Expert Episode: Judge Sheila Calloway

Klare speaks with Judge Sheila Calloway, who oversees the juvenile court system in Nashville. 

Episode Transcript

(00:02):
Welcome to Case by Case, a legal podcast.
Keep in mind the contents of thispodcast should not be taken as legal
advice, nor does this podcast establisha client attorney relationship.
Case by case is meant foreducational purposes only.
Enjoy.
Hi there, I'm Claire and thisis Case by Case Legal Podcast.

(00:25):
And with me today isJudge Sheila Callaway.
Hello, judge Callaway.
Um, I'm so gratefulthat you're here today.
I've seen you speak atCLEs numerous times.
I've seen you speak at an animal law Yes.
CLE, which we'll get into later.
And I always thought if I ever getthis podcast off the ground, I have
to ask Judge Callaway to be on it.
So thank you so much for being here.

(00:46):
Thank you so much for having me.
That's exciting.
Uh, for our listeners, judgeCallaway oversees the juvenile
court here in Nashville.
So in my first episode of this podcast,I tried laying out where laws come from.
Our state judicial systems generallyhave a district court, an appellate
court, a state supreme court.
Where does your court fallwithin this structure?

(01:09):
So juvenile courts are adifferent kind of, um, character.
We are a statutory court.
Okay.
And so our, our court is, um, ddesignated by Tennessee legislature.
And so we're in sections 36 and37 of the Tennessee legislature.
Okay.
And it kinda outlines everythingthat we're supposed to be

(01:30):
doing as a juvenile court.
And what are you supposed to be doing?
It's a juvenile court, youknow, I like to sum it up.
Uh, and the purpose of the juvenile courtsystem is in 37 1 1 0 1, and it basically
says that we are to, for all the childrenthat come within our jurisdiction, to

(01:50):
make sure that they are, um, to take careof their wholesome health wealth needs.
And anything that comes tothem, we are responsible for.
We're also charged with removing thetaint of criminality from any of the
children that may come in front of us.

(02:11):
And we're supposed to substitutea program of treatment and
rehabilitation for our youth.
Okay.
And so it's a lot.
It's a lot.
And, you know, we have differentways that we get to that and things
that we do in order to, um, takecare of the, um, wholesome health
wealth of all of our children.
So it seems like.

(02:31):
You capture anything that really dealswith the child here in the Nashville area?
How, what type of cases doyou see on a regular basis?
So I, um, break it down intobasically three categories.
Okay.
Uh, the first two are allabout the parents, which a
lot of people don't recognize.
Mm-hmm.
We do all cases of custodymatters for unmarried parents.

(02:57):
So anybody that's not married, okay.
And they need help of the courtsystem to navigate custody of
their children, we handle those.
And so we actually startwith paternity cases.
And so someone, um, may want to comeand assert themselves of the father
and wanna do paternity testing.

(03:18):
We do DNA testing on site.
And so every Thursday we have a labthat comes and swabs individuals
to, they swab the children, swab theparents, and send it to the actual lab.
And we go in court one day and when weget the results and open up the envelope
and say, congratulations, either youare or you're not the father, you

(03:40):
know, whichever the congratulations is.
Yeah.
And, and then from there, afterwe determine, um, paternity, then
we determine who should be the.
Residential parent.
Okay.
Who should be the alternate parentand what is a residential parent?
The residential parent is theone that's designated to have the
majority of the time with the child.

(04:01):
Okay.
Um, even if that's like one day more,you know, got, and so we designate
who's the, the, um, residential parentwho's the alternate res, the parent.
And so the parent who hasthe lesser amount of time.
Okay.
And then we determine how much time eachparent should have with their children.
Okay.
And anything in between that weneed to determine as to that we also

(04:23):
determine how much child support,ah, the alternate residential parent
should be paying in order to provideappropriate support for their child.
So if parents were married and thendivorced, that goes through family court.
That goes through the circuit courts.
Okay.
Okay.
Yes.
So you're strictly for parents thathave never been married at any point?

(04:45):
That is correct.
Okay.
Interesting.
It's.
How do you feel about itbeing split up in that way?
Do you think it if, what'sthe reasoning behind that?
Is there a reasoning behind that?
Well, I, I dunno.
Yeah, we can edit anything, Adam.
We dunno the answers to things.
I do it all the time.
Yeah.

(05:06):
So I, I think at some point, just inthe state of Tennessee, the circuit
courts probably had too many cases.
And it was probably a, just a decisionthat in order for us to kind of, to
split this up, let's let juvenile courtsdo some of the, some of these as well.
Okay.
And then we can separate itmarried versus unmarried.

(05:28):
And that's a easy way to separate it.
And every um, city or every jurisdictionin Tennessee doesn't have juvenile courts
that are doing paternity and stuff.
Yeah.
It just depends on howbig your jurisdiction is.
And so here in Davidson County,'cause we're one of the biggest, um,
jurisdictions in the state, all thecircuit courts couldn't hear everything.
And so, right.

(05:48):
A long time ago, they decided thatjuvenile courts would be able to
have jurisdiction to hear thosecustody cases of unmarried parents.
And that's the way they divided it.
Okay.
It's, that makes sense.
Literally, it's probably the, thelargest amount of cases that we handle,
or really at least a second amount.
Yeah.
Second largest amount of cases.
Um, we have.
Anywhere from a lot of those cases arestemmed from child support actions.

(06:12):
Okay.
Where if anybody is receivingany type of state assistance, um,
such as taniff benefits mm-hmm.
Um, then the state isrequired to file an action.
And if they're not married, it'srequired to come to juvenile court.
And so, and when we do, if we'recoming to set child support, then
we're gonna do parenting time anduhhuh everything in between that we

(06:33):
need to make sure that, that the childis getting the best that they can.
Right.
Our goal in those cases is alwaysthe best interest of the child and
we strongly believe that it is in thebest interest of children to spend
as much time with both parents aspossible, and, um, for the parents
to have cooperative parenting mm-hmm.

(06:55):
So that they can get along for thepurpose of parenting their child.
So parenting plans go through you all?
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Yeah.
We do parenting plans, wehave media, we have, um.
Rule 31 trained mediators mm-hmm.
On staff.
And so if parents wanna come in andthey wanna try to resolve it without
having to see one of me or one of themagistrates, we'll let them sit with

(07:19):
one of our ma or one of our mediatorsand go through the parenting plan and
hopefully get everything resolved.
What all is included in a parenting plan?
I know it's probably a lot of scheduling.
You get them on this holiday,I get them on this holiday.
Is there anything else included?
That's exactly it.
Okay.
Everything's on there.
So yeah.
Holiday time.
Um, your day to day schedule,what that's gonna look like, um,

(07:41):
whether the in, you know, we tryto start off with every other week.
And so one parent has a childone week, the next parent
has a child the other week.
Um, that doesn't work.
Like if one parent's live in,in Antioch and the other's
parent's living in Bellevue.
Yeah.
It's difficult to geta child to school Yeah.
Uh, on that kind of schedule.
And so it would depend on, youknow, where the parents are.

(08:03):
But we try to start off, um, with equal.
Parenting time.
And then, um, so day to day we doholidays, we do transportation,
where they meet, um, who picksup who, and you know, yeah.
Uh, we do, um, child support withinthose parenting plans as well.
And anything vacation, summerbreak, spring break, fall breaks,

(08:26):
everything has to be laid out.
We even on many occasions, have to layout how many times a parent can call
their child if they're not with them.
Wow.
Okay.
And she would be surprised inthe arguments that we have.
And, you know, if there are some parentsthat don't get along so poorly or get
along so poorly that you can't, without.

(08:49):
You have to spell out everything.
I had one case where literally we,everybody pulled out their calendars for
the year and I said, okay, mother picks upfrom Father on this day, April the second.
And then Father, you pick upfrom Mother on April the ninth.
And we literally went through every partof the calendar and I said, now that's,

(09:10):
that's on a Monday now, father, since whenthe child's with mother, you can make a
phone call at 6:00 PM to mother or youknow, to, yeah, to the child on Wednesday.
And there are cases at.
They're so, um, antagonistictoward one another, uh, that
they forget it's about the child.
Right, right.

(09:30):
They forget that they're,it's more about winning.
It's more about winning.
It's a competitive thing.
Yes.
Is there any, I remember in law school,uh, an example of, I think there are
parents going through a divorce, butin the parenting plan, uh, what you
can and cannot say about the otherspouse or the other parent in their
absence, do you get a lot of that?
We, yes, we get a lot of that as well.

(09:51):
So we kind of have a general order atthe beginning of the parenting plan
that no party is to talk negativelyor disparaging about the child, around
the child or in front of the child.
Or the child could hear Yeah.
To the child and that theyshould not be talking about the
case with the child as well.
Got it.
I mean, that's, that's a gooddisclaimer for the child.
It's very interesting and, um, I, Ihad been married for several years and.

(10:16):
Even on our worst days and all our, ourdays that we're angry with one another.
I can't imagine that it would get tothat point where I have to have someone
tell us, you can't say this about thisperson, but that's what we deal with.
Yeah.
And when you think about um, dealing withit an unmarried, I think for marriages
it's easier because you've been in thiscommitted relationship where you told,

(10:40):
you know, your friends and the officiant.
Yeah.
You declared a commit fair commitment.
You declared Yeah.
Commitment.
You know, we have cases thatwere one night stands where these
people didn't know each other.
They just strangers.
Strangers.
And now they are connected to each other.
Gosh, for 18 years.
Yeah.
It's film comes forever.
Yeah.
Forever.
Wow.
And so, you know, having to spellout everything that you can do

(11:03):
to make this work for your child.
Yeah.
And reminding parents that.
You may not like him, but half of yourchild has this person's DNA in it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So to, to insult that parent isto insult your kid Absolutely.
In somewhere.
And so we do a lot ofparenting classes Yeah.
And, um, where we are trying to empowerparents to learn how to, um, co-parent.

(11:28):
Mm-hmm.
Um, and to learn that it's not aboutyou winning, because if you win,
eventually your child's losing.
Yeah.
And so, um, we do a lot of referralsto different agencies, um, that
do family counseling and familyservices for our, for our children,
so that they can That's great.
Help through it all.
Great.
'cause it is like you, like the statutesaid, it's about the health of the child.

(11:52):
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
So we have one bucket of whatyou do is family law and we
talk our parentage cases.
Parentage cases, yes.
Is our parentage custody casesthat deal with custody issues.
Our second bucket, um, which is probably,um, a little bigger than that bucket,
is our cases where we are finding thatchildren are either abused or neglected.

(12:16):
Okay.
And we call 'em our DNA in, in abusecases, neglect dependent and abuse cases.
And those are where we get referrals from.
The majority of them are referred fromthe Department of Children's Services.
Okay.
Someone has called, um, a referral tothe Department of Children's Services
and, um, there's been a removal fromthe family and we are determining not

(12:40):
if the family, like if it's an abusecase, we're not prosecuting the parents,
we're determining whether that child waswhere the child goes because the parent
would go through a criminal Correct.
Court.
Okay.
Correct.
And.
Just as a side note, is Tennesseea required to report state?
Yes.
Okay.
That's what I thought.
So meaning if you see a kid that is beingabused or if you have any inkling that

(13:04):
a child's being abused or neglected, youare required to Absolutely call it in.
Every single person in the state ofTennessee is a mandatory reporter.
Yeah.
And in some states it's just teachersor it's just healthcare providers.
But here in Tennessee it's everybody.
With everybody.
Yeah.
And if you a phone, if you seeit and you don't report it, then
you are subject to criminal.
Wow.
Receiving.
Yes.
Okay.

(13:24):
So it's a misdemeanor, a class, Amisdemeanor, not to report child abuse.
Interesting happening.
I remember in that animal, CLE, therewas a, a veterinarian who was also an
attorney and he was talking about a casewhere a animal, a pet had came, come in
and it, the pet was so neglected thathe called because he said, well, if they

(13:46):
treat their pet like this, I am assumingthat anyone else living in that home is.
Potentially in danger.
So, um, so you're dealing with, ifkids are in that situation, where
do they go and who gets custody?
Absolutely.
Okay.
Yes.
So our, our first step is determinewhether or not they're at risk of harm.
If they're remaining in the home thatthe referral came from, if they're at

(14:08):
risk and harm, we determine whetherthey should be removed immediately
or whether they can remain inthere with some type of services.
Um, we ultimately will determinewhether or not they, yes,
they were abused or neglected.
Okay.
And if they were, whereshould they go from there?
Should they stay with thefamily, with services, or should
they go to relative custody?

(14:29):
Ultimately, the, um, last resort isthey go to the Department of Children's
Services in the foster care system.
Gotcha.
Okay.
So.
Your court is making that determinationkind of in step with a criminal court,
or are you doing your own findings?
We're doing our own findings.
Okay.
So separate than what ishappening to the parent.
Absolutely.
Potentially in a different court.
Absolutely.

(14:49):
And the criminal court processis a lot longer uhhuh, I imagine?
Yes.
Yeah.
So Okay.
For us, and, and there's statutoryguidelines on how soon we need
to have those cases heard Sure.
As well as well as federal law guidelinesthat determine when we need to be Oh, wow.
Finding permanency.
Okay.
You know, the, the issue is, um,what's in best for the children.

(15:11):
Mm-hmm.
And for children to be in limboof where they're living and.
Who's gonna take care of them for therest of their life is heartbreaking.
Right?
And so children need to be inpermanent places as soon as possible.
So we can't wait on the, thecriminal system to do these things.
Right.
We've gotta go forward with them.
Yeah, that makes total sense.

(15:32):
Um, do you guys utilizeguardians, ad litem?
We do in this space.
So for, yes, for every child.
And this is also by state law, everychild that there's a allegation of abuse
or neglect, they are, they have to havea guardian ad litem appointed to them.
And a guardian ad litem is a person thatjust works in the interest for the child.

(15:54):
They're not worried about what the state.
Wants or what the parents want,they're there to represent the child.
Right?
Absolutely.
Okay.
And so they are, they are, they haveto be attorneys in, in Nashville
or in, excuse me, in Tennessee,by law they have to be attorneys.
And so they are advocating forthe best interest of the child.
Right.
And so they, their role is to kinda,you know, see what's going on with

(16:15):
the, um, parents, see what's goingon with the, if it's a foster care
placement, um, finding relatives orfinding, you know, family, friends
that may be willing to take the child.
Yeah.
And, um, and if their homes are safe.
Absolutely.
And if the kid wantsto go there and, yeah.
Yes.
Okay.
Yeah, that's a reallyimportant part of our system.
I know here in Tennessee a lot of, um.

(16:37):
Attorneys donate their time to do that.
Yes.
And it's, it's super, super important.
Yeah.
Uh, we don't have enoughattorneys that, um, wanna do it.
It's hard work.
Yeah.
It's hard work.
And so you have to have thestamina and the love of that
work to really wanna do it.
Mm-hmm.
Um, the Guardant litem and the,the, all the parents also have

(16:59):
appointed attorneys as well.
'cause the parents have theright to have attorneys.
Mm-hmm.
That's a constitutionalright to parent their child.
And so when we take that away,they have the right to have
an attorney represent 'em.
And so on any given case, we needat least three appointed attorneys.
That's a lot of it andit's a lot of attorneys.
Um.
Our state is working on it, um, ofmaking our rates competitive, but

(17:21):
we are one of the, currently oneof the lowest paid, um, appointed
attorneys, um, around the country.
Wow.
We pay our attorneys pretty low rates.
Yeah.
It's like $40 or $50 an hour.
Okay.
Um, and it's hard for a lot ofour, um, attorneys to really
consider doing this full-time work.
Yeah.
Because you don't make good money on it.

(17:43):
Yeah.
You know?
Well, and here in Nashville,the cost of living has gone
up so much the past few years.
Absolutely.
I, yeah, that would be tough.
It'd be very, very tough.
Yeah.
And you know, you think about thehard work that they do and the hard
work that they do, and it's hard forthem to have offices that, I mean,
the overhead to have assistant ifyou're not making that much money.

(18:04):
Yeah.
And so that's why we're alwaysconstantly looking and if any of your
viewers would wanna come and be a.
Appointed attorney, whether it's forGuardian ad litems or for their parents.
Yeah, we will take them immediately.
As a reminder, a lot of states requirepro bono work as well for, I don't
know how that would work with theappointee cases, but if we, we make work.

(18:26):
Yeah, I know.
Here I think it's a suggested 50 hoursa year, but yeah, I, they do really
important work, especially for those kids.
Yes.
Representing them.
I think, you know, one ofthe hard things too, for.
Our attorneys that represent these kids,these, these cases can go on for years.
Really?
Yeah.
And so as an attorney, you, youwould probably reach your cap of

(18:49):
what you get paid by the state,um, you know, a year into the case.
Yeah.
And the, these mean judges expect you tostay with the case for as long as you can.
It's, uh, for, like, if a kidis removed from their family and
they're two when they're removed,you have removal hearings.
You have what we call child and familyteam meetings where you're trying to find

(19:12):
a alternative placement for the kids.
And you're meeting, um, as a group tofigure out what you can do best for
the, for that family and that child.
You are having foster carereview board hearings, and that's
like in front of a volunteer.
Court ordered a group that has to doreports for the court, um, by statute.
And so, you know, so you have to do thosehearings, you know, and that's outside of

(19:36):
your regular court hearings that you have.
Right.
And so if you're having theseHA hearings and meetings on a
regular basis, you reached yourcap before you have your trial.
Right?
And so and so, it's alot of, it's difficult.
Is the goal for these cases too?
I, it depends.
I'm sure on each one is the goalreunification, the, the number one

(19:57):
goal always starts with reunification.
Okay.
And so, even if it's like asevere abuse case, we start with,
um, the goal of reunification.
Unless there's a findingthat we can make that says
reunification is not appropriate.
Okay.
'cause of, so, I mean, thatcould be a really long.
Journey to get, absolutely.
Get to that pointly.

(20:18):
So that absolutely makes sense.
It's like forever.
Yes.
And so you have these, you, you don'twant youth and children, particularly in
their form of years, who are languishingin custody, our foster care system.
Mm-hmm.
And so we try our best toget things set quickly.
Yeah.
And to help them to get to a, a placewhere they can find a loving, supportive

(20:41):
family, um, that's going to take them.
And if it is the parents, um, giving themas much support and as much as they need
to be able to take their child back andprovide them everything that they need,
and then there's gonna be follow up.
And so, oh yeah.
These cases last, you're not gonna Yeah.
Let 'em go.
That.
Uh, what's the success ratein terms of that like kind of

(21:03):
rehabilitation reunification?
I'm sure it's hard to put a number on it.
It is hard to put a number on it.
Um.
I don't have a number on it.
I think we usually find permanencyfor most youth within 12 to 15 months.
Wow.
Um, and that unit, that permanency couldbe back to home or with a relative.

(21:26):
Okay.
Um, and so there are, the Department ofChildren's Services keeps, um, regular
statistics on, um, point pointers, likehow long it took the child to reach
permanency, um, if there is anotherremoval after they've achieved permanency.
So like if we send 'em back home and thensix months later there's another removal

(21:50):
action, they keep all of those numbersof, on the things that happen in those
cases, I, I don't know what they are.
Yeah.
I know that they can be improved.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Um, bottom line is every day thosenumbers definitely can be improved.
Yeah.
'cause ideally it's.
The best known, like ahundred percent success.
Yes.
Yeah.
And we're we're far from that.
Yeah.

(22:10):
Is there, uh, I know a lot of people.
Uh, are sometimes interestedin foster care programs.
I know on Instagram and TikTok,there's, um, like a lot of
support groups about foster care.
How do you interact with that system?
And we, is there a shortage here?
I'm guessing?
Yes, yes.
All of that.
Yeah.
So we operate hand in hand with, uh, thefoster care systems and which is run by

(22:34):
the Department of Children's Services.
Yep.
There are a number of agenciesthat, along with the Department of
Children's Services, that, um, helpfoster and help foster parents.
It's like Youth Villages, um,Catholic Charities, um, Oasis.
Um, there's the few of those that I,I can think of off the top of my head
that they support foster parents.

(22:56):
And so you can become a fosterparent either through the Department
of Children's Services or throughone of these private agencies.
Okay.
Um, it would require youto go through some path.
Classes.
Um, I'm not sure what PATH stands for.
That's one of the thingsthat we do in juvenile court.
We use a lot of acronyms.
Yeah.
And you use them solong, makes it more fun.
Right.
It makes it more fun.
And people are like, nowwhat does that stand for?

(23:17):
And you're like, who knows?
And so, so we, we use acronyms,but the foster parents with or
the potential foster parents wouldgo through some training Okay.
On how to become a foster parent andwhat it means and what it looks like.
And once they've gone through thetraining, then they can start fostering.
We are in dire need of morepeople to step up to foster.

(23:40):
Yeah.
We did not have a whole lot of, we.
We, we did not have an adequatenumber of youth that, or
foster parents prior to COVID.
And then when COVID hit, it wentalmost to, um, really dire states Yeah.
Of how many people would keeppeople, um, in foster system.
Yeah, I can imagine.

(24:01):
And it, we really hit a all timelow during the first parts of COVID.
I remember there was, uh, somescrambling from the state to put these
kids in safer situations and tough.
Yes.
And we're still scrambling,we're still overcoming.
Um, you know, it, it is aneed that is a desperate need.

(24:21):
And it, it, it takes a lot to foster.
Yeah.
It's worth it.
Yeah.
And you know, I've, I've notfound too many foster parents or
foster homes who said they wouldnot have done what they've done.
And it really, really, really canmake a, make a breaker a child.
Yeah.
If we don't have a safe place for him, we.

(24:42):
Currently around the state andthey've done some, um, news stories
about, you know, some of the.
Alternative placements thatwe have until they can find a
permanent place for a child.
Mm-hmm.
And a lot of them here in Nashville,they're no longer staying in offices.
They used to, if theydidn't have a place to go.
Yeah.
Um, they would go to theDS office and just wait.

(25:04):
A day or two until they canfind a placement and they
would lay out cot and things.
And that's just hard on a kid.
Yeah.
You know, that feels you're being lonely.
Yes.
Yeah.
You're being removed from yourparent and half the times you
don't understand the reason.
Yeah.
Especially, you know, youthink about a young, a younger
kid, a four or 5-year-old.

(25:25):
Yeah.
6-year-old.
You're being removed.
You're not really sure why.
Yeah.
And you don't know where you're going.
And the people who are picking youup, you've never met them before and
they're just coming and literallytaking you and then they take you and
then they are placing you somewhere.
You don't know where you're going.
You don't know who thepeople who are taking.
Yeah.
And so you don't have much of a say in it.

(25:45):
Don't have 24 hours at all hours.
Yeah.
Yes.
And so you're literallybeing taken somewhere.
And so for the ones that get to go.
Have the privilege of beingtaken to a foster home still
where they don't know anybody.
Yeah.
They don't know who's here.
Still is scary.
Yeah.
It's very, very scary.
I just think if you don't have thatand you get taken to an office Yeah.

(26:06):
Just cold.
Just cold.
Yeah.
And that's where you sitand that's where you wait.
I'm an adult and I don't like beingin an office, so I can't imagine.
Yes.
And half these, when they aredim removals, you don't have
time to pick your things up.
Yeah.
So you're not like packing a bag andsaying, oh, we're going on a trip.
You're being removed in a veryfast manner where it's just like

(26:29):
you, you're going with clothes,you're grabbing what you pack.
Wow.
I will say there's a programcalled Isaiah, the Isaiah House,
and we have one in Nashville.
Um, they, I can't remember what part ofthe state they started, but they are, um,
in other states now, but Isaiah House.

(26:50):
A removal house.
Okay.
Which we use.
Um, our d our Department of children'sServices uses it, um, hopefully on a,
on a regular basis, but when they don'thave a actual place to take a child, they
can take 'em to the Isaiah House and atthe Isaiah house, um, it's volunteers
and they have a basement of everything.

(27:12):
And so the child can come in and pick anew pair of shoes or pick some clothes or
pick, you know, whatever it is they want.
Yeah.
Have some the, the as powerand the They have some power.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Um, the volunteers of Isaiah House willsay, you know, what's your favorite food?
And they will make sure that they'recooking their favorite food for them.
Wow.
Or they're going to get it for them.
And so people can volunteerat the Isaiah House.

(27:33):
People can volunteer atthe Isaiah, Isaiah house.
It is a beautiful house.
Um.
The way they have designed thehouse is, um, open and friendly.
Um, definitely child friendly, um,beautiful backyard area where they
can go and play, but they can goand find friendly faces and friendly

(27:56):
people who are gonna just givethem whatever it is that they want.
Yeah.
At that removal, because that's themost difficult time for a young child.
Yeah.
It has to be just so confusing.
Yes.
This may seem like, I mean, Ithink it's an antiquated question.
I know once upon a time we had moreorphanage type style placement.

(28:18):
My grandma was orphaned at ayoung age, and this was in the
thirties and she was still kind ofmore in a foster care situation.
But is there anything like thatwith the state being developed since
we aren't getting as many fosterfamilies, so we do have residential
treatment places as well, and so.
What happens when a child is removed fromthe Department of Children's Services?

(28:42):
The department's gonna do that veryfirst day, um, as much of a thorough
assessment as they can to figureout what the child's needs are.
Um, where the child, if there'sbehavioral issues, there's medical
issues, they're gonna get all of thatinformation as much as they can at the
day of removal, at the time of removal.
And then based on that, the childis, I guess rated 1, 2, 3, 4.

(29:07):
Um, and it makes a determination ofwhat type of placement they should have.
Gotcha.
And so if it's a very low levelneeds, low level assessment, it's
like a level one foster home.
Okay.
And so those children, they'll look fora foster home for those, those children.
Gotcha.
If it's a child that has higher needs,maybe some behavioral issues, then
it might be a level three, whichwould be a residential facility.

(29:29):
Okay.
And so we have some residentialfacilities as well that they would
go to a residential placement.
Okay.
Um.
We don't have enough of those either.
Yeah.
And so, so, so we'relacking in that as, as well.
Yeah.
We also have, um, if a child is likea level four, that's a child that
has some significant mental healthissues, we definitely don't have

(29:52):
enough resources for children whohave severe mental health issues.
Wow.
Yeah.
And so those are the kids a lot of times.
'cause they havedifficulties in foster homes.
Mm-hmm.
Um, because of their, unless it's a,we call 'em therapeutic foster home
and those are very significant, smallnumber, um, significant foster homes

(30:13):
who are trained on medical issuesor therapeutic issues that, um, for
those high risk, um, level four youth.
Okay.
We have very few of those in the system.
Yeah.
If you don't have them, you have,we don't have very many residential
placements for those level four youth.
A lot of times we're ending upsending those youth to other states.

(30:34):
Wow.
Services and for placement.
Okay.
Which is very disappointing.
Yeah.
So a, we may have a child that's atlevel four and we don't have anything for
them, and they'll either go to Georgia.
There's a, a place in Georgia that wesend a lot of those youth, um, there's a
place in, um, Illinois that they go to.
So surrounding states, we have to sendour children to different places for

(30:58):
them to get the services that they need.
I even know, just some adults gettingmental health care here is a struggle.
The amount of beds that we havearen't enough, even for an adult.
So I imagine kids need a little bit more.
They need a lot more.
Yeah, they need a whole lot more.
Yeah.
And it, and I, I, I can only say it,I can say it enough times, but, um.

(31:21):
We definitely saw a breakdown inmental health issues, um, after COVID.
Did you see an uptick in these kindsof cases during COVID or less because
there was less teacher interaction,less people having eyes on the kids?
I would say that there wasn't muchchange in the number of cases that we

(31:42):
saw coming through the court system.
Okay.
So we as a court stayedopen the entire time.
Right.
Um, for COVID.
For those kind of cases and for, forremovals, there were definitely cases
that people were still getting removedor children were still being removed.
We fear that there's probably morethat should have been removed mm-hmm.
That we weren't catchingbecause of less interaction with

(32:04):
school teachers, counselors.
Yeah.
Um, but it did not meanthat we stopped business.
Oh, sure.
Yeah.
We, yeah.
Business kept, kept, kept going.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I just think it could have probablydoubled what we were doing and Wow.
We did not see that.
Wow.
Yeah.
Um, we do see, um, a lot more youth whohave exhibited some significant mental

(32:26):
health issues, um, post COVID Yeah.
Than we had before that.
That makes sense.
Yeah.
Is it a certain age of childor just across the board?
Just across the board.
Wow.
Across the, the board.
Okay.
Uh, so we had our.
Paternity bucket.
Yes.
We had our, um, removal, neglect.

(32:46):
Neglect, dependent neglect.
Yes.
What else do you guys handle?
So, yes.
And so, you know, I, I tell people allthe time, so two thirds what you just
heard are all about the parents mm-hmm.
And what the parents have done to thechildren or what they're doing to each
other that's affecting the children.
Yeah.
Uh, and my court is very, um,keen on recognizing that we can't

(33:08):
operate in our bucket silos.
Right.
That we all gotta work together,uhhuh, and we gotta get these
parents on the right track.
Because what we absolutely know bystudies abroad that youth who are in
safe, secure placement with loving, caringstructure, parents will never come to the.

(33:29):
Delinquent side.
Okay.
On the flip side, yeah.
Youth who do not have that stabilityor who have parents who are constantly,
consistently arguing are using drugs areincarcerated, what we know are now adverse
childhood experiences have a much higherlikelihood of ending in the criminal side.

(33:51):
And so the last part of what we do are allabout the children and their behaviors.
Okay.
And so we, I split that in two categories.
So that last third bucket issplit in two, and we have what
we call our status offenses.
And a status offense is anoffense based on your age.
It's only a crime because of your age.

(34:13):
And so I have a, a 21-year-old,he'll be 22 this year.
Uh, in, in about a month he'll be 22.
I'm not that old.
Had him when I was really, reallyyoung that, uh, so my 22-year-old
when he's about six, um, he, I thinkI told him to go clean his room.
Not sure exactly what, how this allinteraction happened, but I told, I think

(34:36):
it was, I told him to go clean his room.
He was not having it that day and hejust had his own little breakdown.
It was
Oh, and just
the drama he gave me that day.
Yeah.
He said, I'm just gonna leaveand go find me a new family.

(35:01):
And I'm looking at this kidlike, are you kidding me?
You're like, well, I do this for a living.
Yeah.
I said, no, no, no.
I want you to stay here with your father.
I'm gonna leave and I'mgonna find me a new family.
And he gave me this looklike, is my mom crazy?
I said, so two can play this game.

(35:21):
Right, right, right, right.
So had I left.
To go find a new family.
I just wouldn't have been awoman running for freedom.
Hallelujah.
No crime, no harm.
Yeah.
Just outta here.
Right?
Had he left to find a family thatwould've been a crime for him.
Yeah.
That's a status offense.
Okay, so that's a runaway.
Yep.
And so you talk about runaway curfewviolation to back a smoking, um,

(35:47):
uh, truancy, not going to school.
Yeah, that's cool.
Um, skipping school,Lord, during school hours.
Um, underage drinking.
Those are status offenses.
Okay.
And so we treat those in adifferent way than we treat.
Crimes that happen at any age.
And so our status offenses, there arestrict federal law and regulations

(36:10):
and state law and regulations onhow you can treat status offenses.
For one, we can't lockup status offenders.
Sure, that makes sense.
Yes.
And you don't wanna lock up tax offenders.
And um, you know,
we hear all the time, I hear and we havemore status offenders than we have youth
who are committing really regular crimes.

(36:30):
Sure, yeah.
That makes youth, that makes sense.
Skip school and don't go to school.
Yeah.
I truancy numbers, youknow, there's a lot more.
Petitions for status offenses.
There are.
And so I giggle like when people areon the news and saying, or you know, on
blogs saying, judge Calloway just needsto lock them all up and it's Ah, yeah, we
probably don't need to lock them all up.

(36:50):
Yeah.
Particularly these, and the majorityof them that start in our system kind
of start with some status offenses.
Gotcha.
And so we do a lot of diversionprograms for our status offenses.
What mean, what that means is we don't,they don't come in front of a judge.
They're not seeing me, but we're sendingthem, we're doing some assessments and

(37:10):
a risk assessments and we're sendingthem to some of our local non-profit
organizations to kind of mentor.
Oh wow.
Okay.
Give them services thatthey actually need.
So what are, what would that look like?
It's them telling them, yougotta go to school 'cause you.
Need to do that to get a job?
Is it that kind stuff or what'sSo most of them are like, kind
of like good mentoring programs.

(37:32):
Cool.
Um, I, I, I name a whole lot of 'em.
We work with a program called EpicGirl, um, find design, um, why
we can't wait be about change.
Um, Oasis Real Program, Oasishas a, a bunch of other programs
that we work with them Okay.
With.
So there's a lot of thesenonprofit organizations and what

(37:55):
they really do, they, they reallygive the children what they need.
And so if it's a child that, um, maybethey're only child, they don't have
other siblings in the house, maybe it'sa one parent home and they just don't
have anything to do and they just.
Are getting into trouble because Yeah.
Ran away 'cause Yeah.
Yeah.
Parents at work and they, yeah.

(38:15):
And so we, we will connect themwith one of these programs that we
think is probably best suited forwhat the issues they're presenting.
Okay.
And so, you know, we work with, findDesign is a wonderful program for
young girls who are, you know, dippingtheir toe into, um, deviant behaviors.
And so fine design doesn't.

(38:36):
A wonderful, wonderful job working withgirls and giving them, like, it's a
collaborative program for several reweeks where they have a cohort of girls
and they're learning how to supportone another and Oh, that's great.
Um, how, how to reach out when theyneed mentor help and, um, giving them
activities and things to do and, you know,when we're gone, how do you find your own

(38:58):
activities that are how do not be bored.
Yes.
Productive.
Okay.
Absolutely.
Cool.
And so that's called Find, find Design.
Find Design.
P Design.
Okay.
Um, and I'm guessing they'relooking for volunteers as well?
Oh, yes, yes.
All of our nonprofit organizationswe're signing everyone up for Yes.
Volunteer work.
Absolutely.
That's great.
I didn't know about alot of these programs.

(39:19):
So it's, yes, we have at least about 30partners that we use on a regular basis.
Okay.
That we, um, send some of these lowerlevel cases and our status offenses to,
and say, you know, go do what you do.
Yeah.
Because.
We trust them.
They have the people who are workingon the ground to give these children

(39:39):
just another outlook, another thing todo something else that will keep them.
It's kind of like what your parents mayhave done or what my parents did for me
when they put me in Girl Scouts, right?
Or they put me in, you know, there'sa, there's an extracurricular yes.
You know, here's somestructure for your day.
And I was like, oh, I don't wannago to link's, mom, I gotta go.
But it was my structure forthe day and my was like, oh,

(39:59):
you were absolutely doing that.
And so a lot of our families in our.
Community and the people that weserve don't know who these people
places are and accesses are.
Yeah.
But if they could just get theirchild in a positive program, it would
make a huge difference in their life.
Yeah.
And so that's whatthese programs serve as.
That's great.
And I imagine if you are doing like theselow level offenses, going to a court would

(40:22):
only kind of perpetuate that behaviorin a sense where you're like, well, if
I'm, if I'm the bad kid, then I'm gonnareally be the bad kid instead of taking
them out of the court system physically.
Absolutely.
And putting them somewhere more.
Kid friendly.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
That is, you're Keyon, you Keyon.
And so that's some days I am.

(40:42):
That's, uh, and, and, and that's why,uh, I wish more people understood
child development and, and how childbehavior is and how the brain develops.
And so, you know, when when we'reout and we're hanging with the bad
kids, it's like, oh, that's cool.
Yeah.
And so the more we, this is my group now.
Yes, yes.
Yeah.
And so the more we inundate themwith that kind of negative thing,

(41:03):
the more that overtakes them.
Yeah.
That's what they become.
Yeah.
We don't want that.
And so that's why it's superimportant for us to divert them
out of those things and say.
Yeah, you're not, you're notbad enough to come to court.
We're sending you overthis to this other program.
Yeah.
You're just, you're just bored over here.
Bored over there.
Yeah.
Okay.

(41:24):
Very.
And so it is so important for us toremember that, that, you know, child
development is about, you know, thelast part of your brain that develops
is your prefrontal cortex, and that'syour decision making part of your brain.
And so if it doesn't truly develop untilyou're about 25, I say like 20 for, for
girls and for boys it's like 30, 45.

(41:45):
They're still going to they 30.
30, 40 years old.
Yeah.
And so it's important for us to understandchild development and to operate in
a way that it supports what we know.
Yeah.
Know that the brain and then we, thechildren need positive programs in order
for them to grow out of this behavior.

(42:07):
Then that's what we should send them.
We shouldn't be sending them to jail.
We shouldn't be looking tosend them to jail anymore.
Right.
We should be sending themmore to things that are gonna
help improve their behaviors.
Well, I imagine that's also cheaper fora taxpayer to send them to Absolutely.
An arts and crafts camprather than to use up a bed.
Absolutely.
Are you guys using data research?

(42:29):
How do you guys get that?
And how do you use it?
Yes.
So we definitely use data.
Um, all the kids that come in, we do riskassessments and we do a, um, depending on
the level, if it's a case that's going tohave some type of, um, court supervision,
we'll do a, um, child and least childand adolescent needs assessment.

(42:52):
We call it the cans.
And so we're getting data andinformation from these cans.
We're keeping, um, we have a, adata specialist, uh, on staff.
And so you guys are generatingyour own research as well?
A research as well.
Okay.
And I, I love having, um, interns.
I, we get interns.
We, we, I believe inthe internship program.

(43:14):
I believe that if we have youth thatare working with us on this side of the,
of the, the, the table, then they'reless likely to come on the other side.
Sure.
So we partner, uh, with.
A lot of other metro agencies too.
But we partner with Power YouthProgram, um, that's run out of
the, um, Metro Action Commission.
Okay.
And we hire high school students.

(43:37):
Wow.
The summer we have about seven of them,and they learn all about the program.
And so some of the thingsI have them do is, is kinda
look at some of this research.
We also work with theNational Bar Association.
Yep.
And we get interns from them.
Okay.
And then we just, I have other internsthat just want to, to come and work.
And so we probably have atotal about 10 interns that are

(44:00):
working with us this summer.
That's good.
And.
The, the, particularly the law schoolintern and the, um, undergraduate college
students, they need projects, Uhhuh Yeah.
Things that they can getwriting the samples on.
Yeah.
And so we let them do a lot of research.
So they're filling outthose Excel spreadsheet.
Absolutely.
And so, yeah, we had one that, um, youknow, when I said we split the, the

(44:23):
cases in half the status offenses andthen the ones that are actually crimes.
Yeah.
And so I had one intern one year,take a look about the last 10 years,
and this was probably about sevenyears ago that the intern did this.
I'm gonna get one to continue it now,but look at all the youth who were
transferred to the adult system basedon the crime and their background.

(44:46):
Okay.
We determined that they could not, um,have their case heard in juvenile court.
It would have to go to, so the reallyserious crimes, very, very serious
cases, most of your homicide cases.
Okay.
And so I had our intern look at that andsay, where in the system did they start?
Mm. Because our, allour fouls are by child.
Mm-hmm.
And so every time the child comes,you have the history of the child.

(45:09):
Wow.
So you'll have from theparenting plan days Absolutely.
To the removal.
Absolutely.
Wow.
Okay.
And what we learned from that, ofwhich I, and I think I generally kind
knew it 'cause I can see it in court,but the majority started with either
parentage or neglect dependent cases.
Wow.
Yeah.
So that was like, um, 70% of our casesof the youth that were transferred

(45:33):
to the adult system started becauseof a parent action in our system.
And then the rest of them, the majority,the rest of that 30%, maybe 20, 25%
started with like a status offense.
So the majority is very, two ofthem started off with a crime.
Yeah.

(45:53):
And so it's always somethingthat led up to this.
Big crime that they did.
And so where did we asa system not catch it?
Wow.
And not change it.
And not change that trajectory.
Wow.
And so that's, it's almostlike a medical record now.
Yes.
Yep.
Wow.
Yeah.
And so really to curb criminal offensesthat our youth are committing, it

(46:20):
probably starts with that rehabilitationeducation of the parents in those
first few years of the kids' life.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
And that's why I appreciate ourstate legislature for making our
purpose of juvenile court very broad.
Mm-hmm.
Where we are to take care of thewholesome needs of all of our children.
Right.
And that absolutely includesfrom beginning when they

(46:42):
are born with their parents.
Yeah.
And what are we doing to put them onthe right track so that they're not
ending up in our criminal system.
Yeah.
I guess this is anecdotalfor our listeners.
If generally speaking, if you practicefamily law as an attorney, you also
practice some criminal law and vice versa,because those two intertwine so much.

(47:07):
Sadly, I, yes.
But, uh, I have some friends whostart off as family and then they
got a bunch of criminal casesthat they weren't expecting, but
it, you know, they, they overlap.
Absolutely.
Wow.
So percentage wise, how many seriouscriminal cases are you seeing?
It seems the more we talk this portionof the pies getting smaller and smaller,

(47:30):
it is actually, actually so muchsmaller than what people believe it is.
Yeah.
Because when you hear juvenile court Yes.
You're like juveniles.
Oh my god.
Absolutely.
The youth.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And so, you know, majorityof people think that that is.
All we do every day, all day.
It is actually the smallestamount of cases that we have.
And so when I think about the delinquencycases we have, I also run a, um, I'm in

(47:57):
charge of a pretrial housing facility,and that's where we detain children
that have committed a crime that, orexcuse me, who have alleged to have
committed a crime that we believe, um,because of the seriousness of the crime
or because their previous record, they,um, cannot be placed in the community

(48:18):
until their trial is heard that theyhave to stay in our detention facility.
Okay.
And our pretrial housing facility.
So they're detained.
Um, we have average about 40 kids.
Okay.
And so you think about, just in general,in Nashville, there's about 80,000
youth that are in our school system.
Um, and that's in ourpublic school system.

(48:39):
Right.
And so you add in private school.
Yeah.
On top of that.
You are my, you probably around ahundred thousand youth in our community.
Right.
Of a hundred thousandyouth in our community.
On average.
40 of them are doing really bad stuff.
Okay.
So it's a very 0.4% of our youth Yeah.
In our community are um,not quite getting it right.

(49:02):
Yeah.
And so it's a very smallnumber and it makes it more
manageable for us to deal with.
'cause now.
We can put a lot of intensive servicesand a smaller number of youth,
especially if we're gonna divert theones that don't need our help and
don't need, they just need a friendlyface and a nice community organization

(49:26):
that they can go and hang out with.
They need a Boy Scout.
They need, yeah.
You know, a fine designor why we can't wait.
They don't need a court system.
Right.
There are some youth that need a courtsystem and need a person who's supervising
them in the community and making surethat they're not repeating offenses or
they need a higher level of structured.

(49:46):
Um.
Indoor structured or, um, you know, behinda structured building, um, program so that
they can be treated and rehabilitated.
And then on average I probablytransfer about, um, 15 youth
a year to the adult system.
Okay.
And so is that when they're aging outor is that the severity of the crime?

(50:09):
Those are the ones thatare severity of the crimes.
Okay.
And so on average they'reprobably between 15 and 18.
Okay.
And they've probably committed or allegedto have committed a very serious homicide.
Wow.
Okay.
Um, sometimes they seriousrated robberies where someone's
actually harmed in that as well.
Sure, sure.
And so those are the ones that usuallyget transferred to the adult system.

(50:30):
Okay.
And the goal for youth, I think,generally is rehabilitation.
Absolutely.
Because they're committing these crimeswhen they're so young and they're
not developed, and absolutely all thereasons we talked about with their
parents, that there's probably a bigthreshold for rehabilitation potential.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Um, most youth are goingto be rehabilitated.
Even youth who have committed murdercases have an option, have the

(50:54):
ability, once they, um, have grownand their minds have fully developed.
If we help them in positive ways,we'll grow out of that type of behavior
and we'll never commit a crime again.
Uh, there's like this powerfulbook, um, um, by Jim Grafana and

(51:14):
it's called, um, Miller's Children.
Okay.
And it talks aboutafter the Supreme Court.
The United States Supreme Court made aruling that life in prison or life without
possibly parole is not appropriate foryouth and cruel, unusual punishment.
And, um, those sentencesneeded to be redone.

(51:35):
And so he went this, um, psychologistwent around and testified on be behalf
did evaluations, and a lot of these youthwho were lifers, um, and testified for
them in, in court and system, and themajority of them were literally treated
and rehabilitated and could absolutelybe functioning well in our community.

(51:58):
Wow.
If given a chance.
Yeah.
Um, you know, he said it's notfoolproof and there's a few of 'em
that he, he evaluated were like,uh, not quite you, but the majority,
you know, like I, I don't even know.
He, he has the numbers in his, inhis book, but the majority of them.

(52:18):
Grew out of this behavior.
Wow.
And we have so many examples of that.
Yeah.
Do you, do you think sentencing is leaningmore towards this rehabilitative track?
Or do you think it's staying kind ofa balance of some rehabilitation, but
mostly like retributive and, yeah,I think, I think we're on the other

(52:40):
end of the pendulum and I think thependulum swings, um, over years.
You know, when we hit the juvenilecourts became in existence in the
very early, uh, 19 hundreds, late1,819 hundreds, started in Chicago.
Um, three ladies were like, thisis inhumane that we treat kids the
same way that we're treating adults.

(53:01):
And yeah, you gotta separate them out.
And they started the movementand by, you know, the 1940s,
fifties, all states had kind of.
Started juvenile court systems and had,were developing systems where we were
separating youth and not putting themin adult systems, and not putting them
in adult jails and seeing a lot of goodprogress on development of the children.

(53:24):
Well, yeah.
I can't imagine.
Yes, yes.
But then we hit the early, late eighties,early 1990s when I believe it was tied
to the war on drugs epidemic that we had.
Mm-hmm.
And where we were splitting up familiesand locking up a lot of people.
And kids were growing up in differentcircumstances than they ever had in

(53:49):
the crime spite and juvenile violentcrime spite in the early nineties.
And that's when you had, um,people calling them super predators
and gotta lock these kids up.
And there were.
Federal government giving statesincentives to figure out ways to
send children to the adult system.

(54:12):
And then we realized,oh, that was a trend.
Yeah.
And it's gone down.
And so since then, crime hasconsistently decreased for youth.
Wow.
Across the nation.
Yeah.
And consistently all crime has decreased.
Um, and so you started seeing a lotof communities and, um, jurisdictions

(54:35):
saying, we should not be doing this.
And that's when you get the Miller, uh,cases and a lot of cases behind that,
that said, we should not be treatingthem, that we should not be lucky enough.
And so we started having somejuvenile court reform where we were
not, um, we were doing much betterand the sentencing laws were giving

(54:55):
juvenile judges more opportunity todo some diversions and other things.
And then we have a, um.
New outlook within new administrationwho operates, I think on a spirit
of fear, um, where we are trying to,um, make every different sections of

(55:19):
our communities, um, more harmful.
Um, and people are using the languageagain that we were using in the nineties.
And so we're starting that pendulumback, in my opinion the wrong way again.
Okay.
Where we're starting to open thegates of we should now start locking
up more kids in the adult system wheneven though there's proof that numbers

(55:43):
are still going down, there was when.
COVID happened.
Mm-hmm.
Numbers of kid crime wasalmost, you know, state.
I mean, count countrywidejust was really, really down
because wasn't nobody going out.
Right.
You know, we, we were all in our own.
Yeah.
And locked up then rehabilitationsat our home and, and so crime

(56:05):
went really, really far down.
And then it started when we startedto open up the floodgates and people
started going back out to falls andpeople start, cars started getting
stolen and guns started stolen.
The numbers started creeping up, butthe numbers are still significantly
lower than they were in 2019 before.
COVID.
Wow.
So they're up from COVID.
So they, they're up fromCOVID, but still down.

(56:27):
Still down kind of overall.
Overall that's in, I'm interested to see,I know there's other kind of specialty
courts, like drug court that has beenrolled out here in Nashville, and I know
there's one up in Michigan where I'm from,um, that's focused more on rehabilitation.
So I'm interested to see whathappens with those types of Yeah.
Organizations to your, I think systems.

(56:48):
I think there are a lots, and, and I'mproud of Davidson County that we have a
lot of different, um, specialty courts.
Yeah, we do.
And we are, um, we are sponsoring theum, American Judicial Association.
Conference next yearand here in Nashville.
And one of the things we're talkingabout is, you know, how do we continue

(57:09):
the, the judicial work that we doin such indecisive in um, times, um,
how do we keep doing the good work?
And one of the things we're focusingon is especially courts because people
can see how it benefits people Yeah.
And how it benefits the system.
Well, and I think just from afinancial perspective too, there's

(57:30):
a ton of data that shows this.
So economical for the state and for thetaxpayer that I think that's always a
really good point to bring up when itcomes to these small specialty courts.
And while they may look maybe expensiveon the front end, they pay off.
They absolutely pay off in the long run.
They so many long run.
Yeah.
And you know, the recidivism rateson these specialty courts, it's so

(57:52):
much, much lower than what you seewhen somebody's just sitting in jail.
Right, right.
Or sitting in prison and not gettingservices and not getting help.
Yeah.
And then they're releasedand what happens?
They're released with nothingand nothing to fall upon.
And they go back to, they goright back to what they know
and then they know survival.
Yeah.
And if it's survival means I gotta go robsomebody to get some money to go pay for

(58:14):
a hot dog, then that's what I gotta do.
Yeah.
And so when we give themthe tools that they need.
We work with them on an individual basisand every, and to recognize, and that's
the beauty of these specialty courts.
'cause they're small enough, the judge andthe team that are working with them know,
this youth needs this or this adult needsthis, this one needs something different.

(58:39):
And we can work with you to get youwhat you need and to help you get on
your feet and to help you learn thetools that when we're done working with
you, you can survive and be all right.
Right.
And that's what the specialtycourts really, really do for
the people that we serve.
Yeah.
That's why I love juvenile court.
'cause it Yeah, it's itsown big specialty court.
Yeah, it is.

(58:59):
Yeah.
Uh, I, I, there's a family friend ofours that runs a drug court up in.
Michigan, and it's the passionbehind it too, is you guys get to
interact with these people and youget to watch them grow and you get
to be on that journey with them.
So it's fun.
I see a lot of similaritiesbetween you two and the passion
that you have for your work.

(59:20):
Um, yeah, yeah, yeah.
I love it.
Uh, so I guess, well, Idid have a few questions.
We talked a lot.
My one question was, uh, what are somecareer options for someone wanting to get
involved with the juvenile court system?
We listed out, I think, about40 different jobs throughout.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
There's, uh, foster parenting, there'svolunteering with, uh, these organizations

(59:45):
that help kids get on their feet.
Uh, there's the Guardian ad litems,there's coin court appointed attorneys.
You also can just do familylaw or criminal law and people
will pay you out of pocket, notas a court appointed attorney.
Um, your staff, youhave interns Absolutely.
That are through.

(01:00:06):
For, uh, undergraduate graduate students,high school students, uh, law students.
Who else do you guys employ atyour, so I have a staff of about
130 people that I'm in charge of.
Wow.
Yes.
And so that's my staff.
And then I also have thepretrial housing facility, which
staffs about 80 people as well.

(01:00:26):
And so
and so, yes.
So you have jobs for Yes, we have jobs.
We have jobs.
Um, you know, and under my staff,um, I have nine magistrates.
And so we have enough cases whereI can't hear them all by myself.
And so your case will probablystart with one of the magistrates.

(01:00:48):
Okay.
And then if you are unhappy withthe magistrate's result, then you
can ask me to rehear their case.
Okay.
And so I'm like the appellatecourt for the magistrates.
Got it.
Okay.
And so I also hear.
I'm the only one that hears the caseswhere the state is asking that a child
be transferred to the adult system.
And I also hear the cases where, um,the state or a private party is asking

(01:01:13):
that a parent's rights be terminated.
And so the ultimate decision cases Ihear plus the appeals of the magistrates.
Got it.
And so we have those.
And under the, under themagistrates we have, um, I have a
team of, um, youth case managers.
We have about 40 youth case managers,and there's different areas of

(01:01:35):
the courts that they work in.
We have some that work withour foster care review board.
And so if you want to be a volunteeron a foster care review board, we
have a team that we can Oh wow.
Get you volunteers.
Okay.
Yes.
And so we have to.
By law, we have to review any caseof a child that's in department
children service custody.

(01:01:56):
Um, at least twice a year.
And because of the way our dockets are inthe, how many, we have about 800 kids in
Davidson County that are in DCS custody.
Okay.
And so our mag, my nine matches came here.
All of us.
Yeah.
All the reviews that arerequired to be heard.
Right.
And so by statute, we're allowed tohave a volunteer board who serves

(01:02:16):
as like a pseudo arm of the court.
Yeah.
They hear these reviews.
What, uh, what do they have to be?
Is it you have to be 21.
Okay.
Over and on each board, we haveto have someone who has some
type of educational background.
Okay.
We have to have someone who hassome type of medical background
and, um, there needs to be someone.

(01:02:40):
Young person, not a young person,but someone younger on the board.
Um, the statute lays out the requirements.
Oh, so these are all statute requirementsof, for what the board looks like.
Okay.
Like the village people of the board.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
Okay.
And there has to be, I think there hasto be at least five people per board.

(01:03:01):
We run in Davidson County 18 boards.
And so 18 times five, I don'tknow what the number is.
I don't that big of count.
That's why I went to law school.
Uhhuh, I can't do count.
But 18 times five is how manypeople we need per for to.
Fully have a full staff Wow.
Foster care review board.
So maybe if you don't think youhave the capacity to foster kids,

(01:03:24):
but you wanna work in this in somecapacity, that sounds like Absolutely.
And I, and if you want to do theFoster Care Review board and be on the
board, it's about four to five hours.
A ki four to five hour commitment a month.
Okay.
And so it's not like you haveto give a whole lot of time.
Yeah.
It's not five hours a week, it's,it's about four hours a month.

(01:03:45):
Have to in, and you do is you'rereading, you get the plans beforehand
of what the department has, expectationsfor the parents, expectations for the
child, expectations for the department.
And so you're going over these,these plans and saying, so how
is the child doing in school?
How's the child's medical report?
How's the child's, um.

(01:04:07):
Extracurriculars and you're goingthrough to make sure that you know the
child's getting everything they need.
Yeah.
That the parents are workingand DCS is providing everything
they're supposed to do.
Okay.
And so you serve as an arm of the court.
If they're not doing it, thenyou immediately say, our team,
you'll tell our team we wantthis case reviewed by the judge.
And so it comes up to when a meor the magistrate to say, we're

(01:04:29):
having some issues with DCSproviding this or this happening.
Okay.
And so we want the the, so they'reraising the flag for you all.
They're raising the flag for, for us.
Okay.
So we have Judge Callaway, we haveyour nine magistrates under them.
We have your boards.
We have, we have the fostercare review board team.
We have a regular, um, what we call oursupport intervention Accountability team.

(01:04:52):
Those of our what?
People would typically sayare probation officers.
Okay.
And so they work with the youthwho have done delinquency fences.
Got it.
And they, they also do the help withthe diversions and help with the
community partnerships and, um, helpwith actually supervised probation.
We have like a, one of our teams,there's three different teams

(01:05:13):
under the our SIA team and oneof them is our high risk team.
And so they work with US youthwho have high charges, or when
they did their assessment, theywere high risk for re-offending.
And so they get a little moreattention over attention, some of
our low risk team than the personwith the MIP and absolutely.
And so, so we have those, those,um, SIA team members that are under.

(01:05:38):
Then we also have, um,several specialty courts.
We have what we call our gangresistance intervention program grip.
Another acronym.
Another acronym.
Our grip court is for our high riskthat are gang related, and so we
have a specialized program for thoseyouth that might be in gangs, what

(01:06:00):
do you do differently in that courtthat they meet on a regular basis?
Like literally once or twice a month?
Okay.
Excuse me.
They have court hearings regularly.
Okay.
They as a cohort, they do, we workwith, um, the Oasis Center and they
have an art program at the OasisCenter and they also have the REAL
Program Reaching Excellence as Leaders.

(01:06:22):
Another acronym I told you,you gotta have acronym, you're
remembering a lot of, I'm impressed.
And so, and they have a, I think it'sabout a eight to eight week to 10
week program where they're literallygoing through different positive
activities as many that we can do.
They also have psychologicalevaluations so we can figure

(01:06:45):
out why this child is leaningtowards, um, destructive behaviors.
Are these kids that are alreadyin the system or are they.
They have like some of these lowerlevel offenses and you think, uh,
they're doing this 'cause they're in agang, let's put them in this program.
So most of these kids arekids who have committed Okay.

(01:07:05):
And been found guiltyof high level offenses.
Yeah.
Not high enough to send them tothe adult system, but fairly high.
Okay.
And that they need alittle more extra care.
Got it.
And so those are the, in that group team.
Um, we also have a youth recovery,um, like a drug court for youth.
Yep.
Okay.
And then we have a family recoveryfor families who have lost custody of

(01:07:28):
their kids because of drug and alcohol.
Wow.
We have a specialized court for them.
Yeah.
And so we have youth casemanagers and parent case managers
that deal with those cases.
We have, we, on our parentedside, we have our, um.
What we call our parental assistantcourt specialists, and those are where

(01:07:48):
we have our, um, trained mediators.
Okay.
And so they do, um, they do mediationfor parenting plans, and they also
do activities and referrals for ourparents, our noncustodial parents.
They're giving them services to help themto be more active in their child's life.
And to pay their child support and so andso, so if they, if there's a barrier for

(01:08:15):
them seeing their child or paying theirsupport because they have a record, we
work with the Public Defender's office on.
So we'll do a referral to thepublic Defender's office for them.
We'll sometimes walk with them to thepublic Defender's office and say, can, can
you work on getting their record expunged?
Like what can they get expunged?
What can we, you know, okay.

(01:08:36):
Take care of.
Or if they lost their license becausethey were behind on child support, we'll
take them and work with the, um, DHSand try to see what we can do to make
arrangements to get them a license ora special SR 22 license so they can
at least go back and forth to work.
Yeah.
If they don't have, can't pay your childsupport, you don't, you can't get to work.

(01:08:57):
Can't.
Uh, or and if they don't have jobskills, they don't have a job.
Work with programs like four 13strong or Goodwill and get them in
some of their training, job trainingprograms so they can get jobs.
So I got a staff that does that.
Who else you got?
I got my data specialists.
I got, we got it.
'cause we need it people.
Yeah.

(01:09:18):
Um, we have, um, the, the heart.
Need of the court, the ones that do thefinance and our, our HR and our payment
and making sure that everybody gets paid.
And I mean, it's good to go through allthis though 'cause even if you're not
in Nashville, you probably live nextto a court that is similarly staffed.

(01:09:38):
And you know, if you're interested inany of this stuff, there's probably
one near you place you can do it.
Yes.
Can we talk about your furry employees?
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
I have an employee for that too.
Absolutely.
I was gonna say before you getto that, oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
You go.
You know, when I went to law school,I went to be a lawyer and to.
Help people in the system.

(01:09:59):
I didn't, I didn't havedreams of being a lawyer.
I just, I mean, a judge, I just,it happened, but I never in my mind
thought I would run an organization.
Never in my mind, we don'thave managerial training.
Did not have managerial training.
Yeah.
I was fortunate if I went toVanderbilt for undergraduate, knowing
that I wanted to go to law school.
I didn't wanna major, major in politicalscience and that was the only kinda

(01:10:21):
legal major we had at Vanderbilt.
Mm-hmm.
At the time that I went to school inthe early late eighties, um, early
nineties, there wasn't, you know,like a public policy class or things
is political science and that was it.
And I was like, oh, that's boring.
And so I didn't wanna take politicalscience and so I majored in communication.
And so as part of communicationwas an interdisciplinary major,
and so you got to take classes indifferent areas of the, of the school.

(01:10:45):
And so, um, all the football players took,um, human organization and development.
Yeah.
I said, Ooh, I wanna goover there with them.
And so following somefootball players, right.
I took an that, that's howyou become a judge kid is
Absolutely.
And so I took a human organizationdevelopment class and, uh, enjoyed it,

(01:11:08):
did well, and look back now and I'm like.
It was like, only God thatmade me go take that class.
And now I'm using the skills I learned.
And that's the only place Igot managerial training from.
That's wild.
It's, so you have, youhave over 200 employees.
I do.
That's a lot.

(01:11:29):
And I run a budget of millionsand millions of dollars and I have
to go and present to the mayorand you know, the team about what
my mu, what my budget should be.
And I guess too, we didn't talk aboutif someone does wanna be a judge.
You're a judge.
You're elected.
Yes, I was elected, yes.
Okay.
Yes.
How, how does that process work?

(01:11:52):
Woo.
That was an interesting process.
So I actually, so I startedas a public defender.
Okay.
And I started after law school.
I was a public defender and I was apublic defender for the adult division.
Mm-hmm.
And loved it.
Learned.
Got a lot of trials, jury trials.
I bet.
Loved experience.
I bet.
Um, got a little frustratedwith the, the system.
This was literally earlynineties, um, mid late nineties.

(01:12:14):
And I didn't see, we didn't, wejust were starting when I left,
um, the adult system, they juststarted the first, um, drug court.
Drug court.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
And it was just getting startedand it was becoming something good.
And that was the only piece of hope thatI saw in the adult system at the time.

(01:12:35):
Yeah.
And I said, I can't do this anymore.
And so.
I had a case that kind of broke me.
And uh, it just, I, I got that case.
I was like, nah, I'm, I'mdone with this and this is it.
Yeah.
And, and then I worked for Judge Shriver,Tom Shriver at the time, and he died.
And I was just like, I gottado something different.
And so Carl Dean, who laterbecame the mayor, he was the
public defender at the time.

(01:12:56):
Oh, wow.
And he, so he's my boss, and I askedhim if I could go try juvenile court,
and he's like, you wanna go down there?
And I was like, I wanna try it.
I just, I knew something different.
Yeah.
And that was in 1998.
Wow.
When I first stepped into juvenile court.
That's, and I hadn't beenthere ever since and loved it.
Uh, loved just the attitude.
And they've, uh, you know, everything wasabout what can we do to help the kids?

(01:13:19):
Yeah.
A very productive, hopeful, it wasnot always fighting as an adversarial,
like it was in the adult system.
Mm. It was really about.
Especially.
Yeah.
And it happened.
And so I loved it.
I did a, I was a public defender from 98until 2004 in the, um, juvenile system.
Wow.
And then I was appointed by Judge BettyAdams Green to be one of the magistrates.

(01:13:42):
Okay.
And so I was a magistrate from20 2004 and then to 20 20 13.
In 2012, judge Green, um,retired before her term was up.
And so the Metro Council selectedher replacement and there were
three of us that went for it.
I was not the one that got it, so I didnot get the appointment from the council.

(01:14:05):
Um, but so when the next election camewith 2014, I decided that I was gonna run.
Oh, wow.
And so theoretically I ranagainst the incumbent at the time.
Yeah.
And I, um, I. I, I was let go frommy position and I can understand
Uhhuh, I'm running against you.
Yeah.

(01:14:26):
I imagine you don'twant me to work for you.
And so, so I was letgo from that position.
And so there was a nine month periodwhere I I, from November of 2013 until
I won the election and was, um, yeah.
Um, seated September of 2014.
How do you, so like judgesimpartial, how do you campaign?

(01:14:47):
It's super hard when you can't reallyhave a platform aside from like, I'm going
to be honest and ethical and I'm goingto deliver justice for the community.
Like, what else is there to s how do youdifferentiate yourself from someone else?
Yeah.
So for me it was easier to, to makea difference in juvenile court.
Mm-hmm.
Because.
And both of us, you know, had workedin juvenile court, but I can actually

(01:15:11):
talk about specific plans of thingsI wanna do for juvenile court.
And one of the things that I hadcampaigned on was restorative justice
and having an actual restorativejustice program and doing diversions
and getting people children into,um, better placements and everything.
And so it's, it's so mucheasier, in my opinion.

(01:15:32):
It was easier too.
Campaign about policies and beliefson how children should be treated
in a system than it is about adult.
I don't know how you runfor general sessions, judge.
I don't know.
Yeah.
You say, I'm gonna hear thecases every day, you know?
Yeah.
I'm gonna, I'll be here.
I'm gonna, I'm gonna take care ofthose traffic violations, you know?

(01:15:52):
Yeah.
Yeah.
I, yeah.
I don't know how you do that, and Idon't, you know, that was not my vision.
Yeah.
I, I do see like a couple of judgesthat, um, campaigned in journal sessions,
did kind of have their own littleplatform or kind of cases and things
that they wanted to do, like Yeah.
Some initiatives.
Yeah.
Okay.
And so, and so you can dothat, but it, it is difficult.

(01:16:14):
Yeah.
Uh, I had a family member who did probate.
Mm-hmm.
Well, I'm gonna take care ofyour dead people saying that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's, she was great at it though, butI, I, it's a weird barrier to have to.
Cross to say, okay, well nowhow do I get these people to
think I'm right for this job?

(01:16:35):
Right?
And when it's the general publictoo, I think when you're talking to
another attorney, you, you could usethings that, oh yeah, I've seen that.
And Oh, that makes sense.
And absolutely.
Yeah, it was, it wasn't easy.
Campaigning is a, is a different animal.
Uh, I will tell you too, I think.
Because of all the work I had donepreviously in the community with

(01:16:55):
some of the nonprofit organizations.
I, I used to tease and say, evenwhen I was a magistrate, that I was
at the Oasis Center all the time.
Like, I would literally go anddo programs with them and talk to
them and do graduation speeches.
And so these people that were childfriendly agencies that we worked with,
with, who would care about voting inthe first place, knew who I knew youth.
Oh yeah, that makes sense.

(01:17:15):
And they supported me Yeah.
In the run.
And they knew my philosophy andknew that I worked with them
and I wanted to support them.
Yeah.
So that, that helped.
Yeah.
So let's talk about our pet therapy.
Oh yeah.
So when, one of the times I sawyou speak was for an animal.
CLE.
Why?
As a juvenile court judgeat an animal law program.

(01:17:38):
It's because you guys have pet therapy.
Pet therapy.
Yeah.
So cute.
Uh, what do you guys use them for?
I imagine a few different things.
Yeah.
So we use 'em for everythingthat we talked about.
Mm-hmm.
And so we use 'em for very highlycontested, um, custody cases.
We use them for neglect.
When children.

(01:17:58):
And these are for the kids to use theanimal or is it also for the parents?
It's for the parents.
Wow.
And they might need it.
Anybody that wants anybodymight need support.
Or they have to testify.
Yeah.
Or they have to hear them.
They, we constantly have 'em forour foster care review board.
Uh, almost always there are pets in,in our foster care review board for
the foster care review board hearing.

(01:18:20):
So it's for those who wanna volunteer.
Not only do you get to volunteer andhelp our youth make sure, I'm sure you
have free coffee and, and free coffee.
A to pet a dog.
Yeah.
Well, I imagine it's a lot of hardthings to hear throughout the day.
There's a whole lot of, especiallyif you're a kid who has to testify
against potentially their parents.
Absolutely.
You can rely on a petwhen you're on a stand.

(01:18:41):
Absolutely.
And that's a scary place.
If you think about the fostercare review board proceedings.
You have the parents there,you have the child there, you
have the foster family there.
Yeah.
And then you have your DCSworker and all these attorneys.
And as a child.
And as a parent who's lost custody oftheir child, you got a room full of
people who you think are judging you.

(01:19:03):
Judging you Yeah.
And who think that you are not good.
Yeah.
And think that they're, you know,determining you're not gonna
get to see this child anymore.
Yeah.
How do you feel?
And so we love our, haveour pets there with them.
Who manages the program?
So I have my, I have a staff person.
I have a staff.

(01:19:23):
I have a staff, yeah.
And then, and Dana Wolf is her name.
And she, um, came to me fromthe district attorney's office.
We actually started, I was a publicdefenders and when she was working in
the DA's, and we were the same age Cool.
And graduated, you know,from school at the same time.
And she was in theirvictim witness program.
Wow.
And so when I became judge and waskind of looking at what holes are

(01:19:46):
we missing, what do I need to fill?
And we had some, you know,vacant positions and.
At some point, you don't needto just keep bringing in youth
case managers if you don't haveenough kids that they're managing.
Right.
But one of the holes that we didnot have was someone who could
work with the victims of cases,the district attorney's office for

(01:20:07):
juvenile court cases, staffs victimwitnesses for the very serious cases.
For the cases, they're gonna gettransferred to the adult system.
They'll have a victim witness person.
Okay, that makes sense.
But for the rest of the cases, yeah,there's not, they, they don't have enough
staff to, you know, staff the rest of 'em.
And so she serves as ourvictim witness person.
And so if you get like your carstolen, it's by a youth and you, you're

(01:20:32):
frustrated and you wanna know, well,how am I getting, get my car back?
Who's gonna pay for to fix it?
And who, you know, howwhat's gonna happen?
You can call Dana Wolf and shecan help you through the process.
Okay.
And so as we developed her to do that, um.
But another one of my staff who wasactually a, a youth case manager, her
mother had a therapy dog, and she cameto me and said, um, my mom has a therapy

(01:20:55):
dog and I think it would be very, veryhelpful for us to have him in court.
And I was like, Hmm, that's interesting.
Let's do it.
And Boone was this beautiful dog.
Boone was probably about, I, I know yourlisteners can't see, but it was very big.
Uh, I think it was a bow variant.
I can't, I can't remember the name.

(01:21:16):
Yeah.
What he was.
But he's huge.
Super, super hairy.
You couldn't see his eyes.
'cause he is had so muchhair and soft and cuddly.
And as soon as I met him I said,oh yeah, we're doing this hired.
Yeah.
We're gonna get this.
And so we're, we're all in a meeting.
Um, Dana's there, my courtadministrator's there and we're all
like playing and, and loving on Boone.

(01:21:39):
And someone says, well, how arewe gonna get this program started?
You know, who's gonna, because Ican't, you know, as a judge, I can't,
I have you you also walk the dog.
Yeah.
Had lunch.
Yeah.
I was gonna do all the scheduling.
And so I kind of look at Danaand I'm like, huh, that would be
a great program for our victimwith this person to take over.
And she was excited about doing it.

(01:22:02):
Excited about being voluntold.
Yeah.
And she has.
Develop it to a length thatI never thought it would.
And so that's great.
She, we literally have ev everyday she's saying, let me know,
or letting the staff know whichdogs are coming in the next day.
That's great.
And she's even reached out and we soonmight have a one of those tiny horses.

(01:22:24):
Oh, a Shetland pony.
Yeah.
I'm so excited about, about that.
Feel like in Nashville you haveto have a horse in your course.
We have to have a horse in our course.
They have to have a bachelorette partypink cowboy hat be in downtown Nashville.
It's gotta be Ns all about Nashville.
So yes.
So she's development.

(01:22:45):
That's great.
Um, to a wonderful level where,and, and they're all volunteers.
Wow.
They all volunteer to come downand spend time with our youth.
They, we have one that comes, Ithink once a month on a Friday
and goes up to our youth who arein our pretrial housing facility.
Wow.
Because they need therapy too.
Yeah.
And they need something to comfort them.

(01:23:05):
Yeah.
And they need, um, love in waysthat even though they probably
committed some really seriouscrimes, they need some love as well.
And so the, the pets go up to theirfloors and give them some love as well.
Wow.
Yeah.
And so we use it forevery part of the court.
Uh, I'm just blown away by, you alreadylisted like 200 people that work and

(01:23:27):
then 10 additional dogs and now a pony.
Yes.
So it's, yes.
Uh, that's a lot of moving parts,but I love that the focus delo kind
of comes back to wellbeing and, um,I don't know, rehabilitation and.
Curbing future behaviors and Absolutely.

(01:23:49):
The futures of these kids.
Absolutely.
And hopefully gettingthem into safe spaces.
Yes.
That's our goal.
Uh, anything else you wantlisteners to know about what you do?
The juvenile court system,these kids that I don't, I don't
think I have anything else.
I, I'll say, uh, we are in theprocess now of, uh, moving and Wow.

(01:24:13):
Building a new facility.
You guys buy the Titans Stadiumby the site Stadium, so it
might be demoed in a bit.
Yes.
Okay.
Got it.
If we could, if, if the Titansteam could demo us tomorrow, that
would make them very, very happy.
Uh, I used to have to park behindyour building for my commuter lot,

(01:24:33):
so I know it well, I walked past it.
Yes, yes, yes.
So, okay.
So, um, our building, for all of the workthat we are doing, that's, we are trying
to be a trauma-informed court from frontdoor to the back door, from top to bottom,
um, understanding that people come tous, people aren't invited to come to us.
Yeah.

(01:24:54):
They're not letting us.
They might not wanna come to you.
Yeah.
Yes.
And so they come with us and theycome with us with a lot of trauma
and so we need to uplift them and getthem to a place where we can help.
Ease some of that trauma andmake it a better experience
when they come in the door.

(01:25:16):
And you can't really do that inthe facility that we're in now.
It's too small.
Mm-hmm.
Um, it's too dark and dreary.
Um, it has so much needs, um, ofrehabilitation of for the building Yeah.
To be rehabilitated.
And, and so, um, several years agowe made a pitch to the Metro Council

(01:25:38):
and the mayor that said, please.
We need help.
Yeah.
We need a better place.
We need something that we canwork collaboratively, functional
and more functional and reallyhelp the people that we serve.
That's, and so where are you guys going?
We're going on Brick Church Pike.
Oh, right off of Trinity Lane.
Yeah.
If you remember where theAlamina Shrine Center was.
Yes.
And the story behind that is beautiful.

(01:25:59):
Is what?
Yeah.
So they sold Metro, that property andit's 14 acres and we're building a campus.
Wow.
It's called the NashvilleYouth Campus for Empowerment.
That's great.
And everything that we do is gonnabe trauma-informed and beautiful.
Um, the youth will no longer be injail cells, but they'll be in secure

(01:26:20):
cottages where they have plenty ofgreen space so they can, um, work out
some of their angst and anxieties andbad things that are going on with them.
Uh, it's going to havebeautiful courtrooms with a
lot of light and natural light.
Lots of light colors tohave a cafe kid friendly.

(01:26:43):
Yeah.
Hi friendly.
Yeah.
You know, if you have a case in mycourtroom today that takes all day and
the trials do take all day, we don't haveanywhere for you to go eat or to snack.
Yeah.
So now we'll have a cafe that we'rehoping that's gonna be run by one of
our, um, partners, um, pathways Kitchen.
And so they work with at-risk youthand they teach them how to run a, a

(01:27:05):
business and how to run a, a cafe.
And so they catering, um, theydo a lot of different things and
so we want them to run our cafe.
That would be cool.
It's, it's gonna be abeautiful facility and I'm.
So looking forward to it.
That's so exciting.
Yeah.
Right Now you guys are pretty muchin the parking lot of Nissan Stadium.
Yes.
We're, yes, we're, and it's reallynice for like, it's very concrete.

(01:27:27):
Yes.
Yeah.
If I need, you know, if I gottickets to concert or to the game.
Oh.
The parking validation I canonly imagine is, uh, but beyond
that reason, enough to volunteer.
Yeah.
Uh, that's gonna be great though.
Congratulations on.
Thank you.
Getting that.
Thank you.
Yeah.
Uh, that's all I got.
Well man, I learned so much asalways listening to you and yeah.

(01:27:51):
If anybody ask questions, emailus [e-mail].
Thank you so much for being here.
Thank you for having me.
A big thank you to JudgeSheila Callaway for joining us.
Another thank you to Jillian Rufor engineering this episode,
and a big thanks to Sonia TV forletting us use their studio space.
If you have any questions orcomments about this episode,

(01:28:13):
email us [e-mail].
Thank you so much for listening.
Bye.