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A nine-year-old boy was left traumatized after he remained locked on a school bus for hours alone while sleeping, Fox 2 Detroit.
Tashonda Bennett said her son, a student at Detroit Service Learning Academy, was found on a school bus around 9:30 p.m. when he is usually home by 3:45 p.m.
According to Bennett, the nine-year-old boy got on the bus to come home after school like normal. She fell asleep and realized her son was missing at roughly 7 p.m.
Bennett said she then called everyone, including the school, family, police, and the bus driver, who said that her son never got on the bus.
However, the nine-year-old's brother and grandmother ultimately found the boy sleeping on the bus.
"The police didn’t find my child, the school didn’t know where my son was, my son’s brother and grandmother found my son sleeping on the bus at 9:30 (p.m.)," Bennett recalled.
The boy's brother got him out of the bus through a hatch on top of the vehicle.
"He was asleep. I was banging on the window. He woke up, he was wiping his eyes, looking around, and he just started crying," the brother said. "I knew there was a hatch (on top of the bus), so I opened the hatch."
Detroit police confirmed the incident.
"It takes the police, and it takes the community acting together in this situation, my officers collaborated with the grandmother. The grandmother went to one location, while the officers were handling business here," police said.
Bennett believes the bus driver didn't do a walk through or he would've found her child asleep in the back.
"I just don’t know what to do. I feel like my son shouldn’t have had to go through that," Bennett said. "My baby is 9 years old. He’s traumatized, he doesn't want to go to school, he's afraid to even get back on the bus… I feel like school failed us. It was my child who found my baby."
It's unclear if the bus driver is on leave or still working for the Service Learning District.
Superintendent DeAngelo Alexander said the district is "addressing this matter with the staff involved."
"Additionally, we will be conducting a thorough review of our policies and procedures to ensure that our practices are aligned with the highest standards in the transportation industry," Alexander added.
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