Here, again, we have an example of false, misleading, race baiting information circulated in meme form to get people up in arms and in their feelings about something that isn't even true. Whoever created this garbage is obviously playing on the fact that people DON'T fact check, research or reason for themselves... rather if something is stated succinctly on the internet (especially in meme form) it must be true. So you have this trash circulating around the internet, with hundreds of comments, thousands of likes and ten thousand shares, when a simple Google search would expose the blaring differences between the truth and what's written here. I'll try to be brief in giving all of the reasons why this picture is simply not true.
Wait... let me correct that. The information on the right side (Catalina Clouser) is basically correct. She's a 19 year old mother who was smoking marijuana one day, put her child's car seat on top of the car and then drove 12 miles without realizing that the child had been up there and had fallen off a ways back. The child was unharmed, Catalina was arrested, her child placed with Child Protective Services, and she pled guilty on a plea bargain with a sentence of 16 years probation and 3 months of deferred jail time (if she complies with probation, she wont go to jail). Here's a link with the full story. http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/phoenix-mom-high-drove-baby-car-roof-probation-article-1.1756526
Now onto Ms. Taylor.
Ms. Taylor is a 35 year old Air Force veteran who, finding herself down on her luck, went to a job interview one day and left her 2 year old and 6 month old children in the car for at least an hour. The windows were cracked about an inch and the children were found sweating and crying by a passerby who called the police. Taylor said that she left the children in the car out of desperation because she was homeless and unemployed with no child care, but that is in dispute as it has been reported that she lived with her father in a 4 bedroom home at the time, and some reports say she held a part time job. In any case, she was arrested and her children were placed with Child Protective Services as she currently awaits trial.
So here's what the meme got wrong
1. Taylor wasn't homeless (though she did not own the home she stayed in)
2. The children were 2 years old and 6 months old, not 2 months and 6 years old
3. The children did not "wait in the car". She left two babies in a car in Arizona in the middle of the day for at least an hour. The temperature inside the car was 100 degrees when they were found.
4. She was not sentenced to jail and her children taken away. Her case has not been resolved yet, she wasn't sentenced to anything.
BOTH women were arrested and charged with multiple felonies including child abuse.
BOTH women spent days in jail until they were bailed/bonded out
BOTH women's children were placed in CPS custody, as is the case in the majority of occurrences of a parent being arrested for child abuse.
BOTH women were facing 8+ years in jail when first charged with their respective crimes.
Up to this point, the women were treated basically the same, except for the fact that Taylor has received an enormous amount of support and contributions from people who sympathize with the desperation she must have felt to make the choice to leave her kids in the car. More than likely, Taylor will receive a similar, or even less harsh, plea deal involving probation, parenting classes, etc. (if she decides to accept it). Let's not forget though, what she did WAS a crime, it was negligent, and had the story ended tragically as these stories often do, we probably wouldn't be sympathizing with her.
I'll sum it up with this... Don't believe everything you read on a meme. Especially when it is an obvious play on your emotions and intelligence. There are enough REAL cases of racism, injustice and inequality for us to rally against. Let's focus on those.
