When the Judges Forgot Who They Served

In 2018, a federal investigation in rural Mississippi uncovered that two juvenile court judges had been routinely sentencing Black teenagers to months in detention facilities for offenses as minor as missing school or talking back to a teacher. Meanwhile, kids from wealthier families received counseling referrals and second chances. One mother, Odessa Kelly, told reporters she watched her fourteen-year-old son get shackled in a courtroom for a dress code violation while the judge barely glanced up from his paperwork.…