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A young lawyer named Wes Clark begins defending children at the Rutherford County juvenile court. He quickly sees a troubling pattern: Kids are jailed for minor offenses, even when the law says they shouldn’t be. But he can’t always persuade the juvenile judge to let them out.
Wes is frustrated and demoralized, even more so because no one else at the court seems to think there’s a problem.
That is, until Wes meets another lawyer who sees things the way he does. When one of Wes’s clients is held in solitary confinement, both lawyers think they have a case that will make the court comply with the law.
‘The Kids of Rutherford County’
For over a decade, one Tennessee county arrested and illegally jailed hundreds, maybe thousands, of children. A four-part narrative series reveals how this came to be, the adults responsible for it, and the two lawyers, former juvenile delinquents themselves, who try to do something about it.
Your Host
Meribah Knight is a senior reporter and producer at Nashville Public Radio. She is the host, reporter and producer of the Peabody Award-winning podcast “The Promise,” an immersive series about inequality and the people trying to rise above it. Her work has appeared in publications including The New York Times and The New Yorker. Her reporting on juvenile justice for ProPublica was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, the Goldsmith Award and a National Magazine Award.
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About the Music
The Blasting Company is the project of J.R. Kaufman and Justin Rubenstein, brothers best known for their work on the Emmy-winning animated series “Over the Garden Wall.” Starting as a two-man street band in Nashville, the brothers busked their way to Los Angeles, where an accommodating farmer’s market and kindly word of mouth led to unexpected adventures in film, television and, as of this year, podcasts and video games.
Credits
“The Kids of Rutherford County” is a production of Serial and The New York Times in partnership with ProPublica and Nashville Public Radio.
Reported and hosted by Meribah Knight
Additional reporting by Ken Armstrong at ProPublica
Produced by Daniel Guillemette
Additional production by Michelle Navarro
Edited by Julie Snyder and Jen Guerra
Additional editing by Anita Badejo, Sarah Blustain, Tony Gonzalez, Ken Armstrong and Alex Kotlowitz
Supervising Producer, Serial Productions Ndeye Thioubou
Research and fact-checking by Ben Phelan
Additional fact-checking by Naomi Sharp
Music supervision, sound design and mixing by Phoebe Wang
Standards review by Susan Wessling
Legal review by Dana Green and Al-Amyn Sumar
Original score by The Blasting Company
Additional production by Jenelle Pifer
Executive Assistant, Serial Productions Mack Miller
Art by Pablo Delcan
Deputy Managing Editor, The New York Times Sam Dolnick
Special thanks to Elizabeth Davis-Moorer, Nina Lassam, Susan Beachy, Kitty Bennett, Alain Delaquérière, Sheelagh McNeil, Kirsten Noyes, Jeffrey Miranda, Mahima Chablani, Renan Borelli, Kelly Doe, Anisha Muni, Kimmy Tsai, Jordan Cohen, Victoria Kim and Ashka Gami.
And to Katie Mingle, Mike Comite, Aaron Reiss, Bianca Giaever, Stephen Engelberg, Charles Ornstein, Susan Carroll, Emily Siner, Alex Mierjeski, Hannah Fresques, Julie Whitaker, Katie Fuchs, Peter DiCampo, Alissandra Calderon, Kassie Navarro, Kenda Lovecchio, Rachel Iacovone, Dan Petty, Chris Morran, Alexis Stephens, Kengo Tsutsumi, Mack Linebaugh, Suzanne Bond and Nicole Kemp.