UPDATED at 6:11 p.m.: Police have charged a Bed Bath & Beyond manager who allegedly refused to help a Danville couple trying to contact police after discovering a child locked in a hot van Saturday.
Lexington police Officer Tommy Puckett said Thursday that Elizabeth A. Miller, 34, of Richmond was issued a summons for duty to report dependency, neglect and abuse, a Class B misdemeanor that carries a maximum sentence of 90 days and a maximum fine of $250.
A court date for Miller has not been set.
Miller could not be reached for comment.
First Assistant Fayette County Attorney Brian Mattone told the Herald-Leader Thursday that under the statute, everyone has the duty to report dependency, neglect and abuse of a child if they have knowledge of it. He said prosecutors thought that Miller, through witnesses, had knowledge of possible abuse or neglect. Moreover, there is language in the statute stating that “nothing should relieve their obligation to report,” Mattone said.
Miller told witnesses and Puckett Saturday that it was the company’s policy not to get involved in any activity in the parking lot.
Randy and Nancy Belcher were at the Bed, Bath & Beyond off Nicholasville Road on Saturday when Nancy Belcher noticed that there was a boy in the van parked next to their vehicle. The boy, who was wearing long sleeves and was covered with a blanket, did not respond to repeated knocks on the van’s windows, Randy Belcher said.
Because of where the van was parked, the Belchers thought that the parent was probably in Bed Bath & Beyond.
The Belchers went into the housewares store and were referred to Miller, who told the Belchers that it was against store policy to get involved with anything happening in the store’s parking lot, Randy Belcher said. The Belchers said Miller would not let them use the phone or make an announcement over the store’s public-address system to alert the mother or parent that the child was in distress. The Belchers then returned to their vehicle — where their cell phone was locked inside — and called police. Others in the parking lot had also called police.
Police were able to remove Ryan Patel, 3, from the van by breaking the window. He was treated at the scene for dehydration. His mother, Tanuja Patel, was arrested and charged with first-degree wanton endangerment. She pleaded not guilty Monday.
Patel’s lawyer has said the mother thought the car was running when she left the toddler in the car.
A spokesman for Bed Bath & Beyond told the Herald-Leader on Monday that there is not a store policy banning employees from helping someone in its parking lots, and that the national chain was disappointed that the situation was not handled properly.
But it appears that Miller was not the only employee who thought store policy was not to call police. Debbie Price said she was shopping at the Bed Bath & Beyond store in Hamburg Pavilion last August when she was told something similar by a Bed Bath & Beyond employee. Price said Thursday that she had seen a dog — a small terrier mix — inside a car in the parking lot. The dog was lethargic and failed to respond to taps on the window, she said. Price said she went inside and asked a Bed Bath & Beyond employee whether she could use the phone to call police, and the employee told her that it was against store policy to get involved or call police.
“She was very apologetic about it,” Price recalled.
Price said that by the time she got out to the parking lot, the car’s owner was on her way to her vehicle.
Officials with Bed Bath & Beyond did not respond to e-mail and phone requests Thursday seeking comment.
Hank Reinhart, a vice president at Bed Bath & Beyond, said Monday, after repeated questions about the store’s policy regarding its parking lots, that there was no policy that would prevent store managers from helping someone in distress. Reinhart said the store was retraining its employees after what happened Saturday.
Mattone said Thursday that the county attorney’s office has researched the failure-to-report law extensively since Saturday. He said other states have successfully prosecuted people for failing to act on information that a child was in danger. It’s unclear whether a similar charge has been used in Kentucky.
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GOOD!!!
Thats great to hear…how can people be so uncaring especially when it comes to kids!!
Why shouldn’t the couple be charged with leaving the vehicle to go inside the store and request someone else make the call. We all have cell phones and seconds could have left this child dead. I think the couple should be held responsilbe as well.
Yeah good to get Parent for that but the manager would have been fired if she had called police and went against policy!
With the way the economy is now… would you break policy and be out of a job? Maybe the store needs to CHANGE the policy as I’m sure it was to protect them against the auto accidents, break in’s, that are normally the issues in a parking lot of a retail store!
What a bunch of crap! This lady had no dogs in this fight at all. I don’t want to hear all that BS about being a Good Samaritan either. This women was being drawn into this through no actions of her own and she had no idea as to what the situation was at all. He**, why don’t you just start hauling everyone who was in the parking lot that day over to the jail and charge them! ABSOLUTELY UNBELIEVABLE! If and when Elizabeth Miller beats this bogus charge, I hope she gets a really good slimey Lawyer and sues the Belchers, the police and the city for every da** dime she can get! I sure would like to be sitting oon the jury when it happens, but thankfully I don’t live in the Socialist Fayette County anymore.
The mother should be charged regardless of whether the car was running or not. The child could have climbed out of his car seat. It is not safe to leave a young child in a car, running or not. The clerk should have let them use the phone even if she was not comfortable calling someone.
Glad they were able to charge her. Especially since there was no policy prohibiting calls by customers in an emergency.
Wow, the people who think the woman shouldn’t have been charged hopefully have not reproduced, and if they have, hopefully they learn more civic responsibility than the parents. “Socialist Fayette County” indeed. What a laughable remark.
My last trip into Bed, Bath and Beyond was indeed that — my last trip. Whether they change their policy, blame one person, or claim absolute innocence, I will not shop there again.
As for the people finding the child — break the glass!! Don’t wait for action on someone else’s part. Act NOW!
No my dear,
Just because you have a cellphone does not mean that everyone does!
I have to say that I am a bit disturbed about the charges against the store manager. Bed Bath and Beyond has already acknowledged that training is at the heart of the issue and I am sure that the manager has heard policy–even if it is not written. The store should have back her up and delt with policy later. They are simply covering themselves against a bad reputation.
If it was truly and emergency, all they had to do was what I did the other day at Wal-Mart when the bushes outside were ablaze…scream out at the top of their lungs!!! I needed a fire extinquisher, custumers immediately looked around and found one mounted on the wall. These Danvillians should have jumped into more creative action rather than calling for the store manager.
Hope that someone else shows up when and if I need help!!!
Charging the manager is beyond stupid. Everybody has a cell phone these days. The Belchers are the only ones who witnessed anything and they are the only ones obligated to report the abuse.
Suppose somebody comes into Target claiming there is a pipe bomb out in the parking lot and the store needs to call the police. The manager remembers the stupidity of the Bed Bath and Beyond manager getting in trouble for not calling in and reports a bomb in the parking lot. The police arrive and to find there is no bomb and the unknown person who told the manager there was a bomb has disappeared. The manager, trying to do the write thing by all you idiots, is now in trouble for calling in a false bomb threat.
You are only under obligation to report what you witness. If somebody else witnesses something, they are responsible for making the report. The Belchers EVENTUALLY used their own cell phone to call police. That is what they should have done in the first place.
What HUMAN ADULT would respond to such a request??? Where in the hell have our downright gut instincts gone? Have people gone mad in this world? We have missing children, sick babies and babies that are left in hot vehicles…..this store manager should be put in a van for nearly an hour, no water, no cell, and doors locked in a car seat and see how in the heck she feels! I am outraged and appalled at this lady’s response. dumb, dumb, dumb!!!!!
Are people all without scruples these days!!! For goodness sakes if there was a child in a hot car in a parking lot and someone felt that its life might be in danger then there is no question that someone needed to call for help. And yes… I would risk loosing my job for that. Wouldn’t you… would you rather have some childs death on your consience? You people need to get real!! What if that had been your child. Rules dont negate your moral responsibility to do the right thing. Thats whats wrong with the world today… to many people with opinions and a big mouth and not enough gumption to do something. And to have the nerve insinuate that they charge the good people who found the child and were trying to get help… please!!! Do you not have sense enough to know something is WRONG with that statement.
We need to also consider in today’s society you can’t always take people for their word. If the couple had been dishonest in their dealings, it would have come back on the stores manager as well. The store manager would have been charged for allowing a false report to be made from their business. How could Ms Miller know they werenot trying to distract employees to rob or roll out a cart of merchadise.
There are many sides to this scenerio, let us all learn from it. The most important lesson would be; a responsible parent doesn’t leave their child unattended anywhere. Mary
WHERE DOES IT SAY THE BELCHERS USED THIR CELL PHONE TO CALL POLICE IT SAID “Eventually, police were called” AND EVERYONE DOESNT HAVE A CELL PHONE ON THEM AT ALL TIMES
It is no wonder no one wants to help anybody anymore.
chris flannery what kind of pathetic person are u, so u saying if u saw a child in a parking lot u would do nothing, u are the loser and idiotic person that would be saying no u can’t use my phone to save this child, GROW UP get a life and dont talk about stuff that u have not a clue about please, the world would be better off without ur little response there
I hate to tell you people, but not everyone has or wants a cell phone. And from the sounds of it, the child was still in the car alone when the police arrived, so I don’t think that is actually an issue. The boy was dehyrated and was taken to the hospital. Was that a figment of their imagination too?
Hopefully, Mr/Ms Flannery is sterile or chooses not to produce children. Don’t defend the actions of the inactive. What the store manager did was reprehensible, especially when a human life is on the line.
I suspect the policy was intended to cover them going out and intervening in the parking lot - but in reality, the woman was just stupid.
I’d have broken the window, but that’s just me.
I do understand that their cell phone was in a vehicle much farther away than the store, which is why the elected to go to the store first.
It is, by the way, a violation of the law to leave one’s care running unattended, so either way, mom was in the wrong.
A previous report said that the Belchers had locked their cell phones in their vehicle, and asked the manager to call in hopes of getting the call in as quickly as possible. When the manager refused, Mr. Belcher ran to his car and got his phone and called. Therefore, Mr. Belcher performed his duty under the law, and should only be charged with being a decent human being. With regard to the store manager, it’s my understanding that state law takes precedence over the personnel policy (real or imagined) of a private company. The manager’s duty to uphold the laws of Kentucky was greater than her obligation to adhere to company policy.
So what you are saying is that the manager should protect her job as opposed to helping a defenseless child? I wonder how guilty she would have felt if that child had died. She could have at least run out into the parking lot to check the validity of the story. I would rather have been fired than be partly responsible for a tragedy.
ANYONE that would risk the life of a child for ANY reason is completely and totally STUPID! ANYONE that WOULD defend that stupid a@@ store manager is just as bad as her. PLEASE tell me that you HAVEN’T nor plan to EVER have kids of your own. And I hope they do EVERYTHING they can possibly do to both the parent and store manager when it comes their day in Court. I know now why I would NEVER live in Lexington again. People are just plain IGNORANT when it come to COMMON sense there.
It does say in the article that the Belchers were parked next to the car, wouldn’t have been quicker to get the cell phone locked in the car? And why is it not the mother’s fault all the way around for leaving the kid in the car in the first place. It wasn’t the managers fault, it was the mothers.
I am a retired police, fire, Emer Med dispatcher! I once found myself in a similar situation in a parking lot in Ohio. A co-worker, police officer, was in the lot… an unconcious child was locked in van with motor & a/c running in summer high heat. Officer asked for my assistance in dealing with/trying to awaken child…as a woman in plain clothes, I would be less frightening to the child. I did my best to awaken child without breaking windows… No go! Mother came out of store… started screaming at me! Officer put a stop to that… Officer dealt with mother… I was allowed to leave… a sick child left alone in a vehicle can die just as quickly of the heat or fumes from the exhaust. Paula Rice
I cannot believe that anyone would leave a child in a car (running or not) after all the fatalities of other children have been in the news so many times!!!! How important could it have been to leave an innocent child at such a risk of dying???? To shop, of all things!! Unreal! I would not have depended on anyone else to call, I would have done it myself or SCREAMED out for help when the child did not respond immediately.
#1. Let’s put the blame where it belongs: THE MOTHER.
#2. Lets see….. the people that witnessed this child in the car, according to the police report, had parked NEXT TO the vehicle in question. AND they had a cell phone in the car. Anyone want to guess why they chose to WALK INTO THE STORE to get somebody else to make the call? BECAUSE THEY DIDN’T WANT TO BE INVOLVED!!!! This is what these hypocrites are accusing Bed Bath and Beyond of! It was only after they realized they would be seen as “heroes” that they showed their faces on TV.
Mary your an idiot,
can’t charge the couple and no we all don’t have a cell phone!
Mary,
Not everyone has a cell phone, my father, grandmother, BIl, they don’t have one. This happened to me, I called 911 on my cell phone and also ran into a store that to get some help and they refused, (Hen House grocery store in Kansas City, KS). There were 4 kids in the Kansas summer heat in August of last year. I came out and she was gone, I did give the police her license number but was never called for a case so I am not sure what happened. Sad call on society!
Typical of a large organisation such as them. I hope the manager is sentenced and server the full 90 days.
Reading both sides of these comments , makes me wonder if there is really intelligent life on earth
Lesson? Never ignore a busybody.
I don’t know who this “Mary” person is, but for the love of God and the most basic of human rights to, at least of all, safety. Why is it so hard for anyone to wake up and realize that all the store manager had to do was step out of the store with another employee to witness this CRIME against the life of a child. That store manager should be charged with ignorance as well. And what should we charge the heroic couple with-FEAR FOR THE CHILDS LIFE, OR BETTER YET, CARING FOR ANOTHER INDIVIDUAL especially the life of an innocent and obviously neglected child. SHAME on any of you who think the HEROIC couple should be charged for their compassion and love for another.
Hargis Henson
Registered Nurse
The manager may have ended up in the unemployment line if she broke store policy. The couple who discovered the child in the car has a cell phone handy and should have used it sooner. It appears that they wanted someone else to call the police. Cowards!!!!!
I hope I get to serve on the jury for this manager. “NOT GUILTY” Let’s make sure to subpeona the owners of BB&B so they can explain “their” policy.
Keep your head up Ms. Miller, things will work out for you!
Maybe the couple should face charges for wasting time looking for someone else to contact the police instead of retrieving their own cell phone and using it to call police.
I hope Momma got all her shoping done before she got arrested. She should be put in jail for a long period of time. Remind her that this is the USA!
There is NO way Miller would’ve lost her job as it was illegal to do what she did (or her failure in any case). She would’ve had a serious lawsuit.
The company cannot fire someone for abiding the law in that way. That’s a ridiculous claim.
That clerk should NOT be charged. That couple went into BBB because they didn’t want to get involved, otherwise they would have called from the car phone they had locked in their car which was parked right next to the car with the kid in it. They dragged this poor woman into a situation that THEY witnessed, but didn’t want to put themselves out there for. It wasn’t til the manager used poor judgement or training or whatever that they got on their high horse and pointed a finger. Give me a break. Anybody who has ever worked in that kind of retail situation knows that whatever happens in the parking lot is the responsiblity of the shopping plaza owners’ (mall security etc…). The manager clearly did not think this situation through but wasting taxpayers money for this kind of nonsense is ridiculous.
The couple who went into BB&B were saving the life of a child and probably trying to alert the mother so that her sorry butt didn’t go to prison for neglect. The mother absolutely deserves serious jail time. I hope the store manager spends 90 days in prison thinking “what if this child died?”
Belcher’s wanted the screaming mother who left the child locked in the car to be screaming at Bed, Bath, & Beyonce not screaming at the Belchers.
At least when that didn’t work they still called.
Good grief, If everyone was so concerned about the infant, why wasn’t a window removed so some air could enter,And if the strength of your convictions faltered during scrutiny by anyone. LIE and DENY
Why weren’t the couple who waited until they got in the store charged? They could have used their cell phone to call police. Why were they exonerated. Good grief! We have gone way too far when people are arrested for this. The next thing you know, we will be resuired to rescue fetuses aborted by their mother’s. What is the world coming to!
Happy to hear clerk could be and was charged, although I suspect the judge will dismiss the charges unfortunately.
It disheartens me to see so many people writing to indicate they agree with the clerk’s decision.
What is wrong with people who put a store’s stated policy or a job above the value of a human life? Fate would be fair if those individuals experience the need to the ‘helped’ and find no one to come to their rescue
Though common sense seems to be in short demand that does not change the fact the clerk should have used her head in this matter, but good grief people, what causes so many people to believe because THEY own such a phone, EVERYONE DOES? I know many people who DO NOT have a cellphone.
It doesn’t change the facts of this case, but this belief that EVERYONE owns such a luxury and the proliferation of so many to side with the clerks’s action does tend to show the short sightedness of much of the general public regarding the importance of helping others and the blatant egotism of the “I” generation.
Ok, the police are charging the clerk. What about the Belchers who discovered the child? They wasted valuable time because they did not want to be the ones calling police and getting involved. Are they being charged also for waiting so long to report it? They wanted someone else to blame if something had happened and picked the store manager. THE TIME IT TOOK THEM TO WALK TO BB&B, FIND A MANAGER, EXPLAIN THE SITUATION TO HER, THAT CHILD COULD HAVE DIED! DID THEY ASK TO USE THEIR PHONETO CALL POLICE THEMSELVES? NO. The manager on the other hand did not know if these peoople were telling the truth or trying to get her to make a false report. Seems to me, the POLICE should be looking at others in this case besides BB& B.
I think the couple went into the store to find a parent because that would be faster than waiting for EMS, rather than getting their own phone out of their car and calling 911. A simple page on the store system could have alerted the parent to come unlock the car and saved time. If you say to a random employee ‘can you make an announcement about XXX’ they would be more likely to get their boss to make sure it was ok with company policy. Which is how the manager could have gotten involved assuming she wasn’t the first employee they saw.
The bottom line is this — a company cannot instruct an employee to commit a criminal act. If Bed Bath and Beyond did indeed instruct their employees to commit a criminal offense, then the employee is required by law to disregard that instruction.
If the employee choose to follow a criminal directive, then she alone is personally liable for the consequence. Bed Bath and Beyond may be held separately liable for conspiracy to not report [and I hope that they are], but any liability that Bed Bath and Beyond may face is separate and distinct from Ms. Miller’s offense.
Frankly I think that she should serve the full 90 days.
I am so happy this lady has been charged. I think she needs to lose her job for this. Maybe now she has learned a lesson when someone ask for help she will help.
“”The Belchers EVENTUALLY used their own cell phone to call police. That is what they should have done in the first place.”"
“”Lexington police Officer Tommy Puckett said Thursday that Elizabeth A. Miller, 34, of Richmond was issued a summons for duty to report dependency, neglect and abuse, a Class B misdemeanor that carries a maximum sentence of 90 days and a maximum fine of $250. A court date for Miller has not been set. Miller could not be reached for comment.”"
A hot story, emotional laden, emotions calling for uprise in all. What if this was a set up? Sad thing to say because the baby probably was getting really hot by the time someone came to find it. Calling to the plight of abused children for more funding? I don’t know? I think it is sad if that is the real point here. I may be wrong? Testing laws and making it known that they will be enforced? I don’t know? Not everyone that says that what they do is for the interest of the child or in the best interest of the child has the child in mind at all, most people do. Hard to look at it this way? This should be interesting to follow up on, I hope you do. Just a different perspective, not a judgement statement at all, I don’t really know it just seems strange to me.
They had a cell phone, didn’t call, knew what store the mom was in?, then asked the manager for help which was refused, she has been charged, there is no court date for her? One never knows about stuff like this?
Amen to this statement……
“If the employee choose to follow a criminal directive, then she alone is personally liable for the consequence. Bed Bath and Beyond may be held separately liable for conspiracy to not report [and I hope that they are], but any liability that Bed Bath and Beyond may face is separate and distinct from Ms. Miller’s offense.
Frankly I think that she should serve the full 90 days.”
In addition, The company must pay the maximum penalty for this since the Hamburg store echoed the same “Store Policy” last year concering the dog locked in the car.
This woman should be fired for not using her common sense. Apparently, she would have rather kept her job and let a child die than to take her chances on losing her job. This is not rocket science and it has nothing to do with being a “good samaritan”. It has to do with having the sense to know between right and wrong and the woman should have been bright enough to figure out that BB&B was not going to fire her for calling the police.
So… essentially, the next time you spank your kids in the parking lot for acting like little hellions the store should be required to call the police. I personally like people keeping their nose out of my business. This is an extreme situation…
However for most day to day… someone falls and breaks a leg, someone smashes your car with a cart… its all the same. The store is not responsible neither are its employees.
She was scr@wed either way she went. For all she knew this couple was attempting to kidnap this kid or involved in some criminal activity.
This may be a sad world but her job is what puts a roof over her head and her kid’s heads, if she has them. Her job is what pays their bills and feeds them. Not everyone is an attorney as we all seem to be acting like here and would know store policy might not be in line with the law.
Like it or not… we all do what is best for us and ours. Its a sad situation that his MOTHER left him in the car. Its the mother’s fault and nobody but the mother’s. If the Belchers were SOOO concerned the vehicle’d have had one less window really damned quick.
Its all well and good to play holier than thou… course most BBB shoppers are women that don’t actually have to work for a living… not really possible to put yourself in a working woman’s shoes.
OK, fine. For all you people screaming for her head in bloodlust in this case, let’s stop and use the same judgment elsewhere shall we?
The Belchers should be charged as well. the fastest and quickest way to get emergency medical response would have been to take the 2 seconds to open their car door and dial 911 themselves.
EVERY single person in the parking lot at that time. If you were present at the time this was happening and you didn’t break your own neck to get to a pay phone, cell phone or even a convenient bullhorn to get the entire world involved, then you should seemingly be charged in the same way the manager was.
The “other” employee who referred them to the manager. But why stop there? why not every employee in the store? ooh, and not only the employees but the customers too. i’m sure at least one person heard the talk of what was going on and could have used a cell phone or a pay phone or the obligatory bullhorn referenced earlier.
ooh, and maybe there was a cop close by who heard the call but didn’t respond due to giving a traffic citation at the time. Maybe if they had run back to their car and gone blazing toward the BB&B parking lot, they could have saved this child even more agony? why wasn’t every cop in town responding to this call regardless of where they were since they had knowledge of it as well?
do you see how ridiculous most of that sounds? simple fact of the matter is: The couple who found the child were parked RIGHT NEXT TO the van and should have unlocked their door (even without remote keyless entry that’s, what? 3 seconds?) and dialed 911 on their own cell phone first. if you’re gonna charge the manager for not stumbling over herself to break out the window, the same “courtesy” should be shown to the couple that left the van and went inside instead of calling it in themselves.
regardless of how right or wrong the manager was, if the couple had followed their own “civic duty” then the manager wouldn’t have even been involved until AFTER the cops showed up or the window was broken anyway. it’s like a bank robbery happening and you, as one of the people present, not going against what the robbers are telling you to do and calling 911 yourself. or even worse, the manager wasn’t even assured that this wasn’t a falsehood. it’d be like sitting in the donut shop across the street from that bank and not calling 911 even tho you had no idea the crime was being committed.
grow up people. place the blame where it should be…on the mother. leave the poor manager out of this fight…its some cop or political freak looking to score publicity points for being a “model citizen” and acting like it’s their civic duty to make an example out of her. why do you think they tell rape victims in New York to yell out “Fire!” instead of rape?
The point only some are catching are the couple were in parking lot with their car near and see the kid in van they should have called 911 their cell. They left the kid to go have BBB store page to try and find the owner of the van. That is horrible if you people think they are such heros they should have just called themselves or broke the window. If you people realize in spur of the moment running a store on a Saturday customers get panicked about car,kids,strange people and dangers in parking lot. You get involved in that stuff outside the building all customers inside would complain about customer service!!!! I have been with 3 retailers over seventeen years and people always want to pass the problem on not take action themselves. That couple was not wanting to deal with it head on so tried to pass problem off to BBB. Manager should not be blamed for stupid customer and couple who really did not want to face the problem and get phone out of LOCKED car. Hit button on remote idiot and get phone out.
I’m an employee of a bed bath and beyond and it is definitely not store policy to stay out of situations in the parking lot. On one occasion this HOT summer, a customer informed us of a dog locked in a car and we immeadiately called mall security and got the dog out of the car within 15 minutes. This manager clearly is just trying to save their own ass. should be fired. All it takes is a page and a phone call, not that difficult.
“”The point only some are catching are the couple were in parking lot with their car near and see the kid in van they should have called 911 their cell. They left the kid to go have BBB store page to try and find the owner of the van. That is horrible if you people think they are such heros they should have just called themselves or broke the window.”"
That is right, and they find it easier to point the finger at everyone besides the people that really could have done something. I would have asked the store manager to see if she could find the mother, but how in the world did they know where the mother was at so quickly?