him back to the zoo, but he was a little bit intimidated by my Boxer Brian, who just wanted to play with him. Thankfully, there was a little market just down the street that was just about to close. I took him there so he could stay warm until the police arrived. They picked him up a few minutes after I got there (there is a station right next to the zoo).
The officer took him away in the squad car and I'm assuming that he was returned safe & sound.
No kids here. But I freak out if I realize I don't know where my phone is.
I'm glad there are a lot of good people out there to help those affected by others mistakes.
sac
I've got a six year old. There is no way you wouldn't notice the profound silence if he went missing for so much as a minute!
I don't know how it is in the States, but in Australia the Police are mandatory reporters of child protection issues and would have filed a report. The mother would be fine if this was a one off but CPS (or equivalent) would look into it if there were a few similar reports.
Well done for taking responsibility of the child, so many people would have just walked by.
I would have been taken away by CPS if I was a child these days. With all my runnings off and having accidents and generally getting into to trouble it wouldnt be good for my folks.
About every other time we went to a department store I managed to get lost. It usually started by hiding in the clothes racks....
[beer]
Quote from: Mendo Dave 2.0.3 on June 23, 2014, 05:39:44 AM
I would have been taken away by CPS if I was a child these days. With all my runnings off and having accidents and generally getting into to trouble it wouldnt be good for my folks.
About every other time we went to a department store I managed to get lost. It usually started by hiding in the clothes racks....
Me too. I was a master at ditching my mom at the local laundromat when I was about 4 years old or walking to the local Sav-On about a mile away to check out the Halloween masks. But Los Angeles was a different place then.
I have worked for CPS about 14 years now and have seen alot of this crap. The parent who leaves their kid in the car to run into the store to buy some cigarettes (would you leave your wallet unattended on the front seat of your car?). One of the most egregious was when a mom went in to buy some crack and forgot her kids were in the car for several hours. (http://[url=http://www.thespeedtriple.com/forum/images/smilies/slap.gif%5Dhttp://www.thespeedtriple.com/forum/images/smilies/slap.gif%5B/url%5D)
We have had numerous cases of children dying in cars in summer while the parent ran in to gamble.