Calls to prosecute the parents of cyberbullies who fail to monitor their childrens' online activities have been gaining steam ever since central Florida 12-year-old Rebecca Sedwick who jumped to her death at an industrial site in Polk County, Fla., on Sept. 10. Although the two girls responsible for harassing Sedwick have been arrested for felony-stalking, no states have passed a law holding parents criminally liable for cyberbullying waged by their children, according to NBC News. In fact, some experts say that statutes might even drive online harassment deeper into the Internet underground, further from the reach of schools and parents, making the abuse and the abusers harder to find. However, while no parents have been charged for their child's cyberbullying, in sporadic cases, police and prosecutors have charged and convicted American parents for negligence after their children killed other kids with loaded guns left lying around the house or by crashing cars into other people when driving drunk.
