Sometimes jail is the only place that will take a child in

Almost every part of a juvenile proceeding is either maddening or saddening. Delinquency hearings are usually sad; a boy or girl under the age of 17 is already on a difficult and unhappy path. Neglect hearings are sad but the stronger emotion is often anger: anger that a parent shows such apathy toward their children, anger that a child’s future has an anchor on it from square one, anger that I cannot do anything to help. There are few happy beginnings, middles, or ends in our Tuesday afternoon juvenile motion call.

Today we saw a case that had equal parts of both emotions and blurred the line between delinquency and neglect as no case I have yet seen. The short and simple is that the court had to send a teenager to the GVRC juvenile detention facility because neither parent wanted them in their home. The young man (I will call him M) had to sit in a chair with his hands cuffed to his waist in front of 30 people and hear in minute detail that his mother and his father do not want him. It was excruciating, and I was merely the guy behind a computer in the corner. M was re-detained and will spend this evening and every evening for the next month (at least) within the green walls of GVRC not because of the severity of his crime, but because the only people that will provide him a roof and a bed do not let a child wear his own clothes.

I only somewhat know M’s story and I certainly know hardly anything about M’s parents. I know M is accused of violence toward others and that he appears to have mental health issues. Somehow, I feel like neither should make a difference. I know the mother has other children to think about and I know the father is between homes. Somehow I don’t think either of those things makes a critical difference either. But of course they do, at least for today. I cannot change that reality, and for now neither can the court system. That does not mean it does not suck.

This is on its face just another case in afternoon motions. Mental health, crimes by children, parents not providing support, etc. M’s case sticks with me hours after not merely because of what happened in the big moments on the record—though that might have been enough—but in the small moments after the red light shut off. M was walking toward the deputy, toward the only place that will house him tonight, with only the clothes on his back and whatever small items remained at the facility. However, M has one last indignity to suffer. M’s mother wants a coat back; the very coat M has on. Its the coat keeping silver handcuffs away from a 14 year old’s skin and will be one of the few comforts M has on the van trip back to GVRC. But his mother wants it back. And M gives it to her. And that makes me incredibly sad.

So M, tonight I want you to know I am thinking of you, even though you’ll never know. You're a brave young man and I am glad our paths crossed today, if for just a moment.