A Virginia mom let her 5-year-old son walk about half a mile through their gated Williamsburg neighborhood to collect goose feathers from a pond. Weeks later, she was facing a misdemeanor charge.
Karyann Parkinson told CBS News that her son Samuel had already been out with her that morning before asking to return to the pond by himself. She gave him permission and told him to go straight there and come back.
Samuel never made the trip on his own. A security guard stopped him and brought him home after a neighbor reported seeing the boy alone. Parkinson said the guard told her children were not permitted to be outside in the neighborhood by themselves and called police after she challenged whether that was actually a rule or a law.
Police and Child Protective Services responded that day. About two weeks later, Parkinson was charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor. She was eventually convicted and received a six-month suspended jail sentence.
The case also produced a separate consequence through Virginia’s child-welfare system: a substantiated social-services finding put Parkinson and her son on the state’s abuse and neglect registry. Parkinson is challenging both outcomes.
A Half-Mile Walk
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Parkinson told CBS she had just returned from a walk when Samuel asked to go back for more feathers.
“I gave him permission to go,” Parkinson said. “I told him, ‘Go there. Come right back.'”
The family lived in Ford’s Colony, a gated community with paid security. Parkinson said she considered the neighborhood safe and believed her son could handle the trip.
The Washington Post reported that the June 5 outing followed a trip Parkinson and Samuel had already made together that morning. Samuel knew the route, and Parkinson said she and her husband had taught him how to cross streets, return home and ask neighbors for help.
On June 18, police returned with a warrant for Parkinson’s arrest, according to the Post.
The Criminal Case
Parkinson was convicted in Williamsburg and James City County Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court of contributing to the delinquency of a minor.
Williamsburg Commonwealth’s Attorney Nate Green told the Post that the judge imposed six months of suspended jail time after Parkinson declined a withheld finding. Accepting that option would have required her to agree that the evidence was sufficient for a finding of guilt while the misdemeanor charge remained pending.
Parkinson said she refused because she did not believe her parenting decision was a crime.
Virginia’s contributing-to-delinquency statute, § 18.2-371, provides several ways an adult can commit the misdemeanor. One covers willfully causing a condition that renders a child “abused or neglected as defined in § 16.1-228.”
The available public reporting does not establish which particular statutory theory the judge relied upon in finding Parkinson guilty. That distinction becomes important when the state’s definition of child neglect enters the picture.
Room To Roam
Virginia’s definition of an abused or neglected child contains a provision specifically addressing childhood independence.
Under Virginia Code § 16.1-228, a child is not considered abused or neglected merely because a parent allows independent activity without adult supervision, provided the activity is appropriate for the child’s age, maturity, and abilities and the lack of supervision is not so grossly negligent that it endangers the child’s health or safety.
The law even gives examples. They include traveling to nearby places on foot or by bicycle, playing outdoors and staying home alone for a reasonable period.
That does not mean Virginia law gives every unsupervised trip automatic protection. The statute makes age, maturity, ability and the actual level of danger part of the analysis.
It does mean Parkinson’s case sits against statutory language written specifically to distinguish some unsupervised childhood activity from neglect.
A Separate Finding
The criminal conviction was not the only proceeding Parkinson faced.
The Post reported that the James City County Department of Social Services also made a substantiated finding against her. Parkinson said that finding placed both her and Samuel on Virginia’s Abuse and Neglect Registry for seven years.
CBS reported that the registry placement prevents Parkinson from doing things such as volunteering for activities in her son’s classroom until he is in sixth grade.
Keeping those actions separate is important. Parkinson was criminally convicted of contributing to the delinquency of a minor; the registry consequence came from the separate child-welfare finding.
Parkinson is appealing both, according to the Post.
One More Round
The controversy has since moved far beyond Ford’s Colony.
Parkinson told CBS that she has heard from other mothers who say they have experienced similar intervention over parenting decisions. She has also defended the larger principle behind letting children exercise some independence.
“I think that, ideally, we have a conversation, we see that a kid is confident and capable, and we leave it at that,” she said.
Her attorney, Andrew Gordon, told the Post that he understands why people disagree about the underlying parenting decision.
“We just disagree on whether this is criminal,” Gordon said.