21–30 of 763 posts
This is ridiculous, kids can (and should) be a little bit independent. It was in his own neighborhood. And 20 years in prison as a maximum punishment?
https://www.popehat.com/2013/02/05/crime-whale-sushi-sentenc...
https://www.treehugger.com/children-protected-reasonable-ind...
> Waco, Texas What? If this draconian policy is happening in Texas, the land of the free, can I assume it's even worse in the rest of North America? I hope Texans are up-in-arms about this government overreach.
In Japan, children are encouraged from early age to be independent. They even take the subway and bus by themselves, albeit it's significantly safer there than in other parts of the world. Still though, I think people in America have gone off the deep end.
> Waco, Texas What? If this draconian policy is happening in Texas, the land of the free, can I assume it's even worse in the rest of North America? I hope Texans are up-in-arms about this government overreach.
It's frustrating because these kinds of overreactions are based on a perception that crime is much worse than it is. At the same time, the perception that these kinds of incidents are common is itself wrong. Both false perceptions are caused by the "man bites dog" effect, where the media reports what is interesting, and media consumers therefore overestimate the frequency with which these unusual events occur. This k…
Police just power tripping as usual. I wonder why they don't name and shame the officers - clearly these are the people doing wrong and should be removed from their positions.
Clearly the cops started this stupid ball rolling, but anyone at the local attorneys office could have just chosen not to persecute. Instead they offered the plea deal.
My house was 0.99 miles (seriously) from my kid's elementary school - the cutoff for bus service was 1 mile, so my kids were classified as "walkers" to elementary school. I went ahead and drove them myself anyway, but the school seemed perfectly fine with them walking 0.99 miles each way every day.
>A woman one block away had called the cops to report a boy walking outside alone. That lady had actually asked Aiden where he lived, verified that it was just down the street, and proceeded to call nonetheless. The cops picked up Aiden on his own block. this is the real problem here. who in their right mind calls the cops on a kid walking around his own neighborhood?
There will always be people who overreact and call the police for inappropriate reasons. That isn't the problem. The problem is that the police, and then the DA, chose to make this a criminal matter. Either of them could and should have dismissed the issue after verifying that the child was not being put into a harmful environment.
The only independent verification I can find on this story is a GoFundMe launched by a relative: https://www.gofundme.com/f/restore-money-lost-after-wrongful...
Reason exists to flog stories about our terrible government overlords, and they've been caught pushing bad info in the past. This doesn't even report info that is publicly available in the arrest report and court plea!
I'd strongly recommend waiting for a general news organization like the local TV station to report this first before forming too many opinions.