Posted on 07/19/2005 9:34:10 AM PDT by AbeKrieger
CAMDEN, N.J. — Three boys who suffocated in a car trunk last month were alive for at least 17 hours, slowly succumbing while police searched their neighborhood, a lawyer for the family of one of the boys says. Lawyer Peter M. Villari told The New York Times that officials of the Camden County prosecutor's office went over details of an autopsy report with him, the newspaper reported Tuesday. The boys, ages 5, 6 and 11, disappeared from the yard where they were playing a little after 5 p.m. on June 22. Their deaths were ruled accidental. Relatives searched for the boys for three hours and then called authorities. A two-day search that included dogs, helicopters and boats on the nearby Delaware River ended when the father of one of the boys found them dead in the trunk of an inoperable car sitting just feet from where they had been playing. The autopsy report, which has not been released publicly, found that the boys died between 10:30 a.m. on June 23 and 2:30 a.m. on June 24, Villari said. That estimate was based on fluid and tissue samples and weather data, he said. Villari told the newspaper that responsibility for the deaths is now "squarely on the shoulders of the police." "I think the numbers speak for themselves," he said. "They were certainly alive when the police arrived and certainly well after the search started." Villari did no immediately return a call seeking additional comment Tuesday. The prosecutors' office had no immediate comment.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
"I'll put you on my prayer list."
I will do the same since some of these cops you want punished are probably Christians as well (If you are a Christian).
You go after these officers (Who did not do anything intentionally wrong) with great zeal that they should "pay" for what they did. How Christian of you!
I'm not blaming the kids here but I don't understand why they weren't making noise trying to be heard - especially during the first few hours.
(If what I just wrote makes you sad or angry,
Intriguing question, but it seems pretty safe to say that no search warrants of any kind would be legally necessary once a citizen invites the police into a missing person(s) search. At that point the cops have been "hired on," so to speak, to help search, and no property would be exempt from their examination.
Clearly no one, neither the police nor the family, asked the commonsense question "Did anybody check the trunk?" The question then becomes who's responsible for not asking that question and carrying out that task. The police, who just arrived on the scene and had no prior knowledge of any of the principals involved or of the property? Or the family, who knew the boys play habits intimately, knew the environs, and had been looking at that abandoned car in the yard for years? It seems abuntantly clear to me that any parent with half a brain would search any and all spaces on the property big enough to contain a child within the first twenty minutes of becoming aware that a child was missing.
The police may have made a flawed assumption. I'm willing to admit that much. They may have wrongly assumed that the parents and other responsible adults in the neighborhood had half a brain.
In the hierarchy of responsibiliy for this tragedy, the parents hold the top position by a mile. It turns my stomach to find that they are now looking to get paid by the taxpayers for their own negligence.
The question isn't how long they searched, the question is how effective was their search. I'll state again, my point is that it would seem the police erred in not conducting a thorough search of the vehicle. However, it would be interesting to learn whether or not the police were even authorized to search the trunk.
Agreed. It is hardly a gem of a city.
"I agree.....parents are responsible
1. Had the kids played in this trunk before?"
I agree too. Geez, too much expectations are placed on Americas over burdened law enforcement and at the same time the insane negligent schizo citizens of America despise the very same law enforcement they want to wipe their whiney poopy butts 24-7.
If those kids had climbed into the trunk of a parked squad car the parents would being sipping frozen strawberry margaritias on some exotic beach with their windfall law$uit.
I just hate this story.
So true...and hey I love your page!!!! :)
The police were called 3 hours after the search began. The car probably wasn't the first thing that was searched. So in reality, the 3 boys could have been unconscious by that time and not making any noise at all. Hindsight is always a great teacher, the trunk should have been searched by someone, albeit the police or parent. The police should not be held liable for this tragedy.
It said they were alive for 17 hours and then they suffocated. I have been inside many trunks and one might die of dehydration, but not suffocation.
According to you, since they failed to find the children, their search was ineffective.
Shouldn't cops be required to search until the missing child is found?
Wow, you are really grasping. Again, I'll note for you my point- it would seem that the police erred by not conducting a more thorough search of the vehicle. If you mean to ask about other cases in all recorded history, then the answer to your strawman of a question is, as you are aware, there are unsolved cases and each case depends on variables that the police should thoroughly investigate.
Which sat in the front yard of the mother's house, unlocked, for the whole world to search, including the mother.
They probably never expected the kids to be IN THE %#$$@ FRONT YARD FIVE FEET FROM WHERE THEY WERE SPEAKING WITH THE %#&^@ MOTHER!!!!
Are you saying the cops are more responsible for this tragedy than the mother?
Maybe the "lawyer for the family" would like to sue...THE FAMILY?
I would love to hear you take the excuses of officers working for you if you were the police chief.
"How was I supposed to find the kids in the car, Sarge? I ain't got no x-ray vision."
If the cops missed a concealed gun when searching a killer: "Sorry, Sarge. How was I supposed to see under his shirt? I ain't Superman with that x-ray vision thing!"
how long would you want them to search for your missing child?
It's obvious you are not exactly civic minded or logical.
No, the cops are only responsible from the time they showed up and took over.
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