The story of Jeffrey Baldwin is a truly horrible one, as his grandparents were convicted of second-degree murder for allowing him to die by starvation in 2002. After he and his siblings were taken from his teenage parents and ordered to live with his grandparents, he was forced to live in conditions that I don’t even have the stomach to read about. The grandparents were convicted in 2006, but it wasn’t until late last year that a coroner’s inquest caught the attention of an Ottawa man named Todd Boyce, according to Global News, causing him to create a fundraiser for a memorial to honor the young boy, who just so happened to love Superman.
Boyce enlisted an artist named Ruth Abernathy to design a statue of Baldwin in his Superman Halloween costume preparing to leap from a park bench, which relates to a comment that the boy’s father made in his testimony. Earlier this week, though, the tribute hit a little snag. DC Entertainment refused permission for Abernathy to use the Superman S logo on the boy’s chest, because the company didn’t want to be associated with child abuse. However, good news came today as DC apparently re-evaluated the situation and determined that Baldwin’s tribute is more than welcome to keep the S.
We are honored by the relationship that our fans have with our characters, and fully understand the magnitude of their passion.
We take each request seriously and our heartfelt thoughts go out to the victims, the family and those affected.
DC Entertainment uses a flexible set of criteria when we receive worthy requests such as this, and at times have reconsidered our initial stance.
After verifying the support of appropriate family members, DC Entertainment will be allowing the Jeffrey Baldwin Memorial Statue to feature the Superman S Shield. (Via Global News)
According to the Toronto Sun, the decision was less of a re-evaluation and more of a response to negative feedback once fans found out that DC had denied the request for the memorial. Either way, the right decision was finally made.
[protected-iframe width=”650″ height=”400″ id=”85b5ab52b3f2ace568da6a246a07b6b9-60970621-60085469″ info=”https://globalnews.ca/video/embed/1441382/” width=”650″ height=”400″ frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen=””]