Woman accused of leaving young son outside bar while she had a drink

As for byronbca: I will put you in your place. All the above is illegal. You just don't leave a child unattended period. Especially in front of a bar at nighttime? What is the child was kidnapped, raped, murdered? There are children kidnapped our of their front yard and in the instance of Elizabeth Smart out of her own bedroom. The fact that she needed to go to a bar in the first place raises alarms. Yes our parents left us unattended a lot, but that was a different world. Laws were not created for the heck of it, They were created because there was a need. And your comment of "a case of an over zealous cop and a mother freaking out because she's worried the state might try and take her child away." All I can say aghast is Really?

byronbca,

If you weren't aware. Assaulting a police officer, whether facing unjust charges or not, is a crime. You can take it up with a judge. But you aren't justified in assaulting someone. It's illegal. It's also wrong.

I hope she learns a lesson and improves from this experience. These days, that's a rare thing.

BYRONBCA - not only did I raise 6 children but I also had 3 step-children and I NEVER deliberatly put them in harms way, not even once. All 9 of my children learned to problem solve very well & because they did, they have NEVER deliberatly left one of my 25 grandchildren in harms way either! Of course, growing up my children had time alone but it was always where it was safe! NEVER did I leave a young child unattended in a public place. That was a 5 year old child that was left to themselves outside a bar with inebriated people coming & going.... time for you to rethink this one!

When I was a kid we shopped at the Great Lakes Mall in Mentor Ohio. While mom bought groceries at the Kroger I was allowed, at 6 years old, to walk down to JC Penny to the toy department about halfway down the mall. I knew where I was going, knew to go no place else, knew not to make a big mess, knew to go back before too long because mom did not want to come after me.

Never had a problem. Never had security or a cop or anybody else hassle me. Always felt totally safe going and coming back.

And, FBI statistics show that the biggest danger to children is not strangers, it is people they live with. We just hear about the strangers because it makes a bigger news story.

All you guys whose fathers left you in the car outside the bar while they got sloshed are indeed lucky to be alive.
If you try to emulate your dear old dads, I hope you lose your license to drive on the same roads I use.

To me the issue is not drinking alcohol but leaving your child unattended in front of a bar? THAT is not smart to do consider where the bar must be and the type of people who are roaming around that area. If people are that foolish, maybe there should be a law preventing them from having children? Then they could stay in the bar for a couple hours!

RE Kristy:

So you are telling me that you have been able to raise 6 kids and there has never been a ten minute span in which one of your 6 children was left unattended? One never ran off while at the grocery store? On never slipped out of the house without you knowing? You never left a child out in a public area while you went to the rest room?

That is literally unbelievable. Don't children need time by themselves to develop and solve problems?

Sounds like some anal retentive cop got a little over involved on this one.

If she really wanted a beer, why didn't she buy one at the grocery store, where she COULD take her kid, then take it home, where he'd be safe, then down it? I guess that extra kick from the shot was more important to her than her child's safety?

I’m just glad Utah is smart enough not to legalize other intoxicants, whether for “medicinal” or recreational use. Just think of the incidents of abuse similar to this that would occur were we as selfish and short-sighted as Colorado?

Million, xert,
you were in a car, this child was not.

I see we have another feel-good story about how alcohol has helped a family come together.

@Stormwalker: awesome comment. @John Charity Spring: Not sure what "croc-wearing hordes" are, but as "lowest" points in Western Civilization go, slavery, war and genocide might be the serious person's pick.

@JCSPring:
"No serious person can deny that Western Civilization has truly reached its lowest point in several millennia."

Setting aside the fact that Western Civilization hasn't been around for "several millenia", kids are far safer now than they were a century ago when they were allowed to work in factories, could be beaten half to death by parents while the law stood by, and when they had the same status as livestock. Do a bit of reading about life in Western Civilization during the middle ages, particularly for the lives of the common folk and the poor, then try to explain why they were so much better off.

Extreme hyperbole doesn't help anyone's cause, especially in a case like this where no one was harmed and where the presumed punishment will do far more damage to the family than the act being punished.

Right on, Estudiante. When I was a small kid in the late 40's and early 50's, my Dad took me into a local bar occasionally. I would get a bag of pretzels and a glass of soda (and maybe money to play the juke box), and my Dad would have a beer or two with his neighborhood friends. I am still alive, not an alcoholic, a mother and grandmother who had a successful career and, wow, not a bit depraved.

@JCS: "We can no longer allow parents who neglect children in order to drink to maintain custody of children. The children must be removed until the parents give up alcohol."

This is a good point. We need bigger government, to check each home, to make sure that every parent is following all the rules. A large government agency would have to do this, do you have enough coverage for all families.

Happily, Utah will soon have many more foster homes available. While gay individuals are acceptable as foster parents, as soon as gay marriages legalized gay couples will be able to foster all these children that are taken away from parents by the state.

This sounds like a win for everybody! Thanks for suggesting it.

This happened to me when I was a kid. My dad took me to work with him. He showed me how to clean up after you finish a job and taught me to put tools back in their proper place. He worked me really hard and we were both tired afterwards. I was about seven. On the way home, we pulled in to the back of a bar and he said he was going inside for a couple of minutes to collect money and to have one beer. He asked me to stay in the car, but if there was any trouble, to honk the horn. I waited and the whole thing took about fifteen minutes. We went home afterwards. I lived.

In Scandinavian countries it is quite common to leave children in their strollers or buggies on the sidewalk while a parent goes into a café or pub to have a drink or a meal. The child is absolutely safe, not molested or kidnapped or killed. The Scandinavian countries are secular and civilized. They see child raising as the efforts of the village, and children are there for cherished and taking care of.

I know my wife would flip out if I did that. There is a cardinal rule about watching your kids.

byronbca - I can hardly believe there truly are adults out there with attitudes like the ones you expressed! What this woman did was endanger the life of a child & yes, it is child abuse! It only takes seconds for harm in today's society to come to an unattended child. I raised 6 children & I can say I never left them alone for even minutes in harms way. You don't risk the lives of your greatest treasures by leaving them alone, in front of a bar, no less. Several weeks ago, in WA. State a little 5 year old girl was found murdered (by a 17 year old boy)several weeks ago because her parents had this same mentality. They put her to bed Saturday night & when she wasn't in the house the next morning when they awoke, they assumed she was outside playing around the neighborhood like she usually did. They didn't bother to check on her until 6:00 that evening because because they figured it was safe in their neighborhood!

I was left alone in the car in the middle of summer when I was five a lot of the time. Of course in those days we rolled down the windows by hand. My dad would be driving along and say, "My, I am getting dry." and then would pull over and stop for a couple of beers at a bar. I would be out in the car playing with one of those puzzles where you move the little squares or I would read a book. My dad would come out and bring me a bag of sunflower seeds once in awhile. This was all okay because my dad was a doctor and doctors always know what's best.

Why not take the kid into the bar? Back in the 60s, my Dad did that with me. I was four, five, six. I saw a lot of bars.

How many incidents like this must occur before society at large acknowledges that alcohol is a pernicious evil which destroys families? Indeed, this woman is fortunate that her child was not killed or molested while she was drinking herself silly.

No serious person can deny that Western Civilization has truly reached its lowest point in several millennia. In a time when the ignorant masses consider drinking beer to be high culture, there is great reason for concern. Essentially, the great croc-wearing hordes are dragging society into depravity. Our society is rapidly approaching a new Dark Age. This process will soon reach the stage of being irreversible unless we act fast to protect what little refinement still exists in society.

We can no longer allow parents who neglect children in order to drink to maintain custody of children. The children must be removed until the parents give up alcohol.

I'm trying to figure out what exactly was illegal here. Is it illegal to leave your child unattended for a few minutes or be slightly intoxicated while around your child? I think what the accused did was irresponsible and sketchy at best but was it really child abuse? Would it be child abuse to leave a child in a public place for 5 to 10 minutes while the parent uses the rest room?

If leaving a child unattended for 10 minutes is child abuse then I think we would have to charge just about every parent with child abuse. If there are any parents out there who have never left a child unattended for more than 10 minutes please feel free to put me in my place.

I see this as a case of an over zealous cop and a mother freaking out because she's worried the state might try and take her child away.