Mike Tang spent a night in jail and faces a year of parenting classes and picking up trash for his choice of discipline.
Mike Tang was charged with child endangerment for leaving his 8-year-old son in a grocery store parking lot a mile from home. It was supposed to be a life lesson.
"I just wanted to reinforce that money is hard to earn and that, if he doesn't do a good job at school, he could end up sleeping...[with] the homeless," says Tang, who lives in the Southern California suburb of Corona.
The incident took place after Mike caught Isaac cutting corners on his homework. At about 7:45 p.m., he drove him to the parking lot and drove away. About 10 minutes later, Tang's father came to pick him up.
But Isaac had already been picked up: He was in police custody. A stranger had spotted the boy and called the cops, who arrested Tang, and he spent the night in county jail. A jury later convicted him of child endangerment, and the judge sentenced him to parenting classes and a 56-day work release program picking up trash and doing other menial work.
Mike is refusing to serve the sentence, and there's an outstanding arrest warrant for his failure to comply. He scrawled a response on top of the warrant and mailed it back.
"Fuck you all!" Mike's written response begins. "Walking on a public sidewalk at 7:45 p.m. is not child endangerment."
Is Mike right, or did he jeopardize Isaac's safety? And was it appropriate for the police to intervene?
"It rises to the level of unusual. It rises to the level of, perhaps, controversial. But it was not literally dangerous. That's not a crime," says journalist and Reason contributor Lenore Skenazy, founder of the Free Range Kids movement.
Watch the full video above and decide for yourself.
Approximately 5 minutes. Produced by Zach Weissmueller. Camera by Weissmueller and Alex Manning. Music by Blue Dot Sessions.
Mike Tang was charged with child endangerment for leaving his 8-year-old son in a grocery store parking lot a mile from home. It was supposed to be a life lesson.
It was an excellent life lesson for the father . spending a night in jail, attending a year of parenting classes and picking up trash.
You dont leave a 8-year-old kid in a grocery store parking lot alone a mile from home this day and time just to teach him a lesson.
There are other reasonable ways and far safer methods for the kid to learn a life lesson.
If an 8-year-old girl can be kidnapped while walking alone through Walmart and murdered, then a 8-year-old boy can be kidnapped and murder while being left alone in a grocery story parking lot.
Watch the video .then try to get some fucking sense in your dump mind, asshole.
Surveillance video shows chilling moments before 8-year-old girl was kidnapped and murdered ..