Not sure who I am more irked at, but I have power with my D

Parent Cafe
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<p>I understand the point about prioritizing community assets. To me, court does seem like a bit much given that we have all sorts of automatic methods to settle a myriad of first time offenses that are far more serious. My d took a LaffStop driver’s ed course and paid a fine by mail to take care of a speeding offense. What she did was far more dangerous to herself and others than not paying a bus fare or jumping a turnstile. (We issued our own punishment…she lost car privileges for an entire summer…the worst summer of her life.)</p>

<p>Not saying punishment for cgm’s d isn’t in order. But something along the lines of mailing a fine in with perhaps proof of community service hours seems more appropriate.</p>

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<p>I doubt cgm’s D needs more community service hours. LOL</p>

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<p>^I think you got my drift though…right hereshoping?</p>

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<p>It may have been more dangerous, but it was not theft. </p>

<p>So those kids would do community service and put it on their college applications that they did xxx hours? NOT!</p>

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<p>okay…let me be more CLEAR. Something that is done around here…kids who commit disciplinary infractions, for the FIRST time, can find themselves spending their Saturdays cleaning disgusting trashcans and desks at local schools. So no, I’m not talking about volunteering at the local hospital for the ol’ college resume.</p>

<p>I’d rather the courts and police devote their time to other things such as punishing 18-wheelers drivers/owners who have been tagged and ordered off the road for failure to pass inspection and who continue to drive anyway. One such vehicle jackknifed and killed my neighbor’s daughter, a senior engineering student at Texas A&M, who was on her back to school after visiting family in Corpus. A 50 cent theft seems pretty minor in comparison.</p>

<p>Btw…I come from a family full of law enforcement officers…everything from DPS to FBI to ATF/SS/Treasury Department. Laws like the one cgm describes are the bane of their existence.</p>

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<p>Yes, I did-- sorry–and on Easter, yet…the devil made me do it! :)</p>

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<p>CGM, in SF the fare evasion tickets are a major source of revenue. There is a juvenile court commissioner whose job is to hear only traffic cases, so no - its not a waste of resources – it’s all the person does and she isn’t all that busy – I think she only holds court for a couple of hours each day. At least when we were there there wasn’t much going on. </p>

<p>FWIW, my d. asked for a trial on a fare evasion (she had paid on the metro, but lost her ticket stub so couldn’t show “proof” that she had paid) – and the cop never showed up so the ticket was dismissed. </p>

<p>The muni runs at a deficit and loses thousands of dollars a year due to fare evasion - obviously it is very easy to board a bus via a back door and avoid payment or jump the gates at the metro stations – so yeah, its worth it to them to get the word out that they are strict with enforcement when they catch people at it.</p>

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<p>^Nothing wrong with ticketing these offenders and offsetting the revenues lost by fare evaders. Give 'em a big fat ticket, and haul them in if they don’t pay/show up for court issued community service. But court appearances in advance of failure to pay/perform just seems to be overkill to me for first time offenses. </p>

<p>Spending one afternoon in court waiting for a judge to spend 20 minutes chewing a kid out doesn’t seem nearly the deterrent that spending a month of Saturdays hosing dumpsters might be.</p>

<p>Just my humble opinion. ;)</p>

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<p>My S had to pay a fine, do community service, and spend 3 hours in court getting a really severe lecture from a judge who wagged his finger and said “You are the future of America, and we have to make you turn out right”. Couldn’t have it any better if I was the judge.</p>

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<p>

In other words, you would rather that the SF police spend all their time harassing teenagers from poor families in the mission and bayview rather than messing with obviously middle class kids in the sunset, probably wearing their private school uniforms at the time they were cited? </p>

<p>I know you are going to find this post inflammatory, but back in the days when I practiced criminal law, I really didn’t like seeing the disparate treatment that happened day in, day out for poor black and hispanic kids and adults as opposed to middle and upper middle class white kids and adults. I could walk into court on the same day with the same judge with 2 different clients charged with virtually identical offenses, and every time the poor kid would get harsher treatment than the one whose parents had money. I’m quite sure that no poor, minority kid would get away with going to court and telling the judge that they “didn’t know” they were supposed to pay and thought that they were supposed to jump the turnstile like cnp55’s brother. </p>

<p>There’s plenty of statistics on disparate treatment of african-american juveniles in the courts to back me up on this, by the way. The problem isn’t wasted resource; the problem is that we have two very different justice systems in this country, one for the poor, and a very different one for the upper class.</p>

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<p>I’m not sure CGM if you are saying that the punishment should be less/none in areas where there is a budget shortfall because they are wasting their resources ?</p>

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<p>Calmom, after yesterday, I think that’s true. I actually got pulled over for making an illegal u-turn. I didn’t see the sign, but, the police officer who pulled me over said there was a very large, clear sign posted saying “no u-turns”. Anyway, she asked for my license, registration and proof of insurance. I didn’t have my insurance paperwork, because just the day before I pulled it out of my purse to get the policy number - the policy is up for renewal and I had called the company to discuss the pricing on the renewal, and stupidly left the insurance card on my desk - anyway, I had no evidence of any kind in the car that I have insurance. </p>

<p>So she took my license and registration, and went back to her car, came back to me in like 15 minutes, and let me go. No ticket, nothing. She said something like “I ran your record and you’ve never done anything wrong or had any tickets, so, I’m letting you go, just be careful and don’t make any more moving violations” and then she said “it’s the law to have proof of insurance” - I told her I aggressively pay my insurance, and she said “I’m sure you do, ma’am, I can see this is a new car so I am sure you do pay for your insurance - please just make sure you carry your insurance card with you at all times from now on” - and that was it.</p>

<p>I drove away feeling funny, thinking, if I had had even one other driving infraction of any kind, or if I were a minority, or perhaps even just a young male, I would have recieved tickets for both violations, for sure…not that I wanted to receive tickets, it was more I just sort of felt stupid, and like I was committing some sort of fraud. </p>

<p>Having said that, cgm, I do think for the absence of - did I read it right, fifty cents??? that’s a LOT of law enforcement resources, it’s a wonder there isn’t some more efficient way to handle violations like this. In any case, I do hope it works out o.k., and, I think it’s far better that young people learn these sorts of lessons while they’re still at home and close to their support systems (better to have the unfortunate experience of having to appear in court NOW, rather than, say, just after college graduation and perhaps two weeks into a new job, and having to explain the need for time off to go to court to a brand new employer, for example).</p>

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<p>CGM, First, of course I feel badly for you and your D that something relatively small and a first offense has turned out to be such a major ordeal for your family. On the other hand I’m afraid I agree with the posters who feel that it’s a fair and just consequence, and designed to prevent anything similar or worse from happening in the future. The only thing I would add is that even if you feel the way that you do (and I understand the natural inclination to protect your D from an unpleasant experience) , I hope you won’t express that to your D. She needs to learn how to take full responsibility for her mistakes in life, not put the blame elsewhere. </p>

<p>We all make mistakes in life, some big and some small. Part of learning from those mistakes is in learning how not to justify oneself or make excuses. The court may choose to take circumstances into consideration, but that doesn’t mitigate the need for your D to own up to her mistakes and whatever consequences come from them. And that’s the clear message I’d want to give as the parent in a situation like this , too.</p>

<p>Best wishes and sorry you are all going through this.</p>

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<p>

I’m pretty sure that if CGM wants to mail in the fine amount, the court appearance can be waived. But they have to send a notice to appear before they can collect the fine – it’s the same if you get a speeding ticket. The police officer will issue a citation, and you may be able to pay the fine in advance, but if you don’t do that – the next thing that would happen is you would receive a notice to appear in court. </p>

<p>So it’s really up to CGM and her daughter as to whether they want to go to court or not.</p>

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<p>^^ but… if the appearance is waived - and fine paid - it is an automatic guilty - whereas - if one goes to the court appearance - it may be lessened or dropped, etc…</p>

<p>Here if a kiddo is caught stealing/shop lifting in a store - they are detained by the management - police and parents called - into cruiser - child taken to police station in cuffs - charged etc… and then released to the parents.</p>

<p>sometimes it is just a tough love - lesson learned - for kids - to see how the justice system really works - can be a pretty scary situation - and many a time it certainly serves the right purpose - and the kiddo never does anything like that again.</p>

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<p>My four year old took a pack of gum from Key Foods on Broadway. I took him back up there and the 6’6" bejewelled Jamaican manager roared as he threw back his head and leaned down to get in the face of my son. “Don’t you NEVER do something like that again, young man! This is MY store and that is MY gum! Don’t take something that doesn’t belong to you!” ROOOOOOOAAAARRRR.</p>

<p>He scared the living daylights out of little bits. I thought it was perfect punishment.</p>

<p>cgm… this incident is going to become a family joke. I promise. You’re over-reacting–but we’d have to boot you out of the boomer club if you didn’t. ;)</p>

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<p>Well, Jeepmom, the way the justice system works is that if you want to present your lame excuse to a judge, then you have to go to court and ask for a trial, which means going to court a second time. That’s just how “due process” works. If it is important enough to argue about, then the accused should feel very happy that the system will accommodate her by giving her the opportunity to formally contest the charges. On the other hand, if it’s a waste of time… then she (or her mom) can just write a check.</p>

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<p>This is minor compared to Cheers’ huge bejewelled Jamaican manager story, but when my daughter was in kindergarten, I found a stash of little toys, erasers, etc. in her room. My daughter waited with another kindergarten girl for transportation to their after school program in the lobby of the school. It turned out that the other girl was stealing things from the “School Store” in the lobby while they waited and giving them to my daughter. I took my daughter to the school office and asked for the principal and made her explain where she got the things and give them back. She was mortified!</p>

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<p>At least in Colorado, you can’t just “write a check” and be done with it. Many offenses (and I am just guessing that this is one of them; I could be wrong) have a non-waiveable first court appearance. Since it involves theft, I am thinking that this would be one of them. The “write a check” ones usually involve minor traffic or non-moving infractions.</p>

<p>I still think that there’s a valuable lesson to be learned for cgm’s daughter, no matter how “inconvenient”.</p>

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<p>A few years back my child loved to do an illegal activity. I am a firm believer in folowing the law. He felt I was not being reasonable and the law was not reasonable. His friends parents agreed and would help them do what they wanted to do. It was a constant battle. He would sneak and I would find out and ground him.
He had two incidents of getting caught. In the first case the policeman called the other boy’s Mom. She went down and picked them up. She told me about it the next day. The policeman basically told them it wasn’t safe what they were doing but he had done the same when he was a kid. I was annoyed since it was basically telling them it was against the law but your free to go. The 2nd time they got citations to appear in court. Before the court date he got a letter from the court with his “fine” that he had the choice to do or go to court. His fine was to appear as a juror in teen court. It was a great lesson. I appreciated what the court was trying to do. Teach them about the justice system and hopefully keep them out of it in the future.
His crime was riding his bicycle at daybreak in the skate park.</p>