She should be prosecuted for that hideous name.
A texting teen driver absentmindedly drifts across the double-yellow and kills a family of four. There’s no evidence he did it on purpose - he’s been, in all other ways, an exemplary kid. What purpose does prosecution serve?
She need not be crucified, as social media is so often wont to do, and jail time seems excessive to me, but I don’t think a fine or suspended sentence would be out of bounds.
Then why have the crime of endangerment, or criminal negligence, at all? We should just excuse everything not a deliberate crime. Drunk driving? No one was hurt? No problem!
Being a parent isn’t just a thing, like volunteering at the book fair, there is a duty, a commitment. Someone has to speak for the kids that get killed (or could have been killed) through negligence, and that is the law. “Oh, she was a good parent otherwise (except for letting her kid die from heat. But that was ONE TIME!”) does not excuse it.
I think a misdemeanor charge is appropriate in this instance.
Hey I’m even worse. I think even if the kid had ended up in some terrible accident and died as a result of this, no charges should be made against the mom. This was not something over which she had any control. The brain, sometimes, it just, farts, you know?
Here’s a really sad but very necessary story that gets into the whys and wherefores about the causes of things like this happening. If a person is distracted, especially if a break from routine is involved, the person is basically helpless to be able to reliably remember even things that are of utmost importance to that person. It’s just how we are made.
I have no idea.
She didn’t think her kid was anywhere. The location of her kid didn’t impinge on her mind as something that needed checking. The part of her brain that checks off “I finished putting kids in the car” did it’s thing, incorrectly. This doesn’t mean she literally believed her kid was in the car with her. It means she was set up, by her own mind, to not even ask the question of where her kid was.
I believe that’s the article I read. It’s harrowing; I can easily imagine it happening to me. Heck, it has- just with far fewer last consequences, since what I forgot was relatively minor.
Yeah pretty terrible to have a name that signifies the high degree of love your parents intend to show you.
Yup, I left my kid in a dangerously hot vehicle for about five(?) minutes, completely forgetting he had been in there with me, because he was sleeping and I was making a fairly normal quick run to a store during which I would not normally have had a kid with me.
Big BIG panic when I came back to the car and realized what had happened. Got him some water just to be sure, but he did seem perfectly fine.
Could have been much worse. I kind of get sick thinking about it.
And this was AFTER I had read the linked article and I knew all about the dangers. 
Drunk driving requires you to *drive *while drunk. It’s something you have complete control over. You get to say whether it happens, or it doesn’t.
Not so with the type of forgetfulness that happens when a child is left in the back seat of a car.
So would you say that those parents did it on purpose? If your answer is “yes”, then punishment is called for. If your answer is “no”, then what’s the point of punishment, except revenge?
Jesus, I just made the mistake of reading some scattered passages from the link I myself provided. Y’all the article is SAD.
Just re-warning people.
Negligence means you didn’t do it on purpose. It’s still a crime.
But you are asking what is the point? What’s the point of any criminal punishment? Deterrence, incapacitation, rehabilitation, retribution, and restitution.
Say the poor child actually died in the hot Arizona sun. Deterrence helps us all not forget our own kids in the car. Incapacitation prevents her from “forgetting” about any of the rest of her kids. Rehabilitation makes her realize her negligence has a price. Retribution - now we’re at revenge. And finally, restitution. It really doesn’t apply, as there is no price that can be paid to bring her child back. The only restitution is “spiritual”. She has to pay with her time, to “think about what she had done”.
Unless you’re thinking there is no purpose to any punishment?
Should OJ be punished for murdering Nicole? He’s never going to murder another wife, so let him be. How about the Menendez brothers? They’re not going to murder their parents again, so just let their own conscience be their punishment. They don’t need deterrence, incapacitation.
“The guilt you feel is far worse than any punishment you might receive. Now, don’t you feel terrible? Don’t you feel remorse for what you have done? Well, that’s all I’m going to say…”
You really seem to be unable to understand the difference between an intentional crime and an unintentional one.
What, precisely, would prosecuting those parents accomplish?
A misdemeanor or maybe just an infraction. Something so it’s official that this incident happened, but no real punishment for a first offense. That way, if it happens again, there’s a record.
And you seem to not understand “negligence” as a crime. Unintentional crimes are still crimes.
I’ve said what it would accomplish. Among other things, it will help prevent this the next time.
That’s exactly the problem–it can’t prevent it from happening again, because these kinds of events aren’t under anyone’s control. You may as well make a law to punish earthquake victims.
Under the right circumstances, people will reliably fail to remember simple things, even things very very important to them, and there is nothing they or you or I or anyone else can do about this fact about how human brains work. We can think of ways to prevent the “right” circumstances from occuring, but in the moment, once the circumstances have come about, no amount of fear of punishment will have any effect whatsoever on a person’s vulnerability to this bug in the human system.
What **Frylock **said. The parent’s actions (or inactions) wasn’t a conscious choice- no amount of deterrence will stop it from happening to other people. You can be as careful as you want to try to avoid losing your keys someplace- but it *will *eventually happen to you. That’s just the way our brains work.
When you punish those parents, all you’re doing is adding to the mental torture they’re already going through.
Read for comprehension, please. The article clearly states that the baby was found almost immediately by a police officer, who took the baby inside. The baby didn’t lay kicking and screaming in the blistering sun for 40 minutes.
Read for point, please.
IF no one had found the kid, he’d have been outside, in the sun, in 108plus heat, for 40 minutes. We would be having a different discussion, because the kid would be dead.
She had no idea anyone had even seen the kid. He could have rolled into the street for all she knew.
But apparently, it would still be OK, I guess, because she didn’t MEAN to do it. or something. So sorry.