The next time Roberto Isales gets on a bus, it might have wire mesh covering the windows.
The 51-year-old school bus driver was arrested April 13 for leaving a two-year-old alone on the bus as he went back home to get some sleep.
Police said that they were called to the corner of West Brighton Avenue and West 2nd Street at 10:30 am after a man walking his dog past the bus heard little Adrien Long’s cries and found the terrified child inside.
The dog-walker immediately ran to PS 370 on West 1st Street and got a school safety agent to free the child, who, while apparently unharmed, was brought to Coney Island Hospital for evaluation.
Responding officers quickly tracked down Isales and the bus matron, identified as Ruth Thames, charging them both with endangering the welfare of a child.
It wasn’t too hard to find Isales, who, according to published reports, was sleeping at his Ocean Parkway apartment.
Officials said that he and Thames were supposed to transport little Adrien to the Infant and Child Learning Center on Parkside Avenue, but never noticed if he had left the bus.
They apparently never gave the bus a quick once over after parking it in Brighton Beach, police allege.
Isales reportedly put the blame on Thames, claiming it was her job to check the bus.
This is the second time this year that a neighborhood school bus driver was arrested for leaving a child behind.
Back in January, 78-year-old school bus driver Phillip Vallone and 66-year-old matron Madeline Shedd were arrested in Sheepshead Bay for accidentally leaving a mute, mentally handicapped five-year-old in their bus for nearly an hour and a half, police said.
