A Bronx, New York mom says she nearly passed out when she found her toddler son playing outside their apartment that sits seven stories high.
According to PIX 11, Jeanine Malave had no idea what her son was doing when the nanny cam in her toddler’s bedroom recorded the 3-year-old child tugging at their AC unit for several minutes.
The toddler, who has autism, continued to tug until the window unit fell onto the bed below. It was then the young boy crawled out of the bedroom window and onto the scaffolding below.
After Malave’s went to check on her 3-year-old boy, she told PIX 11 she couldn’t find him:
“I looked left, looked right – I didn’t see my son.”
As PIX 11 reports, the mom went to the nanny cam footage to learn what happened. That’s when she saw her son, Jariel, pulling at the AC unit and crawling out of the seven-story high window.
Malave’s admitted she thought her son “was dead.” But then she heard the screams of another woman in her same apartment building, Maria Espertome.
Espertome was washing the dishes when she saw little Jariel outside playing on the scaffolding. She said she screamed when she saw him and tried to get the boy inside:
“Give me your hand, little one. Give me your hand.”
Despite her efforts, Jariel continued to play, and that’s when Espertome yelled for Malave. The mom then ran over and grabbed her son, pulling him safely inside.
Malave admitted to PIX 11:
“I almost fainted.”
Thankfully Jariel was okay and unaware of the danger he was in.
Now, the mom of three wants other people to know her story so that it doesn’t happen to more families with window units.
Property management for the New York City Housing Authority told PIX 11 that the mom was at fault for the scary situation because she installed the AC unit herself. However, the mom said she requested help with installation, but the ticket went unanswered for two weeks, so she decided to do it herself.