Should parents be arrested for child endangerment for not following a mandatory evacuation order?

Question

It was just a general question. I was watching a show on hurricanes and there was this family who refused to leave after the authoritys told them too. They all survived but part of thier house did collapse and trap them. (Husband, wife and 2 little girls) It just got me thinking.

Answer 1

Yes, it is a parent's responsibility to place the interest of a child's needs as a priority. An individual making decisions that solely effect themselves has a little more latitude to make decisions that might result in negative consequences but no one has the right to make questionably bad decisions for someone else or even themselves if in doing so it places a child at risk. If an evacuation order has been issued, then it has already been determined by those in positions of authority that sticking around poses a threat; therefore, to ignore the order - especially if in doing so something bad did happen to a child, would just be setting themselves up for legal problems and rightly so. This also applies to anyone who has accepted legal guardianship of a child, handicapped person, or the elderly.

Answer 2

Given the sparse detail, it is hard to say.

Depends on the nature of the mandatory evacuation, its purpose and who called it. There are also responsibilities on the part of authorities that call the evacuations, as we learned from Hurricane Katrina.

I can hardly wait until all the litigation gets to court over this one.

Answer 3

The depends entirely upon the facts of the case and you haven't disclosed any of the facts. I can't even tell if the "mandatory" evacuation order was lawful. It would be helpful to to what lead to the evacuation order.

Answer 4

yes they should