Dad charged after girl, 11, dies walking in snow

[volcanicweather]

Unbelievable....

Dad charged after girl, 11, dies walking in snow - Crime & courts- msnbc.com

Dad charged after girl, 11, dies walking in snow
Daughter was sent on 10-mile trek after truck got stuck on Christmas Day

TWIN FALLS, Idaho - The father of an 11-year-old girl who died, likely of hypothermia, after trying to walk 10 miles in the snow on Christmas Day has been charged with second-degree murder and felony injury to a child.

Robert Aragon, 55, of Jerome, made an initial appearance Monday in 5th District Court, where Judge Mark Ingram appointed a public defender for him. The judge denied Aragon's request to lower his $500,000 bond. He was being held in the Blaine County Jail.

Aragon was emotional during the short hearing. He banged his head on the defendant's table as Ingram read the charges against him, The Times-News reported. After Ingram noted that second-degree murder carries a maximum penalty of life in prison, Aragon said "Oh my God" as he banged his head on the table one final time.

Sage Aragon and her 12-year-old brother, Bear, were with their father on Thursday when his truck got stuck in a snow drift on a highway north of Shoshone in southcentral Idaho, according to the Lincoln County sheriff's office.

The children live with Aragon in Jerome and he was taking them to visit their mother, JoLeta Jenks, in West Magic.

After the truck got caught in the snow, authorities allege Aragon let the children out to walk to their mother's house while he and another adult stayed behind to free the vehicle.

Jenks said she called Aragon because she was concerned after no one arrived at her home on Thursday. Aragon had driven back to Jerome after letting the kids out to walk to her house, Jenks said.

"They didn't even call me, telling me they were walking," she told the Times-News.

Jenks called the police and a Blaine County search and rescue team found the boy at a rest area near the highway shortly before 10 p.m. on Thursday night.

Adults in the search effort described the snow as knee-deep for them.

The boy was found wearing only long underwear, Blaine County Sheriff Walt Femling said in a news release. Apparently delusional from hypothermia, the child had discarded his jacket, pants and shoes, the sheriff's office said. He was treated and released at a nearby hospital.

The rest area was about 4.5 miles from where the children started walking.

At some point the children separated and their mother said her son told her they disagreed about whether to keep going or turn back.

"(Bear) kept on telling her: 'Let's go, Sage, let's go, Sage,'" Jenks said, recalling what her son told her. "She said, 'No, I'm going back.'"

The little girl was found about 2.7 miles from where the two set out, barely visible under windblown, drifting snow when search dogs located her along a local road about 2 a.m. Friday. She was wearing a brown down coat, black shirt, pink pajama pants and tan snowboots, the sheriff's office statement said.

"I thought she was alive because they said they found her," Jenks said. "I was excited."

The girl was pronounced dead at a Ketchum hospital; preliminary autopsy results indicate she died of hypothermia.

Officials say temperatures in the area at the time the girl was missing ranged from 27 degrees above zero to minus 5 Fahrenheit (minus 20 to minus 3 Celsius).

Jenks and Aragon are not married. While she said she doesn't understand the decision Aragon is accused of making in letting the children walk to her house, Jenks added, "I don't need to sit and yell. I know he's going through hell right now."

[Drex]

http://www.theargonath.cc/characters...s/aragorn1.jpg

[Mizango]

Yeah I saw this on TV a few weeks ago, this is extremely fucked up.

[Ohaigaiz]

i saw this on the philip defranco show yesterday. apparently dad's side of the family says 'you don't know the other half of the story'. defranco show put it like 'oh, now after hearing the other side of the story i completely understand why you raped her.'

[MrW]

This is a terrible story

[#686578]

I thought you couldn't be charged for murder unless you actually killed them on purpose (Premeditated or otherwise). Shouldn't this be manslaughter or extreme child neglect?

[Hellfury]

I thought you couldn't be charged for murder unless you actually killed them on purpose (Premeditated or otherwise). Shouldn't this be manslaughter or extreme child neglect?

my uneducated guess would be that they're going for the accusation that he knew perfectly well what he was doing, but it wasn't preplanned.

[Meian]

For some reason I was reminded of that story I read as a kid about the father who walked through the snow to find gas for their stopped car. The girls were left in the car and decided to go out. They found some library that was mysterous or something. Was a pretty good story wish I could find the name of it...

This news though sucks. I couldn't imagine a father saying this hmm...

On a lighter note, "Sage Aragon" and "Bear Aragon" are pretty cool names.

[volcanicweather]

I don't understand why he didn't let the kids just sit in the vehicle...

He's an idiot for making two kids walk several miles alone in those conditions, and then not even bother to drive and see if they are OK after he gets un-stuck?

In my opinion, he deserves murder charges. He made not one, but several horrific choices, and his daughter died in result.

[Maguspk]

I thought you couldn't be charged for murder unless you actually killed them on purpose (Premeditated or otherwise). Shouldn't this be manslaughter or extreme child neglect?

Second degree makes sense based on it's definition of being not premeditated.

This is a pretty sad story, the fact that it was their Christmas just makes it worse.

[#686578]

I don't know, I think it's kind of harsh. (Not sentence but just by definitions, fuck if I care if some stupid ass goes to jail)


It just seems that he's going to jail for being stupid not because he wanted to kill someone. That's typically what manslaughter is reserved for right? Like accidentally running over someone with your car or something?

[Mizango]

I don't understand why he didn't let the kids just sit in the vehicle...

He's an idiot for making two kids walk several miles alone in those conditions, and then not even bother to drive and see if they are OK after he gets un-stuck?

In my opinion, he deserves murder charges. He made not one, but several horrific choices, and his daughter died in result.

Because he is selfish self serving fuckwad? I saw him in court last week or so, he is completely able bodied. No handicaps, no mental hang ups no nothing, just a prick. As a father I couldn't imagine doing such a thing.

[Hellfury]

Well, the prosecution probably thinks he WASN'T stupid, that he did it on purpose.

[Tyr]

Sage Aragon? It's like, if you see a child who has an extremely obscure name or something from LoTR or Star Wars or World War II, they're gonna die before age 14. Why? Because the parents are fucking idiots.

Parents should inform law enforcement what they're going to name their kids, and if its some shit like "Voldemort Esquilax," they should be taken away immediately. If you can't even name your kid, you can't take care of your kid.

[#686578]

Sage Aragon? It's like, if you see a child who has an extremely obscure name or something from LoTR or Star Wars or World War II, they're gonna die before age 14. Why? Because the parents are fucking idiots.

Parents should inform law enforcement what they're going to name their kids, and if its some shit like "Voldemort Esquilax," they should be taken away immediately. If you can't even name your kid, you can't take care of your kid.

So basically what you're saying is that the police take it one step further and just take away all black children rather than just keeping an eye on them.

[TheShadyMan]

With black children, its either you take them at birth, or wait 13 years and catch them stealing a bike and take them, really.

[Hellfury]

So basically what you're saying is that the police take it one step further and just take away all black children rather than just keeping an eye on them.

On that note, did anyone read that economist connecting reduced crimerates to the Roe vs Wade verdict? Arguing that the aborted were the ones who were most likely to fall into a life of crime, as such, the increase in abortions post Roe vs Wade led to reduced crime rates. I didn't read the actual document, but from what I understand, his reasoning added up, and no one managed to prove him wrong.
I think his name was Steven Levitt?

[Seraph]

On that note, did anyone read that economist connecting reduced crimerates to the Roe vs Wade verdict? Arguing that the aborted were the ones who were most likely to fall into a life of crime, as such, the increase in abortions post Roe vs Wade led to reduced crime rates. I didn't read the actual document, but from what I understand, his reasoning added up, and no one managed to prove him wrong.
I think his name was Steven Levitt?

It's discussed in the book Freakanomics. The name of the authors escapes me.

[Katlan]

'09 just started and this guy will prolly win the "Most negligent father of the year" award. Is this just one unfit father or is there a population of ppl who are actually this retarded?

[Hellfury]

'09 just started and this guy will prolly win the "Most negligent father of the year" award. Is this just one unfit father or is there a population of ppl who are actually this retarded?

I don't have any numbers on hand, but look at the darwin awards etc.
It's very hard to measure though, since education isn't NECESSARILY an indication of not being an idiot (and not having an education doesn't mean you're dumb.)

That said, if I was to venture a guess, I would feed rather confident guessing that there's a lot of people who are quite simply quite retarded.