Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Parents shocked to be facing charges

After a restless night with his cranky 2-year-old, Won Chong ran into a Starbucks.

About to pick up his wife and parents for a quick trip to Southern California, Chong thought he could do two things at once: get a cup of coffee while his son, Kyle, got some needed sleep in the car seat in the back of the car.

What he thought would be a quick errand, one which he could watch his son through the coffee shop window, turned into the worst day of his life.

"My whole world has been turned upside down," said Chong, who is facing child endangerment charges for leaving his son June 6. "It put me in a depression. ... I've never been arrested before."

District Attorney David Roger said Tuesday he would press charges against Chong. Roger also said he would press similar charges against Maria Door Soto, who is accused of leaving her son in a car June 3 to run into a shoe store. Door's car was stolen but later found with the child.

In both cases the children were not harmed.

The charges come after prosecutors refused to press charges against a man whose child died after being left all day in a hot car. The man forgot, authorities said, and didn't willfully mean to leave his child.

"One person forgot they left their kid in the car and the kid died," said Chong, 32. "I knew I left my child in my car. It doesn't make sense."

Asked if it was fair, Chong said, "I have no idea."

Both Door and Chong, and their respective spouses, say they are shocked by the news. They also said they are good parents and that they have already paid an emotional price for committing what they called serious errors.

Chong spent 26 hours in jail after a police officer found him in the Starbucks June 6. The officer yelled at him, Chong said, for being a bad father.

"That is what hurt me the most," he said.

At their home near Buffalo and Westcliff drives, Cesar Olivas, husband of Maria Door Soto, said, "We're surprised ... and didn't think it would come to this."

Like Chong, Maria Door Soto said she didn't want to wake her 16-month-old son, Edwin, from his nap unless Vegas Shoes, where she was looking to buy him sandals, was still open. So she left him in the car with the motor running and walked to the store's entrance.

"We're going to try and show that we're good parents," Olivas said. "We have faith in God that ... justice will be served and (the court) sees it is better for our son to be with his mother than (to put her) in jail."

Groups that work with parents and children around the Las Vegas Valley had mixed reactions to the news of the charges Tuesday.

Roger announced the charges on the heels of a Friday decision not to press charges against David Joseph Fish, whose 7-month-old son died after being left in the car for eight hours.

Chong's arraignment is July 7 in Las Vegas Justice Court. Door Soto's court date will be set in the coming days.

Since May, 11 cases have been reported of parents who have left their children in cars, according to Lt. Jeff Carlson of Metro's abuse and neglect division,

Roger said he received a great deal of public comment that was split on what to do with Fish's case before Friday's decision.

"The feeling of many was that the child was dead and somebody has to pay," Roger said. "But that is not the way the law is written. What I've tried to is educate people on the law. I don't make the laws, I enforce them."

In a memo to Metro Police about the cases, Roger and his staff stressed the issue of "willfulness."

He said in the two cases that have charges pending the parents "willfully placed their children in a situation where the children might have suffered unjustifiable physical pain or mental suffering." He said that wasn't the situation in the Fish case.

The difference between the decisions -- and seeing three cases in a month's time -- has been controversial among those who work with parents and children.

On the one hand, they said, the seriousness of the issue begs for a solution.

On the other hand, methods other than prosecuting parents such as Door Soto and Chong may be more appropriate for educating the public -- and the law as currently written is difficult to prosecute as it hangs on proving that a parent willfully placed a child in harm's way, they said.

"It's a frightening situation," said Candy Schneider, who works in the school community partnership program at the Clark County School District and is an advocate for children's safety.

"You wonder in a court of law how you determine ... if a parent had intent to harm their children."

Schneider said the message that parents should not leave their children in cars may best be communicated through educational campaigns.

"I'm not sure if making an example of these parents is going to help deter other parents," she said.

Kiki Rodgers, president of Safe Kids, a Las Vegas nonprofit, said education is sometimes also achieved through prosecution.

"Whatever means it takes to get the information out that people need to slow down a little ... and some people learn the hard way," she said.

Moises Denis, spokesman for the Nevada Parent Teacher Association -- perhaps the state's largest organization concerned with families, at about 25,000 members -- said his organization "liked to educate parents through campaigns or one-on-one.

"I don't know if legal action is always the best thing."

Susan Klein-Rothschild, director of family services, says all adults just need to be more careful. "Too many times we see children who were left, and there tragic circumstances. No one wants this to happen to their child. We want to do everything we can to prevent it.

At her Las Vegas home Tuesday night, Hye Young Kim, Chong's wife, said her husband cared deeply for her son.

"It's too much," she said of the charges.

archive