Poll: 10 year old murders baby brother

[WorldCritic]

The kid is to blame, pretty sure when you're ten you know that killing is bad.

 

[Flack]

The baby sitter is NOT to blame.

 

[Littlee300]

Also, not every bad thing a person does is because of negative influences in their youth. There are a lot of bad people who were not abused mentally/physically when young and still ended up doing a lot of bad things. A lot of crime done by people is because they were never reprimanded for the bad things they did when young and then because they didnt not learn about consecuences to their actions they in their older years think that they can do what ever they want.

Yes they do. Every single "criminal" who has either stolen or murdered has done so because they were either coerced, abused as a child or mentally ill. Oh, and ignoring your child is still considered abuse.

Wanting to do evil is a mental illness? I didn't know that human nature is considered a mental illness.

No not caring that you are doing evil and not being sorry for it is though

Add, brain not fully developed to your list than since most beatings to death are done by young kids.

And guess what? most of those kids don't feel guilty after the fact

Are you thinking what I am thinking

We alter genetics to alter how the brain develops!

 

[Littlee300]

The babysitter should be charged for not taking care of the children. It was her job to take care of both children. She left an unsupervised baby with a 10 year old, an age at which legally you are not responsible for your actions. She's not a teenager, she's a child that pretty much does not discern from good, bad and everything in between unless told.

10 year olds know the difference between right and wrong.

What I'm wondering is whether she knew that shaking a baby could kill it.

The only thing she was thinking is
"I love this sadistic pleasure I am getting!"
Probably subconsciously though.

 

[Epic Fail 1977]

I understood death and murder when I was 10.

I don't know the details of this case but I think ordinarily one has to shake a baby pretty hard to actually kill it. So I voted for the second option.

 

[jaketaz]

It is completely the parent's fault. There is no way the 10 year old could have known that would happen, no ten year old would want that on their conscience. However, adults are older, have more life experience, and are SUPPOSED to be smarter. Smart enough not to leave an infant alone with a young child long enough for something terrible like that to happen.

 

[JMeganSnow]

It's ridiculous to call this "murder". Murder means something specific. It means attacking someone INTENDING to kill them (and then doing so), and I don't think a 10-year-old yet has sufficient grasp of the matter to intend to kill someone as an adult would intend to kill someone. This lack of judgment is precisely why there is such a thing as legal minority.

This wasn't a murder, it was a *killing*. The child should be charged with manslaughter and tried AS A CHILD. The responsible adult on the scene should be charged with criminal neglect.

 

[Skratt]

snip

Aptitude & circumstance dictate the speed of a child's development. You do not magically start to understand the world around you at some predetermined age. A child is only as likely to develop logic at an early age as their aptitude and circumstance permit.

I would NOT have known at 10 years old that shaking a baby would kill it. I simply lacked the circumstance to infer any such notion, I did not lack the capability. I really only learned about babies after having them. Before that, I rarely held them and didn't have any family or friends that had them.

Given the article, you cannot infer what that 10 year old did, did not or could not comprehend, you can only speculate on the likelihood. To absolutely say that kids absolutely cannot comprehend until X age is absolutely ignorant. To say that kids likely would not comprehend, or generally do not until X, is far more plausible and probably would have saved you a ton of responses.

Then again, it is the escapist, so maybe not. We are pretty much as diverse a group as you can get.

 

[numbersix1979]

It sounds more like bad parenting to me. Like maybe the parents didn't make sure the girl knew her own strength, or teach her to control her anger. However charging her with murder is A) Totally pointless and B) Ridiculous. Not only that, but the babysitter had no idea the girl would do such a thing. You can't really see something like this coming.

 

[Astoria]

By the time I was 10, I could tell right from wrong, and life from death, so I don't know what the fuck y'all are talking about.

Yeah same here and I was helping my parents look after my baby siblings when I was 3 and I certainly didn't shake them or anything like that. Yes this baby sitting should be charged with child neglect or something like that but not murder and I think the daughter needs some serious councilling and some sort of punishment.

 

[rabidmidget]

People do realise that 10 is not 5, right? Granted it was more manslaughter than murder, but a 10 year old does know that killing someone is wrong, you don't see 4th graders killing each other all the time, do you?

 

[Moromillas]

You have got to be kidding me.

A 9 year old child with no behavioral problems is not going to suddenly decide to kill her baby brother. The fact that both children were not being supervised shows negligence by the person who was supposed to be looking after them, the babysitter.

part of a babysitters job is feeding them, cleaning up after them, putting them to bed, and CARING for them. To do these things they are not always with the child and at some point a baby might get left alone in its crib while the sitter went about her job.

We don't know the time of the incident. Time could place the sitter doing one of her chores thinking both kids are asleep; thinking one is playing, the other napping, and her prepping lunch. We don't know these things so we need to withhold judgment.

We do know that the child had the opportunity to pick up the baby, unsupervised. That should not be happening, at all. You do not let a 9 year old child pick up a baby unsupervised, saying that you were preparing lunch is no excuse.

You are just being unreasonable. What if the children were both supposed to be asleep? Is the sitter supposed to stand in the hall and watch that they don't leave the room?

"We payed you do watch the kids and clean up after them why is there dirty dishes laying out?"

Sorry sir i had to keep constant eye on the 10 year old so she did not murder the baby.

Yes, you are supposed to know, exactly where they are and what they are doing. Lets say that child didn't know how to swim yet, and decided to go for a swim in the pool. If the child drowns in the pool while under your care, you can't use the excuse 'I didn't know she was over there' especially when the child shouldn't have access in the first place.

 

[Kortney]

What the hell is it with this site and trying to find "fault". You think this is the best response to this terrible tragedy? To sit around and argue who is the villain? Wow.

OT: This is no one's fault.

 

[Small Waves]

At the age of 10, you should understand death to some degree. If the sitter knew that she shaked the baby, then she deserves a larger portion of the blame for neglect and not seeking medical attention.