United States of Fear vs Denmark tilled(trust) culture

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wenty years after going to jail for leaving her baby in a stroller outside a New York City restaurant, Anette Sørensen is ready to set the record straight.

The then-30-year-old aspiring actress had gotten pregnant while studying theater in New York City the previous year, and she had flown to the Big Apple from Copenhagen to introduce her 14-month-old, Liv, to the baby’s Brooklyn-based father, a playwright named Exavier Wardlaw.

When she and Wardlaw decided to grab a drink at a Dallas BBQ in the East Village, she did what she would have done back home. She left little Liv outside sleeping in her stroller.

“I had lived in New York [during school], so, of course, I knew that I didn’t see prams all over the city,” said Sørensen. “But . . . I had been living in Copenhagen, I had given birth to my daughter in Copenhagen, I was raised myself in Denmark .  .  . That’s just how you do it in Denmark.”

Sørensen said it’s a superior parenting style, showing what Danish people call “tillid”: a deep trust that is an essential part of the culture.

“People live in fear [in the US]. Children are not allowed to play in the playground alone,” said Sørensen, who now lives in Hamburg with her husband

Sørensen claimed that she was sitting by the window at Dallas BBQ and keeping watch over Liv. Diners and servers at the restaurant told the press, including The New York Post, that the child had been crying, and that the couple had ignored the server’s request to bring the baby inside, and continued drinking instead. Sørensen insisted that wasn’t the case and said Liv was sleeping calmly until someone called 911 and the cops showed up ‘Of course, you should be allowed to put your child outside when you’re sitting behind the window and you can see it.’

“The first time she woke up was when the officer took her out of the pram,” she said.

Sørensen claimed that she was sitting by the window at Dallas BBQ and keeping watch over Liv. Diners and servers at the restaurant told the press, including The New York Post, that the child had been crying, and that the couple had ignored the server’s request to bring the baby inside, and continued drinking instead. Sørensen insisted that wasn’t the case and said Liv was sleeping calmly until someone called 911 and the cops showed up.

‘Of course, you should be allowed to put your child outside when you’re sitting behind the window and you can see it.’

“The first time she woke up was when the officer took her out of the pram,” she said.

Initially, the first two officers on the scene were going to let her leave with the baby. She went into the restaurant to quickly pay the bill, but then a third policeman arrived.

“I said, ‘I’m leaving now,’ and he said, ‘No, you’re not: You’re arrested,’” she said.

Officers charged both parents with child endangerment and Wardlaw with disorderly conduct.

Sørensen spent 36 hours in prison, where she said she didn’t get much sympathy from the other inmates. Liv was put in foster care by the city’s Administration for Children’s Services.

The American press admonished her for being a negligent, selfish mother — particularly after she decided to sue the city, in 1999 and again in 2003 — while Danish news outlets rose to her defense

“For every Dane it was a nightmare because we are used to living like that,” said Sørensen.

Her travails echo a more recent case. In 2015, Louise Fielden, a female cop from Britain, was arrested after leaving her sleeping 15-month-old son alone in a Manhattan hotel room for 75 minutes.

Police took the boy from her and placed him in foster care. Fielden, who was eventually cleared of criminal charges, defended her actions, saying leaving children alone for short periods of time was “normal and acceptable” in her native culture. Just this month, Just this month, a judge ruled that Fielden had the right to file a $50 million civil negligence suit against the city.