With a degree in Law Enforcement, a Master’s in Criminal Justice, and decades spent working in the child welfare and juvenile justice field, she is able to take readers behind the closed doors of a system the public seldom sees. She began her career as line staff in a juvenile detention center before moving to a job as a juvenile court probation officer. In her mid-twenties, she landed the position of director of a private youth-serving agency that operated a group home for status (runaways/truants) and public offender youth. While in this capacity, she obtained funding and housing to open a shelter facility for public offender boys who would otherwise have been placed in secure detention. Eventually, she moved into the Kentucky state government and helped develop a training curriculum for all of the state’s child welfare workers and community juvenile staff. A sought-after speaker, Vicki presented at numerous state and national conferences on juvenile justice and wrote a monthly article for the Kentucky Educational Collaborative for State Agency Children (KECSAC), dealing with behavior management of difficult youth in school settings.

Key Points

Vicki Reed is the author of the book The Car Thief, a fiction story about a child going through the juvenile justice system.

This story follows the main character, a kid named Kelly, on his journey through foster homes, courtrooms, and dealing with trauma.

This book has become a resource to educate people on the various topics and themes throughout the story.

Resources

Vicki Reed’s Website

Buy The Car Thief

The Car Thief Reviews

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Transcript

Dave [00:00:00] You’re listening to the Ending Human Trafficking podcast; this is episode number 246: Why You Should Read The Car Thief.

Production Credits [00:00:09] Produced by Innovate Learning, Maximizing Human Potential.

Dave [00:00:30] Welcome to the Ending Human Trafficking podcast. My name is Dave Stachowiak.

Sandie [00:00:36] And my name is Sandie Morgan.

Dave [00:00:38] And this is the show where we empower you to study the issues, be a voice, and make a difference in ending human trafficking, Sandie. Today we have a conversation with someone that’s a little different than we normally do. And yet I’m really excited for this conversation to discover more. Aren’t you?

Sandie [00:00:56] Oh, I can’t wait.

Dave [00:00:58] I am so glad to welcome Vicki Reed to our show. Vicki, after earning her bachelor’s degree in law enforcement and master’s degree in criminal justice, immersed herself in a successful, decades-long career in juvenile justice. She’s a sought-after speaker and is currently executive director of the Kentucky Juvenile Justice Initiative in Lexington, where she lives with her husband and son. And she’s also an author of a book. Vicki, we’re so glad to welcome you to the show.

Vicki [00:01:29] Thank you so much. I’m really excited to be here and I love the good work that you all do.

Sandie [00:01:34] Well, Vicki, we met at a conference for kids, and I knew right away we were kindred spirits. And you sent me your book, A Car Thief, and I read it in one weekend. And as I was reading it and Dave, you probably have this feeling because you read so much. I kept thinking of people I wanted to read it to because it’s so clearly illustrated a trauma-informed or an uninformed approach to communicating with young people. So, my first question for you, Vicki, I mean, you’re an expert in juvenile justice. Why did you write a fiction book?

Vicki [00:02:18] Well, I didn’t start out to actually, I didn’t start out to write any book. It wasn’t one of those people that said, oh, I want to write a book someday. But I am a voracious reader. I love to read. And I wanted to read about juvenile justice. But when I looked, you know, I really couldn’t find much out there, especially when it came to fiction that things that were there were very much inaccurate. And if you’re in the system, I guess it’s like a doctor who was reading a book about medical stuff. And if you say they didn’t sterilize the instruments or something, you’d be grimacing. So anyway, so I had Toni Morrison, who you’ve probably heard of, a famous author, said that if there’s a book you want to read that’s not out there, write it yourself. So, I decided I would write a nice little nonfiction and explain how kids get in the system and who they are and how traumas involved in that and so forth. And it really wasn’t going well. And about three o’clock in the morning, one night when I was trying to work on it, when I couldn’t sleep, it morphed to fiction and I felt much better. I was taking this hypothetical kid all through the system and basically Kelly, the kid in the story, he took over and he wrote the book from there.

Sandie [00:03:30] So, OK, so let’s talk a little bit about Kelly and some of the other characters. But don’t tell the ending. We don’t want a spoiler in our podcast. We want people to get the book and read it themselves. So, tell us about Kelly.

Vicki [00:03:50] Well, he starts off. He’s 12 years old and he has been involved in you know, he lived in Wyoming. He’s had some trauma in his life. And I don’t know that I wanted to do that. Should I tell what the trauma is?

Sandie [00:04:04] Yeah. Why don’t you start off by telling what his trauma is.

Vicki [00:04:07] OK, well, I’ll start off by saying that the book actually starts in the mi...