Something like this happened to me about 1 1/2 years ago on a summer afternoon. I went to the neighborhood grocery store, a few blocks from my house. About a block from there lived toddler triplets and their parents. Even at this young age, they were notorious for being in the street, or being left outside alone to play. As I turned the corner, I saw what at first glance I thought was a small dog or cat. I quickly realized it was the little girl. Her brothers were not out. I quickly stopped the car, and got between her and the middle of the road, to stop her progress. A grandfatherly man on the other side of the street shouted out to me that they were always 'escaping' and one day one of them was going to get hit by a car. I told her to hurry back into her house because cars were coming. She looked at me and then obediently ran into her yard. At this point, mom came out, yelled at her and looked at me weirdly. I muttered something about how fast toddlers are and how quickly they can escape. She slammed the door shut, still yelling at the child. I was very glad the old guy had witnessed the whole thing. They did later put up a fence.
Things have changed a very lot in a short time. Years ago, when my son was much younger, a young toddler had 'gotten away', crossed the road, and started talking to my son and I at a local park. We took him by the hand and walked him back in the direction he came to grateful parents. Now, it's like we have to stop, wasting valuable time, to decide the best way to handle it. The pervs to seem to have the upper hand here, changing the way we react to situations.
I'm more laid back now, and if I were to happen across something like that again, I would like to think I would just take the chance. I'm older, a female and would just risk the consequences.
When push comes to shove, men should probably do that, too. That is tragic what happened in the lead story.
Funny though, to the best of my memory, it was always a kindly woman who "rescued" me. Luckily no perv ever bothered me that I can remember. I remember being good and scared a couple times though when I became an adult. I was not used to the ways of the world and went to see my husband at Ft. Leonard Wood. I had to sit all night alone at the St. Louis bus station waiting for my transfer. Some creepy guy started bothering me.
One of the scariest things that happened was that when I went to pick up my daughter with her new baby at my sister's, I went into Minneapolis to a huge building to apply for a job. I left my daughter waiting with the baby in the lobby because we were going to do something else after I was done. When I came down from the interview, my daughter and the baby were gone. I really started feeling panicky. Some lady had come up to her and offered to buy the baby from her so she went and hid. I was so relieved when she came out of wherever she had gone and found me.
I'm glad that mother got a fence, but she was not being very responsible to let those little girls outside. I got a fence, too, as soon as I could work it into the budget, and the fenced in backyard was the last place my kids wanted to play :-).