I don’t envy your experience, but I do admire your grit. I hope this has a happy ending and the parents are sufficiently shamed into showing more sense.

I’m not up on the law so I don’t know if this will result in child endangerment charges or a stint with child protective services, but I don’t imagine the parents will be very happy—if, in fact, the parents were involved. Could be a babysitter or an older brother or sister for all I know.

I feel crummy tonight. That was a really awful experience.

Good on you for taking the initiative.

Out here we’ve had at least three cases where a car was left in front of a convenience store with a child inside and the motor running, resulting in car thefts.  In all cases the baby and car were quickly found and returned to very shaken parents, but it makes you wonder what they use for brains.

Linkmeister, I think we know what they use for brains and where they keep them, too. 

Thank God you were where you were Kate and noticed and did something about it.  All too often we are so intent on what it is we are doing or going to do that we are oblivious to everything else.  For sure, I know I often am.  But reading this made me aware and I am going to do my best to pay more attention to what is going on around me. Hopefully the little one will be fine and all will be well.  Scary and when you think of what might have happened..........sad.

BTW, I swear I keep getting the word “medussa” - is someone trying to tell me something?????

Simply amazing that people continue to do this. There was an incident in Virginia a few years back that ended in tradegy; a child lost and a father eventually imprisoned.

In my vehicles I carry a simple tool (relatively inexpensive) that shatters car glass. I have used one of them to free a dog from an unattended SUV in the local Walmart parking lot. Not enough time to summon the police. Ice and water from a bystander’s cooler probably saved the animal’s life. And yes, the vehicle (and pet) owner showed up and became VERY irate. The police calmed her down though with a summons for animal cruelty. I figured I would have to pay for the glass and several bystanders offered money on the spot to help me with that. Didn’t need it though.  Just my $.02.

Linkmeister, yeah we have people who leave kids in the car with the engine running in front of our convenience store, too. Maybe they think it’s safe because they are standing only a few feet away from the car and they can watch the car through the plate glass windows. But they could also watch someone run up and drive away with their car and kids, too. People do amazingly risky things when it comes to their kids. But if they had a laptop or other piece of expensive property sitting in the car, the car would be locked up.

Don, I’ve seen those window breaking gadgets and have thought about getting one. I’ve often thought about what I’d do if I saw a dog in a locked car that needed rescuing. And a lot of people leave their dogs in their cars in the parking lots. I don’t think I could break a car window without a gadget like that. I’d be really hesitant to use one to extract a child, though. I can imagine an irate parent appearing on the scene accusing me of trying to kidnap their child.

That case in Virginia—was that the one where the father had the baby in the back seat and didn’t remember to drop him off at day car and went directly to work? He discovered his dead baby in the car after work?

I had to go down to the police station to fill out a witness report this morning. It’s a formality, they said, and that will be the end of it as far as my involvement is concerned. The little boy is okay. He was discharged from the hospital, though I don’t know if he went home or where. That’s private information. But I feel much better knowing that he’s fine now.

Sadly, not a rare occurence in VA:

http://www.4rkidssake.org/VA3432.htm

Attempting to help a child in distress could result in a misunderstanding, but I think faced with the actual circumstance the protective instinct kicks in and consequences be damned. Just pray that the irate parent (or some passerby) is not armed.