Entire story: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,306556,00.html How can you "forget" a child is in the car? I am sorry but I cannot see this as reasonable, these parents that leave kids in hot cars for even a few minutes should go to jail.
Horrible when this happens. So sad.. Reminds me of a story I saw the other day on CNN. A soldier put his baby in a microwave but his lawyer wouldn't discuss it on CNN because he had requested info from the military and is going to go the PTSD route in court to get him off.. nice.
I can almost see this happening. A f*cking nightmare. One I have all the time. Dreams where I'm walking around with my kid, and later I remember I had my daughter with me, and now shes not. Sheer panic, even in the realm of dreams. This lady wasn't drunk. She wasn't high. She was just busy and no doubt her child was sleeping quietly in the back seat. Her mind was elsewhere. An oversight? Terrible was the outcome, but the act itself no more difficult than leaving the house without your keys. Except of course, your child is supposed to be a priority. Prison time is NOT warranted in this case. A lifetime of nightmares and horrible thoughts beseech her. Her actions were negligent, but not purposeful. No extenuating circumstances (drinking, drugs, partying). No homicide. I don't know how to feel about this. Usually when you hear of something like this, either the parent was intoxicated, or even did so on purpose. Such as: http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20071029/baby_car_071029/20071029?hub=Canada Now thats reason for prison. I know what happened in the case cited in the OP is horrible, just horrible. But she should not be given ANY jailtime. The fact that she worked at Hooters restaurant has nothing to do with it. This is being tauted by the media for sensationalist value. I feel TERRIBLE for the mother. Sympathy is indeed warranted. The charges can't stick. Theres no way she will be convicted of negligent homicide. I think the only crime being committed is prosecuting the mother. The prosecutor gets his name in the news, ALOT. He likes that. Good for his career. They should throw the prosecutor in jail for being a dickhead and jailing a grieving mother. It sucks, ya. People drop their babies down the stairs because they were trying to carry laundry at the same time. People accidentally put their kids in scolding hot bath water, forgetting to check it. People accidentally fire off their hunting weapons while they clean them, killing their children. People make mistakes. And a mistake is all this was. No matter how horrible the outcome. I feel extraordinary compassion for the mother.
I'm too shocked to have an opinion on this right now. Its just too awful. Maybe he mother's an imbecile or something.
Good god. I can see everyone feels sorry for this mom, but I gotta tell ya, my son is on my mind every second. When my son was 1 I was working fulltime on average 12 hours a day, I drove quite far to his daycare also. I remember that when I dropped him off you have to sign a paper stating the time, any meds they might have had, whatnot. You were not allowed to leave unless you signed the drop-off form. What kind of daycare did she have I wonder? So sad.
This child dies from the direct actions of the mother, that is homicide. If I take my attention off the road for a second and cause a crash that kills someone, that is called vehicular manslaughter in most states. The concept is that if someone causes the death of another person, they should get into trouble. If we refuse to hold this woman accountable for killing her child, then what are we telling society? We are justifying a parent to kill their child. What if a parent sees that and leaves their child in their car on purpose and only "claims" they forgot them in there? How do we know for sure? I would bet she was on a cell phone at the time, that is just my guess. You can offer compassion without giving her a pass on her actions. Being a parent is a serious undertaking that most people do not take seriously. If we will put someone in jail for not paying attention while they are driving, then we should do the same for the more serious lack of paying attention as a parent that causes their childs death.
Living somewhat near where this happened, I am torn on whether jail time is called for or not. The guilt and pain that I am sure this mother now feels is more than adequate to keep her from ever doing it again. If she ever has more kids, you can bet your bottom dollar that she will watch over it to the point of overprotection. However... This happens way to often in Arizona. (Does this happen in other places, and it just isn't as hot, so the kids don't die and thus no news about it???) I think the threat of going to jail, if it helps keep this on the mind of other parents and keeps them from leaving their kids in cars, is a good thing. I dunno...
She never made it to the day care. She bypassed it. Unnecessary for an involuntary example of negligence. Please see; Sh*t happens bumper sticker. I would think the potential for harming or killing your child to be suffice. No more menacing an act than if I forgot to put my car in park and it rolled on top of my daughter. Shall I be thrown in prison with murderers, rapist and robbers for this mistake? I think not. Thats not exactly how it works. Extenuating circumstances must be present for someone to be guilty of making a negligent choice. Example; Talking on your cell phone while you drive causing a crash. Intoxication. Speeding. Aggressive driving. SOMETHING. People are not ever convicted because of an accident. Even if they run a red light. If they exhibited no such action for the cause, than the cause is purely accidental. We can't go around throwing people in jail because other people might use the reasoning in this case as an excuse. Her child is DEAD. Punishment enough? YES. Why should she answer with her freedom for this? An investigation IS warranted in this case. BUT, why immediately arrest her, file charges and throw her in jail? At least have the common decency to allow her to grieve first. For Christ sakes this is mean spirited prosecution based on socio-emotional knee-jerking. Ahh ha! You cheeky bastard, that was what I was going to suggest. Thus why I feel an investigation is fully warranted. Find out if she was making the choice to be distracted. If she was high. If she had been up late the night before partying. Something, anything that displays that she made a negligent choice. Negligence is a two headed monster; Voluntary & involuntary. Example; I hit a baseball throw a window. Charge me with negligent destruction of property? NO. I'll pay for the window. I forget to salt my walkway. The mailman slips and breaks his hip. Charge me with negligent battery? NO. I'll pay his bills. In this case I may even choose not to salt my walk, yet I have no fear of imprisonment. Involuntary negligence CANNOT be deterred through prosecution. Compassion suggests understanding. Investigate her. Find out if there are extenuating circumstances involved. If not, as horrible as the outcome was, it was an accident! Don't just haul off and arrest her before she can even bury her child. Don't file charges of negligent homicide when it may have just been an accident. Accidents are not prosecutable crimes. A drunk driving "accident" is not legally recognized as an accident. Driving hazardously and causing an "accident" that results in serious bodily injury and/or death, is not legally recognized as an accident. So far, in this case, I see no reason to term it as anything but an accident. I think your assessment of "most" is a bit pessimistic. I cannot imagine "forgetting" my child is in my care. I'm trying real hard to see past the terrible outcome and view this as just that, an accident. We DO NOT throw people in jail for having accidents, even if they run a red light. If they are speeding or driving recklessly, then yes. An accident IS NOT a prosecutable crime. A penalty in this case serves only to cause further harm with no positive outcome. No deterrence can be present in unforeseeable accidents.
That is something else I do not understand, if it was normal for her to do that each morning, she should have driven there without even thinking about it. People tend to have routines and it is difficult to break that routine without taking real effert to break it. I would be curious to see a comparison of the drop off record for the daycare and her work record to see if she would leave her kid in the car other times. Kids being killed by their parents is not just sh*t happens, I'm sorry but that is completely disrespectful of life itself. No, your trying to compare two completely seperate issues. In this case, she had to get her child ready for the day, cleaning, dressing, prepering the diaper bag, etc.... Those of us that have raised children can identify with the amount of work you put into getting children ready to go somewhere. Then she had to load the bag and child into the car, again, this takes time and requires much work to get the child settled. At that point, it would take a great deal of negligence to completely forget something you just spent over an hour messing with, mush lees to forget your own child you just spent over an hour on getting ready. Sure they are, all they need to prove is a lapse of judgement, and leaving your child to die in your hot car is a serious lapse in judgement, intentional or not. Because her negligence resulted in the death of an innocent life. If not for her direct actions, this life would still be living instead of being killed by it's mother. Because the child is dead now, not next week. Did the child get any second chances from it's mother? If the innocent life had no breaks, why give the killer of the child breaks? I don't buy that, no matter if she was on a phone or just stressing over bills, she voluntarily took her attention away from her child to the point she killed her child. There is always choice in these situations. There was no outside force that made her leave her child in the hot car. She had a choice, the only one that did not have a choice was the innocent child. Again, you are comparing apples and handgrenades. We are talking about the death of a child from the direct actions of the mother, not a busted window and comparing a lost innocent life to a window is disrespectful of life. There is no such thing as involuntary negligence. There is always a choice, a choice to swing the bat when you don't know what you are doing or a choice to be lazy and not salt your walk (using your examples) is still deciding, there is nothing involuntary about either example. As with anything the law covers, we must look at the seriousness of the crime to determine how we respond. In this case, the direct actions of the mother killed her child, she has the choice to pay attention and not kill her child but she decided that other things were more important to her and caused her child's death. This is not an accident. And death of an innocent child is as serious as it gets. While I do, I see a mother that got distracted by things less important than the life of her child. It was her choice to become distracted, nobody forced her to become distracted so it is not truly an accident, she had a choice, while the child did not have a choice. If you cannot imaging forgetting your child, maybe that is because you are a good parent and she is not. Why is it good people get stuck looking at situations from their eyes and refuse to admit that bad people and parents do not think the way you do? This women is a prime example of being a bad parent, you can never allow yourself to be distracted to the point you cause your child's death. It was forseeable by the mother, that is the point. The only person that had the ability to pay attention to what was important and keep her child safe was the mother. The mother made the choice to be distracted and her child paid the price for it's mother's decision. Punnishing this woman severely sends a message to the many other parents that get diestraced in their daily lives that if they decide to get destracted and cause a death of their children, they will pay for that distraction, not be given a pass. I see this as the next step in abortion, now we have people wanting to make it legal to just let your child die in a hot car like that life has no value. Who speaks for the child? Who protects the child?
I cannot accept drinking, drugs and partying as extenuating circumstances. If I knew that shortly in the future, I was going to be childminding, attending the elderly or other vulnerable people, driving a car/lorry/ motorcycle etc, I would not be doing booze, drugs and partying. That would be irresponsible and would indicate culpability, not extenuating circumstances. In Victorian England, if you said to the magistrate/judge, that you had been drinking prior to the offence, he would immediately double your sentence, and with good reason imho.
I knew that more would spill out. There simply wasn't enough info in the OP link. I retract my defense of this abhorrent mother. People shouldn't be prosecuted for mistakes. But a true mistake is made with no circumstance leading up to it.
