People that know me know I'm not a sentimentalist. I'm not going to be necessarily moved by stories of the human condition enough to shed a tear. People being cruel to others, be them human or animal, just seem part of the human condition. Even a mother who loses her child and parties for a month before reporting the child missing doesn't hit me as being too far off the radar. So you won't see me angrily shaking a sign at the woman.

However, even I, who have seen a lot, can be moved by some tragedies that show a breakdown all around, with every system being so against someone they never had a chance. When I see stories where no one, and I mean no one, bothered to lift a finger to save someone, that is when I get moved.

No doubt some of you have heard about the case of Ame Deal. She was the 10 year old in Phoenix who initially was found in a footlocker and the caretakers of her said this happened because she was playing hide and seek and got lost. It was later found out the girl was placed in the locker and killed.

Four adults were charged in the case. The general question many have in the area is how could this happen to a child? Fingers, of course, are pointed at the four guardians, but as you dig deeper into the story a pattern emerges where you begin to realize little Ame Deal as lucky to live as long as she did. From initial reports by the police, the girl was placed in the box because she 'stole' a Popsicle from the freezer. The discipline from the guardians was to place her in the box. This wasn't the first time this happened. One of the people living in the house not charged, oh I have to say there were four people who were not related to the people who lived inside the house who lived in tents in the backyard, reported that the child had been placed in the box as punishment before. They had seen the guardians rub dog feces on the girl. They knew the child had been left to sleep in the shower as punishment for wetting her bed. The people in the backyard never told the police or Child Services of this abuse.

At least four neighbors, upon investigation by the police, talked about how the kids living in the home, estimates were there were at least ten from ages to one to fifteen, would be out all hours of the night. They reported seeing Ame Deal punished by walking barefoot on the sidewalk. For those of you who might not know, when Phoenix heat reaches over 100 degrees, the sidewalk can be 10 to 20 degrees hotter. Someone walking on that without shoes is going to get blisters on their feet. The abuse neighbors saw of the kids living in the home wasn't reported to police or Child Services.

The children were supposedly home schooled, so there was no contact with an outside system like a teacher who could see and report the abuse. It seems to me that everyone that could have done something was too interested in protecting themselves and not wanting to get involved to help the kids. Now, one of the people charged in her death may or may not have been her biological father. That uncertainty brings up a whole new set of tragic events.

The obvious question is where is the mother? Well the mother is alive and found out about the death of her child by a message from a friend by Facebook. I know, the first instinct is to say 'what a messed up way to find out about your daughter being killed' but don't shed a tear for dear old mom. Mom had no idea where the child was for four years, and made no effort to fight for custody of her or her other two children with the guardians. In a news interview with the mother, and you heard her tell the story in her own words, she said she had lived with this group for a number of years. She had two children with her husband, who was related to the group. She said she lived in constant fear because the group treated her like a slave, making her do all the chores and would constantly yell at her. At some point she had an affair and had Ame, so because of the timing she is unsure who the father is. Soon after the child was born, she had enough of the slave treatment and she left the group, leaving her three children behind.

She met a man online and lived with him for a while, then when that relationship broke up she hooked up with another man and moved to Iowa. She lost track of what happened to her kids, however she did say she was aware of some abuse issues in Utah, where the group lived for a time. It seems once the charges were dropped the group moved to Arizona and since there isn't a lot of interstate communication on such matters, the abuse continued.

So who was there for Ame? No mother, no guardians, no possible biological fathers, no neighbors, no renters in the backyard. No one bothered to pick up a phone and report the abuse, or even kept tabs on where they were. Ame Deal died in a box because she dared to eat a Popsicle.