TITUSVILLE, Fla. – A school bus driver for Brevard Public Schools is suspended with pay after the driver dropped off a 3-year-old boy at the wrong bus stop Monday afternoon, according to Brevard Public Schools.
The boy's mother, Virginia Merritt, said her son Ronald is in the Head Start program at the Riverside School in Titusville.
Merritt said when the bus was running 20 minutes late Monday, she knew something was wrong.
She drove to the school, getting more worried by the minute.
"I start panicking and I'm telling them, 'Hey, I need answers. Where's my child? Where's the bus?' And they said, 'I don't know. That's what we're trying to find out.' And then the phone started ringing," Merritt told News 6.
The phone call to the school offices came from another parent saying Ronald was at the Forest Park Apartments.
The 3-year-old was dropped off on the bus two miles from home, left wandering an unfamiliar neighborhood.
"I freaked out. I panicked and I sped to the apartment complex," Merritt said.
Merritt said she confronted the bus driver at the apartments and the driver admitted her mistake.
"She said, 'I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Please, forgive me. Please, forgive me. He's here. He's right here,'" Merritt said.
Brevard Schools said the driver is suspended with pay and every county school bus driver in the northern part of the county will get more training to avoid it happening again.
Merritt wants the driver arrested and said her son won't be attending public school any longer.
"If that parent would have never grabbed my child or called the school, they would have never known where my son was," Merritt said.
Titusville Police and the Department of Children and Families are also investigating. Police said charges are not expected.