Kristin Henning, law professor and former DC juvenile public defender, defends Black children’s right to enjoy childhood without over-policing.

Kristin Henning, the author of the award-winning book, “Rage of Innocence: How America Criminalizes Black Youth,” met with members of New Rochelle Against Racism (New RoAR) and other concerned community members at a Zoom session on the evening of Monday, August 14.  

Participants described the session, moderated by David Peters, as “informative,” “inclusive,” and “inspiring.”  The full session can be viewed here.

[This session was one of a series of online public education sessions on Monday evenings to explore the social injustices and inequities in the juvenile justice system and its negative impacts on Black youth.  For an invitation to join these sessions, send an email to newroar1@gmail.com.]

Henning, a professor of law and director of the Juvenile Justice Clinic and Initiative at Georgetown Law School, has been representing children accused of crime for more than 26 years and has co-founded a number of initiatives to combat racial injustice in the juvenile criminal legal system.  Her years witnessing the disproportional presence of Black youth in the legal system and the disparity of treatment they received compared to white youth arrested for the same infractions sparked her desire to write and expose the injustices faced by youth of color.  Her experience raised  her awareness of how structural racism plays out in all systems that Black youth interface with and affects their life trajectories.  

Henning was a trainer in the recent workshop at Georgetown that led to the formation of New Rochelle’s new Youth Justice and Equity Team (YJET), a multi-disciplinary initiative in New Rochelle led by Judge Jared Rice.  YJET aims to engage the community to challenge structural and institutional racism by supporting young people at risk of involvement in the juvenile criminal legal system. To support YJET’s work, New RoAR is leading a series of online public education sessions on Monday evenings to explore the social injustices and inequities in the juvenile justice system and its negative impacts on Black youth, as described in Henning’s book.  [For an invitation to join these sessions, send an email to newroar1@gmail.com.]

Henning says that “the American obsession with incarcerating Black Americans begins with Black children,” and points to historic prosecutions, lynchings, and police killings of Black children like the Scottsboro boys, Emmett Till, and Tamir Rice as limiting the expectations and possibilities of Black youth and acting as “an early mechanism of social control.”

She cites social science research establishing the “developmental necessity” of play, recreation, and leisure for establishing strengths, self-esteem, and leadership potential for all children, and shows how hyper-surveillance and over-policing in urban areas with inadequate green space make play unsafe for Black children. 

Henning describes how structural racism reinforces a negative narrative of Black children, exposing them to  scrutiny, judgment and criminalization for engaging in behaviors that would be forgiven if they were not Black.  

She discusses the “inextricably intertwined” roles of race and poverty in restricting and limiting the development of Black children, citing redlining and other economic burdens historically imposed on Black communities, which set Black children up for failure.  And she speaks about the “culture of fear” surrounding Black children, including stereotypes of young Black men as “superpredators,” the sexualization of Black girls, and the general  “adultification” of Black youth, who are often perceived as years older than their real ages.  This belief system affects how our young people are policed and treated even here in New Rochelle, where the sight of  Black and brown youth congregating in a park can set off an alarm of fear in some residents. 

Hennings says that Black communities have a right to safety and a desire for protection without over-policing.  She advocates for a “public health model of public safety” that provides resources to Black communities rather than reflexively looking to the police to impose control, and calls for “meaningful investments in alternatives” to policing, community (including youth) participation in program planning, and room for trial and error with new programs to learn what will work best. And she calls on political leaders to support a public health approach even at times of crisis when the impulse to resort to policing is greatest, and to take a “both/and” approach to policing and social support. 

She told meeting participants that every child needs at least one “irrationally caring adult” in their lives–one adult who will show them unconditional love and support no matter what they do.

A video recording of the meeting can be viewed here.  For an invitation to attend the Monday evening online educational sessions, send an email to newroar1@gmail.com.