Authorities say they found a 3-year-old boy who was sitting in a car stolen outside a Utah day care Tuesday after he answered his mother’s cellphone and honked the horn to draw their attention.
The boy’s mother left car unlocked and running on a cold and snowy morning as she dropped off another child, a baby, at the day care around 7 a.m. in Ogden, said city authorities. When she walked out, she saw someone driving her car away with her son inside.
Police arrived and called her cellphone, which was in the car, hoping to reach the thief and negotiate the boy’s release, said Lt. Tim Scott.
Instead, the boy answered the phone. He told officers that he was alone after the thief left the car and ran away, but he didn’t know where he was.
Officers told him to start honking the horn and followed the sound to the car, which was abandoned about three blocks away.
“He was scared, but it was a good thing at his age that he was able to get himself out of his child seat and honk the horn,” said Scott.
Police reunited the boy with his mother about 20 minutes after the car was stolen.
Officers are searching for a suspect in Ogden, a city of about 84,000 people located about 40 miles north of Salt Lake City
