Background: A blurred child appears in a van at Pawnee Lake in Nebraska (Izabella Glover/KOLN/YouTube). Inset: Mayde McGuire (Lincoln Police Department).
A Nebraska police captain continues to face legal trouble after authorities say she locked her two‑year‑old daughter in a van while she and her partner fished, causing the toddler to scream for help.
Mayde McGuire, 54, and her partner, 49‑year‑old Mary Tobiassen, were cited for misdemeanor child abuse, the Lancaster County Sheriff’s Office announced. McGuire serves as a captain with the Lincoln Police Department, as Law&Crime previously reported.
Both defendants have now been formally charged with misdemeanor child abuse, according to Lincoln CBS affiliate KOLN.
On August 23, Izabella Glover and Braydon Nichols went fishing on Pawnee Lake in Lancaster County, Nebraska. While there, they heard a child screaming.
“It was a child in distress. It wasn’t a child just wanting to get out of something they didn’t want to do, like it was a child that was … they wanted their parents. They didn’t know what was going on,” Glover told the local television station.
The screams drew the couple’s attention, and they photographed the scene. The image released by KOLN shows a two‑year‑old in the front seat of a van with tinted windows. Glover said she did not see the girl’s hands until the child pressed them against the glass.
The toddler apparently crawled over the back seats to reach the front of the vehicle, where the windows were less tinted, and began banging on the glass for assistance.
The witnesses dialed 911.
By the time sheriff’s deputies arrived at approximately 4 p.m., McGuire had reportedly removed her daughter from the vehicle.
According to investigators, McGuire,who was off duty,and Tobiassen left the child inside the van for about 25 minutes; the engine was off, the windows were up, and the outside temperature approached 80 °F.
Lancaster County Sheriff Terry Wagner emphasized that even when outdoor temperatures appear moderate, the interior of a vehicle can heat rapidly. He warned that children should never be left unattended in a vehicle.
Deputies interviewed McGuire and Tobiassen. Investigators administered a preliminary breath test to McGuire, which indicated a blood‑alcohol level of 0.11, exceeding the legal limit of 0.08.
The defendants are scheduled to be arraigned in court on Wednesday.
A March 2023 press release from the Lincoln Police Department states that McGuire began her career with the agency in 1998 as a patrol officer, steadily advanced through the ranks, and was promoted to captain in 2011. She also managed the department’s Emergency Communications Center and oversaw the Education and Personnel Unit.
Leave a Reply