Ed Foote wrote: > To some degree, I have to disagree. Even in the Boy Scouts, we leaders > now must always have two adults present. The legal ramifications of young > boys accusing a solitary adult leader of abuse were too great to allow. > The same holds true of the adults going into homes. If there is a 13 > year old, having a bad day, and they accuse you of raping them while you were > in the home with them, you have just spent a fortune, (perhaps your life > savings!) to pay for the legal defense that you will need, regardless of your > innocence. This is a tremendous liability. > I will never put myself in a position of risk. If there is an under 18 > child in the house alone, I will not schedule a first time tuning at the > same time. It hasn't cost me any work, and I am never in jeopardy of a real > mess that can arise. ( My father is a judge, and has seen the ruination > caused by poor foresight in a case like this.) > I hate it, but I am also determined not to be placed in an indefensible > position. > > Regards, > Ed Foote > Ed: Yes, there are always going to be cases of innocent people wrongly being charged with a crime. Many years ago, a first-time customer called me up, the evening after I had serviced her piano, and accused me of stealing the top 20 dampers out of her grand piano. I returned them immediately, of course <g>! But, I did not then adopt an attitude of worrying about every little possible legal hassle I might have every time I entered someone's home. You can have an attitude of: if you run, the dog is going to chase you. Or, you can have an attitude of: if you don't act fearful, the dog will not notice you. There is a congruity between having a concern for being falsely blamed and wanting to stay out of risky situations. I can understand your position. I wonder, though, if your father has done you a favor by relating what happens in the courtroom. If it happens to only one person in a million, he's the guy that appears before the judge. -- Thomas A. Cole, RPT Santa Cruz, California
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