I don’t get it. This woman is presumably damned sorry that her stupidity got her daughter killed. It’s a tragedy she’ll have to live with for the rest of her life, so WTF is gained by imprisoning her for 25 years? Seems unlikely that she’s potentially a repeat offender, so nobody is safer because Mariann Belair is in prison. This is just jackass sentencing, the very definition of cruel and unusual. Giver her probation and let her get on with her ruined life.
If only there had been a good toddler with a gun, this tragedy could have been avoided.
The Genital Observation Party approves this comment.
The solution is always more guns!
Deputy District Attorney Lauren Amrein told jurors that the gun sat on the couch at least 12 minutes before Belair’s son, who was about to turn 3, picked it up and shot his sister. She said no reasonable person would have let the gun sit there so long with small children present.
Three kids in the room and she just leaves a gun on the couch.
A LOADED gun, that she was carrying in the diaper bag!
Dude if you are so negligent you get a kid killed you need to be kept away from the rest of us.
What if it was someone else’s kid that was killed by her negligence would you be happy with a slap on the wrist? Why does she suddenly deserve leniency because she birthed the child she got killed through her absurd negligence?
Because the cruelty here accomplishes nothing but cruelty.
Who is it cruel to exactly?
If she truly cared about her kids at all she would be happy to be kept away and let them be raised by someone who won’t kill them through incompetence.
Sure, MAYBE, she learned her lesson about guns… MAYBE. What about cleaners? Cars? Heights? Strangers? Electricity? Fire? It shouldn’t cost a kid to learn about every dangerous thing that could harm a child.
On the one hand, yes. But on the other hand what if it had been someone else’s child? The law should treat people with equality as well as equity. How much of this death involved her negligence?
“Belair testified at her trial that she removed a loaded 9mm handgun from her diaper bag and placed it on the couch next to her in October while she was home with her 4-year-old daughter, Lawrencia Perez-Belair, and her 2-year-old son and 1-year-old daughter.”
Then how the hell did she get hit with murder 1?
EDIT: I should note, murder 1 is premeditated, this clearly was not the case.
Not gonna lie, I have no idea, all I read was some of the article. I didn’t watch any court proceedings or anything related to her sentencing. I’m just pointing out that while I do think she probably will never be able to forgive herself for this, she’s not the only person who lost a kid, or a family member that day, and if it was her negligence or lack of positive control over a firearm in her possession that was the main cause of this death then that’s on her.
If I had to guess she probably didn’t have a team of lawyers either. I don’t trust the justice system to be a fair or just institution because too often it just isn’t. But, I can certainly see why people who are tired of children dying to poor gun control measures would want to serve up consequences for someone whose negligence led to the endangerment of two children and the death of one of them.
All of this death involved her negligence, and you’re right that if it had been someone else’s child it would call for a different response.
But I don’t know what, except that I wouldn’t want to be a judge.
“Nobody is safer…”
The surviving kids are safer? That mom sounds negligent and dangerous. Why is there a gun in the house at all? Why is it loaded?Why isn’t it secured? Why aren’t the kids supervised?
Feels like you’re doing a lot of forgiving yourself for a “mistake” you imagine you could make yourself, OP?
Edit: OP, you’re ridiculous, did you even read this article?
“Belair testified at her trial that she removed a loaded 9mm handgun from her diaper bag and placed it on the couch next to her in October while she was home with her 4-year-old daughter, Lawrencia Perez-Belair, and her 2-year-old son and 1-year-old daughter.”
Fucking ridiculous, and she’s eligible for pastime in 25 years when she’ll still be under 50. Seems she got off easily for how unforgivably reckless and ridiculous this was.
what’s your basis for saying she’s sorry? the parents of that school shooter who were just imprisoned were pretty loudly sure they bore no responsibility
and I’m not saying she doesn’t, I’m asking because I’m asking
what’s your basis for saying she’s sorry?
Humanity?
Certainly willing to reconsider if she swears under oath that she has no regrets, but sorry seem like a safe assumption.
Sounds like a clear cut case of Stand Your Ground. If you can’t defend your toys, you don’t deserve them. Good shoot.
The best defence against a bad toddler with a gun is a good toddler with a gun.
To me this feels like a scapegoat, what she did was horribly irresponsible and she deserves to be in prison, but 25 years? That’s something you give a murderer, not a fatally irresponsible person.
I think this helps people feel good about the lack of gun control, because now they can say “yes, it’s dangerous, but the consequences are very serious so it stops people from ignoring the dangers”
The internal tension of commenting something heartfelt for these poor kids or JUST DUNKING on the gun dweebs for setting the stage for this so needlessly.
You know what’s worse than having to live with the guilt that you killed your sister as a young child? Having to live with the guilt that you killed your sister AND that it caused your mom to get taken away for the entire rest of your childhood.
“Belair testified at her trial that she removed a loaded 9mm handgun from her diaper bag and placed it on the couch next to her in October while she was home with her 4-year-old daughter, Lawrencia Perez-Belair, and her 2-year-old son and 1-year-old daughter.”
Yup, I read the article, even that paragraph.
Loaded gun. Diaper bag. 12 minutes.
Don’t forget the loaded gun.
The kid was two. Chances are they won’t remember it.
Destroying what’s left of this family satisfies some primal urge in society, I guess.
Diaper bag. Loaded gun. 12 minutes.
On a park bench near where your child is playing…
Or sitting at the table next to yours at the restaurant…
Or in a pediatricians waiting room…
…right next to your child.
I don’t think you have kids (or generally good judgement or the ability to empathize, for the matter)
How about the neighboring kids, everyone she comes close to, or anyone who enters the house? How about the UPS guy? They’ll all be safer. If you can’t even keep a loaded gun away from a toddler, you’re most likely also not being responsible with a loaded gun around anyone else.
Heck, at three years old, my kids understood there were some things they were not allowed to touch. What happened with parenting?
