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Woman takes kids with her to court date
By Joe Gorman
YOUNGSTOWN
A woman who was sentenced Monday to 20 days in jail took her children to the court building with her.
Tamikia Butler, 36, was given the sentence in municipal court by Judge Elizabeth Kobly after she pleaded no contest and was found guilty of a charge of resisting arrest for head-butting a Mahoning County deputy sheriff in September at the county juvenile justice center.
Judge Kobly read off several charges that Butler has faced in the past, including two resisting-arrest charges in 1997 and 1998, and asked her who cares for her five children when she is in jail.
Butler said no one does.
“The state,” she answered.
Her attorney, William Blanchard, asked the judge if his client could have a time to report to the jail so she could make arrangements to have the children cared for. The judge said no.
“Your client’s bad judgment continues,” Judge Kobly said.
The children were not in the court itself. Court policy prohibits young children from even being on the second floor of city hall, where the court is located.
Judge Kobly said she would have to call the county Children Services Board to take custody of the children.
Butler was taken into custody at the JJC on Sept. 16 after she began swearing and talking loudly in a magistrate’s courtroom. She was taken to a holding cell after she refused to calm down in a hallway, and then head-butted a deputy while she was in the holding cell.
Judge Kobly asked her how she could behave that way in a court facility.
“I was having a bad day,” Butler said.
Butler told the judge that she was in court because a stepsister had made a false allegation against one of her children, and she became flustered and agitated when she tried to explain what really happened.
Judge Kobly said Butler was setting a horrible example for her children.
“The saddest thing about this whole scenario is you are teaching your children this is how adults act,” Judge Kobly said. “You are making mini me’s of you.” Blanchard had asked for a house-arrest sentence at minimum so Butler could care for her children, but the judge refused.
A pre-sentence report also recommended a 20-day jail sentence.