I haven't found a story that doesn't use Reason as their source. I only found one that tried to contact the police department for comment, but they hadn't responded.

So we do still only have one truly distinct account of this story, which is the mom's side of the ordeal.

Virality and outrage don't make a story more accurate.

We don't know why the woman who encountered the boy on the road called the police. We don't know what the kid was doing at the time. Was he walking to the side of the road? Was he walking on the road? Did he seem "off" in some way that made it so that the woman called the police? Were there previous warnings that that road was dangerous?

Police set up a safety plan for the son, that involved making sure someone always knew where he was. Why was that done? Multiple people in the PD all looked at the case and decided this was the right course of action, why?

I'll judge once I hear what the police says their motivations were. They could have well stepped over the line here. Or there were legitimate concerns for the child's safety.

The question is what they're leaving out of the story. Maybe this is a full accounting and law enforcement needs to chill the fuck out. Maybe it's not the whole story and law enforcement are doing their job correctly. Maybe it's still an overreaction, but more justifiable. In any case, there is no reason to take Reason at their word.

What I am wondering is what this publication is leaving out of the story in order to sell their perspective on everything. Maybe it's nothing and this really is just a DCFS gone mad (there are certainly cases in which this is true), or maybe there's more to the story and they are just glazing over it to make things sound better to their point of view.

Either way, this is a Republican run state which is the party that likes to court libertarians so I am pretty skeptical of everything regarding this.