This story of a 5-year-old who wandered away from home is going viral today for a wonderful reason: The cops did not arrest the parents!
In Jacksonville, Florida, a 5-year-old named William managed to leave his family’s home and fully fenced-in yard one recent morning and walk over to the local Chick-fil-A. Alone!
Whereupon the employees couldn’t help but notice he seemed younger than your average solo customer. They called the cops while feeding the boy what must’ve been a delicious breakfast: Freedom!
When Patrol Officers Perri and Kelly arrived on the scene, they were kind to the kid. Where did he live? “It’s right across the street, right over there!” the boy replied, waving vaguely. So they put him in the cruiser – prompting the kid to ask (understandably), “Are you going to get me in jail?”
Nobody’s going to jail.
“No, I’m not going to put you in jail!” was, thank God, the response. The cops proceeded to drive William around the neighborhood asking if he recognized his home and then – he did!
If the cops rang my bell and told me they had my kid, I’d have a heart attack. But these guys couldn’t ring the bell – it wasn’t working. So one of them actually hopped the fence (that is a graceful phrase for what he did) and alerted the parents.
When they came down, Phil and Victoria were not clapped into handcuffs as this Georgia mom was when her son, 10, did the same thing – walked off without her knowing it. Nor were they handcuffed like this Texas mom, who had her son, age 8, walk half a mile in their suburban neighborhood after he misbehaved in the car.
Empathy abounding.
Instead, the cops and parents marveled together at how wily kids can be, and how scary it can feel when your kid goes missing. And later on, the family, the cops and the Chick-fil-A employees had a little celebration, complete with high fives.
There are a couple morals of this Jacksonville story:
- Kids will always be kids. To arrest parents simply because they don’t know where their children are every single second of the day means arresting parents for being humans who are raising younger humans.
- It’s only fair to celebrate the good, not just the bad. God knows I sound the alarm when cops go overboard on parents. When they do the opposite – proceed with common sense and kindness — it makes sense to spread the word, too. They are role models!
- Florida just became the 11th state where Let Grow (the nonprofit I helm) helped pass a Reasonable Childhood Independence law. It clarifies that “neglect” is when you put your child in obvious, serious danger – not anytime you take your eyes off them. When I asked the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office Spokesman Christian Hancock if our law was the reason the cops did not arrest the parents, he said it was simpler than that: “These parents didn’t do anything wrong.“
Amen! And, finally:
- Chick-fil-A is fast becoming Woodstock for a generation of freedom-seeking kids under 10. This video went viral earlier this year when Utah mom Stephanie Read let her son, 7, go into a Chick-fil-A and order for himself. She’d just read The Anxious Generation by my Let Grow co-founder Jonathan Haidt. His book recommends giving kids more independence in the real world. The mom was worried and teary while she waited for her son to emerge with their lunch, but ultimately they were both elated by his adventure.
Let’s hear it for the power of a chicken sandwich! And for re-normalizing/de-criminalizing the fact that kids can do a whole of things – with or sometimes without their parents’ permission – on their own.