Push to make being a bad parent a crime

This is one of those things that I could actually see being reasonable...if there was a mathematical formula to raising children, some perfect means that if we all followed would work.

But raising children is not driving a car - legislating it in the same way seems silly and just a bit dangerous.

It is already a crime to "be a bad parent" eg. to neglect, abuse, or corrupt your children. Murdering another child is quite a leap from stealing bike parts. I'd be very surprised if his parents saw that coming. Not sure what this guy hopes to accomplish.

I feel horrible for what he's had to endure. As a father, I can't imagine a worse nightmare than losing one of my children. I have a friend who lost a daughter a few years ago to a preventable accident because of someone's negligence.

Having said that, I can't see how this would be workable. Sometimes you just don't see the warning signs. Or you do and you think you're doing what has to be done. I can see it as a lawsuit, depending on the circumstances.

Honestly, I'm disgusted by this. It feels like some scuzzy small-town lawyer trying to make a name for himself by taking advantage of other people's suffering. For example, getting free coffee at the diner and who knows how many other perks.

The victim's parents are suffering because they lost their daughter, and obviously aren't feeling like justice was done, even though their daughter's killer is in jail and paying for his crime. So they want to try and point the blame at more people, hoping that might help them through it.

The murderer's parents are probably suffering as well because they have to accept that their son did something absolutely unforgivable, and is now going to spend a long time in prison. His whole life is going to be colored now by what he's done.

There are a lot of jokes made about the morals of lawyers. Guys like this only show how a lot of those jokes are closer to the truth than just good for a laugh.

Yeah, I'm with Shaun on this. Especially I think it's interesting that apparently the onus is on the (abused) mother for letting her son learn abusive behaviours from the man who abused her.

How does that work? If (as we know is the case) abused children often grow up to find themselves the abused partners in abusive relationships, then yes - abuse is going to be repeated generationally. Will a law suit solve that? Or is it something that should be solved by society before the next crime is comitted?

Here's a thought - more support for abused children, and more support for people trying to break the cycle of abuse.

mccardey said:

Here's a thought - more support for abused children, and more support for people trying to break the cycle of abuse.

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+1

I think he's looking for someone to blame, and as a parent, perhaps he doesn't want to hold a 15 year old kid entirely responsible for his own actions.

It's just difficult, though, because how do you see "warning signs" that your fifteen year old son is going to kill someone? We do know that some kids that age are capable of killing, but it's not something we ever expect, even from kids with severe behavioral problems.

ShaunHorton said:

Honestly, I'm disgusted by this. It feels like some scuzzy small-town lawyer trying to make a name for himself by taking advantage of other people's suffering. For example, getting free coffee at the diner and who knows how many other perks.

The victim's parents are suffering because they lost their daughter, and obviously aren't feeling like justice was done, even though their daughter's killer is in jail and paying for his crime. So they want to try and point the blame at more people, hoping that might help them through it.

The murderer's parents are probably suffering as well because they have to accept that their son did something absolutely unforgivable, and is now going to spend a long time in prison. His whole life is going to be colored now by what he's done.

There are a lot of jokes made about the morals of lawyers. Guys like this only show how a lot of those jokes are closer to the truth than just good for a laugh.

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As a lawyer, I find it irksome when people put all the blame on lawyers for doing their jobs.

A lawyer cannot bring a case without a plaintiff hiring him. If the case has no merit or legal basis, the court will dismiss it before it ever gets to a trial. And if there is a trial, the lawyer can't win the case if he hasn't proven it to the judge or jury. Thus, a lawyer generally has little motivation to bring a case that has zero legal merit (and if he does, he generally doesn't get far). Indeed, many lawyers don't get paid unless they win (i.e., have proven their case to the court). And if you're on the defendant side, even a guilty scumbag has the right to have zealous representation in court. This is the way our legal system works. We're not all crooks any more than everyone in your field is a crook. Many lawyers even do work pro bono -- yes, for free! -- for indigent clients.

Surely, if a case comes out with a result you find unfair, there are some folks who are at least as responsible as the plaintiff's attorney. Like the plaintiff himself. The judge. The jury. Our legal system and our laws.

End rant. I'm sorry for the derail. If you want to debate me on this, I'll happily do it elsewhere.

Ahem. On the actual subject of the post , I do think you can often trace the delinquency/criminal tendencies/issues of a child to bad parenting. But then again, often you have a kid go badly wrong when the parents weren't any worse than all the other parents on the block. I don't see how you can realistically police "bad parenting" any more than we already do with laws on neglect, abuse, etc. As a matter of policy, I believe it's better to hold the individual responsible for his or her own actions.

If your 8 year old kid throws a rock and breaks my window, I expect you to pay for it. But that doesn't mean it's your fault that kid threw the rock. Some kids are simply bad despite their parents' best efforts. Maybe it's the people they hang out with. Maybe they inherited that bad gene from their great grandfather. Who knows? But just because your kid killed my kid doesn't mean you didn't do everything you could to raise him right.

I can't see this going far, and I have no idea why a lawyer would take up a case like this.

Haggis said:

If your 8 year old kid throws a rock and breaks my window, I expect you to pay for it. But that doesn't mean it's your fault that kid threw the rock. Some kids are simply bad despite their parents' best efforts. Maybe it's the people they hang out with. Maybe they inherited that bad gene from their great grandfather. Who knows? But just because your kid killed my kid doesn't mean you didn't do everything you could to raise him right.

I can't see this going far, and I have no idea why a lawyer would take up a case like this.

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FWIW, I wouldn't take it. I agree that (at least based on the facts I know -- and sure, there may be plenty I don't), I doubt it will go far.

CassandraW said:

FWIW, I wouldn't take it. I agree that (at least based on the facts I know -- and sure, there may be plenty I don't), I doubt it will go far.

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I don't think most lawyers would take it. But I'm guessing you'll agree that, just like George Carlin's Worst Doctor in the World who has an appointment at 9:00 tomorrow morning, there's also the Worst Lawyer in the World, who will do anything for publicity. I expect this is what is at play in this case. And I feel terrible for the girl's parents about the whole thing.

I'm well aware that it only takes a few people behaving badly to spoil a reputation and that many lawyers do a lot of good work.

With this guy going around town now, taking advantage of his new fame/notoriety, he certainly seems like one of the bad eggs. It's also not unheard of for some of them to take people reeling from a tragedy like this and planting ideas in their heads so that they do hire them.

I fully admit to being a cynic when it comes to human nature though.

Haggis said:

I don't think most lawyers would take it. But I'm guessing you'll agree that, just like George Carlin's Worst Doctor in the World who has an appointment at 9:00 tomorrow morning, there's also the Worst Lawyer in the World, who will do anything for publicity. I expect this is what is at play in this case. And I feel terrible for the girl's parents about the whole thing.

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Indeed I do agree -- there's a worst everything. And there are crooks in every field, including law. Alas.

Of course, it's also possible that this lawyer genuinely believes that parents should be held criminally responsible for their kid's criminal actions. I've heard that opinion voiced by several people, mostly non-lawyers. I just don't agree with it. (ETA: for example, if the lawyer is getting free coffee from the local diner for taking on this case, there are a lot of people in that town who share his point of view. I can't assume they all just have a good faith opinion but he's an attention-seeking crook!)

(Though if the underage kid breaks your window, I'm all in favor of his mom and dad paying to fix it.)

Haggis said:

If your 8 year old kid throws a rock and breaks my window, I expect you to pay for it. But that doesn't mean it's your fault that kid threw the rock. Some kids are simply bad despite their parents' best efforts. Maybe it's the people they hang out with. Maybe they inherited that bad gene from their great grandfather. Who knows? But just because your kid killed my kid doesn't mean you didn't do everything you could to raise him right.

I can't see this going far, and I have no idea why a lawyer would take up a case like this.

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Not many, I think. I do believe children usually want to be good. But sometimes the child-raising thing doesn't go as well as people would like, often despite the parent's very, very best efforts. And that's when having an extended society that looked out for its members would be a real bonus.

I don't think many kids want to be bad. But if your kid killed my kid I would be wondering how come you, me and the rest of our local group of friends, school, neighbours hadn't been aware and a little more proactive - protective of both kids.

The point to remember, I think, is that by and large society creates the children, and adults create the society.

It's really absurd to me for someone to be criminally responsible for someone else's actions. And as stated before, some people are just bad eggs. If we make parents criminally liable for children who they know have turned "bad," and don't know how to stop, what are they going to do? Get rid of the kids because they can't be held criminally responsible for murder? That... kind of seems like it would start more problems than it would solve.

Celia Cyanide said:

I think he's looking for someone to blame, and as a parent, perhaps he doesn't want to hold a 15 year old kid entirely responsible for his own actions.

It's just difficult, though, because how do you see "warning signs" that your fifteen year old son is going to kill someone? We do know that some kids that age are capable of killing, but it's not something we ever expect, even from kids with severe behavioral problems.

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I agree. The child's mind does not operate like the adult's, and is hard to predict. I'd imagine most parents of troubled children would not think they would go that far.

Likewise, a child who "turned bad,"as was said, needs proper support and guidance, because they do not do so unless they are suffering, whether from circumstantial or genetic reasons. A child is still a child and should not be written off as a bad egg when he or she can still be helped and taught.

So who decides which parenting practices are illegal and which are legal?

Jack Asher said:

So who decides which parenting practices are illegal and which are legal?

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Generally, Protective Services workers, the police and the courts.

That's when we get into trouble, and decisions are followed by those who cite rules rather than those who are qualified to make judgements.

One of the few times I really wished it were possible to prosecute parents for their kids' crimes was when there was a case in Colorado where a couple of teens beat another teen so badly he ended up with permanent brain damage. They were charged with aggravated assault and battery (should have been attempted murder, imo, since they were kicking their victim in the head after he went down). And the father of one of the assailants said that he didn't understand why the media was villifying his son, since it had been a fair fight.

Ergh, it would have been nice if that guy could have gone to jail.

But yeah, I agree, this responsibility deep pockets thing would just be too hard to prove. There's no formula for raising a kid "right," and anyway, most horrible parents are damaged people themselves who were also parented badly. So maybe they should go after the grandparents if they're still alive?

Just as children cannot be held responsible for the crimes of their parents, neither should parents be held responsible for the crimes of their children. Once you get caught up in this whole game of one-degree-of-separation in shifting blame sideways (or up or down) from one person to the next, then there's no stopping it.

It is a crime to be a bad parent--it's called child protective services.

If the kid is stockpiling pipe bombs and the parents never even try to get him counseling, I could see charges for the parents past the usual CPS charges if he goes out and blows up a school. So the extreme examples might be good places for more legislation.

Inciting your kid to extreme violence would also be an easy thing to add to the list of criminal possibilities, imho. But most cases aren't like that, and the OP doesn't sound anything near that. I'd think it would have to be reserved for behavior beyond the pale, but I'd be OK with it at that level.

[Personal anecdote, feel free to skip My brother's bully/nemesis also had fights with his good friend, in little gangs of guys. Instead of continuing self-defense after being jumped as a plan, my brother's friend went with his father to meet the nemesis with his father at a restaurant and they'd all talk it out like civilized people.

Nobody knew the guy's father was even batshit crazier than the fight-club son. He literally sandbagged the friend's dad right after they all sat down! Brought the weapon to the restaurant and everything! Yeah, charges involving how he raised that kid might have been appropriate at that point, imho.]