4% of kids in Juvenile Court come from 2-parent household
SHELBY COUNTY, Tenn. — Less than 5% of children who step foot in Shelby County Juvenile Court live in a home with both parents.
As most of the Mid-South starts summer break next week, many are calling on the community to step up — including a single mother we spoke to.
“I don’t know where else to go,” she said when she contacted us.
We are protecting her identity since her son is still a juvenile. Her family moved to Memphis in 2021. The following year, he entered high school.
“There were kids jumping him. He had that issue. He had a couple more fights and then he started to run away,” she said. “He was literally gone for three months.”
She said she eventually found him, but he’s continued to run away.
She said what’s made it even harder is managing the business she started to provide for her family while also focusing on his needs as a single parent. Her partner and her son’s father passed away from health problems right before they moved to Memphis.
“I think it took a lot out of him. I tried to get him some counseling, but it didn’t work,” she said. “I can’t get him to sit still. He’s not listening. He’s wanting to go and come as he pleases.”
The mother said she’s tried to find more support. In 2022, she went before the Memphis Shelby County School Board.
“I had an issue with my son when we first moved here about an incident he had. No one came to me and spoke to me about this,” she said at the podium in front of the board.
She said she’s also called Memphis police and juvenile court.
“I was wanting them to see if they can find him and pick him up for being an unruly child. They said there’s nothing they can do,” she stated.
While her son hasn’t been in trouble with the law, she’s afraid the wrong influences have him surrounded. She said the city needs more positive male role models to care.
Research shows single parents have harder time supervising kids
Researchers continue to dig deeper on what leads a child down the wrong path. Many studies have found their family breakdown is a strong factor, stating single parents can’t supervise their children as well simply because there’s one parent rather than two. The more support, the better.
New data from Shelby County Juvenile Court shows that, out of all the children they’ve come in contact with, less than 5% come from a two-parent household.
Teenage brothers show up on police radar as young as 11 years old
Just looking at the children accused of being unruly or having committed a crime, two-thirds are raised in a home with a single mother, 5% in a home with just their father, 16% with relatives and 4% in a home with both parents.
Some studies suggest the issue is far more complex than that data. Variations like the neighborhood and economic conditions also contribute to the child’s outcome.
Shelby County Juvenile Court tells us they’re studying the data to help provide more context.
Experiences children have early in life play a crucial role in their development and success.
“We all have to rally around this idea and belief of uplifting our youth,” Dr. Archine Moss Jr. said. “Really disrupt whatever trajectory that might not be putting them on the path to success.”
He founded The Gentlemen’s League. It’s a mentorship program serving boys of color from third grade through high school.
“Our purpose is to disrupt those systems to really get them on the right path. Ultimately, alter the prevailing narrative that’s surrounding the boys of color in Memphis,” Moss said.
He said they’re mentoring 364 boys in 13 schools.
“We have seen our GPAs increase through our mentorship program. We have seen the number of absences that students are experiencing decrease. We have seen the number of behavior or infractions decrease,” he explained.
He said the more people and funding they get to do this work, the better off the city will be. Something we’ve heard time and time again over the past decade.
“We are noticing our offender population is getting younger and younger,” former Shelby County Mayor Mark Luttrell said to WREG in 2014.
“We need to expand the number of supports that are available for our teenagers in town,” Shelby County Mayor Lee Harris said in March 2022.
“We have thousands of young people that need intense intervention,” former Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland sated in September 2022.
“Find out who’s doin what, what they need to do more, where’s there’s gaps,” former Memphis Mayor AC Wharton said in front of our cameras in 2014.
The conversation only continues at City Hall.
“Youth, for whatever reason, the caregiver is not intact or the resources are not intact for them to thrive. That is our number one case type,” said Stephanie Hill, the Chief Administrative Officer at Shelby County Juvenile Court.
She and Juvenile Court Judge Tarik Sugarmon went before a Memphis City Council committee in March.
They said child welfare cases make up most of their work, but 45-70% of the children involved in those cases end up committing a delinquent or criminal act.
They just got funding from the Shelby County Commission to hire more staff to start working directly with children and families to find out what they need.
“I know it sounds like a novel idea, but to work directly with the child and family and come up with the best plan to keep them out of our system. That’s been a large shift in our work,” Hill explained.
Meanwhile, Memphis Mayor Paul Young said his team is trying to tackle the issue. He hopes to bring more nonprofits and activities into community centers.
“Our kids are making logical decisions, believe it our not. They have despair one side and see a pathway to getting some money,” he said. “We need them occupied. We need their time occupied and their minds occupied in order to change the outcomes we are seeing.”
As for the mother we spoke with, she said she wants “these kids to know that they are loved.”
She said it’s her love that keeps her fighting. She hopes her story will be heard and helps reach her son.
“My biggest fear is them calling me and telling me something happened bad. I don’t want to get that call,” she said.
Cooling Off Crime: A WREG Special Investigation
WREG Investigators continue their special investigation Thursday as they continue to dig deeper into problems that lead a child down the wrong path and what’s being done to stop it.
As we start summer break next week, we take a closer look at various programs the city is offering to help parents and children stay involved in positive programming. We take a closer look at what’s being offered and whether the research says it will work. Catch the story Thursday on News Channel 3 at 10.
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