Posted on 08/03/2017 10:18:51 AM PDT by rey
A man remained in the Mendocino County jail Wednesday for allegedly tying his diaper-clad 2-year-old son to a tree branch without access to food or water.
Jeffery Wilson, 27, of Willits, is being held on suspicion of felony child abuse, possession of a controlled substance and trespass, according to the Mendocino County Sheriff’s Office.
Deputies said they discovered the child July 27 in an illegal encampment along Highway 20 near Willits. The property owner previously had reported the encampment and deputies had warned Wilson and the other two adults staying there — believed to be the child’s mother and grandmother — to clean up and leave.
When deputies were called out again last week, the child was found secured to a tree branch by a rope tied to his right wrist, sheriff’s officials said. Wilson was sleeping on the ground nearby.
Deputies said they also found several weapons and other dangerous items within the child’s reach.
The child was taken into protective custody. Two dogs also were removed from the encampment, officials said.
“Deputies said they also found several weapons and other dangerous items within the child’s reach.”
At least the kid could defend himself.
It sounds like the child had an area in which he could roam. My mother had me on a leash with a muzzle until I was 2 years old.
Sounds like a potentially bad situation and I’m not going to try and defend it, but I will point out that in previous generations, typing children to porches was not that unusual. Let them be outside. But don’t let them run away and get into trouble. It was seen as a reasonable compromise. But we live in a different age now.
He left the weapons in reach of the child, so the cops wouldn’t shoot his dogs.
What if a bear had found the child?
Now doubt it was a bad scene.
However
I had a younger brother whom at around 4 years old, used to sneak out of the house in the early morning and go long distance around our neighborhood seeking new places to play (flower beds) with his bucket, toy shovel and toy cars.
Usually this was only discovered after an older brother and I finished morning paper routes, would be sitting having our breakfast and mom would come out and ask where our little brother was. Usually we assumed he was still in bed, but mom was asking because he wasn’t.
Usually a not so major search would find him at a nearby neighbors house.
One day, his absence was not noticed until after dad had left for work - usually between 7 and 8. A search on our block didn’t find him. Neither did a more extensive search with the help of neighbors.
Dad was called to come home and the police were called too. Our little brother was found.
My dad had never been more angry - the worry our brother had put mom and dad through.
But dad’s solution horrified us older kids.
He got a very long rope, tied one end around our brother’s waist and the other around a tree in the back yard. He instructed my mom and us that that was where our brother was to remain from whenever he finished his breakfast to whenever my dad got home. Mom could let him in for the bathroom and take his lunch out to the tree. My brother and I were required to check on where he was when we got up to do our routes and when we finished them. Dad didn’t answer how long this would last. His answer was “until I say different”.
The sight of my little brother tied to the tree, no matter how long the rope (about 25 feet), made some of us cry.
True story.
The parents in the story don’t sound like charming characters, and I am not making any excuses for them, but I have experienced, personally, the huge grief and concern of parents whose kid is missing only because, at a real immature age, they wandered far from home.
So cops somewhere still enforce these things, eh?
Every so often, I see a parent, usually a Mom, walking through a grocery store with her child on a short, thin leash. It still happens. I can see why people do it, as some preschoolers can move very quickly, and may get lost.
The Mom and leashed child are always stared at by other people.
This is seen as frequently (meaning almost not at all) as seeing a pet owner walking a collar wearing Cat.
I have seen that only three times in my life.
Each time, either the owner was very old, or the cat was still a kitten. Cat’s do not heel very well, and can be moody walkers.
now the .gov will get to own, control and drug this child-victim for the next 17yrs . ..
My mom had 5 kids within 6 years, as well. When we went with her to the grocery, we would (apparently) all scatter throughout the store. She bought some kind of leash thing that she only had to use ONCE on us, at the grocery. After that, we all stayed with her.
I had a child harness for my toddlers. It was beautiful, leather and padded underneath the straps. Without it I would have been a basket case with a toddler and a baby. I had bought it in Italy. Today I would be afraid to use it.
Our fourth child was like that. Many moments of extreme anxiety for us when she was between the ages of two and five.
We had to put eye hooks on all the exterior doors because she would get up and explore between 1 and 5am. Freezing to death in a Minnesota winter or drowning in the lake while we slept were very real possibilities for her.
She was also like a little mountain goat in a shopping cart. No buckle could contain her. I tried using a harness and leash in the grocery store but she just lay quietly on the floor. I would have had to drag her. Briefly considered it because she would have thought it a game, but knew someone would report me for abuse.
We were so relieved when she grew out of that!
One can always count on a dumbass showing up and saying something stupid.
It was better than letting the child roam away and out into the street. Lots of kids have been put on leashes in the past but today the nanny state can’t have kids safe. I was put in a high chair while granny got her housework done. She’d put me in the hallway which had easily cleaned linoleum. I could see the tv and the front porch and had snacks and a drink. I remember being happy, not mistreated.
Just turn this guy loose in the general prison population. Case closed.
Dang....everybody knows you got to leave food and water.....
Yeah, it seems this is more than “kid tied to tree.”
Dad was asleep. Weapons I guess accessible. Food? Water? was that child being kept safe? An illegal encampment they’d been warned about. . .
I don’t think this is like mom using a harness in a supermarket.
My mom used a leash on me when I was two, we were touring Europe. We joke about it but there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. It does not harm a child and in situations mentioned above and in crowds, very practical.
I keep thinking of little Adam Walsh in a dept store.....
In less than a minute, as his granddad got distracted, an evil child predator swooped down and escorted little Adam to a brutal death.
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