Free Republic

Reports that federal agents were looking for evidence of child pornography when they seized computers from the Elgin district office of former state Rep. Keith Farnham shocked local officials who said the lawmaker was well-liked and active in the community. "I couldn't even fathom it. I was stunned," said former Elgin Mayor Ed Schock, adding that Farnham always worked on the city's behalf. Farnham has not been accused of any crime. Federal agents were searching for documents "pertaining to the possession, receipt or distribution of child pornography" as well as computer files, copies and negatives of child pornography or any...

In a recent paper, Lubinski and his colleagues caught up with one cohort of 320 people now in their late 30s. At 12, their SAT math or verbal scores had placed them among the top one-100th of 1 percent. Today, many are CEOs, professors at top research universities, transplant surgeons, and successful novelists. That outcome sounds like exactly what you’d imagine should happen: Top young people grow into high-achieving adults. In the education world, the study has provided important new evidence that it really is possible to identify the kids who are likely to become exceptional achievers in the future,...

A Burbank couple used their box spring mattress to save the life of a toddler tumbling from a third-story window.

FULL TITLE: Six-year-old girl who froze to death outside Minnesota home identified as her cousin is arrested for manslaughter Police have arrested a Minnesota woman in connection to the death of her 6-year-old cousin, who was found frozen outside her home last month. Rachel Downer, 22, was taken into custody Friday and charged with second-0degree manslaughter and felony neglect of a child. Downer's cousin Mercedes Mayfield was discovered unconscious in the entrance to an apartment building in Bemidji on the morning of February 27 after spending hours in temperatures that fell to nearly 30 degrees-below-zero with windchill of -40.

COLUMBUS, Ohio • A central Ohio principal says she suspended a 10-year-old boy from school for three days for pretending his finger was a gun and pointing it at another student's head. The boy's father says he thinks it's the adults who are acting childish after the boy was suspended from Devonshire Alternative Elementary School in Columbus last week.

Citing a radical United Nations treaty known as the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), lawmakers in Scotland approved a deeply controversial new law assigning an individual government overseer to each and every child in the country charged with monitoring their development. However, the draconian measure, which has sparked criticism and outrage around the world as a brazen assault on parental rights and privacy, is already in the process of being challenged in court. Outside of Scotland, concerns have been especially widespread in the United States, where parental-rights advocates are warning about an accelerating worldwide attack on...

In the English language, the word “Spartan” has come to mean austere. The culture of ancient Sparta was so harsh that mothers would send their sons off to war with the warning, “Return with your shield or on it.” Spartan austerity began at birth. New-born infants were examined and if they were not fit, they were left to die. Infanticide was not unusual in the ancient world. But, in Sparta, it was managed by the state with chilling efficiency. What mattered most was not the individual, but the nation. Weak individuals were not allowed to drain the strength of one...

I was a 56-year-old man who had never before (or after) been accused of child molestation. I had been going out with Mia for 12 years and never in that time did she ever suggest to me anything resembling misconduct. Now, suddenly, when I had driven up to her house in Connecticut one afternoon to visit the kids for a few hours, when I would be on my raging adversary’s home turf, with half a dozen people present, when I was in the blissful early stages of a happy new relationship with the woman I’d go on to marry —...

Dr. Michael Niccole takes pride in his profession and the spoils of his work can be seen in his children. The Orange County plastic surgeon has operated on his adopted 25-year-old daughters multiple times over the years, according to a video by Barcroft Media. Daughter Brittani says in the video her first surgery was breast augmentation after she finished high school at 18. Then she got a nose job right before her 21st birthday and started Botox injections at the age of 22. Meanwhile, her sister Charm got her navel changed from an outie to an innie when she was...

A pregnant woman has had her baby forcibly removed by caesarean section by social workers. Essex social services obtained a High Court order against the woman that allowed her to be forcibly sedated and her child to be taken from her womb. **SNIP** The baby girl, now 15 months old, is still in the care of social services, who are refusing to give her back to the mother, even though she claims to have made a full recovery.

An Ohio couple committed a crime when they recently gave child welfare officials a 9-year-old boy they raised from infancy, according to a prosecutor, after they said he was displaying aggressive behavior and threatened the family with a knife. Forty-nine-year-old Cleveland Cox and 52-year-old Lisa Cox pleaded not guilty Wednesday in a Butler County court to charges of nonsupport of dependents. **SNIP** Adolfo Olivas, an attorney appointed by the court to protect the boy's interests, has said the emotionally hurt and confused child is now receiving help that the parents should have gotten for him.

The city clerk’s office has informed KRQE-TV that there’s been a record number for early voting on a proposed ordinance. What has caused over 23,000 people to vote as of this morning? The city of Albuquerque’s “Pain Capable Unborn Child Protection Ordinance,” which would ban abortions after 20 weeks, the juncture by which science shows the unborn child can experience pain. Early voting ends November 15th and Election Day is November 19th. (There is also a run-off election in one city council district that will give the city a new councilor.) There are four known late abortion centers in the...

(WXYZ) - It is an unthinkable crime that robbed a 2 year old of her innocence. Even more unbelievable, it happened inside a local church. Tonight we're exposing the vicious attack. A sinister crime that has a mom fighting for justice, and seeking answers from the church she grew up in and considered family. "I really became active in the church when I was like 11 or 12. They've just been a big part of my life." she tells 7 Action News. The identity of the 23 year old mother is not being revealed for this story in order to...

In my last column, I proposed some explanations for why many conservative parents have left-wing children. In a nutshell, American parents who hold traditional American values — such as belief in small government as the basis of liberty, or a God-based moral code, or American military strength as the greatest contributor to world peace and stability, or American exceptionalism, not to mention the man-woman definition of marriage or the worth of a human fetus — are at war with almost every influence on their children’s lives. This includes, most important, the media and the schools. Here, then, are some suggestions...

What the wha??? Blogged By trisha haas 374 Comments I cannot tell you how hyped up I am at this note my friend Linda received today from her child’s school.Her child has to have DOCTORS NOTE to send a packed lunch to school.And does anyone notice the irony in the “health coordinator” and enforcement of no bagged lunches?(pic used w/ permission from linda) 

BRUSSELS -- Since euthanasia was legalized in Belgium in 2002, Belgians have been euthanized for blindness, depression, anorexia nervosa, and a botched sex change operation. Now, Belgians want to allow euthanasia for children. Under legislation currently being debated in the Belgian Parliament, terminally ill or suffering children under 18 could be euthanized if they request it, their parents consent to it, and an expert deems the child capable of understanding their decision. The bill is widely supported and is expected to become law. ***snip*** Not only do two thirds of Belgians favor the new euthanasia bill, but in a controversial...

On a sweltering New York City day in July, 1991, a highway worker made a horrible discovery. He had noticed a putrid odor just off the Henry Hudson Parkway in the Washington Heights neighborhood of upper Manhattan and traced it to a dirty cooler. Among empty beer cans and debris, Baby Hope’s tortured body was found. The child had been found naked, sexually abused, starved, and asphyxiated.

HUNTINGTON, WV - A mom and dad are facing charges after officers say the parents had no idea the toddler was found in a store parking lot wearing nothing but shoes. Charles Grieco, 41, and Patricia Grieco, 40, of Baltimore Street in Huntington, are charged with felony child neglect, according to court documents. Officers with the Huntington Police Department say they found a two-year-old boy in the parking lot of a store in the 2900 block of 5th Avenue Sunday morning. Officers say the boy only had shoes on and managed to walk across Irvine Avenue to the parking lot...

FULL TITLE: Applebee's called police on family and threw them out of restaurant because their kids were 'too active' A couple said they are 'heartbroken' after staff at Applebee's called police on them because their children were being too active, it emerged today. Eli Gau and his wife Lillian Maliti admit their sons Ryan, three, and Ethan, one, can be a handful at times but nothing that would warrant being asked to leave a 'family-friendly' restaurant. On Sunday night the family of four went to an Applebee's restaurant in Katy, Texas, for dinner. SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO Everything seemed normal...

FULL TITLE: Adoptive parents of Ethiopian girl who died of hypothermia and starvation in their backyard found GUILTY of manslaughter A Washington state couple were convicted of manslaughter Monday in the gruesome starvation and hypothermia death of a teenage girl they adopted from Ethiopia. A jury found Larry Williams, of Sedro-Woolley, guilty of first-degree manslaughter, while his wife, Carri Williams, was found guilty of homicide by abuse as well as manslaughter. The jury also convicted them both of assault and each faces a possible life sentence. Hana Williams died in May 2011 in the backyard of the couple's home, where...