Balloon Dad's First Parenting Failure

When you thought Richard Heene couldn’t be any worse of a father, a video surfaced Tuesday showing him trying his best to do just that. Ten years ago, Richard Heene posed his oldest son Bradford—who was then a baby—with an empty beer bottle and cigar to create what he seems to consider a hilarious video shoot. Just as he allegedly orchestrated the Balloon Boy hoax to garner media attention, Heene sets up the shoot to resonate for the camera. He tries to force a cigar into Bradford’s mouth, then places it into the baby’s hand and curls his tiny fingers around it, while another male (the camera operator, presumably) exclaims, “Oh, that’s good, but your hand’s in the way. Oh God Richard. Your hand’s in the way. He’s like fondling the bottle.” Heene’s wife says “no” at one point in the video, seemingly asking him to stop, but Richard pays her no attention. What a guy.