Stressed Mother Arrested for Leaving 4-Year-Old Child in Car
As California’s weather goes, it has been relatively cool lately. It’s still early spring, so temperatures have not climbed to the 90s, or even 100s, as they can in the late summer. Yesterday it was about 72°F in Laguna Hills, where Jessica Marie Taylor, 39, was arrested for leaving her four-year-old child unattended in the car.
Taylor was arrested on suspicion of felony child endangerment, and said through her lawyer yesterday that her child had been sick and vomited on herself. Sources say that she did not feel that it was right to take her obviously sick child into the mall to buy her clothes to replace the soiled ones, so Taylor left her in the car.
The call to police was made at 11:15 a.m. by a concerned citizen, who noticed the child unattended in the Sears parking lot, in a Saturn Ion with the windows rolled up and in full sun, according to Laguna Hills Chief of Police Services Lt. Tom Behrens. The caller said that the child had been in the car for 10 minutes, and Taylor did not return to the car until 15 minutes after the police arrived at the scene. They managed to convince the child to unlock the car, otherwise they would have broken a window to release her from the car.
Authorities are not commenting on whether or not the child had vomit on her clothing or whether or not Taylor had new clothes for her daughter when she returned to the car. She was released on $100,000 bail on Tuesday.
Her attorney, Fred Thiagarajah, said the situation might reflect poor parenting, but it does not rise to the level of felony criminal conduct.
“I’m not condoning this activity, but the charge of felony child endangerment for these specific circumstances is over the top,” he said, adding that if Taylor could turn back the clock, she would, according to the Orange County Register.
What do you think? Did the mother panic and run to the store to get replacement clothing instead of home to put her daughter to bed? Did she assume that her child was just reacting to something she ate, and wasn’t sick with something like stomach flu? Most parents know that there are days you don’t make the best decisions-do you think this is what happened to Taylor? Do you think the officers acted too rashly? Or do you think she was negligent as a parent and the charge of felony child endangerment was appropriate and justified?
At the Law Offices of Glew & Kim, we see all clients as innocent until proven guilty, and believe in equal justice for all. If you or someone you know has been involved in a crime and needs honest, unbiased defense, please call us immediately on 714-713-4525 or use our online form for a free case analysis.
*This is not an attorney-client communication, and as such no advice is being offered in this article. Any and all communications related to the Glew & Kim website should be deemed and considered advertisement. This article is purely opinion, and the basis of this and any opinion was formed subject to the reporting by the actual news agencies, the information from with was used as source material.
This is not an attorney-client communication, and as such no advice is being offered in this article. Any and all communications related to the Glew & Kim Law website should be deemed and considered advertisement. This article is purely opinion, and the basis of this and any opinion was formed subject to the reporting by the actual news agencies, the information from which was used as source material.
