Thread: NC-Immigrant's arrest strands children on NC highway

Immigrant's arrest strands children on NC highway
The Associated Press

RALEIGH, N.C. --An advocacy group is questioning whether police acted properly when they left three children in a car with a family acquaintance after arresting their mother along Interstate 85.

The News & Observer of Raleigh reported Wednesday that an Alamance County deputy sheriff stopped Maria Chavira Ventura about 2 a.m. on June 14. She was traveling from her home in western North Carolina to Maryland to visit the children's father.

She was jailed on charges of driving without a license and displaying a false license plate. Authorities also put her under a federal deportation order.

The North Carolina Justice Center said a man from Ventura's church was riding with the family. Fearing arrest, he fled and left the children in the car. The children - ages 6, 10 and 14 - were left alone in the car for eight hours until their father, who had to travel from Maryland, was able to get there.

Alamance County Sheriff's Office spokesman Randy Jones said the arrest was handled under established procedures.

Jones said children of people arrested often are left with friends or neighbors as long as the parent approves. Otherwise, officers call the Department of Social Services.

"We make arrangements all the time, and we have to do it on a case-by-case basis," Jones said. "We're not going to let something happen to a child."

Jones also said the department hadn't received a complaint about the handling of the case and wasn't aware until recently that the children were left alone. He said it was the man's responsibility if the children were abandoned.

The deputy said the man, who didn't have identification, had a cell phone and said help was coming for the children, Jones said. The officer asked the teenage daughter to ask her mother, who spoke little English, if the children could stay with the man.

"The girl said something to the mother in Spanish," Jones said. "And the officer said the mother looked at him and nodded."

But Justice Center lawyer Dan Rearick said Ventura and her daughter told him on July 9 the officer didn't seek permission to leave the children with the man. The man fled because he was worried that an officer would return and he might be deported.

The children's father, Antonio Perez, said his sobbing children called him after their mother was arrested. Perez doesn't have a driver's license and got a relative to drive him to North Carolina, where he found the children about 10:30 a.m.

"They were left abandoned there in the middle of the street," said Perez, whom the News & Observer identified as an illegal immigrant from Honduras. "It was a horrible experience for them, just horrible."
FAMILY VALUES .....
http://www.thestate.com/statewire/story/468915.html

"They were left abandoned there in the middle of the street," said Perez, whom the News & Observer identified as an illegal immigrant from Honduras. "It was a horrible experience for them, just horrible."

Horrible, just horrible that their own adult friends and family members would abandon the children. Some value system. Cowards.

All the spinning in this story makes me dizzy.

What does 'false license plate' mean? Was it stolen, expired, or perhaps "manufactured".
This woman left her kids with a friend from her church. The church friend left the kids, so now the cop gets the blame.

Sadly typical.

I don't believe for a minute that a police officer in the US would leave kids alone, the family is obviously lying.

This happened more than a month ago and they're NOW bringing this up? BS! They've been coached by the advocates, I'm sure.

I do not understand this story. It sounds like the police were trying to do this illegal invader a favor by leaving the children with this guy who was traveling with them. It sounds like that was done, but this guy (also an illegal) fled AFTER the police had departed and he had already taken custody of the children!

The cops should have arrested both the passenger and the driver and taken the children into custody until the father could pick then up. The cops should not have left those children with some guy who could not produce any identification. That's what common sense would suggest, but I do not know the policy or proceedure for such situations.

Of course, not a mention of condemnation for the illegal invader who agreed to take custody of the children and then abandoned them on the side of the highway!

Social Services should have been called to the scene.

W

Some kind of "mother" this one is, huh? Just leave her kids with whoever instead of insisting they go with her to be detained because SHE chose to break the law. They don't have any problem insisting on anything else, do they?

Such wonderful and desirable folks to break the law and then abandon kids. Just peachy.

I am wondering why the church friend did not call the church and ask someone to come stay with the kids before he abandoned them?
I agree that all should have been taken to the police station. Keep the kids until dad can come. Check legal status of the passenger with no ID to be sure he is not wanted for a serious crime.

Just goes to show you that illegal aliens can't be treated in a normal humane way, never trust them to take responsability for crime, tell the truth, take no blame. They confuse compassion with weakness.

The man (boy friend?) had no ID so the cop may be lucky that the kids ended up OK.

This will only cause more problems every time an IA gets stopped that has kids with them. The Border Patrol has let thousands go that have kids with them.

now they will get a lawyer etc.

"They were left abandoned there in the middle of the street," said Perez, whom the News & Observer identified as an illegal immigrant from Honduras. "It was a horrible experience for them, just horrible."

They werent left in "the middle of the street". They were in a car with a adult male who was a church friend of the family. The mother and teenager agreed to leave them under his supervision. He decided to run off and abandon them there because he was afraid of being deported.

Besides, whats wrong with the 2 children being cared for by the 14yr old? I was babysitting infants and children when I turned 12yrs old. And I was the most sought after babysitter in the neighborhood.