News & Views

Jackie FarahThe way police are describing the conditions in a home where they found 19 kids living alone this week make me want to cry. Kentucky authorities say the home where the kids were alone for a week had dog feces an inch thick on the floor of one room. The youngest child was 8 months, the oldest only 14 years old. And to top it off? The area was going through a heat wave, but the kids had no air conditioning.

How much worse could it get for these poor kids? Wait, don't answer that. The reports out of Kentucky are already pushing me to my limit.

To be honest, the whole story of how all 19 kids ended up alone is hard to understand -- and not just because most of us wouldn't leave a dog alone in such conditions (although these kids were allegedly left with nine dogs plus a cat!).

The latest allegations include the arrest of a woman named Jackie Farah, a 32-year-old who seems to be the mother of at least some of the kids. Police have charged Farah with 14 counts of criminal abuse and five counts of wanton endangerment. They say that she and a man named Irving "Joe" Smith left town for a "family emergency" right in the middle of the heat wave, leaving behind the 13 kids who live in the house plus six cousins who were visiting for the summer.

If what police allege turns out to be true, think about this: they had to know what it was going to be like in that house. Leaving a 14-year-old in charge of 18 younger kids would be bordering on insane in any situation -- I don't care how responsible the 14-year-old is. But then you just keep adding in the awful factors, and you throw the heat on top of it?

I can't think of a single excuse for doing this to a human being, period. Doing this to children? That's just plain cruel.

What part of this story just set you over the edge?

Image via Warren County Sheriff's Office