…the angered woman was relentless.
Woman Screams at Kid Outside Target Selling Candy. But Stranger Has Had Enough!
Street vendors, panhandlers, and entertainers of a vast variety are commonly encountered on the busy sidewalks of any major city. Technically, they should all have the required license to do whatever it is they do, but with the abundance of them, law enforcement has better things to do than enforcing something so menial.
While these sidewalk workers might at times be annoying to some, they are simply part of any city’s downtown culture. From musicians in Nashville to magicians in Chicago, they are usually just harmless folks trying to make a buck or two.
Two enterprising kids in Rowling Heights, California didn’t quite take to the streets as we might imagine. They took to the sidewalk in front of a Target store to sell candy.
Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, local kids, cheerleading squads, a soccer team earning money to go to the state championships, and a vast array of other groups are commonly seen perched in front of department and grocery stores. And, at least in most cases, nobody seems to mind.
But a 77-year-old woman who was shopping at the same Target store where the kids were, did mind. The young sister-brother team for reasons still unknown to anyone else, felt the brunt of the old woman’s anger when she began verbally assaulting them.
She asked if they had permission to be doing what they were doing. She then demanded to see their license to sell.
One of them replied back, “I’m just selling candy. I’m trying to make some money.” But the angered woman was relentless.
She continued harassing the already terrified kid until he began to cry, then she went to work on the other child. Andy Lizarraga had just finished shopping with her mother and was exiting the store.
Andy Lizarraga
When Lizarraga saw and heard what this beast of a woman was doing to these innocent children, she raised her cell phone and hit record. The video has since gone viral with over 5.5 million views.
A man who had also been witnessing the event with horror, Jay Lopez, decided to put an end to the nonsense. He paid $80 for every piece of candy the kids had.
Lopez said when the woman started telling the girl the cops were going to show up and arrest them, he had no choice but to intervene. After telling the screaming woman to mind her own business, he told her he was going to give the candy away to all the people who had gathered there.
Lopez gave the following advice as he left the scene. “Mind your own business. Take care of yourself and your family and everything will come together for you.”
We could not agree more, Mr. Lopez. We could not agree more.
…targeted because of his skin color.
Heart Warming: Tells Cook He Doesn’t Want “Black Man Touching His Food.” Then 8-Year-Old Girl Leaves Him in TEARS
Racism is an unavoidable subject in the media today. Though it can be a difficult topic to discuss and sensitive in nature, it is important that it is not avoided for those reasons.
Whether or not you have personally experienced or witnessed racism, there are sadly many occurrences still taking places daily. There are devastating stories that many who have been hurt by racism have shared.
Even though these stories are heartbreaking, the voices of those suffering need to be heard. Even when victims themselves are silenced, there are those willing to use their own voices to take a stand.
One KFC worker was targeted because of his skin color. He never expected for an 8-year-old girl to be an advocate on his behalf.
Eight-year-old Autumn was at a KFC with her mother Danee Maserang when they witnessed an act of racism. One of the cooks was a black man.
A customer made it clear that he would not accept food from this particular cook simply because of his skin color. The customer said, “I don’t want any black man touching my food, so you have to re-cook it.”
The mother and daughter saw the hurt in the cook’s face when he heard that horrible statement. They both wanted to do something to show their support for the cook.
Maserang got in touch with her friend Jana, who thought of a creative idea. Jana worked at a Christian school as an art teacher.
Jana’s students were given the task of creating cards for the KFC cook. The students also included messages in the cards to show their support.
The cook’s experience itself as well as the art project of making cards for him were eye-opening for students. Many had never personally encountered racism beyond it being explained in history books.
Serena, Jana’s daughter, wrote “God loves you” and “I’m sorry that happened” in the card she made. Maserang and Jana took their daughters back to KFC to deliver the handmade cards and gifts to the cook.
The cook tearfully accepted their offerings of support and clearly looked touched that the customer’s racism toward him did not go unnoticed or unheard. While the students learned a meaningful lesson on racism and touched this cook with their kindness, may this story also encourage us to be more proactive in fighting against racism so that these situations cease to exist.
A church youth group leader found an apparently abandoned one-month-old baby in a car seat on the side of the road while driving along a busy interstate Saturday afternoon
NEWS: Baby Found Abandoned in Car Seat on Okla. Highway with $5,500 in Cash, Birth Certificate, Social Security Card
“He was just a little fella,” Rodger Prater, 46, the leader of the youth group at Abba’s House of Worship Center in Ada, Oklahoma. “Thank God we got there in time.”
The infant was found with $5,500 in cash, a birth certificate and a social security card, according to Sgt. Gary Knight of the Oklahoma City Police Department
The startling discovery came when Prater and his wife, Nancy, were driving a van full of church youth group members home after spending the day at an amusement park, he says.
At about 4 p.m., while heading down a rural, wooded stretch of I-40, he spotted what he says looked like a car seat.
“I couldn’t fathom it at first,” he says. “Then the little boy’s feet moved. I told my wife under my breath, ‘I think I see a baby.’ She said, ‘What?’”
The child was sitting inside the carrier, about 10 feet from the white line on the shoulder of the busy, two-lane highway, according to the police report obtained.
With temperatures exceeding 90 degrees, the blacktop on which the carrier sat was hot. But the baby showed no signs of distress. “He wasn’t sweating, sunburnt or hot,” says the report.
Police estimate that the infant had only been there about a half hour.
Prater says his heart skipped a beat when he approached the car seat and didn’t see any movement. “His eyes were shut,” he says. “I was freaking out. I thought, ‘Don’t let there be anything wrong with him.’”
When he picked up the car seat, “the baby’s eyes popped open,” he says. “I started bawling. I was relieved he was OK.”
Prater brought the baby back to the van, laid him on a seat, turned on the air conditioning to cool him off and then called 911.
“He was real clean and had a onesie on,” he says. “Beautiful baby.”
While they waited for help to arrive, his wife changed the baby with a diaper that a Good Samaritan who stopped to help gave Prater, he says.
Once police and emergency personnel arrived, the baby was taken to an area hospital. “He was checked and he was just fine,” says Knight.
Police were able to locate the child’s mother later that day using the information found on the documents that were with the baby, says Knight. “The mother was taken to a hospital to be evaluated,” says Knight.
Baby found on side of road
Credit Rodger Prater
No arrests have been made and the baby is in custody of the Oklahoma Department of Human Services.
“The little boy is safe,” DHS communications director Sheree Powell.
Her office has been inundated with offers to adopt the baby.
“This baby’s story has touched the hearts of people around the country,” she says.
Prater downplayed his quick-thinking act of heroism — and credits the discovery of the baby elsewhere.
“All I know is that God intervened,” he says. “One day when the baby is old enough to understand, he can call me and I will tell him that it was no fluke that we found him. We found him for a reason. I will tell him that God has a plan for his life.”