Anonymous wrote:Yeah I cannot believe the hate these parents are getting. It is crazy. But then I never feel that sort of hate/hysteria that people feel toward parents who have a tragic accident, hot car deaths, etc. for which they are responsible even though accidental.

The victim here is the 3 y/o.

Anonymous wrote:Yeah I cannot believe the hate these parents are getting. It is crazy. But then I never feel that sort of hate/hysteria that people feel toward parents who have a tragic accident, hot car deaths, etc. for which they are responsible even though accidental.

The details matter. As a general rule I have nothing but empathy for people who lose a child, it is my worst nightmare. And no one is perfect, we all make mistakes.

But sometimes the details are too upsetting to maintain that empathy, because the parents have not merely made a mistake but committed an act of negligence. I was abused and neglected as a kid by very immature, selfish parents who had kids too young. In that situation, my empathy goes to the kids, not the parents. And that's where it lands here.

This isn't a case of a parent being exhausted or understandably distracted and then a child going somewhere the parent could never have expected and dying. That does happen. This was just neglect. A 3 year old was ignored by his dad, who was watching basketball and placing bets online, and left to access an open pool via unlocked doors, and the dad didn't check on him for almost ten full minutes at which point he was dead. That's neglect. This is like a parent having a loaded gun in the house and then letting their toddler rifle through the closet where it's kept. It's not an accident, it's not understandable. It's neglect. The dad left his son to die.

It's like that hot car death from last year (also Arizona) where the dad intentionally left a child to nap in a car while he went inside to play video games and drink in the middle of the day. It's neglect. These dads killed their kids. It deserves criticism. People need to know that if you do this, other people aren't just going to shrug and forgive you, oh well $hit happens. You need to try harder. You owe it to your children to try harder.

Yeah I cannot believe the hate these parents are getting. It is crazy. But then I never feel that sort of hate/hysteria that people feel toward parents who have a tragic accident, hot car deaths, etc. for which they are responsible even though accidental.

I don’t think the 3-5 minutes was a lie. They described him at the scene as panicked, inconsolable, and incomprehensible at times. It was during the very first interview which was very shortly after the drowning that he said 3-5 minutes. He was a complete mess and I am sure he had no idea exactly how many minutes he hasn’t seen the child. In his mind it hadn’t seemed like very long. I don’t think that much that someone says just after they have found their child dead and are doing CPR and it was due to their negligence should be taken to heart. Their emotional state is going to be so intense and dysregulated that they aren’t really thinking straight. I am not saying he didn’t lie at all but denial and convincing yourself of things that didn’t happen can also be a coping / defense mechanism to survive such an intense emotional experience.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Apparently the Dad lied more than I realized. According to those who have read the entire police report, he initially told police he was sitting outside feeding the baby and "lost sight" of the 3 yo for "a couple minutes." Turns out he was never outside at all. Didn't he know he had surveillance footage? Lying shows consciousness of guilt.

He said he was watching his son from inside the house. Police had viewed the security footage. He couldn't tell them anything the child was doing while he was outside. Then he fessed up. Also the child had been let out by himself in the backyard before.

And Dad admitted he knew the pool net was off because the family had recently used the pool and decided not to put the net back because the pool company was coming the following day.

Anonymous wrote:Apparently the Dad lied more than I realized. According to those who have read the entire police report, he initially told police he was sitting outside feeding the baby and "lost sight" of the 3 yo for "a couple minutes." Turns out he was never outside at all. Didn't he know he had surveillance footage? Lying shows consciousness of guilt.

He said he was watching his son from inside the house. Police had viewed the security footage. He couldn't tell them anything the child was doing while he was outside. Then he fessed up. Also the child had been let out by himself in the backyard before.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This video shows the backyard and pool and if you look closely you can see the "net" covering the pool that was obviously not on at the time of the incident. Our friends have a motorized retracting cover that is significantly more substantial than this that they use any time they are not directly using the pool. They do not have a fence though. Theirs is in VA, but not in the DC area.

https://www.tiktok.com/@itk.023/video/7506331034108120351

I feel like you all were making really misleading comments. This video shows there literally is a large fence around their entire yard, like everyone with a pool. I have never seen anyone put an even smaller fence around their pool. This tragedy is just shitty parenting. And sure, I suppose this was not the ideal home for a couple with two babies. But still, just shitty parenting. Did they make the unemployed dad give a drug or alcohol sample at the scene?

You've never seen a second fence because you are inexperienced and don't know anything about home pools. I can drive 2 minutes from my house in Va and show you many. People in my neighborhood have privacy fences and safety fences around their pools.

You are ignorant.

Frankly I’m surprised the kid lasted as long as he did with this set up and those two as parents.

Arizona seems to attract these types of incidents. Instead of Florida man it’s like Arizona parents.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone have a photo of the pool? I'm having trouble envisioning what's so great about it that a fence would ruin its aesthetics. I don't think I've ever seen a pool without a fence -- and we have some fairly wealthy friends.

I think you and some other posters may be confused about the fence terminology. Of course they had a their entire backyard including the pool fenced - like a tall wooden stockade fence - to keep random toddlers from wandering in from the neighborhood and drowning in their pool. This is what local jurisdictions and homeowners insurance policies universally require. What they did not have was a pool fence between the deck and the actual water, which keeps toddlers wandering out of the house from drowning in their pool. When their kids were little my SIL’s family had one like this, but shorter:

My brother and SIL did too, when their kids were young. These types of fences are very common when you have little kids.

My brother paid for a fence like that to be installed for the pool at our parent's house. It is removable so when his kids visited our parents (the grandparents of the kids) the first thing he did was to immediately put up the fence. Then when they left or the grandparents were done babysitting the fence went came down. This was especially important because even though there was a sliding glass door with a lock that was up higher, there were dogs that needed to be let in and out.

I was really grateful when I had kids because I would do the same. I would NOT have felt comfortable leaving my kids at that house without a fenced pool area. We have a pool and besides the fence that encloses the backyard there is a separate 5 foot fence when you go out the back door between a grassy area and the actual pool.

It is shocking the family thought it was okay to have the set up that they did. 18 children died in drownings in Arizona in 2024. People posted to the mother's account that the set up with the pool was dangerous and they were deleted.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone have a photo of the pool? I'm having trouble envisioning what's so great about it that a fence would ruin its aesthetics. I don't think I've ever seen a pool without a fence -- and we have some fairly wealthy friends.

I think you and some other posters may be confused about the fence terminology. Of course they had a their entire backyard including the pool fenced - like a tall wooden stockade fence - to keep random toddlers from wandering in from the neighborhood and drowning in their pool. This is what local jurisdictions and homeowners insurance policies universally require. What they did not have was a pool fence between the deck and the actual water, which keeps toddlers wandering out of the house from drowning in their pool. When their kids were little my SIL’s family had one like this, but shorter:

My brother and SIL did too, when their kids were young. These types of fences are very common when you have little kids.

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone have a photo of the pool? I'm having trouble envisioning what's so great about it that a fence would ruin its aesthetics. I don't think I've ever seen a pool without a fence -- and we have some fairly wealthy friends.

I think you and some other posters may be confused about the fence terminology. Of course they had a their entire backyard including the pool fenced - like a tall wooden stockade fence - to keep random toddlers from wandering in from the neighborhood and drowning in their pool. This is what local jurisdictions and homeowners insurance policies universally require. What they did not have was a pool fence between the deck and the actual water, which keeps toddlers wandering out of the house from drowning in their pool. When their kids were little my SIL’s family had one like this, but shorter:

Anonymous wrote:This video shows the backyard and pool and if you look closely you can see the "net" covering the pool that was obviously not on at the time of the incident. Our friends have a motorized retracting cover that is significantly more substantial than this that they use any time they are not directly using the pool. They do not have a fence though. Theirs is in VA, but not in the DC area.

https://www.tiktok.com/@itk.023/video/7506331034108120351

I feel like you all were making really misleading comments. This video shows there literally is a large fence around their entire yard, like everyone with a pool. I have never seen anyone put an even smaller fence around their pool. This tragedy is just shitty parenting. And sure, I suppose this was not the ideal home for a couple with two babies. But still, just shitty parenting. Did they make the unemployed dad give a drug or alcohol sample at the scene?

Anonymous wrote:Who even buys a house with this layout with very young kids?

26 year olds with more money than they know what to do with and fans to impress.

The parents are babies and it shows.

Who even buys a house with this layout with very young kids?