'He's Very Traumatized,' Mom Says: ...

A South Carolina mother says her family is still reeling after her son was allegedly left on a school bus and then handed off to a stranger before he was returned safely to school

Published Time: 23.12.2024 - 02:31:22 Modified Time: 23.12.2024 - 02:31:22

A South Carolina mother says her family is still reeling after her son was allegedly left on a school bus and then handed off to a stranger before he was returned safely to school.

"He's very traumatized right now," Myeisha Marks, of Horry County, tells PEOPLE. "He hasn't been riding a bus because he's scared of being let off with a stranger again."

Marks says she was at her birthday celebration two hours away in Charleston on Thursday, Dec. 5, when she received a call from her sister, who said that Marks' 4-year-old son, Shamiar Smith Jr., did not get off the bus.

According to Marks, the bus driver claimed to have checked the entire bus but did not see her son.

However, Marks says that after she called Aynor Elementary School, they reached out to the bus driver, who then allegedly said he found Shamiar asleep underneath a coat and proceeded to drop the child off with a neighbor.

Marks tells PEOPLE she immediately called her sister, who "turned around from going to the school" to go check in with the neighbors. But, according to Marks, she then got another "hysterical" call from her sister, who said the boy wasn't there — and the neighbors hadn't seen him.

"Oh my God. My heart dropped in my stomach," Marks says.

When Marks called the school back, she claims she was told that her son was there — and when her sister showed up to get him, the principal allegedly told her that a "stranger just dropped him off."

Marks says that the next day, she called up school officials because she wanted to watch the bus video — and she claims that what the bus driver said happened wasn't the truth.

"Shamiar wasn't even balled up on the coat. He was laying against the window," Marks alleges. "His face, everything was exposed."

CBS affiliate WBTW was the first to report about the incident.

In a statement shared with PEOPLE this week, a spokesperson for Horry County Schools says, “The school and bus office have been in touch with Ms. Marks to discuss -

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the incident in detail and provided an opportunity for Ms. Marks to review the bus video. Procedures from that day are under review and will be addressed appropriately with personnel.”

“Our school bus protocol includes a system of checks and balances to guarantee that each student is accounted for as they arrive at their bus stop,” the spokesperson added. “These steps include, but are not limited to seating charts, the student tag program, and driver interaction with the students. Currently, we are reviewing our tagged child program to determine if any areas of our processes can be refined to improve the safety of the program.”

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Marks says that she eventually met with the stranger who dropped her son off at the school.

"I was thanking her for getting him back to the schoolhouse," Marks says, sharing that the woman told her that her son "was terrified."

"She was like, 'He was so scared. He was scared to go with me. He was scared about the whole situation,' " Marks adds.

Marks tells PEOPLE that she filed a complaint with the school and bus office, but she hasn't heard back as of Thursday, Dec. 19. However, she says the principal has apologized and said it will "never happen again," and the driver has been removed from that particular bus. (The school district spokesperson did not immediately respond to PEOPLE's request for comment.)

Meanwhile, her son, who has been in the process of getting diagnosed with autism and used to love the bus, is now extremely anxious, she says.

"He's like, 'No, I can't ride the bus because they'll give me to a stranger," she says. "I have to talk to him every day, like, 'No, they not going to give you to a stranger no more. It's okay. Mommy's got you.' So it's a lot on me, too."