Justice for Quinten

It certainly appears to matter when it concerns the father doesn't it?

Or does that not count?
does it matter?

why do people step on kitten and post a video?
why do parents sell their daughter for a drug?
why do nanny beat up and throw baby around like a toy doll?

you're gonna hurt your head trying to figure it out.
 
I think you are missing my point. The story in the OP is showing how a daughter had to turn in her father for child abuse charges.

I am NOT disputing that the father was abusive. I think that he should be held accountable.

What I am wondering here is ... why isn't the mother also being held accountable?

or does she get a "get of jail free card" in all of this?
 
I think you are missing my point. The story in the OP is showing how a daughter had to turn in her father for child abuse charges.

I am NOT disputing that the father was abusive. I think that he should be held accountable.

What I am wondering here is ... why isn't the mother also being held accountable?

or does she get a "get of jail free card" in all of this?

again.... does it matter?

what matter is children's well-being. I hope they're placed with a wonderful foster family. that's all it matters. anything else is irrelevant and unimportant.
 
again.... does it matter?

what matter is children's well-being. I hope they're placed with a wonderful foster family. that's all it matters. anything else is irrelevant and unimportant.

Be sure to include your statement with *in your opinion* :ty:

In my opinion, yes, it does matter where the mother is, or not is.
 
Be sure to include your statement with *in your opinion* :ty:

In my opinion, yes, it does matter where the mother is, or not is.

how can it relates with mom with quinten's death. He died by dad who allowed it to happen to him. the case worker didnt do nothing.
 
Be sure to include your statement with *in your opinion* :ty:

In my opinion, yes, it does matter where the mother is, or not is.

why the redundancy? if it came out of my mouth, it's an opinion.

and in this case... my opinion > your opinion. you're beating your head over stuff that doesn't really matter. always a why why why why. focus on what we can do for kids. the world's full of people who do unexplainable things. get over it.
 
I think you are missing my point. The story in the OP is showing how a daughter had to turn in her father for child abuse charges.

I am NOT disputing that the father was abusive. I think that he should be held accountable.

What I am wondering here is ... why isn't the mother also being held accountable?

or does she get a "get of jail free card" in all of this?

There is some reasons about mother isn't responsible to take care of this child: she may passed away or no longer want this child (just like give up for adoption or other families). It isn't mention in this article.

The father is in charge to take care of Quinten, so he's responsible to take care of him, even agreement from sister. There is nothing mention about mother so you can't blame on mother because it wouldn't do anything.

You are wasting your time to find out that may be not existent.
 
I am trying to figure out what kind of mother would abandon her kids like that.

His sister said: "The boys' mother has not been in their lives since they were toddlers and did not know about what was going on."

I'm not sure why the mother is not there but there are various reasons for her absence. The sister said nothing about how or why both parents were not together anymore. But, it's safe to assume that their father is an abusive parent or terrible boyfriend. That's huge clue enough.

Bu, still, I can't see why anybody should worry about the mother when the elder sister took care of him now. It's good news for his new family...
 
Steinhauer, I think it is best wish for you to respect sister's word above.
 
It was just a question Foxrac .. no need to get all bent out of shape over it. :lol:
 
From CNN:

Valerie Wood-Harber's brother, Quinten, needed a lot of special care.
He was born with a rare chromosomal abnormality, which meant even as a teenager, he needed help doing things that most people take for granted.
Getting dressed could be a challenge. So could eating.

But Quinten was also a happy child, who loved water, hugs and the music duo Daft Punk, his sister said. He smiled and laughed about everything.
"Honestly, my biggest worry about him was that he was going to outlive the people that were able to take care of him," said Wood-Harber.

"That was my biggest fear. He was healthy."

Quinten Douglas Wood, 15, died on January 4.
A medical examiner's report lists his cause of death as acute pneumonia. The manner of death was ruled natural.

Despite the report, Wood-Harber, 28, says she has questions, and she's not alone.

Wood-Harber has started an online petition, calling for the governor to investigate schools and the Oklahoma Department of Human Services over her brother's death, which she says was caused by negligence.

More than 250,000 people have signed it.

Quinten passed away less than a month after Wood-Harber says she called DHS to report their father, who took care of Quinten and the boy's younger brother in Oklahoma City. Wood-Harber lives in Fayetteville, Arkansas.

In keeping with its policy following the death of a child when there is an open or pending referral, DHS initiated an investigation.

The department is working alongside the Oklahoma City Police Department, the Oklahoma Commission on Children and Youth, the Oklahoma Medical Examiner's Office and The Children's Hospital.

Their investigations are ongoing.

The goal is to find out exactly what happened, said Sheree Powell, director of communications and community relations at DHS.

Who knew what and when? And what, if anything, could have been done to prevent Quinten's death?

"I think the biggest thing we would like to emphasize right now is just how heartbreaking this whole situation is and that we're working very, very diligently to try to find justice for this boy," Powell said.

'Wouldn't live to see a year'

When his son was born, Michael Wood says that doctors thought he wouldn't live to be a year old.

Unlike his daughter, he recalled the various health problems his son suffered.
Wood, 47, said Quinten had so many ear infections that antibiotics rarely worked. He had been hospitalized at least nine times with pneumonia, and each time took its toll, he said.

A single working dad, Wood needed help to care for his disabled son. He said he went to DHS three times, starting in 2010, to ask for it.

"They bounced me to another department, and they said well, somebody will come out. And nobody ever came out," Wood said. "I finally said, forget it, I'll do it on my own."

"I'm not real big on every time I have a problem, go to somebody else to fix it," he said.

Powell, with DHS, declined to comment on whether Wood had ever approached the department and if so, what happened. That sort of information, if it exists, would be included in a report DHS plans to issue at the end of its investigation.
Without help at home, the responsibilities of feeding and changing Quinten fell to his other son when Wood was at work.

The brothers were only a year apart and best friends. They were together when Quinten died.

Their father left work early that day because he felt under the weather. Already sick, Quinten's brother was home from school.

"I was going to take both of them to the doctor that afternoon," Wood said.
Quinten stopped breathing before he got the chance.

His father started CPR and told his other son to call 911. Quinten was transported to The Children's Hospital, where he was pronounced dead shortly after arrival.
"As a parent, no matter how your kid dies, you feel guilt," said Wood.

"Would he have been alive if I'd taken him to the doctor the day before? Probably, maybe not, I don't know. People die of pneumonia in the hospital."
He said he thinks about things he could have done differently. He wishes he'd spent every second with Quinten that he could.

But sometimes, life gives you a bad hand, and there's nothing you can do.
"There are some people that when they're hurting, they have to put blame somewhere. Personally, I was raised a Christian, and personally I put the blame on God," said Wood.

He lashed out at his daughter and others who say he wasn't a good father.
"If I didn't care properly for Quinten, he wouldn't have lived 15 years, especially when we were told that he wouldn't live to see a year."

'The system, it doesn't work'

Wood-Harber says she 100% believes that her brother would be alive if her father had taken better care of Quinten. But, in her mind, others are responsible for his death as well.

Parents might fail, but that's why there are agencies in place to pick up the slack.
Specifically, she said she told teachers and administrators at the boys' schools -- Jarman Middle School and Midwest City High -- to be on the lookout for signs of potential abuse or neglect. She thinks they failed to notice Quinten lost a substantial amount of weight.

"They're called mandatory reporters for a reason. If you even suspect something is going on, you're supposed to report it," said Wood-Harber.
Stacey Boyer, director of community relations and records management at Mid-Del Schools, which includes both of the boys' schools, declined to comment on the case, citing privacy laws.

She said no one from the Wood family has contacted the Mid-Del Board of Education.

Besides the schools, Wood-Harber blames DHS and the police.
She says she called to report her father to DHS on December 17. A worker went to interview Quinten and his brother at their schools almost immediately, she said.

The worker promised to make a home visit the next day, but never showed up, and stopped returning her calls, according to Wood-Harber, who says she also reached out to police.

The Oklahoma City Police Department received a report from an anonymous caller on December 17, requesting that officers check on Quinten and his brother, said Sgt. Jennifer Wardlow.


Officers checked the home, but there was no answer at the door.
No report was generated.Not 'just a cautionary tale'

Far away and frustrated, Wood-Harber considered at one point just going to Oklahoma City and taking the boys."Of course if I could trade a pair of handcuffs, and sitting in a jail cell serving time for kidnapping, for my brother being alive, I would do it in a heartbeat. But at the same time, I know that with the resources and the information that I had at my disposal, I did everything that I could.

"I relied on the system to work, and that's just the problem. The system, it doesn't work. It's very much broken," she said.

Wood-Harber started a petition at Change.org, which has so far collected more than 250,000 signatures.

In it, she calls for the governor of Oklahoma to investigate DHS and the schools. She hopes it will help ensure that what happened to Quinten won't happen to another child.

"This isn't just a cautionary tale. We could actually change things and prevent this from happening on a larger scale," she said.

Alex Weintz, a spokesman for Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, told CNN that her office was aware of the petition and monitoring its progress. The governor's staff has requested more information from DHS.

In the meantime, Quinten's sister says she'll continue speaking out about her brother, and on behalf of other children.

"That's the only way that I can make sense of it. Maybe if what happened to Quinten can save somebody else's life, then there'll be a little bit of justice in this world," she said.

Woman cries foul over brother's death, calls for investigation
 
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