Standing on her Shoulders: Celebrating Meta L. Christy, DO, and African American Alumnae Trailblazers
Assistant District Attorney; Supervisor, Juvenile Unit, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
鈥淚n Southwest Philadelphia, where I was born, we didn鈥檛 have a lot of structured activities.
So we took a broomstick and played stickball. We would break windows, because we were
playing in the middle of a residential street. That鈥檚 criminal mischief, by the way.
That鈥檚 in my crimes code book. We put a milk crate on a telephone pole to make a basketball
hoop. So the ball is out in the middle of the street, bouncing on the hoods of cars.
Now we鈥檙e congregating near the corner; that鈥檚 failure to disperse. These crimes are
all rooted in the conditions that exist naturally in disadvantaged communities. 鈥�
When I was nine, my parents scraped together everything they had to move us 15 to
20 minutes away, to Mount Airy, and that entirely changed the trajectory of my life.
That trajectory has also caused me to be a reformer, a change agent. 鈥� Mount Airy
was more like a campus, sprawling with trees and grass and playgrounds. The expectations
for kids were completely different. The conversations were around where we should
be developmentally. And in the old neighborhood, the conversations were centered around
survival. 鈥� There鈥檚 very little difference, if any, between the kids in these different
neighborhoods鈥攊t鈥檚 just opportunity. It鈥檚 structure, resources, having a community
that鈥檚 able to absorb adolescent behavior. The outcomes of your behaviors are going
to be reflective of what鈥檚 available to you in your environment. 鈥� I鈥檓 trying to reform
our juvenile justice system so that only the kids who really need to come into our
system end up here. Most of them can be diverted away from the justice system, diverted
to age-appropriate and child-appropriate structured activities so that they can continue
to develop the competencies they need to become productive and caring young adults.
鈥� I鈥檝e been doing a lot of work on the history of the juvenile justice system in this
nation. When it started in 1899 in Chicago, its purpose was to focus on the needs
of children, not their deeds. Given everything we know about adolescent brain development,
we understand that these are not adults, they are kids. When you鈥檙e 40, you wouldn鈥檛
recognize who you were at 16 or 17. 鈥� I can bring my whole self to this work. I鈥檓
striving to become the prosecutor that kids deserve. That鈥檚 the tagline on my email.
And it鈥檚 designed to raise the question: Do kids deserve prosecutors?鈥�
as told to Janice Fisher
Read more stories from African American female physicians, leaders and health professionals.
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