Is it a crime to raise a killer?

[DocM]

http://news.yahoo.com/is-it-a-crime-to-raise-a-killer--190558283.html

Is it a crime to raise a killer?

A tragedy in New Jersey raises questions about where parental responsibility ends when a child becomes a murderer.

Anthony Pasquale stops to visit his daughter at the Cedar Green Cemetery every morning, then returns once or twice more during the day. He sits on the small white bench and faces the polished granite headstone, etched with a hologram of Autumn on one side and the things she loved on the other ? bicycles, soccer balls, cheerleading, skateboards.

From where he sits he can see the middle school, where his 12-year-old girl was a student, and next to that the high school, where the 15-year-old boy who killed her was one, too. When school is in session, Pasquale has even glimpsed a classmate peering out of the ground-floor science-lab windows, which look directly onto Autumn?s grave.

That?s how things work in a small town like Clayton, New Jersey, where everyone knows everyone else, where lives and stories intertwine. ?Because it?s a small town ? that?s why we live here,? says Anthony Pasquale. But it was also why Autumn died.

?She trusted him because she thought everyone was raised the way she was,? he says of her attacker. ?That everyone could be trusted. That all parents taught kids right from wrong.?

It has been nearly two years since Autumn went missing and Justin Robinson went to jail, pleading guilty to strangling her after she stopped by his house to trade parts for her brand-new bicycle. In that time her parents have learned that the stages of grief now include another step ? finding someone to blame. It?s a stage well known to parents wrenched by a particular kind of loss, a kind arguably more common and certainly more public of late ? losing children at the hands of other children. And it is raising questions with few answers in the existing legal system.

?Where were their parents?? grieving families asked after Columbine and Newtown, after Isla Vista and Troutdale.

?Where were the parents?? asks Anthony Pasquale, sitting in the back booth of the Liberty Diner in Clayton, where his coffee is on the house now, because, as is the case everywhere else in town, everyone knows who he is. ?Parenting comes with responsibilities, and one of those is to raise your kids right, to pay attention and know when they?re a danger to someone else. That?s a parent?s job.?

To fail at that job is a crime, he believes. He?s recently taken his certainty to court, suing Justin Robinson?s parents for, essentially, being bad parents. He has also turned to Change.org and the New Jersey Legislature, advocating for ?Autumn?s Law,? which would punish such parenting with prison.

?Parents who ignore the warning signs of their children?s propensity toward violence are direct contributors to their minor children?s murders,? his petition reads. ?If the minor who murdered my daughter was properly treated, parented, disciplined and supervised my daughter would probably be alive today.?

Or, as his lawyer put it, ?If you?re going to raise a murderer, you?re going to take responsibility.?

It is a controversial point of view, rooted in society?s ever-changing expectations of parenting ? and the increasing impulse to right wrongs with lawsuits. Are today?s parents too lenient, creating a generation of undisciplined kids? Or too hovering, creating fragile, dependent children? Are parents too quick to blame their children?s quirks and missteps on ?issues?? Or is our mental health system not equipped to respond to the rising need of families for help? What is a parent?s responsibility for and toward a child as he gets older? Is it bad parenting to insist on knowing everything about your children? Or bad parenting not to?

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[+LogicalApex MVC]

It won't really hold water I don't think. In reality, what are the limits parents can reasonably go to if they think their kids is so out of control and has a strong potential to be violent and kill someone? They can have the person involuntarily committed to a mental institution due to their belief that they are a harm to themselves or others, but even that has a maximum duration (~120 days in PA). The parents can't place their child into prison, only the state can do this, and they are severely handicapped in actual punishments they can legally dish out.

 

So, realistically, what can the parents actually do? We can't neuter parents while at the same time chastise them for being "too lenient"...

[blerk]

So essentially he wants the government to define what "correct" parenting is?

 

Why, that's a brilliant idea. Especially considering that much of what makes up "correct" parenting at any one point in time seems to be based more on fashion than anything resembling science.  :rolleyes:

[DocM]

In all 50 states there are parental responsibility laws where parents are civilly liable, and in many they are also criminally responsible for the actions of their minor children. This can include jail time and financial restitution.

[wakjak]

In all 50 states there are parental responsibility laws where parents are civilly liable, and in many they are also criminally responsible for the actions of their minor children. This can include jail time and financial restitution.

 

And when was the last time that was enforced? Or is this just more unenforced baloney here?

[DocM]

It's certainly enforced in Michigan and other Midwestern states, and I'd bet the West and South are similar.

Here's info on the California law....

http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/california-parental-responsibility-laws.html

[+John Teacake MVC]

So what about parents of those who go into the armed forces? ........

[Shiranui]

So what about parents of those who go into the armed forces? ........

 

Shhh..

[Tews]

So what about parents of those who go into the armed forces? ........

 

You have to be kidding ...  :wacko:

[Skiver Veteran]

It's a long article but I got out of it what I expected to find...

 

 

 

 

As he reached his teens he became known to local law enforcement. ?The police knew him by name,?

 

Maybe I'm not reading enough, but if this kid was known to be a "not so nice kid" and the daughter obeyed her fathers every word, where was the guidance of stay away from that kid. My parents forbid me to play with certain kids when I was growing up because they were a "bad influence on me". They were right, I got into trouble whenever I was with them. Nothing serious and remotely close to this but it was always something my parents didn't want me doing. If you want to "blame" the parents then maybe he needs to look a little closer to home.

 

Pretty harsh view and I'm sure he was a great father, but I very much doubt the parents of this other child ever expected something like this. He sounds like a pretty troubled kid with a lot of psychological problems, but I don't see any of them spelling out killer.

 

 

So what about parents of those who go into the armed forces? ........

 

I really don't want to go as offtopic as I suspect asking this will make it, but what does the Armed Forces have to do with this?

[Tews]

I really don't want to go as offtopic as I suspect asking this will make it, but what does the Armed Forces have to do with this?

 

 

Absolutly nothing.. Its so ridiculous, it is close to being troll bait.

[+John Teacake MVC]

It's a long article but I got out of it what I expected to find...

 

 

 

Maybe I'm not reading enough, but if this kid was known to be a "not so nice kid" and the daughter obeyed her fathers every word, where was the guidance of stay away from that kid. My parents forbid me to play with certain kids when I was growing up because they were a "bad influence on me". They were right, I got into trouble whenever I was with them. Nothing serious and remotely close to this but it was always something my parents didn't want me doing. If you want to "blame" the parents then maybe he needs to look a little closer to home.

 

Pretty harsh view and I'm sure he was a great father, but I very much doubt the parents of this other child ever expected something like this. He sounds like a pretty troubled kid with a lot of psychological problems, but I don't see any of them spelling out killer.

 

 

 

I really don't want to go as offtopic as I suspect asking this will make it, but what does the Armed Forces have to do with this?

 

I just went off the headline, If your in the armed forces your a trained killer. So you have raised a killer in effect....

[Skiver Veteran]

I just went off the headline, If your in the armed forces your a trained killer. So you have raised a killer in effect....

 

I have to completely disagree with you, many of the Armed forced are trained to use a weapon yes, but that does not make you a killer. It's a complete and utter generalisation that the Armed Forces do nothing but go out and kill. Where in fact it's probably a tiny percentage of the Armed Forces that have a job that requires them to use their weapons regularly. 

[DocM]

These days about 45% (~2.4 million) of the US armed forces (all services) are the reserve units**, and much of what they do disaster relief and rescue. Remember hurricane Katrina? 50,000+ deployed.

**Army Reserve, Navy Reserve, Marine Corps Reserve, Air Force Reserve, Coast Guard Reserve, Army National Guard, Air National Guard

[simonlang]

there are so many bad parents out there, totally overworked and unable to properly educate children, and most likely these also don't know about counterception.

i think in some scandinavian countries parents are legally bound to show they are up to a proper education and children get checked regulary. this could also be done via schools, doctors or whatever. this is supposed to work rather well, at least better than in rest europe where society just tends to look away and only on their own goods.

 

another bash against the armed forces? well sure, that had to be come, but i wonder why that early.

if you are in the armed forces, you are not a killer. you are just doing your job.

[DirtyLarry Veteran]

While I do get why he would take this stance as a grieving parent, about the only way I can see this argument making any sense is if it can be proven the parents actually covered up incidents that would have led to the discovery that their child had more than a few screws loose. Otherwise how can it be proven the kid himself was just not able to hide his true thoughts and feelings? He could have portrayed himself to everyone else, including his parents, as being completely normal on the outside, but a monster on the inside.

Again I get why this grieving parent could be led to take such a position, however if you really sit back and analyze the situation, it really falls apart due to so many different variables.

[+John Teacake MVC]

I have to completely disagree with you, many of the Armed forced are trained to use a weapon yes, but that does not make you a killer. It's a complete and utter generalisation that the Armed Forces do nothing but go out and kill. Where in fact it's probably a tiny percentage of the Armed Forces that have a job that requires them to use their weapons regularly. 

 

Noooooooooo sorry you misunderstood. I meant it from a point of view the article or proposal from the headline of the article was invalid. As in it makes no sense from the point of view that if your in the armed forces you are at some point expected to kill or be trained in how to deal with killing......Does this make the parents responsible?