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Edited on Sun Mar-18-07 06:43 PM by Divernan
I think it's skewed toward the kid. He snuck in a back door. He took about $500 in cash, plus another couple of hundred dollars worth of games/equipment. He knew they were there because they belonged to his friend, the homeowner's son.
Everyone should really read the whole article (I assume you did), before posting their opinions. The article you link to is very detailed and balanced and presents points of view of the kid, his mother, his 7 year old accomplice (who was not charged), the victim,the DA, various experts, etc.
When I worked for the state legislature, I used to get a lots of requests from legislators to handle calls from moms of convicted criminals, who wanted their adult sons to get immediate parole from state prisons, because they were innocent, had never committed a criminal act in their lives, etc.
When I'd look into the cases, it was never a matter of one crook pointing the finger at someone else to get a deal; but where one person alone had been involved in theft or drug dealing and got caught in the act. However, these guys were so smooth at lying to their mothers that they would claim total innocence, despite all evidence, confessions, etc. When a man has masks, scales and piles of cocaine in his house, and he lives alone, he's GUILTY!
This ten year old is described by classmates, teachers, etc., as just the loveliest kid - would never do ANYTHING criminal. They say this despite the fact that (1)first he denied ever setting foot in the house; (2) the game controller was found in HIS home, (3) the money has never been accounted for; (4) he manipulated a 7 year old into participating in the theft: and (5) his gullible mother tells the world that he didn't take anything.
DUH! The game controller was IN THEIR HOUSE!
There's a reason state law allows kids as young as ten to be charged like this. It's because they do steal valuables. And imagine the cojones on this kid, that he stole from a friend's Dad, who was a prosecutor w/ the DA's office. And I can understand the victim's anger about this. It's bad enough if a kid in the neighborhood sneaks into your house and steals stuff. But when it turns out to be a friend of YOUR kid, it's worse. When a kid's mother/father cannot face reality and make the kid face reality, there's still hope that getting ordered to wash police cars for the summer, or some such punishment will rehabilitate the kid.
Here's more from the link:
On Friday, Sept. 1, Joe and a 7-year-old boy, both friends of Gambardella's 11-year-old son, entered the prosecutor's townhouse in the Patriots Ridge development near Doylestown. A rear sliding-glass door had been left unlocked.
Over that weekend, the 7-year-old told Gambardella that he and Joe had been in the house, and that Joe had stolen things.
Gambardella summoned police Sept. 4. He told the officers he had left $350 in large bills on his bathroom sink counter, and that only a $100 bill remained. An additional $192 had been in his son's wallet; now there was only $2. Also gone from his son's bedroom: a pack of Yu-Gi-Oh! action cards, a "Nintendogs" video game, and a game controller.
The action cards were returned by the 7-year-old. THE CONTROLLER WAS IN JOE's HOUSE. Nothing else has surfaced.
When confronted by police at his home down the block from Gambardella's, Joe denied everything - and then fainted. Police called off an ambulance when the boy quickly revived. That night, Joe confessed to his mother, Jocellyn Maisonet, that he had been in Gambardella's home, but insisted he took nothing. She called the police.
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