KYLE COLLETT - 5 yo - Sanger, TX

Child left on school bus in Sanger

Posted: Aug 30, 2013 10:24 PM CDT Updated: Aug 30, 2013 10:33 PM CDT
By: Brandon Todd
Adapted for Web by: Danielle Cocanougher



A school bus driver was arrested after a 5-year-old he was supposed to drop off at school, never got off the bus.

Sanger ISD confirmed Kyle Collett was forgotten on one of its buses Friday morning, instead of getting dropped off at Chisholm Trail Elementary.

He spent eight hours on the bus, which was parked at the bus barn.

His grandmother told FOX4 Kyle remembers yelling and trying to open the bus door.

Jeffery Collett, Kyle's father, went to the school to pick up his son at 2 p.m., but says he was told the school didn't know where his son was.

Minutes later, he says the school told him Kyle was found on the bus.

"It took them from 7 o'clock this morning to 2 o'clock to realize the there was a Kindergartner on a bus in 100 degree weather, and nobody knew it," Jeffery Collett said.  

Police say eventually a football coach picked up the bus and drove it from the bus barn to the high school to take players to a game. When he arrived at the high school, he found the 5-year-old.

Kyle's parents took him to the emergency room to get checked out. Other than being dehydrated, it appears he's OK.

His father was told Kyle fell asleep on the bus, although he wonders if he was passed out from the heat.

"I was told he was drenched in sweat, they changed him they had to get him some clothes," Jeffery Collett said. "I can just imagine, I can just imagine, a hundred degrees outside for 8 hours."

The bus driver, 78-year-old Charles Renz, was arrested and charged with child abandonment or endangerment.