Jailed as teen, now a mentor

Eric Alexander followed the encouragement of older inmates to make good use of his time behind bars.

He graduated from high school while incarcerated. He taught himself how to paint, got a barber's license and plowed through the library's developmental psychology textbooks. And, he spent much of his ten years in prison trying to make sense of all the decisions that led him to the day he served as the 17-year-old lookout in an armed robbery that ended in a Memphis shop owner's murder.

Twenty-two years later, Alexander is trying to help Nashville teenagers avoid making similar mistakes. He launched a program to mentor youth through the YMCA. He is also advocating for legislation to give teenagers sentenced to life behind bars a second chance to live a productive life after they have served 15 or 20 years of their sentence.

"One of the biggest conclusions I've drawn doing this work is that kids have a better chance at success when they see someone genuinely care about them," Alexander said. "Once they see you care, the sky's the limit. I've seen kids try to outdo each other to show me who is doing better."

Alexander operates a YMCA program for kids referred by teachers, guidance counselors and principals in an after school program that serves about 25 middle schoolers each year.

In 1994, he was with two of his childhood friends in Memphis, when one decided he was going to rob a store, Alexander said. Alexander served as a lookout. Inside the store, his friend shot and killed store owner Charles Cantrell. Alexander pled guilty to facilitating first degree murder and aggravated robbery.

Alexander said he learned later that the friend who pulled the trigger was acting out a scene in Menace II Society, a 1993 movie about the violence that dominates the lives of its teenage characters in Los Angeles. His friend had even twisted his hair in the style of O-dog, the main character.

"A lot of the young men I encountered while incarcerated had these wild fantasies," he said. "It shows their immaturity and lack of adult reasoning. They're sometimes thinking out of a cartoon-like state. They don't have a true sense of a life or death process."

They often don't have strong support at home either, he said.

When a fifth grader named Adam showed up at Alexander's program six years ago, he was being raised by a grandmother who was battling addiction. Adam's mother was in prison. He was falling behind academically, but he was polite and motivated, Alexander said. On days when there was no transportation arranged to the YMCA from Jere Baxter Middle Prep, Adam would walk the two miles. Then, his grandmother simply left. He had no place to go.

"When I got a call from him, saying 'I'm stuck. I have my bags. My grandmother left me,' it wasn't a big decision to take him in," Alexander said. He and his wife, who have a 19-month old daughter, agreed to care for Adam until his mother was released from prison. But when her release date came, she did not want Adam.

Alexander and his wife have since adopted Adam. "I was basically parenting him already," Alexander said. "And in all honesty he was a student I just always liked. He was very polite considering his circumstances. He just exuded all the characteristics of a great kids just born in a bad situation."

This is how you stop a cycle of violence and incarceration — one youth at a time, Alexander said. But the solutions must also be systemic, he said.

Some lawmakers and advocates are behind a proposed law that would give teens sentenced to life in prison a chance for parole after they have served 15 years in a non-fatal crime, or 20 years for a fatal one.

The bill was born out of a recognition that teens have not reached their full maturity, he said. While they must pay for their crimes like Alexander did, they should be assessed again once they are adults, he said.

Such measures are opposed by some victims advocacy groups, including those with the National Organization of Victims of Juvenile Murderers, as "lavishing all their resources on convicted murderers."

Reach Anita Wadhwani at awadhwani@tennessean.com, 615-259-8092 or on Twitter @AnitaWadhwani.

This is part of an occasional series chronicling the public policy debate over sentencing teenagers to life sentences in Tennessee. "Sentencing Children" is a collaboration between The Tennessean, Daniel H. Birman Productions and "Independent Lens," a PBS series presented by ITVS. To view the full-length documentary film, "Me Facing Life: Cyntoia's Story," go to pbs.org/independentlens/videos/me-facing-life-cyntoias-story.