TENNESSE SCHOOL TO PRISON PIPELINE LINES THE POCKETS OF RACISTS
THE PROBLEM WITH THIS UGLY HORROR STORY IS THAT THE WRITER WROTE ABOUT IT WITHOUT CONDEMING THE ACTIONS OF THE RACIST WHO NOT ONLY CREATED THE PIPELINE BUT PROVIDED BLACK CHILDREN TO SEND THROUGH THE PIPELINE STRAIGHT TO THE PRISON FACILITIES THEY BUILT. THESE ILLITERATE COUNTRY BUMPKIN SAVAGES WERE GIVEN PERMISSION TO ABUSE CHILDRENS BLACK BODIES UNDER THE COLOR OF LAW AND GOVERNMENT INTERVENTION. FROM THE POLICE TO THE JUDICAL DEPT MENTIONED IN THIS HORROR STORY TWO THINGS ARE CLEAR. THE WHITEMAN AND WHITEWOMAN ARE DEVILS TO BLACK CHILDREN. THE REALITY BLACK PEOPLE HAVE TO ACCEPT THAT THE WHITEMAN AND WOMAN HAVE ALWAYS WORKED AS A TEAM TO UNDERMINE, CRIMINALIZE AND DEGRADE BLACK PEOPLE FROM THE CRADLE TO THE GRAVE. TO THE DOCTOR AND HIS NURSE. TO THE TEAHER AND HER PRINCIPLE. TO THE COP TO THE JUDGE THEY WORK IN TANDEM ON EVERY LEVEL TO IMPRISON AND KILL US WHETHER WE WERE YOUNG OR OLD. READ THIS HORROR STORY AND UNDERSTAND THE WHITE MAN AND WOMAN BEING DEVILS IN THE FLESH OF THEIR BEING IS NOT HYPERBOLE....ITS ACTUAL FACT!
The judge who jailed Black children for a crime that doesn’t exist
Meribah Knight
Chapter 1: "What in the World?"
Friday, April 15, 2016: Hobgood Elementary School, Murfreesboro, Tennessee
Three police officers were crowded into the assistant principal's office at Hobgood Elementary School, and Tammy Garrett, the school's principal, had no idea what to do. One officer, wearing a tactical vest, was telling her: Go get the kids. A second officer was telling her: Don't go get the kids. The third officer wasn't saying anything.
Garrett knew the police had been sent to arrest some children, although exactly which children, it would turn out, was unclear to everyone, even to these officers. The names police had given the principal included four girls, now sitting in classrooms throughout the school. All four girls were Black. There was a sixth grader, two fourth graders and a third grader. The youngest was 8. On this sunny Friday afternoon in spring, she wore her hair in pigtails.
A few weeks before, a video had appeared on YouTube. It showed two small boys, 5 and 6 years old, throwing feeble punches at a larger boy as he walked away, while other kids tagged along, some yelling. The scuffle took place off school grounds, after a game of pickup basketball. One kid insulted another kid's mother, is what started it all.
The police were at Hobgood because of that video. But they hadn't come for the boys who threw punches. They were here for the children who looked on. The police in Murfreesboro, a fast-growing city about 30 miles southeast of Nashville, had secured juvenile petitions for 10 children in all who were accused of failing to stop the fight. Officers were now rounding up kids, even though the department couldn't identify a single one in the video, which was posted with a filter that made faces fuzzy. What was clear were the voices, including that of one girl trying to break up the fight, saying: "Stop, Tay-Tay. Stop, Tay-Tay. Stop, Tay-Tay." She was a fourth grader at Hobgood. Her initials were E.J.
The confusion at Hobgood — one officer saying this, another saying that — could be traced in part to absence. A police officer regularly assigned to Hobgood, who knew the students and staff, had bailed that morning after learning about the planned arrests. The thought of arresting these children caused him such stress that he feared he might cry in front of them. Or have a heart attack. He wanted nothing to do with it, so he complained of chest pains and went home, with no warning to his fill-in about what was in store.
Also absent was the police officer who had investigated the video and instigated these arrests, Chrystal Templeton. She had assured the principal she would be there. She had also told Garrett there would be no handcuffs, that police would be discreet. But Templeton was a no-show. Garrett even texted her — "How's timing?" — but got no answer.
Instead of going to Hobgood, Templeton had spent the afternoon gathering the petitions, then heading to the Rutherford County Juvenile Detention Center, a two-tiered jail for children with dozens of surveillance cameras, 48 cells and 64 beds. There, she waited for the kids to be brought to her.
In Rutherford County, a juvenile court judge had been directing police on what she called "our process" for arresting children, and she appointed the jailer, who employed a "filter system" to determine which children to hold.
The judge was proud of what she had helped build, despite some alarming numbers buried in state reports.
Among cases referred to juvenile court, the statewide average for how often children were locked up was 5%.
In Rutherford County, it was 48%.
In the assistant principal's office at Hobgood, the officer telling Garrett not to get the kids was Chris Williams. Williams, who is Black, had been a Murfreesboro cop for five years. "What in the world?" he thought, when he learned what these arrests were about. At Hobgood, two-thirds of the students were Black or Latino. Williams wondered if such arrests would be made at a school that was mostly white. He had a daughter who was 9. He pictured her being arrested. This is going to blow up, he thought; I'm going to end up in federal court over this. He considered quitting, but instead tried to get someone to intervene. Tucked in an office corner, he called a sergeant, a lieutenant and a major, but couldn't find anyone to call it off.
The officer not saying anything was Albert Miles III. Growing up, Miles, who is Black, had friends who hated the police. But Miles' dad was a cop. Miles wanted to prove that police could be trusted. That afternoon, Miles had been pulled out of roll call along with another officer; a sergeant told the two to go arrest some kids at Hobgood. The sergeant didn't say why, but at Hobgood, Miles started picking up details. Miles, too, wondered if these arrests would happen at a school full of white students.
The third officer at Hobgood was Jeff Carroll. He'd been pulled out of roll call with Miles. Carroll, who is white, was a patrol officer and SWAT team member. In evaluations, supervisors praised him as a leader, "cool under pressure." Carroll also had no idea what these arrests were about. But his sergeant had ordered them, and he followed orders. Carroll was the officer telling the principal: Go get the kids.
Garrett asked if she could call their parents first. Carroll told her no. Garrett told the police that one girl had diabetes and got treatment when she arrived home after school. Please, the principal said. Let me call her parent. On this, the police ultimately compromised, saying the girl could get a shot in the nurse's office before being taken to the jail.
Of the two officers telling Garrett what to do — get the kids, don't get the kids — Carroll seemed the more aggressive, the principal would say later. She agreed to get the kids.
Having these arrests take place at Hobgood was not something school officials wanted. They wanted kids to feel safe at school. Garrett grew up poor. Nine-tenths of her students were poor. Years before, Hobgood had struggled academically. Now it was a celebrated success. Garrett and her staff had worked to build trust with parents, with students. "I don't give up on kids," Garrett says. But she knew that trust is fragile, and trauma endures.
As Garrett gathered the girls from their classrooms, she believed the police would at least avoid a spectacle. School let out at 2:30. That was minutes away. Garrett's understanding was that the police would keep the girls in the office until school was dismissed and everyone else was gone.
Garrett rounded up the sixth grader, a tall girl with braids who had visions of becoming a police officer; one of the fourth graders, the girl with diabetes; and the 8-year-old third grader. In the hallway, the principal tried to prepare them, saying the police were there regarding a video of a fight. Hearing this, the sixth grader told Garrett that the two other girls hadn't even been there.
After returning to the office with the three girls, Garrett relayed to police what the sixth grader had told her.
Her words were barely out when Carroll made it clear he'd had enough, Garrett said later when interviewed as part of an internal police investigation.