Madmax, Thx for clarification. I always have heard second degree burns in association with scolding so I'm guessing I figured it to be more damage than actually happened. 7 hrs..most have hurt. I am not for strict criminal prosecution just child protection through either education or supervision. Chris
A bit confused by this statement. You mean like when the getaway driver gets the same penalty as the looney robbing the store. Even though the looney is the one that shot the cashier? Child or reckless endangerment do not necessarily hinge on intent. Tax evasion does not hinge on intent.
I said for the most part, Hayes. I didn't make an absolute statement. Of course there are ways people can be prosecuted for reckless behavior. Why are you arguing with me still? Didn't you just say in a previous post you weren't interested in seeing her prosecuted?
Calm down, Max. You went to law school, right? So if I don't understand something you wrote, I ask, ok?
Max-- With all due respect you can't take your experience with a 2nd degree suburn and apply it to a 2 year old. You should know how sensitive they are to such things. Heat exposure that wouldn't phaze you or I can do serious damage to the little ones. This woman was grossly negligent at best. Had the kids been older then I'd be more inclined to agree with you. I don't think she should go to jail, but she should be somehow reprimanded to know that this is intolerable. At what point does it stop being a mistake and start being neglect or endangerment of a 2 year old? I'm not for ripping families apart either...but I fear that this woman is going to do something REALLY stupid next time...and the children won't be so lucky.
First...I recognize that a burn on a child is worse...or at least I can understand that...but my point is that it is still a sunburn. What if she had spilled something on her kids...something far worse...a total accident...would we be trying to take her kids away because she was so "reckless" for having them in the kitchen while she was cooking?? or for having butterfingers?? And who gets to determine who is smart enough to keep their kids?? So what would you propose?? People do make mistakes, Ref...you can't take their kids away from them because they make mistakes, or we would all have our kids taken from us. They dont give you a manual when you leave the hospital with your baby to cover all the possibilities of life. She made a mistake. And I sure as hell don't want her locked up for it, leaving the kids without their mother. Some sort of counseling??? What??? My point is that it's outrageous that she's being charged the way she is (given the facts as I understand them from this article)...she's facing three counts of child endangerment that COULD put her away for 15 years. Come on!!!!
There's an awful lot of people in this thread speculating on how the mother never intended to put sun block on her kids in the first place. Or next time it will be much worse. Can we really infer all this from one article? We're getting all our info from the guy who arrested her saying she "pushed" her kids around a fairground all day. Has anyone here been around little kids? Adults don't push them around fairgrounds filled with candy, games and rides. The kids drag the adults all day long! I can't count how many times my parents would be bone tired from schlepping around an amusement park all day and I'd be BEGGING them to let me walk around longer. Did anyone see this woman's kids crying to be taken home? And Refman, are you SERIOUSLY advocating taking the kids away from their mother because of this? Is being placed in foster care preferrable to a sunburn? If that's the case I think the majority of people I know would have grown up in foster care (who hasn't been sunburned as a kid?). Don't you think mom might be able to be rehabilitated with some counseling and a trip to the sunscreen aisle at Eckerd? I don't know all the facts here, but, at this point, neither does anyone else. I'm shocked by the number of people who are willing to throw mom in the slammer based on one person's account of the situation.
While I believe that prosecuting this woman seems a little harsh, I do think something should be done to this woman. It's akin to letting your kids run around in the street.
Here's a follow-up from today's issue of the Steubenville newspaper: STEUBENVILLE — Charges were reduced Wednesday afternoon against a Brilliant-area mother in connection with her children receiving serious sunburns while at the Jefferson County Fair last week. Eve Hibbits, 31, of 162 New Alexandria Road, Brilliant, had been charged with three counts of felony child endangerment but the charges were reduced during a hearing Wednesday afternoon to one count of misdemeanor child endangering. County Sheriff Fred Abdalla said a deputy sheriff saw Hibbits pushing a stroller with her 10-month-old twin sons and 2-year-old daughter. The children were red from the sunburns and the deputy escorted the woman and children to a medical tent at the fair. Medical personnel then recommended the children be taken to the hospital for treatment. The initial report Abdalla said he received noted the children had suffered first- and second-degree burns and one child had a collapsed lung that a doctor said may have been caused by the child crying. County Prosecutor Bryan Felmet and Abdalla said they received a final medical report Wednesday morning that said the child was born premature with an underdeveloped lung. The medical report also stated the children didn’t suffer permanent serious physical injury from the sunburns, the prosecutor and sheriff said. Hibbits entered an innocent plea at the court hearing on Wednesday and was released on her own recognizance. She had spent eight days in the county jail. A trial date will be scheduled in Dillonvale county court. Her attorney, Shawn Blake, didn’t return repeated calls asking for a comment. Hibbits was facing prison sentences of one to five years on the felony charges. The misdemeanor charge carries a maximum of six months in jail. Abdalla said the children were released from the hospital after receiving treatment and were with the father. Hibbits returned home to the children on Wednesday but Abdalla said county children services would continue monitoring the situation. Abdalla said he didn’t have a problem with the felony charges being reduced to one misdemeanor count of child endangering. “I have no problem with that,” he said. “I felt she should have been charged with a misdemeanor. At the time, we were looking at second-degree burns and a collapsed lung.” Felmet said Hibbits was charged with the felonies based on the initial investigation. Felmet denied the national media attention to the case resulted in the charges being reduced. “This seems to be the summer of terrible things happening to children. I’m glad it didn’t happen here,” Felmet said. “The sheriff’s office and bystanders are encouraged to look out for one another and children. Children are so fragile that a minor thing could turn into a tragedy in the blink of an eye. That is what we had here, but fortunately it didn’t happen.”
Apparently the kids were VISIBLY sunburned already. So much so that it alerted the officer on the scene. At what point does it stop being a mistake and start being neglect? That's all I'm asking here. Also...what if this officer hadn't stopped her. How bad off would these small children be right now? At least a third degree sunburn if you accept the article. Gross overexposure to the sun can poison a susceptible person Max. Had that mother not been stopped the possibilities are scary. I don't know what the answer is...but patting her on the back and saying "our mistake, ma'am" isn't the answer. Nope. But I think that the authorities should order a home study be done. This is WAY unlike anything that anybody I have ever known experienced as a child. Sure I had sunburns...but never that bad. Never at 2 years old did I have a face red with sunburn and my mother just blissfully pushing the stroller with no knowledge of my condition. What she did was crazy. It damned well may be neglectful. I just wonder if she's neglectful in other, more meaningful ways.
Well if she intended to, what do you think happened? She just forgot? It never occurred to her the entire day, even after they were burnt to a crisp? When you were 10 months old? You must have been quite advanced. I don't think I've seen one poster in this thread say they wanted the mom in jail.
From the recent article: Medical personnel then recommended the children be taken to the hospital for treatment. Those who say "it was just a sunburn", and "I got sunburned all the time when I was a kid"...how many times did you need to go to the hospital for one?
And what state-of-the-art medical technology did the hospital have to use to treat those terrible sunburns? "Cold compresses" Thank God they had those chilled washcloths handy -- no telling what might have happened otherwise! I think the main reason they recommended the hospital was because of the suspected "collapsed lung" of the child. (Which turned out to be a birth defect and they would have known had they asked the mom before carting her off). Look, I would never advocate ignoring child abuse or neglect in any form. But this instance simply doesn't strike me as either. The mother (where was the father, by the way?) didn't put sunscreen on the kids before they went out. Is that smart? No. Should it be a jailable offense? I doubt it.
Bottom line is this....is not putting sunscreen on your child a punishable offense??? i don't think it is ref, you're talking about sun poisoning...at worst, these were 2nd degree burns...it's pretty damn easy to end up with 2nd degree burns, quite frankly.
Why do you keep trying to minimize what was done to these two infants and toddler? Not putting on sunscreen is one part of it. Leaving them out in the sun all day until they get severely burned is another part of it. The fact that they were 10 months and 2 years old is the other and most important component of this. What would you do to a woman who left her infant in a car while she went into a store, and found it dead when she came back (happens quite a bit)? Is that "just a mistake" too? Guess we can't take her kids away in that case at least. Not "at worst", they WERE 2nd degree burns, which coincidentally: "Involve both the epidermis and underlying dermis. In addition to redness, tenderness, and pain, significant blistering occurs. " Yeah, happens to me all the time! I hear it's real common with infants too!
It wasn't the Mom who looked at the kids and said "Oh my...I have to get little Johnny out of the sun." It was the cop. If left to her own devices, Mom would have kept on trucking. What would have happened then...I don't really care to think about it. That is a MUCH different thing. Leaving a kid in a parked car is just a different type of act that it's not comparable here. I'm not for throwing Mom in jail or necessarily taking the kids away. I come out somewhere in the middle here. I just fear that something really horrible will happen to these kids later.
1. I'm not trying to minimize anything, Freak. Simply don't think we can punish parents for mistakes all the time. As Ref pointed out, I think this is tons different from leaving a child in a parked car. It doesn't take long to die in a parked car... 2. No...at worst they were 2nd degree burns...from the most recent article it says they suffered first and second degree burns...that contemplates to me that not all of the children had second degree burns. Again...I've had second degree burns before...I had second degree burns before going to Galveston with my family as a kid....my parents were tremendous parents, but I still ended up with a sunburn. A sunburn with blisters, no less. When I was in high school, my feet were blistered from sun exposure at the beach. These kids were out all day at the fair...she didn't have them locked up in a dungeon...there's no indication that she's intentionally harming or starving these children...she took them to the freaking fair and they got sunburned. 3. I'm concerned with the overcriminalization of our society...commit a crime and put a stamp on it, and all of a sudden you're bumped up to a federal offense (mail fraud) for no justifiable reason...i'm very hesitant to bump omissions and errors into the criminal realm...if you want this woman to go through counseling or something, fine. She certainly needs to be taught the dangers of sun exposure. But here's betting sun exposure will never be a problem for these children again...I'm betting she's gotten the point by now.
