Black people, judges will affect your life and your family’s life before any president ever will. I’ve been a lawyer for 31 years. Judges decide whether you go home or go to prison. Who gets your kids. Whether CPS takes your kids. Whether you get evicted. Whether somebody can foreclose on your property. Who gets what when somebody dies. Whether a hospital or corporation has to pay when they hurt you. Even whether you can run for office.
From little bitty cases to big cases, from little dollars to billions. Criminal, civil, family, juvenile, probate and JP—every kind of court. You better hope you get a judge who’s going to give you a fair shake. Look at Nolan Wells. If three Black boys went out on a boat on the 4th of July with a white boy and that white boy came back dead, those Black boys would be under the jail. They’d be presumed guilty, and convicted.
Look at Latarsha Sanders and Lindsay Clancy. Two mothers accused of killing their children. One Black. One white. Same judge. The Black woman had a documented history of mental illness. The with woman did not. The white judge allowed mental health evidence in for the white woman and kept it out for the Black woman. Sanders got life. Clancy almost got found not culpable. Thank God for the one Black man on that jury. Same judge. Different treatment.
Look at Karmelo Anthony. The white judge wouldn’t allow him to claim self- defense. The jury also didn’t hear Austin Metcalf ’s history—that he’d been locked up as a juvenile, had a history of violence since elementary school, called Black people the N-word, praised Nazis and the KKK, and said he wanted to kill Black people. This is why judges matter!
And we don’t even have to look across the country. Right here in Harris County, Black women filed to run for judge as Democrats and were challenged by white Democrats. They weren’t even attacked by Republicans. Black Democratic women were challenged by white Democrats and the Harris County Democratic Party and ultimately did not get to run in the primary. Angela Reese McKinnon, Velda Renita Faulkner and Kimberly McTory were the three women who didn’t even get the chance to just let the people decide.
That’s why diversity matters!
On September 22, I’m hosting The Importance of a Diverse Judiciary at the Third Ward Multi-Service Center. Judges presiding over the eight different kinds of courts will explain to you what they do and why the courts they preside over matter. And why you should vote for them this November. Black people, if we don’t vote for nobody else, we better, at least vote locally, all the way down the ballot, for our judges. Judges will preside over our lives not the president.
This system almost never works for us unless we have a judge with similar lived experiences and cultural competency who gives us a fair chance. We’re not asking for special treatment. We just want equal treatment. And before anyone says this article is too Black, the facts are that there are more white judges than Black judges, Latino judges or judges of other races. So, I don’t want to hear nothing. I’m advocating for diversity and inclusion of people with lived experiences like ours. Advocating for diversity is not anti- anybody else. Plus, this is African American News & Issues.
