I’ve been thinking a lot about how differently we respond to preventable child deaths.
Carter Lee was ten years old.
Last September in Burns, Tennessee, he was shot and killed in what was described as an accidental shooting. A child, a loaded and accessible gun, a moment that should never have happened—yet it did.
No one was charged.
The community rallied. More than 2,000 people showed up for Carter’s funeral. A 30-mile procession of motorcycles, dump trucks, and first responders escorted his body.
Online, people wrote, “Prayers for the family… we don’t care how it happened… all we know is it happened… victim shaming doesn’t help.”
But not every child is mourned this way.
Kyrie Brock was five years old.
Last June in Mansfield, Ohio, he was left in the back seat of a car. Alone. As the temperature climbed, his body shut down. Heatstroke. He died at the hospital.
His mother was arrested and charged with involuntary manslaughter, reckless homicide, and child endangerment. Her bond was set at $75,000. She is still in jail.
There was no funeral service.
No large public gathering.
No procession.
Online, people wrote: “She KILLED her CHILD… hope she rots.”
Two children. Two completely preventable deaths.
Two very different responses.
Both families lost a child. Both losses are devastating.
Carter’s death is called an “accident;” Kyrie’s is treated as a crime.
And when we call something an accident, we stop there.
We grieve. And then we move on. And nothing changes.
But it could.
Twenty-seven states and Washington, DC decided to change their approach to child gun deaths and stop viewing them as just “accidents.” They’ve passed Child Access Prevention (CAP) safe storage laws that have reduced these tragedies. Why not all 50 states? Lawmakers are reluctant to “punish” parents who have “paid the ultimate price.”
Parents of hot car deaths haven’t “paid the ultimate price?”
Of course they have.
Just like parents whose children find unsecured guns.
We know how to prevent both types of deaths.
A locked gun a child can’t access; a quick check of the back seat before getting out of the car.
Laws that make both the expectation, not the exception.
Accountability is not cruelty, it’s clarity.
We can hold space for grief and still expect responsibility. We can care about families and still pass laws that protect children. We can stop calling these deaths accidents and start treating them as preventable.
Because Carter and Kyrie deserved the same thing.
Not just our grief; not just our prayers.
But the kind of response that might have kept them alive.
Because the goal shouldn’t be to decide which parents deserve compassion and which deserve punishment. The goal should be fewer dead children.
