No income cap for cruelty

Re “2 women are arrested in ‘unbearable abuse’ of boy,” June 15

The article describes the hideous treatment of a 5-year-old boy at the hands of his own mother and her live-in girlfriend. The final paragraph states that “the poverty rate in the neighborhood ... is nearly triple the national average.”

Does The Times think that this is somehow a mitigating factor in this terrible tragedy? That somehow if these depraved women had a higher income that none of this would have happened?

This is insulting to the good people in the neighborhood who came forward to condemn this disgusting behavior.

Jeff Klemzak

La Crescenta

Re “Asking why father killed son,” June 17

While reading the story about the two women who severely abused a 5-year-old child, my sorrow for the victim quickly turned to anger -- even rage -- against the perpetrators. Then, I read a second story of the abuse and murder of a 2-year-old boy in Northern California.

Both stories were so disturbing that I couldn’t think clearly. There’s no justification for harming an innocent child who cannot defend himself. There is currently no legal consequence harsh enough for the abusers. Life in prison or even the death penalty just doesn’t seem cruel enough retribution. Maybe as a deterrent, an “eye-for-an-eye” punishment should be proposed.

The abuser should feel what the child experienced. We could call it the torture penalty.

Christopher

Grisanti

Monrovia