Click to enlarge photos.By Ashley Hungerford
Marietta Daily Journal Staff Writer
SMYRNA - Under Nebraska's new safe haven law, a Smyrna mother drove almost 1,000 miles on Saturday to drop off her 12-year-old son at a Lincoln, Neb., hospital.
Officer Katie Flood, spokeswoman for the Lincoln Police Department said 33-year-old Tysheema Brown of Smyrna dropped her 12-year-old son off at BryanLGH Medical Center East on Saturday around 9:50 p.m.
Flood said the mother indicated the child has "discipline issues," and the mother was unable to find needed help to deal with the issues.
The Nebraska law does not define the term child, allowing anyone to leave a child younger than 18 at a state-licensed hospital without fear of prosecution for abandonment.
Flood said when a child is left, the police department is notified to make sure the child wasn't abused.
In the Brown case, she said no criminal charges will be filed and there are no legal repercussions for Brown.
Todd Landry, director of Division of Children and Family Services for the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services, said they have placed the boy in the care of a temporary residential shelter. DHHS is working with Nebraska and Georgia authorities to find the boy a permanent home, he said.
Other media reported Monday night, however, that Brown's son may return to metro Atlanta sometime this week. The Marietta Daily Journal could not confirm if the child would be coming back to Georgia. Calls to Brown were not immediately returned.
Since Nebraska's Safe Haven law went into effect on July 18, this is the 12th instance of use of the law and the 20th child left at a hospital. Flood said of the 20 children left, only one has been under the age of 2.
This case is the third incident of an out-of-state mother leaving a child in Nebraska. Children from Iowa and Michigan have been dropped off at Nebraska hospitals since the law went into effect.
Nebraska legislators are considering amending the law to define child as an infant up to three days old.
"This law has had serious, unintended consequences," Gov. Dave Heineman said last week in a statement. "It needs to be changed to focus on its original intent - protecting infants. I also want to make Nebraskans aware of our efforts to ensure that families and children in need know about the services available to them."
In Georgia, the intent of the "Safe Place for Newborns Act of 2002," is to "prevent injuries to and deaths of newborn children that are caused by a mother who abandons the newborn."
The act allows for mothers to leave their newborn child, who is no more than one week old, at a medical facility and not be prosecuted for cruelty to a child.
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Posted Comments
I no i might be bomb rush for saying this,his mom is getting back what she did to her mom,what goes around the world, come back around,like a revolver door.Cobb Co school system sucks, when you have problems with your child,they want to kick them out,send them to central alternative school which is full of violence,they perfer to see you suffer before you get help, or they will send your child to a Onbusman program.I no what this parent is going thru with,because i had a similar issue with my son, and boy,hell and high water broke thru.Tysheema, you do whhat you got to do, to get this problem solved, still love your son,and keep God in front of everything you do,.I could go on & on with this but i have to stop.
This story breaks my heart. To know that there are actually mothers out there that could leave their child after raising them for 12 years, drive them 1000 miles away from home and drop them off at a hospital- saying they were a bad kid. That poor little boy was probably crying the whole way there, promising to be good. He's 12. Not a grown man.
It's not the schools system's responsibility to fix your broken child. It's to try to get him to a behavior where he can learn - and keep the behavior from keeping others from learning. This is from a mom tired of hearing stories about the misbehaving students ruining my child's education that my tax dollars help pay for, too! If they can't behave for a "regular" school, then they should go to Alternative school...or you can always homeschool them, if you don't like the public schools provided.
Didn't we see this story 3 days ago?
It is hard to get help for your child in the public school system. An elementary school child has to fail miserably before the public school will test them for learning disabilities. By this time the child is terribly frustrated. To the parent whose child is perfect-Stop the Madness, you don't know what it is like and you evidently don't care to know. The perfect students and the not so perfect need to be taught. Federal & state laws need to be changed, so that you don't have to wait until it is out of control. I have had educators tell me that it is more difficult to get help now than it was in the 80s. Solving the problems now means less problems when they are older.
This is a sad situation. I feel for any mother who thinks that this is her only option. This is where the help of extended family, church, and community programs should be used to give parents some hope that whatever they may be going through can and will be short-lived and give them the support they need to endure the ups and downs of parenting.
If your children have problems and the schools won't test them, you can have them tested yourself. Expense should not stop you from helping your children. I went on my own and had my son tested, and that forced the schools to give him the help he needed. The problem with our schools is the parents not wanting to take responsibility for their children. parnets need to stop blaming the schools, and help thier children themselves. Teachers are not doctors, they can not diagonse problems. We need to quit expecting to the schools to raise our kids, and we need to start doint it ourselves.
This law was not intended to open a dumping group for children who misbehave. Parents are taking advantage of the state. i feel that any parent who dumps a teen should be help responsible for room and board for that child. Clearly this mom was at her wits end, but she should have found another option. This child will never forget that drive, he will never forget him mom leaving him and driving off with his sister and not him. He may grow to be worse than he already is, all because she could not take it anymore.
Any one notice how the mom was nothing but all smiles on tv? I believe she is just hungry for attention and was too lazy to attend to her son's needs. To "angry mom" -- your saying that the Cobb County school system sucks is negated by your horrible spelling and grammar. You wouldn't recognize a good school system if it was standing in front of you. Raise your own kids.