Man walking around outside nursery each morning

[SMLSML]

Not sure if I'm over thinking... For the last 3 months or so, every morning without fail when I drop my daughter at nursery there is a man who is walking past it, then when I come out he's doing a loop the other way back past again. The nursery is on a business park so he could just be walking to work or getting his steps in but I do find it that he seems to do constant loops at exactly the same time every morning. I've stayed and watched from the car this morning and this is his fourth loop around the nursery building again... He doesn't appear to have a uniform or lanyard of any of the businesses on the estate... Am I thinking too badly given everything in the news at the moment 🙃 would you mention it to the nursery?

It does sound a bit Truman Show.

If I was the OP, I would ignore all the sarky comments.
Only she knows why he looks suspicious to her, and like I said, instinct, especially a mother's instinct, can be invaluable.

Don't call the police or put anything on social media, that would not be fair on the man if he is just out innocently exercising.
Having a quiet word with a staff member would be the best action to take imo.

Log it with 101. You can't be too careful.

Yes, log the fact that a man has the temerity to walk around a business park. That's a great use of their time.

I couldn't even get support from police when a complete stranger turned up at my door and threatened me. What an absolute waste of police time this is

This is Mumsnet. He’s doing something a mumsnetter doesn’t like. Of course he’s old….

I think some people may be underestimating how different a business park environment is compared to normal streets. "My grandad used to walk around to get his steps in" doesn't fit that environment quite as much.

Anyway the point is that the bar for drawing the nursery's attention to something like this should not be that there can't possibly be a reasonable explanation. That's not what we do with kids and precautions. The bar should be the fact that here is a person engaging in behaviour that, while it is very likely to be innocent, is probably quite unusual in that business park context and also happens also be typical of what some men with a predatory obsessive interest in children do.

It's a fact of life that we're none of us ever that far from men like that (hence all the men being prosecuted for images of child abuse). That's just life. We have to assume that near every nursery there will be living or working at least one person like that. Like rats.

So this bloke is statistically likely to be totally innocent. Or it's possible he could be this particular nursery's neighbourhood paedophile, one of the ones who just can't stop himself from walking round and round places where children are. It's impossible to know for sure, so it makes sense to at least raise the alertness of nursery staff by drawing their attention to his behaviour, even while knowing statistically he's still likely to be harmless.

Why should he volunteer anything?

What a stupid remark

And someone turning out to be a road surveyor or waiting for their child to settle or whatever wouldn't be a sign that the OP was wrong. The point of being alert is that you don't just assume that's what the person is, when it comes to children's safety you never just assume, you go one step further and either check or take other precautions.

How would that go?

I am calling to report a man walking past a nursery you need to stop it

For a man walking on a public street?

I regularly walk around my local industrial estate. But I'm a woman so that's fine right?

I used to hang around outside the back of the nursery, screened by a fence, for what seemed all eternity but was probably a couple of weeks, when one of my children started nursery because she just wouldn't settle. She did eventually. I wonder if I looked odd? But I'm female so not so suspicious as a man.

“Excuse me officer, there’s a man in the street!”

Imagine. Absolute insanity.

So, OP.. you going to lurk in the car park to watch a man walking around again tomorrow to confirm your suspicion that he's clearly a paedophile waiting to pounce on some unsuspecting escaping child?

Since most kids who are abused are abused by their fathers, stepfathers, siblings, grandparents or other relatives, I don’t think ‘mother’s instinct’ means two
shiny shits when it comes to spotting a paedophile.

What do you think a member of staff is going to be able to do? The nursery can’t stop a man going for a walk any more than the OP can.

Unless the staff are planning to release the kids into the estate to run free, like beavers in a rewilding project, I can’t really see how this man would be able to access any of the kids even if he was some kind of nonce. I assume the nursery isn’t in the habit of handing babies over to total strangers who happen to pass by.

Police will be thrilled to be called because of a “vibe”

That would be my thought too. Dropped his kid off and has to hang around for half an hour to make sure the kid is settled before he leaves. Walking a loop is less alarming than standing around outside the nursery waiting for a man.

@SMLSML How would you feel if your nervous child took a good half hour to settle at nursery and when the nursery tried calling you to come collect them because today it wasn't happening and you couldn't because some woman who had sat in her car stalking you, called the police?

“But officer, he’s giving me the ick.”

Have an actual word 😂

A "vibe" no doubt developed from obsessively watching him for three months.

Oh, I think a mother's instinct is very strong when it comes to their kids, some may ignore or simply not care enough to act on it, but it's there.

Once the nursery knows a parent has been uneasy about seeing a man repeatedly walk past the nursery, they can be aware of it.
No action needs to be taken, obviously he has done nothing wrong, and probably never will.

Nice dig there about how not reporting a man walking along the street, doing absolutely nothing out of the ordinary other than walking in loops, to the police constitutes "simply not caring" as a mother. As a mother, I'd personally prefer my law abiding and generally decent son wasn't suspected to be a paedophile or kidnapper for taking a morning walk, but there we go.

Oh, I think a mother's instinct is very strong when it comes to their kids, some may ignore or simply not care enough to act on it, but it's there.

LOL. What bollocks.

To what end?
Lunatic Mum "There's a man who walks on the public street around here every day and for no reason other than my paranoia I want you to do something about it"...
Nursery Worker "I'm sorry I'm not the local council so I don't actually own the road...".