Here is a story that makes me think this whole country is just losing its mind: Mother to face charges for unusual punishment.
What did she do? Make her 10-year old walk to school.
OK, it was 4.5 miles to the school.
Valerie Borders’ son, Nequavian, had his bus privileges suspended because of yelling on the bus. So she made him walk to school since he could not ride.
This did not go over well with the Jonesboro, Arkansas Police department. From the Yahoo story:
“There were a number of things that could have happened to the child,” said Lyle Waterworth, a spokesman for the Jonesboro Police Department. “The child could have been injured, abducted.”
How? How would he have been more likely to be injured than just playing? And abducted? Kids these days are safer than ever. Just read Free-Range Kids.
And here’s the most disgusting thing. She mother was charged with endangering the welfare of a minor in the second degree.
I looked that up for Arkansas. Here it is:
5-27-206. Endangering the welfare of a minor in the second degree.
(a)(1) A person commits the offense of endangering the welfare of a minor in the second degree if he or she knowingly engages in conduct creating a substantial risk of serious harm to the physical or mental welfare of another person known by the person to be a minor.
(2) As used in this section, “serious harm to the physical or mental welfare” means physical or mental injury that causes:
(A) Protracted disfigurement;
(B) Protracted impairment of physical or mental health; or
(C) Loss or protracted impairment of the function of any bodily member or organ.
This is an outrage. Allowing a kid to walk to school (even for that kind of long distance) is knowingly creating a substantial risk of serious harm?
Heck, when I was in junior high, I got my bus privileges suspended for 3 days. I walked 3 miles. Big deal. It simply is not a substantial risk. But this is where things are going.
And I am afraid that this sort of ridiculous, overblown concern could lead to similar charges if parents allowed their kids to go barefoot. I can just see some ignorant functionary (similar to Ohio Statehouse functionaries) decided that simply allowing a kid to play barefoot presents a substantial risk of serious harm.
Of course, they would have to ignore (just as the Jonesboro police did) the fact that kids, not that long ago, would go barefoot all summer long (just as they would walk long distances to school).
This sort of overwhelming ignorance just drives me nuts.
Even worse, you can be sure this mother doesn’t have the financial resources to mount a vigorous defense to these ridiculous charges. The whole system these days is stacked against it, where defending oneself from any change, particularly one this serious, can bankrupt just about anybody—so they don’t do it.
Instead, because of the severity of the charge, she will be offered a plea deal of some sort (standard legal crap these days), and because of her financial situation, her lawyer (probably a poorly-paid public defender) will have to counsel her to take it. (And even if she has a non-public-defender, she will have to carefully weigh just how much time she wants her lawyer to put into the case; she’ll only get as much justice as she can afford.)
And if she does want to have a jury trial, that requires even more money. Did you know that in most states you have to put up a bond to pay for juries, in advance?
That’s how the justice system works (mainly) these days.
Let me just add: if there is ever a case of a parent being charged with child endangerment because the kid is barefoot and the cop just doesn’t understand that that is not dangerous, and you are a lawyer who comes across this entry who needs an expert witness, call me. Maybe we can educate a jury together.
Ahcuah 
Outragious! When did it become illegal for children to walk to school? Child endangerment, what a load of crap! Now we see the government putting it’s fingers into more and more of our lives. Where will it end? What next, will we need health department approval to make a sandwhich in our kitchen, or should we expect them to tell us what time to wake our children up on Saturday morning?
The government is imposing itself on every little aspect of our lives.
Re sandwiches, then there is this story, in which a preschooler brought a turkey and cheese sandwich to school. It was taken away as not nutritious enough, and replaced with chicken nuggets.
This is a big concern for me too. My son just turned 14 months and my wife and I are both barefooters and want him to go barefoot as much as he wants to. This kind of stuff worries me, if anything ever happens I’ll be sure to contact you (I live in Cleveland BTW). Regarding the lunch being replaced, that is absolutely ridiculous.
I wasn’t barefoot, and it was long enough in the past that it wasn’t considered criminal, but I chose to walk the mile from high school rather than take the bus because I could get home faster. This was carrying 20 pounds of trombone gear and more or less ten pounds of books.
Bob,
What was the mother supposed to do? Let the child stay away from school? Hire a cab for him? Drive him to school herself? What usually happens if the bus privilege is suspended?
PS When will you Americans realize that driving your child anywhere is actually creating a risk of a serious harm to the child, because cars crash sometimes? That would be the end of USA as we know it.
That is the irony of it – vas is correct. From what I heard, by far the biggest killer of children is the automobile, and I do not mean being a pedestrian and being hit by a car, but by riding in it. The odds of a kid dying or being seriously injured in a car accident is far greater than threats from crazy people. Even the bus, which is so much larger and heavier than a car, presents a greater risk in an accident than just walking to and from school. And the security guard said:
“During his walk he crossed a bank parking lot, catching the eye of a security guard surprised to see a child alone in the area. ”
You mean he never saw a kid walk through a bank parking lot??? What would he do in the 5 boroughs of New York, where everyone walks, most people do not have cars, and kids are walking around urban areas all the time?
This doesn’t surprise me 1 bit. My hobby is reading muckraking. Like on infowars.com there’s entire news sections devoted to police state and big brother categories.
I don’t think police usually have overwhelming ignorance. Police and government usually have a profit motive for making silly laws. Of course they’ll give excuses for their actions like by saying “safety” or “protect the children” but it seems its usually money. For example CPS makes $ off each kid they steal (http://www.jesus-is-savior.com/Family/dcfs_monsters.htm) and big pharma makes $ by getting children vaccinated (http://www.naturalnews.com/022267.html).
Bob,
I really mean it: I am sincerely interested in what you do after your child is suspended from the bus. Can you enlighten me, as a foreigner?
Oh, sorry. I didn’t realize your questions weren’t rhetorical. Also, the short answer is “I don’t know”.
In the suburban area in which I live, I imagine parents would drive the kids, and would have to adjust their schedules to do so (so it’s a punishment of the parent, not the kid). When that is not and option, walking is really all that’s left. I guess this would also apply for rural areas, only moreso.
For an urban area, a school would probably be a lot closer to walk to; if not, there are also city buses (though sometimes it is the city buses that are contracted to do the school buses, so privileges for both might be suspended).
I don’t know just what the authorities thought this woman should have done instead.
Maybe somebody else who reads this entry has an idea?
In our school district, there is pressure on the district to either make sure kids have a safe walk to school or they are bused. Even though we are only one mile from the high school, a reasonable walking distance, bus transportation was provided because the route to school was not safe. The local infrastructure does not have sidewalks along the entire route to school (and it’s not a good idea to encourage kids to walk through farm fields and private property to stay away from the busy roads).
In this parent’s situation, the answer would have been for the mother to drive her child to school since the route to school was, apparently, not safe. That punishes the parent, not the child. I guess the school hopes there are consequences at home for the child so that the poor behavior isn’t repeated.
I suspect, though, that it was the Bus Company, not the school district, that probably imposed the suspension.
Frankly, it’s the Police Department that has failed here. They should be working with the school district so that punishments and suspensions can be administered without putting parents into a Catch-22 situation. If it wasn’t safe to suspend a child from the bus, it should not have been an option for the Bus Company. Perhaps an in-school detention would have been more appropriate.
So was the child injured? Was there an accident? Wasn’t it more important that the child got to school? What were the consequences if she’d just kept her child home during the bus suspension?
I don’t think that kid will ever yell on the bus again, but it’ll be because of the four-mile walk as much as because of the trouble his mother got into.