Column: Who is to blame for kids gone wrong?

Who is to blame when a 10-year-old boy runs away, pops into a gun store and steals what he thinks is an assault rifle? Who fights and bites like a feral cat when he's chased down and caught?

Parents, of course, are a good place to start.

Police say the Solon middle schooler ran away from Four Oaks youth emergency shelter and stole a stock conversion kit last week. He's in the Linn County Juvenile Detention Center now, accused of second-degree robbery - a charge that would net an adult seven-to-10 years on ice.

His parents are no strangers to the law. His father's rap sheet boasts felonies like forgery, burglary and escape, along with a handcart full of misdemeanor convictions. The boy's mother has a criminal record of her own.

But the courts took the boy from their custody in 2002, when he was just three years old. His guardian reports regularly to a judge. The boy was on everyone's radar.

So who is to blame?

That's what I was thinking about when I met with a delegation of African leaders Friday morning. They're part of the U.S. State Department's International Visitor Leadership Program.

Iowa City Human Rights Commission Chairwoman Kate Karacay and I were invited to talk with the 12 women from as many African countries - law professors, legal advisers, cabinet members and other brilliant legal types - about human trafficking.

Karacay, also a board member of the Iowa Network against Human Trafficking, has done extensive research on the issue. I wrote a Gazette series a while back about a human trafficking case here in Eastern Iowa.

I talked about how the victim in that case, kidnapped and forced into prostitution, first was a chronic runaway already in trouble with drugs. That history was part of what made her so vulnerable to traffickers, I said.

Where were her parents, the women wanted to know: “Why was she there for the taking?”

“Parents are supposed to be responsible for their children,” one woman said.

Something that no one could refute, but a statement we all knew was too simple an answer.

Sometimes the family is so broken down, communication so bad, Karacay said, that parents and guardians can't control their kids.

It might be true, but it's not always enough to point the finger at them.

A juvenile court judge will decide what happens next with the boy robber from Solon.

If nothing else, he can't run away anymore.

Jennifer Hemmingsen's column appears on Wednesdays and Saturdays. Contact the writer at (319) 339-3154 or jennifer.hemmingsen@gazcomm.com