There is an interesting criminal and torts case out of Georgia. Roger Stephens, 61, is accused of slapping a 2-year-old child across the face when she would not stop crying. That is bad enough, but the child was not his.
The mother told police that her child was crying in a Stone Mountain Wal-Mart when Stephens, 61, walked up and declared “if you don’t shut that baby up, I will shut her up for you.” When the child continued to cry, the mother said that in a different aisle Stephens grabbed her and slapped the child across the face four or five times. She says that Stephens then told her, See, I told you I would shut her up,.”
A bystander then stepped forward and grabbed Stephens and held him for police. Stephens reportedly apologized to the mother after police arrived, but it still constitutes a classic crime as well as a tort of assault and battery.
He has been charged with felony cruelty to children.
The Emperor: “Good, I can feel your anger. Use your aggressive feelings, boy. Let the hate flow through you. Something, something…. dark side.”
June
I’m wondering when this culture became so mother-bashing, because it is.
mothers are responsible for just about every wrong done to humanity because we are imperfect. we are either to strict or too lenient. too permissive. too uncaring or”helicopter” moms.
we sing too loudly along with the car music and should never dance ever or be interested in fashion because its too embarrassing to our pre-teens.
we can’t have fun of any kind because we are supposed to be like nuns or amish.
the way I see it is this : our kids should have just enough trauma so that when they go into therapy they have something interesting to talk about.
GWLAWSchool and June, what I see happening more and more is parent’s who completely ignore their child’s behavior (June, I understand your child was autistic but the majority of the time children misbehave and throw fits in public this is not the case). If I see a parent trying to deal with the situation I can respect that and have empathy (I am a mother as well), but when I see them ignoring and/or letting their child run wild, with no concern about teaching their child how to behave appropriately in public that’s when I become really annoyed. And I understand that when you’re dealing with other people you’re going to get annoyed from time to time but I think it’s just the considerate and right thing to do, for others but especially for your child, to at least try to teach your child right, wrong and how to behave.
That man has Tourette syndrome from my observation, and along witht that comes impulsivity..He needs help!!
I’m sure the 2 year old child shut up after being slapped in the face 4-5 times – right! She was probably crying louder than ever. The purpose of the slapping was to relieve him of his frustration and anger. I see way too many parents ignoring their crying, screaming children in public. You take them outside, talk to them, and if it doesn’t stop you take them home (and believe me they want to stay at the store!) – be consistent and follow thru a few times and the fit throwing will stop. Unfortunately many (most) parents these days are just too damn lazy to teach or discpline their children and are just plain rude, inconsiderate and don’t care that it bothers other people – tough s**t is their attitude! I agree – if anyone should have been slapped it should have been the mom. With that said, if anyone ever laid a hand on my daughter they would have been dead meat. How did this guy get 4-5 slaps on this child’s face without the mother jumping him! I guess she was probably in shock but she sounds like a complete incompetent – first not dealing with her child’s fit and second not standing up for her 2 year old to this a**hole.
Somehow it’s not surprising to me that this would degenerate into a “blame the mother” fest.
Most people saying this do not understand children at all.
I am a single mom with an autistic child. (My husband is deceased, before I get accused of sleeping around and procreating indiscriminately). I raised him all by myself, and he didn’t always behave, in fact he melted down easily. The autism made him very sensitive to sensory overstimulation when he was a toddler.
I remember one long week of working hard and doing overtime to support ourselves, and finally having to go to the grocery store because we had NO FOOD in the house. I had no alternative but to bring my child along. About 80% through the trip (which I was doing as fast as I could) he totally melted down (he was tired after being in day care all day…) and started screaming. When he was in that mode, really nothing helped. I mean NOTHING. I avoided bringing him places, but that wasn’t always possible. Eventually he grew out of it….anyway, I had a full cart that I needed to pay for, and someone actually started reaming me out, saying “shut that kid up” and then saying that I should just take my child out and leave my groceries! That was real helpful, yep.
I told that wench that if she wanted to do my shopping for me and deliver the groceries to my house since my fridge was empty to go ahead, otherwise shut up and deal with it until I was done shopping.
She shut up. I’m sure my reaction deterred her from slapping my child.
And as far as those of you who throw around the derisive insult “breeder”, I would like to point out that your parents are breeders, having contributed to your dubious existence. Certainly the world would have been better of if your parents had your shiny attitude and chosen to not procreate.
And now my child is 13, and has the nicest manners of any teenager you will ever meet.
And for the record. If anyone touched my child, it sets off a maternal mother lion reaction, and I would tear the perpetrator’s head off.
I usually don’t get involved in discussions regarding how to discipline children. I have my own ideas. they worked well. I never raised a hand to my kids. i was not even tempted. the way I see it is this: your hand is like the atom bomb. if you can;t get your kids to behave without dropping the bomb what will you go to next? how will you escalate?
clearly your kids don’t respond to “put that down right now” so you do what? hit them?
makes perfect sense if you want to rely on being bigger and stronger not nor smarter or more creative or a better problem solver. once you hit your kid you fail. you can’t ever go back.
I like to think that people love to imagine the circumstances that other parents are in and why their kids misbehave. the real truth is that no one knows why that child was unhappy or why the mother could not soothe her.
I’ve had to take cranky kids to places where they did not want to go, sometimes to pick up a prescription or get something we desperately needed in the house and sometimes they were just in a state where they could not be soothed. it never lasted long. it was worse for me than for anyone else.
but that is the thing about living your life in public. other people are going to make you miserable from time to time and that;s just the way it is.
If a stranger had TOUCHED my child,much less slap them..I would pull out a6 pack of whoop ass!!! I am a lover not a fighter..I have 2 grown children…never arrested or to serious problems..and 2 grandchildren..but I will turn on you so fast when it comes to my kids or grandkids..there would be 2 of us standing up there in court!!!!!
Well at least there is someone with common sense who know how to take care of a crying baby in Walmart. The mother should have left the store and gave the kid a time out, but no, someone had to help the parent, by taking matters into his own hands.
By the way, a slap is not a criminal assualt, but just a minor punishment to help teach the crying baby a lesson. Just like in actuall War, the US is currently trying to teach Iraq and Afganisthan a lesson by slapping the hell out them.
Finnally, the people in line enduring the crying baby were probably very happy, the little brat finnally shut-up with a little help from a stranger. Release, the slapping stranger and worry more about the 11 trillion dollar debt we have and to stop spending our life savings on this stupid war.
His mistake is that he slapped the wrong person. He should have slapped the mother for I’m sure was acting like nothing was wrong, especially since I doubt he would have made a comment to the mother in the first place if she was actively trying to take care of the kid.
YES!
BUY THAT MAN A BEER!!!!!
WooHoo!
This world of parenting is for the birds.
Some kids have to know that wrong is wrong and there are consequences for bad behavior. Maybe the mother needs a paddlin’ too.Raise respectful kids,,,,, Don’t abuse them,,,, teach them. Some kids don’t need but just a wisper. Other kids need a good ole’ fashioned butt whoopin’ at the wood shed. Let the kid decide what they want. My kids were amazingly quick studies. My kids were and are great to take into public. I gaurantee this old man wouldn’t touch my kids, their mom and I RAISED our kids. We worked at being good parents.
I see too often those screaming kids throwing a tantrum on the floor because they don’t get what they want. I say lets beat the parents for having kids, obviously they are just breeding stock and not parents.
Raise your kids you lazy sods.
FMS,
I understand that there is a specific set of circumstances that have to be met before you’re calling for the charges to be dropped. My problem is that the circumstances you outlined don’t in anyway justify slapping a child.
One doesn’t hit a child because the mother is behaving badly for the same reason I don’t kick a dog when I see their owner littering.
Just to make sure you don’t try and back peddle the following quotes are from two separate comments you made:
“If the mother was busy talking on her cell phone -Drop the charges.”
“We don’t know, but if she was too busy talking on her cell phone to take care of her child, I would recommend dropping the charges to teach the mother that she does have a responsibility, and talking on the phone isn’t it.”
When I was growing up I had a very healthy fear of my father. He is still a pretty large man with a short fuse, but with that being said, he never once laid a hand on me. My father took a different approach and know looking back I think it worked much better. Living on 22 acres we always had much work to do, so if I ever screwed up I had to spend hours working on our property. On top of that I would get grounded for weeks at a time, confined to my room and the only thing I was allowed to do was read. Another tactic of his was to make me write ungodly amounts of sentences. I recall one time when I was 12 and he told me to do my laundry when I got home from school, instead I went to a friends house. When I got home he informed me that I was grounded until i produced 5000 sentences reading “I will take more initiative when it comes to my responsibilities in this household.” Looking back on it I would have rather had a whippin. The pain only lasts for 15-20 minutes, much shorter than the pain felt in my wrist. My father raised me by himself after my mother left him when he was 20, still surprises me to this day that he did such a good job being a kid raising a kid.
gyges, I guess you didn’t see the word “if” before I made that statement.
IF you hit someone elses child; you should be arrested.
oops. did I just accuse of you of hitting someone elses child, or did I, like i did above, make an associated statement without implying anything?
s,
So the only thing keeping you from striking a child, let alone one not your own, is fear of arrest?
Your mom must be so proud of you.
He is stupid enough to have his information listed publicly, somebody should teach how it feels to be a powerless victim.
Roger P Stephens
3036 Deshong Dr
Stone Mountain, GA 30087-4116
(770) 413-9373
So what? The kid had it coming. He should have kicked the Mom for not taking the whining brat out of the store. Why do breeders think that everyone should be subjected to the horrible noise of a shrieking child? My favorite is the Ahole parent who takes their crybaby out to a restaraunt. I don’t care if it’s Applebees or the Outback or Walmart, nobody should be subjected to the crys of whining child, even though this was a 2year old not a baby. Good work buddy! You did what I always have wanted to do, but did’nt for fear of arrest.
Ever wonder why Palin’s still got a chance at the White House????
http://www.peopleofwalmart.com
You can thank me for the time you waste on this site later.
FMS,
I wasn’t talking about the felony part of your statement. I was talking about, “If the mother was busy talking on her cell phone -Drop the charges.”
You’re excusing violence against a child based on an unwarranted assumption about a part of the woman’s parenting style you don’t agree with. That’s crap. It’d be crap if the woman was on the phone, but it’s especially crap since you have no idea about what actually happened.
To those who say “It shouldn’t be a felony” and suggest that since it was only 4-5 harmless slaps that it should be a lesser charge, you don’t understand the purpose of that law and other VICTIM-specific laws. The exact charges will be something for the DA to decide but if you are really confused about severity of a charge related to a victim-specific crime, a personal demonstration might be valuable. First, find a police officer and slap him (or her) a few times with an open hand. Make sure you do not hurt the police office. Then say “Sorry!” and see what happens.