This petition is about a young girl named Maurnice DeClue, a 15-year-old honor roll student at Hazelwood East High School in St. Louis County, MO. She is multilingual, speaking four languages including Spanish and Korean, plays the violin in the school orchestra, played on her school’s volleyball team and was recently selected for college-level AP classes due to her academic excellence. Prior to an incident on March 8th where she was seen in an altercation, she had never been in trouble. Her hard work as a scholar was tainted by the bullying she had to endure at school. 

However, this single event is being used to define her character and incite racial divisions and political strife with the MO AG calling on the courts to charge her as an adult. It is unjust that such an accomplished young woman should be charged as an adult for assault without considering all the facts of the case that led to the incident where harm occurred. We urge Chief Juvenile Officer Rick Gaines of the 21st Circuit Court not to charge Maurnice as an adult.

We request that all aspects of her life be considered during indictment and sentencing - her academic achievements, extracurricular involvement, linguistic skills and most importantly her alleged victimhood as a bullied student who was under intense and flight vs fight circumstances.

We ask that the Juvenile Court use a combination of Restorative Justice and Rehabilitation methods instead of only using punitive measures to address the harm that occurred. But because politicians are inserting themselves in a juvenile matter it has completely swayed public opinion and has incited more divisiveness not only in the local community but nationally. Since the March 8th incident, the DeClue family has received multiple racist death threats and have had people trying to dox them and release protected and personal information about the family and Maurnice. All of this is getting in the way of a compassionate, fair, and just outcome. The focus should be to pray for the healing and reconciliation of both parties, as this truly was a teenage fight that should’ve never happened to begin with, but did and spun completely out of control (for reasons that the community at-large should consider and contemplate, as bullying and violence is plaguing many communities across our region and country). 

Please sign this petition if you believe in justice for Maurnice Declue; if you believe that one mistake made while under duress should not overshadow years of hard work; if you believe our justice system should consider all factors before making life-altering decisions about our youth.