Here we go again! An Illinois jury has found parents Jeffrey and Sara Hutsell guilty of allowing teens to drink alcohol in their home, and now the Hutsells face possible jail time:

The Hutsells maintain that they did not see any drinking in their home. However, witnesses for the prosecution contradicted the parents' recollection of events. Read the full story here.

We've debated this subject before in Mommy & Family. At the time, most of the comments from BlogHer readers were sympathetic to Virginia parents who received jail time after receiving a guilty verdict for supplying alcohol to underage teens for one of their son's birthday party. The majority of comments indicated that readers thought the Virginia parents were wrong to serve alcohol to teens; however they felt the parents' sentence was harsh.

Nelle, who also blogs at Nelle2Nelle.org, offered the following commentary when considering the Virginia couple:

Lia from Lubeck, Germany, who regularly blogs at The Yum Yum Cafe, suggested that some American youth may abuse alcohol simply because underage drinking is taboo:

One reader came armed with statistical facts, Jody DeVere of AskPatty.com. The following statistical fact struck me as potent:

In my post about the Virginia couple, much of the reader debate revolved around underage drinking and why under certain circumstances it should be allowed. With the exception of Jody DeVere, few readers broached the topic to which underage drinking is sadly connected, drinking and driving.

Ending that post I said, "Well, we know that drinking oneself into a stupor is all fun and games until somebody goes to jail or while drunk, crashes a car and decapitates a child."

In this recent Illinois case, the two 18-year-olds died when their car slammed into a tree after they left a high-school, homecoming party at the Hutsell's home. So, people in that community are outraged, and Chicago media has devoted much ink, bits and bytes to the story. However, the majority of Chicago readers responding to an unscientific poll seem to think putting the Hutsells in jail goes too far to send a message to parents who serve alcohol to minors (Poll).

Chicago Sun Times columnist Tom McNamee says in the headline for his column on this subject that the "parents deserve our scorn but not prison." He says that a friend of his encouraged him to write about the Deerfield incident and possible jail time for the Hutsells. That same friend, according to McNamee, asserted that adults who take a hard line on the Hutsells are phonies:

McNamee said that while he usually agrees with his friend, this time he couldn't. He said he's heard more people sympathetic to the Hutsells, more who assert that teens can be hard to control. He himself swings between extreme feelings about he Deerfield couple, he said:

He ends his column recalling an incident from his youth when a friend's father caught him drunk. As soon as the parent saw what was happening, says Namee, he declared "party's over," but he did not yell at him. He only asked, "What did you learn?" McNamee says he learned not to drink too much.

My children don't drink so far (ages 16 and 26), but we as parents never know what's in store for us when it comes to our children's life choices. I think that if my son ever wanted to have a party and offer alcohol to his underage friends I would stand firmly against it and withhold permission, but teens can be pretty creative when they wish to hide their deeds from parents. Nevertheless, I've repeatedly warned both my minor child and my adult child that they should never drink and drive, nor should they get into a car with a drinking driver.

Do you have more to share on this subject? Should the Hutsells receive jail time, after all those Virginia parents got 27 months in jail for providing alcohol to minors and no one was maimed or killed in that case?

Should America's laws be more lenient on underage drinking so that our youth learn how to drink responsibly around their parents? Do any of us have a practical solution for avoiding the tragedies of youth?

Photo Credit: Chicago Tribune photo collection

Nordette Adams has recently moved to New Orleans, La., her hometown, and hopes to catch up with her personal blog soon.