Parents are charged after their son, 7, is struck dead by a driver
The grieving parents of a 7-year-old child who died hours after being hit by a car were charged with involuntary manslaughter after allowing him and his brother, 10, to walk home unaccompanied by an adult from a nearby grocery store.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/parents-are-charged-son-7-struck-dead-car-accident-rcna210918Open linkView original on lemmy.world644
Comments182
At seven I went to school and back home on foot and alone, about a mile, everyday. I did once have a close call with a car that didn't stop for a crosswalk.
Are parents supposed to accompany their kids at all time until they are 18?
According to 'murica, until 16. Then they can drive their own car.
Seriously though?
No, they're joking. There's no federal law governing it afaik- only state laws that vary wildly. Child development experts mostly agree that under 8yo is too young to be unaccompanied
Edit: NC doesn't have a minimum, and the 7yo was with a 10yo, so it sounds like they have pretty much no case
The article says they were with an adult who was from the grocery store ... So they were with an adult... Just not the parents... Unless I'm reading it wrong... I don't even see anyone else mentioning this
They left their mom at home, and were walking two blocks up the street to meet up with their dad, who was grocery shopping. The dad was on the phone with the older kid at the time, keeping tabs on them while letting them gain confidence going on their own.
As a parent who struggles not to helicopter my kids, none of this sounds out of line to me. The driver who apparently couldn't react to a kid stepping out unexpectedly, in what sounds like a residential area? I want to know why he's got a license.
Kind of residential. It was a 4 lane road they were crossing.
We have many places where phone distracted drivers have made it too dangerous for any aged person to walk or ride a bike.
But it’s hyperbole. Kids in cities can get around alone just fine. And my 7 y/o goes to friends houses across a street and the through backyards. We have no sidewalks and fast cars though. So he is extra careful crossing. To the point that he’s basically a crossing guard when we walk together.
It sucks though because there’s nowhere to safely learn to ride a bike that isn’t driving distance from our house.
It it really hyperbole though? Kids in the city are generally murdered by cars more than anything else. And if you have to cut through backyards to avoid death, that's not really an optimal situation there. Personally I don't care about trespassing at all, but people could literally shoot kids for this in shithole USA.
https://mccunewright.com/blog/2017/03/traffic-collisions-leading-cause-of-death-for-children-in-los-angeles/
No but North Carolina cops will arrest a black parent to avoid having to arrest a white driver.
Yeah 2 miles here. It's still the rule, school bus service available if you are more than 2 miles away from school OR would have to cross a dangerous road.
And no, obviously we are supposed to be precognitive and able to tell if something will happen.
That said - I would let my kids walk to the shop themselves only if there was no big road to cross. Drivers here will run kids right over. Everyone knows someone with a family member killed by a car.
Killed by a driver.
Yeah when I was seven my sister and I would travel laying in the backseat of the car, no seatbelts, with four adults in a car legally limited to five occupants, and they would smoke inside (rolled down the windows at least). I'm alive, and so is my sister. That doesn't mean it was alright and we should keep on doing it.
Parents are supposed to teach their kids to navigate the world and be sure they've learned before letting them loose into traffic, which these people didn't do. Also unloading the responsibility on the older sibling(s) is something that have to stop, a ten years old shouldn't have to carry that burden, imagine the guilt and trauma of that poor child.
Yeah sure, blame the victims of horrible infrastructure. I walked myself to kindergarden, when I was around 4 or 5 years old, when I was 7, I would walk home from school.
There wasn't some busy four-lane-road on my way in my rural town. Four fucking lanes? What the hell?
Living in a city, I wasn't allowed to cross roads by myself when I was seven (some thirty years ago) much less four lane ones. The horrible American infrastructure make it even worse for the parents to let their kids go alone. Was the mother not aware of that road being there?
Better question: Was the old fart not aware there were children under his murder vehicle?
He's cooperating with the cops apparently, but it sounds like it was a bystander who was checking on the other kid until their parents could get there.
Experts pretty much all agree that kids need some level of autonomy and freedom to grow up healthy. The exact level is under constant debate, and at what age things are appropriate is under constant debate. With freedom and autonomy though will come accidents. It's an unavoidable consequence. There's no way to be absolutely certain that a particular kid won't make a terrible lapse in judgement, no matter how much you've drilled something into them. Hell, even adults make those kinds of mistakes all the time.
Put another way, I could keep my kids very safe by keeping them in the house, tethered to an iPad all the time, unable to leave my earshot, like so many parents seem to do now. They'd be super safe. And they'd grow into the kind of inept, stunted kids that people are constantly complaining about.
According to the cops. jfc.
That's ... beyond callous and (hopefully) has no legal standing, even in the USA.
Let's fix it:
So the city, as a group of adults, failed also to ensure a safe environment, should also be arrested.
My thoughts exactly. A "safe environment" really means, "don't raise your kids in these shit hole, car-centric cities and towns all over America".
They gotta blame the people who designed the city. If these kids were a small fraction of the same age and in Japan they would be on TV for braving their first solo trip into the market to buy a vegetable for dinner. It would be a cute TV show called "Old Enough" on Netflix with English subtitles instead of a cruel reality on this side of the same planet where a kid is now dead.
That part of it isn't the fault of the parents, but the fault of the society we have created.
Btw that TV show is a few decades old but my point is that the world is possible. We don't need to be like Japan was in that TV show, but we do need more walkable cities.
Imagine your kid dies, your other kid being traumatized by watching his brother die, and then being charged with involuntary manslaughter.
I have three kids and this is my nightmare.
I came here to mention Old Enough. So sad that my American kid can never have this kind of experience because of how fucked our cities and society are.
A while back I watched a video about jaywalking. The idea was that, before cars were very common, people would just walk around the street and cars had to go around them. As cars became more common, car owners wanted to get rid of the people on the street, so they invented the term and offense jaywalking. Take something that poor people do (like walking instead of driving) and turn it into an offense.
This is basically the same thing. Make the parents responsible for what was a driver's fault on a road that shouldn't have been built the way it was in what must be a residential area - given that the kids just crossed the street from house to store. You have to turn the victim into the perpetrator, because looking at facts makes the wrong people look guilty.
My understanding is it was car lobbyists and PR folks trying to blame pedestrians for fatal car versus pedestrian crashes that invented, spread, and legislated "jay walking."
"Jay" was slang for hobo/tramp/loser.
He hit a pedestrian. If you cannot react to a pedestrian entering the road unexpectedly, especially at a crosswalk, you are, by definition, driving recklessly.
The article says they attempted to cross between the crosswalks. A witness said the younger child jumped into the street. There's only so much reaction even the most alert driver can do.
Then the speed needs to be reduced.
Fair point, it was indeed between crosswalks. But from the sound of it, the kids had been waiting to cross, and the younger kid jumped out on his own.
The older kid saw the danger, meaning the car should have been able to see at least one kid too. I maintain that if you can't react safely to kids you can see jumping unexpectedly off the curb as you drive by, you have no business driving.
Without seeing the incident, it's hard to say whether the driver should have reasonably been able to stop in time. Given what we know, it's entirely possible that he could not.
The only way I can see the driver not being at fault is if he 1) could not see the kids near the road, and 2) had no reason to expect people might be in blind spots near the road.
Given that there were houses less than 2 blocks from the site of the incident, 2 seems unlikely - this sounds like either a suburban or urban neighborhood (multiple crosswalks within 2 blocks for a 4 lane road). No mention was made of any obstructions, which is not evidence in itself; but it's the rare four lane road that hasn't had obstructions cleared from the sides of the road (partly for this reason!), particularly in a non-rural area. At a glance, Gastonia seems to generally keep their roads clear.
I can certainly be convinced otherwise with more evidence, but the burden of vehicle safety absolutely lies on the driver. If you can't respond fast enough to a seven year old running out in front of you from a place you can't see; you are, by definition, driving too fast - regardless of the posted speed limit. And if you can see them, and aren't driving in such a way as to be able to keep them safe should they run in front of you, you're driving recklessly.
yeah i hate it when those damn kids jump in front of my vroomie it slows me down and i have to clean the blood
Reasons why this community exists.
You see unaccompanied children, you take your foot off the gas and hover over the brake pedal.
How about parents hold hand of children? Maybe don't have kids at all if letting free and roaming around.
In civilized countries it's perfectly normal and safe to let your children walk to the fucking supermarket and back on their own. How indoctrinated with dystopian habits do you have to be to not realize there's something deeply wrong here?
When you're operating heavy machinery (like a car) it's your job to ensure you're not a danger to your surroundings. If you can't do that you're not fit to drive.
Physics says it does not care of civilized countries. U can't stop a truck like tundra on a dime. Physics. And even with auto braking these day, no way.
A few things: 1) the speed limit is 45, 2) I went to the street on google maps, you could not hope for better visibility, 3) the driver was 76 years old.
No fucking shot you're sitting here trying to say that, with great visibility and a speed limit of 45, this old fuck isn't responsible for killing Legend. No, actually please confirm this, I've been feeling pent up and going off on a chud would really make me feel better.
Outside of listing out all things, u did not mention why the parents were not hold on to their kids specially in US. Why?
Also ask the question why a 76 years old is allowed to drive? May be no good public transportation system? Oh no now we let senile folks drive. And also how easy is it to get license here in US, my cat might legally drive
Um, wut?
Civilized countries don't have trucks going through areas where people live. In North America there are far too many "stroads".
What you're advocating for is actually detrimental to kids development. Kids need increasing levels of independence in order to learn how to interact with the world and ultimately become better adjusted adults
It doesn’t matter where I’m from, you are supposed to be able to stop
45mph speed limit. No way u will stop in a dime.
Probably too high of a limit then
Double lane. Normal everywhere. We will be seeing stories like this everyday.
Also trucks these days are big. You can't even see people 5 ft in front of the full size truck And I have a tundra. It's massive
Only normal in America
Sounds like trucks shouldn't be so big and should prioritize visibility then
If I'm driving in an area where pedestrians can be present and my view of a walkway is obstructed, I slow down. A speed limit isn't an obligation nor is it a right to travel at speeds that have the potential to be unsafe. I treat every blind spot as if there's something behind it ready to jump out at a moment's notice and I adjust my speed to anticipate it. I do that because I believe operating within legally defined parameters doesn't exempt me from the responsibility of my actions causing harm to another person.
We as a society are far too lenient toward drivers who take for granted the fact that they're in control of high-velocity heavy-machinery that can and do kill people on a daily basis. Traffic deaths aren't an inevitability, in most cases they're caused by overconfidence.
Yep. U got this right. People here are just dumb. Kid jumps in from of the car that is going 45mph. Parents should be holding hand and not letting kids just do what the kids want to do.
Is there dash cam? We are all just doing guess work at the moment.
Oh, so you think we shouldnt have designated places and tools for murdering children?
Why do you hate america and freedom?
That would mean every driver on the highway is driving recklessly.
"yes! Now you see how carbrained society is"
counterpoint: society is to blame, not individual drivers.
Nah, highways tend have lots of visibility around them, you can see a person a long ways off. Though, if you do see a kid on the side (and don't intend to stop), you should absolutely be slowing down and giving them a wide berth!
Highway are especially designed so that people can speed omg. It's what controlled-access mean. Don't play dumb
No, that's my point. Highways are designed for speed. Stroads are designed badly. The stroad is to blame, not the driver using the stroad in the way that the stroad engineers intended. Blaming the individual driver is just the liberal version of carbrainedness.
"Highway" does not mean controlled access; you're thinking of "freeway" or "Interstate."
TBF, the child ran onto the road (a typical US road that encourages drivers to drive fast and be oblivious of pedestrians, I guess), and - according to the police - the driver was neither speeding nor under the influence and is "cooperative".
But to charge the parents with involuntary manslaughter for letting their children walk 2 blocks is madness, and makes me question the police department's objectivity, to put it mildly.
My guess is at the very least the driver's reaction and/or eyesight was impaired due to old age.
You see children next to the road, you slow down. You are the adult operating the deadly machine. You have a duty to be extra careful around kids.
Where I live, if a kid jumps in front of your car, even if there is no crossing and you had no visibility, you still have the majority of the fault. The truth is you are the one driving a killing machine, and if you are going at a speed where you can't ensure, with your currect visibility and road conditions, that an accident won't happen, it's you who is at fault.
Of course that's different on highways and speedways, where the one crossing would be found at fault. But for all residential areas, drivers need to be careful about pedestrians crossing the road, and especially kids who are unpredictable.
So much this!
Also the prosecutor's office, who charges people with crimes.
You gotta be a child to believe the police.
Ofc cops lie about everything.
On top of what everyone else has said, my stance in general is that anyone who harms another with their car should have their license revoked for at least 5 years if they were at all at fault, which this man certainly was being the driver hitting a pedestrian. On top of that, he's at the age where he should probably stop driving anyway. While I don't exactly believe this warrants jail time, especially if the driver has been as cooperative as they are saying, I do think he needs to be charged with something just to get him off the road for the foreseeable future. Outside of that though I do agree with you.
The driver is always at fault. They're choosing to use a deadly machine in public. It's their responsibility not to kill people.
That clause was intended specifically for vehicle on vehicle incidents, I agree that if a vehicle hits a pedestrian they are always at fault.
This doesn't serve justice, in any way.
Why were the children trying to walk between crosswalks? I'd bet because the only crosswalks anywhere in the area are at stoplights and way too far apart. A painted cross wall at minimum, or a HAWK light that stops vehicle traffic should have been there. But those are too expensive until multiple people are killed by traffic, it takes a lot of blood to get human-cebtric infrastructure installed in this country.
The crosswalk directly leading to the middle school near me was known by the school and the neighborhood to be dangerous due to traffic speed, and the community had been fighting for a HAWK light to be installed by the county for nearly a decade. They even widened and replaced the road during that time and still refused to install it (although they did install the underground conduit necessary when doing the roadwork). It took 4 children total being killed by vehicles outside of school hours before they finally agreed to install a HAWK light there.
Charging the parents doesn't do any public good. I doubt they're going to find a full jury that could convict unless there's some underlying information about the parents trying to kill the kids or some shit like that. I can't imagine a jury of 12 would unanimously convict.l based on the info provided.
Pedestrian crossings are potentially miles apart, but it’s illegal not to use them? Makes sense…
Laws that are almost impossible to follow are great for keeping prisons full
You're assuming they'll get a trial and won't simply be held in jail until they accept a plea deal.
Edit: for those unaware of Yankee justice 90-95% of all criminal cases are resolved via plea deals
What??? In Switzerland we walked to school by ourselves at age of 4.
Same here in Germany. Imagine getting killed right around the corner.
And then the parents getting blamed instead of driver??
Victim blaming is basically the rule here.
They've written vague laws about leaving children unaccompanied unreasonably. If you leave your 13 year old alone for a week then that's child abuse probably. So this is the outcome of those laws.
I did in America too.
Sounds like evil inception, first the nightmare of losing your child and then the nightmare of possibly losing your job and house etc. I hope they at least don't have to go through the nightmare of prison (which they would likely have to go through alone, since there is no couples-prison). Evil evil evil
Ends with career in plumbing
Fucking insane. Ancient driver must be good, we must blame someone. How about the folks? They seem to be having a good run!
During my driving lessons in Germany i learned that you always have to slow down around kids. Kids are unpredictable. Kids do not pay attention all the time. Kids struggle with estimating distances and speeds of cars coming your way.
Unless the case is something like "Kids jumped from a bridge right in front of your car." There is no way that the driver couldn't have done something to prevent the accident or at least form it being a fatal accident.
Indeed. Even so much as, if you have small kids neighbours, check under the car before moving it.
If you read the story it sounds like the 7 year old just walked out into the street. So he literally could have walked right in front of the guy. The dad was on the phone with the older son which might have ment he wasn't paying attention to the younger brother b
Give me an effing break.
If the driver wasn't able to respond in time to a pedestrian entering the street, particularly at a crosswalk, he was driving recklessly.
(Edit) Not a crosswalk, between two crosswalks. I maintain that inability to react to pedestrians safely in an area at least near housing constitutes reckless driving.
Fair, on a re-read, 7 and 10 are way too young to be left alone.
I certainly did not absorb it all.
They were going from their house where their mom was 2 blocks up the street to where their dad was shopping. The dad was on the phone with the older kid as they walked. They were not left alone.
In a place with non-negligent zoning and street design, they'd be plenty old enough to walk to a nearby store safely.
I'm SO mad at this story. There is no reason to charge the parents. As others have stated, helicoptering kiddos is detrimental, and they need to be allowed to roam their environment -- That can come at the cost of danger, but we cannot be expected to grow with 0 risk.
Sure, as a parent, you can state: 'don't go there', and 'always look both ways', but kids are kids and there's only so much you can enforce without being overbearing. In this scenario, without video evidence, there's no clear conclusion about fault for either the driver or the child.
I'm okay with letting the driver off (criminally, let insurance pay the family but don't put the driver in jail) and acknowledging this as an accidental death, especially since he stuck around and is complying. Charging the parents for negligence, though, is just fucking brutal when they are suffering the loss of a child, not to mention the impact on the older son, who probably is feeling an unreasonable amount unreasonable of guilt: "I could have held his hand; I could have reminded him of the road..." (not his quotes, my presumed internal dialog). Again, as others have stated, this is a city planning problem, not a parental one: If there was a way to walk to a grocery store that didn't cross a 4-lane road, that'd be a better option, but there are plenty of places where that is not possible.
These parents do NOT need the extra burden of being held legally liable for an accident and anyone blaming them for this without knowing them personally and being able to describe other aspects of their parent as negligent is just an asshole.
it's ghoulish.
They got it backwards. I will hold the road planners, the city government, the driving license issuer, and the driver responsible. It start with poorly designed roads and ends with poor driver training. The parents are the victims here.
It's the parents fault for birthing a child into this hellscape into the first place. We've built this inherently violent landscape and your letting your spawns roam free? /s
but they want people to have more kids. lolwtf
Speaking of planners, i follow
@[email protected]
on Mastodon (a transportation expert who cycles and cycles with her kid) and she put me onto this book
https://bookwyrm.social/book/1907724/s/killed-by-a-traffic-engineer
If you watch the video in THIS report, it's clear that planners should bare some responsibility here.
They designed no logical, safe crossing where people need to cross. Even during the report, you can see other pedestrians walking across.
The only "sidewalk" is a tiny strip on only one side, and it's right against the curb. You might as well be walking in a shoulder!
And the speed in an area like that is too damn fast.
That road was designed to be anti-pedestrian. Not the parent's fault.
This some serious bullshit not even the cops can't be that heartless ... Oh wait the parents are black ... in North Carolina ...
Racism explains a lot of court decisions in the US. Jim Crow laws never truly went away.
Also, there are designated child culling zones.
USA is the premiere shithole country.
edit: It's kind of amazing how many people in here take NBC quoting cops as fact. The cops' tale is obviously bullshit as usual. They're just reciting whatever the old man said. Ofc he thinks the kid just jumped in front of him. The old coot probably had no idea what was even happening: "I was just driving along when this colored boy jumped under my truck...." Cops are like, "Yes, sir, we understand. It happens all the time. Best we can do is lock up the parents." ---> NBC.
edit2: Seriously tho, I feel bad for the driver too. This is a good example of how car dependency is not good for the elderly. Let's get that driver out of a car and onto a train. Ok I gotta get on with my life...
Ahhhh, that makes sense now: the child was black.
Gotta get those black people in prison and give them records.
Can we start labeling if something is US. Cause this feels very US. Have you guys tried sidewalks?
No they needes to add that one more lane in to fix traffic. Turns out it didnt work but maybe 1 more.
lol
This is absolute bullshit, just because the US is incapable of making good walkable neighbourhoods doesn't mean the parents are at fault of letting their childeren be normal.
Explain normal? If this was a street inside a subdivision, I would totally understand. Speed limit on that road is 45mph
Yeah, there just need to be places where its okay for anyone to murder children. These filthy fucking europeans just don't understand, because of their low birth rates, but as proud r strategists, americans need to be able to kill some of their children, and must have robust mechanisms for culling the weak.
No but see we need designated zones where it's okay to murder children.
Otherwise how will we get rid of the most annoying ones?
Schools fill that role apparently.
That just seems wasteful. Think of all the labor and cleaning products you'd need after every single kid!
City makes walking on foot a death sentence, offloads responsibility on people foolish enough to produce life in a world that wants us to die.
NC is a hellscape of stroads and highways. Walking anywhere there is a stressful situation. I'd walk down to the local park and needed to cross 2 lanes of traffic at a crosswalk. The speed limit was 35 yet people flew through doing 50 and this is with medians and a crosswalk. The only way to cross was to begin walking out and hopefully they brake for you.
That's never the way to cross a street. You look ahead for a gap, then start moving the moment the car in front of the gap passes you. If you've gotta run, run, but what you've described is nothing short of suicide. Never trust drivers.
Here's the road
https://maps.app.goo.gl/MXtKFCAxCwW5YrTEA
Curbwalk
So on this road with no line of sight obstructions at all the driver failed to notice two kids impatiently waiting to cross and failed to slow down a little in case the kid actually jumped in front of the car? That guy is obviously not fit for driving.
More strode than road
Nice, how'd you come by that? Posted article didn't have anything but the town name.
I walked two blocks between home and school every day when I was 7. This is insane.
Back in the 60s, I walked to and from kindergarten in a school that was at least a mile away, starting when I was 5 years old. Once I could ride a bike, around 6 years old, a typical Saturdayor summer day meant hopping on my bike after breakfast, and disappearing for the day, with no phone, wallet, id, money, etc. My pockets would be literally empty. If I needed a drink of water, I would knock on a stranger's door and ask for one. The only rule was be home by 5 for dinner.
Everybody was a free range kid back then.
I'm so disappointed that I don't see these days coming back.
5 blocks for me but it's the same thing.
Glad I grew up when I did and in Canada.
About a Kilometer for me. Felt longer as a kid... My brother had to commute by bus at 8, because the school was fused together with the one in the next village.
The US are seriously weird.
Everything felt longer as a kid and I kinda miss it :')
Frankly, I hated it. I am happy that as an adult, I can now walk a two-digit amount of kilometers without having to take a break and being at peace with myself enough to not get bored. I do sometimes get nostalgic about school, but not because of the walk. It felt like forever. In addition, being an unpopular kid that got into fights meant there was a non-zero chance of getting my ass kicked at times.
Yes, it contributed to me being a self-sufficient person who is not afraid of physical activity or picking my own ways. Still, as a 7-year old in winter with a heavy bagpack, I hated it.
Half the kids in my school lived in town, they all walked home. A lot of our streets didn't have proper sidewalks.
Yeah, in first grade I'd walk several blocks to school and back
Okay, I get the rational behind it.
Except when you drive a car, fuck it! You can do whatever you want. As a driver of a vehicle that can kill people, you don't have be responsble for anything.
Only in 'Murica...
Shit, anti-vax parents must be worried now /s
Never blame the asshole in the car. Always blame someone else.
Did you read the article? The kid ran out into the street. The driver wasn't speeding or impaired. They did nothing wrong so what exactly do you want them to be blamed for and why are they the asshole in this situation?
No he did not read. People here do not read and just go for "oh the poor kid" without knowing the whole story. Also they want to stop a vehicle going 45mph to 0 in a dime. Literally these commentator have never driven a car.
In Netherland, max speed is usually 30 kph (about 20mph) when there's any chance of interacting with other traffic (bikes or pedestrians). The idea of walking along a busy road where cars go 45 mph is ridiculous. Separate the traffic streams and give them crosswalk with traffic lights, or slow down the cars.
The idea of infrastructure which is not hostile to humans seems to be totally alien to some people.
You're right. There's nothing insinuating the driver is at fault in the article. That being said with him being 76 I'd fucking loooove to see if he could pass a driver's test.
The fact theyre charging the parents is fucking ridiculous.
@Alaik @Aragaren It's quite possible the driver was following all the rules and using the road exactly as intended and wasn't able to stop in time because the road design and speed limit encouraged drivers of any age to travel at speeds incompatible with child pedestrian traffic despite being in a populated area surrounded by homes and stores. It's also possible they wanted to retire from driving but were thwarted by the same demonic traffic engineers and land use planners.
If a 76 year old passes a drivers test, there is something seriously wrong with the test. I have never met anyone above 70 with good reaction times.
Driving a killing machine. You don't point a gun at anything you don't want to kill. You dont drive a car without willingness to kill.
Streets should not be a place its just okay to murder children.
I would argue, and i know this is kind of radical and lots of you will disagree, that we should not have places where its okay to murder children.
It has been a while since I've come across a statement that leaves me wondering how anyone came to such a disconnect with reality. Watching these mental gymnastics is making me sea sick.
I drive a car with a willingness to get from where I am to where I'm going, quickly. A comparison to a gun is just retarded: guns are killing machines because that is their sole purpose. The purpose of cars is fast transport of people and cargo.
Now, "murder" needs to show intent, and it sounds like you're concluding anyone who is killed by a car is murdered because drivers must intend on killing someone simply because they got behind the wheel. I'm going to go ahead and assume you either a) don't have any friends or family who drive, or, more likely, b) don't have any friends and don't talk to your family.
And a willingness to kill to get that done, if necessary, or you'd be on a train or a bike.
eeeeh might be time for a break
Youre right. Im sorry i said that.
We absolutely need a place where its okay to kill children, and streets are far and away the best option for that.
I get a little stupid and udealistic sometimes when im high, but I've sobered up now.
you're misreading my intent, deliberately. no one is suggesting those things.
cars are fucking this culture up. comments like this are pretty good evidence.
I think your high ping has caused you to be disconnected with reality, try rebooting your modem.
You're right. I switched to a wired connection and im much more reasonable now.
Of course we need designated child killing zones. How else will we cull the weak, and keep america strong?
I think you mean "involuntary manslaughter children" not "murder".
Involuntary manslaughter just requires negligence, and cars and roads seem like tailor made environments for drivers to be negligent.
I know people here like to throw the 'murder' accusation around but it is a totally different level of intent and culpability - and it'd be hard to prove it beyond reasonable doubt.
In my country though there is special laws for drivers , death by dangerous driving, and death by careless driving - so as long as you use a car, the normal rules for manslaughter don't directly apply.
I think , here, if you've killed someone it is hard to defend against a death by careless driving charge, as our highway code is very clear on duty of care towards vulnerable road users. But ultimately it'd be jury's decision on "reasonableness". I can't see how no charges would be brought though - as the jury has to determine it, and any death must be taken seriously.
Prosecution should just need to show that there was a hazard (pedestrians, children, in this case the corpse should do the trick) and that a reasonable driver could have done more, say slow down to less than 20mph.
"no evidence of speeding" might be enough for some jurors, but that should be their call.
Our problem over here is more on the punishment side. The punishment for death by careless driving seems lower than other forms of negligent killing. Many will get away with a small fine/community order and a 12 month ban from driving. So i think a lot of people probably plead guilty to avoid the fine and get away with a 1 year ban.
Weak punishment, but there's at least an acknowledgement that they did something wrong.
Back to this case it seems crazy (to me) that there is not even a question for the court to determine whether the driver was negligent. Maybe the driver was reasonably attentive and had taken all reasonable measures to keep other road users safe, but surely they should be made to demonstrate that to the court.
Welll, part of the issue here is that americans are R strategists, and we must cull the weakest of our children pretty regularly.
Generally crimes committed with a car carry less/no penalty here, but it isn't formalized.
The maga agenda in action ❤️
I bet it's in a Republican shithole city in a Republican shithole state?
I don't even have to check
Rural NC
Ive literally never heard a good news story out of NC.
Was the driver driving a child-killing American truck? If so, both the driver and car company should be charged with voluntary manslaughter.
They knew this was going to happen, yet they still bought and produced the child-killing tank.
Look, americans are proud R strategists. Maybe you sluggish europeans dont know what that means, but we need ways to cull the weak before we waste too nany resources on useless eaters, so designated zones and tools, in/with which it's considered okay to murder children are an absolute necessity. Doing it with our cars, integrqting it into our transit system, more than makes up for the loss of efficiency from not using trains and bikes. So how do YOU propose we murder children, then, huh?
Do you think we should just stop killing children on purpose? Fucking yankeephobic eurotrash.
What the fucking fuck...
Every one needs to travel in a metel box for all journeys. No excuses /s
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot...I was riding my bicycle alone at age 7.
Yeah, something about this is off. I was thinking that the 74 year old driver was white and a "pillar of the community".
Anything to shift accountability away from drivers, huh? Cars and the people behind the wheel of them are just an unavoidable force of nature now?
76yo probably shouldnt be driving, wanna bet the driver could be well connected, alot of these wierd incidents magically disappears.
The Nanniest States of America
Mountains of shame looking for someone to blame in the dum dum land of lowest common denominator. This Yankeeland, this imperialist empire, this empty vessel of lesser things, this pit of despair we lean into the Edward Bernays dreamland of sucking the tit of the rotton corpse of the rugged individualtic mother. Ohhhh the humanity. Ohhhhh the humanity thots and prayerzzzzzzz. Fascist are the useful idiots of empire and capitalism and fascism are like peas and carrots. The liberals are fascist. You call me negative and I think you are stupid. Welcome to the lords and ladies of the clown kingdumb. The leader is a follower ,the follower is a leader that is dead. If their is a hell it is inside your head. Nothing WILL EVER change in Yankeeland. It is like demanding for HBO in Alcatraz. You can not solve generational issues until the boomers in office finally die this won't happen in your lifetime. This evil empire is gonna set the world on fire.
The us is so fucked. I've been letting my kid take the buss to the other side of town alone since she was 9. And traffic accidents are very rare despite most neighbourhoods not having sidewalks at all. Of course we drive a lot slower and it takes months of obligatory coursework to be eligible to take a driving test. https://www.vegvesen.no/en/driving-licences/driver-training/how-to-get-a-driving-licence/passenger-car--b/
This feels like an origin story for a Punisher reboot.
District Attorney Travis Page. Gaston County. Prosecutorial District 38. (704) 852-3113. Tell him your thoughts.
with a bus, driving right at him.
My sister and I played outside until it was dark. Then my dad would blow a whistle so loud that the entire neighborhood would hear it and come home.
Justice??? For what? There was no criminal act. Your kid unexpectly jumped into the road into oncoming traffic. The article says the driver did nothing wrong. I don't agree with the parents being charged for involuntary manslaughter, but you can't attempt to seek justice when there was nothing done wrong.
I agree that the parents should have been with the boys, but holding them to involuntary manslaughter charges is a bit much.
I think the best thing now is for everyone to grieve, and try to move on.
The driver is responsible for the damage their vehicle causes. It doesn't matter if they did something illegal or not. If the article is accurate, nobody should be arrested. But the driver would be civilly liable for the death of the kid.
The way the article describes it is that the kids were attempting to cross a 4 lane road, not at a crosswalk. And unexpectedly steps into oncoming traffic.
It doesn't mention speed, but lets say the guy is driving at 30mph which is a standard speed in the US. Nothing dangerous there. And then a kid just jumps into the road unexpectedly, there may not even be time to react. I've seen it happen in the 90s, where this kid is just standing there, ran after a ball, and the car was right there. Kid went flying. At least 10 feet. He survived, but there's only so much you can do when you're given no reaction time.
Same reason you never try to go around gate crossings for railroad tracks. If a vehicle is moving, it needs time to stop. Especially trains. Depending on cargo and speed, they can take up to a full mile to stop. Cars can stop obviously faster, but not instant.
And the driver would be free to make that argument to defend themselves in the law suit.
No need for court when the cops and prosecutors have already made up that argument for him. \s
Gotta remember that the news is just a stenographer for a cops and the cops are constant liars.
The kid jumped onto traffic in front of the car? No crosswalk, traffic light or anything. They were walking alone with the permission of their parents. The parents should be liable for the trauma caused to the driver.
The lack of a crosswalk is the municipality’s fault. Someone even posted a Google maps view of the area - it’s just completely lacking them.
The lack of attention to crossers is the driver’s fault. Any driving class tells you to be cautious around pedestrians, especially children. Even just braking in time might have changed this from death to mild injuries.
People really out here believing cops telling tales in local newspapers. wew.
Imagine bootlicking cops this hard. This kind of uncritical brainwashing is why we're in this situation. Google "copaganda" ffs.
Did you miss the part where this old guy murdered a child?
"shit happens" isnt a thing anymore...
kid breaks his arm on the playground? sue the school.
kid breaks his arm riding bike in park? sue the park.
the united states is so incredibly litigious that everyone is suing everyone else because someone has to be responsible...
kid gets run over by old man? put the parents in jail.