Fair enough, but that is not information that we will ever get, I don’t think it would be made public.
OTOH, those responsible do know.
If it was a group of toddlers that somehow wandered in, then sure, they didn’t know what they were doing.
But, based on the damage that was done, I can’t see how it could have been anyone under the age of 12-13, old enough to know better. My speculation is that it was older teens, 15-17 or so.
I figured younger. Older teens would have been partying before they wrecked everything. Nothing in the description about cigarettes, drugs, or alcohol.
Don’t skimp on your homeowner’s insurance, folks. I bet keeping personal property off their policy saved them $100/year. I sold insurance for 5 years - the company I worked for wouldn’t sell a policy that didn’t have personal property covered.
I agree, but I was responding to the other poster’s analogy to Vegas.
As I said, it’s a matter of hedging. It I had tons and tons of money, then I wouldn’t bother with insurance, as, in the unlikely chance that something happened, I could cover it.
Since I don’t have tons and tons of money, I instead pay a small amount of money, so that, in the unlikely event that I lose all my stuff, I can afford to have it replaced.
Obviously, having all your stuff destroyed isn’t winning. However, having it insured reduces your loss.
The kids were described as “playing” in the neighborhood before they broke into the house. I don’t think teens would be described that way. I think they’re probably under 12. 9-yr-olds can do some rotten stuff, and are capable of more than they are usually given credit for.
Don’t think of 9-yr-olds in today’s terms, when children are infantilized-- think of when you were 9, if you are now older than 40. Especially if you are older than 50. Did you do things like mow the lawn by yourself, or stay alone in the evening with a younger sibling? Ride your bike out to run errands? or to and from school?
When I was 10, I walked three blocks from my school to the city bus stop, got on the correct bus, got off about five blocks from our apartment, walked to a row of shops and bought something for a snack, then walked home, asked the front desk for the key, and stayed in the apartment by myself for about 90 minutes. In Moscow. Sometimes I went to the cafe on the floor above ours for a cup of tea.
Fairly young kids are pretty capable, whether we admit it or not.
Is “fault” even an issue? It’s the children’s fault for wrecking these peoples’ home. The question now is the remedy and who gets stuck with what for damages.
You obviously don’t have kids. In the space of 10 minutes this morning my 2 year old was caught drawing on the walls, then as we were cleaning up that mess pulled poop out of her diaper and started smearing it on the floor. As that was being cleaned up she went from being cleaned directly to find a market that got missed in the new poop smearing debacle and started drawing on the carpet. That was with two of us watching her, trying to get ready for school and watching the older one. I could see my 5 year old deciding the neighbor’s house was her clubhouse and trashing it like she tries to do to her room. It’s one of the reasons she’s not allowed alone for more than about 5 minutes.
Even young kids can do some serious damage. The kids across the street from me were little barbarians and when their neighbors moved they swooped into the yard the next day and starting tearing things up. I was in and out of my house that morning doing chores and not really paying them close attention until I heard the sound of metal ringing as something hard was struck repeatedly, After telling them to stop beating the brick with their bats I took a good look at the yard and marveled at how much destruction a few kids under 12 could cause in such a short period of time.
Fair enough, maybe they were younger.
It was the destruction of hot tub by shovel that made me think that they would be older.
No way. A seventeen year old who did this would be in adult jail. Probably a fifteen year old, too. Some Googling indicates that in South Carolina, the juvenile justice system includes anyone 13 and up, or 11 and up if there’s an order from a family court. I’m guessing these kids were no older than 12, maybe younger than 10.
The article says that because they were children, they wouldn’t be charged. I don’t think that 15 year olds who commit vandalism are regularly tried in adult courts.
Still, anything over the age of 5, they should face some consequence, even if it’s just having to pick up trash at their local school after class.
No, but they are regularly charged in juvenile court, and can face consequences there. The fact that no charges in any court are going to be filed strongly suggests they are below the age of 12, and probably no more than ten.
Tripler, how did you get the idea that the kids’ parents will be paying for the damages? It seemed pretty clear to me that they weren’t held liable, hence the GFM.
StG
Parental liability in South Carolina is apparently capped at $5,000; even assuming the parents aren’t judgment-proof, that’s not going to go far towards $40K in damages.
Right. Which means they aren’t teenagers, because teenagers would almost certainly be charged for this.
And this isn’t just garden variety “vandalism” - the amount of damage they did makes this a felony. Whether SC would put a fifteen year old on trial for felony vandalism is unclear. They certainly put 15 year-olds on trial for murder. Maybe a 15 year old would skate with just juvie charges. No way a 17 year old would.
What’s up is people reassuring themselves that this would never happen to them, because they’re smart. You could start a thread on the Titanic, and half the replies would be Dopers explaining how they definitely would have survived.
No matter how you slice it, this is a horrific, traumatic experience for the family, and they did nothing to deserve it. The “fault” lies entirely with the sociopathic kids who trashed the house for fun. This isn’t some kind of karmic punishment for failing to read an insurance policy.
If we’re looking for people to blame, I’d want to have a little chat with the agent who sold them a bare-bones policy. Every insurance agent I’ve ever had has tried to scare the hell out of me by warning of the dire consequences I could suffer if I didn’t buy more extensive coverage.
Could be the case where their mortgage company bought if for them as a condition of lending, and went bare bones on it. People make really bad decisions sometimes when it comes to saving money in the short term.
I don’t think that’s what people are saying. Everyone agrees it was a horrific experience and the family are victims here. There’s not much else to say about it. So, we’ve been exploring a little tangent about the need (or lack thereof) of personal property insurance.
If we had a thread about someone getting t-boned by an uninsured driver, I would expect some of us would chime in to remind everyone to buy UIM insurance. That’s not blaming the poor sap who got t-boned.
Oh, I could believe it.
Sort of. From the other side, insurance companies are really investment companies, that make their money from investment. On average, they earn more from investment than they pay out for "vandalism and malicious mischief” and everything else.