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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

#421

Post by godshatter »

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…

I also wondered how the police got there so fast. My thoughts are that the boy wasn't very happy being made to walk home and so looked angry or distraught and that triggered the response from the neighbor and then the incentives to not be the person that drops the ball when a kid could be in danger drove it as far as it did.

I'm not saying it should have gone as far as it did, but I also agree there might have been more to it than we know about.

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

#422

Post by Zak »

lrem wrote: post #326
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? :/

Neither, but crimes like "child endangerment" are always a judgment call with regard to how dangerous the situation is and whether the caregiver's behavior was reasonable under the circumstances.

Does making an 8 year old walk half a mile qualify? In a quiet neighborhood, no. In downtown Waco where the cop's supposed sex traffickers operate, probably still no, but it's getting into more of a grey area. On a highway with no sidewalk or shoulder, yes.

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

#423

Post by dragonwriter »

fluidcruft wrote: post #379
dragonwriter wrote: post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How could CPS possibly know that before they investigate? The same way they knew when the investigation confirmed the initial report, and it wasn't a violation.

So... by investigating? lol

No, they would know by comparing the facts alleged in the report to the law, just like, when those facts were confirmed by the investigation, they compared those same facts to the law.

Now, I am not saying that a report which on its face does not describe a violation does not warrant investigation, but absent some other evidence which provides cause to believe a violation exists which would legally impact parental suitability, it doesn’t warrant limiting parental rights during the investigation, just as a report to police that raises articulable suspicion but not probable cause to believe a specific crime has occurred warrants investigation, but not arrest.

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

#424

Post by rootusrootus »

woodruffw wrote: post #139

This is (one of) the logical conclusions of suburban, car-enforced social alienation: if you don't know your neighbors and your neighbors don't know you, then everything that isn't immediately familiar to either party is treated with suspicion. And this holds for the entire "food chain": police who don't live in the areas they patrol, DAs and CPS employees who don't understand their communities, &c. It's civically an…

I've lived in the city, and I currently live in a suburb. I know a lot more of my neighbors here than I did in the city. And my neighbors know my kids. On top of that, the sidewalk is filled with kids going to & from school each day, and it's noisy all afternoon as they run all over the neighborhood riding bikes and playing.

So I get that you want to find car culture to be the root of all evil, but I don't buy it.

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

#425

Post by sigstoat »

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…

> Let's quickly drop the idea that this is the fault of nosey neighbors, helicopter parents, soccer moms, or "Karens". This is 100% a justice department problem and anyone from the police to the district attorney could have nipped this nonsense in the bud.

there is not a finite supply of culpability. they can _all_ bear (varying degrees of) responsibility for it.

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

#426

Post by rr888 »

rmetzler wrote: post #287
leephillips wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also hear that in Germany you actually require people to know how to drive before you give them licenses. We could learn a few things from you. Cops in the US frequently shoot themselves in the foot, shoot blindly into buildings, etc. Yes, hordes of untrained armed police with emotional problems are a big issue in the US. They are empowered by the knowledge that the legal system will almost never hold them accounta…

Wait, how do you get a drivers license in the US? Do you have a minimum of required training, a theoretical and a practical test?

I got my first drivers license in Utah in the 90s while I was a tourist. You did ~20? multiple choice questions then a 10 minute test drive - wasn't even on real roads. Looks like it hasn't changed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTUCmTbPQfo https://secure.utah.gov/exam-center/exam/bank/take-test.html

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

#427

Post by pessimizer »

NoImmatureAdHom wrote: post #176
klyrs wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every police interaction in the US bears the risk of death. Police will stop kids on the street with or without being called. Ergo, it is unsafe for children to walk to school in the US. Sure, that's all a bit circular, but good luck breaking the spiral with a "law and order" mentality.

This strikes me as crazy. Every interaction with any human or inanimate object bears the risk of death, it's just so low it's not worth thinking about it. U.S. police kill about ~1000 people per year, and the vast majority of those aren't at all questionable. If there are 330,000,000 people in the U.S., that's 0.000303% of the population per year. Each person has, on average, maybe 10 contentious police interactions…

> So, if you're young, black, male, and running around Chicago

I did this without the drugs and guns part, and had guns drawn on me three times growing up in Chicago for the crime of walking. If I had been killed, I'm sure it would have been coded in a way for you not to see it as a problem.

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

#428

Post by Stevvo »

csours wrote: post #405
kgeist wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>According to statistics cited by the NCMEC, most missing children are abducted by relatives or parents It's safer to be around strangers than relatives, when it comes to kidnapping.

10 yard penalty, review logical fallacies, other team gets the ball. https://xkcd.com/1138/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base_rate_fallacy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecological_fallacy Children spend waaaay more time around parents and relatives. Same reason why you are more likely to be killed by an intimate partner than a stranger. (This is not monocausal, and I do not mean to imply that simply spending time wi…

Do they really though? In a lot of families kids are at school, then driven off to soccer/dance/whatever in a lot of other time.

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

#429

Post by acchow »

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…

Curious how the justice department has decided the solution to sex trafficking is to make walking outside illegal…

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

#430

Post by kube-system »

pessimizer wrote: post #416
kube-system wrote: post #363

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem is the person calling will lie or exaggerate instead of saying no. The person calling is likely not "lying" about anything. If they believe it is dangerous for a kid to walk in the street, then the answer is a truthful "yes". These people simply have different worldviews.

"Yes" is not an answer that should be responded to. Details are what should be responded to. Cops shouldn't be asking the neighbor's approval to investigate. They should treat a report as a witness, and refer to a checklist of types of observations that need to be investigated. If a neighbor makes up details in a report to police, they should be charged with a crime. If the cops are asking "do you think we should inv…

I agree. The problem is that police in much of the US are poorly trained, poorly funded, poorly managed, and increasingly marginalized. The US system of strong local governance means that only the nice neighborhoods get nice public services.
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