Laquanda Newby, 25, hardly put the best case forward at her surrender for child abuse. She was charged after leaving her children inside a hot car outside of a Sam’s Club. However, when she appeared at the courthouse to turn herself in, she was later accused of leaving her children in a locked car with the windows rolled up. She is now charged with three counts of contributing to the delinquency or abuse of a child after for the abandonment outside of the Henrico County Courthouse on Monday, June 8, 2015.
The police found the children and gave them water and snacks. They later contacted the father and turned them over to him.
Notably, the temperature that day hit 90 degrees.
Nick – I agree that permanently terminating parental rights must be a last resort. I think the kids need to be removed immediately, at least temporarily, while they investigate what’s going on. This kind of repeated lack of judgement is so disturbing. If she just isn’t capable of making good decisions, then she can’t be their caregiver. I would want to know why she keeps putting their life in danger – ignorance, drugs, alcohol, mental imbalance, callous disregard to human life, deliberate, accidental?
What I found most disturbing about The Shining was that the homicidal villain was the boy’s own father. Anytime a parent either harms their children on purpose, or through repeated neglect, it’s chilling.
We recently had a case in Southern CA where a social worker failed to remove a child from his home, after repeated warnings from teachers, friends, and others. The child was eventually beaten to death after what amounted to years of torture. Sometimes parental rights are severed too early, as in medical opinion disagreements, and other times no early enough.
randyjet:
“Absent any statement that he wished to kill cops, all JT said was to not act if a cop were in trouble. To my knowledge no citizen is required to give aid, especially to those who abuse you. So this sentiment is bad, but it is caused by the cops themselves and is not illegal. Morally it is wrong, but legally no.”
Again, to demonstrate this is false logic and a bigoted statement, please replace “cop” with “black person,” and see how you feel about this statement.
It sounds like these poor children lost the Mommie lottery. There appears to be something wrong with the mother. Since she went there to turn herself in, what was her plan, to leave the kids in the car for the weekend in 90 degree heat? Even if she had an issue getting child care, you don’t just kill your kids with heat stroke by locking them in a car.
Poor kids. The foster care system is so broken that it’s rare for me to advocate taking kids away from their parents. But past behavior predicts future. If these children are not removed from her care, I believe she will eventually kill them. I don’t know what the situation is with their father, but if he does not live in the same home as the mother, maybe they would be better off with him, or some other relative.
randyjet:
“That transformed JT from a law and order rather conservative person, to a man who now hates ALL cops. It is too bad that the authorities will only bring charges against poor black women, and not against the crooked cops. As JT said, if he ever sees a cop in trouble, he will cheer for him to die now.”
I hope you point out the flaw in your friend’s reasoning. Because one cop acted inappropriately, now he cheers for all cops in trouble to die???
How about if you applied that to an African American who wronged him. Or a Boy Scout. Anyone. That’s really lazy reasoning on his part.
How about all the cops who fight gangs, put away murderers, respond to break ins. They should all “die?” What is his definition of “trouble”, which would trigger his murderous wishes? Does he just wish all cops die who’ve had allegations of misconduct raised against them? Does it just take an allegation?
Honestly, I don’t know why cops even bother anymore. If there are allegations made against them that make it to the media, they will be tried and convicted in the court of public opinion before an investigation is even completed. Perhaps the mob should live by the rules they apply to others – and the next time one of them has trouble at work they should be treated the same.
That police officer who responded to the Texas pool party – I wondered why he seemed so emotional. It turns out he had gone on duty at 6 PM. His first call was an African American man who’d blown his own head off in a suicide. His second call was to try to talk a teenage girl down from the roof of her parents’ house, where she was threatening to jump and commit suicide. The pool party was his 3rd call, and I think he was possibly emotionally done. Cops are never allowed to have a bad day, because we depend upon them. We still need to find out more information, but I wonder if your friend wants this cop to die for using foul language, yelling at everyone, drawing his firearm but not firing when someone approached him and reached into their waistband, and then roughly putting a teenager on the ground who was sitting on her butt like a sack of potatoes refusing to move.
We’re still getting more information, and I suspect that some of the cop’s actions will be justified, and some perhaps not. But before the investigation was even completed, he was driven out of the department. Great job for the fickle Mob. I wouldn’t have a problem with it if the investigation was completed and dismissal was warranted, but justice has devolved to the court of public opinion and the rumor game.
Ms. Hemming, you are free to comply with any officer’s request if you wish to do so. However, an officer who is unable to accept a refusal to accede to such a request without abusing the refusing person should not be employed. And members of the public who watch officers in public are doing a public service. I have often called on such witnesses to testify that an officer acted appropriately or otherwise confirm an officer’s account of events. And if you do need to get rid of an officer engaging in misconduct, watching members of the public can provide that evidence, too.
Ms. Hemming, thanks for informing the blog of your skin color, we might not have known otherwise.
That you’re an idiot, and a lickspittle was never in doubt.
Depending on a child’s age, they can die from heat exhaustion in a car even if the temperature is in the 50’s outside. It got to 90 on the date in question!! Enabling black folk is condescending, and dangerous to children.
First, I’m white, but if a policeman asked me to go inside my home because of an altercation nearby I would do so. Assuming he’s finding you guilty of something is a black mindset. Why not do what he asks?
Does the court provide any place for children while mother is in court? Probably not. She needs help to get child care. My mother would have been in court constantly back in the 40’s. A lot of mothers actually. A block of kids played outside (hide and seek, kick the can). Our society isn’t providing the safety these mothers felt. I’m sure they all watched us, but there were no police there. In fact, I was a walker, and one day a policeman came up, age four, and asked what I was doing. I was watching a house being built. Do you know where you live? Sure. Wil you take me there? Sure. And I held his hand and walked home. Most of the neighborhood was out several blocks away, but he asked them to let me take him home. My mother was frantic. He lectured me about what I had done to my mother, not my mother for my actions. I don’t remember any other walks, but it’s sad that kids don’t feel that trust.
If it was so routine for her that she did it when going to the court for that exact issue, it probably means that she did the same already 1,000 times, and nothing has happened.
The state knows better what affects her kids? The article does not say if anything happened to them. Did they complain? did they suffer? got sick?
Or it’s just the assumption of a government bureaucrat who decided that this particular act _is_ an abuse? what if she as a mother disagrees? does the bureaucrat know better?
I’m not saying that there was no room for abuse, and quite likely there was and maybe she does deserve everything that you guys post in your comments – but the fact alone that they were in the car, is not enough to state that they were abused.
I worked @ the Jackson County Juvenile Court in KC. Terminating parental rights cases were ALWAYS contentious, as they should be. With few facts, I do not think this woman’s rights should be terminated just yet. Understand, when that’s done it is final. What judges look for is a family alternative. A sibling, parent, aunt, etc. who has a stable home w/ a good track record w/ kids. Place the kids in their custody if they are willing to step up to the plate. Have supervised visitation. Have mom view some autopsy photos of children that have died in autos. Have a shrink evaluate her as she looks @ those photos. If mom responds appropriately, then start counseling. If mom has no emotional reaction to those photos, then start termination proceedings. Terminating parental rights MUST be the last resort. I put that court action just below the death penalty in severity.
and is not illegal.
This isn’t the issue at all. Statements like these, and support for such statements by others, prevent political and social progress. All you’re ensuring is that the circumstance you claim to hate continues to exist longer than it otherwise would.
The indifference to the law is the kind of thing that produces such reactions.
These reactions prevent solutions. They frame our choice as between two differing sets of wrongs, the result of which is for reasonable people to refuse support for either. So the effect is to reinforce the status quo.
Absent any statement that he wished to kill cops, all JT said was to not act if a cop were in trouble. To my knowledge no citizen is required to give aid, especially to those who abuse you. So this sentiment is bad, but it is caused by the cops themselves and is not illegal. Morally it is wrong, but legally no.
I am so against removing children from a home, it is psychologically destructive in many lasting ways, I would prefer interventions, training, moving them in with neighbors who are willing to take them, etc. (so that the children do not also lose their friends at school and in the neighborhoods) HOWEVER, their are exceptions aplenty, and this case is one of them.
I live in Florida, children and dogs have dropped like flies here roasted to death in cars. That the mother does not get this, is amazing. Seriously, on her behalf, I think she simply must have some sort of organic brain damage.
As JT said, if he ever sees a cop in trouble, he will cheer for him to die now.
This makes as much sense as a similar sentiment about blacks because of the misdeeds of a few, and citing it approvingly shows a severe lack of judgment. We need more reasonable Americans to speak, and fewer extremists.
I quite agree with you Rick, but I can understand his hatred when the DA and the system fails to police the cops who do very bad and illegal things to the citizens. In Harris county, the former newly elected Sheriff found that the dept refused to follow the law when an inmate died while in custody. They simply brought the body out and tossed it to the coroner who did nothing as well. Garcia changed that and demanded that the cell be treated as a crime scene as state law mandates. The indifference to the law is the kind of thing that produces such reactions.
to state the obvious how would anyone know this? Except cps had her under watch….like the peltiers? If her kids were truly endangered under the first go around….why were they in her care for a second? Oh except the first go round wasn’t real it was just to tyranny all other parents. Clear rules might be helpful. If it wasn’t abuse to leave them in the hot car once…..why or how is it abuse to leave them in the hot car twice. The system already okayed for her the once…..dah ….now she is suppose to read their minds?
Take the kids away, permanently, and only allow supervised contact with the mother, if it is permitted at all.
Thick. As. A. Brick.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
A friend of mine, a black co worker who was a 8 year Navy Vietnam veteran, was on his front lawn and watching some police action down the street from his house. A cop came up to him and ORDERED him to get his ass back inside his house. John told the cop he was on his lawn and he had NO right to order him to get off his own lawn and inside his house. The cop did not agree, so he arrested JT, cuffed him and put him inside the police car with the windows rolled up in midday Houston summer heat, with the engine and A/C off. He sat inside for about 30 minutes before the cop came back and took him downtown. He was well roasted, but still alive. He went to the DA and complained, but nothing was done other than all charges were dropped against him.
That transformed JT from a law and order rather conservative person, to a man who now hates ALL cops. It is too bad that the authorities will only bring charges against poor black women, and not against the crooked cops. As JT said, if he ever sees a cop in trouble, he will cheer for him to die now.
Some people should have their children taken away from them. In this case it is either their deaths or a touch and go upbringing. I’d take the touch and go.
Some people never get the hint.