Teen ‘Traumatized’ After Courtroom Field Trip Ends with Her In Cuffs, Jail Clothes

The incident went down on Tuesday, when the nonprofit The Greening of Detroit brought a group of teens to the 36th District Court for a field trip. According to local ABC affiliate WXYZ, Judge Kenneth King was speaking with the group before either the defense or prosecution had entered the court when he noticed the teen falling asleep.

“You fall asleep in my courtroom one more time, I’m gonna put you in back, understood?” he can be heard saying to her in video from the court room. Per local reports, King then had the girl removed from the court room. When that also didn’t fix her alleged “attitude,” he broke out the jail uniform and handcuffs.

“It wasn’t so much, in fact, that she had fallen asleep because I have attorneys that fall asleep sometimes, so that’s not too big of a deal,” King said of his actions. “It was her whole attitude and her whole disposition that disturbed me.”

“I wanted to get through to her, show how serious this is and how you are to conduct yourself inside of a courtroom,” he continued, saying he hasn’t “been disrespected like that in a very long time.”

He then threatened to put her in juvenile detention, but admitted to WXYZ that he “probably” wouldn’t have actually done that.

“Could I have? Probably so. But that’s not what I want to do to a kid who’s there on a field trip,” he said. “Do I think I was heavy handed in what I did? No, I don’t. Because I’ll do whatever it needs to be done to reach these kids and make sure that they don’t end up in front of me.”

King — who said he also spoke with the teen’s parents — also called the stunt his “own version of Scared Straight.”

In a followup interview with the same network, the teen’s mother said they’ve since pulled her from the Greening of Detroit program and turned down the judge’s offer to mentor her.

“Would you want someone to treat your child like that? Would you even treat your child like that if he fell asleep in the court room?” said the girl’s mother, in tears, before explaining the family doesn’t have a permanent residence currently.

“The fact he was talking about you go home and get in your bed. How do you know my baby got a home? How do you know my baby got a bed, her own bed she can sleep in? She don’t have that right now. So, she was tired,” said her mother.

“You didn’t scare nobody straight. You made a parent upset. You scared my child,” she added, saying her daughter gets good grades and never gives her any problems.

The Greening of Detroit also released a statement condemning King’s behavior.

“A group of minors visited the courtroom of Judge Kenneth King at 36th District Court in Detroit on a field trip today. It is unfortunate that he chose to make an example of a 15-year-old girl in front of her peers. He made her wear handcuffs and a jail uniform and yelled at her for falling asleep in his courtroom,” they said.

“Although the Judge was trying to teach a lesson of respect, his methods were unacceptable. The group of students should have been simply asked to leave the courtroom if he thought they were disrespectful,” the statement added. “We have spoken to the student and her parents and the young lady was traumatized by the Judge’s unnecessary disciplinary treatment and scolding.”