Scoop’s Views

Debates have raged since at least the 1980s about violence in movies and on television, as well as in video games. One side argues that the violence is "entertainment," while another side says it is teaching teenagers, and younger children, that violence is an acceptable way of life, but also a way of life that’s normal.

In the 1990s, America — and the world — watched live as police attempted to rescue students, teachers, and staff from a Colorado high school as two students opened fire in the school. In the end, the two students committed suicide rather than go head-to-head in a shootout with police, risk getting shot by snipers from the local SWAT team, or going on trial for the violent and unprovoked attack on fellow students. That shooting seemingly helped numb teens for more than a decade to the value of human life.

Just as the folks in Baytown, Texas about the alleged actions of a 14-year-old student at the town’s Cedar Bayou Junior High who allegedly murdered her newborn infant son immediately after birth, according to police reports. She allegedly killed her newborn son by stuffing toilet paper in her infant son’s throat after he had cried his first — and what would be his last — cries in life, according to police and media reports. After allegedly stuffing her newborn son’s mouth with toilet paper, the unidentified eight-grader then allegedly submerged her baby boy in the toilet, then flushed the toilet, drowning him, according to Baytown Police Lt. Eric Freed, who was quoted in several media outlets as saying.

The girl, who secretly gave birth in the junior high school bathroom, according to police reports, then, after the baby boy was born alive and cried, she allegedly killed her son in cold blood.

For her alleged actions, police have charged her with capital murder. For now, she’s being charged as a juvenile, but Baytown Police Captain Roger Clifford says prosecutors will have the final say in whether to certify her as an adult. If she is certified as an adult, she’d be charged with capital murder, as well as any other charges that may be filed, as an adult, but because she is 14-years-old, she cannot be executed if convicted.

If she’s guilty, not being allowed to execute this alleged baby killer is a terrific thing. That means that she gets to live her life, hopefully behind bars for the rest of her natural life, and will then have to deal with the memories of killing her innocent, defenseless newborn baby boy that she had carried in her uterus for nine months. The birth occurred on April 2, 2008.

“We have had enough evidence to determine that this action was done intentionally and knowingly,” Clifford said. “That means beyond a reasonable doubt in our mind and in mind of the district attorney’s office and in mind of the medical examiner’s office, that this was not an accident.”

Now that the girl has been charged, the legal wrangling begins, and if you listen to the spin the lawyer representing the girl, the girl must be the most mentally retarded, dumb, lifeless, clueless person on the face of the Earth. Her lawyer, Gerald Yoakum, says his client didn’t realize she was giving birth.

I wonder what his statement will be when he tries to explain away her alleged actions of shoving toilet paper in her son’s mouth after he began crying, and then, how he will try to explain away her alleged actions of drowning him by dunking his head in the toilet and flushing it. Perhaps he will say she thought it was a baby doll that she expelled from her body and she was trying to bathe it.

At the time she gave birth, the 14-year-old female was 35-to-36 weeks pregnant. Premature infants, known as preemies, come into the world earlier than full-term infants. Prematurity occurs when a pregnancy lasts fewer than 37 weeks; full-term infants are born 38 to 42 weeks after the mother’s last menstrual period.

According to an article posted on MSNBC, Cedar Bayou school officials learned of the 14-year-old’s pregnancy and labor after another student who was in the bathroom prior to the baby boy’s birth, went to the school nurse seeking help.

The school nurse and the assistant principal ran to the bathroom, according to the MSNBC article. When the two arrived, they found the girl had already given birth. They called 911 at that point, seeking to have an ambulance take the newborn baby boy and the teenage mother to the hospital for evaluation.

According to Goose Creek school district spokesperson Kathy Clausen, who was quoted in multiple media reports, the district is investigating the incident, but also looking to see what school rules the alleged baby killer may have broken.

I suppose if the 14-year-old somehow is found innocent of any wrongdoing, the school district can expel her from school for a variety of district policies.

In the end, though, this tragic incident in Texas is a sign of the state of mind of many teenagers today: they simply have no respect for life. It seems as though too much gaming, whether online, on their PlayStation, or any number of recent "hit" movies that make murder, killing, and all things illegal seem glamorous, but, more importantly, hold illegal activities to be the norm for the hip, in-crowd. That’s the wrong message, regardless of age group targeted by video games, movies, or any other form of supposed entertainment.