Once again, this never happens if it is a white teen.
This is ridiculous.
BSO broke the story of how Judge Mary Ellen Brennan sent a 15-year-girl to juvenile detention because she didn’t do her homework. It has been months and the young girl is doing better, but she won’t let her see her mom.
A 15-year-old Black girl who has been incarcerated in Michigan since mid-May after she failed to do her online schoolwork won’t be returning home, a judge decided Monday, in a case that has stoked outrage that it is emblematic of systemic racism and the criminalization of Black children.
The girl, who is being identified only by her middle name, Grace, was the subject of a report published last week by ProPublica Illinois, with politicians and community activists expressing outrage over her incarceration.
“Give yourself a chance to follow through and finish something,” Brennan said, according to the Detroit News. “The right thing is for you and your mom to be separated for right now.”
Grace, however, told the judge that she wanted to go home: “I miss my mom. I can control myself. I can be obedient.”
Tylene Henry, who has a teenage son in the local school district and was among several supporters outside of the courthouse Monday, said she doesn’t know Grace, but her situation has “opened up my eyes to the school-to-prison pipeline problem.”
Henry said she supports Grace’s release and a larger overhaul of the juvenile system.
“There’s a lot of students like Grace. They’re put into the criminal justice system as children instead of getting the help they really need,” she said. “Why does mental health and behavioral health treatment have to come at a cost of being held in a detention center?
This is SICK.
It is a pipeline to the prison system.
Here is all of Judge Brennan’s info, please keep the pressure on her.