Cops right to arrest kids: readers
Commentators to the Crime Beat blog and to the Baltimore Sun's Talk Forum overwhelmingly support city cops for locking up three kids, agest 7, 8 and 11, for stealing a wagon, a scooter and bicycle parts.
The children's parents thought the treatment too harsh, but most readers and television viewers thought the punishment was either just right or not harsh enough. Baltimore Police defended handcuffing the youths and sending them to detention (no criminal charges were filed) though the mayor said that because the offedners' parents were home, she might have written the reports in the house and let the children stay there.
Seems to me we need to go back to basics. You hear time and again from older community residents, both here and across the country, that in their day when children misbehaved, they could count on being disciplined by their neighbors, then dragged home to be disciplined again by their parents. Word of your childhood transgressions typically reached home before you did.
Before a recent community walk in Southwest Baltimore's Carrollton Ridge neighborhood, in response to a 5-year-old girl caught in the crossfire and critically wounded, association leader Connie Fowler, who has lived there 46 years, lamented at the loss of old-fashion values. "If my son was caught doing something, the person corrected him and came to us to say something. You can't do that here today. If you correct a child, the parents are ready to beat you up. So I don't say anything to the parents. Most of the kids around here are raising themselves."
I know, today is different than yesterday. We can no longer trust each other enough to let children have the run of the neighborhood, confident that the entire neigbhorhood helps raise the neighborhood children. Now we have to screen friends and the parents of friends, worried that a child molester or a drug dealer might lurk around the corner. Perhaps in Connie Fowler's day, these kids who stole the bikes would've been dealt with by the residents and there would've been no need to get police involved.
Here is an e-mail I got this morning from a resident of Medfield, where the young offenders live:
I live in Medfield and have see the two boys that were arrested roaming the neighborhood on a daily basis. They, along with a large number of other neighborhood kids, are always unsupervised and are left to entertain themselves. They jump neighbors fences, bully other kids, tease neighbors dogs, place empty trash cans in the middle of the street, litter, skateboard in the middle of the street and challenge cars to try to pass them. Until yesterday’s piece of news, calling the police was useless. City police response time to a 911 call, let alone a call to 311, is outrageously long. By the time the police arrive the kids are long gone and if the kids find out you called the police, the harassment begins. Please don’t misunderstand, the parents are to blame in this situation. These kids need some focus and discipline in their lives. They need adults that care about what they are doing, where they are going, who they are hanging with. They need their parents attention otherwise they will end up like many of the teens in the neighborhood – another young victim of the drug/alcohol scene.
Here is a sampling of comments:
Why was an 8 year old child unsupervised for a period of time that allowed him to commit a crime? That's bad enough, but what if a far worse crime had been committed against him while he was not being properly supervised? For example: rape, kidnapping, or God forbid, murder. People need to protect their children.. WHERE WERE THE PARENTS/GUARDIANS?
You break the law, commit the crime, you are arrested. It drives me nuts to think that those jokers are suing the city for their son breaking the law. I don't care what age the kid was, maybe he wontt do it again.
If I had been caught stealing when I was that age, my mom would have insisted the cops put me in handcuffs. I would also have begged to stay at the police station knowing what faced me when I got home.
Jim: If the kids weren't stealing they wouldn't have to be put in handcuffs simple as that. Maybe their parents should of been watching them? They are only 7 and 8.
I'm glad they arrested these kids. They didn't actually charge them with anything but maybe putting the fear of God in them was enough to give each of them the lesson of a lifetime. I sure hope this experience sticks with them for a very long time!
Sigmalady: I think putting handcuffs on them and taking them to the police station would have been enough scare for children that small. Locking them up in a cell is excessive. But I bet they won't steal again.
The parents should do a bit better job parenting rather than complaining about the police. If they taught their kids stealing was wrong they wouldn't be in this situation. Ages 7-11 and stealing bikes...that's just bad parenting and supervision. Arresting the kids is warranted because you know the parents (after reacting like this) wouldn't do a thing about it.
So let me get this straight. The three youths stole bikes, got arrested for it, and the parents are upset...that they got arrested. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Baltimore.
After reading about the parents reaction to their kids being detained for "stealing" the bikes, I truly believe the police locked up the wrong family members .... good grief. Leadership starts and apparently in this case, ends at the top.
Why is this news? Seems to me, it 's only because these kids are 7 and 8 years old. If the parents aren't willing to do some parenting, then I am glad that the BCPD is willing to step up and attempt (key word ) to teach these kids right and wrong. If 2 hours in a holding cell will keep them from getting 2 months or 2 years housed in a detention facility down the road, then I'm all for it!! The parents need to save their outrage and turn it where it is directed--at themselves--for allowing their 7 and 8 year old kids to steal stuff.
Categories: Confronting crime, Neighborhoods
Comments
Did you hear about the man beaten in front of Grand Central in Mt. Vernon on Friday night. I didn't see any news coverage but I heard the guy is now still in critical condition.
Posted by: kd | July 22, 2009 12:00 PM
Perhaps those teens who burned a pit bull alive earlier this summer could have benefitted from being taught a lesson earlier on too.
I am so glad the cops did what they did in this case. I can only imagine what crimes those kids will be committing when they are teens, and maybe this lesson will stick with them and make them think twice. Shame on the parents!
Posted by: LD | July 22, 2009 1:10 PM
There's a lot of blame to go around. The parents are the obvious choice. I challenge people to look at the bigger picture. Drug and alcohol abuse are the norm in low-income communities.Businesses refuse to enter. Neighbors don't trust each other.Welfare recipients or renters don't care about their community. The Criminal Justice System does not prevent crimes or rehabilitate criminals. Many inner city minorities don't trust the police or Government. If anything these kids will have a new chip on their shoulder, new street credibly. People can prevent these problems, but don't you think our society creates these issues. I do.It seems like its always someone elses problem. Just don't think about it. You don't live there. Another murder, so what. Pit bull burned the city reacts in total outrage.These societal problems are everyone's problem, and it's getting worse.I don't empathize with the parents on this issue, but I do feel for the humans who have to survive in these problem neighborhoods that no one cares about. How can you parent if you don't know what it is to love yourself and have a healthy, positive and productive home life?
Posted by: Zuri | July 22, 2009 1:38 PM
My son at the age of approximately 10 "borrowed" a valuable piece of jewelry that belonged to my fiancé. I found the piece of jewelry in his dresser drawer after it was missing for weeks. When I found the missing piece of jewelry that my son had taken without permission, I took him straight to the closest Baltimore County Police Department and informed the officer at the desk the situation. The officer understood the message that I was trying to convey to my son and he provided my son a tough lesson that he needed to learn; taking things without permission is stealing and what the legal consequences would be. The officer applauded the steps of intervention I took to keep my son on track. My son is currently away at college and not in a prison or grave.
I cannot imagine my son at the age of 7 or 10 being arrested, but I do believe that this is a lesson that the boys involved will never forgot. However, they will not benefit from the lesson if the message they receive from the parents is that it is ok to steal and not ok for them to be punished according to the law. Moreover, this mentality contributes to the breed of a new generation that believes they do not have to follow the law and that when they break the law and are punished in accordance to that law, that they are being treated unfairly because of whatever extenuating circumstances may exist such as age, hardship, or race.
Posted by: MBJ | July 22, 2009 6:17 PM
What would be your reaction if the cops arrested the kids in a day care center or at bible school in church? Do you really believe that Baltimore's finest would have cuffed two white kids at Gilman who were from wealthy families?
Posted by: Marc | July 23, 2009 12:53 AM
If I were the parents of two white kids, from Gilman, that were caught red handed, stealing I would INSIST that the two kids be handcuffed by the police and escorted to the police station. Trust me, they would find much better treatment from the police than I would have to offer when I arrived. Shame, on all Baltimoreans, Crime is Crime, let the police do their jobs to ring it home, that offenders will be arrested and eventually prosecuted. The earlier one deters criminal behaviour the better our community shall be.
Posted by: city res | July 23, 2009 9:03 AM
@Marc - You are absolutely correct, unless you arrest every 2nd grader who pushes another kid on assault charges, or every kid who grabs a toy from another kid for robbery, then what sense does this argument make ? It seems the opinion leans towards arresting those bad (poor) kids in that bad city rather than to arresting children everywhere... perhaps some people feel that since all those kids are going to be thieves and drugs dealers anyway, we should start locking them up now just to be safe ?
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Is this what responsibility means today ? ...when a 7 year old is caught doing something bad (no doubt at the direction of the 11 year old), that our only reasonable action is to arrest, handcuff, and incarcerate the child ? Is fear and intimidation the only, first, best tool we have to correct the behavior of a 7 year old caught grabbing a bike from a yard ?
I think it's all of *you*, those who advocate this action, that are the problem... you would rather have the police arresting a little kid than have to deal with it yourselves, you want them to make you safe from second grade scooter snatchers!!! You are abdicating your responsibility, and undermining the parent's role by resorting to that. Is scaring a kid and locking him up the best you can do to teach him that taking other people's property is wrong ? Of course it is, because that's the best as your minds can think… "arrest him, arrest him" is the chant yelled from the sidelines… "Arrest the parents, they are bad parents" is the only alternative voice I hear… this is the face of responsibility? This is not responsibility, this is passing the buck and letting the police handle the situation so you don't have to.
Children Live What They Learn.
Posted by: Dave T | July 23, 2009 2:31 PM
Totally agree with you Dave T. But instead of passing the buck, I call it a product of the "Nanny State". Let the local or federal government take care of it. Heaven forbid normal citizens work together to fix a societal problem. Nanny will take care of it.
This type of mentality is really troubling.
Posted by: zuri | July 23, 2009 3:09 PM
If my children at that age
hell at any age were stealing bikes and got caught put them in cuffs and haul them off. Just may teach them a lesson.
MY 15 year daughter got arrested because her friend was caught shoplifting. Her mother my ex flipped out when she was sobbing in handcuffs at the police station. I told her afterwards that an extra 5 minutes in handcuffs didn't hurt her and may make her remember the incident throughout her whole life.
Posted by: jay | July 23, 2009 4:20 PM
Arrest the parents send the kids to detention, the whole family needs a rude awakening.
Posted by: Gordon | July 28, 2009 10:02 AM
There needs to be an NIJ standard declaring a minumum handcuffing age for juveniles. That age should be about 10 years of age. Handcufing the 7 and 8 year olds was inapropriate but probably not criminal brutality. The 11 year old isa different matter. When I was 11 years old, back in 1970, the minimum handcuffing age would have more apropriately been age 14 or 15, maybe as young as 13.
Posted by: ROBERT GREENE | August 12, 2009 5:13 AM
What makes anyone think that the cops are more trust worthy then your neighbor?
Posted by: iknow | August 25, 2009 9:30 AM