LAS VEGAS (KLAS) – As the school bus pulled away a seven-year-old boy realized he was dropped off in the wrong Las Vegas neighborhood. It would be nearly an hour until an unlikely hero spotted the lost child while police and family searched the city.
Over a mile away, Michael, 10, wondered where his brother Kameron, 7, was as he stepped off the school bus, walking to his grandmother near the drop-off site at N. Tee Pee and Dorrell Lane.
Michael’s grandmother knew something was wrong when she realized Kameron was not on the bus and immediately called her daughter.
“I asked her if everything was okay,” Kris Robinson, the boys’ mother, said.
Robinson was around 25 miles away at work and grew frustrated when the call from her mother failed to go through. Moments later the call would reconnect, and Robinson’s heart sank.
“Kameron is not on the bus,” Robinson’s mother said. “He’s missing.”
Instantly Robinson told her boss she needed to leave and rushed out calling her husband and staff at Darnell Elementary School. Robinson’s mother drove to the school and spoke with their transportation department who responded the drivers had no children left in their vehicles.
“I was overwhelmed with fear,” Robinson said. “In the back of my mind, I’m just saying, I hope that he’s okay.”
Sitting in a school office administration room Robinson’s mother and husband attempted to get more information about what happened and where Kameron might have been taken. The school administrator allegedly pulled up the color-coated bus routes and indicated possible sites he was dropped off—but Michael had a key detail.
Earlier in the day as Michael was the first to get in the bus line, he noticed his brother wasn’t around but initially thought Kameron was just lagging. As the bus quickly filled up Michael allegedly told a teacher his brother’s name and said Kameron was supposed to be on the bus.
“And the teacher said, ‘Oh no, honey. I’m sorry. I don’t know who that is,’” Robinson said.
The new detail only made the situation more agonizing as the school office administrator allegedly told the family they would contact them once they had more information.
“At that point, I called 911, I called Metro,” Robinson said. “I let them know my son is missing, gave them a description of my son, and told them I was on my way to the school.”
When Robinson arrived, she was allegedly told it was possible Kameron was on either the blue or green bus route, but the mother wanted all of them to start her search.
For nearly an hour Kameron was considered missing on the streets of northwest Las Vegas and he suffered from seizures and was prone to heat exhaustion. The triple-degree temperatures added a new danger into Robinson’s search for her son.
However, a phone call from an unknown number would bring the search for Kameron to an end.
“Is this Kris,” the unknown caller asked. “I found your son.”
The unknown caller, an Amazon delivery truck driver, explained he pulled his vehicle over near the intersection of north Fort Apache Road and Gilcrease Avenue where he saw Kameron crying on the side of the road next to a backpack.
Robinson thanked the unknown caller as she ran from the school to her car, driving over a mile to the intersection where she saw a group of people. Multiple drivers had pulled over upon seeing the distressed Kameron and worked to reassure him, some offering him water.
“When I got there, I hugged him,” Robinson said. “I hugged them all. I thanked them for stopping. I thanked them for helping him.”
The Amazon delivery truck driver and others told Robinson they were glad he was okay and grateful Kameron memorized his mother’s phone number.
Robinson said later the same day Clark County School District Police and Las Vegas Metropolitan Police visited their family’s home to verify Kameron was safe and with his parents.
“What happened?“
Robinson spoke with administrators at Darnell Elementary School the next day hoping to learn what caused Kameron to be incorrectly dropped off and why Michael’s concerns were ignored.
“[The principal] told me that she was going to have a staff meeting with her staff to ascertain what happened and how they were going to fix what was broken,” Robinson said.
Robinson was allegedly told some school staff, who were instructed to carry a master list of the students who get on the buses, did not.
Robinson understood the difficulties with the busses but said she still didn’t know what school staff were doing for an hour while Kameron was missing.
“You had no answers for me, and you had an hour’s time that is unacceptable,” Robinson said.
During Robinson’s search for more details, she realized the bus tags on Kameron and Michael’s backpacks were a major factor in the bus route mix-up.
Both Michael and Kameron had their old bus route tags on their backpacks. According to CCSD, the elementary school has two opportunities on the first day of school to attach new tags if the bus routes for students have changed: on the bus or in the classroom.
Robinson said she recalled during the elementary school’s orientation she marked she would drop off her kids in her vehicle on the first day of school, which meant her boys should have both received a new bus tag during class—which Michael received.
“There is a systemic problem in CCSD policies when it comes to lost and missing children, and that should be addressed,” Robinson said. “Not just for the safety of my children, but for all children.”
For a month Robinson said she spoke with different levels of CCSD administrators attempting to learn if protocols changed regarding bus tags and if the school had an answer as to what they did during the search for Kameron, but said she is still seeking more information.
“No parent would ever want to get a phone call that their child is lost and missing,” she said.
The Clark County School District responded to 8 News Now regarding the incident and provided the following statement:
On the first day of school, staff were made aware of a matter involving a student at Darnell Elementary School who boarded a bus they were not assigned to.
Upon learning of the matter, school staff immediately contacted police and deployed staff members to locate the student. Thankfully, the student was located and reunited with family. Measures have been taken to prevent an incident like this from reoccurring, and school and district leadership met with the family to listen and address their concerns.
Parents are strongly encouraged to review their child’s bus stop location with them each year before the start of school. If a student is unsure, they should immediately seek assistance from their bus driver.
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