Dear Friends -
I was in Court all day today.
The first proceeding was a dispositional hearing in a juvenile delinquency case. My client was a boy, age 15, who had gotten into a knock-down, drag-out fracas at home. He has a really unfortunate history, was abandoned by his mother as a toddler, and is socially very backward and feels friendless.
The stress of the upcoming hearing (today's hearing) got to him last week, and he ingested a too-large quantity of controlled prescription drugs, mostly hydrocodone. He was hospitalized, and released yesterday. This episode was probably that proverbial straw on the camel's back. I put on my case in mitigation, and led my client through a touching and sincere plea to the judge. But the judge found that home was no longer appropriate, and began his near-incantation of doing the order sending the kid to a residential placement. When this boy realized what was going on, he turned to me, and it was a very little, scared kid who pleaded, "please, do something." Sadly, I've no hidden talent for last-minute, improbable advocacy, something which will change the mind of the presiding judge. (Not his heart - this Judge has a good heart. But judges rule with their minds, that's what we pay them for.) And so, my young client went off "in care" with the Child Protective Service, and it will be months before he comes back to Court in person, although the "multi-disciplinary team," consisting of all of the adults interested in his case, will meet monthly to give thought to what is in his best interests.
And I went on to half a dozen other hearings, and I've heard this kid's plea in my heart all day.
If I had unlimited time, could I have done better for this kid? Please don't answer - that's something that I have to chug around in my mind until the crush of cases forces me to move on.
I guess I'm not in a very good humor tonight.
Also, a friend died yesterday - the only guy I know with a 75 year pin in the Boy Scouts. Of him, perhaps more later.
R
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10 comments:
Sorry for your awful day. A kid tugging at your heart strings must make you feel pretty desperate.
I'm sorrier for his awful day though.
Elu,
How awful
--
emma
I don't know Roger. if his fracas at home was so bad, perhaps, removing him from it for a whort while is not the most horrible thing. It's possible the time apart may help.
I am so sorry Roger
Thanks for the feedback, all. Clank is right, his day was a hell of a lot worse than mine. Indeed, sometimes I worry because these sorts of things don't bother me strongly enough.
I'm having the interesting experience of being someone else's professional client right at the moment. (A super-darling friend.) It is interesting watching myself feel the uncertainty and lack of control that that experience provides.
Onward.
R
And darn it, Jilly, I'm sitting here racking my brain trying to remember the name of that children's home.
R
BURLINGTON!! THAT'S IT!
R
This all reminds me of the Children's Home where JJ is from, and what we went through last year when he had to go to court. I got that exact same pleading, teary plea. Luckily, in the end, his situation went much better.
I was talking to a judge a few years back who had worked in "children's court" and who admitted that after a number of years he had burned out. I made the comment that he must have seen some truely awful things, and he agreed he had but what had got to him mentally and emotionally was that these awful cases kept coming all day long, day after day, week after week, year after year, and it was the incredible magnitude of the misery that affected him and eventually made him leave.
And I know that you felt miserable when you heard that plea, Schell. What a life-defining experience.
You're right, Bly. My best guy friend is a Family Court judge, and I'm really worried that the stress is killing him.
R
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