The Public Restroom Credit Card Caper and Bad Parenting

That's right. It's time to take a look at the latest in unusual credit card crimes and feel good that we're not the victims nor the perpetrators of such dastardly deeds.

A Good Lesson for All Stroller-Pushing Parents

Most people, I think we can agree, are good, honest and decent people. But it doesn't matter when you're out in public. You still have to guard your valuables against the jerk in the crowd who doesn't care that you're a tired, harried mother.

The New York Times, in one of its crime blotters, reported that a mother had her iPhone and wallet (presumably filled with credit cards) stolen at a shopping mall.

Where's the lesson? The mother was going to the bathroom and was inside the stall. The stroller wasn't (see, some people just have no shame). We'll give the mom the benefit of the doubt and assume the child was in the stall with her.

The mother's story resonates with me, though. I remember many a time when my tween-aged children were infants, and I'd be out alone at some public place and nature would call, causing me to wonder: Do I leave them outside the stall and possibly have them spirited away by some child-seizing maniac? Or bring them -- the stroller, if the stall was big enough -- and stuff all of us inside this germ-infested space, try to do what I needed to do and let my kids possibly catch some horrible disease?

What to do, what to do…?

I always went with the disease.

Parent of The Year

Shane Cailleteau, a resident of the Dickinson, Texas, area, is accused of stealing one of his ex-girlfriend's credit cards, according to Houston's TV station KPRC.

Whether that's true or not is beside the point, and Cailleteau, for the record, says that he had permission, although one has to think that if he did, perhaps he used it a little too much? Why else would she accuse him of stealing it? Well, never mind. What made news was that Cailleteau and his ex-beau, Christie Marshall, had an argument about the credit card, and, at least according to his version of events, he buckled in his 4-year-old daughter into his car and drove away.

Then Marshall strapped her 4-month-old into a car seat and gave chase.

Cailleteau wound up calling police after she swerved at him and completely ran him off the street (remember, he has a 4-year-old in the car; she has a 4-month-old). But again, this is his version of events. We don't know what was going through her mind. Let's be fair here. Maybe she wasn't trying to run the father and daughter off the road. Maybe she was just trying to run them partially off the road.

Cailleteau wisely called police on his cellphone while speeding away from her and was able to pinpoint a landmark for the authorities to swoop down on them.

The police were able to find them, but not before she crashed her car into his. Fortunately, nobody was hurt.

Marshall was arrested and charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

There's a special place in heck for this person…

That is, if Shatina Golden is found guilty. Maybe it's all a misunderstanding, but the Chicago Tribune reported that Ms. Golden, 35, stole more than 50 credit cards from Northwestern Memorial Hospital patients. She is alleged to have taken the personal information of hospital patients to pay her bills, things like her water bill, her utilities.

Some of these patients were cancer patients, making me think, Didn't they have enough problems? You couldn't, say, leave them alone and focus on someone in the hospital for an ingrown toenail?

Of course, now I've just insulted anyone who has had gone through the indignity and pain of having an ingrown toenail…

And for the "what the heck?" files…

Chris Abril, 50, of Columbus, N.C., was arrested for allegedly stealing and using a credit card. According to the Spartanburg Herald Journal, he sneaked into resident Melanie Taylor's home, took her credit card and used it to buy gas, among other things.

Abril has compiled quite a criminal record over the last six years, including charges of first-degree statutory rape and drinking and driving. But on the positive side for Abril, at least he knows something about the law and what he's in for: a few years ago, he was the county sheriff.

The original article can be found at CardRatings.com:The public restroom credit card caper and bad parenting