Compassion for Child Abandonment<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I've been rooting for the cops to not catch the mother who abandoned her baby in a NYC subway station. \u00a0Turns out they did, and she's facing a felony\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2014\/07\/compassion-for-child-abandonment.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Compassion for Child Abandonment\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I've been rooting for the cops to not catch the mother who abandoned her baby in a NYC subway station. \u00a0Turns out they did, and she's facing a felony\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2014\/07\/compassion-for-child-abandonment.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Unequally Yoked\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-07-09T19:24:41+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/84\/2014\/07\/subway-baby.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"393\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"266\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Leah Libresco\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Leah Libresco\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2014\/07\/compassion-for-child-abandonment.html\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2014\/07\/compassion-for-child-abandonment.html\",\"name\":\"Compassion for Child Abandonment\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2014-07-09T19:24:41+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2014-07-09T19:24:41+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#\/schema\/person\/17ee17592b35b40040d5f5f7ea5ab464\"},\"description\":\"I've been rooting for the cops to not catch the mother who abandoned her baby in a NYC subway station. \u00a0Turns out they did, and she's facing a felony\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2014\/07\/compassion-for-child-abandonment.html#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2014\/07\/compassion-for-child-abandonment.html\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2014\/07\/compassion-for-child-abandonment.html#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Compassion for Child Abandonment\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/\",\"name\":\"Unequally Yoked\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#\/schema\/person\/17ee17592b35b40040d5f5f7ea5ab464\",\"name\":\"Leah Libresco\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/20e1e6a3a94c4e7928687804a41d888d?s=96&d=mm&r=r\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/20e1e6a3a94c4e7928687804a41d888d?s=96&d=mm&r=r\",\"caption\":\"Leah Libresco\"},\"description\":\"Leah is the author of Arriving at Amen and Building the Benedict Option. 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{"id":9867,"date":"2014-07-09T15:24:41","date_gmt":"2014-07-09T19:24:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/?p=9867"},"modified":"2014-07-09T15:24:41","modified_gmt":"2014-07-09T19:24:41","slug":"compassion-for-child-abandonment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2014\/07\/compassion-for-child-abandonment.html","title":{"rendered":"Compassion for Child Abandonment"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

$\"\"$ <\/a><\/p>\n

The reason I\u2019m feeling queasy about the trial is the poor incentives it creates for desperate parents. \u00a0Given her limited options, the woman picked a pretty good place to leave a child. \u00a0I can see the logic in picking a busily trafficked subway platform where there would be a slew of witnesses to see you push a stroller outside the subway doors and then reboard the train yourself.<\/p>\n

It would be\u00a0better\u00a0<\/em>to go to a firehouse or another designated Safe Haven<\/a>,\u00a0though I\u2019m not sure how well known the existence of those dropoff points are, and, in any event, it appears that the toddler abandoned had aged out of their amnesty rules. \u00a0But, the main thing is, the subway platform was a\u00a0much<\/em> better choice than one that maximized the mother\u2019s chance of escaping unobserved while risking that the child would pass unnoticed, too.<\/p>\n

I just don\u2019t know how much use deterrents and harsh penalties are meant to be in cases like this. \u00a0Giving up your child is a very powerful natural deterrent already; the state has a very limited ability to meaningfully augment the consequences of this decision. \u00a0At a certain point, heavy penalties in these cases seem as futile as punishments for committing suicide (which has also been treated as a felony<\/a>). \u00a0The state should be most focused on deterring murder, abuse, or very reckless forms of abandonment, rather than illegal abandonment.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not quite clear on why it would have been illegal for this mother to take her child to a safe haven. \u00a0Nebraska had a more expansive safe haven law, which allowed parents to abandon children up to the age of 18 without repercussions and\u00a0did<\/em> wind up with over a dozen teens dropped off at hospitals<\/a>. \u00a0In the\u00a0USA Today\u00a0<\/em>article I\u2019ve just linked,\u00a0Adam Pertman, executive director of the Evan B. Donaldson Adoption Institute, described the Nebraska law as the \u201cworst-case scenario of unintended consequences.\u201d<\/p>\n

This seems a little like blaming a bully-reporting initiative for the sudden uptick in bullying reports. \u00a0It\u2019s hard to believe that many hereto stable families only needed the inducement of a safe haven law to abandon their children. \u00a0If teens were being dropped off more frequently than Nebraska hoped, the law may have revealed<\/em> a problem, rather than causing one.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, there are at least two people that these laws should have a care of: the baby, and the mother (and other family). \u00a0It should be as safe as possible to hand over a child, if a parent is determined to renounce it, for the sake of the child. \u00a0And little may be gained by punishing the parent harshly. \u00a0Abandonment is a crime committed\u00a0in extremis<\/em>, qualitatively different from most threats and assaults. \u00a0We should save a child from a parent acting out of desperation and despair, but there is also a second life to save.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Addendum: Omaha.com followed up with the children and teens abandoned under Nebraska\u2019s expansive law for a profile<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"