Father faces first-degree charges for toddler's second-degree sunburn

[dkf]

Golf ball-sized blisters covered a Berea, Ky., toddler's shoulders when his mother retrieved the boy from his father's home Sunday, and police have charged his father with first-degree criminal abuse.
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The 2-year-old had been outside earlier that day for an hour and a half with no apparent protection from the sun, police said.

The boy had second-degree burns, the equivalent of brief immersion in scalding water.

Bobby J. Jones, 27, was in the Madison County jail Tuesday on a $7,500 cash bond.

The mother, whom officials have not identified, brought the boy to the police department Sunday after she discovered the child's burns. His shoulders, face, chest and back were burnt, said Berea police spokesman Capt. Ken Clark.

http://www.honoluluadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080610/BREAKING/80610068

Wow...I didn't realize how dangerous this could be.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

1. I"ve seen a much milder form of this.

My ex would bring the child back to me sunburned, dirty and unbathed. Why, I don't know.

[Fridays Child]

2. She took her child to the police station first, THEN the hospital?

I have to question the mother's priorities.

[Rosemary2205]

9. I'm pretty sure there's no longer a hospital in Berea, Kentucky

I could be mistaken but I think the only hospital (It was really more of a clinic anyway) closed a couple of years ago and now the closest one is in Richmond, KY - about 30 minutes away. If that is accurate, then I can see someone who thinks they have a medical emergency on their hands going to a police or fire station.

[Fridays Child]

17. I just checked. Saint Joseph Berea has an ER.

[Tunkamerica]

3. he should've had sunscreen

but who didn't ever get a sunburn when they were a kid? I just went back and reread that the child was two years old... a little worse since hopefully the dad was watching him the whole time and he wasn't off running around by himself. But I know by five years old I'd gotten a bad sunburn or two. Sometimes with sunscreen.

[Hekate]

4. I saw a redheaded tourist kid at Waikiki once who should have been taken to the ER...

I was a resident and my little blondie toddler was wearing long sleeves and a hat. That other kid (about 10 y.o.) was shirtless and his back was just a mass of blisters and raw skin.

A lot of people just don't get it -- if you are fair skinned, Mr. Sun is NOT your friend. Even one blistering burn like that in childhood and your chances of getting melanoma in adulthood go way up.

As far as the father who got arrested, and why the mother took the kid to the police station before the doctor, it sounds like there was some history. She may have told the yokel numerous times already that this was a bad idea -- and for crying out loud, golf-ball sized blisters? That's really serious for anyone, much less a little guy.

Hekate

[noonwitch]

15. I got sun poisoning in Colorado, when I was 16

I have red hair, fair skin, light eyes. I should have known better-I was 16 and at camp, and not thinking about it as much as I should have. I sat in front of the pool for a couple of midday hours without sunscreen, then I went mountain climbing the next day in a light-colored t-shirt, and no hat or sunscreen.

I did learn my lesson from that experience, though. The atmosphere is weaker at 9000+ feet and at the time, I was able to tan in the summer if I was careful (1981). I've never been able to tan since, though, so I just rubdown with Coppertone Waterbabies.

[skooooo]

22. did you get blisters??

I broke out on my back in blisters that looked like cold sores from overexposure to the sun as a kid.

[noonwitch]

24. Yeah, my shoulders were burnt to a crisp, and I had blisters on my scalp.

The mountain climbing was the last day-that night, we climbed back onto the buses and headed back to Michigan.

This was with Young Life-the camp was amazingly fun. The counselors were very worried about me, because I was really sick-I was seeing bugs crawling up the side of the bus (although I knew better than to tell anyone that at the time). At our breakfast break at a truck stop right before the CO/NB border, the counselors made me drink a quart of orange juice before getting back on the bus, which actually did help with the fever and the shivering.

When we got back to GR, my mom and dad were waiting for me. My mom sees my red face and exclaimed "You look so healthy", to which I said "Don't touch me!", for once having an excuse to evade her overbearing hugginess. The YL leader told my mom (who was a nurse) about how bad the burn was, and she just laughed it off.

I learned my lesson, though, and am never out for more than a few minutes without Coppertone Waterbabies and a hat.

[skooooo]

25. omg....on your scalp!

That would have to be about the worst place to get burned. Poor thing!

yikes.

[NotThisTime]

19. I agree, those injuries are serious... our redhead burns SO EASILY, if he didn't have special

sunscreen he would literally burn just like that... He's 13,hates wearing a sunshirt but has no choice in the matter, then he's got the sunscreen for the rest of him... he's really unlucky this way.... it's just awful.

[nomorenomore08]

5. I got a really bad, blistering, oozing sunburn when I was maybe 9 or 10.

Now, as a twenty-something adult, I'm not so susceptible, but that particular experience was a ghastly one. The only times I've gotten comparable burns since have been from hot cooking oil. :scared:

[no_hypocrisy]

6. My parents allowed me to "burn" seriously at least three times when I was a child.

When I was almost 2, I got a third degree burn on my upper arm. It was painful and scabbed horribly. Three years later a yellow blister on my chest larger than a silver dollar, and the same thing a year later. And my father was a physician to boot. It wasn't until the third burn that they caught on to the concept of sunscreen and making me wear long sleeves, etc.

It's horrible as you literally are as burned as a heat burn.

[Fumesucker]

7. My grandson is four..

My daughter and son in law are by no stretch of the imagination neglectful parents.

And yet he had a pretty bad sunburn last week despite being slathered in sunscreen..

I had multiple cases of pretty severe sunburn through my childhood and my parents were not neglectful either.

On edit: If this standard becomes evenly enforced, half the parents in America are going to be felons.

[Maine-ah]

8. even when it's overcast, you need to put sunscreen

or clothing with sunscreen protection on the little ones.

That poor little babe. :cry:

[My Good Babushka]

10. I stopped putting sunscreen on my two boys

because they kept sweating it into their eyes and it burned. Plus, we have an olive-y skin tone that rarely burns. I do try to keep them out of direct sun especially at the hottest part of the day.

[Squatch]

12. You don't have to actually burn to have permanent (and potentially fatal) skin injury

[GreenEyedLefty]

11. I knew someone who received an Article 15 for allowing himself to get horribly sunburned

I didn't realize the Army could do that... but apparently it can.

DH and I are sunscreen fanatics - and my kids go out in the morning but go back inside until 4:00 p.m. on really hot, sunny days.

[Squatch]

13. That was the threat at Airborne School.

On weekends, you were free to visit the O-club pool, etc. If you came back with a sunburn and were unable to wear your parachute harness, they considered that dereliction of duty and would slap you with an Article 15...or so they said. I chalked it up as a soldier's rumor as I don't think the command would have bothered with such administrative punitive action. More likely, they would have called the sunburned soldier a dumbass and told him to fall back in with the rest of his class to resume training, sunburn or not.

[GreenEyedLefty]

14. Makes sense to me...

BTW, my brother is 82nd Airborne - you all are heroes to me. Poor guy, he's finally coming home from tour #3 in Afghanistan and will retire soon after 23 years - but he's beat up bad. All those jumps take their toll on a body. They have a lot of fixing to do on him.

[TexasObserver]

21. I was threatened with an Article 15 in 1968 for getting a bad sunburn.

I had huge chunks of skin I was peeling off the top of my almost hairless head. It was July. We went drinking and canoeing.

Got the lecture. Didn't get the Article 15.

[Carnea]

16. Sounds a little like a divorce case maneuver.

Not to downplay the negligence on the Father but as others have noticed its very easy to accidental give your kid a sunburn.

Family court and parenting classes are probably in order. First Degree criminal abuse seems way over the top.

[malaise]

18. This is ridiculous

Shit happens. Lots of guys don't know about sun screen

[skooooo]

23. Sorry, you have to be a little smarter if you're going to have kids.

Maybe he should get a vastectomy if sunscreen is too difficult of a concept to consider.

[TexasObserver]

20. Not forseeable, therefore not criminal.

This particular child probably has particularly sensitive skin. One and one half hours in the sun should not be sufficient to do the kind of damage that was described. The average person would probably conclude that a child could get a sunburn in 1.5 hours, but not suffer that kind of damage.

The father has to have a reason to fear having the child in the sun without sun screen for an hour and a half, and there's no reason normally to have such fears. Children that age commonly spend more time than that in the sun, often without sun screen.

Sun screen may do more harm than it does good.

[lightningandsnow]

26. Maybe the child has a sun allergy?

(yes, there is such a thing)

http://www.intelihealth.com/IH/ihtIH/WSIHW000/9339/10710.html

If he's having a reaction that extreme to an hour and a half in the sun, he could have some kind of undiagnosed condition - and it seems like burns like that wouldn't be forseeable, in normal circumstances.