a curious parenting incident

     When my daughter, now grown, was about 14 years old, I looked up from reading the paper at the dining room table one afternoon to see a police car stopping in front of our house. My daughter was still in school, or should have been, but I was worried--perhaps something had happened to her. I was surprised to see a young woman get out of the police car--a teenager I had seen in the neighborhood once, but whom I did not know. She matched my daughter's description pretty well--tall, fair, big, brown shoulder-length hair. There was no real resemblance. I started to go outside, but the police car was gone. The police officer had dropped off a teen at my house, apparently after being told by the teen that she lived there. I went into the back yard, where there was a drive cutting through the backyards of our block, to see if the teen went that way. The police car was at the end of the drive--several houses away--and the teen had stopped to talk to the police officer. I assumed that the matter was settled, and that the girl had been caught giving the police a false address--but was it? I never knew, nor did I find out who the girl was. This must happen a lot---I wonder how often? And does the flip side of it happen, too? When teens are in trouble, does an adult go to court and claim to be the teens' parents? Unbeknownst to the real parents?