CRANSTON, R.I. -- A Providence mother who said she was on a bus going home when she realized that she left her 18-month-old son at the Family Dollar store on Garfield Avenue was arraigned in District Court Thursday on child neglect charges.
Desiree Pope, 35, of 19 Gilmore St., Providence, went to police around 3 p.m. Wednesday to report a missing child -- about 30 minutes after employees at the Family Dollar store called the police to say they found the toddler sitting alone in a stroller, responsive but lethargic.
Pope told the police it was while she was traveling home on the bus that she had realized she had forgotten her child, and that she immediately went to them to seek their help. By then the boy had already been taken for an evaluation at Hasbro Children's Hospital, where he was determined to be in good health.
At Thursday's hearing, a judge ordered Pope to have no contact with her son pending an investigation by police and the Department of Children, Youth and Families. By late Thursday, boy was with his father.
By Richard C. Dujardin