We have previously written about parents going shopping and leaving their babies in cars on hot days. Doing so is not just irresponsible — it’s dangerous. If left too long, a child could suffer heatstroke, faint, or possibly even die.
It happens often enough that police officers stay alert for babies left in parking lots during extreme heat.
One such officer was Jason Short from Keene, New Hampshire. He was on duty when he received a call about a baby left alone in a car in a Walmart parking lot on a very hot day.
But he never could have imagined what would happen next.
Jason didn’t hesitate to rush to the scene as soon as he got the call about the infant.
“I got there as soon as I could,” he said in an interview with WMUR. “I don’t know how fast I was going, but it was quick.”
When he arrived, Jason could clearly see what looked like a baby wrapped in a blanket, with its feet sticking out through the car window.
It was an extremely hot day, and Jason had no idea how long the baby had been there. Without hesitation, he smashed the window with his baton to rescue the child.
Jason gently carried the baby out of the car but feared it might already be dead. It looked lifeless and was very pale, with an unusual skin tone.
A crowd quickly gathered, and Jason began performing CPR. An ambulance was called to the scene.
That’s when Jason started to realize something wasn’t right. He felt something was very off.
Then it hit him.
What he was holding was actually a lifelike doll — not a real baby at all.
The doll’s owner, Carolynne Seiffer, returned from shopping to find a broken car window and a crowd surrounding her $2,000 doll, which she calls Ainsley.
“I’ve been laughed at and embarrassed by all the fuss,” she told WMUR.
According to The Washington Post, Carolynne owns around 40 of these lifelike dolls to help cope with the death of her son. Apparently, these incredibly realistic dolls can help grieving parents as part of the healing process.
“You can’t know how people choose to deal with their losses in life,” she said.
Jason admitted he felt a little embarrassed after realizing he had rescued a doll, but he said he had no regrets and was mostly relieved that it wasn’t an actual baby.
“I would never assume that it’s a doll,” he told WMUR. “I would always assume that it’s a child. I would never do anything different.”
The Keene Police Department paid the $300 needed to repair Carolynne’s car window.
This story is certainly unusual, but the most important thing is that no one was hurt. If you do own one of these dolls, police recommend keeping it in your trunk or carrying it with you — for obvious reasons.
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