Here is a story that combines some of
our favorite Reason.com topics, including strip clubs, jerk cops,
and America’s growing willingness to make less-than-perfect
parenting a crime. In this case, Florida resident Bobbey Jo Boucher
went with her 10-year-old daughter to a neighbor’s barbecue and
left the girl there when she headed to work, instructing her to go
back home when it was over. When the girl didn’t return within a
few hours, her grandmother called the Pasco Sheriff’s Office, which
called Boucher at work. When the line was somehow
disconnected—Boucher says accidentally, police say she hung
up—Boucher wound up arrested for obstructing justice.
The daughter was fine, by the way. In fact, she was going
to play at church with some neighborhood kids. A
group of them had left from the barbecue and were riding there on
the church bus when police stopped it. From Officer Nicholas
Carmack’s report:
I was attempting to put (the daughter) in ACIM’s (A Child Is
Missing) program and (the grandmother, Pamela) did not have all the
necessary information I would need to enter (daughter). Pamela
provided Deputy Bollenbacher with Bobby’s phone number.While on scene a neighbor advised (daughter) may have went to
the Faith Baptist Church with other kids from the neighborhood.Deputy M. Bollenbacher contacted Bobby over the phone and she
advised she was last person to see (daughter). Deputy M.
Bollenbacher said while speaking with Bobby she said she was at
work at Calendar Girls. Bobby then stated “I have to get on stage”
and hung up the phone on Deputy M. Bollenbacher. Due to Bobby
hanging up the phone, I was unable to enter the child in ACIM.
Bobby was obstructing my investigation in finding her
daughter.At this time Deputy R. Nye advised he was behind a Faith Baptist
Church bus and was conducting a traffic stop to see if (daughter)
is on the bus. Deputy R. Nye later advised (daughter) was on the
bus. I spoke with the bus driver, George Horner, who advised he
asked all the children if they have permission to go to church with
him on the bus. George said he remembers talking with (daughter)
and she told him she had permission.
So we have a 10-year-old girl who maybe lied to a bus driver to
go play with friends at church, who has been out of her working
mother’s sight for all of about 2.5 hours, and on whom a missing
person report hasn’t yet been filed. It seems like the Pasco
officers have done their job—locating the girl—and that should be
that. But, no, someone must be punished. Officer Carmack
really wanted to fill out that ACIM report (or at least take a trip
down to Calendar Girls for more information) and he was
obstructed by them finding the “missing” child perfectly
safe and nearby first. More from Carmack’s report:
I made contact with Bobby at Calendar Girls strip club … Bobby
stated she did not hang up the phone she switched over to another
call that was coming in. Bobby said she did not tell the deputy she
had to get on stage, she told the deputy to hang on a minute. I
asked Bobby who would be more important than the deputy trying to
find her missing ten year old daughter. Bobby said her friend was
calling and she wanted to speak with her.
As Bobby hung up the phone so she could “get on stage”. I was
unable to enter (daughter) in ACIM or NCIC/FCIC as a missing child.
Therefore Bobby was obstructing my investigation and I was unable
to proceed any further with my investigation in finding
(daughter).
Obstructing his investigation which actually wound up
progressing along very quickly and well but didn’t result in a
missing person report being filed for a girl who wasn’t missing!
That is what Boucher is in trouble for.
The whole report just oozes with so much condescension
(contempt?) that I feel a little bit slimy reading it. At every
point where it’s possible, the cops assume Boucher is a bad,
unconcerned mother. She would rather talk to a friend than talk to
a deputy about her missing child? Well, maybe the friend had been
at the barbecue, maybe Boucher thought the friend might know
something, maybe she wanted to ask the friend to start asking
around the neighborhood. Or she hung up because she needed to “get
on stage”? Maybe she works at the kind of club where she could get
fined or fired by missing her scheduled stage time. Maybe her
daughter disappears like this all the time, or Boucher assumes she
may have gone to play with the neighborhood kids. Boucher’s time on
stage is likely very short (a song? three?); maybe she was planning
on calling back as soon as possible. Or, hell, maybe she hung up on
the cops deliberately because she let her daughter alone in the
neighborhood and that seems to get
more and
more moms arrested these days.
Argue all you want about what a mother should have done, or you
would have done, but we don’t know what really happend and we don’t
know her circumstances. The bottom line is, do we really want a
criminal justice system where the mother of a missing child can be
charged with obstructing justice for a potentially dropped call? Or
wherein “justice” is defined as filling out the appropriate
paperwork, rather than finding the child?
Boucher’s daughter was located within about 34 minutes from when
the police were initially dispatched. Boucher herself was
eventually arrested, taken to the Land O Lakes Jail, and charged
with resisting without violence and obstruction. No matter how it
shakes out, she already had to miss work, post bond, and owes $78
in “invesigative costs recovery.” The story was also
picked up by New York Daily News, which means it’s now
spreading all over the Internet. Here’s how pretty much everyone
else is covering it:
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