Guillermina Rodriguez, a mother of four, found space to pull over after it took her about an hour to get from 42nd to 30th street in midtown Manhattan. She had a crying three-week-old baby crying in the back seat.
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“Even though I saw it was a commercial area I’m like, ‘I’m not obstructing the traffic... Let me just stay there and I can breastfeed the baby there,’” Rodriguez said. She climbed into the back and began nursing. A few minutes later, a tow truck with the NYPD seal pulled up nearby.
“He’s backing up to tow my truck, so as I am in this position breastfeeding now I jump over to the front seat to honk so he can see you know, like, ‘Don’t tow my truck, I’m in here.’”
So the agent got out and walked to her vehicle.
“I’m actually breastfeeding on one side and pumping on the other so both my breasts are out, and I turn and I’m like, ‘I’m breastfeeding the baby!’” Rodriguez told CBS News. “And he kind of looks and he’s like, ‘Oh, OK,’… puts the ticket on the windshield and leaves.”
She got a $115 ticket for idling in a commercial zone.
According to the NYPD, the officer had written the ticket before he noticed Rodriguez was breastfeeding. Without the power to void tickets, he was stuck. Rodriguez says police should be willing to make an exception for nursing.
“I feel like getting them a little bit more educated on that area would be a lot more helpful,” she said.
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