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Mom handcuffed, jailed for 8-year-old son walking half a mile

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Re: Mom handcuffed, jailed for 8-year-old son walking half a mile

#321

Post by andromeduck »

pessimizer wrote: post #303
bhelkey wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Child services had the family agree to a safety plan, which meant Wallace and her husband could not be alone with their kids for even a second. Their mothers—the children's grandmothers—had to visit and trade-off overnight stays in order to guarantee the parents were constantly supervised. After two weeks, child services closed Wallace's case, finding the complaint was unfounded. This is the fault of the nosey neig…

> This is the fault of the nosey neighbor Only in the most unproductive way. You're not going to fix the problem by exterminating all nosy neighbors. If your new roof leaks when it rains, it's not the rain's fault, blame it on the person who builds roofs ignoring the unavoidable fact that rain will eventually fall.

those "nosey neighbours" are why these stupid rules exist in the first place

Re: Mom handcuffed, jailed for 8-year-old son walking half a mile

#322

Post by matai_kolila »

adamsb6 wrote: post #293
lacker wrote: post #130

I don't know... the story as written does sound really bad. My similarly-aged kids walk about half a mile to school by themselves, as do dozens of other children that live in my neighborhood, and it would be crazy to arrest parents for this. But we're only hearing the mother's side of the story. The neighbor who called the cops, the actions of the police, it's possible they saw something that wasn't reported here. An…

We do get some information from the other side. The giant delta between the possible prison sentence and the consequences in the plea deal is a signal that the prosecution thought they would do poorly at trial.

I'm baffled as to why her attorney advised she take the plea deal.

Re: Mom handcuffed, jailed for 8-year-old son walking half a mile

#323

Post by PragmaticPulp »

VancouverMan wrote: post #122
CodeMage wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me of the time my son finally gathered the confidence to take the training wheels off his bike and learn to ride it without them. My wife and I were walking, and he was on his bike, and he was so happy and pumped about his achievement, that he asked to ride farther away, out of our sight. Now, this is a peaceful suburban neighborhood we're talking about, and we're on a stretch between his school and a park ne…

> smile politely all the way to avoid escalating. That attitude, while perhaps more comfortable in some ways, just enables the sort of behaviour you encountered, and apparently disliked, from that woman. A blunt response like, "Fuck off. Don't talk to my son.", followed by walking away from her, may have been harsher and not particularly polite, but perhaps it'd cause a person like her to avoid such meddling in the f…

> A blunt response like, "Fuck off. Don't talk to my son.", followed by walking away from her, may have been harsher and not particularly polite, but perhaps it'd cause a person like her to avoid such meddling in the future.

No, it would solidify that persons' belief that the people were bad people and embolden her to act more swiftly next time.

Confrontation and escalation with swearing doesn't teach people a lesson. It makes them dig their heels in.

Re: Mom handcuffed, jailed for 8-year-old son walking half a mile

#324

Post by pdonis »

COGlory wrote: post #233
pdonis wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Let's quickly drop the idea that this is the fault of nosey neighbors No, let's not. According to the article, the neighbor who called the cops asked the boy where he lived, "verified that it was just down the street, and proceeded to call nonetheless". Excuse me? What decent neighbor calls the cops on a neighbor's kid walking just down the street from his own house? I agree the law in question shouldn't even be on…

It isn't the neighbors job to be mentally functional. It is, however, the police's, DA, and CPS's job.

> It isn't the neighbors job to be mentally functional.

I'm not sure I agree. One of the requirements for an adult citizen in a civil society is to be reasonable in your dealings with neighbors.

> It is, however, the police's, DA, and CPS's job.

"Mentally functional" does not necessarily mean "giving citizens a break". The criminal law that the mom was charged with is a law, it's on the books, and law enforcement is supposed to enforce the law. They do have a certain amount of discretion, but the incentives they are facing, particularly in a community which is strongly in favor of "law and order" (which I suspect the one in question is), are against their exercising discretion in favor of a citizen. And putting the "sex trafficking" thing into the mix just makes it worse.

The only real way to fix this is to remove things like this from the discretion of law enforcement by not having a law like this in the first place. (Unfortunately, it appears that when the law was revised to allow kids more independence, they only revised the family law code, not the criminal code. They should have revised both. So I would say the ultimate fault here is the legislature, for being incompetent when making law.)

Re: Mom handcuffed, jailed for 8-year-old son walking half a mile

#325

Post by HarryHirsch »

richx wrote: post #306
Mountain_Skies wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It puts neighbors in a bad situation. Yesterday there was a kid, probably about eight years old, outside my house wandering around by himself, yelling at passing cars. There are lots of kids in my neighborhood and I'm accustomed to them being loud when they're out playing but this kid was alone, going out into the road, and just acting a bit weird. It wasn't a kid I knew so I couldn't call the parents but calling the…

Why didn’t you just ask the kid what it is doing and where it is living?

In America that will immediately identify you as a childlifter. Next thing that happens, you'll have to deal with the cops and the court system.

Re: Mom handcuffed, jailed for 8-year-old son walking half a mile

#326

Post by lrem »

Zak wrote: post #229

District attorney is an elected office in Texas. McLennan County DA Barry Johnson should be called upon to explain himself to the public. Chief of Police doesn't seem to be an elected office, but Chief Sheryl Victorian is still accountable to the public, and she should also be called upon to explain the policies of her department and the actions of her officers. https://www.co.mclennan.tx.us/directory.aspx?eid=185 ht…

Which one of them has "and decide which laws are too stupid to enforce" in their job description? :/

Re: Mom handcuffed, jailed for 8-year-old son walking half a mile

#327

Post by fluidcruft »

gspencley wrote: post #290
cbsmith wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...and really, CPS does need to investigate. Yes, most often it's just a nosey neighbour, but every now and then those nosey neighbours are on to something, and while unpleasant for the families, missing that one case is the horror story they want to avoid.

Investigate, absolutely. The cops need to do that as well. However, as someone else pointed out "Child services had the family agree to a safety plan" is not investigating. That's taking action and making a threat: "if you don't agree to this we'll take you to court and let a judge sort it out at your expense."

When CPS is investigating abuse it seems completely reasonable for them to implement a safety plan to ensure ongoing abuse doesn't occur during the investigation. Far better than yanking the kids into protective custody.

Re: Mom handcuffed, jailed for 8-year-old son walking half a mile

#328

Post by Kaibeezy »

public_defender wrote: post #199
smallerfish wrote: post #105

I'm suspicious of the story, honestly. What are they leaving out? Searching for her name in google news, the Reason story is the only hit, and since this is the perfect piece to stoke their readers' engagement, I'm skeptical of their vetting. The GoFundMe was created back in September, and you would surely expect at least local news hits in google news by now.

I agree that Reason is pretty agenda-driven, and not really a reliable source of reporting, but I don't think there is a special reason to mistrust this story. I have represented several hundreds of people in situations like this. This lady's story wouldn't be in my top quartile of stunning injustice. I have frequently called news outlets to tell them about outrageous cases, and stories like this just don't make news…

Local news? Is nearly extinct, supposedly. Will be in (what's left of it) shortly, as this article posted today. Articles about articles are news, right?

Based on the public info, the locations and stuff check out. In my experience, fakes are usually almost totally fake or unverifiable. I don't think this is fabricated.

Re: Mom handcuffed, jailed for 8-year-old son walking half a mile

#329

Post by notch656a »

VancouverMan wrote: post #122
CodeMage wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me of the time my son finally gathered the confidence to take the training wheels off his bike and learn to ride it without them. My wife and I were walking, and he was on his bike, and he was so happy and pumped about his achievement, that he asked to ride farther away, out of our sight. Now, this is a peaceful suburban neighborhood we're talking about, and we're on a stretch between his school and a park ne…

> smile politely all the way to avoid escalating. That attitude, while perhaps more comfortable in some ways, just enables the sort of behaviour you encountered, and apparently disliked, from that woman. A blunt response like, "Fuck off. Don't talk to my son.", followed by walking away from her, may have been harsher and not particularly polite, but perhaps it'd cause a person like her to avoid such meddling in the f…

LOL, let me tell you what happens if you say "fuck off" to an elderly lady if you are a normal dude.

The retired lady, with nothing to do with her time all days, will sit back and scheme about the interaction. She will decide you are an adversary, disrespectful man who needs to be put in his place after 'abusing' an elderly citizen and a child.

You have maybe 1,2 free hours a day to deal with unexpected things that come up. SHE HAS ALL FUCKIN DAY. She will calculate and connive, and avail herself of every authority and ear and talk to them like a sweet concerned grandma who is bearing witness to an evil child abuser. And they will believe her. Every lie she spends 5 minutes conniving, will take days to months to disprove while CPS tries to comb through your personal life.

You have a kid and thus exposed to CPS complaints at anytime. She has no underage kids. You have a job to lose. She does not.

In any verbal conversation, you are the automatic loser. In any physical confrontation, you are the automatic agressor. You cannot win. Literally the only way to win an argument with an elderly lady is to walk off if the situation doesn't call for polite chit chat.

Re: Mom handcuffed, jailed for 8-year-old son walking half a mile

#330

Post by valdiorn »

tastyfreeze wrote: post #255
nineplay wrote: post #38

> As they stood on her porch, the officers told Wallace that her son could have been kidnapped and sex trafficked. "'You don't see much sex trafficking where you are, but where I patrol in downtown Waco, we do,'" said one of the cops, according to Wallace > "I still didn't know it was illegal and I said, 'I don't know,'" says Wallace. "That's when the cop replied, 'Okay, I'm going to have to arrest you.'" Let's quick…

Youtube keeps suggesting https://www.youtube.com/@AuditTheAudit to me. In many of the videos the officers just make up what they think the law is. Just a warning, more than a few of the videos on AuditTheAudit are infuriating due to the level of arrogance, incompetence, negligence, and abuse of authority displayed. But, it is nice that there is a way to air this dirty laundry in public. As GI Joe says, "Knowing is ha…

Audit the audit is great because it's actually very balanced, and they spend equal if not more time digging up laws that might justify the police officers actions, often with some surprising results.
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