Just when you thought that parents were realizing that it’s not such a good idea to leave young kids alone in a car while they take care of business elsewhere, a story like this makes national headlines:
BREAKING NEWS OUT OF KATY, TEXAS: SELFISH FATHER CHOOSES GUN SHOPPING OVER KID WATCHING
That’s my title, and I unequivocally stand by the use of “selfish.”
Here’s why.
According to Texas law enforcement, a dad is being investigated by Child Protective Services after leaving his two young children in the backseat of a hot van while he spent in hour in an air conditioned store shopping for a gun.
Reports say the baby and toddler were discovered screaming in the locked vehicle by a shopper on a day when the Houston area saw record-breaking heat. The passerby called 911 and then went inside the store to let the owner know what was going on in the parking lot.
A local TV news reporter interviewed an employee at the gun store who said that staff members desperately scoured the shop looking for the owner of the van.
“No one stepped up and said, ‘Yeah, that’s my van or those are my children,'” said Nicholas Arrighi, an employee of Tactical Firearms.
Nearly an hour after the dad left his kids alone paramedics showed up at the gun store and rescued the five-month-old baby and 18-month-old toddler from the steaming hot vehicle.
While crews were removing the kids from the van, the children’s father continued to browse inside the store, a move that enraged the shop’s owner.
“I am a father first and business owner second, and I’ll be damned if anybody wastes their money buying my stuff when their kids are being pushed off as second class citizens,” said Jeremy Alcede, the store’s owner.
According to Texas law, parents cannot leave a child under the age of 7 alone in a car for more than five minutes.
Alcede says he confronted the dad after authorities refused to arrest him.
“I said, ‘Are you kidding me? You left your kids in the car.’ And he said, ‘Awww.’ That was it. Not, ‘Oh my God, are my kids okay?’ He just goes, ‘Awww,” said Alcede.
Police called the children’s mother, who reportedly showed up almost two hours later, to pick-up the kids and the delinquent father.
The case has been sent to the District Attorney who will review it to see if there is enough evidence to prove that the father broke the law.
Alcede says he has the entire incident on video surveillance and will do whatever it takes to see that the dad is severely punished for endangering the welfare of two innocent children.
What do you make of the dad? Is “selfish” a bit too kind to describe what he did?
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