Full story below. I’ve replaced my baby’s name with ‘Baby’. I’m sharing this because it was one of the scariest things I’ve ever experienced. I’m happy to coordinate with others who may have similar experiences at this location.
So here’s what happened (including the info from the other mom)
I parked Baby in the cart along a produce stand and turned my back to her to grab carrots and celery out of the main refrigerator. The guy walked in between me and Baby, which alerted my spidey senses because I don’t like people standing between me and my unattended baby. So I took note of what he looked like, pulled Baby over to me and kept shopping.
As I rounded one of the center bins to find onions, he walked past me from the opposite side and made eye contact with me. This triggered my senses again, because he would have had to circle around me in a weird way to face each other.
I walked past the main produce area and picked up a rotisserie chicken along the deli wall. He came up from behind me, passed, and acted like he was shopping along the pre-prepared food fridge. He was pushing a mini cart that had only a couple random items in it.
At this point, I decided I would walk multiple aisles away, and if he followed me then I knew he was stalking me. I left the produce area, walked past three aisles of frozen food, the bread aisle, and went to the soup aisle to get chicken stock.
After putting the stock in the cart, I looked up and sure enough he was coming down the opposite end of the aisle. We walked past each other, and as I reached the end of the aisle I looked back and he had stopped and was staring back at me.
I rounded the corner to the main walkway and then bolted through the clothing racks in the center until I could park Baby along a center clothes wall. I hid behind the wall and watched the soup aisle through some endcap shelves.
Sure enough, he backtracked through the soup aisle looked both ways down the main aisle before heading the way I had turned to get out of sight before hiding in center clothing. I stalked him as he looked for me in each checkout lane.
I waited for him to round a corner near Home & Gardens to checkout my stuff.
While I was checking out (which took about 8 minutes), he had abandoned his cart in the Garden Center and went to the parking lot (maybe to find me or head me off). He approached the other mom who was putting her kid in the car seat, but heard her husband talking through the truck and wandered off to the next car aisle.
He saw me exit the store (walking down the same aisle as the mom he had approached) and walked back to the store front and turned around to follow me down that aisle.
I didn’t know he was outside when I exited the store. I looked for him while walking to my car but never saw him. The first thing I did was open the side of the car and put Baby’s car seat in the base. When I looked towards the front of the building through the window, he was coming towards me about 6-8 cars away.
The spot next to me was empty, but the truck right next to it was on. It had completely black tinted windows, but I knocked on the window fast and kept looking back at the man.
The wife rolled down the window and I said “A man has been following me and my baby, can you guys stay until I leave?”
She immediately turned to her husband and said “I told you!” The husband jumped out of the truck and stood with me. The guy was one car away and when he saw the husband through the window, he made a 90° turn and walked to another car aisle.
I then talked to the couple and she told me how he had just approached her minutes before without realizing her husband was in the truck. He was about 4 feet away before doing a 180 at the husband’s voice and wandering to the other car aisle. I’m assuming that’s why they were still sat there idling their truck while I was coming out of the store.
We agreed to have them follow me halfway home and they would make sure no car was following them.
After they broke off from following me, I broke off 23 and took some backroads to make sure no cars were following me home.
I filed a police report with Delaware PD and saved the receipt so I have a date & time stamp if something happens to another family.
When I got home, Spouse said he was probably looking for vulnerable women to approach/assault for money. Maybe not a child napper necessarily. It was a Monday at 2:00pm after all.
When I had asked if the other mom had a baby too, she said “I was putting my son in his seat” or something, so I’m assuming he was a toddler or young kid. Regardless, super creepy.
I now realize I made two mistakes:
I never should have stepped away from my baby, even just 4 feet away in a store.
I never should have left the store without calling the police or asking an employee to escort me. I’m truly dumbfounded that I didn’t do this. The police said they could be there in 2 minutes when I called after getting home.
