For lack of a better term? I’m not sure what to call it. I started arguing with someone who was claiming you shouldn’t help people in public because it could get you into legal trouble. Without wanting to even get into the ethics of why you should help someone regardless, I brought up good Samaritan laws. This person brought up a guy in Illinois who was convicted as a sex offender for grabbing a girl by the arm and lecturing her for jumping in front of a car without looking both ways first. According to this person, holding someone underage, even for a moment, counts as imprisonment of a minor, and automatically gets you put on the sex offender registry for life.
Now, that seemed fishy, but plausible in an awful sort of way, so I did some digging. I found several sources that mentioned this story, and learned the alleged man’s name is Fitzroy Barnaby, the incident occurred in 2001, he was convicted in Cook County in 2003, and it’s a cautionary tale against being a good Samaritan (ugh). But I cannot find any court documents, nor can I find any original sources. Every source references a since-deleted article by the “Chicago Sun Times”, and Barnaby isn’t even listed on the Illinois sex offender registry. Was this whole story just made up? Or have records been sealed and scrubbed or something?
My conspiracy is that social media is being used to make every one much more callouse and cold to each other. That’s where they break the country. The bots knew it was very easy to manipulate the left to scare them off digital spaces. Now they have free reign to make all kinds of groups and posts filled with comments uncontested. Stuff like Pretti good shot on any shooting, hundreds of them. Over time it changes how people think since there is no push back. As it pushes people to be angrier and pissed off, it moves the public opinion away from any leftist since they’re seen as very weak and ineffective
You are using social media wrong.
I used social media to look at nice women with big luscious tits. No amount of tits on my FYP will piss me off or cause hostile thoughts at any point.
Dude.
It’s a story that basically says “nowadays women accuse you of rape for no reason so you should never help them”
The ones who wrote, believed and relayed this story are just sexual assaulters, nice guys and incels. Of course it’s fake.
It’s also beyond ‘good Samaritan’ due to the whole ‘pulled her towards his car’ aspect. It also reads as someone trying to discipline someone outside of their care. Imagine you’re a teen trying to jaywalk and this random guy turns his vehicle around, grabs you, and tries to drag you towards it.
It definitely gives of ‘I’m only on the sex offender list because I pissed in public’ vibes.
It used to be more common for people to discipline kids that aren’t theirs for something obviously wrong. It wouldn’t usually involve grabbing, unless it was to move them out of the way of a moving car like in the story. Now there is a lot more pressure on just the parents since it’s frowned upon to discipline others children. Whether or not this is better, idk
I was with you on this until that last part.
What are you talking about pissed in public?
It’s missing a word
“Was” pissed in public
Or
Was pissed off in public
At least that’s how I read it
Maybe it’s a California thing, but growing up there was a lot of back and forth about how you could get put on the sex offender list for urinating in public. That wasn’t the case. So if someone said that’s the reason they were on the list, it was never the full story.
To be clear, I’ve never done this, it was just some weird cultural zeitgeist when I was growing up.
I was told the same thing literally across the country from you a decade and a half back.
My recollection was if it was on like school property or some place kids were likely to be. That would trigger some enhancement to the crime. I’ve never been in a position to need to know if that’s true or not.
Okay, so I managed to find a reddit comment section from 12 years ago (don’t hate me) that seems to chalk it up as most likely untrue. Not sure if there’s much more evidence to be found one way or another
https://www.reddit.com/r/AdviceAnimals/s/8rSk4VqE1P
Edit: found an alleged reply from the writer of the original story (of the since deleted original article). This alleged response is from an archive of a chat board in 2005.
"I’ve been reading some online postings in repsonse to this and understand the skepticism, given no other media have picked it up. I can’t explain that, sorry. It’s there to be read at the Appellate Court clerk’s office at Lasalle and Randolph in Chicago. More to it … well, it was a 16-page ruling and I summarized the important stuff, I thought.
He drops his girlfriend off at work, he’s driving back home, girl’s on her way to school, the near-hit happens, he yells at her, pulls around and gets out, grabs her, pulls her toward his car and yells at her, she breaks free and runs off crying, meeting up with friends. A day or two later, she’s in a car with her friend’s mom, they see the same guy, same car, she tells the mom, mom calls police, he’s arrested at Blockbuster a few blocks away, girl makes positive ID. Trial comes, not guilty on 2, guilty on 1, judge says that charge is a sex offense, he appeals, appellate court says - yes, it is a sex offense and now you’ve got to register. Guy has no priors. State’s attorney stands by push for registration, judge says he’s constrained by the law, appellate court says that’s right.
Unfortunately, there’s nothing more to it.
Steve Patterson Chicago Sun-Times 350 N. Orleans St. Chicago, Ill. 60654 312-321-2090 spatterson@suntimes.com"
It would have been really helpful if Steve Patterson could have cited a case number or a caption or something.
It shouldn’t matter in the first place though. Such a story can happen, because, to the surprise of the internet, women are humans and individuals. If a person falls victim to such a scenario, they were just a victim to one individual, not all women in the world, let alone all people in need of help in public.
Fuck Reddit and Fuck Spez.
I saw the same “barely” articles you mentioned that reference the CST as a source. They didn’t actually describe the event the way your discussion partner did. She supposedly stepped in front of his car, and his grabbing her arm seems more out of frustration. He didn’t save her from an accident. He was the driver of the car that would have hit her. He avoided an accident, got out of his car, grabbed the girl and “lectured” her. Seems like a slightly harsher consequence than necessary, but it does sound like an assault of some degree.
That said, I help people – and even in public!!!
Fitzroy Barnaby
Theres no way thats a real persons name.
