Readers, great news from Port St. Lucie, Fla, where, this summer, Nicole eeyirifzdy
Gainey was arrested and taken to jail in handcuffs for letting her son, 7, walk to the park! Thanks to the Rutherford Institute for this story AND for arranging defense for the single mom!
Florida officials have agreed not to pursue the prosecution of a Florida mother who was arrested and charged with child neglect for allowing her 7-year-old son to visit a neighborhood playground located a half mile from their house. In doing so, the state has effectively put an end to the criminal case against Nicole Gainey. Attorneys for The Rutherford Institute, along with Miami-based criminal defense lawyer Brian H. Bieber, a partner at GrayRobinson, P.A., worked with state prosecutors to achieve a mutually agreeable resolution of the matter that resulted in the charges against Gainey being dropped. In addition to being charged with a third-degree criminal felony charge that carries with it a fine of up to $5,000 and 5 years in jail, Gainey was interrogated, arrested and handcuffed in front of her son, and transported to the local jail where she was physically searched, fingerprinted, photographed and held for seven hours.
“What this incident shows is that keeping young people safe and a parent’s ability to know what’s appropriate for their children are not mutually exclusive goals,” said John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute and author of A Government of Wolves: The Emerging American Police State. “All is not lost as long as there are government officials willing to work through issues in a reasonable manner, exhibiting compassion and common sense and recognizing that there are better ways to deal with concerns about child safety than criminalizing parents. When all is said and done, however, what we really need is for the government to stop acting as if it can do a better job of managing our lives than we can, and that holds true whether you’re talking about child rearing, health care or the surveillance state.
Compassion, reason and common sense are the baseline Free-Range Kids wants to see in all interactions with the government, especially when it comes to parenting. Let’s hope that this case becomes recognized as a watership (is that the word?) when issues of parents’ rights come up. – L
48 Comments
My favorite line from the full article:
“coming to Gainey’s defense, Rutherford Institute attorneys argued that parents have every right to make their own determinations about when their children are mature enough and responsible enough to be permitted to safely play outside by themselves, wait in the car by themselves or walk to a neighborhood park unsupervised.”
It wasn’t clear in the article… what was the agreement? what did the mother have to give up or agree to in order to have the charges dropped? I doubt that the prosecutors came to the thought that this was ill advised and asked to drop the charges without asking for something.
Perhaps it is my cynicism regarding deals with the justice system, but don’t they always want something to be given or agreed to for such deals? (I’m sure even when they know they are in the wrong)
“Watershed” is the word you’re looking for, usually it’s “watershed moment”. Though nowadays they call it the “tipping point”.
Love your efforts to keep our kids free!
I love how semantics are used to make a situation sound worse or better. A half mile from home? Wow, that sounds like “A MILE” to someone who thinks she did wrong. Or, you could just say “four blocks” – which is a half mile in the city I live in. Tomato ToMAHto.
@Ryan — I’m curious too. I’m happy for the Mom that all charges are being dropped, but I’m curious if Parenting Classes or Community Service were part of the deal.
Thank the universe! Common sense prevails, AND here’s a case that can be pointed to for future attempts at criminalizations!
I still worry about sending my kids to the park alone, though. I did it last year when they were 6, and nothing happened, but I feel more paranoid now, because these kinds of stories seem to be in the news more and more.
What I’d really love to hear is that the woman got an apology and maybe even compensation for the pain and suffering she and her son went through for no good reason.
And I’d like these things (the decision to not prosecute etc.) to be broadcast on all the news stations, to counter the effect of the rampant stories of meddling and prosecution.
The real danger isn’t stranger abduction.
The real danger is the nosy neighbor or the well meaning stranger who calls the authorities when they see your child without a minder.
Its getting to be that you get adverse to allow child to be free ranging because you can be reported for child neglect or abuse.
Key phrase for me:
“there are better ways to deal with concerns about child safety than criminalizing parents”.
I just wish there was more of this.
Great News! This is one to link to from your site, Lenore.
But it also looks like the low number of comments here means visitors to your site would rather rant and complain than say, “I’m keeping a link to this legal victory for Free Range Parenting handy to give anyone who questions my parenting decisions.”
—–
Lenore, that news story has a contact person at the bottom. Maybe you could ask her for more details or ask if there are other similar cases the Rutherford Institute has won. Maybe she could write a piece for your blog.
PRECEDENT
WHOOT WHOOT
Fantastic!!!!!!!!!!!
I just hope the agreement reached does not include no longer allowing her kid to go to the park.
Does anyone know of any other organizations that do what the Rutherford Institute does? Looking over their site, their approach to school and parental rights issues is not just from a legal standpoint but also one of common sense. Definitely a FRK ally. They have a simple help request form for anyone to use in regard to the areas of law they work in.
Here are some pics of kids around the world walking to school. For some perspective:
http://positivr.fr/risquer-sa-vie-pour-se-rendre-a-l-ecole/
It’s in French, but if you don’t read French don’t worry, the images speak for themselves.
Meanwhile Apple ‘s ios8 includes a family option that makes it possible to get the location of your family members 24/7.
I would like to know what the agreement was. I don’t dare hope that she got an apology, but it’s not much of a win if she’s being made to take parenting classes or the like.
Steve, the low number of comments could also be because this was posted so late in the day yesterday. I, for one, only just saw it.
@Steve Not sure about others, but I do not really need a list of everybody who bookmarks this or any other post. I do not think such comments would add much of the value. Posts get a lot of comments when there is something controversial about them, e.g. when people disagree with each other. There is nothing bad about it, everybody standing around agreeing with each other amounts to boring discussion.
I am curious as to the agreement, also. It is possible that the someone higher up the food chain suggested that this might not be a case worth pursuing.
Steve,
The low number of comments is a reflection of the fact that there is really nothing to say about this except “yay.” How many duplicative “yay,” “great,” “super” comments do you feel that we need?
Unfortunately, the deal was likely that she could not sue them.
I re-watched the 20/20 Elizabeth Vargas story on Kim Brooks (Lenore featured it here awhile back and was also interviewed). Her charges were dropped as well, but she had to commit to 100 hours of community service and a parenting class.
She probably had to promise to never let him walk to the park again, or agree implicitly that she could still get prosecuted if she did, which is not a good outcome in my opinion.
But yes, it is better than having her do jail time.
“Rutherford Institute attorneys argued that parents have every right to make their own determinations about when their children are mature enough and responsible enough to be permitted to safely play outside by themselves, wait in the car by themselves or walk to a neighborhood park unsupervised.”
I remember hearing charges dropped before, but usually with the defense saying the parent made a poor judgment call, all a big mistake, won’t do it again. This affirmative defense that a parent has “every right” is quite different. Though I might note I think this is about the human right to freedom (and the freedom to grow up), which belongs to any child capable of handling that freedom.
I too would like to know what the deal involved (Lenore, please investigate). But I celebrate a victory where the lawyers didn’t beg for mercy but asserted the basic right.
@NicoleK
Thanks for this link! These pictures are not what I expected! I figured they would be run-of-the-mill pictures of kids walking to school down **sidewalks**. They’re not.
One thing I’ve learned from all of these stories is that people walk so little that they have no sense of distance. ONE HALF MILE is an 11 minute walk.
“ONE HALF MILE is an 11 minute walk.”
And a mere three minutes riding a bicycle at the leisurely speed of 10 MPH.
“And a mere three minutes riding a bicycle at the leisurely speed of 10 MPH.”
I sent my 8 year-old biking back to school yesterday because she forgot her spelling book and needed it to do her homework. A mere 3 miles round trip (and took her an extra 15 minutes total) but a mom at back to school night gave me the 3rd degree for not driving her because “something could have happened”. Something did happen. She learned that she needs to better organize her materials so she doesn’t have to make annoying trips back to school to retrieve forgotten items.
she had to commit to 100 hours of community service and a parenting class.
Not much of a victory for Kim Brooks, then. A hundred hours of community for a single parent? First, the child should never-never be left unsupervised and then, “Here are 100 extra hours for you to find supervision for your child.” Plus the parenting class where parents are made to feel like monsters for expecting children to grow up and handle responsibility.
A mere 3 miles round trip (and took her an extra 15 minutes total) but a mom at back to school night gave me the 3rd degree for not driving her because “something could have happened”.
The nerve! Seriously. Criticizing you for something that DID NOT HAPPEN is beyond the pale.
Community service is not free. You pay a certain amount for each hour, usually a few dollars per hour. So 100 hours is a fine of several hundred dollars plus the time you lose from work or family. It is still a judgment against you (ie. found guilty). It does not represent exoneration. Rutherford is correct in asserting what parenting is, rather than just apologizing for not being sufficiently paranoid.
And yes, part of the problem is that nowadays no one has any clue how far ‘a mile’ is — so it sounds SCARY.
This is great news! But it’s a damn shame it ever got to that point in the first place and that the mother had to be put through all that nonsense. Hopefully this case will set a precedent and that police officers will not even bother to question a parent who chooses to allow their child some independence. Unfortunately there will always be some busybody who will call the police after seeing a lone child outside.
@marie – just to be clear, my post about Kim Brooks and her 100 hours is a different Mom than the one Lenore is talking about here (the one being discussed is Nicole Gainey). I don’t think anyone here knows yet what the conditions (if any) the dropping of the charges were.
I was just pointing out that even with a different situation, someone who had charges dismissed, had to do community service.
I hope Nicole Gainey does not have to do that (for all the reasons that you mention), but I don’t think we know.
This case was discussed on the 3rd hour of the Today show and is now on their Facebook page. You should see the replies. So much fear. And on top of that, the Today show also had a segment on a “lost” child and their reporter, Jeff Rossen, was trying to make the people who didn’t help this perfectly capable 11 year old, who didn’t look or act lost, feel guilty. And he brought on John Walsh, who I think is partially responsible for the hysteria that a lot of parents have about never leaving your child out of your sight, in with his refrain of “it only takes a minute.”
@Kathy — I can admit that some of what I’ve read here, has made me “afraid” of how things can go haywire even when nothing is at risk. So I’m sure John Walsh and media DOES have an impact on how people feel and what they thing “might” happen.
For example, last night my college aged sons (who happened to be home) went outside to use a telescope that one of them had picked up at a thrift store. It was around 10:00pm. Now, they were NOT doing anything wrong, they are actual adults. But I did wonder if they happened to be making too much noise or if the neighbor (whose bedroom happened to be closest to where they were situated) would be frightened and call the police. I mean it’s completely RIDICULOUS that I even had that thought cross my mind, but it did. Could they be questioned (or worse) because they were sitting out by the street with a telescope…where they on someone else’s property as they tried to position the scope?. So, in a strange way, reading about the outrageous cases of parents/people being charged for doing nothing wrong, affected my purview.
I’m sure being bombarded by the imagery and stories impacts people.
I’m not sure what fear is better/worse. They are both (parental fear of putting child at risk or parents fearing being charged for their parenting decisions) unlikely events, but we have been influenced on both sides of that coin.
It makes me sad that my children will not be able to go outside and play like I used to as a kid without constant supervision which is not feasible a majority of the time. There is a reason children are so horrible today! Ever since a spanking has been reclassified as child abuse, all you see are spoiled brats everywhere! People just need to learn how to mind their own business and not butt into people’s parenting methods. I was spanked as a child and I turned out just fine!
Yay! is right.
But in the meantime, how much damage to her reputation did this woman suffer needlessly? How much trauma did her child/children suffer after mom was hauled away and will they blame themselves for being the “cause” of it? How many other parents will think twice about something like sending their kids out to play out of fear that they will be arrested AND, unlike this mom, prosecuted anyway?
And thanks to those who stepped up to put on her defense. But what of other parents who also have to spend all kinds of money and lose work time (and pay) to defend themselves in court for stuff like this?
@Flchick — but do we know how often these types of things turn into arrests rather than get resolved w/o any legal/CPS involvement?
What I’m asking is that while it’s VERY troubling to read these stories, how frequently are the occurring? Are they happening with a greater frequency then when unlikely, yet tragic things happen to kids?
Don’t get me wrong, I love the efforts to fight back against these situations.
But is the “fear of being prosecuted” starting to affect our thoughts just like “fear of my kid getting taken”? I really don’t know. Are FR parents being affected by anecdotal stories in a similar way that paranoid parents are affected by headline grabbing tragedies?
@marie — just to be clear, my post about Kim Brooks and her 100 hours is a different Mom than the one Lenore is talking about here
E, thank you for setting me straight. While I knew you were bringing up the story of a second woman, I jumped to the conclusion that Kim Brooks was the McDonalds employee whose daughter spent the day at the park.
You bring up a good question. Which worry is more realistic–the worry that our children will come to harm if we don’t hover or the worry that we will be arrested for not hovering?
While I don’t worry much about being arrested, it is clear that parents do not give children much freedom. I saw that in myself as a parent when my kids were small and I see it in younger parents around me. I hear it in conversations at work and at church.
There is a solid belief that because the world is a “different place” and this is a “different time”, our kids need more supervision than we ever did. Schools use various security measures to keep out random shooters even when shooters have circumvented those same security measures in other schools, preschools take extreme measures to make sure no one walks out with the wrong child. Over 15 years ago, we attended a church that prided itself on the rigorous security around the preschool–even though no one had ever abducted a child there.
Yes, the underlying belief is that it is LIKELY that our children will be harmed–likely enough that we need to protect against everything we can imagine. Shooters, kidnappers, perverts, death after a few minutes in a car…
Free Range parents probably aren’t the ones who are refusing to leave the house because they fear arrest. They are the ones sending the kids to the store or the park or to walk to school and fighting back when someone says they cannot do that…and using rational arguments to refute the shocked looks they get from the ‘fraidy cats out there.
@marie – I agree with you.
Though I admit that I didn’t like the thought creep into my head that some nervous/paranoid neighbor might call 911 because my 19/22 yos were outside near the street at 10-11pm last night. I mean, I wasn’t really worried, but I thought “hmm, what would happen if someone called the police”.
One of my kids got nailed for having 2 beers in his dorm fridge when he was underage. He wasn’t drinking…he wasn’t under the influence (had actually just arrived back from a study room w/his gf) doing anything wrong at all, but some girls had left his room after visiting his roommate and the campus police (this was on 4/20) claimed they smelled of weed. So they searched the room and found 2 cans in the fridge and charged them both with possession of alcohol as a minor. Yup – 100s of $ to a lawyer, $ for an alc ed class on campus, > 20 hrs of community service in hopes to get it dropped. So yeah, I’m aware of the (literal) cost of stupid stuff turning into “something”. (And yes, I realize he should not have had beer in his dorm room.) Gone are the day they pour out the booze and issue a warning.
One of my kids got nailed for having 2 beers in his dorm fridge when he was underage. He wasn’t drinking…he wasn’t under the influence (had actually just arrived back from a study room w/his gf) doing anything wrong at all, but some girls had left his room after visiting his roommate and the campus police (this was on 4/20) claimed they smelled of weed.
It belongs to someone else. Isn’t that what kids say all the time? 😉
You are right that times have changed. I wonder if there isn’t some motivation to get money behind this change. I practice in a college area and one of the district courts has jurisdiction over the campus and local community. The vast majority of cases are minor in possession. It used to be a civil infraction with a small fine when I was a student. Now it is a misdemeanor with a much stiffer fine and a need to appear in court and enter a plea. Most of the students I see don’t bother getting an attorney and just plead guilty and pay whatever fine the judge imposes.
@E “But is the “fear of being prosecuted” starting to affect our thoughts just like “fear of my kid getting taken”?”
To me, the big issue here is the power differential. I don’t like that the police or CPS can take my children over a difference of opinion and my recourse is limited. That does worry me. But I still do my best to be free range, and thankfully, my community thus far has been supportive.
“Meanwhile Apple ‘s ios8 includes a family option that makes it possible to get the location of your family members 24/7.”
Well, for that to work, you’d have to be willing to give a kid who is out playing a kind of fragile object that doesn’t fit easily into the pocket of most 8-year-olds.
I hear about parents sending their kids out to play with cellphones, and I hope they have insurance on those things. I do not send my kid out playing with a cellphone. It would probably end up in the creek or something.
There is another dynamic when comparing “fear of kidnapping” vs. “fear of government interference.” If you told people that a child snatcher came after your kid while she was walking home from school, they would be up in arms against the child snatcher. If you told people a cop / CPS came after you because your kid was walking home from school, many of them would take the authorities’ side. There is not enough community support for parental rights.
@SKL, just like moms being arrested because something *could have*happened, but when it *does happen*, such as a kidnapping, the community rallies ’round with casseroles, search parties, posting flyers, providing support…and it would never occur to the police to arrest the parents of a kidnapped child.
SKL, exactly. I was going to say that, too, but I forgot.
I think our society lives too much with a “Fear” mentality. Fear is being shoved in our faces more and more. Predators, sex offenders, Murderers(i’m not even sure I spelt that right..lol)
I don’t have any stats…but I’m SURE that bad people existed in the 60’s,70’s and 80’s. Yet still – kids were allowed to play outside and go to the park by themselves then. I remember playing games with other kids in the woods in a park that was about 2 blocks away from my house growing up. And we were all fine.
Somewhere over the years – us kids that played outside by ourselves without parents supervision – turned into adults that are scared crazy and we don’t let our kids play outside without us being there to watch them.
Also – I believe – that no government should be able to tell a parent how to raise their kid or when it’s ok for them to play outside unattended. Unless you were involved in creating the child – you really don’t have any say in how the child should be raised.
Unless there is some real & evident harm being done to the child – the only people that have the right to say how a child should be raised are the people who did the horizontal polka one night and brought the child into this world.
The fact that a mother could be arrested for allowing their child to walk to the park by themselves is just ridiculous. Come on people…use some common sense.
@Ryan: I am curious too. As I’m sure the State wasn’t just going to let this go without some sort of compensation.
I am glad to hear that the charges have been dropped, and hopefully this sets precedence to future similar issues. Maybe a step in eliminating people calling the police on parents who feel their children are capable enough to be by themselves? Perhaps even, make busy bodies think before speaking/acting, or else they will be liable for false claims. I believe making false 911 calls are a chargeable offence. 😉
I’m also curious, if her record will be expunged as well. Because if it isn’t, that will be part of her permanent record, and will cause her grief in the long run. She may have been absolved of this false crime, but it will haunt her the rest of her life.