Really think you’ve overreacted here. It’s perfectly reasonable for a prosecutor to consider possible charges when he learns of something that just “smells wrong” to him. His job is to research the law and determine if filing charges is appropriate under the circumstances. Here, yes, the Safe Haven deal would preclude an abandonment charge. It would not necessarily bar other potential charges, such as child abuse. No lawyer knows all of the details of every law on the books. That’s why there are books. You look stuff up, and then decide how to proceed. Sometimes, your kneejerk reaction may be well intentioned, but incorrect. It’s not like this prosecutor had the guy arrested and beat a confession out of him or anything. He said he was considering filing charges. He mentioned one possible charge, which happened to be wrong. Apparrently, after researching and conducting some investigation, he determined no charges should be filed. Sounds to me like he diligently pursued his duty in accordance with his oath of office. That doesn’t deserve the level of outrage you’ve expressed.
Be instructive to learn how the fact of the drop-off was brought to the prosecutor’s attention, and what he was told about the circumstances surrounding it.
Oh, and duffer, congratulations on an eye-catching thread title. I’m sure a lot of people opened this thread wondering what would follow “Douchebag prosecutor f”. Do you suppose you could share with us the full text of it, before it was truncated by the limitations of the field? Feel free to put it into a spoiler box. 
The prosecutor is quoted as specifically saying any abandoment is a felony, which is clearly totally wrong when there is a safe haven law. Considering that there was a social worker already involved, and that the father gave the hospital full information to let them find both the mother and the social worker, I have a hard time believing there is abuse involved. In any case, the prosecutor mentioned abandonment, not abuse.
Considering that there were no arrests made, and no police involvement, wouldn’t it be wise for the prosecutor to shut up until he investigated?
Around where I live the police are careful to say nothing against someone dropping off a baby. If people in this situation think asshole prosecutors might press charges, they’ll start to dump babies in trash cans again.
duffer is right about this jerk of a prosecutor.
I think the prosecutor is reading the “up to one year” as meaning “up to 365 days (even if it’s a leap year)”.
If the kid is over 365 days, and even though the father definitely sounds like he did the rigth thing, Safe Haven doesn’t strictly apply. I do hope he doesn’t get prosecuted, and if he does get prosecuted I do hope that the wheels of justice grind real fast and let him out yesterday. It may lead to a review of Safe Haven, making the “safe” period longer.
I’m with Oakminster. We don’t know what the prosecutor knew and when. Specifically, when the prosecutor made his statement, was he fully aware of the Safe Harbor law and did he know that this case would fall under that law? It certainly could be that the answer is “yes” and the prosecutor dislikes the law and was going to try to make an issue out of it, but got overruled, in which case, pit away.
He did put a foot in his mouth when pressed for a statement, but in the end the correct move was made. He’s not the first prosecutor, legislator or world leader to speak to the press before knowing all available facts, and he certainly won’t be the last. Where’s the outrage?
Now THAT is funny! 
I don’t think it should matter what age the child is, if the parent delivers to an organisation that could reasonably deal with the situation (e.g., police, adoption agency, state department of family services). The response might be for the agency just to hand the kid back (after investigating tghe situation, including possible child abuse, and whether there is another parent or family member who could take care of the child). However, saying to the agency, “Here’s my child: I can no longer cope” should not be grounds fpr abandonment. Abandonment should be limited to leaving the child where you can’t be certain that someone is going to look after the child.
I’ll happily support a prosecutor who thinks about filing charges. You know, giving the idea some consideration before deciding what to do. That’s a good thing.
Or, he could just arrest the guy and find out after the fact that during the event, he was:
a) halfway across town at an ATM
b) halfway across the country at a Christmas party.
We can speculate. The missing text might be:
ucks up bigtime.
orgets safe haven law.
ixes truck instead of learning laws.
ones in filosofical Phreudianisms.
I was wondering the same thing. If one parent does it behind the other’s back, is the kid automatically a ward of the state? Does the parent have to hire lawyers and shit to get the kid back?
As Oakminster noted, the state has possession of the kid and it will not relinquish that possession simply on the word of a person who shows up and says “my co-parent did this without my permission.” There will be some sort of investigation to determine whether the parents live together, the motive behind the action, the safety of the child if/when returned, etc. There are enough variables that one could fill a few pages with alternative scenarios. The fastest way for the child to be returned would for the state to discover that the parent who dropped off the child did not live in the home, was not the custodial parent, and was performing a malicious prank. At that point, the custodial parent would probably be allowed to retrieve the child with the condition that some guarantee was given that the non-custodial parent was not going to pull the same stunt. Much messier would be any situation where the parents lived together but did not agree on their abilities to cope with raising the child. (And all the various other scenarios will play out with longer or shorter state involvement and foster care depending on the issues in the home and the quality of the state agencies.)
Duffer is correct to be outraged. The prosecuter’s knee-jerk campagne rhetoric undermines the whole point of the safe haven law.
In order to work, it has to be publicized, and widely believed that parents who exercise this option won’t be the object of even public attention, much less criminal prosecution.
Unless Samclem is able to educate the mouth breathing, Jerry Springer watching, masses about the wonder that is google’s news watch feature, then they are likely to miss the page-six followup story that the prosecuter was blowing smoke, and only recall only the page one story on how the father was snookered in by the safe haven law.
Duffer, you go dude. Even if you can’t get the shit stain fired, maybe you can generate enough publicity about the safe haven law to offset the damage he has done.
Kevbo, I really, really doubt that a short article like the one linked in the OP was a page one story. Anyone missing the follow up probably missed the original. Additionally, I don’t know what kind of local TV news coverage this got, although I’d be very surprised to see if day one got 90 seconds and day two 10. More likely, these were each 15-20 second spots, if they made the TV cut.
It’s not that I disagree with the sentiment. Page one articles grab eyeballs, and when they do so with information that later turns to be false or misunderstood, they are not corrected with the same vigor. I have noticed this to be especially true in any article that indicts a policeman of some wrongdoing. Police being bad is page 1. Police found to be falsely accused of being bad is page 25.
The situation also highlights an occasional problem with legislative drafting and adding new laws. You may have existing law that says “It is illegal to to .” Sometime later, you may have a second law passed that says “Under these circumstances, it is not illegal to do .” The problem is when the second law is codified separately from the first law – that is, found in a different statute book.
A person who takes the first law at face value and is not familiar with the second law – not saying that’s the case here – might reasonably conclude that is always illegal. That’s why it’s better practice to put all laws dealing with in the same place. But a lot of times that doesn’t get done.
The prosecutor didn’t misquote the law. He did nothing wrong in a legal or professionally ethical sense. He also never filed charges. The worst thing he did was state that he was considering filing charges, and I would too if I thought someone was breaking the law and it came to my attention.
So what did the prosecutor do wrong? He spoke to the press about a situation without fully understanding the situation. He quoted the law without understanding various applicable loopholes within the law. Those are mistakes and ones I hope he takes to heart before the next reporter comes calling. But should he be fired? No. And I seriously question the mindset of those calling for his dismissal.
I can guaratee you this. If you asked ANY prosecutor anywhere in this country “if you believed someone had committed a crime, would you consider filing charges?” I guarantee you you’ll get a 100% response rate of “yes.” They would consider it, just as this guy did.
It’s the ones who wouldn’t consider it I have a problem with. Those are the ones you should be looking to fire.
Nope, it wasn’t a page one story. Lacked names and actual criminal intent. Though there isn’t even a passing mention of a follow-up in today’s edition of the fishwrap.
One thing that’s really pissing me off is that even a dullard as I know about the law. This guy is a prosecutor that is supposed to know the law. His career’s entire existence revolves oraound prosecuting people that break laws. I can see someone saying they’d look into charges against the guy if the kid had bruises, if the guy had previous allegations, if the kid was left in the lobby of the hospital with a note pinned to her shirt. But this guy is supposed to know the basics of these types of laws.
And to right off the bat mention looking into felony charges? This isn’t someone I feel comfortable with having that position. As mentioned upthread, what about someone thinking about using this option after reading that quote?
Thanks for making my point.
No. He simply stupidly issued a press release (or worse, called a press conference) to publicly state that he was going to “consider” pressing charges (against a person who was acting legally to protect a child) in a way that could quite possibly have a chilling effect on the actions of future parents who will prefer to abandon (or murder) their children anonymously rather than take advantage of a law designed to protect children in similar situations.
“Considering” charges in the privacy of his own office until he actually takes the time to find out the rules regarding a rather widely publicized piece of legislation is fine. Making stuipid public comments that will have the effect of thwarting the intention of such a law is morally reprehensible and smacks of grandstanding and seeking publicity at the expense of future children who might, now, never be saved by the law of which he was too stupid to make himself aware.
He meets my criteria for deserving dismissal.
That was the point I was trying to make earlier, though I lacked your eloquence. Thank you.
Wait a minute…hasn’t anyone considered the possibility that the reporter may have twisted words around, to make the story sound more salacious?
As far as I can tell, the prosecutor only said two things:
(1) “Any parent who abandons a child is guilty of a Class C Felony, punishable by blah blah blah prison.”
(2) “I’m gonna check with social services before filing charges.”
These remarks could have come up in any order during his interview. And the reporter may have twisted the words around as he saw fit, to justify the eye-catching headline, “MAN ABANDONS BABY, MAY FACE CHARGES.”
It’s not like the prosecutor went on television, pounding his fist and preaching bloody vengeance against all meth-addicted, deadbeat dads. Maybe if he were up for re-election…but, no. If you’re going to be angry at anyone, it should be the reporter for deliberately using quotes out of context.