
Forgetting a Child in a Car Is a Horrifying Mistake. Is It a Crime? (2009) - Tomte
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/27/AR2009022701549_pf.html
======
u801e
Since 1998, the number of children who died of heatstroke in vehicles has been
around 30 to 50 a year [1]. Before that, the number was a bit lower (10 or
less) [1]. Around that time, the NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety
Administration) mandate on new vehicles having passenger side airbags as
standard equipment came into effect.

To address the issue of children dying due to airbag deployments (which were
designed to protect an unbelted 50th percentile size male in a frontal crash),
the NHTSA recommended that children in car seats be placed in the rear seats
in the vehicle.

Due to the fact that it's much easier to not notice a child in a rear facing
car seat in the rear of the car, as opposed to one in the front passenger
seat, the number of children who died of heat stroke each year increased from
10 per year to 40 per year.

[1]
[https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/624/media/images/76289000/gif/...](https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/624/media/images/76289000/gif/_76289574_airbags_heatstroke_deaths_624.gif)

~~~
dheera
We have keyless entry, lane departure warning, cruise control, and even
autopilot. Can't we have a stupidly simple system that if a human is detected
in the car and the temperature is over 37 degrees C:

\- 0. Call the car owner's phone or alert them through any communication app
they use

\- 1. After 5 minutes, call the police

Ether or both would save lives. It doesn't seem like a very difficult
technical task to me.

~~~
lend000
I wouldn't trivialize the reliable detection of people, especially small
children. I think we are just now getting at the point where that technology
could be reliable, and from an automaker's perspective, it could be a similar
level of investment as autopilot, and a much smaller benefit (more people
would be saved by reliable autopilot, and it's also much more desirable to
consumers). Even if they had such a technology, the automaker would certainly
be afraid of the legal consequences of their system failing a real scenario,
opening itself up for liability lawsuits and bureaucratic investigations.

~~~
cm2187
wouldn't a motion detector be enough? It doesn't really matter if it's a kid
or a dog.

~~~
gliese1337
No, it wouldn't. Not if the child is asleep. Some kids wiggle in their sleep
in a carseat, but there are plenty who sleep like a sack of flour.

------
rayiner
This is a great way to analyze the purposes of the criminal justice system.
Typically, there are three: punishment, deterrence, and rehabilitation.
Prosecuting someone who forgot their kid in the car can't have deterrent
effect--to the extent the event was avoidable, the possibility of prosecution
couldn't possibly match the deterrent effect created by the risk of harm to
the child. Likewise, there is no rehabilitative purpose. You think someone who
did that is likely to do it again? The only possible purpose is punishment,
which doesn't seem valid here either. In my view, the purpose of punishment is
to create and reinforce social norms. It makes people not do something not
because they fear the punishment, but because they feel shame for violating
the norm. Do we need to create such a norm for not endangering your kid?

~~~
mikeash
I disagree about deterrence. There are a lot of shitty parents out there who
fear prison more than they fear losing their child. There are even parents who
_want_ to kill their children. If it becomes common knowledge that you can get
away with murdering your kid as long as you use this technique... I don't
really want to think about that.

People are also really bad about evaluating potential consequences. A person
might not be able to imagine themselves killing their own child, so they might
ignore the possibility since they think it can't happen to them. They might be
able to imagine getting arrested and put in prison, though, and thus making it
a crime could make them think twice.

This seems to me like an obvious case of criminal negligence, which merits
punishment for all the same reasons that any such negligence would.

I would also say that it should be criminal merely to leave a child in a car
like this, even if the child survives. _That_ would go a long way to deterring
people who think they're somehow immune. If the child does die, you should
still prosecute the act of leaving them, even if you aren't necessarily
prosecuting the death. It would be crazy if the punishment were _lower_ if the
crime resulted in death.

~~~
mcguire
"There are _a lot_ of shitty parents out there who fear prison more than they
fear losing their child. There are even parents who want to kill their
children. If it becomes common knowledge that you can get away with murdering
your kid as long as you use this technique... I don't really want to think
about that."

I believe we're going to need a citation on that. What exactly does "a lot"
mean? 1% of the population of parents? 0.01%? (There are 810 such deaths in
the last 20-odd years in the kidsandcars.org database[1]. (Early P.S.: Check
out the "frontover" row for a trend.))

"Criminal Negligence" is something like, "The failure to use reasonable care
to avoid consequences that threaten or harm the safety of the public and that
are the foreseeable outcome of acting in a particular manner."[2] Where
_exactly_ is the failure to use reasonable care in these cases that doesn't
apply to essentially every parent?

[1]
[http://www.kidsandcars.org/media/statistics/](http://www.kidsandcars.org/media/statistics/)

[2] [http://legal-
dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Criminal+Negli...](http://legal-
dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Criminal+Negligence)

~~~
turc1656
Based on the definition you provided, it seems fairly obvious to me based on
how I interpret that definition. "acting in a particular manner" = leaving the
child in the car, that is the act. "foreseeable outcome" = death. "reasonable
care to avoid consequences" = anything that the parent could easily do which
would prevent the foreseeable outcome. There are a few things parents can do,
and could even combine them. And let's be honest, all are very, very simple. A
quick look where you actually lean back and physically see inside the car seat
to verify it's empty is enough. That literally takes 2 seconds and about as
minimal of an effort as I can think of and it's 100% accurate in prevention,
so long as you work it into your routine when exiting a vehicle. For example,
I have a system of making sure I never forget any important item that I
regularly carry with me anywhere (key, wallet, phone, etc.) The details aren't
important and could be considered specific to me, maybe. But it works 100% of
the time and I never forget to mentally check for it. I also have never
forgotten/lost any of the items I check for in about 12-15 years (since I
started using it). And make no mistake - I'm not doing this because I'm
naturally organized. I do because I an not. I'm scatterbrained and forget
things all the time. My system is designed to ensure that I don't forget
anything critically important like, oh I dunno, my kid in a car in the blazing
heat.

Same for the front/backovers. I've had my kid do both of these. The rule on my
side is simple. The car doesn't move if I don't have eyes on my child. If I
can't visually confirm my kid's location, I assume they are in one of these
spots and the car stays in park and then I mildly panic until I can locate
them again. Only then does the car move. How is any of this hard for people to
make into a habit?

This is entirely avoidable in every single case, but it requires creating
unbreakable habits for yourself.

~~~
coding123
Clone your self by 300 million and tell me you won't forget the keys over a
period of 20 years one time.

I'm not sure all 300 million us adults subscribe to your newsletter.

'forget things all the time' \- so you admit there is a chance 100 percent can
drop to 99.9999?

A friend of a friend had their child eat a battery that was left lying around
in the house, I'm pretty sure there are a million other potential killer
forgetful actions that parents face.

~~~
turc1656
Eating a battery is not a reasonably foreseeable event that would occur with a
high probability. It's something that can happen, sure. But doesn't happen
that often even when they are left around. So I don't think anyone should be
charged in that case. You can't protect against everything. But it's really
easy to protect against leaving your kid in the car. And since that carries an
extremely high probability of serious injury or death, people should be
mindful about it and try to do whatever they need to in order for it to never
happen. It boils down to risk and statistics. There are 100 ways your kid can
kill themselves in your house every day. They could stick something metallic
into an outlet and electrocute themselves or knock into something and a heavy
object falls on them. You can't know that any of those things will happen at
the moment they do, but you do know what is likely to happen if you forget
your child in the car on a hot day. The cause and effect are proximate and
immediate. That's why there should be culpability. It should be no different
than how we prosecute the most serious errors on the road such as drunk
driving that leads to a serious, possibly fatal accident or whether it's just
someone who wasn't paying attention or was very tired and accidentally hit
someone. We generally, but not always, charge those individuals. The
prosecutors look at the evidence and if a driver made a serious/negligent
mistake, they charge them. If the circumstances were one of happenstance and
not a clear fault, then charges are usually not levied. Same logic should
apply here.

Yeah I said I forget things all the time but the things I forget are NOT part
of the system I have in place. That's the point. The habits I have are to make
sure I don't forget the things I really care about or absolutely need. So no,
it will not be 99.9999% for those items - it will be 100%. In fact, my habits
have caught me forgetting the things on the list literally hundreds of times
over the past decade. It works and it always catches it.

------
nervousvarun
As others have said this is a problem that in 2017 should already be solved by
technology.

But in the event you don't have access to a technological solution try this:
If you have an infant in your car get in the habit of taking your shoes off
and putting them next to the baby when you drive. When you reach your
destination you might forget the infant...but you won't forget your shoes.

Edit: My dad (who was an absent-minded engineer way before I was) taught me
this trick.

Edit 2: Just called my dad to remind him about this and he said "it was only
one shoe...the one you don't use on the pedal". I've been doing it wrong all
this time :). So the correct way is...put your non-pedal shoe next to your
child. You'll remember it when you start walking :)

~~~
Inconel
That's definitely an interesting method. I'm always surprised that I don't see
more people relying on checklists in day to day tasks. I use checklists
religiously at work and have incorporated them into my daily life as well. I
have a number of friends who are constantly leaving things behind(cellphones,
wallets, house/car keys), I don't think I'm any less of a naturally forgetful
person than them, but because I use simple checklists I rarely forget things
compared to them, even when I'm exhausted or stressed out.

Whenever I babysit my two young nieces I now just add an extra step to my
checklists; don't forget kids in car.

~~~
function_seven
I have a bad habit of forgetting things at home when I leave in the morning. I
developed a habit: “Wallet, keys, badge, smokes, phone” I pat the pocket each
item should be in as I say it out loud.

Unfortunately, I now do this on auto-pilot. I pat the pocket, say the word,
leave the house... and realize I don’t have my badge on me when I arrive at
work.

I’m thinking about installing a card reader that locks me in the house if I
don’t have my badge :)

~~~
wolfgang42
I developed the habit of feeling each item instead of just patting the pocket.
That way, if the item is missing you won't be able to complete the action.

On the other hand, I've found that I now have the problem that if there's an
item that's _supposed_ to be missing (for example if I've lent my keys to
someone) I have a constant low-grade panic where I keep checking my pockets,
realizing there's something missing, reminding myself that it's supposed to
be, and then doing the whole thing over again a few minutes later.

~~~
mcguire
That's how I do the same thing, and I have the same problem.

------
peferron
I'm astonished to see many comments here on HN (albeit heavily downvoted)
saying that if you're a "good parent" then it's easy—just don't forget your
child in the car!

It's like saying that if you're a "good engineer" then it's easy not to drop
your production database instead of the development one—just don't ssh to the
wrong host!

I thought we were done with this way of thinking. Apparently not. Or maybe
people think that there's this "parent magic" that kicks in and somehow makes
you infallible whenever your kids are involved? This sounds so unbelievable
I'm not even sure where to start.

My wife and I have a kid on the way and you can be sure we'll have at least a
basic process in place to reduce the risk of this happening.

~~~
Inconel
I agree with what you're saying but I think your last sentence is an
important, and somewhat often overlooked, point. You've recognized that this
is a mistake than you aren't immune from making and are going to take steps to
lessen the risk of it occurring. I think often times this is the difference
between good parenting and not so good parenting. It isn't so much that good
parents don't make mistakes or forget things, but that they have a system in
place to catch these mistakes before they become incredibly serious. This
still won't eliminate all mistakes but it should certainly lessen the risk.

From a professional standpoint, while I'm not an engineer I am a technician
working in aerospace, I think the same general rules apply. I consider myself
pretty darn good at my job and yet I still constantly make mistakes. The trick
is to have processes in place that allow you, or someone else, to catch those
mistakes before they become irrecoverable. I'd much rather work with someone
who makes frequent mistakes but is able to embrace a process meant to identify
those mistakes than someone who makes much less frequent mistakes but refuses
to adhere to procedures meant to correct mistakes, often out of a sense of
arrogance or ego.

~~~
rlpb
> good parents...have a system in place to catch these mistakes before they
> become incredibly serious.

I don't think it's possible to come up with all possible bad things that could
happen and have a process in place before they happen. Some level of
reactivity is necessary. In some cases, one mistake is too much. Not having
foreseen that one mistake doesn't make someone a bad parent, because it's
human to make mistakes.

------
lph
Reading this article was heartbreaking. Becoming a parent changes you, or at
least it changed me. I can no longer imagine harm to a child---as conjured in
a written article, on a television show, or in a discussion---in an abstract
way as I once could. It is now intensely emotional, as if it were happening to
my own child in front of my eyes.

This being HackerNews, I'm sure we're all thinking about fancy technological
solutions to this problem. But there's a low-tech solution. I'm going to go
out into my car right now and train myself to always visually scan the back
seats before I leave the vehicle. If you do something enough, it becomes
ingrained. I don't think about putting on my seat belt anymore; it just
magically happens.

The memory expert interviewed in the article explains that this problem
happens when the "low level" basal ganglia has the brain on autopilot,
compensating for higher-level functionality that's compromised by stress,
emotion, and distraction.

So teach the basal ganglia how to look in the back seat before stepping out of
the car. Every time.

~~~
mmorearty
I really like your idea, lph. Reminds me of "Why Japan's Rail Workers Point at
Things"
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14011793](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14011793)

My children are teens now, but I agree 100% that having children changed me in
the same way that it changed you.

~~~
lph
I loved that that article about Japan's rail workers. I'm a huge fan of this
stuff. Pre-flight checklists, rock-climbing belay call-and-response, operating
room instrument counts (to make sure nothing was left in the patient!), etc.
Protocols based on the premise that even experts are fallible, and that even
easy things can go sideways.

------
cperciva
Articles like this make me very glad the the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in
1985 that it is unconstitutional to imprison someone for an "absolute
liability" offense. Put another way, while someone can be thrown in jail over
a mistake if they were _reckless_ , there must be a "due diligence" defense
available.

Absent extreme circumstances, it would be very hard for a case like this to
come to trial in Canada.

~~~
avip
Not sure what you are referring to, but leaving unattended children in cars is
quite strictly illegal in Canada.

~~~
crooked-v
Is it illegal to _accidentally_ leave an unattended child in a car? The entire
point of the article is accidental, not intentional, incidents.

~~~
celticninja
And we can tell the difference how?

~~~
ukd1
mens rea vs actus reus

~~~
celticninja
Which means sometimes a prosecution is required.

------
mywacaday
There was a case of this happening in Ireland this summer. Happened on the
hottest day of the year, fathers first day dropping child at creche, took a
call in the car, worked in a quiet part of a industrial estate. Dozens of
minor items aligned to cause the death. It was discussed heavily in the office
and among friends. At least 30% of people had forgotten to drop a child at
creche and noticed the child close to or at work.

I don't think I could judge anyone harshly, all it takes is the odds to go
against you once.

~~~
Macha
To add to the tragedy, this resulted in death threats to the father and his
eventual suicide. I don't think it would have been prosecuted here but now we
won't know.

------
mcguire
" _The human brain, [David Diamond] says, is a magnificent but jury-rigged
device in which newer and more sophisticated structures sit atop a junk heap
of prototype brains still used by lower species. At the top of the device are
the smartest and most nimble parts: the prefrontal cortex, which thinks and
analyzes, and the hippocampus, which makes and holds on to our immediate
memories. At the bottom is the basal ganglia, nearly identical to the brains
of lizards, controlling voluntary but barely conscious actions._ "

That is a pretty decent description of the lump of goo in the human skull.
Weird that many people attribute very impressive superpowers to it.

------
mcphage
The possibility of doing this terrifies me more than almost anything—by nature
I'm a forgetful person. "Out of sight, out of mind" describes me down to a T.

~~~
pmoriarty
I don't have children, but my concern for children makes me not want to be in
any position of responsibility for them.

I've considered becoming a teacher before, and one of the reasons that I
didn't was that I just didn't want to be responsibility for the welfare of
children. If something ever happened while they were under my care, I'd feel
horrible if something happened, even if it wasn't my fault. Not to mention the
liability in the eyes of parents, who can be less than reasonable when it
comes to their children.

I've also refused to take care of children of friends and family, for similar
reasons.

Finally, I've decided not to ever have children of my own, once again partly
because I just don't want the responsibility, and partially out of a concern
that I'd probably just screw it up somehow. Not to mention that the world is
way overpopulated as it is, and it doesn't need me adding yet another person
to the mix.

~~~
rayiner
And yet 40% of kids in the US are born to parents who are irresponsible enough
that they didn't intend to get pregnant. By and large they survive. Kids are
sturdier than they look and designed to alert you to their survival needs. For
example, you can forget to feed a dog, but it's almost impossible to forget to
feed a kid.

~~~
celticninja
Yes kids survive these situations but sometimes the result is they become
shitty humans. Just keeping a kid alive is not parenting.

~~~
rayiner
I doubt there is much correlation between whether your parents are
careless/careful and whether you are a shitty human.

~~~
celticninja
Really? You know that abused children are much more likely to become abusers
when they are older right?
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11731348](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11731348)

Not only is there correlation but there is causation. And it applies not only
to sexual abuse but to physical and emotional/mental abuse too.

So yes, having shitty parents is more likely to result in children turning
into shitty adults. It's not a foregone conclusion but the odds are not in the
child's favour.

~~~
rayiner
But we're not talking about parents who are abusers, we're talking about
parents who aren't that responsible.

~~~
celticninja
I was responding to your point that "by and large they survive". I agree they
survive but how they turn out is related to how they are brought up and so I
dont think that we should be setting the bar as low as "they survive".

~~~
rayiner
I don't see what you're trying to get at. Are you saying that people who get
accidentally pregnant are more likely to be child abusers? My post was in
response to someone who was worried he was too forgetful, etc, to take care of
a kid. The fact that some people are "too child abuser" to raise a kid is a
red herring.

------
simplydt
To all the people posting here who are thinking this certainly couldn't happen
to them, please, read up on some psychology and neuroscience; you are just
like all the people who thought only the Germans could have done what they did
in WW2, until Milgram and co proved the world wrong (it could have been any of
us). TLDR lesson here? Our brains are not built for multitasking. Safeguard
yourself from human error, don't multitask! Laser focus is your friend.

------
csours
General Motors has a rear seat alert available on some models - basically, if
you open the rear door at the start of a trip, the car reminds you to retrieve
whatever you put in the back seat.

[http://abcnews.go.com/US/technologies-designed-prevent-
hot-c...](http://abcnews.go.com/US/technologies-designed-prevent-hot-car-
deaths-work/story?id=47991074)

Disclaimer: I work for GM, but not on this tech.

------
thedevil
It actually is a misdemeanor in my state to leave a child unattended in a car
if it's in public and there's risk of "hyperthermia, hypothermia, or
dehydration."

I looked it up after a stranger hung out at my car to nag me for leaving my
son (who refused to leave the car) for five minutes in a locked car in a safe
neighborhood in 75f weather.

~~~
tarboreus
75 F is not safe. Neither is 65 F. I'm not saying you did something wrong, but
what your neighbor did was certainly right

~~~
seanmcdirmid
It might not have been right, but it wasn't illegal either (in that state,
sure it would be illegal in California).

All of you would probably flip out in Denmark, where kids are left sleeping
outside the cafe wrapped up in bassinets while their moms drink coffee.
Supposedly the cold outdoor air helps them sleep more soundly.

~~~
Symbiote
In England, my parents regularly left me in the car while they rushed into a
shop.

Of course, being England in the 1990s the car didn't have air conditioning, so
some windows would have been ajar. They were manual windows, so I could open
them more if I wanted to.

------
ZeroGravitas
I read somewhere that Tesla had an innovation to prevent this, but then
couldn't Google it later. Did I dream that it can anyone else remember what I
half-recall?

~~~
icebraining
Rather than a car feature, what about one of those sensors that alert you if
the object is too far? And force the user to explicitly acknowledge that it's
intentional (for when you leave them with someone else).

~~~
crooked-v
How do you reduce false reports (e.g. dropped connections) enough that people
won't shut it off in annoyance, though? For a technological solution to really
work for the "break in routine makes someone forget a baby in the car" case,
it has to be something that can be left in place forever once activated.

~~~
icebraining
Good question. I wouldn't warn on a single broken connection, only after a
couple of minutes without a signal, but I suppose even that could be annoying
(e.g. kid sleeping on the next room).

------
rodgerd
I read this when it was first published. The descriptions of what happened
when children died of heat exhaustion gave me nightmares for weeks.

~~~
codinghorror
That one guy who silenced his car alarm three times. I think about that guy a
lot.

------
falsedan
I guess the population, climate, and car culture contribute to how frequently
these sad events occur in the USA. Do they happen as frequently in other
countries?

I think Australia matches at least the climate & car culture of the southern
states, but a quick search shows me lots of events where parents deliberately
leave kids in cars while they run fast errands, & the statistics on how many
car windows get broken to retrieve kids left in cars is much easier to find
than then number of children who have died from being accidentally left in a
hot car.

------
Spooky23
It can be, and prosecutors use their discretion to charge appropriately when
necessary.

------
jlebrech
punishment isn't going to work, losing a child is the worst punishment they
could get and yet people still forget their kids.

It could deter leaving the kid in the car for a few minutes, and might also
serve as an inconvenience.

------
turc1656
As for the major question the articles raises, I think it's somewhat
straightforward. There are a number of different legal types of negligence
(criminal, gross, culpable, etc). I'm not a lawyer, but I believe these people
should be charged with some type of negligence-related crime. Whether it's
manslaughter or something else, I cannot say because I don't know enough. But
to me, it's clear - these parents had a responsibility and they failed in a
major way. Sure, it may have be unintentional, but it still happened. Drunk
drivers don't intend to kill people. But I don't hear anyone coming to their
defense. Everyone seems perfectly fine demonizing them and holding them to
account for their negligent actions. Why should it be any different here?
Hell, I might go so far as to argue it is worse here because statistically the
odds are not all that likely that any one particular instance of drunk driving
results in an accident or death. The odds are just increased. However, the
odds are insanely high that if a parent makes this error that their child will
die in each/any instance.

I do understand the desire to not prosecute because people feel they are
already suffering and that it was not intentional and that these people aren't
likely to ever make this mistake again. I get it. But like I said, it's an
issue of a mistake so horrendously bad that someone died. They need to be
charged. Let a jury decide on a case by case basis whether or not a person
needs to be jailed for their actions. Also, let's consider the other side of
this. What if by charging and jailing these individuals it actually helps them
in the long run emotionally? What if these people feel that they are serving
their time and paying their debt to society? What if that helps them feel like
they can move on because society has deemed their punishment now satisfactory
and complete? And wouldn't it make them less of a pariah in society because
people would know they served their time and didn't just get off without
punishment?

Lastly - I want to talk about that idiot juror Colin Rosse who said, "It may
have been negligence, but it was an honest mistake." I'd really love to see if
that sentiment held up if, for example, Colin Rosse's child was put in jail
and was forgotten for 5 days and received no food or water (like what happened
with Daniel Chong in 2012). I'm sure Rosse would be ok with everything because
it was an honest error, right? And what if someone was daydreaming or just
very tired while driving and ran their kid over and killed them? Rosse sees no
issue with this, right? As long as there was no intent all is well, yeah? I'm
sure that fool would be the first one on the news demanding legal action and
that the person/people be held accountable.

------
jostmey
s

~~~
manyxcxi
I generally agree with the idea of not criminalizing an honest mistake. I
change my tune when it comes to mistakes that show a lack of fitness for the
general task/required skills. In some cases I think a civil action like a fine
or some type of legal mark that can identify serial 'mistake' makers.

If you 'forget' to wear your motorcycle helmet 7 times maybe you just don't
get to operate a motorcycle anymore. Or if you 'forget' to wear your seat belt
enough times the fines escalate and require mandatory safety classes.
Especially in the case where the harm is generally only to the mistake maker,
I think these are reasonable.

Where I completely change my tune is when the lives of other are in your care,
including animals. If you forget to feed your pet or children to the point of
harm, you're clearly not a suitable caretaker. If you cannot seek timely
medical attention and your child dies, you should be held accountable. If you
leave your child in the car and they die, you should absolutely be held
accountable.

I've got three kids under five, I cannot imagine a world where I forget that
they're there (partially because they make a ton of noise). I think there's an
infinitesimally small percentage of people who actually forget, I think the
likelihood is that: a) they thought it would be ok, but oops, and b) they just
don't care- maybe even want the worst to happen. This goes back to my point of
showing signs that you are unsuitable to care for others.

I want to draw a clear distinction, I'm not one of those people that believe
children need to be bubble wrapped and monitored 24/7\. I don't think people
should be admonished if there's a couple of kids in the car and they ran in to
the 7-11 and grabbed a (whatever) quickly while the kids were in plain view
the whole time. I think kids that show the ability to go to the neighborhood
park by themselves should be able to. I think we've taken a lot of the
learning you get from free-roaming and seriously stunted our kids growth and
resilience.

The distinction is, the kids don't get a say in their treatment or care. If
you're ability to care for them is so diminished that they are harmed by a
neglectful act, you should be punished harshly, if it's found that a
reasonable person would have acted differently.

I'm willing to give that in all these negligent care cases we should look at
the totality of the circumstances and make judgements based on that, as none
of this can be black and white.

For example, say mom had a slip and fall a couple weeks ago and got a
concussion. No one realized it, and she's got memory issues. She forgets the
kiddo, and the kiddo dies. Now it's going to be a long, twisted, painful road,
but I would think the right outcome is that the mother isn't punished anymore
than she already will be for the rest of her life. The hard part would be
getting that concussion post-diagnosed and recognized as an extenuating
circumstance.

I'm still okay with negligent care cases defaulting to a presumption of guilt,
because you HAVE to fuck up to get in to this position, now we just need to
see if it was a reasonable mistake or not. A reasonable person does not forget
their child(ren) in the car.

~~~
icebraining
_I 've got three kids under five, I cannot imagine a world where I forget that
they're there_

Which is the whole problem. Our imagination and perception is flawed and
limited. The idea that you can rely on it to accuse others of terrible crimes
shows an unwarranted confidence in it.

People who actually studied memory are telling you (in the article): yes, it
can happen to everyone, and you don't need any concussion.

Yet, you have an unshaken faith in memory, based on nothing but the fact that
it never happened to you.

It's quite scary, actually.

------
celticninja
Yes, someone who can think like this is probably going g to be a better parent
than say these two [0] who probably never intended to get pregnant and likely
have never considered the well being of their child and are hoping that
welfare payments will keep them in weed and cigarettes.

[0][https://i.redd.it/3r7vn6uyemcz.jpg](https://i.redd.it/3r7vn6uyemcz.jpg)

~~~
icebraining
Do you know something about "those two", or are you just judging from
appearances?

~~~
celticninja
Well she is heavily pregnant and is holding a pack of cigarettes in her hand,
so even if you ignore everything else in the picture, I can judge a
prospective parent on that alone. If you cannot stop smoking for the 9 months
that you are carrying a child inside you then you are already failing a child
that has not even been born yet.

~~~
icebraining
I've often carried packs of cigarettes, yet I never smoked in my life.

~~~
celticninja
Do you have a photo of you with a pack of cigarettes that you could access
now? Probably not because if you dont smoke you probably dont carry them often
enough to be photographed doing so.

Also the guy has an iron cross tattoo on the colours of the Confederate flag
and an SS tattoo right next to it. Sometimes you should judge people by how
they present themselves because that is how they want you to see them.

If these two turned up at my house for a babysitting gig I would judge them as
unsuitable to be around my children, so in this instance my point remains,
shitty parents usually end up rasing shitty kids that turn into shitty adults
and yes in this situation you can tell when you look at them that their child
is probably not going to be a net benefit to society.

~~~
icebraining
_Do you have a photo of you with a pack of cigarettes that you could access
now? Probably not because if you dont smoke you probably dont carry them often
enough to be photographed doing so._

Clear survivorship bias. If she didn't have a pack, you probably wouldn't even
have known about the picture. So the number of people who carry without
getting photographed is irrelevant.

~~~
celticninja
I'm not sure that is true re: me not knowing about the picture, the cigarettes
are hardly the main point of this picture, perhaps a minor bullet point at
best.

------
partycoder
Leaving a child in a car is similar to allow children to drown in a swimming
pool. They're seen differently but they are very similar in terms of
negligence and consequences.

In my opinion people doing this should be charged with child endangerment.

~~~
cokeeffekt
No this is different, not watching your kids in the swimming pool is a choice,
you opened the gate to let them in and chose not to watch them.

------
loomer
Knowing how small children these days already have phones, why don't they just
call their parents and tell them they've been left in the car?

Jokes aside, I think the punishment should depend on if the parent had a
history of neglecting their child, child abuse and other specifics.

Under any case, even if the parent was otherwise very loving and caring, at
the very least they should do community service.

If they had a history of neglect, more serious punishments should be
considered.

------
0xbear
Of course it is. It's involuntary manslaughter (that's if you actually did
forget, and didn't do it on purpose like some of those people). Punishable by
up to 8 years in prison. Don't want to go to prison? Easy: don't leave your
toddler alone in a locked car.

~~~
icebraining
That's exactly what this article shows: it's _not_ easy. It only deceptively
seems so.

~~~
0xbear
I'm a parent, I don't need to read an article to be able to tell you it is
easy. If you are with a kid, just take her with you or if you can't do so,
don't bring your kid along. Billions of people manage just fine.

~~~
icebraining
Please read the article. It's _not_ about people who leave the kid in the car
purposefully while they go do something else.

It's about people who bring the kid in the car to drop them off somewhere, and
they simply forget. Yes, it happens. Yes, to regular people.

And yes, billions of people manage to do even this just fine. But it's a
reasoning flaw - a well-known human bias - to assume that the people to whom
it happens must be different somehow.

~~~
0xbear
Yes, I've read it. Just because you didn't mean to do it doesn't mean it's not
a crime. That's why it's called manslaughter and not murder, and that's why it
carries a lower penalty.

~~~
icebraining
I don't dispute that it's a crime. The law - and its agents, like Mr. Morrogh
- are often wicked enough for that. I disputed the claim that it's easy.

------
musgrove
Here's the pivotal and incorrect question asked: "What kind of person forgets
a baby?" And the author proceeds to reassure us it certainly just could be
anyone, as asked. The real question is "What kind of parent forgets a baby?"
Answer: A shitty one.

~~~
tarboreus
Ignorant, uncharitable, and internally inconsistent. I wonder...if a comment
is downvoted enough times, does the text become completely white?

