I will never forget the first time I read about the Wausau parents who prayed in place of getting medical treatment for their 11-year-old daughter, who slowly suffered and died in their home in March 2008.

Unfortunately, I will also never forget a Wisconsin court’s subsequent decision to forsake common sense and ingest the utter bullshit a tiny faction of the religious right has decided to offer as its excuse for stupidity … and

murder.

The Wausau Daily Herald reported Tuesday afternoon that Dale and Leilani Neumann were found guilty of the second-degree reckless homicide of Madeline Neumann.

Ok.

The Neumanns were sentenced to 10 years probation, 30 days in jail every year for the next six years, and their surviving children may be subject to random health inspections until they reach the age of 18.

Wait … what?

These people absolutely knew what they were doing. When their daughter was unable to walk, speak or eat because of untreated diabetes, they let her suffer. They let an emaciated 11-year-old girl incapable of getting care for herself lie in their home until she finally stopped breathing. After she stopped breathing, they were not even the ones to call an ambulance. A family friend had to do it because they were too busy praying.

Imagine that.

So this is a pretty dramatic story, right? There must be a logical explanation as to why two parents would allow their daughter’s ‘blood’ to be on their hands, right?

Dale Neumann explained his logic in court: “Madeline Kara was more than ready.”

That’s right. His daughter died not because Dale and his wife neglected to get her treated for a common medical condition that many people live with everyday; young Madeline died because God said so.

However, I digress. That story is old news.

What is almost more outrageous than two parents showing blatant disregard for the life of their own daughter is a judge deciding it wasn’t a serious crime.

Not only was it such a trivial crime to only warrant six months total jailtime, what Marathon County Circuit Court Judge Vincent Howard is also saying is that the Neumanns are fit to continue raising children.

That’s the scariest part of all of this. There are three children who will remain under the care of Dale and Leilani Neumann — who are obviously unaware and unremorseful of their crime.

The three children’s parents, and perhaps God, neglected to save their sister, and the court has since decided to abandon them, so let’s hope by some miracle those kids make it to the age of 18.

Prayer over medical treatment seems to be a hot issue lately, with more and more cases popping up. Luckily, some of those cases are discovered before more innocent lives are lost.

However, I hope Judge Howard has not set the precedent for future cases.

I understand that the freedom of religion is a fundamental property of our country. I also understand that it can be extremely hard to draw a line between what is acceptable and what is not acceptable when legal issues arise over people’s personal beliefs.

But there are times when this kind of lunacy cannot stand. The death of an innocent 11-year-old girl is not a time for a philosophical debate about the power of the courts. It is a time for pragmatic justice. It is a time for those responsible to be punished, regardless of their excuses.

Had Dale or Leilani been the ones dying and refused treatment for themselves, that’s one thing.

But who knows what Madeline really wanted? Maybe Madeline didn’t believe as strongly as her parents. One could even argue that she couldn’t have known better. As a child, I’m sure she obediently believed what her parents taught her — whether right or wrong, whether or not it would kill her.

Regardless, it is obvious that her parents failed miserably in their duties as parents, and for that, they should have paid greatly.

It is unfortunate that a girl must lose her life to set an example, but I hope that Madeline’s case helps protect other children from this kind of neglect.

And if not, I hope at the very least it infuriates enough people that this kind of crime will never again go unpunished or

underpunished.