The prosecutor called the situation complete dysfunction – a complete breakdown of the family.
A woman gave birth to a baby girl and within minutes dropped the child three stories onto the debris-ridden ground below. A year later, this same woman had a son. Just minutes after his birth, his mother dropped him the same three stories to follow his sister’s fate. But this doesn’t even begin to describe the dysfunction of this legal case.
Lucila Ventura, 18 years old, is charged with murder, attempted murder, child endangerment and so on. She could face 40 years in prison.
Lucila’s father may face 20 years in prison for the crimes of aggravated sexual assault and endangering the welfare of a child. It’s no coincidence that both father and daughter have been charged with child endangerment: If Lucila’s statement is true, both of her newborn children were the result of Jose Julio Ventura’s systematic sexual abuse.
Prosecutor Edward J. De Fazio is correct in his use of the term “dysfunction;” however, further statements from De Fazio indicate that he, as well as the rest of the legal system, is failing to take into account the true ramifications of the case. When De Fazio states that “(Lucila Ventura’s mental state) should never lead to these babies being thrown out the window, like they were some piece of garbage,” the lawyer turns a blind eye to the personal, as well as societal pressure that led Ms. Ventura to commit such a heinous act. Indeed, the Ventura situation provides a concrete example of how certain national policy – or lack thereof – can have indisputable, and often upsetting, influences upon any U.S. family.
No one in either Lucila’s school or family was apparently aware that the girl was twice pregnant; a fact which seriously calls into question Lucila’s educational situation. We’ll get to the family later.
To begin with, it must be taken into account that school is mandatory in the United States, meaning that until the age of 18 our nation’s children spend an average of six hours a day in an educational setting most commonly outside of the home. For those six hours a day, five days a week and approximately nine months a year, these kids are entrusted to the care of their teachers, their principal, their school. Government should seriously reevaluate this responsibility of education, when it was possible for a student’s severe mental and physical ailments to go wholly unnoticed. The possibility that Lucila was sexually abused since the age of 13 and was never able to come forward to anyone and explain her situation shows her school did not do its job.
Of course, in an age where schools are allocated money based on standardized test scores alone, it’s hardly any wonder that Lucila was able to slip under the radar. When the government requires children to be in school, yet decreases funding for education, a situation emerges where young adults are veritably forced into an unmonitored, unsafe lifestyle for a large portion of their journey into adulthood. If there is not enough money to provide adequate counseling and teaching (for the teachers and the administration as well as the students), then the United States government better be prepared to drop its requirement of mandatory attendance in schools.
Or U.S. policy-makers could cordially remove their heads from their posteriors and realize that raising good children is the key to the rise of a great nation. If children are required to be in school, then they might as well learn some real life lessons: how to ask for help, how to recognize the extremity of their inner mental state, how to work past a devastatingly problematic family situation.
And, speaking of the family, Lucila’s is an anthropological study on its own: Recently immigrated, working low-wage jobs, living in an area of extreme poverty – a class that, like Lucila, continuously slips under the radar. The United States is still far behind the rest of the globe in terms of national, bilingual proficiency, and American egocentrism in regards to the idea of integrating other languages into our society will only serve to isolate families such as the Venturas. Furthermore, as long as ethnocentrism and racism remain the skeleton in the U.S. closet, immigrant families will never be able to assimilate to this country and attain good paying jobs as well as they could.
Most importantly, however, is the way in which Lucila’s family situation, and later murder charge, represent the importance of women’s health and family planning in creating national policy. It is scary to think how many other Lucilas may emerge should Bush get his wish and discourage schools and health facilities from discussing important options with women, such proper methods to use birth control and when to consider an abortion.
Lucila’s case is not an isolated incident. Her decision to murder is as much related to her mental state as it is to her family’s and country’s mental states.
Until the U.S. can get its head in the right place, we all deserve a plea of insanity.