(ABC 10)
A woman says police kicked her out of a Brad Paisley concert in San Diego for breastfeeding.
Megan Christopherson was at the show on Thursday when an officer from the Chula Vista Police Department asked her to leave the pit area, citing concerns about the safety of her four-month-old daughter Gracie.
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In a since-deleted clip Christopherson filmed of her exchange with the cop, the officer is heard explaining, “Your child could get crushed… We’re afraid of your child’s eardrums are being hurt. [It] is borderline child endangerment.”
However, the mother says that the infant was perfectly fine (and had actually already been to Tim McGraw and Lady Antebellum concerts at the same venue) and that the real issue was that people had complained to security personnel about her breastfeeding Gracie.
When the cop asked Christopherson to move to seats further from the stage and speakers or to leave the show and receive a refund, she chose the latter.
The mom insists that there was no safety issue, and that security guards and cops used it as an excuse to boot her for nursing her child in public.
“I want to stand up for all nursing women, and stand up for what’s right,” she told local news. “It was completely a cop-out. They’re trying to cover this up because they know they legally cannot remove me for nursing.”
The Chula Vista Police Department disagrees, putting out this statement on Friday:
Last night at the Brad Paisley concert, amphitheater security notified Live Nation Management that there was a female in the “pit” area with an infant baby strapped to her chest. The female was near the stage wall area and mere feet away from the speakers. Security asked the female patron to move from the “pit” area due to the danger to the infant child (crushing from potential crowd surge and excessive noise level from the adjacent speaker). The female refused to leave the area.
CVPD officers were summoned to the area to check the welfare of the infant. She was advised of the danger posed to her infant child (crowd surg e and excessive noise) if she remained in the pit area. She was presented with two options; she could be relocated to a seated area (free of charge) or receive a full refund. The female elected a full refund and left the venue.
The Chula Vista Police Department’s involvement in the incident was due to the welfare and safety of the infant and not due to a mother’s legal right to breastfeed in public.
Check out the video below, and tell us what you think.
Was Christopherson wrong to bring a baby to a concert?
Were the police wrong to ask her to leave?
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