Child Services: Going too far?

[Mithrandir]

That you got them off of the web doesn't help their case either.

They were written by individuals whom I've known for years now.

Regarding the second story, why would Child Services get involved in a case involving a 22 year old? They have more than enough to do as it is -- it seems unlikely that they'd take on something so far out of their regular jurisdiction.

Child Services wasn't directly involved in the case. After the individual was pronounced "Not Guilty" though, he still gets put on a list of suspected sex offenders which is easily viewable by the public and is checked before you are accepted at a job.

The guy is innocent and still gets put on the list. That's where the second poster's beef with CS comes in.

As far as the first story goes -- where did the charges for molestation enter into the picture? Child services asked a whole lot of questions, but we only get the kid's answer to one of them.

Obviously the kid answered 'yes' to at least a couple more of the questions.

What I find really odd is that the poster asks the question, "If you have ever been involved with Children Services you know how well they listen." Which gives the impression that some significant portion of his audience has been involved with Child Services.

Erm, that implication is not there at all. If he had said, "And you ALL know how bad Child Services listens." - then, yes, the implication that the vast majority of the readers would have somehow been involved in Child Services is there. However, he states "If you have ever been..." He is leaving the statement open, suggesting that he can't really describe his frustration, but that the few that might have actually gone through the same ordeal could relate.

So I now find myself wondering, "where the heck did Mithrandir get these posts?"

In a thread on a Dark Age of Camelot forum, Palomides server, in which posters (basically) described many of their frustrations with certain aspects of the law, agencies, etc. Some people (like the above two posters) even provided personal stories.

[--Pete]

Hi,

Now, about child sex molesters?

Define child. Define sex molestation.

Child? A seventeen year old having sex with her eighteen year old boyfriend?

Sex molestation? Naked baby pictures?

The problem in this field is similar to that in many others. The need is for common sense, the typical solution is a bigger rulebook. And this field has gotten to be one of the knee jerk field. Even discussing it is something that a lot of jerks would love to crucify you for.

--Pete

[Kasreyn]

I once heard of a case where a 19 year old guy had sex with his girlfriend, who was either 16 or 17. This was in some New England state, but 16 was the age of consent, I remember. However, pics of sex of those under 18 was considered child pornography. And pictures were, unfortunately, taken.

Well, the girl's parents found the pictures, and brought charges (how DARE our daughter, over the age of consent, have consensual sex with a man we didn't approve of!). The guy was convicted. And jailed.

Don't you love it when the law is inconsistent with itself?

-Kasreyn

[Occhidiangela]

As I typed that, I realized that the problem is that a college student who gets a citation for mooning someone is, in some states, classified as a sex offender, when all he really was was being a fool.

The problem with the labels are as you point out.

My old rule of thumb used to be 'fifteen will get you twenty' but that is based on an age of consent of 16. That too is all over the map. In Texas, being within three years of the age of your date (19 vs 16 for example, 17 versus 14) is a defense to prosecution, but not reason for cops _not_ to bring charges of statutory rape.

What was in my mind was the adult having sex with someone under 12: that I consider a child, not a teenager. Trouble is, my definition is not universal. In any case, adult on 12 year old is

A.) a breach of trust
B.) IMO a great argument for the death penalty, and I again note that the problem of recitivism is taken care of in that case.

"But judge, she looked fifteen!"

"OK, mister, you will live, but fifteen will get you twenty!"

Works for me.

[Kasreyn]

Maybe it's simplistic, but I won't be happy until there is ONE age of adulthood, used for all these different things. Drinking, driving, smoking, sex, voting, the draft. How can we allow a child to do any of these things? But on the other hand, how DARE we deny an adult any of them?? We need to come to an agreement in this country on a sensible age at which we feel relatively certain that the average person is ready to assume the responsibilities of adulthood. And then, when people reach that age, we have to trust we've made the right decision and *let them be adults*. There's room for fine-tuning the specific age we pick as the cutoff, but I think it's silly to have such a confusing mishmash of different ages.

I say, 18 for everything, with a possible proviso of restricted-use "Limited Licenses" available to 16-17 year old drivers. Anyone think 18 is too high or too low?

-Kasreyn

[kandrathe]

Some thoughts.

On your first quote; On occasion I volunteer to teach in the local school system. It has become a common practice that teaching professionals now work in pairs to prevent these false accusations. Almost all the hobbies that I had loved as a child were taught to me by mentoring adults who were not my parents. I even remember back when I was 7, we had a lake cabin and one of our neighbors was a retired merchant marine captain. He would spend hours during rainy summer days helping me to build model ships and teaching me all about the boats that he loved. Tis a sad, sad, world when adults fear to help to bring knowledge to kids. But, raising false accusations are not a new thing. Salem witch trials? What I condemn is a justice system that cannot distinguish between sexual psychopaths, and normal people. So, they choose to err on the side of condemning all.

To the second; There was a guy I knew who was 25, and he was dating this girl he thought was 18. He was one of those perpetual lonely hearts guys who threw himself into relationship after relationship, only to get dumped after 4 or 5 months. Turns out she was 17, and to make matters worse the guy had previously dated the girls 42 year old divorced mother (how he had met the daughter). When the mom found out she was not only spurned, but wanted this guys liver on a plate. He ended up in a situation similiar to your example. It really messed up his life for about 3 years.

Then there is this nagging voice saying, "When you make bad choices; bad things can happen." Some common sense things come to mind like, don't get drunk and have sex with strangers at a kegger, and for the first situation, I guess being the state of things in the world, always make sure there are multiple people to witness what happens at your parties when you invite juveniles into your homes. Heaven knows that we've all made some mistakes and had lapses in judgement, so it is not fair to judge. Hence, why those lists are useless. Once you know that some of the people on the "deviant" list are really "normal" people who are guilty of poor judgement, then the entire list becomes suspect and then useless.

The criminal justice system ideally should punish, reform, and protect society. IMO, it does a poor job at all of them. That is why we have the largest prison population per capita in the world. Land of the free?

[Occhidiangela]

The criminal justice system ideally should punish, reform, and protect society. IMO, it does a poor job at all of them. That is why we have the largest prison population per capita in the world. Land of the free?

sound byte social engineering, The War on Drugs, thanks Reagan and Bush, and sound byte justice, Three Strikes and You're Out, thanks Clinton.

Combining the worst of both parties, wonderful! :P

[kandrathe]

Whatever age you choose, I think the real questions are more toward how do you prepare them for the responsibility, and what should you do about the violations? The problem also is that the transformation from "adolescent" to "adult" is a continuum and not a boundary you cross over. I like 19, just because most 19 year olds have graduated from compulsory schooling, and so you don't get the mixed "juvenile" and "adult" groups mixed together in schools. But, then you have some 18 year olds who are in college, where they are technically not adults, but are living in an "adult" oriented world.

Maybe it should be, 19 or 18 if you have already graduated from compulsory school. Which has the bonus of motivating 100% compulsory school graduation rates. :D

[kandrathe]

Yes, most of it was the politics of the extreme at its worst. Mandatory minimum sentences for drug addicts. As it turns out, 9/11 has had a more profound impact on the "War on Drugs" as we actually need to plug all those holes in our borders from terrorists it seems. Imagine that, if we actually inspect suspicious imported cargo we find "dead illegal aliens" and "drugs" as well.

[Roland]

...too low for drinking (I'm comfortable with 21), and too high for driving.

What I'd like to see, in terms of driving, is mandatory retesting every 5 - 10 years. No exceptions. That, I think, will help alot of things. It won't solve everything, but I think it will be a step in the right direction, at least.

[TaiDaishar]

After reading those qoutes I had a strong sense of fear and anger, anger because that with one sentence a person's life can be ruined for years by the same system that's supposed to protect you! Fear because simply EVERYONE can find themselves in the wrong side of this one sentence, basically a woman can come to the police, point at someone and yell that he raped her, it's simply frightenning.

About the lists... on that subject I can just say thank god I live in Israel instead of USA, being put on a list like that is just... wrong, how is a man supposed to re-establish himself after his jail time if he got his name listed on a list that will most likely make it near impossible for him to get a job, after all, who would want to hire a thief, or a raper etc', the worst problem is that you can't be 100% positive that what he was accused of doing he really did.

This reminds me of a story that happened to my mother, she drove in a crowded area near a few junior high schools, the place was simply packed with cars and children she could hardly move.

A few kids played on the road (it was so packed they didn't need to worry of getting run over) and one of the kids fell on my mother's car, seeing what he landed on he jumped on the roof crying in agony that my mother rammed him with the car, and the other kids, being the infleuntial bunch of dimwits they mostly are in that age, started to back that kid up, saying they saw her (keep in mind she was standing still with the car, not even moving an inch), my mother got freaked out and already saw herself defending herself in court, luckily it didn't come to that but, it could.

The above story just shows how rediculous the entire system of laws became (or always has been), a simply accusation can ruin your life entirely, whether it be from financial, social, psychological, etc' point and you can't do a damn thing to prevent it, that thought is petrifying me.

[--Pete]

Hi,

The problem is in the "child" or "adult" mentality. The binary thinking of thoughtless fools.

We have words for "infant", "baby", "child", "adolescent". We have these words for a reason, because a person doesn't go to sleep one night as an ignorant naive child and wake up the next morning as an experienced adult.

A series of ages for different purposes mirrors nature. Different parts of the body and brain develop at different rates.

Now, if you want to argue that not everybody reaches the same point of development at the same age, then you've got a valid, albeit unrealistic, point. But, until you realize why a top notch fencer is in his teens, a top notch runner in his twenties, and a top notch lifter in his thirties, you don't really know anything about age requirements, natural or legal, And when you do realize all that, you'll no longer spout the "one age for everything" nonsense.

--Pete

[Kasreyn]

I'm well aware that not all things are at their best at one age, and individual people mature at different rates. But that's a pretty vague thing to measure, and when one is talking about the law, it's best to set down black and white lines (IMO) to avoid future misinterpretations and thus miscarriages of justice. People (i.e. juries) are too easily swayed by appearances and good acting (in the theatrical sense) to be relied upon to exercise judgement calls about who is "old enough" for such things. Rather, an age cutoff. It would certainly be unfair to those who have matured faster than others. However, if you find the best age to set the limit at, you can minimize this harm while maximizing the benefit of the protections it will give society against irresponsibility. And that's really all you can do, really - make trade-offs that try to minimize the grief and friction people suffer from living in proximity to other humans.

Since we've *already* decided, in this society, to treat people differently based on whether they are a "child" or an "adult", what I say we need is a very clear legal definition of exactly what those are. I'm not arguing for or against the validity of classifying people that way. I'm just pointing out that with our current lack of a good, concrete divider, our laws can't help but be inconsistent and vague, which is not necessarily a good thing.

-Kasreyn

[kandrathe]

I think we are back to that idea of the Judgicial system being unable to excercise justice due to special causes (for all the right intentions) to be codified into law. I recall an interesting case I saw on Court TV while I was sick in bed one day. The prosecutor was trying to convict a 20 year old of statutory rape of a 17 year old. This young woman already had two kids from a different guy. The judges ruling was that she matured early. That line is fuzzy, yet it is a very common practice (IMO, for political reasons) to try juveniles as adults when it comes to serious crimes. So, I would say that as far as the justice system is concerned in at least one respect being under a particular age does not preclude them from classifying a juvenile as an adult. I think you are right though, that it is in the blurring of that line that the miscarriages of justice will and do occur. I think it particularly troublesome when considering 15 and 16 year olds, as it is less clear that their "Adult" identity is yet fully formed.

[BanditAngel]

For driving: As soon as you're physically capable of handling a car (IE you can reach the peddles and see out the window) and can pass the test, you should be able to drive. A standard practice of not testing people under 16 is reasonable, however.

For drug use: Once you graduate from mandatory schooling seems reasonable to me. The major danger of these things is that they arrest your growth and would make you a disruption in class, so this solves both of those.

For sex: If both parties have graduated already, then it's okay. If one or both are still in school, then I'd say keep the current law allowing up to a 3 year difference, but no one who isn't already in high school (9th through 12th grades out of 12 around here) - makes it easy to decide.

Still, I don't like age restrictions on sex since it requires you to card your partner or risk prosecution because you didn't get PROOF that his/her age was what they said it was.

[kandrathe]

Yet... Isn't it strange that we would share the closest of intimicies with a person who we know very little about. I think knowing a persons age, what school they attend, and/or birthday are right up there with finding out their name. Anyway, being older now I look back at what I did in my late teens and wonder why I was in such a hurry all the time.