Posted on 05/20/2005 8:05:32 PM PDT by Dan from Michigan
Boy Gets Trapped Inside Vending Machine
ELKHART, Ind. - A 3-year-old boy upset that his mother wouldn't let him use a crane vending machine to try to win a small stuffed animal took matters in his own hands. He climbed up the chute to get the prize himself.
Danielle Manges said she took her eyes off her son, James, for a moment to pick up a juice bottle he threw. When she looked up, he was in with the plush toys.
"I bent over to clean it and within two seconds he had climbed through the hole, into the chute and pushed the door shut so we couldn't get him out," she said. "He climbed up in the toys and was in there for a good hour."
Manges said James has been sick and sleeping odd hours so they went shopping about 3 a.m. Thursday at a Wal-Mart in the city some 15 miles east of South Bend. She let the boy play on some of the rides, but wouldn't give him money for the vending machine.
At first, Manges thought it was funny.
"He was playing with all the toys and hanging from the bar like a monkey," she said.
Manges said people leaving the store went back inside to buy disposable cameras to take photos of her son. She bought one herself.
She became upset, however, when Wal-Mart employees said they did not have a key to let James out. So Manges called the fire department for help.
"I expected his hand to be caught in the machine but it was his entire body in the machine," firefighter Anthony Coleman said. "He was swinging from a bar, jumping around. He was having a ball."
About 40 people watched as the firefighters removed the back of the machine and freed him.
James still came up empty handed.
"He definitely didn't get a toy after that," Manges said.
This happened 3 times now, the first was several months ago.
Copycat or law lottery?
talk about "reporting abuse" on FR! Why do we have these dangerously dumb parents?
Rather odd sequence of events.
This comes from letting the kids watch Toy Story....Time to sue Disney!
I'll humbly dispense my two cents worth and note that this machine made a monkey of the lad. If another customer had put in money and tried to win the kid, the device could have injured the child's crane-ium. Mom's wisdom did not com-prize a lottery of common cents.
Wal-mart should have called the cops and settled that, and it doesn't seem like the boy learned not to do it again.
I dunno, I always insist that my kids behave in stores and they know not to try any nonsense.
Psssst. Over here at the Wal-Mart Midway. Bring cotton candy popcorn, and mainly quarters....
LOL!
Truth is stranger than fiction!
Sounds like a horrible child.
Another reason to always have some change on hand.
Leave him in there - That'll learn him.
was the confined to his quarters afterward?
After I scooped him out I wouldn't spank him either if he would bring me one of those bears out with him.
Ping thyself over and look at this story - It's funny.
"Mr. Simpson, I'm not sure how to say this, but we're going to have to saw off your arms."
"They'll grow back, right?!?"
"Uh...yeah...sure."
"Whhheeewwwww."
"Homer are you just holding onto the soda can?!?"
"...Your point being?"
Sounds like Ted Kennedy during Happy Hour.
This kid is a future anti-Houdini, he's good at getting into things and can't escape. Possibly we should use some of his DNA and clone all future children. In case they become future criminals we wouldn't need locks on the prisons...
For more details, watch the mailbox for your quarter-ly Quarterless Cloning Clueless Climbing Kids Catalogue...
I wonder how many quarters she spent trying to get him out before she called rescue....
I question that it really happened but come see what some kid got into:')
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