Police arrested a 54 year old man for whacking a 12 year old boy with a baseball bat after the boy and his friends repeatedly rang his doorbell and ran away in the middle of the night. (See St. Pete Times article 1/3/2011)
After the third ring, the man hid in the bushes and hit the boy as he was running by the house.
He was charged with aggravated child abuse. Aggravated child abuse is committed when anyone commits an aggravated battery upon a child - it is a first degree felony. (See Florida Statute 827.03
By using a baseball bat, technically the man did commit an aggravated battery, since a baseball bat can be considered a deadly weapon.
Many people reading the article, and the newspaper article seems to sway this way too, might consider the "crime" to be mere street justice. If the guy calls the police and they do nothing, talks to the parents, and they do nothing, and the security company in the development do nothing - what was he really supposed to do to stop the harrassment by neighborhood kids? I guess he could have sued the families of the children for distrubting his "quiet enjoyment" of his home. Good luck with that one, or finding a lawyer to take a case like that.
Pawuk & Pawuk doesn't usually handle child abuse cases, however, with facts like these, I think I might.
