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aclark@herald leader.com
Criminal charges have been dismissed against a Berea man accused of first-degree abuse after his toddler suffered a severe sunburn that caused second-degree burns.
However, Bobby J. Jones, 27, might face further legal hassles, according to police.
Capt. Ken Clark of the Berea Police Department said the issue probably will land in family court.
Police say Jones' 2-year-old son was outside for 90 minutes on June 8 with no apparent sun protection.
The child had golf ball-size blisters on his shoulders when his mother came to retrieve him from Jones' home. He also was burned on his face, chest, back and stomach, police say.
The mother took the child to the police department, then to Pattie A. Clay Hospital in Richmond, where the boy was treated and discharged.
Madison County Attorney Marc Robbins said he didn't feel the case amounted to a criminal charge.
"I had the opportunity to sit back and review everything in hindsight, a luxury the officers didn't have," Robbins said. "It was apparent to me that, at the time, the officers were acting in the well-being of this child. Nevertheless, in reviewing the state statutes, it didn't really fit within the realm of the law."
The boy's parents could not be reached for comment Friday.
Under Kentucky law, a person is guilty of first-degree criminal abuse if he or she intentionally abuses or allows the abuse of a child 12 or younger and therefore causes serious physical injury, places the child in a situation that might cause serious physical injury, or causes torture, cruel confinement or cruel punishment.
The jailing of Jones garnered national attention about what some experts say was an unprecedented child-abuse charge.
Paul Fink, president of the Leadership Council on Child Abuse and Interpersonal Violence, said he had never heard of such a case in his 46-year psychiatry career.
Fink said authorities have to make a real distinction between criminal behavior and an accident in a case like this.
"Just having a sunburnt child is not criminal neglect," he said. "It's stupid, but it's not criminal."
Despite the rarity of the charge, there are precedents for sunburn-related abuse cases. In Ohio a woman left her three children unprotected from the sun at a county fair and was arrested on the spot by a police officer, while in New Jersey a father was arrested for allowing his mentally handicapped 12-year-old to burn at the beach.
The Ohio case was later dropped, while the New Jersey man received 48 months probation upon being found guilty of child neglect and abuse.
