Tinley Park mom leaves child in car — endangerment?

Sammy, your digging yourself a deeper hole to get out of. Apparently everyone in this chat disagrees with you. Maybe your ‘ideologies’ need some shaping up. I for one would have put all my groceries and children in the car, get-in the car, drive up to the charity ringer, and pay him there. That would be safer, but sometimes taking the safe trail is always the long trail. Make your life easier and do things logically. Don’t live a life that would make you think that the ‘boogey-man’ is just around the corner. Sammy, if you are a supposed teacher or what not, you horrifically remind me of my English teacher who was clearly paranoid; taken she was a hotshot liberal, airhead. She wanted guns to be banned entirely… Anyways, I hope the mother tangled in this lawless, pointless trial gets away free; she really doesn’t deserve this. Sammy, quit being melodramatic.

This whole thing is such a waste. The taxpayers have to pay for the legal authorities employee salaries. Time is wasted on this matter instead of other more important issues. The poor woman and her family have to waste precious time and enormous amounts of monies defending themselves. It’s really ashame and insane! I lived right next to this suburb once. I thought it was a nice community. I hope I never have to go back there again! I hope this family gets recompensated and apologized to publically. I am really thinking about this issue alot because as a mom of three, I have three pick ups and three drop offs a day for school and I almost every day have to leave one or more in the car for a few minutes to get my kid in the door somewhere. The grocery store is a great example cited here alot. I rarely shop with all three anymore because it is so difficult with the cart and parking lot and all. If the law makers want to impose all these laws on us then there should be things set in place to make it easier for parents. Like make all parking spots near the doors only for cars with children and handicapped. We sometimes see pregnant women spaces. What about the moms with all the kids. Or, make easier “kiss and go” drop offs at all schools. Governmental bodies in the communities might help create neighborhood groups for mom support to help with parenting issue or even a quick babysitting stint. Group shopping. Many more creative solutions could be made and executed. If the authorities want to make it safer, well help put some systems in place for us. These type of power hungry aggressive cops make us fear government that is supposed to work to help us. They don’t want to protect or help us with the kids, they want to push their weight around and forget about us. As I said this issue is really close to me! I am glad to hear just now that the charges will be dropped against this woman. Thank God. The police still say she was at fault as she couldn’t see her car and that it takes just a minute for someone to steal a car. These cops need to recheck the laws they are upholding and get it straight. I think the law even says 15 minutes is OK, not five as I had said earlier. I just rechecked. I’m really fuming over this!

Kind of a double standard there, eh James?

When it comes to my kids, safe will always trump logic. Especially when its something as simple as taking them out of the car.

Valerie says: If your reasoning could be reality then no medical personnel should leave a child alone in a hospital room. - Well what does a hospital do? They mitigate the risk by having monitors and regular checks…again, you do what you can to reduce the risk.

She also says: No parent should allow their child to sleep in its own room. -baby monitors to monitor your kids.

And, NO child should be allowed to play outside while dad does the dishes - My yard has a fence.

And, What if you have a swimming pool? -fence around the pool and wave/pool monitor.

Seatbelts in a car? Mitigate the risk of injury when in a wreck…I can go on with the examples listed above, but whats the point.

Everyone seems to think this is ok, maybe thats the problem with america.

Is there a differnce between leaving a kid in a running car…sure. Or going INTO the store and not keeping the car insight, of course.

But at the end of the day, my kid is the most important thing to me and I will do what I can to keep him safe, as I know all you would do to.

The way we do it differs, the world takes all types right?

And for the record, I’m not a teacher, I am not parinoid, youngness is relative, and I love my kid!

I feel sorry for the dog!

Well sam, i beleive your last comments are coming around to the correct way of thinking at least the majority of the bloggers, and for the record my wife was 19 and i wasnt the father, but your comment about TN is a young typical uneducated comment but i expected that. We do have some fine schools across this state also. Your the one that made it personal not I and as you and your kids grow and you find yourself in the shopping cart situation i want you to remember Big Orange. This country has problems but most are politicians with your line of thinking

My thoughts are with this mother while this “trial” goes on. Why is this mother being prosecuted? There have been more than one case in the city where I live where a child actually died from being left in the parents car, and NOTHING was done to these parents. They just claimed it was an accident and they were let off scott free. I can only hope that she has a judge that can see what a crock this case is and lets this mother get back to her family without a label of being a child abuser. Th police should use some of their time prosecuting real child abusers and save some actual lives

It really is sad when a police officer fails to utilize good discretion when enforcing the law. From what I have read in this story, it appears that the mother was not far from the vehicle which is greatly different than if she left the child in the car and walked into the store. Just because you are out of the car, standing curbside does not qualify as “abandonment.” If that is the case, I guess you abandon the child after you secure them into their car seat because you have to walk around the outside of your vehicle to go to the driver’s seat.

If the story is accurate, the charges are absurd and I would hope the court would see it this way. Now I feel obligated to address the wonderful response posted by Samara. If you truly were a law enforcement officer for 8 years, I am ashamed to be associated with someone of your unprofessional nature. I would like to believe an officer or former officer could construct a well thought out posting using proper sentence construction and proper language to make a point. Insted, you have chosen to utilize foul language combined with rants of anger. It is a good thing for the rest of us cops that you are no longer on the job. It is people like you that give the rest of the good cops a bad reputation. Why did you leave law enforcement? I bet you were fired. Well if not, it does not matter anyway, because I am glad you are gone regardless of the reasons.

Boy, I’m counting my lucky stars as I could be in the same boat as Treffly. Bad timing for her. Guess what folks? This is fact: “In Illinois, parents who leave a child unattended in a car for 10 minutes can be charged with misdemeanor child endangerment, which carries a penalty of up to a year in jail and a $2,500 fine.”

Ten minutes! That’s a long time, but it’s legal. I’ve never left my kids or grandkids alone for 10 minutes but I have left them for about one minute (did it recently while dropping off mail).

I haven’t read anything that says she left her little one alone for more than 10 minutes. Which is why they are throwing this charge out.

Unfortunately, much damage has already been done; the arrest those kids will never forget, the DCFS visit and being on their list, the notoriety. I’d love to be in the courtroom but I’m sure it will be a circus.

I’m so glad that the prosecution has dropped these charges against her. This puts the fear in most mom’s out there! While I do my best to take my kids with me inside everywhere I go, I have to admit, the one place I leave them in the car is when I’m returning library books. Less than a minute to run to the drop box and back. I don’t leave the keys in the car, I arm the alarm, my kids are safe.

That being said, I’m the worst person at the grocery store about returning carts to their special location. I only return carts if I’m parked RIGHT next to the cart return. You can say I’m paranoid, I’ll proudly admit it. But I’ve been through alot in the past 2 years, first being robbed at gunpoint (I had my 2 kids with me, and was 5 month pregnant with my 3rd) and then being victimized by crazed county employees.

So on some points, I can totally see where Sam is coming from. But at the same time, Treffly did nothing wrong! Her car was off, the alarm was set, emergency lights flashing, and she was mere feet away… according to Illinois law, she didn’t leave her unattended. It states that a child under 6, out of eyesight for 10 minutes or more, in being left unattended. All we have here is some overly zealous people, who have probably seen bad things happen, and went overboard. A verbal warning was all that was necessary here. I’m glad the prosecutor (while waiting until the last moment) did the right thing. And I’m doubtful (but yet hopeful) that the police will apologize to this woman, not just for what they did to her, but to her children as well.