I agree with Shane 100% also! My daughter is 5 yrs old and plenty tall to be in a booster seat, but the idea of not having her in a 5 point harness scares me!  I would NEVER go anywhere without having my kids buckled in.  I believe it is a good idea to think ahead so during events you have already thought things through.  Since my  husband works 48 hr shifts I know that if anything happened while he was gone I'd be calling 911.  I am one of 11 kids!! I have seen many of my siblings hurt and rushed to the hospital. Once my little brother had a seizure near the Keene exit on 58. He actually stopped breathing and my mom pulled over on the side of the road  and was breathing for him. Once he started breathing again she put him BACK IN HIS CARSEAT and drove straight to the hospital. Also we have had rides to the hospital with people bleeding, ect. everyone was buckled in!!

More and more I have noticed people that do not have their kids in carseats or even in the proper type of car seats. Like young kids in boosters who are way too small for one!! I know they're cheap, but come on this is your kids safety. It honestly upsets me ALOT!

I also think buses not having seatbelts is one of the dumbest things ever! One reason why I'll probably always drive my kids to school.

I agree with luvmy2girls there should be some type of parenting class for new parents. Children do not come with instructions. I know when i became a mom for the first time i was clueless on how to take care of a new baby. I would of loved to taken a class so i would of been more prepared. Luckily i was staying with my Parents so my mom helped alot but not everyone has that option.

And i personally feel that those that do not put their child into a carseat/seatbelt are endangering the lives of their children and they should face severe consequences.

I don't have strong opinions about too many things but car seats is definitely one of them that I do have VERY strong opinions about. I agree with Shane 100%!! There is absolutely no excuse for not having a child restrained in a car seat! I have seen so many children severly injured or die because their parents (the person they are supposed to be able to trust more than any other in the world) did not take 1 minutes time to buckle them up. And not only do people need to buckle the kids in the car seat but they need to make sure the car seat is PROPERLY buckled into the car.

It always amazes and angers me when I see an innocent child riding down the street unrestrained. I don't know about anyone else but my children are the world to me and I go out of my way to do whatever I can to keep them safe. Car seats SAVE lives! And car seats are not just for young children, a child should not be out of a car seat because they are 6 years old. Car seats should not be looked on as an inconvenience that you can finally get rid of when the child turns 6. I personally have my children in a car seat and they are both 6 or over. I am so glad that they are starting to advertise more on t.v etc about the importance of a child being in a car seat until they are 4'9.

Another important issue associated with the car seats is that children should not be sitting in the front seat of a vehicle unless there is no other choice. The back seat is the safest place for them.

Someone else said that they require you to have a car seat before you can take your new baby home from the hospital. They need to also have a mandatory parenting class before you can take that child home with regular updates for changing laws, safety, etc. God forbid our country put any effort into creating the safest situation for an innocent child. But it's so important that you have to have a license to catch a fish...AMAZING!!

Why didn't they leave the baby with her other child and roommate? The baby died because both were negligent parents! They didn't live in Bear Valley they lived in Metro Bakersfield.

KGET news story posted today!

BAKERSFIELD - Two women -- accused in the no-child-safety-seat car crash death of a 4-month-old -- lied to investigators, according to reports filed in support of criminal charges against them.

Mother and daughter Brenda and Sandy Stockman left Sandy's 6-year-old with Sandy's ''live-in companion'' just before the accident, and could have left the baby, according to the reports. The reports identified the companion as Tanya Roscoe, but don't say what is meant by "live-in companion." The statement by the roommate directly contradicts statements by Brenda, 46, and Sandy, 26, who told officers they had no choice but to take the baby in the car without a safety seat.

The reports accompany misdemeanor charges filed against the two in court this afternoon. At that first hearing, Brenda pleaded not guilty to allegations of vehicular manslaughter and child cruelty. Sandy, accused only of child cruelty, has not been to court yet.

The report says the women were hastily arrested Monday because Brenda was considered a flight risk.

After the accident, the women told a compelling story. Earlier in the day, they said, Kayden's aunt took the baby to a doctor's appointment, and the child's car safety seat was inadvertently left in the aunt's car.

Brenda and Sandy said they were alone with the baby shortly before 8 p.m. when Sandy began having an asthma attack.

Sandy couldn't drive, the women said. They couldn't leave Kayden alone, they said.

So they took off for Memorial Hospital on 34th Street. Brenda drove the Toyota Rav-4 as Sandy held the baby in her lap in the back seat, a single safety belt around them both, the women said.

Brenda was flashing the car's lights and honking her horn as she raced to the hospital. On Chester Avenue, she ran a red light to turn left from southbound Chester onto eastbound Columbus Street, she said. The car was struck by a northbound pickup truck.

Sandy suffered a broken thumb. Brenda was thrown against the windshield and suffered a hairline hip fracture. The baby died at the hospital. The case became a hot topic in Bakersfield. Most callers to talk radio agreed that children need to be in safety seats. But if, for some reason, no seat is available and there is a medical emergency, what's a mother to do?

Now, police say the accident just didn't happen that way. The women could have left the baby with Sandy's roommate, but instead chose to take her on the high-speed run to the hospital, according to reports.

I agree alot with what both beekeeper and colitas are saying. There alot of questions about the entire story but that will be left to the law to sort out and decide the fate of the mother and grandmother. I just hope that this story will get people to think twice before getting into a car with a child and not secureing them in a car seat or safety belt.

I do have to agree with beekeeper.  I am a parent and nothing means more to me than my children.  I would gladly give my life for thiers.  As I'm sure so would the mom and grandmother in the above story.  As they say hindsight is 20/20.  But what would we benefit from these women going to jail?  What would jail teach them or punish them that they are not doing to themselves now.  It was an emergency and sometimes everyone doesn't do the right thing.  They get scared, they get confused, and not all of us are good under pressure.  It's not like they had the car seat and didn't use it.  As a parent there have been times where my child has rode in another car and we forgot to get the seat out.  I do not think I am the only this has happen to.  I think the parents who don't restrain their children when they go to the store, or some trivial errand are worse than a parent reacting to an emotional emergency.  I too have taken my child to the hospital not in a car seat.  He had gotten bit by a friends chow/wolf mix when he was 4 years old.  We were coming from Green Street, so my son's face is bleeding profusely, screaming in pain and fear.  I jump in the car with my friend that is holding my son and we go to the hospital.  I didn't call 911, my son wasn't in a car seat but being held and comforted during the 3 minute ride to the hospital.  Should I be in jail?  Should the tax payers be paying for my stay because I am a danger to society?  Was I wrong, probably.   Should I be in jail, your call---the tax payers and law makers.  Child endangerment--Willful Child Endangerment--do we know the difference in these two charges.  Neglect?  There is a chance our children will get kidnapped or assaulted by a child molester, or get hit on their bike, or get a snake bite or broken bones playing a school sport----are we endangering our children or neglect, should we all go to jail?  Bakersfield has smog, smog is bad, we let children breathe that, we are endangering them.  Please, this is a very tragic accident---do we remember what an accident means before we start pointing fingers and suing everyone and their mother.  This is all just too much!!!-

If I was in her shoes i would of called 911 and then my mother. And there is no way i would put an infant in a car without a carseat. My mom could of stayed there with the child while the ambulance took me to the hospital and i got the needed treatments. I have 3 children ranging from 15 years old to 7 years old and i have NEVER allowed them into a car without a carseat or a seatbelt, no matter what the situation.

And if cost was an issue i can understand that completly. But in an emergency i would not care about the cost i would only care about getting the needed help.