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 ..
Instead, the lesson that he learned is that children belong to the state, not their parents - a sentiment that is echoed here frequently.
The lesson that he learned could have been that his kid belonged in a grave from being left alone.
It has happen before, I showed that to you.
I will show you where it happened again .not that it will mean anything to you, maybe it will to others.
Adam John Walsh was 6-year-old boy who was abducted from a Sears department store at the Hollywood Mall in Hollywood, Florida, on July 27, 1981. His severed head was found two weeks later in a drainage canal alongside Florida's Turnpike in rural St. Lucie County, Florida. His death earned national publicity. His story was made into the 1983 television film Adam, seen by 38 million people in its original airing. His father, John Walsh, became an advocate for victims of violent crimes and was the host of the television program America's Most Wanted.
Convicted serial killer Ottis Toole confessed to Adam's murder, but was never convicted for this specific crime due to loss of evidence and a recanted confession. Toole died in prison of liver failure on September 15, 1996. Although no new evidence has come forth, on December 16, 2008, police announced that the Walsh case was closed as they were satisfied that Toole was the murderer.
Kidnapping and murder
On the afternoon of July 27, 1981, Revé, Adam's mother, took him shopping with her to the Hollywood ("Sears") Mall in Hollywood, Florida. They went together to the Sears store and entered via the north entrance. Revé intended to inquire about a lamp which was on sale, and left Adam at a kiosk with Atari 2600 video games on display where several other boys were taking turns playing games. Revé completed her business in the lamp department at approximately 12:15 pm. She said that she returned to find that Adam and the other boys had disappeared. A store manager informed her that a scuffle had broken out over whose turn it was at the kiosk and a security guard demanded that they leave the store. The security guard asked the older ones if their parents were there, and they said that they were not. It was later conjectured by Adam's parents that he was too shy to speak to the security guard, who presumed that he was in the company of the other boys, and as such the security guard made him leave by the same door as them (which was the Sears west entrance). His parents believe that after the other boys dispersed, Adam was left alone outside the store, at an exit unfamiliar to him. Meanwhile, unable to find Adam in the toy department after returning from the lamp department, Revé had Adam paged over the Sears public address system and continued to look for him throughout the store. She eventually by coincidence ran into Adam's grandmother Jean inside the store, who helped her search for her son. After more than 90 minutes of fruitless searching and public address pages which failed to turn up Adam, she called the Hollywood Police at 1:55 pm.
Two weeks after his disappearance, Adam's severed head was found on the evening of August 10, 1981. It was discovered by two fishermen in a drainage canal alongside the Florida Turnpike near Vero Beach, Florida, almost 130 miles from Hollywood. The Florida Highway Patrol was informed of the discovery at 7:30 pm on August 10. Indian River County and St. Lucie County divers searched the canal. On the morning of August 11, as Hollywood, Florida police rushed dental records to Vero Beach to compare them to the found remains, John and Revé Walsh appeared on the national news program Good Morning America. On the program, the Walshes said that they were still clinging to hope that their son was alive; a $100,000 reward had been posted for his safe return. The recovered remains were positively identified as those of Adam Walsh shortly after the Walshes' Good Morning America appearance, and the confirmation made national news headlines.
Using the recovered head, the coroner ruled that the cause of Adam Walsh's death was asphyxiation and that the decapitation had occurred after death, perhaps to render his remains unidentifiable. The state of the remains suggested that Adam's death had occurred several days before the discovery of his head. The rest of Adam Walsh's body has never been recovered.
This story means absolutely nothing to you, cop-hater .and moves you in no way at all, does it.?
I repeat what I said earlier: You dont leave a kid alone in a grocery parking lot to teach him a life lesson .not in this day an time.