Potty-training a toddler can be tough enough without worrying that any slip-ups will net you a fine – but that’s exactly what happened to one Philadelphia mother.

Caroline Robboy was in a clothing store on South Street with her family when two of her children, aged nine and two, said they needed the toilet.

The shop refused to let the family use the on-site bathroom, and Mrs Robboy said her two-year-old son Nathaniel simply took matters into his own hands. 

Fined: Two-year-old Nathaniel was desperate for the toilet when the incident occurred

As his mother left the store with her elderly in-laws, Nathaniel ran to a traffic light pole and proceeded to relieve himself against it.

Before she knew it, a police officer had given Mrs Robboy a fine for her son’s ‘public urination’.

‘I told him to go over to a grassy patch and make pee,’ the mother said.

‘Next thing you know I have an officer giving me a police ticket!’

Outraged: Mother Caroline Robboy has vowed to challenge the $50 fine 

The officer wrote on the $50 ticket that the little boy had been told to wee in the street, failing to acknowledge that the incident was an accident.

Mrs Robboy said he also gave her a lecture on parenting, saying, ‘I’m doing this for your own protection because God forbid there might have been a pervert out there looking at [your] son.’