Ashvegas tale of woe: Boy in trunk dies

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Jason Sandford

Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.

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The latest tale of woe for Ashvegas, as told in today’s Citizen-Times, chronicles the horrifying death of an 8-year-old boy locked in the trunk of his mother’s Ford Escort.

Seems mom couldn’t get a babysitter, so she left the boy, Devin Gibson, in the car for 16 hours. Incredible. I’m surprised this story hasn’t hit the national news, although it is competing against the Florida girl that was sexually abused by a teen, then stuffed in a trash bin and buried in a landfill.

What is this world coming to? I thought we would be a little more removed from these events, but it seems not. So, questions: how hard will the district attorney’s office go after the local mom? Where was the Department of Social Services in this mess? Police have charged Michelle Joyce Gibson with second-degree murder, voluntary manslaughter and felony child abuse.

Jason Sandford

Jason Sandford is a reporter, writer, blogger and photographer interested in all things Asheville.

  • 1

2 Comments

  1. ddonald May 26, 2005

    No, it happens because (allegedly) this particular single parent chose to lock her child inside a car trunk for hours. It happens because the child inside the car trunk doesn’t have the ability to roll down the windows or open the door, as he would have if he had been in the passenger compartment, as her lawyer contends (child safety locks don’t stop him from climbing over the front seat and opening the driver’s door).

    It has nothing to do with the poverty level or the desire to work. It has nothing to do with the government or working for the American Dream or working merely to survive. It has everything to do with realizing that a child is a human being and that he shouldn’t be treated like the spare tire. It has everything to do with realizing that a parent’s first job, no matter the other incoveniences happening, is to love and protect her child, not kill him.

    Reply
  2. B May 26, 2005

    Appalling isn’t it that in this day and age something like this can happen?

    It happens when single parents have no one else in their lives to rely on, and do NOT make enough money to support themselves and their children. It’s what happens when “social services” say you make too much to be eligible for aid. What they call proverty level is really not what the government declared it to be. Even making above the declared proverty level will not get you a roof over your head, food, a car,and child care.

    And DON’T tell me it’s this way because these single parents do NOT want to work, they’re trying and still not making it. And now with the lack of jobs (at every level) there will be more and more people working not for the American Dream, but just to survive.

    Reply

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