Child Abuse or Bad Judgment? Lawyer Says Parents Mistakenly Granted Boys’ Trunk-Riding Request.
From the "You know, eugenics really might be a good idea after all" Department comes this tale of two knuckle-dragging troglodytes who clearly slept through Parenting 101. I've always found it profoundly disturbing that one needs a license to hunt, fish, own a business, or drive, but anyone with properly functioning physical equipment is allowed to have a child with no questions asked. Mr. and Mrs. Duthoy should never have been allowed to parent anything more life-like than Barbie Dolls.
This is clearly a case of tag-team dumbasses at work. It's difficult to believe that anyone could be so stupid all by themselves. Then again....
July 23— A suburban Maryland couple accused of driving 20 miles with their 12-year-old son and his friend holed up in the trunk of their car have been charged with child abuse, but their lawyer says they are guilty of only bad judgment.
James John Duthoy, 46, and his wife, Mary Elizabeth Duthoy, 42, of Edgewater, Md., were arrested in a liquor store parking lot Saturday night after police officers freed two boys from the trunk of their 1992 Pontiac Bonneville, according to police reports. The boys were red-faced and sweating, police said....
The son, 12-year-old Frederick Duthoy, and his friend, James Patrick Wright, 11, had asked to ride in the trunk of the car after the parents and boys came out of a restaurant near Annapolis, Md., Chandlee said. It would be just for fun, the boys said. The Dulthoys, knowing the ride wasn't a long one, obliged.
It was bad judgment, but not a criminal act, Chandlee said.
Police, who were called after a witness saw the boys get in the trunk, disagreed....
The Duthoys spent 48 hours in an Annapolis jail after the arrest, and were initially being held on $150,000 bail. A judge released them after reducing the bail, but has ordered that they have no unsupervised contact with their 12-year-old son until their trial. The boy is staying with an aunt. The Duthoys' two older children, a 17-year-old boy and a 16-year-old girl, were allowed to remain with their parents.
The Duthoys are charged with two counts each of child abuse, an offense that carries a sentence of 15 years. Mary Duthoy is also charged with two counts of reckless endangerment, and James Duthoy, who was driving, is charged with a count of second-degree assault and one count of reckless endangerment.
If your son and his friend had asked to play Russian Roulette on the living room floor with four full chambers, would you have given them the revolver and the bullets? If they wanted to chug a fifth of Wild Turkey, would you have gone to the liquor store for them?? The astonishing depth of stupidity involved in this episode is almost beyond comprehension. Here's what REALLY gets me, though:
The charges have stunned those who know the family. Mary Elizabeth Duthoy is a former teacher who volunteers as a den mother. James John Duthoy, a superintendent for a roofing company, is known as a model father.
Right. I'm sorry, y'all, but model parents don't put children in the trunk of their car and then drive 20 miles (if the police hadn't stopped them, how long would the boys have remained in the trunk??). If I were the parents of their son's friend, I'd slap a lawsuit on the Duthoys so quickly they'd never know what hit them. THEN I'd petition Child Protective Services (or whatever they happen to call it in Maryland) to strip these DUMASSES of custody and their parental rights. Amazingly, however, the father of James Patrick Wright seems unable to comprehend the reason for the severity of the charges levelled against the Duthoys.
James David Wright, the father of the other boy, said he was not harmed in the incident. Wright said he is stunned by the severity of the charges against the Duthoys.
"Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to put children in a trunk," Wright said. "But I do not feel in any way that anyone was trying to harm my child."
Perhaps Mr. Wright just self-nominated himself for a future DUMASS AWARD. If anyone had put a child of mine in their trunk, the police would be pulling my sand wedge out of their skull. Not "such a good idea"?? (YOU!! Out of the gene pool!! NOW!!!)
For displaying an appalling lack of common sense, as well as a callous disregard for the wellbeing of their offspring and his friend, the Duthoys are well-qualified to be recognized with the coveted and internationally prestigious DUMASS AWARD. They are, without a doubt, certified Grade A, USDA Prime, First Class DUMASSES, who are frankly lucky that the boys are still alive. Of course, the boys should get an honorable mention DUMASS AWARD, but there is as yet no Juvenile Division for the award.
Sometimes the DUMASSES almost pick themselves, don't they??
