Nebraska no longer legal dumping ground for kids
As of 12:01 a.m. Saturday, parents face criminal charges if they abandon any child older than 30 days in Nebraska. Previously, it had been the only state in the country with a safe-haven law that lacked an age limit. Lawmakers made the change today.
Since July, 35 children — most of them teenagers, five from out of state — were dropped off in Nebraska. “These kids are old enough to know they’re being dropped off and that’s not good,” Sen. Kent Rogert told the Associated Press.
Safe haven laws were originally intended to prevent mothers from throwing away or killing unwanted newborns. Some child safety advocates say that the government needs to do more to protect teenagers and expand programs to help them.
One mother told the AP that she sympathized with parents who dropped off their kids as a last resort. Therese Guy of Papillion, Neb., said that it had taken her nine months to get her foster child’s mental problems diagnosed because of the backlog in social services. Kids dropped off under the safe-haven law got help immediately.
“Don’t change the safe-haven law until you have other changes in place, because it’s helping the kids now,” she said.
