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Prosecutor, cop find child walking alone on the road
A small girl walking alone on the road near the Marianas Business Plaza in Susupe last week has raised some question with its school.
It turned out that the girl, described as about 4 to 5 years old, is a student of a school at the Marianas Business Plaza building. The school staff members had been looking for the girl at that time, Saipan Tribune learned.
Instead, what happened is that a prosecutor and a police officer came upon the girl near the corner of Texas Road and the street leading to the Marianas Business Plaza building.
Assistant attorney general Betsy Weintraub told Saipan Tribune yesterday that she and Police Officer Jeffrey Olopai were riding back to the Office of the Attorney General Criminal Division from the Superior Court last July 17, at 10am when they saw the girl.
Weintraub said when they turned the car onto the road leading to the Marianas Business Plaza, they spotted the girl walking down the road by herself.
“So we stopped and looked around for her parents. Another car coming from the other direction also stopped. It quickly became apparent that she was lost…because she started to cross the street and head toward the jungle area,” Weintraub said.
Weintraub got out of the car and started walking with the girl and trying to talk to her, gently guiding her away from the woods.
After a few minutes, she said, a young woman came out of the gate next to the building, saying they’d been looking for the child.
Weintraub said that when the woman stated she is from a school inside the building, she asked to contact the girl’s parents to notify them of what happened.
“I followed up and verified it, and eventually spoke to the mother personally,” said Weintaub, adding that the Department of Public Safety and the Division of Youth Services did look into the matter.
“I’m just really glad we were in the right place at the right time.
“We are all responsible for protecting the children in our community. If something seems wrong, it never hurts to check,” she added.
