Stranger danger

what has the world come too? you cannot even talk to someones kid without being called a perv or pedo.

one hour? really....stop elaborating the time you ******* pedophile

I don't see what makes the mall cop dumb here. The kid ran away from OP screaming for help. The mall cop is doing his/her job in questioning the situation. Sort of. In the mall cops shoes, my priorities would be in staying with the child and ensuring they find their parents. It is up to the police to investigate the pedo angle. But really, whatever works works. There is no right way of dealing with these situations. The mall cop didn't select the most right option, but certainly not the wrong way.

No shit sherlock .

18 I was saying that with reasonable explanation or a well dressed one, the cop should have let OP go.

The mall cop obviously did let OP go, and probably made no attempt to restrain or otherwise detain OP. The mall cop simply acted in a manner he or she thought best under the circumstance.

you cant just make shit up ok?

FHL (**** her life)? :')

Nup. Screw that mentality. Isolated incidents of people being dickheads after having their ass saved wouldn't stop me from helping another human being that was in trouble. Buying into that hype makes the world a crappier place.

Its true. What would you do recently did a show where they put a screaming kid alone on a sidewalk and thousands of people walked by and didn't do anything. When asked why... they were scared to get involved because they hear of the consequences on tv all the time even though they are totally innocent and just trying to help. Society is so corrupt now, that we can't even be good people.

If you are an untrained civilian and you, say, do the heimlich manouver (no idea if I spelled that right) on someone who's choking and actually break their ribs, they cannot sue you. You are not a trained professional and therefore cannot be expected to perform perfectly. They might sue for pulling them out of a burning car if they are assholes but they wouldn't win if you weren't a professional

But I think it's actually illegal to perform any kind of CPR on a person, if you're not licensed. Kind of ridiculous, but I've heard that multiple times.

Agree^^

Most places have some kind of 'Good Samaritan' law to protect people in cases like this. If they don't have them, it's probably because they're not hyper-litigious societies, and it comes under 'common sense'.

In my country, Guatemala, there are no ridiculous lawsuits like that, people hear someone asking for help and they're not afraid to help. Last year, a Guatemalan living in New York helped a woman who was being robbed, but by doing so, he ended up wounded. He bled to death in the streets, a lot of people passed right beside him and no one helped. Security camera footage showed that one guy even took a photo of the wounded man and just left. It's sad how, in some societies, people are either too scared to help or they just don't want to.

Sinkhole - I think people are just looking for an excuse not to step up. This 'somebody got sued once' is just a way for people to vacuum their consciences about their self-centred actions.

Yeah, you're right, if someone doesn't want to help, they'll find whatever excuse not to do so. There's also the 'bystander effect', so it's not only that they try to vacuum their consciences, but the social influence sometimes is stronger than the desire to help.

38- Bystander effect. When there's other people around, people have a diffusion of responsibility and often will not help the person in trouble. Ironically you're most likely to get help, the less people are around.

Umm, exactly this is what makes sense. A hour long chat with a mall cop, or worse a trip to the police station, or even worse the frantic mother returning and filing a false police report out of fear... are not worth helping a child who might be lost, or might be helped by a policeman or mallcop.

dat is true

Truth! My friend was charged for returning a guys wallet with over $400 cash in it, the guy was mad because he thpught he had stolen from him. People today suck, best to let them suffer.

Jesus Christ, did you guys write long nough comment?

Well # 31, I really don't know. Would you rather wait for a licensed pro, or have someone try to help? Because I'm trained, and not licensed (it expired after a year, but I was trained by a pro), and would rather someone try to do something.

Yes, that's true. I'd worry about a mall cop NOT having a chat with someone who approached a child. And all children should be taught to call for help when approached by a stranger. But, that still leaves the best way of avoiding this situation being to walk on by. If you just take 30 seconds to think about the problem, it kinda goes away on it's own.

The best way of dealing with the situation is not to walk on by, because the next person who sees the child could abduct them. That would make you at least indirectly responsible for what happens. The best action is to help the child to customer service or security desks/offices. They will have a procedure in place for handling the situation and ensuring the child stays safe. What happened to OP was unfortunate, but to hell with such consequences. A few minutes of your time as youre ruled out as a pedophile is worth seeing that child is safe. The problem today is that people only care for themselves, and have the attitude "someone else will deal with it."

WARNING: READING!!!

he wasn't creeping though Damn

u stupid bitch

There's this thing called a JOKE... Geez :-/