*So much for that proposal to enact a curfew for teens in St. Petersburg. The one that would have required those 16 and under to be home by 11:00 on school nights. Obviously the teen accused of murdering a police officer on a school night was a factor.
But the proposal never had a chance. That’s because cops are not surrogate parents. That’s what they would have become.
St. Pete City Council member Bill Dudley could not have been more direct. “Parents are the ones that should be putting their curfew in,” he said. “If parents would do their job, we wouldn’t even be having this discussion.”
*Interesting treatment by the St. Petersburg Times on the post-arrest role of the parents of the youth accused of murdering that St. Petersburg police officer, David S. Crawford, in February. A page-one piece showed them doing the right thing by helping police get what authorities have said was a voluntary confession from their son, 16-year-old Nicholas Lindsey. They didn’t turn their back on their son, and they cajoled important information from him. The alleged killer went from defiant to despondent to cooperative.
The poignant exchange was recorded on video. A lot of it was redacted.
Just wondering. While it was certainly helpful for the parents to become ad hoc interrogators, might the bar be set a little low on their positive contributions. Might a redacted part of the video, in effect, contain this sort of exchange?
Parents: “Son, tell us what happened. We beg you.” Son: “Well, as you now know, it was about 10:30 on a school night, and I was out with my loaded gun looking, uh, around at parked cars. No need to get a good night’s sleep because, as you may or may not know, I don’t go to school most days anyhow. … Anyway, where was I? …”
Would that the parents’ cooperation had been on the front side. It’s exactly what City Councilman Dudley was underscoring.