Mom’s Car Repossessed At Daycare While She Ran Inside To Drop Off Her Toddler — It Was Taken With Her Infant Still Inside
The story has sparked a debate about who's at fault for the mishap and the cruelty of capitalism.
FluxFactory / Getty Images Signature / Canva Pro In everyday life, let alone parenting, all it takes is a split second for absolutely everything to go wrong, and one Indiana mom recently learned that the hard way.
Her morning daycare run quickly turned into not just a debacle but the kind of situation that would make any parent's heart sink, and many are calling out the difficulties single moms face.
The mom's car was repossessed with her infant inside.
The incident happened in Evansville, Indiana, on a recent morning when Sabriya Miles was going through the usual routine of dropping her toddler son off at daycare. In the car alongside her was her newborn infant, just days old.
As she ran into her toddler's daycare to drop him off, she came out from the school to a most unpleasant surprise—her car had just been repossessed. But as if that weren't trouble enough, her newborn baby, just days old, was still inside.
The mom had left her infant in the car with the engine running, intending to simply dash in and right back out of the daycare.
As many parents have done countless times, the mom parked her car, left it running, and quickly dashed into the daycare to drop off her son and came right back out.
Why go through the entire song and dance of undoing and refastening a baby's car seat, especially if the baby is sleeping, for an action that will take 30 seconds max, right?
But as many parents online have pointed out, that's ample time for catastrophe to strike, and that's the first thing that crossed Miles' mind as she was blindsided by what happened. She thought her baby had just been kidnapped.
"I couldn’t talk,” Miles told local Fox affiliate WFIE. "I was crying. I carried my baby for nine months, and now I lost her."
Thankfully, the repo agent realized what had happened and pulled over shortly after he left. Police told local news outlets that they had no reason to believe there had been wrongdoing on either's part and found no evidence of neglect toward Miles' children.
Miles' story sparked a heated debate online between those who empathized with her situation and those who think she should face charges.
As you might expect, many on social media have had very little empathy for Miles. "This is a case of dumb meets stupid," one Reddit commenter wrote of Miles and the repo driver.
"It’s not [expletive] ok," another wrote. "I’m a parent and it’s a pain but you don’t leave your kid in the car. She absolutely should be facing charges."
But others said they'd made the same mistake before. As Miles herself said, "it was two seconds," and it's easy to assume everything will be fine when it's such a brief moment.
And many felt that the real crux of the story was how brutal and unfair the situation is that Miles has found herself in. "This is [messed] up on so, so many levels," another Redditor wrote. "Like my god... there has to be some exceptions made for this stuff. Like they obviously need that car."
"I'm still skeptical whether or not repossessing a sedan an impoverished single mother needs to get to work is the answer," another wrote. "Certainly won't help her get her debts paid." Another was far more blunt and succinct. "God, capitalism is just [expletive] barbaric."
The mom had no warning about the repossession, and a local lawyer has organized a donation drive to help her get her car back.
Miles told local news she was totally blindsided by the repossession. She told WFIE the repo driver was understanding of her situation, but that, of course, has not solved the issues with her car.
Her cell phone, both of her children's car seats, and other supplies are still inside the car, which she can't access.
A local lawyer who also owns a daycare herself, Tanisha Carothers, decided to organize a GoFundMe to get Miles' car back or help her find a new one, and to replace some of the much needed baby supplies she lost in the repossession.
"I want to focus on highlighting the need for humanity and empathy," Carothers wrote on the GoFundMe page, pointing out that the situation arose because she "doesn't have adequate support so she had to juggle her toddler and infant by herself."
For her part, Miles insists she is a good mom and has learned from this unfortunate experience. "This is the first time that anything like this has ever happened to me,” she told WFIE. “I won’t let it happen again."
John Sundholm is a news and entertainment writer who covers pop culture, social justice, and human interest topics.