Florida News

We have two big stories going on here, and both of them involve children. I'm going to be uncharacteristically (I hope) judgmental in discussing them. The first involves a missing (and now presumed dead) 21-month-old boy, last seen in the company of his five-year-old sister and his mother's boyfriend. The boyfriend had dropped the mother off around 8:30 Thursday night at her job at a local "gentlemen's club" -- where she was presumably a stripper/dancer, although that might not have anything to do with the story -- and when he went to pick her up around two in the morning (after he ran back up to his apartment to use "powder cocaine" and left the children in the car) he claimed that the car was stolen and the toddler was gone with it. As the story has developed, it's become apparent that his story is at least somewhat false. The car was found quickly, just several miles away, with no child inside. It turns out the boyfriend had a restraining order placed against him preventing contact with the child's mother and her sister. So far the reason for the restraining order hasn't been revealed, but he does have a history of violence against women and children. Why would any woman leave her children in the care of such a man? I could see the possibility of her not knowing about his past, but his current restraining order was placed less than two months ago. She had to know about that, especially as it was intended to protect her. I wouldn't wish the death (or disappearance) of a child on anyone, but this woman had a duty to protect her children. The boyfriend has stopped cooperating with police and is in jail for child neglect at the moment. He is expected to be charged with murder. Meanwhile, the five-year-old is in her mother's custody, and the search for the missing boy continues.

The other story involves two fourteen-year-old boys who went on a fishing adventure, "most likely to the Bahamas". One mother was interviewed on tonight's evening news and said how sad it made her to think about her son out there without her, all alone and scared. So here's my question: Who lets fourteen-year-olds sail alone anywhere? Is that even legal? The boys were allegedly experienced boatsmen, but teenagers are both capricious and underdeveloped, especially in their reasoning skills. It's not so much whether they know how to pilot a boat as whether they are able to come up with solutions to problems they may encounter. Is this yet another form of "free-range parenting"? The Coast Guard has been searching for the boys from Jupiter (where, I think, they live) all the way to Jacksonville, and the last I heard was that they had searched an area the size of Indiana.

My greatest hope in both cases is that all three of these children are found -- alive, healthy, and safe. But my lesser hope is that this reminds parents of their responsibilities to their children. Children cannot -- and should not be expected to -- protect themselves from potential dangers that their parents are aware of. To think such things can't happen to their children, as opposed to other people's children, is stupid and negligent.