Seaside police find small child wandering streets barefoot at 2 a.m.
A 4-year-old Seaside girl was found wandering barefoot more than half a mile from her home at 2 a.m. Tuesday, police said.
An employee at a local business spotted the child, then called police.
“I was the one who called police,” said Charles Rios, a maintenance worker at Del Monte Manor Apartments.
The girl was found in an alley south of the 1200 block of Broadway Avenue early Tuesday morning. Officers say the child was not able to communicate with them and may be autistic. The child was dressed but not wearing shoes.
Rios said he was going about his job Tuesday morning when an officer approached him. They were asking residents if they had any idea where the child lived. Police also released pictures of the child to the media.
Rios said he took a photo of the girl and brought it to tenants to ask if they knew her or her parents.
“The first tenant I happen to run into says ‘yes, I do know this child.'” he said.
He said the woman led him to an apartment, where the girl’s mother realized her daughter was not in her bed. Police say the girl crossed some main intersections after crawling out of a window in the middle of the night.
Rios is skeptical. He says the child’s father didn’t come outside when he found out the child was missing, and that the mother didn’t cry or show other emotion.
Police said they were surprised no one had reported the girl missing. Around 11 a.m., they made contact with her family.
“She appeared happy, she was calm and again she wasn’t able to really communicate with us but we did our best to make her feel comfortable,” said Sgt. Jorge Enriquez about finding the girl.
Police won’t say whether the family could face charges. Meanwhile, the little girl is still in protective custody.
“It’s definitely a scary situation, a girl that young walking around an alley barefoot, in the middle of the night,” said Enriquez.
Police say what’s concerning them is that they don’t know how long she was roaming around before she was found, and they believe she had been out for quite a while.
