GUILTY AZ - Shanesha Taylor leaves kids in car during interview, Scottsdale, 2014

A 35 year old Phoenix woman left her 6 month old baby and 2 year old alone in a car with keys in the ignition while she interviewed at an insurance company for a job. Temps inside the car were over 100 degrees. The woman was arrested and charged with child endangerment. The public has demonstrated sympathy for the woman, and donated $90,000 to her defense fund.

What do you think about this situation? Should this mother be cut some slack for her neglect since she was at a job interview? Or is this just as bad as someone who leaves kids in a car and goes to a store or a bar?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/28/shanesha-taylor-homeless-mom-arrested_n_5050356.html

Shanesha Taylor was arrested on felony child abuse charges after Scottsdale police discovered her two kids, aged 2 years old and 6 months old, in a locked car.

Scottsdale police responded after a witness reported a child crying from inside a Dodge Durango parked at an office complex on March 20. Police said that two children were left alone in the car with the engine off and the windows slightly cracked. The car was left parked in the sun and all the doors were closed.

AZFamily reports that the kids had already been in the car for 30 minutes when police arrived. Police said 35-year-old Taylor returned from her job interview about 45 minutes after officers came to the scene. She said she didn't have anyone else to care for the kids while she was on an interview at an insurance company.

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http://news.msn.com/crime-justice/phoenix-mom-facing-abuse-charges-gaining-support

The case has attracted considerable attention on the Internet as a fundraising site created by a New Jersey woman for Taylor has amassed nearly $90,000. Taylor's tearful police mugshot, the danger she put her children in, and her dilemma of trying to juggle a lack of child care with her job pursuit all have contributed to the debate.

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http://www.thefrisky.com/2014-03-31...aving-two-kids-in-car-during-a-job-interview/

http://www.theepochtimes.com/n3/607...ldren-in-car-for-job-interview-gains-support/

How much money would those people have donated if the kids were dead?

Well she would have been roundly criticized if she stayed home with the kids and they all got government benefits.

I could just smack NG upside her head some days. I saw this covered by her and I kept thinking

this is the woman who would normally be vilifying this mother but saw a chance to jump controversial bandwagon. MOO

I applaud this lady for trying to find work. As a mom, with bills to pay, I totally get it. What I have not sen answered or even asked anywhere for that matter, is why she could find no one else to watch them? And what was she going to do about childcare if she was offered the job and asked to start the following monday? Would she have made a good decision or a bad one in that circumstance? We have only this one to go by . . . but if it had worked out this time . . . ?

just whats rattling around my bean.

What difference does it make for the kids if she went to the job interview or not?
There was a case not so long where woman left kids in the car because she had to go to work. The kids did die.
I mean, how does it make it any better that she went for an interview if her kids are overheating in the car?
What was she going to do with them if she did get the job?

MissJ said:

Well she would have been roundly criticized if she stayed home with the kids and they all got government benefits.

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Now she can get government benefits & the 90k all those fools gave her.

I have no kind words or kind thoughts for what this woman did, and I also strongly suspect that this wasn't the first time she left the kids alone. I agree with others-- what was her plan if she got the job and had to start right away?

I do think she had options and choices. If she had walked into ANY church, hospital, police station, or fire department and asked for some advice on where to turn for help, they would have helped her connect with some agency that could have helped. We don't know what efforts she made to find childcare, but clearly she stopped trying and decided that locking them in a car in the sun was the best option. That is massively bad judgment.

Because of the very young ages of the infant and toddler, I do believe she should face some jail time, followed by a lot of supervision and counseling. These kids were much more vulnerable than if they were older kids, and they could easily have suffered serious heat stroke or died.

I think for now the best place for the children is in foster care, while the mom sorts out her legal and social problems. They can work out some supervised visitation. I hope the judge can mandate at least 5 years of social services follow up and probation once she is sentenced. I also hope the judge can mandate some life skills training, and parenting classes, as a condition of getting her kids back eventually. She also needs to participate in some kind of charity or county services to help her secure a job, childcare, and stable housing.

I am absolutely appalled that anyone would donate money to this woman, or start a petition. She has a ton of problems, but rewarding her poor judgment and negligence with a windfall of cash is a really, really bad idea, IMO.

This woman may not understand this now, but the best thing that has happened to her and her kids in the last month was her getting arrested. Now all 3 of them at least have a chance to start over, with support and services. IMO.

$ 90 k ! For real ?

Clearly my broke, law abiding a$$ is doing something wrong.

Isn't there a law somewhere that prohibits criminals from profiting as a result of crime ?

When I first did a search with this woman's name, I was thoroughly astonished at the number of articles and comments justifying her actions, basically saying she "did what she had to do", that she was "desperate", and celebrating her efforts to try to "provide for her kids." Celebrating what a "good mother" she is. No kidding, as I read more, my jaw just dropped lower and lower. And I became more and more confused. I figured I was the only one on the internet who agreed with the arresting officer and prosecutor. Everyone else seems to think what she did is just fine, since the kids are ok, and she didn't INTEND to hurt them, AND she was trying to get a job. All that makes it ok?! Really? I'm just dumbfounded. There are petitions to have the charges dropped!

Why does this woman get a "pass" for her serious negligence with a very young infant, and a toddler? Why don't the babies matter? Why are so many people so eager to justify and explain away what she did to 2 babies? Why are so many people pouring in donations? Just because she is single, homeless, and unemployed? Plenty of young women are in the same situation.

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[modsnip]

What is going on here with the public, IMO, is just surreal. The babies were left in a horribly dangerous, and vulnerable situation, purely for the convenience of the woman. Stealing bread to feed a starving child is desperation. She didn't leave them alone in the car while she dragged her dying self into a hospital-- that would be desperation. Leaving her babies in a hot car for a job interview is just not a demonstration of "desperation." It's just not justifiable in this circumstance. IMO. I hope she is BOTH punished appropriately, and helped to improve her situation for the sake of herself, and to get her kids back. And supervised for a long, long time-- at least 5 years, or more.

Is no one responsible for their actions anymore? That's a serious question. I'm just dumbfounded.

I've lived in AZ for 40 plus years, once removed, FL. You can't leave anyone or any animal in a vehicle for that long, especially with it being two young children. Vehicles can reach outrageous temps. Shaking my head no. jmo

And it doesn't have to be all that hot outside for children to overheat and die. Temperature can get much higher inside the car.
Here is the article about the woman I mentioned before, who left her children in the car to go to work. Both children died. High temperature was only 76.
http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/local/henrico/article_a7f449fb-48f3-5221-b1eb-e0b6204ccf45.html

I think those that support her actions are most likely the types that would do it to their own kids. Sorry but what she did was very wrong and could have been deadly for her babies. It is a scarey time to be a baby or child in this world IMO. How anyone could defend her actions is beyond me.If she was hired most likely those kids would have been left alone again. Mothers who leave babies and small children alone in a hot car are a danger to their children.Sometimes I feel like we are living in a world gone backwards when people defend actions like these. [modsnip]. I have never seen fund raisers for something like this before and I find it offensive.

ETA I feel like starting a petition for the money raised to be given back to the donors instead of this irresponsible mothers pockets.

Dr. Know? said:

I've lived in AZ for 40 plus years, once removed, FL. You can't leave anyone or any animal in a vehicle for that long, especially with it being two young children. Vehicles can reach outrageous temps. Shaking my head no. jmo

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I live in Scottsdale now, including the past two weeks. It's been unseasonably "cool." Temps in a parked car in an hour were not deadly. For me, it's all about intent. I'm glad she was looking for a way to support her kids instead of leaving them in the car for other popular reasons.

jmo

90K ,Wow. I hope that does not encourage people to leave babies in their car.

Karmady said:

I live in Scottsdale now, including the past two weeks. It's been unseasonably "cool." Temps in a parked car in an hour were not deadly. For me, it's all about intent. I'm glad she was looking for a way to support her kids instead of leaving them in the car for other popular reasons.

jmo

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It doesn't have to be very hot outside for inside the car to get hot. Her reason for leaving kids inside the car makes no difference if her kids are overheating inside the car. They could have died just the same.

The bigger picture here is we have a huge population of single mothers who are utterly and completely alone with no help whatsoever.

That's a crisis for our society. Mothers need husbands and grandmothers and next door neighbors and sisters and brothers and cousins and best friends. This complete isolation that many single mothers with more than one child are enduring is unendurable.

Where is the father(s) of these two little babies? I'd like to see him (them) charged with leaving the kids in the hot car also. Because they weren't there either. What they've done, in my opinion, is worse than what this mother has done.

I don't know why women who are unable to adequately take care of a child by themselves are vilified worse than the fathers who don't even attempt to help. It's their job to help - it's the way humans were made. We need a mother AND a father.

If you see a mother cardinal bird struggling mightily and losing the battle to raise a nest of chicks and the dad is chirping merrily away all by himself in another tree doing nothing whatsoever to help, you certainly wouldn't blame the poor struggling mother bird. It's he who has failed, not her.

A while ago I was at a gas station and a beater car pulled up next to me and a woman got out, put about $5 worth of gas in the tank. Inside the car was a tiny newborn infant with a hospital band on its arm, and the woman had one on her arm. She looked like hell. She had given birth and there was no one at all to take her home from the hospital. There were no flowers, no balloons, no one to pick her up and help her out. Inside was the hospital gift bag with little freebie goodies next to the baby on the car seat. That is about the saddest thing I've ever seen.

JeannaT said:

The bigger picture here is we have a huge population of single mothers who are utterly and completely alone with no help whatsoever.

That's a crisis for our society. Mothers need husbands and grandmothers and next door neighbors and sisters and brothers and cousins and best friends. This complete isolation that many single mothers with more than one child are enduring is unendurable.

Where is the father(s) of these two little babies? I'd like to see him (them) charged with leaving the kids in the hot car also. Because they weren't there either. What they've done, in my opinion, is worse than what this mother has done.

I don't know why women who are unable to adequately take care of a child by themselves are vilified worse than the fathers who don't even attempt to help. It's their job to help - it's the way humans were made. We need a mother AND a father.

If you see a mother cardinal bird struggling mightily and losing the battle to raise a nest of chicks and the dad is chirping merrily away all by himself in another tree doing nothing whatsoever to help, you certainly wouldn't blame the poor struggling mother bird. It's he who has failed, not her.

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You know nothing about the father. He may have been at work or he may not have even known.....there are many things men and women can do to stop pregnancy. ..the children were in her care and she left them in the car.

He didn't fail she did.



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shygrl said:

You know nothing about the father. He may have been at work or he may not have even known.....there are many things men and women can do to stop pregnancy. ..the children were in her care and she left them in the car.

He didn't fail she did.



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What do you know about the father?

What I know is she is homeless and alone. That kind of tells me what I need to know about the father(s). How can you say he didn't fail, that she did? If he's not doing anything at all to help raise his kids, he failed worse than she did.

JeannaT said:

What do you know about the father?

What I know is she is homeless and alone. That kind of tells me what I need to know about the father(s). How can you say he didn't fail, that she did? If he's not doing anything at all to help raise his kids, he failed worse than she did.

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It's kind of a pointless discussion. You can't charge father (or fathers) for leaving kids in the car because him (or them) were not there.
That's based on our laws.

shygrl said:

You know nothing about the father. He may have been at work or he may not have even known.....there are many things men and women can do to stop pregnancy. ..the children were in her care and she left them in the car.

He didn't fail she did.



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I disagree. This woman was homeless and left with two babies. Maybe the fathers should be charged with child abandonment. If there was a father in the picture then why didn't he open up his home for his kids. Its to off ten fathers bail out on the mother and the mother is left trying to work get a home welll taking care of the kids.
The father now is in the clear yet he had offered no support. And yes there is ways to stop pregnancy but its a two way street and it takes two create a child.

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