Baltimore Dad Unleashes on Soft Prosecutors, Begs Them to Keep His Son Locked Up
“I’ve been begging for help for my child for two and a half years. I’ve had petitions signed by judges to have him to have him sent away for mental eval[uation]. I have no idea what else to do. Like, I’ve tried everything. I’m at the end of my wit… What else does a father do to save his child’s life?”
Santiago Garcia-Diaz, a Baltimore resident, is desperate to save his son. It reminds me of something right out of The Wire.
He spoke to the local Fox station a few days ago but went national on Tuesday to bash soft-on-crime prosecutors.
Santiago’s 15-year-old son Bryce has a criminal history. He believes prison is the only way to get Brysce straightened out.
Santiago refused to pick him up from prison, but the prosecutors threatened to charge him with neglect for leaving his son in prison:
“I got the call from prince Frederick County and Calvert County telling me that they had him in custody and they told me what had happened and stuff and I said you know what let him stay there in custody and they told me you got 6 hours to get here and get him or we will be coming to get you for neglect and abandonment issues.”
He’s a father who believes his son needs to be punished to be rescued.
“I want my son to get some help I mean if it’s jail that what’s it’s gonna take then jail, what my son needs he needs some mental help.”
Santiago set up a GoFundMe account because of the financial toll it’s taken on the family.
The link to the campaign is no longer valid.
This morning on Fox, Santiago reiterated his pleas and worry about his child:
Santiago Garcia-Diaz joined “Fox & Friends First” Tuesday to discuss why he wants his son behind bars and his appeal to prosecutors, who now want to charge him with neglect, if he refuses to pick up his son from jail.
“I’ve been begging for help for my child for two and a half years,” Garcia-Diaz told co-host Todd Piro. “I’ve had petitions signed by judges to have him to have him sent away for mental eval[uation]. I have no idea what else to do. Like, I’ve tried everything. I’m at the end of my wit… What else does a father do to save his child’s life?”
“He’s running with the wrong crowd,” he continued. “I live in a dangerous area… in Baltimore… What else should I do?”
This is insane. 18 of the 19 charges were dropped even though he allegedly ran over a police officer and crashed a stolen car.
Santiago sounds like an involved parent, but Bryce just won’t stop:
“The last time he disappeared for over a week, he came home, and we had to rush to the hospital, and they said that we wouldn’t have brought him in, he would have been dead,” Garcia-Diaz said.
“My son was born with a chronic lung disease where he doesn’t get a full expulsion of his lungs, and he smoked weed all the time, he smoked cigarettes, and it had gotten so bad that he couldn’t breathe,” he continued.
—
“As of June 1st, they changed the laws for the juvenile justice system to where they can only be charged with certain crimes at certain times, and they got to go through so many steps before they can actually make a move to really do anything against the child now,” Garcia-Diaz said. “It’s ridiculous.”
We need more parents like this.
A WBFF report highlighted these chases in September: High speed chase involving teens sparks new concerns about juvenile crime.
It all came to light after a 16-mile chase in Baltimore ended with the arrest of three teens, a growing trend in juvenile crimes:
It’s part of what some see as a dangerous trend in Baltimore that involves more young people being accused of violent crimes.
Friday’s high-speed chase came on the heels in recent weeks of a teen arrested for gunning down, killing a student in broad daylight outside of his high school and a 15-year-old who’s now been charged as an adult for the killing that left a 17-year-old dead in the Inner Harbor over Memorial Day Weekend.
“A lot of stealing, violence, just a lot a lot of different things,” said Ivan Chestnut.
The police department said they “have charged ten people under 18 with murder so far this year and nearly a dozen kids have lost their lives on city streets.”
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And the idiots do ( I know, LOTS of stealing)
Baltimore dad begs prosecutors to keep his son locked up.
When Obama heard about it, he said, “No, no! We must let criminals out. I will have Fetterman to explain it to you.
—as soon as he puts on his hoodie.
This father is in a race against the clock. Two years or so left to get his son some help, then the son turns 18. At that point, it may be game over unless he voluntarily goes for some kind of treatment. And even with treatment, who knows how he’ll end up?
I was in the father’s shoes (in some sense) a few years ago. Things aren’t going well here, and the outlook isn’t great.
He can just move to NY or CA and never go to jail.
I’m sorry to be such a downer here but this guy’s pleading and begging will have zero affect on what will go on in MD from now on. Larry Hogan was a RINO’s RINO but at least he was a buffer on some of the horrible and evil things the MD legislature wanted to do. With his republican replacement-hopeful down by 20 – 30 points in the polls to Obama’s new favorite son, things will only get worse.
Baltimore city, Baltimore, Prince George, and Montgomery counties can be counted on for virtually 100% support for any candidate with a “D” after their name, and now that guy is Obama’s son.
The mental health community is by and large not interested in dealing with the hard patients who have complex problems. These folks would rather have a nice group of suburban and college educated folks who they can see twice a month to complain about rather pedestrian issues of attachment and disappointment while handing them an Rx for zanex.
It’s hard to really blame them. The financial benefits and social status they receive are large. Who really wants to be handed a very difficult group of patients from a homeless encampment suffering from addiction and it’s traumas on top of their underlying disorders?
When we closed the mental institutions we decided to allow the disturbed and often violent to live among us. Same as opening up the prisons for sentencing reform. All these folks are now running loose with no mechanism to force compliance with basic civic norms.
When government fails, look to the market, including the black market.
The cult industry seems to be in a slump… perhaps there are some experienced “kinetic deprogrammers” looking for gainful employment.
The rate of Veteran suicide is a sad testament to abject failure of the mental health community writ large. Recent studies looking at raw data from coroner determination of death in eight States reveals the true number to be multiples higher than the VA is publishing.
Your observation about a black market is spot on. AD service members largely self medicate with alcohol and try to ‘suck it up’ to avoid a trip to mental health. It’s the end of one’s career almost to a person with a few exceptions. Eventually some do ask for some help and get shoveled into an underperforming VA system where pills are pushed over therapy.
My own experience confirms this as does my countless conversations with other AD service members and Veterans asking advice or help. Modern medicine is largely captured by its reliance upon pharmaceuticals v other more time consuming treatment options.
Families used to bear the burden of a lot of this stuff. Families are disappearing.
Putting his son in jail may not be the solution. Too many people end up becoming professional criminals in prison. Would a better alternative be some kind of rehab facility that does not allow patients out until rehabbed?
He probably does not have the income to pay for it. There is a wide range of costs of staying in a residential treatment facility.
Prices range from $10,000-60,000 per month or ($320-1,930 per day) for psychiatric residential treatment facilities.
Much of this cost variation comes from both the environment created by the treatment facility as well as by the treatments offered there. For example, the more expensive psychiatric residential treatment facilities may offer spa-like services but these don’t equate to better mental illness outcomes.
Medicare and Medicaid will not cover the costs for most residential mental health treatment centers; however, most facilities will work with insurance companies to attempt to keep the out-of-pocket expenses within reason. Normally even their best negotions don’t help much.
So let’s see,….State Prosecutor Marylin Mosby is still facing Federal charges and used money from a fund for her defense for people of lower income, She has begun to make payments on the loan from the fund.
Her husband and city Council President has an aide that was stopped by the police where drugs and an illegal firearm was found. She was recently granted “probation before judgement” which means that after a year, her record will be expunged.
Baltimore has not had a mayor serve their entire term due to being charged or forced to step down.
After massive corruption in the Police department came to light, a federal magistrate was appointed by the Department of Justice to oversee the City and it justice system. This happened under the Obama administration. This magistrate has implemented rules where police cannot stop people for minor infractions and the City will not prosecute them if they are charged.
One of the scourges in the city are so called “Squeegee Boys.” These are violent kids who stop people downtown, clean off people’s windshields and then demand payment. If you don’t pay them, or are simply walking along the street, you can and will be attacked by these folks.
The DOJ Magistrate has refused to allow the police to address the issue.
In a bit of karma, a few weeks ago that very magistrate was attacked by the Squeegee Boys.
In summary, the justice system is horrible, the school system is broken, the infrastructure is crumbling because maintenance that was recorded as being done is not done, and the City Council is corrupt and does not all any public comments on issues.
People are leaving the city in droves and the people who can address issues, do not.
Maryland is about to elect an uber-left-wing governor who believes in cashless bail and CRT to start with. So things will only get worse. He and the supermajorities in the MD House and Senate will get anything done they feel like which will include abortion up to and including a fully birthed innocent little baby a month AFTER they’re born.
Think it can’t happen, just wait. That would be a horrible evil that I cannot even comprehend.
“I live in a dangerous area… in Baltimore… What else should I do?”
Assuming that the environment/peer group there are actually at fault and at the risk of sounding flippant…. move. Yesterday if not sooner.
I moved from Baltimore to Portland. It should be obvious that the Dems are using criminals and feral humans to fight their proxy war. While we are occupied by them, we can’t effectively counter their chicanery.
A face and look comes to me on this topic, of a kid who had twice been in juvie, in an upstate grown-up county jail holding cell. His father moved, to bring him out of NYC, away from the gangs and temptations; the volume and easy access to crimes. They moved to a place where there were perhaps also other things to do.
The kid got caught out in the boonies on a vandalism-ish prank gone too far, pushing it into a felony; his third. So he’s three-striked into the adult system, three-striked into a mandatory sentence, three-striked into a different trajectory, and a different mix of options forever more. It was gonna be an unpleasant trip for some years, whatever he did at that moment.
As he was routed out of that cell into the general pop jail, to await his trial, others were bailed, or ORed, out and back to their lives after a brush with the wild side.
The look as it sank in. He had BSed, and cheated, and worked the edges vs. worked. Some get away with it. He was now clipped, hard.
I learned three things, and one more:
1 — An individual crime can be small, and simple: one assault, one victim, one violation, one act. “Crime” in the large is unbearably complex.
2 — Everything about crime is unbearably consequential.
3 — And any crime, even single and personal, has impacts, and participants, and consequences beyond knowing. That kid’s father’s life was crushed in some fashion at that moment too.
A few things about a particular crime are simple. Anyone who tells you that anything about “crime” in the large is simple is lying, deluded, or selling something.
His son needs discipline, responsibility, and an outlet. A physical task seems to be an effective choice for the boys.
Our crime situation is out of control. We don’t have enough police, jails, courts, prosecutors or prisons. Nor do we have the will to utilize what we do have properly. Criminals instinctively see and recognize (and act on) this, and people on the fence as to whether to break laws don’t see much if any reason to stay on the straight and narrow. People fleeing the cities to avoid crime just compound the problem — heck, many encourage further soft-on-crime policies because it won’t affect them, insulated with their security in their gated communities.
I’m afraid John Adams had a point: “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other” — so, now what???
“He believes prison is the only way to get Bryce straightened out.”
That’s probably not going to work.
Once you reach a certain point you’re in that life forever. Started at 15? Disappearing for week or more? Heavy drug usage? Almost died from drug usage but still using?
I know dad loves his kid but it’s probably time to accept that this kid can’t be salvaged. When the kid hits 18 prison is where he will end up (or the county morgue). Especially given the city and looks like soon to be state government are going all out to make life easy for the criminal class.
The purpose of prison is not to reform, but to punish. The effect of prison on his son will likely make him a hardened criminal. The recidivism rate is also quite high—for Maryland it is 40.5%