Sentences Vary When Kids Die In Hot Vehicles

I was just reading a very interesting story about children who are left in vehicles and die from heat exhaustion, not by design, but by neglect. It may be a parent, guardian, babysitter and often results in charges which may result in jail sentences for the person who neglected the child by forgetting that they were in the backseat of the vehicle.

I know you may be sitting there wondering how in the heck someone could forget that their child is in the vehicle, but as the cases show, it happens to people in all walks of life from derelicts to professionals.

The crux of the story is that there is a huge disparity in the sentences that are handed down in these cases. There is a wide range of penalties, which range from no time in jail to several years in prison, depending on many variables, such as whether you were the parent, what state you live in, and whether it was intentional or not.

Since the mid-1990s, the number of children who died of heat exhaustion while trapped inside vehicles has risen dramatically, totaling around 340 in the past 10 years. Ironically, one reason was a change parent-drivers made to protect their kids after juvenile air-bag deaths peaked in 1995, they put them in the back seat, where they are more easily forgotten.

Please check out the full story as it will really make you think. I know that whether someone goes to prison or not, they must forever be haunted by the knowledge that they caused the death of their child. I am usually a pretty hardcore law and order guy, but reading some of these cases makes me a little less inclined to "throw" the book at them. Obviously, that is a case by case basis, because I did believe that in some of the cases, prison was appropriate, in particular when it was intentional, such as when alcohol or drugs were involved. These were choices that were made by these people, who were supposed to take care of children, who had no choice in who their parents were, and died because of it.

KIDS