Legislators have delayed voting on a bill that would expand South Carolina's safe haven law to older children.
/ FILE
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -- Legislators have delayed voting on a bill that would expand South Carolina's safe haven law to older children.
The measure would allow parents to safely abandon children up to 3 years old without punishment. State law currently limits the no-penalty age to infants up to a month old.
A House panel discussed the idea Wednesday but didn't vote.
The main sponsor is Republican Rep. Chip Limehouse of Charleston. He vowed to introduce the measure last August after an Orangeburg mother confessed to suffocating her 2-year-old and 18-month-old sons, strapping them into their car seats and letting the car roll into a river.
Subcommittee Chairman Thad Viers of Myrtle Beach says increasing the age to 3 is entirely too far. He says that could unintentionally lead to parents dumping their kids.
(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
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