Father Exonerated of Child Injury Charges
On June 1, according to KGNB.am, the “former New Braunfels police officer accused of injuring his son was exonerated by a Comal County jury.” The 50-year-old SWAT sniper, Michael Cochran, was found not guilty of 2nd degree felony injury to a child. He was charged after allegedly “striking his son in the head with a stick while disciplining him over the results of a homework assignment.” The defense argued that Cochran was within his right as a parent to discipline his son as such. The police detective that had originally investigated testified that his force was reasonable. Cochran was fired from the police department in 2011 after an indictment “was issued by the Comal County Grand Jury”, and the man still faces another “injury to a child charge for allegedly slapping his son” in 2002. The Convention on the Rights of the Child is a United Nations (UN) Human Rights Law signed by almost all member countries of the UN, and requires signatories to “protect the child from al forms of physical or mental violence… while in the care of their parents.” Yet the U.S. has NOT ratified this convention, and disciplining one’s own child by use of physical punishment is indeed still legal in the country. Regardless, several advocacy groups continue to promote the idea that any form of physical punishment against one’s child is a form of abuse, and can have psychological repercussions in addition to physical. According to report issued by the International Journal of Pediatrics in which children were interviewed in China, Colombia, Italy, Jordan, Kenya, the Philippines, Sweden, Thailand, and the U.S., “54% of girls and 58% of boys had experience mild corporal punishment, and 13% of girls and 14% of boys had experienced severe corporal punishment in the last month.” If you or someone you know is facing personal injury charges, don’t go through it alone. Contact a dedicated New Braunfels injury attorney today.
