I think it's horrible that the girl's mother didn't call for an ambulance, but I don't think it was right for her to be held criminally responsible for her death. The woman does not have the medical training to be held responsible for not recognizing the seriousness of her daughter's condition.
I do think that someone is responsible for what happened, but I don't think it's the mother. The girl had just been released from a secure facility, which means she'd had recent contact with the justice system. Given that her father died of a heroin-related overdose, her sister has a history of heroin overdose, and her mother has lost numerous friends to the drug, I think it's extremely likely that her mother is also a heroin user, and it's quite clear that her home environment is going to provide significant exposure to drugs.
As soon as she was taken into custody, the state had a duty to care for her. And yet they chose to return a minor with a history of substance abuse to a home environment in which she was extremely likely to be exposed to heroin, and in which there was a high likelihood of neglect. The authority that had previously taken her into custody failed fulfill their duty of care, and responsibility for what happen lies with the state, not the child's mother.
Emily
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I think its totally unfair, the mother lost her daughter over a mistake... isnt that punishment enough
also, how many parents send their kids to bed to sleep off alcohol intoxication, are we going to hold them accountable for any damage suffered to the person as a result.
I agree the state is responsible, I believe they need to blame someone, and the mother was the easiest target. As Carly was in a unit, they should have properly risk assessed the place they discharged her to.
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Obviously the mother made a bad decision - I don't think anyone would deny that much. Personally I can't imagine not calling 911 if I knew someone overdosed, whether I thought they'd be okay or not, and I agree that the mother should have been able to recognize the danger given her history. But that doesn't make her criminally responsible for it. People are only legally responsible for failing to provide first aid if they have formal qualifications indicating knowledge of the appropriate care, and a duty to care for the individual. By that standard, the mother shouldn't have been held legally responsible for her incorrect medical judgement.
And I do think that however misguided it turned out to be, she was trying to do what she thought was best for her daughter, rather than that she simply didn't care. As a middle-class white university student, I would see no reason not to call 911 in that situation. But that's not true for a significant population, at least where I grew up. In a lot of low-income communities, particularly those with a significant drug and gang presence, government authorities are feared and resented, and contact with them is avoided whenever possible. People are hesitant to report a crime or seek emergency medical care because they're afraid that they'll arrested, their children will be taken away, or they'll be deported, or they believe they're not entitled to these services because they or their relatives have been in trouble for drugs or are involved with gangs. And these fears are not unfounded. I grew up in an urban area, and emergency response people are supposed to arrive at the scene within 4 minutes of receiving a call. If you live in the wealthier parts of town, they do. If you live in the projects (government subsidized housing), it can take over half an hour for the paramedics to respond, and the police may not even show up at all. When police or even paramedics do respond to calls in these places, most of them treat people there like crap, and basically assume that everyone is involved with gangs and drugs, even though they may be completely innocent, law-abiding citizens. Then of course the people in these communities resent the authorities, and it ends up as a vicious cycle. But the bottom line is that I'm not at all surprised to see someone be extremely reluctant to call for help and risk her daughter being taken into custody.
Also, drug overdoses can be difficult to judge as the symptoms vary considerably between individuals, and even between incidents for a single person. And the specific symptoms that they mentioned in the story (blue lips and drifting in and out of consciousness) wouldn't always mean that there's an imminent risk of death. Blue lips could just as easily be caused by being in a cold room, and my understanding is that it's also relatively common with heroin that's not a life-threatening overdose. And drifting in and out of consciousness wouldn't necessarily have seemed particularly alarming, as drifting in and out of sleep is fairly normal with heroin use that's not an overdose. So I do think it's possible that the mother thought the girl would be fine even despite her presumed experience with heroin overdoses.
Emily
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I don't know what to think. It seems that her mum MUST have known something was wrong, but was afraid because she knew she'd taken heroin.
I just hope that the mother genuinely believed she would be ok, and was sadly mistaken.
Had she seen her daughter when she'd OD'd before? Did she recognise the signs? I don't know.
I have seen someone overdose from heroin. You know something is wrong. Unless someone has SEVERE circulation problems their lips do not turn blue just from being a wee bit cold. Your face turns blue because you're not breathing properly.
But manslaughter? I'm not convinced that that is really just.
By the sounds of it the mother knew something was up and due to the history she probably knew what to look out for with a Heroin OD, she'd been exposed to it before and it sounds like a large proportion of the people they knew were addicts. The mother did not inject her with it so she shouldn't be given manslaughter but the girl was only 16 and so she did have a duty of care. It could be though that she didn't realise how ill she was and I can understand why she wouldn't want to report it. It likely mean having the daugther put into custody once more and probably have the police searching the house for drugs which could have got the mother in more trouble. Even so, health should come first.
I do wonder though whether the mother was a user and she was on it at the time and maybe she misread her daughter's symptoms and that's why it all happened and it wasn't exactly neglect; she probably meant right by what she was doing but didn't really know what to do for the best.
That's ****ing awful O__O
What the hell is the woman doing just accepting her SIXTEEN year old daughter taking HEROIN for?!
She was just like "I'd seen her in worse states on drugs" and to me thats just the worst parenting ever.
It's one thing accepting if your 16 year old smokes to much weed or gets a bit dunk at a party and comes home a little bit worse for wear, I mean my friend's parents do that on occasion.
But heroin is a whole different kettle of fish.
That's just sick.
If your husband died from a drug overdose surely you'd be more inclined to protect her?
She'd been hospitalized for ODing before so why was she so worried about getting into trouble this time?
Why had no one suggested rehab?
It's so wrong.
I do think the mother is a bit to blame really but its not something she should have been taken to court for. She will have to live for the rest of her life knowing that she possibly could have helped her daughter and that is punishment enough. I think possibly she was just scared of her or her daughter getting in trouble. It a such a sad story.
her husband as died from an od it is not as if she didn't know what was going on
ok she losted her daughter and she never gave her the junk, but she let her die
if i was driving down the road and never made sure kurt had his seltbelt on and he dies because of that i would be face the same charges i know the risk that i am taking and i would deserve to go to jail for it.
Yes but YOUR taking the risk by driving. She made the discussion to take drugs, she was old enough to know what she was doing. I'm guessing kurt is your son? Is he old enough to realise why he needs his seatbelt because if not then it is your responsibility to make sure he's wearing it.
And maybe it was her responsibilty to keep her daughter safe but, to me the girls sounds like she had a number of problems and wasn't really under her mums control.
if i was driving down the road and never made sure kurt had his seltbelt on and he dies because of that i would be face the same charges i know the risk that i am taking and i would deserve to go to jail for it.
How old is Kurt? At least in the US, the driver is only responsible for ensuring kids under 16 are wearing a seatbelt. It is, however, a traffic violation for the driver if a passenger isn't wearing a seatbelt (regardless of their age), but it's not manslaughter if they die in an accident. Also, so far as I know, parents are never charged for with manslaughter when a child dies in an accident because he/she was improperly restrained. For one thing, it's virtually impossible to conclusively prove that the child would have survived if he/she had been properly restrained, so it can't be proven, and for another thing, people are simply not charged with manslaughter over the death of a passenger in their car (with the occasional exception of DUIs that result in a fatal accident).
Emily
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