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NEED TO KNOW
- A little boy named William snuck away from home for a Chick-fil-A breakfast sandwich in Jacksonville, Fla.
- Jacksonville Police found him sitting in the restaurant along with the manager, and drove him home
- His parents were shocked at his escape, and later reunited with their child with help from the officers and restaurant’s staff
This Florida boy stopped at nothing for a snack.
The 5-year-old, identified as William, slipped through the front gate of his family’s home and wandered to a nearby Chick-fil-A, where he was greeted by the staff and treated to a breakfast sandwich, per the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office (JSO).
“Officers Kelly and Perri found little William happily enjoying breakfast and lots of attention from the staff,” the JSO wrote on X, where they shared camera footage of the June 24 incident on Monday, Sept. 1.
Police said William managed to squeeze through the fence by himself as his parents slept, and went out to breakfast. He walked over to the restaurant, located on San Jose Boulevard in Jacksonville, Fla.
“I have children, and you know, the first thing, you know, you get that knot in your stomach because somebody else who’s a parent is missing their child,” Officer Perri explained in JSO’s video.
Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office/X
As the officers walked William back to their patrol car, William nervously asked, “Are you going to get me to jail?” to which Officer Kelly laughed and assured him that would not happen. The officers then took William on a drive through his neighborhood until the boy pointed out his house.
When the officers knocked on the door and greeted William’s parents, they were shocked at how the little one made his snack run escape from what they referred to as “the most secure house on that block” given its full perimeter fence.
“It’s kind of scary, actually, because we didn’t realize what was going on until after,” his mom, Victoria, said during a reunion with staff and cops at the nearby Chick-fil-A location following the incident.
Video footage from June shows Victoria and her husband Phil shocked at their son’s quick fence escape.
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“I know he knows how to get to Chick-fil-A because we walk there,” Victoria elaborated in the video. “I would’ve never expected him to come down here on his own in the morning before anybody else in the house was up.”
William’s father, Phil, was happy their son returned home safe and sound.
“I was worried about him, because, was he scared, was he crying was he upset? He was quiet, which was unusual for him,” Phil said. “I think he understood that it was serious, but we did talk about it.”
PEOPLE has reached out to the Chick-fil-A location and the JSO for comment.
