343 replies to this topic

[Terry]

As a parent, how would you feel under these circumstances?

You get a phone call in the middle of the night and are told that your child has been invloved in a car accident. One person is dead, two are in the hospital and the police have waited almost 6 hours to call you. Even though the accident happened at 2:45 in the afternoon the police don't think it's important enough for you to get a phone call about your child until after 8:00pm.

You spend almost an hour talking to the police trying to find out what happened. During this time the police tell you:

They don't know how fast the boys were driving.
There are no witnesses to the accident.
They have three witnesses that saw the boys driving fast near Intel. Which is almost 2 miles away.
That all five boys are lying, because they are all telling the police that they were not racing.
That the boys all claim that they were driving with the normal flow of traffic for Iron Point Road.

You end your conversation with the police by confirming that all of the other parents have been contacted already. That you were the last parent that the police called and all the other kids are with their parents. The two police officiers that you are talking to bring out the head of the department to confirm this with you.

Now that you have determined that all the kids are safe with their parents you can take your child home.

As you get in the car to leave the police station you call one of the parents to see if their child is safe with them. It's the first they have heard of the accident and they have no idea that anything has happened. It is now almost 10:00pm. It is now over 7 hours since the accident happened.

On top of all this, two of the police officiers tell you that the first police officier that arrived at the accident has a second grade daughter in Susan McNew's classroom and that he is leading the investigation.

As a parent, how do you feel?

I'd feel terrified, but only because my "child" has been gone for 8 hours and hasn't checked in! Sorry, I guess I can't find sympathy here for the "parent". The investigation comes first, particularly when a death occurs.

I guess I can ask a similar rhetorical question, as a family member of Mrs. McNew, how do you feel?

[Robert Giacometti]

I'd feel terrified, but only because my "child" has been gone for 8 hours and hasn't checked in! Sorry, I guess I can't find sympathy here for the "parent". The investigation comes first, particularly when a death occurs.

I guess I can ask a similar rhetorical question, as a family member of Mrs. McNew, how do you feel?

Terry, how does one "check in" if they are in police custody?

It seems that the police could be doing an investigation & contact the parents at the same time...they had the kids in custody...they weren't going anywhere. They probably weren't going to go out and try and erase the skid marks were they?

No we hear of an allegation that someone in the police department LIED to one of the parents. Who investigates that?

How many times have I already asked this question...Are there any witnesses who saw the kids driving at the accident scene?

All of us probably understands there needs to be a thorough investigation, but one would hope that it would done with an open mind to get at the facts. If what Family Friend is saying is true, then we have some serious issues that need to be addressed!

Maybe, I'll start another post about those who are denial about questioning things from City Hall!

[Family Friend]

Some of the boys were going to work from 4pm - 9pm that day and not due home for hours. The police took their cell phones so they couldn't call home.

What I am saying is that the police report and the media report don't match.
They are not even close to being a match.

You can hate me for sharing this information, yell that I am in denial, but it is the truth.

[ducky]

Family Friend, I do find it alarming that the parents weren't notified earlier, especially if their child was injured. Unfortunately, the police did have a job to do and it sounds like they had a lot of accident interviews to do. They need to do those separately to get each individual's story accurately. Unfortunately, when we give children adult privileges what comes with that are adult consequences and responsibilities.

I am not surprised that the police report and the media report don't match up. I've read the watered down police log for years in this town. I can't make the leap though that that automatically means the police are lying.

There is enough physical evidence at the scene that the truth will be known soon enough if speed was a factor. I'm surprised there weren't any security cameras at businesses in the area that perhaps picked up the accident or the cars perhaps right before the accident.

[old soldier]

as a parent my first thought would be is my kid OK. then I would seek and look at the facts to see if he made a mistake and even if it was so I would look for a way to give support. finally after I had most of the facts I would look to myself to see if I had made a mistake.

when a big accident happens in a small town like folsom its a big deal and not an everyday happening so I would bet the police were almost upside down sorting things out with witnesses, evidence, kids in custody and more. if a kid is same, and subject to a criminal investigation as soon as the parent gets involved there is one more distraction and it just may be the parent notification got a lower priority than say talking to witnesses

if it was my kid and he was speeding I would be mad at him. If he was in a fast car I might be asking myself did I stand up hard enough in the car buying debate where I wanted a less powerful car. Or if I was a parent who during my foolish years had a second best drag car told my kid I cn afford to give you the fastest car.

kids that age can be foolish they may have been wrong in this case and they can't bring back the teachers life but how this plays out will be long term memory for all the kids involved and more important than the kids it seems to me will be the balance shown by the parents as time proceeds.

[Deb aka Resume Lady]

I guess the question is: Are police officers required to contact parents of minor children when those minor children are taken into custody (or as soon as possible thereafter)?

[camay2327]

It is hard to believe that the parents were not contacted by someone, if not police. Everyone has cell phones now days and if the police took their cells they could have asked someone else to call their parents.


Also, FamilyFriend, are you a friend of the driver that hit the car or a friend of one of the others in the vehicles?

[cw68]

I'm sure the parents are going through hell right now, but I can guarantee that if I hit anyone (regardless of the reason) and I was trying to rescue the speakers from my car instead of being on my knees either praying or in grief, my parents would be calling me out on that. Why didn't they call their parents before the police got there? Instead they were concerned about their bloody speakers.

[Family Friend]

I know all of the boys and the families invloved in the accident. Also, about 12 years ago, I lived in Shingle Springs for two years. At that time, I knew the McNew family. My sister's 3 kids attended Blue Oak school. I was on campus everyday.

Everyone can see that the boys were speeding. Nobody will argue that fact.
Do two teenage boys going fast in the same direction automatically equal a race?

Nobody, is going to defend the boys for getting their speakers out of the car if this is true. However, so many other parts of the story the media has been telling us is wrong. I am not sure if this part is accurate.

For example, how many of you will be suprised to learn that the driver of the Dodge Stealth is a Black kid, living in apartments with a single mom? and that his passanger is asian?

Is that the story the media has told?

[mylo]

For example, how many of you will be suprised to learn that the driver of the Dodge Stealth is a Black kid, living in apartments with a single mom? and that his passanger is asian?

Is that the story the media has told?

I don't remember ever seeing race or residence mentioned in any of the articles I read.
Does it make a difference?

[cw68]

I know all of the boys and the families invloved in the accident. Also, about 12 years ago, I lived in Shingle Springs for two years. At that time, I knew the McNew family. My sister's 3 kids attended Blue Oak school. I was on campus everyday.

Everyone can see that the boys were speeding. Nobody will argue that fact.
Do two teenage boys going fast in the same direction automatically equal a race?

Nobody, is going to defend the boys for getting their speakers out of the car if this is true. However, so many other parts of the story the media has been telling us is wrong. I am not sure if this part is accurate.

For example, how many of you will be suprised to learn that the driver of the Dodge Stealth is a Black kid, living in apartments with a single mom? and that his passanger is asian?

Is that the story the media has told?

No, we weren't told that and I'm glad. What does race have to do with this?

[Chad Vander Veen]

For example, how many of you will be suprised to learn that the driver of the Dodge Stealth is a Black kid, living in apartments with a single mom? and that his passanger is asian?

Is that the story the media has told?

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?

[Family Friend]

I don't remember ever seeing race or residence mentioned in any of the articles I read.
Does it make a difference?

I didn't mean to imply that race has anything to do with what happened at the accident. Nor, do I feel that it is relevent to the case. And the media hasn't mentioned it.

My point is that most of the people that I talk to about the case, that have seen the news reports, had assumed that the kids are spoiled, rich, white kids.

In this regards, the media hasn't painted a picture for people that is accurate.

This is one of the things that leads me to question if other statements made by the media are accurate.

[mylo]

This is one of the things that leads me to question if other statements made by the media are accurate.

They didn't explicitly state that one of the kids wasn't a spoiled rich and white, and now you're questioning their accuracy?

I would say they've been more accurate. Simply by not inserting commentary on potentially unrelated topics like the kids house. They've generally stuck to the facts "Witnesses say racing, cops say racing, skid marks say racing". I don't even think I've seen the authors say they were racing, just quote these facts.

All in all, a tragic story, but I don't think it's been misreported outside of the conjecture of some MyFolsom Super sleuths.

[SacKen]

I didn't mean to imply that race has anything to do with what happened at the accident. Nor, do I feel that it is relevent to the case. And the media hasn't mentioned it.

My point is that most of the people that I talk to about the case, that have seen the news reports, had assumed that the kids are spoiled, rich, white kids.

In this regards, the media hasn't painted a picture for people that is accurate.

This is one of the things that leads me to question if other statements made by the media are accurate.

I don't think many people would assume a kid driving a 15 year old Dodge is spoiled or rich. White... maybe.