Defining The Law’s Reach
For the parents of a woman killed recently in a car wreck, the tragedy is compounded by the legal difficulties confronting their beloved son-in-law.
Todd Sligar is accused of vehicular homicide in the accident in which he allegedly was driving drunk.
His wife, Caryle Nielsen-Sligar, died at the scene and the couple’s two children were injured. The dead woman’s parents and sister don’t want Sligar charged with a crime.
That’s compassionate.
But should their wishes have any bearing on the authorities’ decision about whether and how to proceed against the man?
Laws against such behavior as drunken driving exist to protect the whole of society, after all. Should a victim’s immediate loved ones have the power to insulate certain lawbreakers from the consequences of their choices?
Or does a grieving family deserve a respite?
Can the long arm of the law reach a keyboard?
Use of the World Wide Web and places to explore on it are growing faster than anyone can keep track of.
Near-instant communication anywhere on Earth is possible via e-mail.
Volumes of information on any subject imaginable are available in your home over the Internet.
Obviously, technological ability is in place to conduct national criminal background checks of people who seek jobs supervising abused and neglected children.
That’s what some people want Washington state to do when hiring social workers who oversee children and adolescents - now that one of them has been accused of 40 counts of possession of child pornography.
The state Department of Social and Health Services employs 1,800 such workers, whose criminal histories in Washington are checked routinely, though they are not checked elsewhere.
In the since-fired Harry Pitcock’s case, his references from Texas where he had been a day-care investigator were clean. But officials don’t know if there were legal problems surrounding his resignation from that job.
Is that situation adequate grounds for the state to instigate nationwide criminal background checks of all applicants for social-service jobs involving children? Or, given the vulnerability of the potential victims, is there any excuse not to?
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