Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Forgetting a Child in a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime? (2009)

washingtonpost.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 234 posts

Re: Forgetting a Child in a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime? (2009)

#121

Post by PhasmaFelis »

Sleeep wrote: post #109
rayiner wrote: post #31

This is a great way to analyze the purposes of the criminal justice system. Typically, there are three: punishment, deterrence, and rehabilitation. Prosecuting someone who forgot their kid in the car can't have deterrent effect--to the extent the event was avoidable, the possibility of prosecution couldn't possibly match the deterrent effect created by the risk of harm to the child. Likewise, there is no rehabilitati…

How do you tell the difference between someone who forgot their child in a car from someone who "forgot" their child in the car? Should we really be sending the message "you can always get away with killing your kid as long as you use this method. It's a get out of jail free card." From my experience growing up parental child abuse is fairly common but very underreported so the case of malice can't exactly be discoun…

That's true of many crimes, though. Leaving a pan on a hot stove could be insurance fraud, murder, or honest absentmindedness. It's already the court's job to look at the facts and make the best judgment they can.

Re: Forgetting a Child in a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime? (2009)

#122

Post by mysterypie »

evanpw wrote: post #119
mysterypie wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There are a lot of shitty parents out there who fear prison more than they fear losing their child. There are even parents who want to kill their children. This raises a question I've wondered about. Can a parent who doesn't want their child "give up" the child to the state without any strings attached? I.e., without doing something bad that would cause the state to take away the child and without being on the hook…

Yes, at least in the US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safe-haven_law

That's for babies, under 30 days old, which the parents could have readily put up for adoption even without this law. Moreover, the government treats it as a criminal act (abandonment) in some states.

Like I said above, it surprisingly difficult to get a straightforward answer to this.

Re: Forgetting a Child in a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime? (2009)

#124

Post by wolfgang42 »

function_seven wrote: post #100
Inconel wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's definitely an interesting method. I'm always surprised that I don't see more people relying on checklists in day to day tasks. I use checklists religiously at work and have incorporated them into my daily life as well. I have a number of friends who are constantly leaving things behind(cellphones, wallets, house/car keys), I don't think I'm any less of a naturally forgetful person than them, but because I use…

I have a bad habit of forgetting things at home when I leave in the morning. I developed a habit: “Wallet, keys, badge, smokes, phone” I pat the pocket each item should be in as I say it out loud. Unfortunately, I now do this on auto-pilot. I pat the pocket, say the word, leave the house... and realize I don’t have my badge on me when I arrive at work. I’m thinking about installing a card reader that locks me in the…

I developed the habit of feeling each item instead of just patting the pocket. That way, if the item is missing you won't be able to complete the action.

On the other hand, I've found that I now have the problem that if there's an item that's supposed to be missing (for example if I've lent my keys to someone) I have a constant low-grade panic where I keep checking my pockets, realizing there's something missing, reminding myself that it's supposed to be, and then doing the whole thing over again a few minutes later.

Re: Forgetting a Child in a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime? (2009)

#125

Post by [deleted] »

evanpw wrote: post #119
mysterypie wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There are a lot of shitty parents out there who fear prison more than they fear losing their child. There are even parents who want to kill their children. This raises a question I've wondered about. Can a parent who doesn't want their child "give up" the child to the state without any strings attached? I.e., without doing something bad that would cause the state to take away the child and without being on the hook…

Yes, at least in the US: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safe-haven_law

[deleted]

Re: Forgetting a Child in a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime? (2009)

#126

Post by conanbatt »

0xbear wrote: post #116
mcappleton wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe it's better that some guilty go free if it means that the innocent are not wrongly punished. Wrongly punishing the innocent is terrible and causes so many psychological problems. That's why we have innocent until proven guilty

The key phrase here is "some", and not "all". I mean why is it even an argument that killing your own kid through negligence should be a crime? The perp may or may not be convicted, but they _must_ go through a trial for something like that, and the jury of their peers must decide. Anything else would cause a spike in "negligence". Because let's face it, there are a lot of people out there who have no business having…

If we could openly admit that we send innocent people to jail, it would be much easier to argue for better prison services for inmates. Afterall, we are assuming some portion of it is innocent.

Re: Forgetting a Child in a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime? (2009)

#127

Post by m_mueller »

rocqua wrote: post #89
nervousvarun wrote: post #41

As others have said this is a problem that in 2017 should already be solved by technology. But in the event you don't have access to a technological solution try this: If you have an infant in your car get in the habit of taking your shoes off and putting them next to the baby when you drive. When you reach your destination you might forget the infant...but you won't forget your shoes. Edit: My dad (who was an absent…

As horrible as this form of death is, it seems statistically unlikely. I'd wager that there are orders of magnitude between child deaths in cars due to heat and child deaths in cars due to crashes. As such, I don't think an app for this makes sense. I don't think this ranks when looking at the numbers. That said, this must be amongst the worst ways of losing a child, and that is saying something.

> I'd wager that there are orders of magnitude between child deaths in cars due to heat and child deaths in cars due to crashes.

Don't just calculate the risks, also calculate the ratio of mitigated-risk-to-cost. Lowering the risk of death in traffic [1], after a certain extent of due diligence, can be very costly or impossible (don't go to work/preschool anymore). Lowering the risk of heat death, as GP describes, seems rather trivial - so there's no reason not to do it.

[1] which is quite high btw, I completely agree on that point. In an 80 year life in the US you're statistically going to die in a traffic accident with a probability of 0.85%. Almost 1 in 100 people die this way, so most people will know someone. For comparison, the same calculation for the UK (one of the lowest) comes out at 0.24%, so there's ways to go there for the US.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_traffic-r...

Re: Forgetting a Child in a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime? (2009)

#128

Post by Macha »

mywacaday wrote: post #94

There was a case of this happening in Ireland this summer. Happened on the hottest day of the year, fathers first day dropping child at creche, took a call in the car, worked in a quiet part of a industrial estate. Dozens of minor items aligned to cause the death. It was discussed heavily in the office and among friends. At least 30% of people had forgotten to drop a child at creche and noticed the child close to or…

To add to the tragedy, this resulted in death threats to the father and his eventual suicide. I don't think it would have been prosecuted here but now we won't know.

Re: Forgetting a Child in a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime? (2009)

#129

Post by jMyles »

tarboreus wrote: post #64
thedevil wrote: post #9

It actually is a misdemeanor in my state to leave a child unattended in a car if it's in public and there's risk of "hyperthermia, hypothermia, or dehydration." I looked it up after a stranger hung out at my car to nag me for leaving my son (who refused to leave the car) for five minutes in a locked car in a safe neighborhood in 75f weather.

75 F is not safe. Neither is 65 F. I'm not saying you did something wrong, but what your neighbor did was certainly right

> 75 F is not safe. Neither is 65 F.

OK, I'll bite. What are you talking about?

Re: Forgetting a Child in a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime? (2009)

#130

Post by mcguire »

"The human brain, [David Diamond] says, is a magnificent but jury-rigged device in which newer and more sophisticated structures sit atop a junk heap of prototype brains still used by lower species. At the top of the device are the smartest and most nimble parts: the prefrontal cortex, which thinks and analyzes, and the hippocampus, which makes and holds on to our immediate memories. At the bottom is the basal ganglia, nearly identical to the brains of lizards, controlling voluntary but barely conscious actions."

That is a pretty decent description of the lump of goo in the human skull. Weird that many people attribute very impressive superpowers to it.

Post reply on HN