A mom is demanding action after her six-year-old daughter was left behind for two hours during a school trip — while her classmates travelled 26 miles back to class.
Cianni Allen, 6, was found wandering alone in the pumpkin patch at Tuttle Orchards in Greenfield, Indiana, while teachers and classmates caught a bus back to school.
Her mom, Dearra, 33, found out when she got a panicked call from staff at Christel House Academy West.
She rushed to the school while a teacher went to pick up Cianni, who says she thought she’d never see her mom or dad again.
Despite the school’s apologies, Dearra says they aren’t enough.
“They’re trying to keep me quiet with all these apologies, but I don’t care about that. You lost my child,” says the licensed health and life insurance agent from Indianapolis.
“I’m not letting this go. I’ve contacted four lawyers, and I’m pushing this out to the press. This needs to be heard. Teachers aren’t doing proper head counts, and these chaperones — parents who already have their own biases — are responsible for our kids.”
“This is a six-year-old,” she adds. “Anything could have happened to her, and I’m going to make sure people know that.”
Cianni went missing on the trip on October 16.
Her mom says the rest of the class left the orchard at 2:00 and got back to the school at 2:45.
They noticed Cianni was missing when staff from the patch called the school, says her family.
Teachers called Cianni’s emergency contact — her grandmother.
In a state of panic, Dearra, who has two other children, hurried to the school where she met Cianni, who was returned at 4:30.
“We were sitting there, trying to understand how this could happen,” she says.
“Her teacher was there, saying, ‘I did a head count, and everyone was accounted for. I didn’t see Cianni or her pumpkin, so I thought she was already on the bus.’ How do you leave an entire child behind and not realize it?”
Dearra says her daughter was understandably shaken after the ordeal.
“Cianni was by herself for almost two hours. She knows about stranger danger. We had just gone over what to do if a stranger approaches, and then this happens,” she says.
“I thought they turned right back around to get her, but she was sitting there alone for two hours. Anything could have happened to her. Someone could have snatched her.
“She had to talk to strangers while she waited for someone to come back for her.”
Cianni, for her part, feels “sad” about the incident.
“I was scared,” Cianni says. “When I was by myself, I said, ‘Where’s my teacher? And I looked in the apple orchard and the pumpkin orchard.
“And this lady, she said, “What’s wrong?’ And I said, ‘My school is missing.’ And then they took me into their office and called the school.”
On whether she thought she would see her mom and dad again: “No.”
When the school’s principal finally returned with Cianni, Dearra says she “just hugged her and cried.”
“I couldn’t believe this happened,” Dearra says. “Cianni’s dad was furious. He talked to the principal, but I couldn’t even focus. I was too busy holding my daughter.”
Christel House Academy West did not immediately respond to a request for comment.