During
a terrifying bank
robbery in Stockton, California, last week, three
robbers entered the Bank of West Branch with handguns and an AK-47.
They took three women hostage and sped off. Two of the women
survived after being flung from or jumping out of the moving SUV.
The third, Misty Holt-Singh, a 41-year-old mom, was used as a human
shield. She died.
There is no good side to this story, but there is one thing to
note: Holt-Singh had been running this errand with her 12-year-old
and allowed the girl to wait in the car. In other words, she did
exactly what so many public service announcements—and busybodies
and cops—tell parents not to do. She left her daughter unsupervised
in a car.
Her daughter is alive today.
Just one week before this tragedy, a mom in Bristol,
Connecticut, was charged
with leaving her 11-year-old daughter alone in the
car while she ran an errand. The rationale was that the
child was in danger. What if she got abducted or died of
heatstroke? What if? is the rationale behind arresting
parents who let their kids wait in cars.
But tragedies are
extremely unlikely to happen while parents run errands. The vast
majority of kids who die in cars—up to 40 each year—do so because
they are forgotten all day, not waiting while mom picks up the
pizza or runs to the bank.
What happened in Stockton should serve as a reminder that
we just can’t predict tragedy. We shouldn’t be arresting parents
under the assumption that outlandishly unlikely dangers are always
just around the corner. You could prohibit parents from leaving
kids in cars and then have them die in bank robberies! Both dangers
are extremely rare and impossible to predict—why have laws
that assume lightning is always about to strike?
There is risk in everything in life. Punishing parents who make
rational decisions just because something bad could happen
is not going to change that. Something bad could always
happen.
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