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Unregistered 04:29 PM 05-21-2010
I left my job as a 911 dispatcher a year ago. We received these calls all the time about drunk drivers. Not necessarily a parent picking up a child at daycare, but citizens calling in on other drivers, restaurants calling in on patrons leaving, family members calling about someone leaving their house, even a parent calling in on another parent who had just picked a child up for visitation.

We would get as much of a vehicle description as we could, the exact location the vehicle was last seen in, and their direction of travel. We would then put it out over the air...

In my 5 years in that job, I can only remember one time an officer actually paid attention to information, happen to be in the exact spot the vehicle was in, and pulled them over. The rest of the time, the information was ignored. No officers went looking for these people. The did NOT respond. No one paid attention to what was said.

The only time that it actually worked was when some would follow the driver, against our *ahem* advice not to and repeated warnings that the police department would not be liable for their safety.

I'm not saying that EVERY police department is like this. But if it is a large city, or even a medium sized city...it is more likely that your phone call will fall on deaf ears.

I don't know whether or not kidnapping charges or false imprisonment charges could be brought up if you refuse to keep the child... I'm just saying you are more likely to get a police response if you do.
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