.
Readers — I’m traveling today and can’t eloquently express all my rage about what happened to this nkdkeyznit
loving, rational mom. So let me just say that it is not fair to treat 6-year-olds who can open a car door as if they are salamanders or something, incapable of doing anything in the human world.
Remember: The laws exist to deal with people who are doing something indisputably and incredibly dangerous, not people who happen to be raising their kids differently from the way you’d raise yours. And a shout out to Christy Gutowski at the Chicago Tribune for such thorough reporting. – L.
Nurse who left daughter, 6, in car fights DCFS neglect finding
A longtime emergency room nurse, Lisa Graham knows what child abuse and neglect look like.
In fact, she’s called the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services hotline when minors appeared at the suburban hospital where she works with a suspicious injury or other sign of potential risk.
But, two years after the Wheaton mother had what she considers “at most a momentary lapse in judgment in a busy life,” she still is fighting an emotional and costly battle to prove she is not a neglectful parent.
Early one evening, with the temperature hovering at 92 degrees, Graham left her 6-year-old daughter alone in a locked car with the windows rolled up for 10 minutes while she ran into a local market to buy a few dinner items.
Prosecutors eventually dropped the misdemeanor, but child welfare officials in separate proceedings brought a neglect finding against her on the basis of inadequate supervision and placed her name on a state central registry for five years. Graham, 51, maintains she did nothing wrong. She is asking a DuPage County judge to expunge the DCFS finding.
Read the rest of the story here, including the fact that the air conditioning had been blasting for the prior 45 minutes, so the car was still cool when parked, and the child told her mommy she was “fine” upon the mom’s return. So let’s not act as if passersby — and DAs and judges and CPS officials — care more about kids’ welfare than their own loving, rational parents.
While we’re at it, let’s also remember that leaving the windows down (not just cracked) ensures that cars don’t overheat. And the fear of kidnapping should not stop us from making that move, if we so choose. Â L
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Can we please stop treating every child waiting in a car as if this is a crime scene?
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I think the ONLY valid complaint here is that the child had no way to summon the parent in case of some real problem arising. But that’s not neglect.
Parents have been losing their rights to raise their children as they see fit. This has been going on for decades. It’s true that child abuse is a problem. Laws were made and a bureaucracy was put in place to address this problem. Unfortunately they can’t help themselves from overstepping.
This resembles the scene from the Disney movie Fantasia. Mickey Mouse made a broom carry the water for him. However this broom wouldn’t stop getting the water. Even when Mickey Mouse was in danger of drowning, the brooms kept bringing in more water. In the same way CPS and the police keep ‘finding’ (more like inventing) more and more dangers.
As a result parents are losing more than their rights and children are losing more than freedom or the ability to develop self reliance. Children are constantly told that they are as helpless as a salamander and don’t even have the brain power to open the door!
Unfortunately, children start to believe it.
here is part of my blog
http://www.onmysoapboxx.com/
This is a scathing attack on bureaucracy while at the same time it’s standing up for bureaucrats.
Q. How can you be on both sides?
A. I’m not. I’m highlighting the concept of a third side. A bureaucracy is like a ship. The bigger the bureaucracy, the bigger the ship AND THE MORE LIKELY THAT IT HAS NO CAPTAIN! This is the third side. I want to show that the system has taken on a life form of it’s own. Many bureaucrats have little or no power. They can only follow procedures or get fired. (even jailed!)
The full article appears to be behind a paywall….
James, I don’t understand the whole “the child could not summon help”. The child could get out of the car and go look for the mom. When I was 6, I lost track of my mom at the supermarket. When I went out to the parking lot to see if she was outside the car was gone. She had only pulled over to the other grocery store door to wait for me to come out. However, I thought she had just gone home and left me as a punishment for wandering off. So I ran all the way home, about 2 miles and when I saw no one was home I just went in and starting watching TV. Meanwhile at the grocery store when my mom couldn’t locate me at all, she called the police. The police drove around the neighborhood and eventually made it to the house, were I was calmly waiting for my mom to get home. Again, same age as the kid in the story, and the police didn’t call CPS. It was just a mix-up, something that happened and everybody turned out to be fine.
Oh Gosh. I left my 5yo and 3yo in the car while I ran into the supermarket just a few weeks ago. I have never left them in the car out of eyesight before.
But I weighed the risks. It was 5pm on a warm spring evening. It was bucketing down with rain. The type of heavy that sees people massing undercover outside the supermarket refusing to step out in it.
Dragging the kids out would mean that I would get truly drenched. I would have to unbuckle them both, and walk slower. Leaving them in the car just didn’t have any serious risks. There were no car theives running around in this weather (they would be hiding too). I was going to be all of 5 minutes. The weather meant there was no chance of them dying in the car from heat, or being too cold.
In an extreme scenario involving me somehow dying in the supermarket and not being able to say “my children” with my last breath. Either the car would be sitting suspicously alone in the carpark at midnight, and my kids would have a very uncomfortable night until someone figured it out, or someone would spot my car keys and go check.
I just couldn’t come up with a scenario in which anything bad happened to them.
“Again, same age as the kid in the story, and the police didn’t call CPS. It was just a mix-up, something that happened and everybody turned out to be fine.”
And what did I say? Oh, yeah:
“that’s not neglect.”
“I don’t understand the whole ‘the child could not summon help’. ”
So… in your case, there was a considerable amount of stress for you, presumably a considerable amount of stress for you mother, a disruption in the operations at the store, and a diversion of police resources that could have gone to people who, unlike you, might have actually needed their assistance. All because you and your mother had no reliable way to communicate. Now does it make sense?
Mom goes into store, child stays with car. Mom EXPECTS to come back out, and find child with car. But if something happens that causes child to leave car, then… THAT’S why the fact of the child not being able to summon the parent is objectionable.
“I just couldn’t come up with a scenario in which anything bad happened to them.”
Challenge accepted.
People drive poorly in the rain. Another car taps yours in the lot, causing damage to the vehicle. This frightens your kids badly enough to decide to go seek you out inside the store. As they’re crossing the lot, another car fails to notice to small people in the weather and runs them over. Egads! But the horror story continues. You, emerging from the store, notice the hubbub in the parking lot and realize it’s your kids lying in the puddle. You rush over to check on them just as an impatient driver, tired of waiting behind a stopped car, lurches around it, adding you to the casualty list. As the last light of life fades from your eyes, you think, “If only I’d brought my kids in with me, if only…”
THE END
James, I assume you sell cellphones and family plans for living.
“Your 6 year-old definitely needs a cellphone! What if she was sitting in a car while you were in the store and she needed to talk to you! We have this wonderful model over here which would be perfect for this! And it’s only an extra $19.95 a month on your cellphone plan.”
In regards to the scenarios, I can come up with them, too. Sure, Mom was only in the store for 10 minutes, but what if there’s a robbery? She could be trapped in there for days in a tense hostage situation while her poor young daughter dies in the back seat. The cellphone wouldn’t help either because the Mom is tied up in the back room and the robber has a gun to her head.
Y’know, I’m totally sending that in to “Law & Order: SVU.”
“James, I assume you sell cellphones and family plans for living.”
I don’t even carry one.
“In regards to the scenarios, I can come up with them, too. Sure, Mom was only in the store for 10 minutes, but what if there’s a robbery? She could be trapped in there for days in a tense hostage situation while her poor young daughter dies in the back seat. The cellphone wouldn’t help either because the Mom is tied up in the back room and the robber has a gun to her head.”
Mine was better. Cellphones can dial 911. I don’t think SVU would want your story idea as-is. Maybe you could add a 911 operator, who takes the call, but turns out to be a serial-killer pedophile. Mom finally gets out of the hostage crisis, and rushes to call her kids, but the phone just rings and rings… roll credits.
The satellite Tiangong 1 can fall out of orbit. What if it falls on the car?
How ridiculous to assume the child had no means of summoning help or communicating with the mother, without a cellphone. In the event of a problem, she simply needed to use that time-honoured child tactic of leaping out into the open and screaming blue murder.
Wouldn’t be a great deal of help if Tianggong 1 is sitting atop her, but should cover most other scenarios.
“How ridiculous to assume the child had no means of summoning help or communicating with the mother, without a cellphone.”
Indeed. Why did you assume that?
‘I think the only valid complaint here is that the child had no way to summon the parent in the case of some real problem arising’.
And with that, off to attend to the chickens, who actually need feeding…..will leave the trolls to themselves.
Oh we can all come up with scenarios!
Scenario 1: Child accompanies her mother, slips in rain bangs her head on the pavement and dies an hour later from a cerebral haemorrhage. If she’d stayed in the car that wouldn’t have happened.
Scenario 2: Child goes with mother and gets struck by lightning and killed stone dead. If she’d stayed in the car she would have been safe, even if that was hit by lightning. Faraday cage you know!
Scenario 3: Child goes with mother and is confronted by gun wielding paedophile lunatic. When mother tries to protect her daughter he shoots her down, knocks out the little girl and carries her off to be raped, tortured and murdered. If she’s stayed in the car she would most likely have been safe.
What I find extraordinary is the notion that an adult’s presence automatically makes a child safer. But in many of the worst things we can imagine happening to a child whether an adult is present or not would make no difference. The sad truth is that many, if not most, of this life’s tragedies are not preventable. But as a society we find this increasingly hard to accept.
@James Pollock “Indeed. Why did you assume that?”
You assumed that in the first comment under this article when you wrote: “I think the ONLY valid complaint here is that the child had no way to summon the parent in case of some real problem arising. But that’s not neglect.”
Copy pasted with full context, so it is clear that you did not called that neglect or anything like that. Dont wanna accuse you of something you haven’t done :).
Eh, I don’t think leaving any child in a closed up vehicle on a 92* day is okay. I’ve been in a closed up vehicle for a short period of time, and it does quickly become uncomfortable, and it wouldn’t take a very long delay for the child to feel sick. A child may be able to open the door, but they also may not do so for various reasons. I’d feel somewhat differently had the windows been rolled down, especially in the shade. And had it been a cool day I would 100% agree it was completely unreasonable.
Having said that, I do wish the mom the best. We need to be more forgiving as a society, people do have momentary lapses in judgement. Five years on a registry seems harsh, especially if this was the only incident. Thankfully, the vast majority of the time, those lapses are of no consequence.
Andy:
“Dont wanna accuse you of something you haven’t done :).”
But that’s exactly what you’ve done. (And you’ve made the same assumption hineata did.
Unless you can point to the word “cellphone” in
“I think the ONLY valid complaint here is that the child had no way to summon the parent in case of some real problem arising. But that’s not neglect.”???
hineata:
“How ridiculous to assume the child had no means of summoning help or communicating with the mother, without a cellphone.”
You actually added TWO assumptions, the ones about summoning help AND the detail about the cellphone.
I’m sure the apologies will be immediately forthcoming, now that it’s been brought to your attention.
Have a nice day.
Time to resocialize people – stranger danger isn’t real. Our kids can and should seek out an adult when needed, that includes adults outside of the immediate family. An inclusive community isn’t a burden placed on neighbors to be responsible for other people’s children – it’s a way to support the next generation experiencing life.
Only as it relates to children do we allow authorities to enforce penalty where no injury occurred. Ridiculousness!!!
“Only as it relates to children do we allow authorities to enforce penalty where no injury occurred.”
Well, no. You can be penalized for attempted murder, for example, even if nobody was hurt. At the other end of the scale, people of all ages can be penalized for trespassing whether or not there was injury.
@james pollock: I have read multiple articles on this site as well as a vast majority of their comments. Most of the time, at least HALF of the comments are from you. Your comments are obnoxious, rude, outrageous and generally pointless, unless your point is to play the most useless devil’s advocate on the net. Don’t you have anything better to do?
James, short of calling the mother on a phone from the car and physically going to find the mother in the store, what other ways does the child have of contacting the mother?
I’m actually really curious.
What we have here is a communication problem. Technology disappearing up its own backside, apparently.
We are not capable anymore of seriously considering how hypocritical we can be, when it comes to actual child endangerment, and not delusional paranoia.
We, as a society, put kids in danger in divers’ ways, compared to previous generations, and the sad fact is one of the greatest dangers to children in this “modern” era – are misguided and hysterically idiotic attempts to “save” them…..from bogeymen and phobic meltdowns of our own creation.
Household brand common sense should indeed solve most of this confusion – but apparently this has atrophied out of existence, and been replaced by the usual and typical Homeland-endorsed punitive attitude run amok across the land.
My goodness, how we have come to hate “wrongdoing.”
Punishments no long remotely fit the crime.
Sometimes I think that the so-called “wrongdoing” is hardly in the picture at all……..leaving just the hatred…………
sort of like a landfill of the soul.
And a kid is hardly human anymore. Just an exploitable opportunity to kick around the caregivers.
Read my lips. No new taxes!
All levels of government are engaging in oustlandish behavior to assess charges, fines, fees and other means to obtain income. They over police. Let CPS run wild. Jail people for minor offenses. And set up these trauma-inducing registries. Not to establish orderly communities but to balance their budgets. And get reelected..
Too bad; the people, the voters, set it up this way. Anything to avoid paying for services through taxation.
If the people wanted a fair and equitable Justice sytem, they could have one. But the majority are unwilling to pay for it, so we have a fee and fine system instead.
Not what the founding fathers envisioned.
“James, short of calling the mother on a phone from the car and physically going to find the mother in the store, what other ways does the child have of contacting the mother? ”
Really? You can’t think of any other ways people can communicate with each other, except a cellphone?
“I have read multiple articles on this site as well as a vast majority of their comments.”
Good for you?
“Most of the time, at least HALF of the comments are from you. Your comments are obnoxious, rude, outrageous and generally pointless, unless your point is to play the most useless devil’s advocate on the net.”
Since you find reading what I have to say so intensely distasteful to your, here is some free advice (and worth every penny) on how you can stop wasting your time reading what I have to say. Ready? Don’t read it.
“Don’t you have anything better to do?”
Because whining about what other people do is so much better?
Don’t you have anything better to do?
A way to summon help? Don’t most cars still have horns? From what I can tell, it’s a requirement to be street legal. I know from experience that I can hear the horn of my minivan from the checkout line of the local grocery store. Little kid in the back seat had opened the locked door, which sets off the panic feature, which big kid in the front seat couldn’t turn off without the car fob. Oops. I bolted for my car and was confronted by an elderly couple who only wanted to know the trick for turning off the panic alarm because their grandkids had done the same thing once or twice.
But there’s a difference between summoning help and just getting mom’s attention. I was never out of eye or earshot of the car until my kids were old enough to get out and come into the store if they needed me. How old that was depended on which store, what parking lot, time of day, etc. And no one ever has needed to come looking for me.
A few months back, the local Walmart was on lockdown for hours because of an armed standoff in the parking lot. Happily, we weren’t grocery shopping in that store that day, but that didn’t stop me from wondering “what if?” What if I’d left my kids in the car, or sent a kid inside on their own, or been waiting in the car with my kids while my husband ran inside? In just about every “what if” I could come up with, it would have either worked out and been okay or been just as bad with or without our being together.
As for this six year old, who was clearly capable of getting out of the car if it got too hot, if she was still sipping her frozen drink, I’m guessing the car wasn’t at a dangerous temperature.
It’s really quite remarkable that the same country that will not allow children to sit alone in the backs of parked cars WILL allow children to handle automatic weaponry.
Maybe that’s the answer. I imagine nothing much would get Mum’s attention faster than shooting out the windscreen with an Uzi. Exercised Constitutional rights and a means of getting rid of unwanted nosy well doers in one swoop.
I am dead set against leaving babies in a car on a sunny day-babies have poor temperature regulation, and the temperature inside a car can shoot up. But a six year old can open the door, she can even step out if she feels hot. A baby can do none of those things. The two types of situations are vastly different.
@hineata, not only that, but once you’re 10 (at which age staying home alone or in the car or walking to the park still seems questionable to sanctimommy passers-by, cops, and CPS), you can waive your Miranda rights!
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-child-miranda-right-20151016-story.html
@Beth – oh my gosh, that is sick! Though IF he is put in a decent facility and given a lot of help, he might just be better off in jail.
Not holding my breath though….
“What I find extraordinary is the notion that an adult’s presence automatically makes a child safer.â€
You’re right it. This is completely false. It doesn’t make any sense. However as I study more and more about human behaviour, the more I understand why people can feel that it’s true. Long story – but here is the short version. (James make sure you shoot this down. I’m certain you’ll find a flaw as I simplify the short version.)
The more stress a person feels, the more simplistic thinking that the person can engage in. (we all get stressed but some are more susceptible to simple thinking than others) They can shift into black and white thinking. It can no longer see shades of grey. ‘It’s us or it’s them’, ‘It is or it isn’t, ‘She’s safe or she’s not. People start thinking that if the child does ‘A’ then he is perfectly safe. If the child does ‘B’ then there is a risk. It’s often doesn’t understand that if the child does ‘A’ or ‘B’ then there is a risk. It’s also quite terrible at determining the amount of risk. That’s why children waiting in a car on a cool cloudy day can drum up horrific images of children being in a hot car for 6 hours.
The simple part of the brain was not designed to weigh up and compare risks. The frontal lobe does that. Unfortunately the frontal lobe can be temporarily disabled when the person feels fight or flight stress.
http://www.onmysoapboxx.com/puppet
“The more stress a person feels, the more simplistic thinking that the person can engage in.”
This is true enough. It’s a side effect of epinephrine.
It’s why people who may be suddenly and unexpectedly confronted with danger, but still make good decisions, have to practice so much beforehand. Airline pilots, soldiers, cops, firefighters, NFL quarterbacks… all practice a lot, in advance, what they’ll want to do if something happens and they need to make a decision under pressure.
Not sure how that applies to the problem at hand, though. I don’t see the connection to “the notion that an adult’s presence automatically makes a child safer.”
“’What I find extraordinary is the notion that an adult’s presence automatically makes a child safer.’â€
In any case, this line of reasoning is easily defeated.
If the child is, say, Bartholomew J. Simpson, while the adult is Bob Terwilliger, then the child is not safer due to proximity to the adult. (See also Violet Baudelaire and Count Olaf, or, if you prefer non-fictional examples, Cheryl and Elizabeth Diane Downs).
“The more stress a person feels, the more simplistic thinking that the person can engage in.â€
This is true enough. It’s a side effect of epinephrine.
James you sure threw me a curve ball. I didn’t expect you to agree.
This is why consider the brain to similar to a muscle. If it isn’t exercised, it loses fitness. If you exercise often, you improve your fitness.
“Airline pilots, soldiers, cops, firefighters, NFL quarterbacks… all practice a lot, in advance, what they’ll want to do if something happens and they need to make a decision under pressure.†(they exercise and improve mental fitness)
“Not sure how that applies to the problem at hand, though. I don’t see the connection to “the notion that an adult’s presence automatically makes a child safer.â€
The lower the fitness, the more the reptilian complex and the limbic system can declare ‘martial law’ in the brain. It does this because it can visualize even the smallest of threats as a fight or flight situation. Therefore if everything is a fight or flight situation, children are obviously always safer when an adult is around to protect them.
As the reptilian complex and the limbic system can declare ‘martial law’ in the brain, the frontal lobe takes a back seat and can even become temporarily paralyzed. The frontal lobe is where reason, logic, and where rational thinking comes from. It’s also the part of the brain that can determine risk and can measure it.
The frontal lobe sometimes isn’t used. that’s why a student that puts Draino on aluminum foil gets hauled away in handcuffs and treated like a terrorist.
“James you sure threw me a curve ball. I didn’t expect you to agree.”
Just full of surprises, I guess.
It seems like in situations you’re damned if you do and you’re damned if you don’t. If you take the kid with you and struggle to do your errands because of them, you’re a horrible parent for not controlling them. If you leave them in the car, even for a few minutes (or, in CT, for ANY AMOUNT OF TIME, including the amount of time to get a carton of milk from a gas station) you’re a horrible parent who doesn’t care what happens to your child when you’re gone.
You can’t win against these people. We can only hope that we grab the majority so we can change the laws back to common sense.
James,
Well…if the child is in the car and the parent is in the store, I can only think of 2 (realistic) ways that the child might be able to get in contact with the mother:
1) Call her on the cellphone
2) Get out of the car and go into the store
What other ways are there? Or are you going to answer my question with another question? If I could think of other ways in which the child would be able to speak to their parent, I wouldn’t have asked.
To the children alone in cars is a crime
Should mothers fathers to the children, should not let the child alone in the car, if not may regret all my life.
Read the article “mothers don’t break the cars save the son”, I found it strange, why the car can be higher than the sample situation? Despite strenuous, how miserable to buy BMW, the only material. The largest property with the parents, to be his children.
Ignoring the emotional aspect, which refers to the law, maybe in China just like Vietnam, the law does not yet have rules about this behavior. If the other mothers in the United States, will undoubtedly be the police incarcerated is not much comment in France, because the crime of intentionally to my son 3 years in the car. Here are some typical case occurred in the United States:
A young boy was captured to infant children alone in the car on a cool day, when he visited shopping about … 2 minutes. You may not believe it, but it is true that occurred in Iowa, June 2013. The boy then penalty infractions.
Similarly, a parent in New York to his children in the car was also only a few minutes also arrested and forfeit. The case for longer, dangerous to life can incarceration in prison. Even a father was sentenced to 20 years in prison for murder to minor daughter died after 18 hours left in the car.
Not only to older cars, in all cases to children playing in the Park, the street … are being arrested, fined or imprisoned.
In Vietnam not long ago also happened the pitiful case, when her parents left two small children to climb into the trunk of a car and killed. Don’t care to children, to the child alone in the car is no longer merely the careless, that it actually is a crime. The crime caused no chance to regret.
Can buy a car or some other aircraft or ships, but what children can swap!
@Andrew D. Roper “Can buy a car or some other aircraft or ships, but what children can swap!”
The best sentence ever. Through, I can not buy aircraft and would prefer not to swap children.
“Well…if the child is in the car and the parent is in the store, I can only think of 2 (realistic) ways that the child might be able to get in contact with the mother:
1) Call her on the cellphone
2) Get out of the car and go into the store
What other ways are there? Or are you going to answer my question with another question? If I could think of other ways in which the child would be able to speak to their parent, I wouldn’t have asked.”
You’ve added two extra conditions to the original problem.
First off, the “(realistic)” requirement closes off some fanciful, but possible solutions, such as a system like the one they use at the local pizza restaurant… when you order, they give you this coaster that lights up and vibrates when it’s time to pick up your pizza.
Secondly, you’ve changed to verb from “summon” to “speak to”, which cuts out any communication media that uses an intermediary or nonverbal message, again killing the light-up-pizza-restaurant-coaster method but also killing sending someone else into the store with a message.
However, even after adapting to your much, much narrower problem definition, you could still use a nice cheap pair of toy-grade walkie-talkies, which meets both the original problem (a way to summon the parent) AND your version of the problem definition (a (realistic) way to speak to the parent).
And, for the people who kept insisting on substituting “summon help” for “summon the parent”, you guys kept ignoring the hazard lights, which all cars operated on public roadways are required to have, and several standard signals for “I need help”, such as leaving the hood up.
DCFS employees should be tested for mental retardation.
I’ve got to say, it would be kinda hard to snatch a 6-year-old out of the water and let her sort of waddle on my hands because it’s so funny to see how she moves…
@Hineata: ” I imagine nothing much would get Mum’s attention faster than shooting out the windscreen with an Uzi. Exercised Constitutional rights and a means of getting rid of unwanted nosy well doers in one swoop.”
Don’t give them ideas!
@Andrew Roper: Was this automatically translated or something??
I don’t agree with this at all…if the six year old opened the car door willingly to a store employee then they could also open the door to a pervert willingly and then she is gone forever. A few moments spent getting soaked or losing a few moments due to moving slow is ALWAYS a risk I will take because I would rather those minor annoyances to have my babies faces to kiss each night while I tuck them into their beds..safe and sound!
“if the six year old opened the car door willingly to a store employee then they could also open the door to a pervert willingly and then she is gone forever.”
You’re not scared enough. While it IS true that there might be a child-stealing pervert waiting around in the rain for some parent to leave their darling helpless child alone in the car, it is ALSO true that there might be a mother-murdering, car-stealing, child-stealing pervert waiting around in the rain for some parent to drive up in a car. In fact the odds for these two events are ALMOST EXACTLY THE SAME. So… better not ever leave the house with your darling, helpless child in the car. (At least, until your security team can sweep the parking lots and ensure your safety.)
I don’t agree with neglect, or criminal charges, but my rule of running in a store is always take the kids, because “if it’s a pain in the rear, and takes twice as long, it’s good-parent decision. If you choose quick and easy for you, it’s a bad parent decision.” Also, that’s what Billy did that killed Delia on Y&R.