Posted on 07/07/2011 4:16:47 PM PDT by Do Not Make Fun Of His Ears
Four states are drafting legislation in the wake of the Casey Anthony trial which will force parents to report missing children in the first 24 hours.
Lawmakers in Florida, New York, Oklahoma and West Virginia have announced they will propose versions of the legislation, which comes in the wake of nationwide fury following the acquittal of young mother Anthony on charges that she murdered her two-year-old daughter Caylee.
The prosecution case in the Anthony trial was largely hampered by the fact that Caylee's body was found so late. The child was reported missing a full month after her family last saw her.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
There are already too many useless laws..
That’s not true at all. The whole 24 hour thing is largely myth. It’s completely false when a toddler is lost. The police will get involved immediately.
If these laws pass, the state should be required to act in those same 24 hours and if they don’t, criminal charges should be applied to those state officials who refuse to act.
Far too often, you have parents begging the police to act.
That wasn’t the case here, but it does happen far too often.
If these laws pass, the state should be required to act in those same 24 hours and if they don’t, criminal charges should be applied to those state officials who refuse to act.
Far too often, you have parents begging the police to act.
That wasn’t the case here, but it does happen far too often.
Yeah, she could get “time served and probation” for “failure of timely notification” and be in jail until July 25.
You really think anyone who murders his or her child is going to worry about this charge? “Oops, I killed Tom. I’d better tell the police he’s missing, or I’ll be breaking the law!”
I check the law in my state. California
There is NO waiting period for reporting a person missing. All California police and sheriffs’ departments must accept any report, including a report by telephone, of a missing person, including runaways, without delay and will give priority to the handling of the report.
Agreed....another stupid meaningless law that will make felons of innocent people and not save one child
Why not 24 minutes? That way, the search radius will be much smaller.
Another common sense law..
OK, so what would you like to do? Put the law in place and go back and charge her with breaking it? I’m not happy with this outcome, but the prosecutor failed to convince a jury that she committed a murder and now we’ll never have any way of knowing.
Not for that reason, but so defendants can't create their own reasonable doubt, should they go to trial.
By waiting a month for ANYONE to report the child missing, Casey increased, with each passing day, the reasonable doubt for her own case.
That shouldn't be allowed.
Reasonable doubt should occur naturally, on its own -- not self-manufactured by the defendant, to use to his/her benefit at trial.
It doesn’t have to be a federal law. We can have 57 separate state laws.
>>but the prosecutor failed to convince a jury<<
Or put another way, the jury was too stupid and/or lazy to put 2 and 2 together.
Does this really need to be a law? The only parents who don’t report their missing children are the ones who kill them. We all know that.
Whats the penalty for not complying?
If a person is insane enough not to report their kid missing after 2 or three hours, any penalty of law is not going to help.
I can see all the people waiting 23 hours before making the call, just so they wont be law breakers.
That’s what I thought, that in most places, the police require that parents must wait 24 hours before doing so.
Either the police will have to change their requirements, or parents will remain trapped in a conundrum.
What about a 15-year-old who lies and says at 5 p.m. ‘Mom, I’m going over to Suzie’s for the night. See you at dinner tomorrow.’ 6 p.m. the next day, kid’s still not home. Now it’s been 25 hours and Mom is in danger of being charged for a felony.
No, because the kid hasn’t been missing, in mom’s mind, until 6pm when she isn’t where she should be.
My kid, I would speak to the parents of Suzie and make sure she got there safe and sound, but that’s me, not necessarily good parenting.
Mom wouldn’t be in danger of being charged with a felony.
and, it’s a stupid idea for a law anyway.
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