Posted on 04/28/2008 7:58:13 AM PDT by mombyprofession
If you watch much television, you've probably heard of a product called Mike's Hard Lemonade.
And if you ask Christopher Ratte and his wife how they lost custody of their 7-year-old son, the short version is that nobody in the Ratte family watches much television.
The way police and child protection workers figure it, Ratte should have known that what a Comerica Park vendor handed over when Ratte ordered a lemonade for his boy three Saturdays ago contained alcohol, and Ratte's ignorance justified placing young Leo in foster care until his dad got up to speed on the commercial beverage industry.
Even if, in hindsight, that decision seems a bit, um, idiotic.
Ratte is a tenured professor of classical archaeology at the University of Michigan, which means that, on a given day, he's more likely to be excavating ancient burial sites in Turkey than watching "Dancing with the Stars" - or even the History Channel, for that matter.
(Excerpt) Read more at wzzm13.com ...
Foster care is not abduction.
Again, in Detroit - for obvious reasons - there is very little leeway in the law.
To me what is truly bizarre is that the university was not able to get a top-notch attorney to get an injunction against the child services administration within hours.
Most firms I've worked for would have done that for an employee once he explained the situation to management.
It’s bottled to look like a soft drink. You probably wouldn’t know it was alcohol unless you searched the label.
i’d agree with your 15 minutes assessment.
if everyone was really worried about the wellbeing of the child, why is the father not sitting in jail on “contributing to the delinquency of a minor” charges?
Oh well...let this guy go, but hammer the trailer trash that might watch TV.
That's what I gather from this line.
It functionally is beer, flavored like lemonade. You'd think someone with the education for a PHD would be able to discern the 'hard' part of the lemonade. I wonder what else he got from the vendor when he purchased the Mike's. Maybe Dad had a coke.
I know. I looked up an image of it online and it says “Malt Beverage” on it. But I’ve known for years that it was an alcoholic beverage. Anything that’s ‘hard’ is, hard sauce, hard lemonade, hard cider. I’m just amazed that a professor didn’t know that (and I truly think it was an honest mistake on his part).
It is bottled in a beer bottle.
I believe that Ratte had no clue it was an alcoholic beverage, but it is not deceptively packaged.
I agree. I meant that if the kid were openly drinking a cup of beer at a stadium, there would probably be people thinking it was terrible and have said something. But because it was ‘lemonade’, nothing should have been done. I’m surprised at Dad’s non-knowledge too.
Becasue the focus of the law is actually on the well-being of the child and not on punishing the parent.
How could one argue that a law that focused primarily on locking parents up was motivated solely by the child's well-being?
Looks a lot like a soda.
I'd suggest that the parents sue, but it was probably the fear of a lawsuit that caused the officer, people at the park, and CPS to handle things the way they did.
It's hard to be glad that it didn't take longer to sort out what should have taken moments, but when lots of people that know very little about what really happened all go overboard trying to do what is in the best interests of the child, things can get very screwed up, and can take a while to straiten out.
Looks like a snapple.
If this hard lemonade was an alcoholic beverage, wouldn’t the dad have been carded when he ordered it?
The Comerica cop estimated that Leo had drunk about 12 ounces of the hard lemonade, which is 5% alcohol. But an ER resident who drew Leo's blood less than 90 minutes after he and his father were escorted from their seats detected no trace of alcohol.
Not a very good commercial for Mikes Hard Lemonade.
Good thing about this is that everyone involved are probably flaming liberals. Maybe now they'll question some of the crap flowing from the little fiefdoms that are so purvasive throughout local government.
removing of a child from an upstanding family over something like this is abduction. CPS, the cop that recommended it and the judge that signed off on it should be facing charges.
this is pure and simple abuse of the system. a short interview with the family should have sufficed.
and don’t tell me there’s little leeway in the law. the decision is based on recommendation of CPS and police. if it was this bad, what’s the father being charged with? how much jail time is he facing?
No, many people havent.
I dunno . . . I think one would have to be pretty dense not to realize that a drink called "Mike's Hard Lemonade" is an alcoholic beverage.
I doubt he said “Why don’t you give me a Mike’s Hard Lemondae”
He probably said “Lemonade”
The vendor handed it to him and didn’t think that the seven year old was going to be drinking it.
The good professor probably didn’t even glance at the label as he navigated his way to his seats and handed the bottle to his son.
it also comes in a 16oz plastic bottle
To me, it appears bottled similar to beer, not soda. There must have been signs there somewhere saying over 21 only, no? And if I was unfamiliar with the brand, I would certainly read the label. So many beverages these days contain high amounts of caffeine or other ingredients I would not want to consume. The father should have known exactly what he was giving his child. He is smart enough to read a label.
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