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Wandering 3-Year-Old Greensboro Boy Rescued By Dollar General Employee

An employee of the Dollar General on Phillips Avenue found the boy and called Greensboro police.

GREENSBORO, NC (WFMY) - A 3-year-old boy was found alone in Greensboro Thursday morning, according to Greensboro Police.

An employee of the Dollar General on Phillips Avenue found the boy and called the police.

"Some employees at that location which is a Dollar General took the child and took him into the Dollar General and put some clothes on him because the clothes he was wearing were wet because he had been out there for a while," said Sergeant Alexander Ricketts.

"When we got there, we located the child, we tried to locate the mother in the area, we knocked on some doors, tried to make some calls but weren't able to identify the child and or find a mother or father. So we took the child into our custody and took him to Maple Street Police station and contacted social services."

Police say the child's mother returned from work to discover the child missing. She then reported to the Claremont management office and called the police.

Police announced Thursday afternoon they had located the father of the boy found wandering Thursday morning.

Robert Townsend is facing misdemeanor charges of child abuse, failure to report a missing child and child abuse. According to authorities, the child was in Townsend's custody when he wandered off.

Robert Townsend (Photo: Guilford County Jail)

Police sent a voicemail through the Guilford Emergency Alert, Notification and Information System that a boy was wandering alone in the 2700 block of Patio Place near Claremont Courts around 8:30 a.m.

The child said his first name was Mikey. He was wearing a Winnie the Pooh rain jacket and black pants with a yellow stripe down the leg.

"It could have been a lot worse had it not been for good citizens trying to locate the child. He could've wandered away and frozen to death because it was below 35° at the time when the child was wandering around outside," said Sergeant Ricketts.

The child was handed over to the mother by Social Services.

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