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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

#231

Post by ajsnigrutin »

pdonis wrote: post #198
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 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…

I mean... this is a case where the police should also say "it's ok, it's not that far mr/mrs neighbor, you don't have to call us for that".

it's also a case if the police actually cuffed and brought the mom to jail, someone there should tell them they won't book them for something stupid.

If a DA is involved, it's also a case where the DA should say that they won't prosecute such a stupid thing.

This failure is not one crazy individual, but a whole failed system, from the bottom up. You'll always have a crazy neighbor, a paranoid cop, etc., but having a whole chain this rotten really sucks, and something should really be changed.

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

#232

Post by klyrs »

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…

Okay, sure. What are the statistics behind TFA; how many moms are getting jailed for their kids walking to school? Should anybody care?

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

#233

Post by COGlory »

pdonis wrote: post #198
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 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.

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

#234

Post by woodruffw »

ch4s3 wrote: post #61
monological wrote: post #24

Japan has entered the chat... 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.

Its funny, because I see young-ish kids alone or in small groups walking around all the time in Brooklyn. Between 2:30 and 4:00 PM the sidewalks around my apartment are choked with unaccompanied kids.

This is true in my part of Brooklyn as well, and it's how I was raised in Manhattan.

These problems are not unique to suburbia, but they're definitely amplified.

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

#235

Post by CodeMage »

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…

It's easy to call someone an enabler, but it might be more generous to assume they have reasons other than being "comfortable".

The first thing you learn as an immigrant to the US is to avoid escalating conflicts, especially with Americans. Even a perfectly legal immigrant like me, in a "blue state" like Washington, will avoid rocking the boat. You don't have a safety net to fall back on, you don't have extended family to help you out and support you, and you already have too many other things to worry about, so you try to avoid the risk of having a random stranger make your life a living hell because you misjudged how safe it is to tell them off.

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

#236

Post by cbsmith »

fluidcruft wrote: post #225
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…

CPS investigated and cleared them and then dropped the case. It's the cops and DA who kept going.

...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.

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

#237

Post by dekhn »

beaned wrote: post #49
SirensOfTitan wrote: post #14

Vaguely relevant, from Peter Grey's book "Free to Learn": > In our culture today, parents and other adults overprotect children from possible dangers in play. We seriously underestimate children’s ability to take care of themselves and make good judgments [...] Our underestimation becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy—by depriving children of freedom, we deprive them of the opportunities they need to learn how to take c…

Nobody wants to be the one parent out of a thousand who has their kid scooped up off the street because they were letting their kid explore and be free. Edit: Not sure why I'm being downvoted, this comment isn't a judgment on anyone or promoting any type of child-rearing philosophy. It's just an obvious truth. Nobody wants to be that parent, and that obviously influences behavior.

It's true that parents live in fear of their child being taken (and blamed for some action/inaction that allowed it to occur). Generally it seems like Americans have developed a strong aversion to 'being considered at fault for an adverse event'.

It took me quite some effort to overcome that but I made it easier by reading the statistics on child deaths and other crimes.

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

#238

Post by CogitoCogito »

1123581321 wrote: post #72
mlindner wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Correct! There's a lot of crazy people out in the world who'll call the cops for all manner of things. The correct response would have been to ignore the call following a couple questions by the 911 operator. "Is the child in danger in any way?" the response would be "No." and then hang up on them.

The problem is the person calling will lie or exaggerate instead of saying no. If questioned later, they can fall back on claiming they were just trying to help and avoid getting in trouble. Angry or nosy neighbors, police and social services can get each other caught up in a cycle of escalation that lasts years for some unfortunate families.

In that case the police should investigate and then rightfully conclude there is no danger and leave the child alone to continue walking in the street. After that they should arrest the caller for exaggerating (i.e. lying) regardless of their claimed intentions.

This assume some sort of rationality in our legal bureaucracy of course. Unfortunately that doesn’t seem to exist.

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