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No Charges For Child-Whipping Judge Caught On YouTube
theodp writes "Federal prosecutors will not charge a Texas judge seen lashing his teenage daughter with a belt on a YouTube video taken seven years ago and posted online last week, closing the door on the possibility of criminal charges in the case. The viral video, uploaded by now 23-year-old Hillary Adams, shows her father, Aransas County Court-at-Law Judge William Adams, whipping her with a belt for downloading music when she was 16 (full video, requires login). 'F*****g computers,' the judge tells his now ex-wife on the video. 'I told you I didn't want one in the god damn house. See all the problems they cause?' Judge Adams issued a statement asserting that his daughter released the tape to retaliate against him for withdrawing his financial support."
I bet 10 bucks he later wanked on that spanking. Those sort of people always do. This is more than just a crime. It is a form of sexual torture and rape and should be treated as such. Since this is also a minor, that guy should get the chair. Especially since he is a judge and clearly has pulled all his known strings to get away with it and after that points the finger at the victim.
Neh 16 yo aren't adults. That is a proven fact. Their brains can't comprehend cause, danger, effects as real adults do. 25.... yeps, those are adults. It can be seen by brainscans btw. Some 16 yo are perfectly capable of doing a lot of things some adults can't... but put them in a scanner and you can see the difference.
Nope. She's posted about it elsewhere, but basically, she saved the video in order to blackmail him. Fast forward to a week ago, and he threatens to stop allowing her to borrow his Mercedes. So she posts the video in response.
They're both horrible people: the judge for beating his daughter, and the girl for blackmailing him over it.
If she wanted him punished, she had the chance. She didn't. She wanted money from him.
Gotta agree with the AC - I've been beat before, and while it looked like this man was putting his heart into it, he looked like an out of shape skinny punk compared to the whippings I got as a child. When a beating was finished in my household, the crying didn't stop for 30 minutes, and you'd be lucky if you weren't limping afterwards. If the video had shown her inconsolable for 20 minutes after the beating, hardly able to move because of the pain, I'd be more inclined to feel some sympathy for her. As it was, she had a dick father, and a dick mother, but as soon as they got out of the room, she was cool as a cucumber, walking around like the beating was nothing to her.
Now be clear, even if you're a wimp with a belt and can't give a 16 year old enough of a smack down to keep them crying for 30 minutes, you shouldn't be beating your kid - it's stupid and unproductive. But this was definitely "gotcha" videography on the part of the kid. The whole family is rotten, and frankly, I'm most appalled by the mother - the fact that she was cool with it as an observer (although I think she got one lick in too) was chilling.
Ho ho. I got beat left and right for stuff I did as a kid. This video is so much BS, bunch of wormy liberals complaining about a real person taking control of their family, after their daughter has stolen stuff off the internet. Yup. That's what I thought until I watched about a third of it before I couldn't stomach any more.
I'm for discipline, and I'm for corporal punishment, but that was a sick individual getting his kicks punishing his child. You lose the moral battle when you curse as much as he did, when you seem to enjoy it as much as he did, when you won't stop even when your child is a weeping wreck in front of you.
What sort of parent looks back on that I thinks they've helped mould their child into a good citizen?
There's a lot of talk about how she only showed this after he took away her toys. Because you expected adult, rational behaviour from her? Yeah, that's how she was raised. Wasn't it?
I don't normally get angry at Random Q. Internetguy, but that wasn't an Internet meme, that thing you just saw, that was the repeated, planned, brutalization of a child by her parent, and it was appalling.
Yet another target for "Anonymous" to go at - and he isn't declared innocent either if he isn't charged. You need to bring him to court to determine guilty or not.
I think that by avoiding to charge him they try to avoid having to re-take a lot of cases that he has been involved in.
But the video is good enough to get him convicted by almost any jury unless they are specially picked from extreme Amish or similar societies where they don't use computers or TV.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
As a native Texan, I'm all for corporal punishment as a method of last resort. But not in the manor in which this was delivered. But if you have to go there, you have much bigger family problems in the first place. Such as lack of respect for others. Second, the parent delivering the punishment should never be in a state of hate and rage. Remember, corporal punishment is about sending a message of last resort. *NOT* to be used an excuse to vent rage and frustration like her parents did. The later only perpetuates family problems down the line.
Case in point. The daughter never forgave the father (big issue) to this day, and she blackmailed him for money (so he says). Either way, they're are much bigger problems within that family we do not know about. Absolutely broken! Sad.
Life is not for the lazy.
You don't beat a child to make a moral point. You can, and should, smack a child to teach them when they can't understand - for example, if a young child is about to touch a hot oven, you smack them to shock them and reinforce the point, something you can't do with words when they are young. But that is about shock, communicating and not real harm. You should never be beating a child with an object, and never repeatedly. It should never be more than enough to cause a bit of mild pain and shock to grab attention and make them realise. By the time they are 16, you should be able to talk with your child a reason with them. If you can't, consider the idea you might be wrong. Sure, sometimes kids won't listen, but beating them is never an answer. Kid, adult - they are people. Beating them is wrong.
-- Lattyware (www.lattyware.co.uk)
You are very clearly not reading everything.
The child has cerebral palsy. First, it's a felony by reason of age - 16 is not old enough in Texas to reasonably live on your own without support or aid. Secondly, Medical (physical) disease further adds to this. Thirdly, it's a third-degree felony alone if committed when the child assaulted is covered under Family Code 71.005 - Household member.
You don't know jack about Texas law. How about you shut up and listen to an actual Texan?
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Hmmm...let's think about the causality here. I think giving her a Merc and supporting her financially is frankly only a part of what he ought to be doing by way of recompensing her for beating her like that. What do you think is the likelihood that this is the only time she was beaten?
You don't have to spank your kids to keep them in line. I was spanked a lot as a kid. Didn't want to finish my food, didn't want to go to bed, fighting with siblings (I was middle child. What older said was always right and younger was too young to know better, so always my fault), plus other random things. It didn't make me a better person, it made be a better lier and I stopped trusting my parents. I knew that if I went to them with a problem, there was a chance I would get in trouble and a chance I would be spanked. Out of habit at 25, I still barely talk with them. Spanking made me hate and distrust them. Also, it doesn't take too long to get used to it. It's not fun, but it's not too bad either.
However when they took things away from me (no computer, no cartoons, no dessert, no toys) or sent me to my room, it was more "Why did I do that?" and I had to come up with something productive to do instead of sitting around bored. Spanking gave me the excuse to focus on my parents as the enemies, while non-physical punishment gave me no outlet except I did wrong.
I was spanked with a razor belt more times than I care to count when I was growing up. Not radically different than this. You can bet I didn't do whatever caused the whipping again. Even then I didn't think it was abuse. I would bet it didn't look much different than this to an outsider. Spanking is also still legal in the U.S. as long as the force is reasonable. Hell it's still legal in a large number of schools as well (something like 21 states still allow corporal punishment). Claiming she was 'almost' an adult is like saying someone is 'almost' guilty. You either are or you aren't. If she was living in her fathers house, under his rules, and she is a minor, then it's appropriate that he is able to dole out punishments as long as they aren't excessive, or abusive.
TFA article states that there are no allegations of abuse on record:
He wasn't being investigated because the statue of limitations on such cases is 5 years. They have no legal course of action at this point. Although they did say the video would have warranted an investigation and they would have pursued charges based on the video.
I always find it interesting how a video like that turns every American into a model parent when in short, it's none of their damn business. If the child was 'abused' in the truest sense (bruises, black eyes, broken bones, etc), then by all means it should be reported and the father should be investigated. If the video is however making this look worse than it is (and I know of no way to judge how 'hard' she is being whipped), then this is nothing more than judging the man as guilty with no proof of abuse. The fact that there are no allegations of abuse doesn't help her case either. Looks to me like a father who probably lost his temper and a young woman playing to the internet 'jury' for sympathy and revenge.
Granted, he's scaring the hell out of his daughter in the video (probably with good reason), but unless there was evidence of such abuse then I think people should mind their own damn business.
It's very rare, but in California, the court can issue a "declaration of factual innocence", which is to say there was no reasonable cause for the person to have been arrested or put on trial.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
And that's what everyone is missing. They think she is a spoiled brat blackmailing him for cutting her off. As you said from all appearances that car was her only transport. Given that's she got palsy she's probably very limited in what kind of transportation she can use. Although it doesn't excuse the fact that she should get her own transportation he's clearly using it as a form of control. He probably gave it to her with the intent to use it to control her, when she failed to do whatever it was he wanted he'd yank the chain and try to force her to obey. I'm willing to bet up to this point he's exerted immense influence over her and her life.
He needs serious help in the form of counseling, and I dare say she does as well because I really don't think this was an adult response to the situation.
What went on in the video wasn't child abuse. When I was growing up my parents would hit me with the METAL END of the belt as hard as they could. Once, I called my Mom a bitch (under my breath) and my parents knocked me down to the floor. My Dad proceeded to repeatedly kick me in the stomach HARD while my Mom jumped on my head and chest. THAT was child abuse. My parents would beat the shit out of me if I ever stepped out of line and I still didn't turn into a sociopath. There are probably some emotional scars there but I managed to move past all that. I actually have a very good relationship with both of my parents now. My older sister, on the other hand, came to school with some marks on her body and Social Services came to the house and she didn't live with us anymore after that. The father sounds like an asshole but it isn't child abuse unless it leaves a mark. Everyone needs to stop pushing their values on other people and telling them how to raise their kids. I don't advocate violence, but sometimes it doesn't hurt to spank a child when he misbehaves. It teaches the child that there are consequences to his actions.
Please stop being deliberately obtuse.
This case of a judge beating his daughter has nothing to do with physical discipline. It's a sick bastard beating a child for pleasure. Clearly abuse and completely different from what I was talking about.
The liberal media will often try to equate physical discipline with abuse (and of course use terms such as "beating") and will report horrific child abuse cases as "raising the question" about smacking in general. I live in a country where it has for several years been illegal to smack children for any reason (though of course children are still allowed to hit whomever they please, since this "think of the children" society is hell-bent on giving children more rights than they can handle but no responsibilities).
And guess what? Since that law came into effect, actual child abuse hasn't decreased at all. Not a bit. What has happened though is a generation of disrespectful children who can get away with near murder and a culture where and any parent who pulls their two-year-old away from traffic is regarded with suspicion.
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
"It wasn't as bad as I got when I was a kid."
"She's just digging for money."
"Teaching a lesson is a good thing."
"Other countries do this all the time."
You people are sick.
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.