4-yr.-old left alone for hours – matron busted

A 4-YEAR-OLD GIRL was abandoned on a cold school bus in Queens for five hours after a careless matron hopped off without checking the vehicle, police sources said Thursday.

Little Andrea Rodriguez was still trembling with fear hours after the harrowing ordeal outside Public School 21 on 26th Ave. in Flushing.

“She said she was scared, she was crying, and nobody heard her,” her mother, Kenia Contraras, told NBC 4.

Contraras added that officials from the private bus company Coky Transportation bought her daughter candy before dropping her off in a bid to buy her silence.

Venecia Bisono, 38, the bus matron accused of leaving Andrea behind, was arrested and charged with reckless endangerment and failure to exercise control of a minor, police sources said. Her arraignment was pending Thursday night.

The troubling incident was set in motion when the bus picked up Andrea outside her former home on Northern Blvd. in Flushing about 7:30 a.m. Wednesday, sources said.

The vehicle arrived at PS 21 at 8:15 a.m., sources said.

After the students emptied out, the matron left the bus without noticing the girl who had apparently fallen asleep during the ride, sources said.

Andrea remained alone on the bus until 1:15 p.m. when the afternoon shift driver climbed aboard and spotted her.

The driver called his boss and was told to continue on the route and drop her at home because she was in good health, sources said.

The girl’s parents only found out what happened when they asked her about her day.

“I spent the whole day on the bus,” the girl said, according to a police source.

“The parents freaked the source added.

The furious mother and father from Hicksville, L.I., drove to the school and complained to a school safety agent, who called the bus company and the NYPD’s 109th Precinct stationhouse.

Bisono was called to the school where she was arrested about 10:30 p.m., sources said.

A mother of three, Bisono landed the job within the last month, her oldest daughter said.

“Why is she arrested for this? out,” It was of course an accident,” said the 20-year-old daughter. “Wouldn’t it be the driver’s fault, too? He could’ve gone and seen if someone was on the bus, too.”

A city schools spokesman declined to comment on the incident other than to say that the bus was not contracted by the Department of Education.

Parents on rare occasions pool together to charter private bus service for their children, though it’s not clear if that was the arrangement in this case.

A call to Coky Transportation, which was sued after a bus crash last June, was not returned.

Contraras told NBC the incident has traumatized her daughter who is now afraid to be left alone.

“She can’t sleep,” Contraras said.