Posted on 06/14/2008 11:43:09 AM PDT by LibWhacker
RALEIGH, N.C. -- A couple accused of tying their 13-year-old son to a tree for two nights to punish him for disobedience has been charged with murder in his death, authorities said Friday.
Brice Brian McMillan, 41, of Macclesfield, told a deputy that the child was being disobedient and was forced to sleep outside Tuesday while tied to a tree, the Edgecombe County Sheriff's Office said. The teenager was released Wednesday morning but again tied up that night for bad behavior, authorities said.
The boy was left tied to the tree until the following afternoon when his stepmother found him unresponsive, Sheriff James Knight said. Knight said authorities believe the boy was bound to the tree with plastic ties and possibly other kinds of material.
"An adult couldn't get out of those," he said.
Temperatures in the area rose to above 90 degrees on Thursday afternoon, with a low of 73, according to the National Weather Service. Knight would not discuss any details on the cause of death, saying an autopsy was being conducted at the state chief medical examiner's office in Chapel Hill.
The sheriff also didn't have details on why the boy was being punished, although he said deputies were investigating whether he had run away.
Dwight Jefferson, an emergency responder with Pinetops Rescue Squad who was first on the scene, said he did not know the cause of the child's death.
"What we found was a 13-year-old laying on the ground - CPR being done by his father," Jefferson said. "Then we took over."
Knight said the boy was taken to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead.
McMillan and Sandra Elizabeth McMillan, 36, also have been charged with felony child abuse. Two other children at the home, ages 7 and 9, have been placed in the custody of the Department of Social Services, authorities said. Knight said he does not know of any past allegations of child abuse in the family.
He also said he could not release the name of the boy.
The McMillans are being held in the Edgecombe County Detention Center under no bond and are scheduled for a first appearance in court Monday. The sheriff's office said they did not know if the couple had an attorney.
Macclesfield is about 90 miles east of Durham.
That’s flat-out a lie. I did NOT say that I did not CARE what the kid was capable of.
IF the kid was capable of violence, then he should be sent to reform school or spend a night or two in the county jail. IF he threatened to kill the family, then he needed reform school.
NO. I would not call the cops on my kids for disobeying me; but I would not tie them to a tree in the scorching heat and go off and forget them for hours. - I personally would like to slap the crap out of both of those sorry excuses for parents.
What’s wrong with you anyway?
Lets wait for all the facts. No one knows what they would do unless faced with it first hand. I am not saying what they did was right but I won’t say it was wrong to the point in charging them with murder either.
I think several here (myself included) are saying that under no circumstance could they ever see tying a human to a tree. Ever.
It would be interesting to learn why they left FL? Maybe they were being investigated there (child abuse?) and decided to move on. Their zip code may have changed, but their parenting didn't.
No criminal record there as far as I can see and the dad has a speeding ticket for doing 66 in a 45. $25 fine.
James Pollard said Brice McMillan told him he was a construction worker. McMillan had worked hard building a horse fence, he said.Janice Pollard recalled Brice McMillan asking her about the neighborhood during a visit before they moved in.
"I told him it was the most peaceful place he'd ever find", she said.
Are you incapable of acknowledging that other people believe tying a child to a tree overnight is inappropriate for any reason?
Sure, you can believe what you want. I see lots of statements of beliefe on this forum I don’t agree with. Tying the kid to the tree wasn’t the smartest move but I don’t believe it killed him.Sending a kid to public school isn’t the smartest either but many here do but these parents didn’t. Quit trying to judge people till you know the whole story.
Tying a kid to a tree, and keeping him there over night equates with public school attendance in your universe?
Oh grow up and quit nit picking, I was just stating that these parents homeschooled and were concerned about the kind of neighborhood it was. They sound vicious.
Are you for real or just playing devil’s-advocate troll?
I’m stating that I don’t believe tying a child to a tree overnight is an appropriate punishment for any transgression. You can excoriate me for what you see as haughty judgment of others if you want. I don’t care. I do believe I’ve made better parenting choices than them this week, yes.
What do you believe might have killed the boy? Was it his natural time to go, coincidental with being restrained outdoors for, conservatively let’s say 23 hours out of the final 48 of his life?
[Before you try to change the subject by nitpicking my choice of numbers, I am estimating 7 hours for Tuesday night and 16 hours for Wednesday/Thursday, basing his imprisonment occuring at midnight both nights. I’m presuming it was earlier, but since the number of hours sounds heinous to me as is, I’m willing to give conservative estimates until we know.]
I am not nit picking...you are painting with a very broad brush stroke there. Just because these ‘parents’ homeschooled doesn’t make them paragons of virtue anymore than sending children to a public school makes a parent deficient or abusive. Concerned about what kind of neighborhood it was? Maybe the concern was more about meddlesome neighbors who would report their discipline choices?
OK, I’m tired of playing tag team with you four, lets wait for the whole story and quit hyperventilating on a onesided news article till we get all the facts. Devils advocate troll, hardly, I just don’t lockstep from info that has a one sided source. The only side we heard from is the government, of course, they wouldn’t lie now would they?
No one disputes the logic of not believing politically biased news sources, but I think the majority of people on this thread believe that they have enough facts to make a general judgment that transcends your argument.
I don’t need to wait for more facts. I already have heinous ones. Parents did (x) and kid died. What else do I need to know? This isn’t a story about whether a man or woman running for office had an affair with an office staffer.
Thats right, string em up now before they have a chance to defend themselves. The cops say they are guilty so why wait!!
Are you a parent?
That is what I thought when I saw those pictures. They look annoyed and indignant at the fact they are being booked.
If I did something that caused my son to die I would be too distraught to care about what happened next. But then, however bothered I got about his behavior, tying him to a tree would probably never cross my mind.
Rocky Mt Telegram has a photo of one of yard's trees.
Study Zimbardo’s prison experiments.
As Zimbardo said in one of the intros to his INTRO PSYCH text . . .
my paraphrase . . .
If there are monsters OUT THERE, it’s not so bad. We can gang up on them. But if the monster is within each of us . . . that’s a much scarier and more difficult challenge.
But that is just what Christianity teaches . . . the monster is in each of us . . . whether we feed him or starve him and persistently take him to the Cross of Christ . . . makes the difference.
I hate governmental interventions . . .
But I sure wish there were sufficient social cohesion and social pressure to prevent folks from having children without approval of some committee of their peers and then only after sufficient training.
We do more to lic scooter drivers!
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