Child OK After Falling From Fleeing SUV During TV Theft
FALMOUTH (CBS) — A mother pleaded not guilty Monday in a bizarre shoplifting incident on the Cape in which her child fell out of a moving vehicle.
Lisa Degerolamo, 29, and Daniel McLaughlin, 29, kissed while they were handcuffed during their arraignment in Falmouth District Court.
Police say the couple went to a Walmart in Falmouth Sunday afternoon and stole a 60-inch flat screen TV.
But as they were loading it into their SUV, a man and his wife noticed them.
They also saw a young boy in a car seat in the back seat.
"It was still a pretty strange situation," the witness who wished only to be identified as "Brian," told WBZ-TV.
"The kid's screaming, the guy's wrapping a white towel around the door of the rear passenger side of the car to keep the door shut because the TV was too big to fit in."
Brian said the open door didn't stop the couple from trying to speed off.
"As soon as she took the left and spun around that barrier to go up that hill, the boy just, he really flew out of the car and hit his head off the concrete really, really, really hard. And she made that left and just continued. She flew up that hill. See you later. Gone."
As Brian and his wife comforted the 5-year-old boy, Degerolamo came back in the SUV.
Brian's wife took a photo of the mother just before Degerolamo and McLaughlin put the boy back in the SUV and sped off.
"I was clearly upset. I mean, I'm a parent, a father and it took everything I had not to really give him a good one."
It didn't take long for police to find the couple and arrest them at their home in East Falmouth.
As for the 5-year-old boy, his mother claims he is autistic.
He is now in the custody of the Department of Children and Families.
Degerolamo and McLaughlin were each ordered held on $2,500 bail.
