Some people just shouldn't have children...

[Cuban_Liberal]

There are a lot of things I deal with every day that don't really bother me a great deal, but there are some that just 'push my buttons'...

I love kids, absolutely adore 'em, and though I don't know exactly how or when it will happen, we intend to have one or more. I guess that's why any offense wherein a kid is the victim just makes my blood boil. Today I had to deal with one such offense.

I got a call this morning to the IGA store in Arthur, the call involving 'a small child locked in a car'. I drove there and was sorta hoping I'd find a kid who had locked mom/dad/grandma out of the car as a prank (I've dealt with 2 of those before, actually). No such luck, unfortunately...

Inside this beatup LeBaron was a 9 month-old little boy clearly asleep in his car seat, the car locked, and no adult connected to the car in sight. I ran the plate, aksed for DCFS and a locksmith to be dispatched to my location and asked the store manager (who had appeared by this time) to see if the driver was inside. Again, no luck.

The locksmith arrived and got the car unlocked and I checked the little boy out, and other than a wet diaper (which I changed), he was fine. I waited with the baby in my car until DCFS arrived about 30 minutes later, and then turned him over to them. Since the car was used in the commission of a crime, I had a wrecker dispatched and had it towed to impound.

I'm still waiting over an hour later when this car pulls up where the LeBaron had been and this lady gets out and starts frantically looking around, spies me in my patrol car, and comes over. To make a long story short, she had left her baby asleep in the car (locking it so that he would be 'safe'), and taken off with the driver of the second car to score some meth. It took longer than she had thought it would, apparently.

I arrested her on the spot for felony child endangerment, felony abandonment, felony possesion, possession with intent to distribute, loitering with intent and failure to maintain insurance on her car. She, of course, maintains that 'she wasn't gone that long, blah, blah, blah, more bullshit, blah, blah, blah...'As we speak, she is being held pending bond in our county jail.

:wtf: is wrong with some people?

:grr:

[arcane1]

1. and oddly enough, some call contraception a "sin"

:shrug:

[tooncesj0nes]

15. addicts and mentally ill breeding more of....

..the same....I have owned low income rental properties for years. People who are alcoholics, drug addicts, mentally ill, sex addicts having children without any regard for the childs future. After a while, the number of these kids expand exponentially..as these children grow up and eventually have their own kids, the addiction genes are passed on. sorry, but as Scandanavian countries that legalize drugs know, a certain percentage of these people are just going to fall through the cracks of the system. There is no solution other than avoiding them. Your comments are welcome.

[Feanorcurufinwe]

2. I could never be a cop.

[Cuban_Liberal]

5. There are times when the urge to use the baton are pretty great.

Cases like this cause me to ask for the strength to not do what I so desperately would LIKE to do, on a personal level...

[displacedtexan]

3. I hear you!

I will never forget the parents of HS girls who wouldn't let them press charges against a teacher who had molested them (before the new reporting laws passed).

Unfortunately, kids are either a biological punishment or a status symbol for many people.

[camero]

4. Sounds like somebody needs rehab bad

Few things out there are worse than meth. I'm assuming she would actually be a good mother without it. It's the sober ones who do things like that that scare me. I'm glad you handled the situation. You did the right thing.

[redqueen]

6. Addiction, that's what's wrong

You've seen it before, right? People lose touch with what's important -- the drug starts to take priority over everything else. :(

And it's not just drugs that causes it - gambling, soaps, anything just about can get a hold of people's brains and they just lose it. So tragic. :(

I'm glad someone called. That could have been a LOT worse. :cry:

Again, CL, kudos to you for doing that job. Thanks for looking out for those that can't look out for themselves. I know if / when you have kids, you'll both be superb parents.

[Cuban_Liberal]

7. Yes, she's in the grip of 'the monster'.

The drug has taken control of her life, which happens so often with meth. I truly think meth is more destructive than crack or heroin, and I deal with its aftermath every day...

[redqueen]

8. What I don't get is why

we check our kids for lice, for spinal deformities, for hearing deficiencies, etc... but if they have an addictive personality or whatever other possible mental illness then they just get to deal with that later on by themselves.

:(

[Cuban_Liberal]

10. Economics.

We didn't start the school-lunch program or mandatory physical-ecucation, hearing and vision tests in the schools until we saw how many 4-Fs there were in WWII. Once our nation finally realizes the true long-term cost of that and other problems, we'll do something about it...

[absyntheNsugar]

9. As much as I hate banning substances...

I am glad Ephedra is being treated as a controlled substance alongside meth....any chemist will agree the stuff practically the same...

[Demobrat]

11. All those damn weight loss drugs are the same thing.

Speed.

[absyntheNsugar]

18. Exactly....they call it an ECA stack

Ephedra - Caffeine - Asprin

Basically Ephedra and Caffeine speed your heart up wayyyy high, and the asprin opens your bloodstream so it hits you faster.

Of course you lose weight, get addicted and end up looking like a crankster. I'd see women all the time at the gym, totally strung out on Hydroxycut or Xenadrine shooting their heart up wayyy past where it should go...

[muchacho]

12. I hear ya...

my wife is an ER resident here in New York City and some of the things she relates to me almost makes me lose my faith in the goodness in people...

[NightTrain]

13. Man, I could never do your job!

It wouldn't take long before I stopped resisting the urge to punch somebody like that right in the mouth! :grr::nuke:

[Cuban_Liberal]

14. The only thing that holds me back, ultimately...

is the fact that these people ARE ill; otherwise, there'd be a mess of 'black and blue' spread all over this county...

[BlueJazz]

17. Boy..It must be stressful being a Police-Officer

I would think after a while that a P-O would start to develop a "thing" against all folks....Having seen the down side of society on a constant day to day basis.

I guess all I can say is: You're a better Man than I am.. :)

[absyntheNsugar]

19. That's what happened to my dad

Before he joined he was a liberal - totally into civil rights and MLK Jr...even volunteered on the Adlai Stevensen campaign.

Then, 25 excruciating years on both the SFPD and SJPD he hates pretty much everyone but *his own.*

I almost think Sunnyvale, CA had the right thing going when they had "City Officers" instead of police, who would rotate Fire, Police and EMT duties.

[dolo amber]

16. Just curious...

What would've been the charge had she TAKEN the baby and gotten busted? And don't AT ALL think I'm advocating such a thing, I think it's despicable either way, I'm just curious, and I'd imagine you'd know...

:hi:

[Cuban_Liberal]

20. They'd have been mostly the same...

In addition, I'd have charged anyone and everyone involved with the transaction with felony endangerment, too.

[LWolf]

21. 2 kids died in my town last year.

I live in the desert. Triple digit temps are common. This foster mother left her 2 foster kids in the car for 2 hours while she "ran in to check on one of her businesses." The temperatures were in triple digits. The kids were dead when she got back. She is currently on trial. Crying over the fate of the kids, and saying she "lost track of time."

[SarahB]

22. It's pretty sad

My husband works at a pediatric hospital and I have heard stories too awful to repeat here. I know this woman is in the grips of addiction, but it's really hard to feel much empathy when so many of of have busted our butts to not only to do an okay job at parenting, but try to make the world a better place somehow with our children by working very hard to put their needs ahead of our own. It's just sad. Poor little baby. :(