Child ENdaNgermeNt aNd Child Abuse
Child abuse or neglect is defined in Black’s Law Dictionary as:
“When a child’s parent or custodian, by reason of cruelty, mental capacity, immorality or depravity, is unfit to properly care for him or her, neglects or refuses to provide necessary physical, affectional, medical, surgical or institutional care for him or her or is under such improper care or control as to endanger his or her morals or health.” Child endangerment as it pertains to impaired driving falls into the above legal definition of child abuse when a parent or caregiver knowingly puts a child in the car after drinking alcohol with the intention to drive. This choice falls under the “improper care…so as to endanger his or her morals or health.” However, driving while impaired with a child in the vehicle is rarely, if ever, charged as child abuse. Child ENdaNgermeNt Laws Child endangerment is a term used to collectively identify laws that create a separate offense or enhance an existing penalty for an offender who endangers a minor. Endangerment is any action that might place a minor in jeopardy of physical, moral or mental well being. While most states now have some kind of endangerment statute, 35 states currently have statutes that create special sanctions for cases of driving under the influence / driving while intoxicated (DUI/DWI) while the offender is transporting a child at the time of the offense. For information about state laws and child endangerment, please refer to our website at: http://www3.madd.org/laws/law.cfm?LawID=YDAN
Child endangerment statutes fall into the following categories:
• Enhanced penalties: Penalties that are added to the penalties for a DUI/DWI law violation. • Separate offenses: An offense for DUI/DWI with a minor in the vehicle that is separate from the DUI/DWI laws. • Aggravating circumstances: Laws that allow the fact that a child was in the vehicle to be used by the judge/jury in sentencing as an aggravating factor, but not necessarily mandating a specific enhanced penalty.
Driving impaired is not an “accident” or a mistake. It is a choice, just as blatant physical child abuse is a choice. Rather than a fist, the weapon is a motor vehicle.
MADD is concerned about the increasing number of calls MADD victim advocates receive from distraught parents and other loved ones regarding allegations of an adult driving impaired with a child in the vehicle. In polling MADD chapters during the last year, MADD victim advocates across the nation received approximately 17,000 child endangerment calls. Many of these calls indicate that reports filed as child endangerment to state agencies are slipping through the cracks of the system, putting children at a greater risk of victimization. These calls are not from victims of drunk driving crashes, but from potential victims of drunk driving. Often victim advocates feel helpless and frustrated with these calls for help. There seems to be no relief for the problem due in part to the lack of public awareness of the extent of the DUI/DWI child endangerment problem and the reluctance to accept that to drive impaired with a child in the vehicle is a form of child abuse.
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