Youngstown teens 'terrorize' neighborhood; mother sentenced

YOUNGSTOWN — Christine Mechling ignored warnings that she’d be arrested for letting her twin boys “run the streets.”

The 32-year-old Silliman Street mother now has the distinction of being the first person convicted in municipal court of violating the city’s parental responsibility ordinance.

The second-degree misdemeanor carries with it a penalty of up to 90 days in jail and $750 fine.

Last week , Judge Elizabeth A. Kobly sentenced Mechling to 200 hours of community service that must be completed by Aug. 7. She was also placed on two years’ intensive probation and ordered to finish a parenting program at juvenile court.

The boys turned 14 Friday.

“The judge, she put the fear of God in me,” Mechling said, perched on her porch steps with a backdrop of all-black kittens. “I don’t blame her.”

Judge Kobly said the twins’ mother “was creating little thugs.”

The judge said she intended to get Mechling’s attention about what is required “and if I put the fear of God in her, I accomplished that.”

Mechling said she has a drinking problem and is in treatment.

She readily admits that her boys were running the streets and getting into trouble. She also acknowledges being warned by police that she was responsible for their behavior.

“Her boys were terrorizing their neighborhood and we put her on notice: ‘Control your kids or face parental responsibility,’” said Detective Sgt. John Perdue, commander of the Family Investigative Services Unit. “She’d get drunk and let them run the streets. They didn’t go to school. Sometimes she’d lock them out and they’d stay in vacant houses.”

Read the full story Monday in The Vindicator and on Vindy.com