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Mom Arrested, Shackled Over Son's Unexcused School Absences
insider.foxnews.com ^ | May 21, 2015

Posted on 05/22/2015 5:25:17 AM PDT by ilovesarah2012

A Georgia mother and substitute teacher says she was arrested and placed in shackles because of her son's unexcused absences.

Julie Giles reportedly wrote on Facebook that a warrant had been issued for her arrest after her son tallied 12 unexcused absences from school.

The total is six more than the Screven County school district allows. Giles argued that her son's doctor re-issued a note for three of the absences, meaning she would be arrested over a total of three absences.

Giles said she was briefly placed in ankle shackles, with police saying it was normal procedure. She was released and given a court date in July, but faces jail time.

Giles said her son is an A and B student, but often misses school because of illness. Due to higher copays than she can afford, she said sometimes she must keep her children home without being able to get a doctor's note.

WTOC-TV reported:

Screven County Schools Superintendent, William Bland, says this is not unusual, that they are following the law, and that "several" parents have already been convicted in these situations this school year, after not being able to work out a solution with school officials.

(Excerpt) Read more at insider.foxnews.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; US: Georgia
KEYWORDS: education
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To: wintertime

I totally agree, wintertime. This is also about the school trying to intervene in the basic bond of child/parent(s). A parent knows when their child is sick. I can look at my kid’s eyes and coloring and I KNOW. If a child completes the work and testing... the issue with an exact attendance number is ridiculous. I don’t know how many times I have volunteered at school and seen feverish kids.. some with awful sounding, productive, barking coughs.


61 posted on 05/22/2015 7:04:45 AM PDT by momtothree
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To: pepsionice; theBuckwheat
Please read #53 a post by theBuckwheat.

You are suggesting that the state take away one year of this child's life. That is the power of the government. Government can take away LIFE! It has police with bullets, courts, and prisons that do this. If a person resists the police can shoot him.

Line up 75 pennies. Take one away. That is what one year is in a person's life. You would suggest this punishment for a person who is reported to be a good student?

62 posted on 05/22/2015 7:09:44 AM PDT by wintertime (Stop treating government teachers like they are reincarnated Mother Teresas!)
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To: wintertime

Like I said, I don’t like public schools either and would like to see them disbanded, Honestly, the district I came from wasn’t all that good even 50 plus years ago when I was a student. But at least back then, we learned something valuable along with the indoctrination. Today kids learn that the US was the aggressor in World War II but they can’t read, write, do math or fill out a job application.

But my point was that parents have the obligation to ensure their child get an education somehow...if not in public school, then in private or parochial schools or at home. Just enrolling your child in a public school, and then not making sure the kid actually attends does the child no good, unless you want your child being 35 and living in your basement.


63 posted on 05/22/2015 7:12:18 AM PDT by fatnotlazy
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To: ilovesarah2012

Why did they arrest the mother and not the father?


64 posted on 05/22/2015 7:15:36 AM PDT by ladyjane
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To: pepsionice
If state law was written in a fashion to hold the parents responsible...it’s this gal’s tough luck.

I am vaguely aware that there is some case moving the law in that direction but it must make all of us uneasy to impose vicarious criminal liability. Remember, this is a single mom and although she does not plead this circumstance in this case it does not take much imagination to conceive of a situation in which a single mom simply has no control over her teenage son. We see this in the ghetto every day.

I don't like the idea of punishing A for the crimes of B.


65 posted on 05/22/2015 7:24:04 AM PDT by nathanbedford ("Attack, repeat, attack!" Bull Halsey)
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To: fatnotlazy
There is the moral obligation to educate one’s child, of course.

But...Should there be a government obligation? I say, “No!”, for five reasons:

1) Government obligation means police force and court action. That **is** what government **is**.

2) Government schooling violates every First Amendment Right of the child and the parent. The risk to **all** the children is that they become comfortable with government functionaries violating their constitutional rights.

3) Government hasn't done a very good job with kids who don't want to learn and come from families who don't support education.

4) There have **never** been studies that prove government schools teach anything at all. Please read my post #42. It is entirely possible that the only thing government schools do is send home a very expensive curriculum that is followed **in the home**.

5) Godless government schools teach child to think and reason godlessly. The child must just to cooperate in the godless environment. How could be otherwise?

66 posted on 05/22/2015 7:24:04 AM PDT by wintertime (Stop treating government teachers like they are reincarnated Mother Teresas!)
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To: Darren McCarty; theBuckwheat
Please read Post #53 by theBuckwheat. It is excellent.

Behind every government teacher stands an armed policeman with real bullets in those guns on the hip. That is what government compulsion is. That is what government compulsory education laws are!

67 posted on 05/22/2015 7:29:40 AM PDT by wintertime (Stop treating government teachers like they are reincarnated Mother Teresas!)
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To: wintertime
Agreed. It galds me that I have to pay taxes for this.
68 posted on 05/22/2015 7:57:51 AM PDT by fatnotlazy
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To: justlittleoleme

I have to think that the situation you describe may have reflected your children not a general rule. Your kids may have had other issues like an unhappy atmosphere at school, homework undone, test not studied for etc if this was a chronic problem.

I had 4, one of whom homeschooled due to illness after grade 8. If my kids said they were sick they were, unless when young they were occasionally unprepared for an assignment or test, which was my first investigation when a forehead wasn’t hot to the touch.

However when a child had an issue with a teacher or clique dynamics it most frequently presented with a sudden repeated passionate tries to skip school until I uncovered the underlying issue and communicated with the school/helped work out interpersonal issues.

Like every other time bureaucrats are involved the rules get more and more convoluted and the lack of flexibility means that the rules are the king not the education or the student’s well being. Schools are trying to do an impossible job and are destructive while trying to convince themselves that they know what they are doing and its best for the children.


69 posted on 05/22/2015 7:59:58 AM PDT by JayGalt
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To: wintertime
I don't understand compulsory education laws.

You sure make a lot of noise about something you admit you don't understand.

70 posted on 05/22/2015 11:03:09 AM PDT by humblegunner (NOW with even more AWESOMENESS)
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To: ladyjane

I asked that same question but haven’t heard anyone else ask her.


71 posted on 05/22/2015 1:12:09 PM PDT by ilovesarah2012
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To: PLMerite

So you say it’s a good idea to shackle a woman whose child missed too much school? Do you also favor tasering old people during routine traffic stops?


72 posted on 05/22/2015 3:13:23 PM PDT by Rides_A_Red_Horse (Why do you need a fire extinguisher when you can call the fire department?)
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To: ilovesarah2012

Since when is a doctor’s note required for your kid’s school absence?


73 posted on 05/22/2015 6:24:21 PM PDT by ViLaLuz (2 Chronicles 7:14)
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To: justlittleoleme
I went through a period like that. Always somewhat of a rebel and just bored outta my mind in school. I skipped...a lot. And to be honest, there was not much my mother (or father) could have done to keep me there. My school was way out in an rural area and we'd leave first thing in the morning and walk back into the town/city. She'd drop me off to ensure I would get there, I'd still leave.

To hold her responsible would have been pretty unfair to her. Was she responsible? Sure, partly in a much deeper sense but it was also just my nature to rebel.

74 posted on 05/23/2015 8:17:08 AM PDT by riri (Obama's Amerika--Not a fun place.)
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To: ilovesarah2012

OMG, we have gone nuts. This should make the teachers’ unions happy. They blame all public school failures on parents so they can go on being abusive and incompetent.

Even though her son gets a’s and b’s, it is the mother who is guilty of everything and anything, even nothing at all. No way should they legally harass a student or parent when the kid is making A’s and B’s. This is insanity.

I know money is important, but if you can rescue your child and family from public schools, do it. You won’t be sorry. They are getting worse and worse.

The first son is super smart and sucks up knowledge like a sponge. He knew more about everything than most of his teachers. He did alright in a high end public school in AP courses and also took some jr. college courses.

The youngest, by second grade, was threatened with Ritalin so I pulled him out and taught him at home. He did fine and did not end up a drug addict. He also had allergies, got headaches and missed some school and they always harassed us.

When he came home to learn, his allergies and headaches almost immediately disappeared. (We figure he was allergic to his smelly teacher. : ) He recently graduated from college. When he got out of public school, I felt I was released from a State mommy prison.


75 posted on 05/24/2015 10:46:48 AM PDT by SaraJohnson
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To: SaraJohnson

Home schooling is much better for kids.


76 posted on 05/24/2015 6:15:40 PM PDT by ilovesarah2012
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