Tammy Cooper, a stay-at-home mom who lives in La Porte, Texas, was arrested earlier this month after a neighbor reported her for allegedly letting her kids play outside on their motorized scooters unsupervised.
Cooper, who spent 18 hours in jail overnight, says she was watching her children, ages 6 and 9, from a lawn chair during the time of the incident. The family lives in a cul-de-sac, and Cooper told KPRC that the safe location was one of the reasons she had chosen to reside there.
When police showed up at Cooper's home to arrest the mother for child endangerment, her kids protested.
“My daughter had him [the police officer] around the leg saying, “Please, please don’t take my mom to jail. Please, she didn’t do anything wrong,’” Cooper told the station.
The charges against Cooper were dropped, but she is now suing the City of La Porte Police Department, the arresting officer and her neighbor for damages.
Cooper's arrest caused a bit of outrage, even making the news in Australia. On the Internet, some moms rallied to Cooper's defense, saying that she didn't deserve to be arrested for child endangerment.
"All children may not be old enough to handle such a situation, but some definitely are, and it should be a parent's right to decide if they are," Julie Ryan Evans wrote on CafeMom.
It is worth noting that some parents are proponents of a hands-off playtime.
HuffPost blogger Lenore Skenazy, who holds a class called "I Won't Supervise Your Kids," notes that it's good for children to figure out how to play on their own.
"For the last few decades, child development experts have been telling us that the crucial thing missing from kids' lives is exactly what used to fill them: Time with friends of different ages, playing outside, on their own," Skenazy wrote.
At least she was watching them. If my parents knew that I was making jumps and bombing down the hill into Fish Creek on my BMX when I was 9, they'd have taken my bike away.
And for the record, it's not fun unless someone can get hurt.
The Following User Says Thank You to 4X4 For This Useful Post:
lol my mom should get arrested for letting both me and my sister play alone outside from roughly the same ages (6-7ish)
This is absolutely ######ed. The neighbor who called the cops would have a fit if she went to europe where kids that young roam around whole towns alone.
I remember very clearly my parents watching my sister and I, laughing, and even taking pictures of us suiting up in my hockey gear and launching ourselves down the stairs to our basement. 12 or so stairs with a 90 degree turn at the bottom with outside concrete wall on one side. We'd take the couch cushions and lay them at the bottom for a soft landing. We did lots of stuff like that. My parents likely would have got the death penalty today.
At least she was watching them. If my parents knew that I was making jumps and bombing down the hill into Fish Creek on my BMX when I was 9, they'd have taken my bike away.
And for the record, it's not fun unless someone can get hurt.
My mom didn't even have to take my bike away. The hills we went bombing down had steep drops. Landed wheel first once and bent the frame. Punishment: I didn't get a new bike for a year. Taught me a lesson about the consequences of breaking my stuff though.
Motorized scooters seems to the key here. Misleading headline.
They are probably those little mini bike like scooters, not real bikes. Ripping around on those in a cul du sac while being loosely supervised from a lawn chair seems reasonable.
They are probably those little mini bike like scooters, not real bikes. Ripping around on those in a cul du sac while being loosely supervised from a lawn chair seems reasonable.
Yeah, I don't think the kids were driving Vespa's
They're talking about these:
Or since it's the US, there's a good chance it's one of these:
The Following User Says Thank You to polak For This Useful Post:
I'd like to get the neighbour's perspective on why she/he called the cops. Straight up, that mom looks like white trash. It makes me wonder if she was letting the kids do something more stupid than this sympathetic article is showing. The article definitely made no effort to get both sides of the story.
I think the bigger problem here is the cops who think they have all the authority in the world to enforce whatever they want, and the sheer number of laws that are out there, that can feasibly make a criminal out of everyone.
I know of somebody who lost access to his kids because of somebody calling the cops because they misinterpreted play wrestling as attempt to murder. Don't wrestle with your kids on the trampoline in your backyard. Some nosey neighbour will rat you out!
Mother arrested for letting her kids play outside.
