Background:
One of our neighbours is a single mother with two kids living with her. The two kids are a girl aged six and a boy aged four. I have never spoken to the mother and barely seen her. (For clarity, we will call the mother Susie, the six-year old Jill, and the four-year-old Johnny - names changed to protect the innocent.) Jill and Johnny run around the neighbourhood in the evenings until it’s late, with Susie nowhere to be seen. One of our other neighbours further down the street (also a mother with two children - let’s call her Cindy) once called the police when Jill and John were still playing outside after dark and Susie was presumably somewhere inside the house. I thought Cindy should have just banged on Susie’s door but she wanted to make more of an impression and so called the police - Cindy said she was tired of feeling like she needed to keep an eye on Jill and John. This happened several months ago. BTW I also have two children aged five (almost six) and two and a half.
Last week-end a big U-Haul moving truck was outside Susie’s door all Sunday so I assumed that they were moving. Sunday night / Monday morning at 2:00 AM I hear a child crying in the street. (This is a Southern California housing tract where houses are within spitting distance of each other.) I look out our second-story bedroom window and see a car nearby with the inside light on so I figure someone came home late and the child woke up. But 10 minutes later I hear again some child screaming “Mommy! Mommy!” I can’t see anything through the window so I go out on the sidewalk to verify. I see Johnny on the sidewalk crying out for his Mommy. Then Jill comes out of the house and says that her mother left at midnight with the moving truck and isn’t back yet. At the same time a young couple from the house on the other side come out and we confer. The young couple (new to the neighbourhood - I had never met them yet) said that they thought they had seen an older girl around today. I start questioning Jill who answers a lot of questions with “I don’t know” but the short answer is that she doesn’t know where to reach her Mommy but her sister is in the house. Her sister is older but Jill doesn’t know the sister’s age. Is your sister a lot older then you? I don’t know. Is she in high school? 6th grade? I don’t know. I ask her if she can go get her sister and Jill wanders in and comes out after 30 seconds by herself. We are standing in front of Jill’s house, the front door is open, the lights are on so I can see in the hallway. I’ve never been in Jill’s house before. My first reaction is that Susie probably has a teenager staying with the kids and I should just barge in there and wake that lazy young girl up. The neighbours are saying we should call the police. I’m thinking that this is probably going to be a waste of a policeman’s time.
Q: What would you have done? Gone inside the house to check or call the police? Pros to calling the police: There is less of a chance that I will be eaten alive by a zombie hiding inside the neigbour’s house. Cons: Why should I need to call the police for every little thing that happens in the neighbourhood? I’m sure they have bigger fish to fry.
You can skip the rest since it’s not relevant to the question, but here’s how it ended.
I go to get my cellphone, confirm again with Jill that she doesn’t have a phone number for her mother, and call 911. Eventually a police car shows up while the neighbours, Jill, Johnny and I are standing in front of the house. (I tried to talk to Johnny but he doesn’t say a word - he stopped shouting for Mommy when the adults showed up.) The police officer tells Jill to go get her sister and tries to talk to Johnny but Johnny still doesn’t say a word. Jill again comes out by herself. The police officer goes in the house (I hear him shouting “Police! Anyone home?”) and after a couple of minutes comes out and waits. After another few minutes a 17-year-old girl wanders out.
Policeman: Who are you? How old are you?
17-year-old: Their sister. 17 years old.
Policeman: Why are Jill and Johnny wandering outside by themselves?
17-year-old: I don’t know.
Policeman: Where’s your Mom?
17-year-old: They’re with the moving truck at the new house in (next town.)
Policeman: Can you call her? (17-year-old has a cell phone in her hand.)
17-year-old: (looks at her phone) No, their phone is turned off. (How can she tell this just by looking at her phone? Those young 'uns sure do understand technology better than I.)
Policeman: What about your dad? Does he have a cell phone?
17-year-old: My dad or (indicating Jill and Johnny) their dad?
Policeman: Which one is with your mother right now?
17-year-old: Neither.
Policeman: Is there someone with your mother right now?
17-year-old: Yes.
Policeman: Who?
17-year-old: Her boyfriend.
Policeman: What’s his name?
17-year-old: Biff.
Policeman: His last name?
17-year-old: I don’t know.
( I am thinking of telling the policeman that this is starting to sound like a comedy routine but from his scowl I figure maybe now is not the time to point out the humour in the situation.)
I’ll skip the part where the 17-year-old knows her Mom’s name but doesn’t remember her Mom’s birthdate or exactly how old her Mom is.
Policeman: (not in a good mood) So tell me, can you think of a reason why I shouldn’t call Social Services right now seeing as how your brother and sister are wandering the street in the middle of the night?
17-year-old: (shrugs) I don’t know.
Policeman: (he’s red in the face by now) OK here’s what you’re going to do. You’re going to take your brother and sister into the house and you’re going to sleep in the same room with them and you’re going to lock the door so that they don’t wander out and you’re going to try to show that you care a little bit about your brother and sister and you’re going to have your mother call me tomorrow… (added indignation omitted for the sake of brevity)
Kids go back in and policeman is muttering “Unbelievable. Unbelievable.” He emphasizes with us (the neighbours and I) to be sure and call him if we hear anything else in the night but he didn’t want to have to send the kids to social services if he didn’t absolutely have to. I go home. Of course my wife has slept through the whole thing - and then she accuses me of being impossible to wake up!
The next day I saw the mother, boyfriend, Jill and Johnny leaving in her car. I was going to stop her to tell her (in case she didn’t know) that the police came by but there were gone before I had the chance to.