The mother of a 15-year-old girl who fell asleep in a Detroit courtroom and was brought into court wearing a prison uniform and handcuffs has sued the judge who took her into custody. Her lawyers said Wednesday that the judge’s actions were inappropriate.
The girl fell asleep in Judge Kenneth King’s courtroom at Detroit’s 36th District Court during an Aug. 13 field trip and he yelled at her, said James Harrington, an attorney with Fieger Law Firm. When she fell asleep a second time, King humiliated her in front of her classmates and on YouTube, where the trial was streamed live for everyone to watch, Harrington said.
“This is a very disturbing case. A member of our panel verbally abused, humiliated and essentially locked up a 15-year-old child,” Harrington said Wednesday at a news conference announcing the lawsuit. “This was very, very real, very frightening for her and someone in a position of trust, someone in a position of authority and power is threatening her with jail time, threatening her by literally putting her in handcuffs.”
The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in federal court in Detroit, names King, courtroom security guards and two court officials, accusing King of malicious prosecution, false arrest and impeachment, malicious infliction of emotional distress, false arrest and invasion of privacy.
Harrington said they were not seeking a specific amount of damages.
Todd Perkins, King’s attorney, declined to comment specifically on the case but said King has always been committed to protecting children. He said King, with whom he studied law, shows “remorse and regret” when a young person is harmed.
“He wants only the best for this young person and all young people. She matters. They matter. They are our future,” Perkins said in a statement.
The girl visited the courtroom as part of a field trip with the nonprofit organization The Greening of Detroit. The court was not in session, but King gave a guest lecture as part of a job training organized by the nonprofit, the lawsuit says.
“If you fall asleep in my courtroom one more time, I’m putting you in the back, understand?” King told her, according to a video from the court’s YouTube page that was broadcast by WXYZ-TV (Channel 7). At another point, he told her, “One thing you’ll learn about my courtroom is that I’m not a toy. I’m not a toy to play with.”
He verbally abused her, ordered her detained, handcuffed her and demanded that she remove her clothes and instead wear the uniforms worn by Wayne County inmates, the lawsuit says. He conducted a “mock trial” in which her classmates and possibly his internet followers served as jurors and his audience, the lawsuit says.
“Then the defendant JUDGE KING mocked the justice guaranteed by the Due Process Clauses of the U.S. Constitution and panned the camera to focus on his juvenile audience for the benefit of his Internet fans. He invited the youth’s peers to act as a mock jury of public opinion, deciding whether she should go home to her mother and grandmother or serve her sentence in the juvenile prison that he had denigrated as unsuitable just moments before.”
King’s record has been temporarily suspended and he must complete training to “address the underlying issues that led to this incident,” Chief Judge William McConico said in a statement last week. McConico said he could not remove King from office, but the state court’s administrative office approved the temporary suspension of King’s record and imposed the training requirement.
The court’s chief judge said last week that King’s actions were inconsistent with the 36th Circuit’s commitment to providing people with access to justice without intimidation or disrespect.
“We regularly and actively welcome students to observe and participate in the court process with the goal of providing valuable learning experiences and promoting familiarity with the justice system. We sincerely hope that this incident does not undermine our long-standing relationships with local schools,” McConico said.
Mother of a teenager speaks out
The teenager’s mother, Latoreya Till, said at a news conference in Southfield that the consequences of King’s actions were devastating. She was shocked to hear what King said to her daughter and couldn’t believe it.
“The behavior of a grown man in a courtroom was unexpected,” Till said. “I was speechless. I didn’t know how to deal with it. I was angry. I was sad. I wanted to cry for my own child and at the same time I wanted something to be done.”
Her daughter does not want to leave the house and has nothing to do with anyone other than the family, Till said.
“She’s asking me why the judge did this to me,” Till said. “She’s ashamed and humiliated. And I don’t blame her. … I just want Judge King to take responsibility for the way he humiliated my daughter.”
Till said she and her two daughters have no permanent home and commute between her mother’s house and her aunt’s, which is why her daughter appeared sleepy in court. The murder hearing, which was attended by students, forced the teenager to “relive a traumatic event, causing her to shut herself off,” the lawsuit says.
“Apparently, for the amusement of his followers and fan base, he hatched a plan to inadvertently cast (the teenager) in an episode of ‘Scared Straight,’ which he later claimed as his own.”
Lawyer: “No immunity” for judges
Harrington said King had “no immunity” for his actions in the courtroom.
“Immunity applies when a judge is acting as a judge in a court proceeding,” Harrington said. “This was an extracurricular matter, this occurred outside of the work of a judge. There was no hearing. (The juvenile) was not a party to the proceedings, she was not a party, she was not a witness, she was not an attorney, she was not a court officer. She was there on a field trip. This occurred outside the scope of regular court proceedings.”
“This was completely outside the scope of what a judge should be allowed to do as a matter of decency, but also outside any kind of procedure.
Nothing the girl said, even if it was disrespectful, would have justified King handcuffing her, dressing her in a prison uniform and threatening to throw her in juvenile hall, Harrington said.
“There’s nothing she could have said that would have justified what he did at that moment,” he said. “I don’t care what she said. I don’t care if she was tired and fell asleep. I don’t care.”
Harrington said he did not know how King’s actions had anything to do with the group of people who regularly watch his court hearings. King has been criticized by lawyers in the past for making comments on the YouTube stream during hearings.
“When something like this happens, we have to hold people accountable. We can’t just say, ‘Well, because that’s a judge, I’m not going to take the case,'” Harrington said.
