The next time you tell your kids how easy they have it, think about these news stories, all just from this week, proving that sometimes, it’s not easy to be a kid:
15-year-old Girl Deported Mistakenly to Colombia Returns to US
The Guardian reported today that a 15-year-old Texas runaway was deported to Columbia after she told police she was an illegal alien. Jakadrien Lorece Turner reported left home a year ago November. When she was arrested for a misdemeanor theft last April, she told the Houston police and the local courts she was a Columbian woman born in 1990. The Guardian reported:
Her grandmother, Lorene Turner, called the deportation a “big mistake somebody made” and said US officials need to do better. “She looks like a kid, she acts like a kid. How could they think she wasn’t a kid?”
Upon arriving in Columbia, she was given citizenship there and entered the “Welcome Home” program there, provided with shelter, psychological assistance and a job., which is a heck of a lot more than she got in the States, where it appears, no one bothered to check her identity.
She is on her way back to the U.S.
Police Enforcement of Library Lending Leaves 5 year-old in Tears
CNN is among some 100 news outlets and blogs reporting on the 5-year-old Massachusetts girl who received a visit from the police about overdue library books.
The mother says she never received notices for the overdue books.
The library says they were really after the father’s $100 late fees for overdue audio books, and that they’d sent a warning letters and placed calls to the house.
The police officer who visited the house said he really didn’t want to be involved.
Little Hailey Benoit said, “I was scared.”
The Worcester Telegram & Gazette says that “13 other families in the area were also visited by police, who collectively had in their possession a total of $2,634 in overdue library materials.”
Parents everywhere started looking under the couch for overdue books.
Boy Falls at School, Told to Crawl Back to Classroom by Teachers
Strollerderby reported today that after kindergartner Rahul Chandani fell over a snow mound at his school, teachers reportedly told him to crawl back to his classroom.
Turns out, the six-year-old had a fractured tibia, a hematoma on his head and a concussion, having first fallen by the swings, hitting his head and leg.
His parents have filed a lawsuit against the school. Reports the Chicago Sun Times:
His teacher told him, “You’re a big boy — I can’t carry you. She told him to walk back, but his leg was broken so he fell again and then had to crawl at least 200-300 feet back to the school building.”
So, let your kids have a break this weekend. It’s been a rough week for kids indeed.
