Gardenia Zakrzewski Johansson was arrested after she took her dog into Nieman Marcus in Scottsdale, AZ, but left her 2-year-old son in the car.
She had asked valet Quest Wolfe to keep an eye on her son, who was sleeping in the 2002 BMW with blackout windows. Wolfe's fellow valet, Tyler Gocken, called his mom to see if it wasn't wrong to leave a kid sleeping in the car. His mom was all, "Duh, yeah! Call security!"
Besides being a deep vein for the DT Namewatch to mine, this story is a great read, full of lines you'll read out loud to someone, only to find yourself reading the whole thing.
There is a silver lining, though, knowing that Mrs. Gocken raised her son right.
Police: Mom takes dog, leaves kid in car at mall [eastvalleytribune.com via dt reader ponch]
So how much do Montessori teachers in Scottsdale earn that she can afford to shop at Needless Markup and drive a BMW? Any why oh why, didn't the article say what breed of dog it was?
This is a woman who takes her holiday shopping very, very serious.
More importantly, I think the name "Quest Wolfe" needs to be added to the baby name watch list (Valet Edition).
So, on this topic, I have had many conversations with parents of older children (5 and up) regarding this "When can I leave the kid to run in and grab a soda at the quickie mart while filling up the gas tank?"
I still fall down on the "I'm not leaving my crazy kid in that car alone EVER!" But I think it is a good question, in this age of never leaving kids alone, when do you start giving them a bit of freedom? I mean at the rate we're going we might need to hire babysitters for our 16 year olds?
-Oh, and I haven't read the article about the crazy dog woman so this comment in NO way reflects on what that paticular mom did.