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A 3-year-old was found abandoned at a playground in Cork city

Published 15:29 28 Feb 2017 GMT

Gardaí said it was the third time this toddler had been found wandering on her own.

That's what they told a couple who found the little girl near a playground at 5pm last weekend. Speaking to the Neil Prendeville show on Cork's Red FM , a man called Terry describes the moment he found the little girl:

"It started raining and we noticed another family there with two boys. There was this young girl with them and we presumed she was part of the family. The parents and the two boys started to head away and left this young girl there. We were baffled that there was nobody else in the area. This young girl was just left on her own. She was no more than three years old.

"We asked where her mummy was and she said she was at home. We rang the guards and they said they'd send a car straight away. We were told to stay put so the child's parents could find her if they went looking for her. We were waiting in the rain and it got very wet. We were worried about the girl but we were also worried about our own child."

Terry said he offered the little girl some of the food he had been using to feed the birds with his son and said "she would have ate the hand of me if I had anymore. She didn't look as though she was cared for." He said the gardaí knew exactly who the child was and that they told him she had been found wandering twice before. According to the Irish Independent, the child was taken into custody and is now in the care of child protection services.

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