Should a 10-year-old be charged for Southern CA's fire?

[KellyC]

By MICHAEL LINDENBERGER Wed Nov 7, 2:40 PM ET

The 10-year-old boy who accidentally started one of the worst California wildfires last month could face stern consequences, should prosecutors decide to bring charges. Though too young to be charged as an adult, the boy could still face millions of dollars in fines, removal from his home and possible detention as a ward of the state. For now the boy's fate - and that of his parents, who would be partially liable for any restitution payments he would have to pay - rests with Los Angeles County District Attorney Steve Cooley. His office told TIME he has not yet decided how to proceed. "The matter is under review," spokeswoman Sandi Gibbons told TIME on Monday. "No decision has been made."

To bring those charges, all Cooley must decide is whether the boy knew right from wrong - an easy standard to meet, other prosecutors in the state say. "That is a lot easier to establish than you would think," said Cyndi Jo Means, a deputy district attorney in nearby San Diego County who leads that county's juvenile division arson team. "Think of your own children, even very small children; most of the time they know when they did something wrong."

Despite the low hurdle to prosecution, Means contends the California juvenile justice system seeks to help young suspects, who can benefit from counseling and close supervision from the court and case workers. Children under 14 are nearly always charged as juveniles, not adults - no matter what the crime. "We try to help the child, and prosecuting them as adults would not be very helpful," Means said. Any finding of guilt, she added, would not follow the boy into adulthood.

Southern Californians are still sorting through the wreckage from the fires, which burned more than 800 square miles - an area 40 times as large as Manhattan - and destroyed some 2,100 homes. The 10-year-old's carelessness sparked the Buckweed fire in Los Angeles County, which destroyed 21 homes and injured at least three people. Those losses have left some residents in a less than forgiving mood. "If you accidentally set a massive fire that destroys homes, causes residents to flee for their lives and requires millions of dollars in resources to extinguish, then you damn well need to pay the piper," wrote Dave Bossert on his online newspaper, The West Ranch Beacon.

Peter Arenella, a professor at the UCLA Law School said any prosecution of a 10-year-old that aims to punish the boy, rather than help him, "is an absurdity. The only justification for that would be if, in some extreme case, there was a need to protect society from him." Barring that, he said, prosecutors should be reluctant to sweep the boy up into the legal system.

It's hard to see how stern consequences - taking the boy from his parents, for instance, and handing down a multi-million fine - would be helpful to the 10-year-old. Much of the decision of whether to prosecute him rests with Cooley, who like prosecutors everywhere has a great deal of discretion. Unless uglier details about the boy's behavior are discovered, he could decide that in this case playing with matches doesn't rise the level of arson - even if the boy admits he knew that doing so was wrong. As Means points out, children almost always admit they knew their actions were wrong when they are questioned by police or prosecutors, which can be a scary experience for a kid.

When the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the death penalty for inmates who were under 18 when they committed their crimes, it argued that teenagers' brains are not fully formed until they are grown, and that punishing them as adults was therefore cruel and unusual. No one is saying a 10-year-old boy ought to be executed for setting a fire, but even the lesser punishment the boy is facing could be nearly as cruel. That has led some to argue that the bar for prosecution ought to be higher than simply proving that he knew right from wrong. Boys know lots of things are wrong - from ignoring bedtimes to eating too many cookies. A better standard, some argue, would be determining whether the boy, at 10, had any way of knowing the consequences of what he was doing with those matches. With reporting by Jill Underwood/San Diego

http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/2007110...XnNGu2jEGs0NUE

This is a tough one. I definitely don't think he should be criminally charged for what he did even if it is established that he knows what he did was wrong. I certainly don't think he should be free from liability either. Would it be "right" to fine him millions of dollars or send him to state detention centers as suggested in the article? After all, "he's just a kid." And what of the parents? Should the victims have a say in this?

[Frosstbyte]

Wow, that's a nasty one. I'm inclined to think that punishment should reflect foreseeable consequences and I'm not at all sure that a 10 year old would ever be able to foresee that starting a fire during a dry, windy period could cause a fire like that one. I understand that people are scared and hurt and lost a lot, but, really, fires of that size-no matter what exactly starts them-are kind of along the same lines as a hurricane or an earthquake, in my mind.

The article is pretty vague about what the kid did. I guess I'd see sense in throwing the book at him and his parents if he'd poured gasoline in the backyard and set it ablaze or had done something equally reckless and out of control. If he was just lighting matches or trying to light a small fire or something, I really think it makes no sense. A significant (but not crushing) fine and some serious counseling and some community service would do wonders to making him understand what he did without ruining his (and his parents') lives.

Punishing a person for everything that led to the catastrophic scale of the fires defies the purpose of a justice system which is to punish in line with the severity of the action. Hopefully reason and not revenge will prevail.

[SecretMethod70]

Originally Posted by Frosstbyte

Wow, that's a nasty one. I'm inclined to think that punishment should reflect foreseeable consequences and I'm not at all sure that a 10 year old would ever be able to foresee that starting a fire during a dry, windy period could cause a fire like that one. I understand that people are scared and hurt and lost a lot, but, really, fires of that size-no matter what exactly starts them-are kind of along the same lines as a hurricane or an earthquake, in my mind.

The article is pretty vague about what the kid did. I guess I'd see sense in throwing the book at him and his parents if he'd poured gasoline in the backyard and set it ablaze or had done something equally reckless and out of control. If he was just lighting matches or trying to light a small fire or something, I really think it makes no sense. A significant (but not crushing) fine and some serious counseling and some community service would do wonders to making him understand what he did without ruining his (and his parents') lives.

Punishing a person for everything that led to the catastrophic scale of the fires defies the purpose of a justice system which is to punish in line with the severity of the action. Hopefully reason and not revenge will prevail.

quoted for truth

[Fast Forward]

Originally Posted by KellyC

Should a 10-year-old be charged for Southern CA's fire?

I taught my children not to play with matches so if I caught them lighting the things up you can be sure I'd punish them. So why should this 10-year old be treated any differently?

[MageB420666]

But which response will get more viewer/public sympathy? /sarcasm

Honestly, it all depends on the situation. There are some 10 yr. olds that deserve life in prison because they will never change, and there are some that just made a mistake. It all depends on more facts than are provided.

[Fast Forward]

I agree with you.

[MSD]

I did some dumb shit when I was 10, and I still haven't outgrown playing with fire. I knew that my parents couldn't be anywhere, and when they weren't where I was, there was a good chance that I would be out in the back yard tossing fireworks into groups of army men, making paper sculptures and throwing flaming paper airplanes at them, or writing words in lighter fluid and watching my work go up in flames.

I understood that fire could cause serious damage, and I kept a gallon of water and a fire extinguisher nearby so I could stop something before I burned down the house like the woman across the street did when she was a kid. On the other hand, my understanding was that fire + fire extinguisher = safe, not even close to a full comprehension of what I could do by playing with fire in an area with a few trees.* I'm lucky I didn't start a serious fire.


* - heavy sarcasm. this is my neighborhood.
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[ratbastid]

Originally Posted by Fast Forward

I taught my children not to play with matches so if I caught them lighting the things up you can be sure I'd punish them. So why should this 10-year old be treated any differently?

A swat on the behind or a week without TV is a little different from millions of dollars in fines and being taken from your parents.

The kid's learned his lesson by now, I'm quite sure. You really think he'll do that again?

[Ustwo]

Was he melting his action figures and it got out of hand, or did he dump a gallon of gas on the landscaping and light it?

Way to vague.

Did the kid have a history of starting fires and the parents ignored it? Was he on medications that they didn't make him take? etc etc etc.

The story as is, is meaningless.

[Bill O'Rights]

Originally Posted by Ustwo

Way to vague.

The story as is, is meaningless.

I agree. It's impossible for me to formulate an opinion without the background information. While I feel fairly safe in assuming that the kid did not set out with the intention of burning up a 800 square mile chunk of California, it'd still be nice to know what exactly did set off the event. Without that information, all I can do is shrug my shoulders.

[Fast Forward]

Originally Posted by ratbastid

The kid's learned his lesson by now, I'm quite sure. You really think he'll do that again?

A more interesting question is .... Are you really sure that he won't?

I agree that an "adult's punishment" should not be metted out to children - but a "child's punishment" should be. What sort of punishment is it that will increase the chances of it being a lesson for a life-time ... even for a ten-year-old?

[genuinegirly]

ok... just a second...

let's reflect on the nature of the situation.

The coastal sage scrub of SoCal is a fire-adapted plant community. It builds up dead plant material so when the stray spark flies, it can burst into flame immediately. Once burned, it has a variety of methods to regrow quickly - root-sprouting, and more. Seed germination in most of the species found there are enhanced, if not triggered, by the chemicals found in the smoke. This plant community follows a natural cycle of fire and regrowth. Depending upon rain and drought, this cycle - which ends and begins in fire - will take anywhere from 10 to 25 years to complete. Invading species have no chance of surviving, unless they too are fire-adapted. We're an invading species. Are we fire adapted? Why do so many people choose to live in a region where their homes are destined to be burned every 10-25 years? Why aren't these people informed?

Now... should you prosecute a 10 year old kid for starting a fire that could have just as easily started by two dry blades of grass rubbing?

[ratbastid]

Originally Posted by Fast Forward

What sort of punishment is it that will increase the chances of it being a lesson for a life-time ... even for a ten-year-old?

I guarantee you, the answer to that question is something OTHER THAN millions of dollars in fines and being thrown into the state foster care system. Talk about pouring gas on the fire.

I agree with Ustwo (it happens often enough that I'm over being surprised by it) that we don't know enough about the nature of the kid or the firestarting to form a very meaningful conclusion. I'm assuming that the fire-playing was relatively innocent, and that it wasn't intended to destroy any property. If that's the case, then the media attention and the threat of massively serious consequences is, in my opinion, punishment enough. For a normal, non-problem kid to have accidentally caused this sort of devastation, be found out about it, and be the subject of huge legal and media attention and be threatened with separation from his family? Yeah... I feel pretty confident that kid's learned his lesson already. He's got to be completely terrified by all this.

Now, if he's a hooligan who started the fire maliciously or to destroy property, that's another issue. But they're calling it an accident, so... Again, we're forced to draw conclusions from a vanishingly small data set.

[abaya]

Originally Posted by genuinegirly

ok... just a second...

let's reflect on the nature of the situation.

The coastal sage scrub of SoCal is a fire-adapted plant community. It builds up dead plant material so when the stray spark flies, it can burst into flame immediately. Once burned, it has a variety of methods to regrow quickly - root-sprouting, and more. Seed germination in most of the species found there are enhanced, if not triggered, by the chemicals found in the smoke. This plant community follows a natural cycle of fire and regrowth. Depending upon rain and drought, this cycle - which ends and begins in fire - will take anywhere from 10 to 25 years to complete. Invading species have no chance of surviving, unless they too are fire-adapted. We're an invading species. Are we fire adapted? Why do so many people choose to live in a region where their homes are destined to be burned every 10-25 years? Why aren't these people informed?

Now... should you prosecute a 10 year old kid for starting a fire that could have just as easily started by two dry blades of grass rubbing?

You beat me to it... in one of my classes, we looked at the horrible forest/fire management practices in that area and even in many national parks, etc... and yeah, there are a LOT more people (including Smokey the Bear) at fault than just a 10 year old. If it area was being managed properly, a kid playing with matches would NOT have started a conflagration of that size.

[kurty[B]]

Some punishment is in order. Jail time is nonsense, millions in fines is nonsense.

For a perspective. I, along with a bunch of my friends (ages 8-12) trashed our old babysitter's house one day. She was not home, we smashed windows, we TP'ed the home, we set dog shit in a paper bag on her porch on fire (we didn't realize this trick was supposed to be done when someone was home to stomp it out). It caught the toilet paper on fire, which then caught the front of the house on fire. We were long gone when the fire department showed up, but damage to the house was minimal. A much different scenario as what we did was intentional, but we did not get sent to jail or juvenile hall and if we had I'm sure that would have just been worse, we had to do community service and pay for the repairs to her home (about $800 out of each of our pockets; there were over ten of us involved). The monetary loss (my parents made me use my savings, and work my ass off all summer to cover it), had more impact than any jailtime would have.

I think in this case, a minimal fine (enough to impact the child's life, but not bankrupt the family), and mandatory community service time (trail building, tree planting) something to keep him occupied every other weekend for half a year would probably let him know (I'm sure he already does at this point) that what he did (accident or no) was not safe or permissible.

[Willravel]

As long as he's not tried as an adult and his parents are punished, I'm fine. He's caused so much pain and suffering, whether it was accidental or not.

[Bill O'Rights]

Originally Posted by willravel

As long as he's not tried as an adult and his parents are punished, I'm fine.

and...his...parents...are...punished???

[Willravel]

If he's liable for any of this his parents are, too. He's a minor and as such his parents take partial responsibility for his actions, legally. From a less legal perspective, this is an obvious case for "WATCH YOUR FUCKING KIDS". He's 10 years old and was completely unsupervised. The kid should be under house arrest (state mandated grounding) and the parents should be fined $20,000.

I'm not asking for an unreasonable penalty from the child or the parents, only that they're held responsible.

[The_Jazz]

Wow, we don't even know what happened and you've got the punishment ready to go, will.

Yet another example of the internet rush to judgement.

sigh

He's the proximate cause of the fire, that much we know for sure. Whether or not he's LIABLE for the fire is something completely different. We don't know that yet. If he deliberately set it, then he is. If he didn't, well, maybe he's not liabile.

House arrest doesn't mean much to a kid unless you take away their TV, internet, phone, etc. Even then, I don't see it as much more than a passing attempt to placate the bloodthirsty mob.

When I was 10, I was unsupervised most afternoons. So were all my friends. So are most 10 year olds. It's part of growing up.

[flat5]

Some kids LOVE to play with fire. He likely had no idea his fire would get out of control. He was always able to control his previous fires. I also suppose he did this away from the eyes of his parents, etc.

He's ten and he f..ked up. If I'm right then community service might be the answer.
Perhaps moping the firehouse for awhile.

[Willravel]

Originally Posted by The_Jazz

Wow, we don't even know what happened and you've got the punishment ready to go, will.

Yet another example of the internet rush to judgement.

We know many facts of the case, and I suspect the rest will come from an investigation and litigation. My post was OBVIOUSLY a hypothetical punishment assuming that the child is guilty.

Burning down thousands of homes is thankfully not a part of growing up, though, and excusing suspected poor judgment by parents and suspected bad behavior by a child really isn't going to do anyone any good.

[Bill O'Rights]

Originally Posted by willravel

From a less legal perspective, this is an obvious case for "WATCH YOUR FUCKING KIDS". He's 10 years old and was completely unsupervised.

Awww, c'mon Will. Are you telling me that your parents knew exactly what you were up to, at any given moment, 24/7/365? I know mine didn't. And that is precisely when I would be doing crap, that hindsight now tells me, I had absolutely no business doing. And, I suspect, the same could easily be said for 99.9999% of the human population on this planet.

Look...I'm not saying that parents do not have responsibility. But, I also don't think that parents need to be punished for the misdeeds of thier offspring. Otherwise, the next generation will be bemoaning the leashes and collars that thier parents make them wear.

[Willravel]

Originally Posted by Bill O'Rights

Awww, c'mon Will. Are you telling me that your parents knew exactly what you were up to, at any given moment, 24/7/365?

At age 10? They knew where I was. I had borders and very strict punishments if I broke those borders. At age 10, I suspect it was not going beyond the block, but I can't remember for sure. Most of the time I was in the front yard shooting hoops or inside. When I did go around the corner to the park, I did so supervised. It wasn't until I was 12 that I was allowed to set my own realistic boundaries, as I had a paper route. We agreed on boundaries and I kept to them.

Originally Posted by Bill O'Rights

Look...I'm not saying that parents do not have responsibility. But, I also don't think that parents need to be punished for the misdeeds of thier offspring. Otherwise, the next generation will be bemoaning the leashes and collars that thier parents make them wear.

Legally, they are responsible, though. I'm sure you're aware of that.

Speaking outside of legality, though, you really think that parents bear no responsibility for the actions of the children they are raising? Would you say the same about the parents of the Columbine shooters? I'd say the level of destruction due to simple parental negligence is not dissimilar.

[snowy]

Originally Posted by flat5

Some kids LOVE to play with fire. He likely had no idea his fire would get out of control. He was always able to control his previous fires. I also suppose he did this away from the eyes of his parents, etc.

He's ten and he f..ked up. If I'm right then community service might be the answer.
Perhaps moping the firehouse for awhile.

Yeah, boys and girls love to play with fire. Heck, the Boy Scouts even have a supposedly secret group within their organization whose express purpose is to promote playing with fire (more or less).

I think this is a great service learning opportunity for this 10-year-old. Put him on probation with a community service requirement. It'll get taken off his record once he's an adult, but he can still learn a good lesson by serving others. Having the parents do community service alongside their son would be great for the whole family.

[Bill O'Rights]

Originally Posted by willravel

Speaking outside of legality, though, you really think that parents bear no responsibility for the actions of the children they are raising?

Originally Posted by me

Look...I'm not saying that parents do not have responsibility.

Originally Posted by willravel

Would you say the same about the parents of the Columbine shooters? I'd say the level of destruction due to simple parental negligence is not dissimilar.

Do you really think that Columbine was the result of "simple parental negligence"?

Ok...10, 12, 14, 16...whatever. At some point the parents have to look away for a moment. I recall having a bit more freedom at the age of 10 than you did, but that is subjective. I was raised in a rural area. The point was that no parent knows what their child is doing every second of the day...every day.

[Glory's Sun]

damn, if my parents knew half the shit I did when I was 10.. they'd probably be in jail for homicide.

If the kid did it on purpose, then yeah the kid should be punished severely. If he didn't, then make him do community service and slap a fine on him. Legally the parents can be held resposible, but it's unlikely that anyone will follow through with that angle.. then again.. it is California.

[Willravel]

Originally Posted by Bill O'Rights

Do you really think that Columbine was the result of "simple parental negligence"?

That was a big factor, of course.

Originally Posted by dksuddeth

Ok...10, 12, 14, 16...whatever. At some point the parents have to look away for a moment. I recall having a bit more freedom at the age of 10 than you did, but that is subjective. I was raised in a rural area. The point was that no parent knows what their child is doing every second of the day...every day.

...but they can teach them simple fire safety. I played with fire, too, but I did it in a rather controlled environment. I was near water and I didn't play with anything that I couldn't put out.

[Frosstbyte]

I think Columbine should be the new Godwin Law whenever children are involved. Did you seriously compare a kid who may or may not have done anything seriously wrong to two kids who deliberately plotted to slaughter their classmates?

I don't want to go down the Columbine road here, but not watching your kid every second of every day does not make you a horrible parent who is unleashing a ravaging monster on the world. SOMETHING happened here which caused whatever this kid was doing to have consequences far beyond what anyone would usually expect to happen from setting a fire. If you teach a kid about fire safety, I think we can all agree that you would generally say, "You'll burn down the house and might hurt yourself." Reasonably you can extend that to the neighboring houses.

But again, can you really turn that into knowing that it would start a catastrophic wildfire that would rampage across thousands of acres because of horribly dry conditions and about the worst weather luck anyone could conceive of? Really, short of the kid having doused his backyard in gasoline (or someone's house or his own house, etc.) and running around cackling like mad as he threw firecrackers into the holocaust, I see no reason that a punishment exactly like the one Snowy laid out wouldn't be completely appropriate.

[mixedmedia]

Originally Posted by Bill O'Rights

and...his...parents...are...punished???

When my two oldest daughters were about 10 and 7 they broke our neighbor's camera and I was the one who had to pay to replace it.

Them breaking it was an accident even though they shouldn't have been handling the camera. They received a lecture and a few weekends of being grounded.

The article above states that this was an accident even though, obviously, he was doing something he shouldn't have been doing.

Now breaking a camera does not really compare to starting this fire, but it's highly likely that this little boy didn't think anything more about playing with fire than my kids did about playing with someone else's valuable property. Kids do things without thinking about the consequences. It is seeing them go bad that makes them learn. Unfortunately, this was a really hard lesson. I don't doubt he is very troubled by the knowledge of what he did.

New information supporting the fact that this kid did something malicious aside, I don't see the child being punished by law-enforcement or the state in any way other than community service. And trying to draw blood from a stone in the form of millions of dollars from his parents seems unproductive, as well.

This is just a very unfortunate circumstance.

[Fast Forward]

Originally Posted by genuinegirly

ok... just a second...

Now... should you prosecute a 10 year old kid for starting a fire that could have just as easily started by two dry blades of grass rubbing?

Good question. I don't know. Should we prosecute a murderer who's taken the life of someone who might just as easlily have died of a natural heart-attack? - or falling off a cliff?

Originally Posted by ratbastid

I guarantee you, the answer to that question is something OTHER THAN millions of dollars in fines and being thrown into the state foster care system. Talk about pouring gas on the fire.

You're probably right. But then we're back to the subject of whether the American capitalist system is really a just one. It doesn't look as thought it is. Money, money, money. Them's whose got it and them's who don't.

[Ustwo]

Originally Posted by Fast Forward

You're probably right. But then we're back to the subject of whether the American capitalist system is really a just one. It doesn't look as thought it is. Money, money, money. Them's whose got it and them's who don't.

What in tarnation does a unsupervised kid starting a fire have to do with the American capitalist system?

I suppose the damage would have been less had America not been capitalist, as people would not have the money for expensive homes to burn down, but Jiminy Cricket, some of you like to stretch everything into a political discussion.

[dlish]

ustwos been making more sense lately.. is it just me or do other people notice this too?

[genuinegirly]

Fast Forward, you and I have very different opinions on this matter.

You're much more of a sensationalist. I do not see how murder relates to a 10-year-old kid playing with matches.

Murder, by definition, is pre-planned killing - something entirely different than manslaughter, which is probably (?) what you meant. Even that is a poor comparison.

Prosecuting the kid places blame, which is what people want right after a disaster.

[MSD]

Originally Posted by genuinegirly

Why do so many people choose to live in a region where their homes are destined to be burned every 10-25 years?

Just like people asking "why would you build a city there" after Katrina hit New Orleans, I think you know the answer.

Originally Posted by Bill O'Rights

Do you really think that Columbine was the result of "simple parental negligence"?

It wasn't the only cause, but if that factor weren't present, it couldn't have happened.

Originally Posted by dlishsguy

ustwos been making more sense lately.. is it just me or do other people notice this too?

He's been making a lot of sense for a while, he just started being nicer about it.

[Fast Forward]

Originally Posted by genuinegirly

Fast Forward ..... You're much more of a sensationalist.

Perhaps. But I just think that one analogy deserves another. I'm not critizing the other one but it was an over-simplification, so I submitted one that goes in the other direction. What's wrong with that?

If analogies are meant to make one think more then mine was just as good as the other one.

Originally Posted by Ustwo

What in tarnation does a unsupervised kid starting a fire have to do with the American capitalist system?

It has to do with the earlier statement about the "cost" the child has caused. Americans tend to put too much weight on monetary costs and exert not nearly enough investment on the quality of living.

[Baraka_Guru]

Originally Posted by dlishsguy

ustwos been making more sense lately.. is it just me or do other people notice this too?

Yes, Ustwo's stock is rising....