Mother who forgot baby in car wants changes made to car seats

[cindy05]

I absolutely agree.

Originally Posted by Bag*Snob

I bet she didn't forget her purse in the car....This makes me so angry. Sure - make someone else responsible to do what you should already be doing.

[schadenfreude]

Originally Posted by kroquet

Just a little food for thought: What if the busy, stressed out Mom dropped off her kids at daycare and accidentally forgot to drop the puppy off at the Vet and he died from the heat. Would charges be filed and how would we feel about that? Legaldiva - I suspect that CPS is keeping an eye on her

This actually happened in my city not too long ago, except it was a cop that left a German Shepard from the K9 squad in his car! The dog died and the officer was charged with animal cruelty (later acquitted). Other similar instances have resulted in the arrest of the dog's owner with misdemeanor charges of animal cruelty, if they can show that it was "intentional". The cop in that case was "distracted" (not unlike these parents) and thus it was considered unintentional.

Whether it is a puppy or a baby, it is a living, helpless creature completely at the mercy of its caretaker. Having a puppy or (especially, obviously) a baby is a humongous responsibility and are both an active choice people make. You don't have to do either. I firmly believe that harm by negligence to either animals or children should be punished as severely as harm by intent.

[KatsBags]

There will be another mother who did this on Oprah tomorrow.

http://www.oprah.com/slideshow/oprah...0902_tows_moms

[sweetneet]

Originally Posted by KatsBags

There will be another mother who did this on Oprah tomorrow. http://www.oprah.com/slideshow/oprah...0902_tows_moms

thx for posting, that should be interesting. I do feel bad for this mother (i don't think any parents deserves to go through this) and i think it's great that she is trying to awareness about this issue...though i guess what always bugged me about this particular case was how she had on previous occasions intentionally left her daughter in the car unattended (one time just a two days before the fateful incident..see link below). Sure, it was only for like 10 minutes, but still..that just seems wrong, especially with the heat and everything. i mean, it seems like if one made a habit to doing that on purpose, then it's no wonder it would be somewhat easier for one to unintentionally leave the child in the car.

http://www.wlwt.com/news/14049501/detail.html

[Panda1]

I think it's important to know the reasons why parents forget their children in the car so we can find a solution. However, I also agree with some posters there should be charges filed. No it doesn't bring the baby back but there are consequences for people's actions. A baby or animal is at the mercy of their caretakers...they don't have a choice. The caretaker chose to have a baby or pet.

[kroquet]

I can't get over the fact that she had been warned before and still did it.

[Panda1]

Really??? OMG

Originally Posted by kroquet

I can't get over the fact that she had been warned before and still did it.

[kroquet]

^^It's in the link that Sweetnet posted. I was totally shocked!

[nataliam1976]

Originally Posted by kroquet

I can't get over the fact that she had been warned before and still did it.

I wonder if Oprah brings it up. In this case I have no compassion whatsoever for that woman, how DUMB or ignorant do you have to be?

This just makes my blood boil . From the link above:

"A police report showed the Symmes Township woman had left Cecilia Slaby in a car on at least three occasions, including an incident when she was left unattended for 10 minutes two days prior to the girl’s death.

Tara Phillips, a teacher at Compass School in Mason, told police that Nesslroad-Slaby asked her 5-year-old daughter to hurry up during an Aug. 21 visit to the school because “the baby was in the car.”

Phillips told police that the older girl asked to stay and watch part of a play she was participating in, and both she and her mother stayed inside the building for 10 more minutes.

“Mom didn’t go to check on the baby,” investigators said in their report.

Police said school officials had cautioned the Slaby family about leaving their children alone inside vehicles after parents alerted them to the situation."

[HauteMama]

^That is absolutely unforgivable. She was setting herself up for forgetting that child. Any time (and I mean ANY TIME) a parent leaves a vehicle, that baby needs to come with them, whether it means paying inside at a gas station or running inside the post office to mail a letter. Leaving a child unattended in a car is illegal for a reason. This is equivalent of being warned for reckless or dangerous driving, and then doing it again and killing someone, and this particular woman ought to be locked up. Leaving her baby alone in the vehicle was, at least sometimes, intentional; who is to say whether it was intentional on the day the baby died or not?

[kroquet]

I can sympathise with many of the parents, but not this time. She had been warned a couple of days prior and knew better. This is the one that had also gone to her car a couple of different times during the day and had gotten the donuts out of the back of the SUV. I do have Oprah set to record.

[rainrowan]

omg. This mother went back to the car 5 TIMES that day and did not notice her baby in its car seat? There's something fishy about that. I think the mother is assigning blame to everyone (her daughter's play, donuts, husband, work) but it sounds more like she was using the car as some kind of babysitting device. How can she not notice there is a human being inside the car? Didn't she have to look in rear view mirror to drive/park in the new location?

[sweetneet]

Originally Posted by kroquet

I can sympathise with many of the parents, but not this time. She had been warned a couple of days prior and knew better. This is the one that had also gone to her car a couple of different times during the day and had gotten the donuts out of the back of the SUV. I do have Oprah set to record.

yeah, i'm gonna tivo it too. i am interested to hear what she has to say. in the oprah website posted it summarizes the interview and it mentions that she does admit on the show that there were times where she purposely left her child in the car while the engine was running, but she "didn't make a habit of it". nevertheless, even with the engine running (and a/c on, i imagine) it's still really dangerous to leave a baby in the car IMO...i mean any random person could have gotten in her car and harmed her child.

and i guess this case is an example of what dallas and others were trying to say about this whole thing about wanting to "have it all"..it does seem like these days a lot of moms are obsessed with trying to be the perfect mom as well as the perfect employee and that is a big reason why so many mothers get so overwhelmed & stressed these days to the point of forgetting what's most important (their children). sure, every parent has stress in their lives, i'm sure everyone struggles at some point with balancing work/family and paying the bills etc..but for a growing number of people there is this additional stress of wanting to be "super mom" (or "super dad") and wanting to do everything perfect (make perfect dinners, have the house in perfect order, volunteer at all their children's activities, head this other committee at work, etc). it does sound like this mom (Brenda Slaby) was getting very distracted with trying to make things perfect for work that day (e.g. bring donuts in). i mean on the website she even admitted she was the kind of person who "tried her best to be super mom" and that she had always strived to be "the perfect employee". and while i'm not saying that is necessarily bad or wrong, i'm saying all this added stress is what tends to interfere with minding the safety of one's children. i think this is what this mom is trying to warn other mothers about by going on Oprah:

Brenda says the lesson she learned that she wants to pass on to other moms is to slow down—don't become overwhelmed with perfection. "I've learned to say a lot, 'It just doesn't matter,'" she says. "The house doesn't matter, the perfect dinner doesn't matter—the kids matter."

-from http://www.oprah.com/slideshow/oprah...02_tows_moms/8

[kroquet]

YOu are so right, but she is a little late, eh??

[missisa07]

I'm not a mother, but my mom had a crazy schedule when I was a baby. She was always driving around everywhere with me safely in the backseat, and even with her hectic life, she says she can not even begin to fathom forgetting me in the car, even for a few seconds.

Yes, it's sad that the parents "forgot", but that doesn't make it okay. The child still died. What if parents just decide they don't want their kids anymore and leave them in the car to take care of the "problem". Then what, they don't get pressed charges because it was a tragic accident? I highly disagree with that. It sets a wrong example.