THE BOOK--Playing The Percentages In Baseball

Under Illinois state law, parents who leave children in a car unsupervised for 10 minutes or more can be charged with child endangerment.

Well, IF that is true, and IF they are not charging her with some OTHER statute and IF the police cannot prove that she left for more than 10 minutes, then she has nothing to worry about.

In all these articles, we basically got HER side of the story (not that I think the facts are in dispute), but as I ALWAYS say, I form an opinion on NOTHING until, at the least, I hear all sides of a story.

I say “at least” because in a dispute like this, one or both sides are usually lying, distorting the truth, or somewhat delusional, in order to protect their self-interests, as we all do.  Then in order for a third part to form an opinion, they would literally have to embark on a fact-finding mission (which is why we have trials and things like that)…

Crestwood is a Chicago suburb, so I’ve read plenty about this story in the local papers.

The police side of the story is that, the officer had no way of knowing how long the child was left alone. So, he chose to make the arrest, instead of letting it go based on the mother’s explanation, on the premise that if her explanation turned out to be valid, she would probably be let go (that’s what has ensued). And if her story didn’t pan out, she would be charged.

Whether this cop should have been less rigid in his actions is open to debate. Older veteran cops probably feel that they have enough experience to exercise their discretion, even if they are in effect expanding their role to prosecutor and jury. Younger cops, trying to follow the letter of the law, probably look at things differently. They will do their part, and let other parts of the system make appropriate corrections.

In the end, the system worked, and this woman is off the hook.

What about the part of the other kids being left unattended while she was in cuffs in the cop car, and they started wandering away?

Did that happen?

Also, if the law is “10 minutes”, it seems therefore that the only way to know is for the cop to have the woman on a lookout for 10 minutes, right?  Otherwise, the “he doesn’t know for how long” method of arresting someone will force a cop to arrest everyone.

Sorry, I don’t see how the system “worked”.  The system is supposed to go after criminals, not go after everyone, and let the innocents go free.

And if a copy came by, left, and it turned out the lady was in the store for 3 hours and the baby died, we’d be hearing about how negligent the cop was, right?

Maybe the cop used bad judgment, maybe he didn’t.  Maybe the system is working and maybe it isn’t. Maybe the prosecutors are being out of line, maybe they aren’t.  I just don’t see how we can tell given the limited information we have.