Riverfront Times, May 8, 2024

WEEKLY WTF?!

What, did Tesla design this thing or something? PROVIDED

PILE WATCH

What: a twisted stack of metal and wood providing no shelter for man nor vehicle When: 9:41 a.m., Wednesday, May 1

Where: An alley in Tower Grove South, between Gustine and Spring Was this a carport or a garage? Ooh la di da, Mr. French man. It’s a car hole. What happened here? The safest bet is one of St. Louis’ dumb cops lost control of their Tahoe again whilst speeding through the alley. Are you guys ever going to stop making fun of the boys in blue for their many car accidents? Depends. Are they ever gonna learn how to drive?

15 SECONDS of FAME SHIT STIRRER OF THE WEEK JAZZMINE NOLAN-ECHOLS

FRONT BURNER 5

[QUOTE OF THE WEEK]

“It’ll be back. The Haven always comes back!”

— Jake, on Facebook, responding

to our online story about the Haven bar and grill closing after decades in Boulevard Heights

Previously On LAST WEEK IN ST. LOUIS

MONDAY, APRIL 29. Our very own Washington University suddenly feels like a major, if unlikely, point of conflict over Israel’s actions in Gaza after the arrests of 100 people on Saturday. The university draws ire for swiftly suspending six faculty members and telling them they can’t have contact with students or colleagues, even off campus. As for the 23 arrested students, they say they were given until 8 p.m. Sunday to clear out of the dorms. Lost in all the excitement around Wash U’s draconian methods: The announcement from Mayor Tishaura Jones that she’s signed a bill legalizing red-light cameras in St. Louis and — poof! — our streets are now safer

while, Thomas Kinworthy is found guilty of killing St. Louis police officer Tamarris Bohannon after a trial where prosecutors suggested he might be faking mental illness And in Jefferson City, advocates of sports betting turn in enough signatures to get their initiative on the ballot. Get ready to gamble away your last few farthings

FRIDAY, MAY 3. Less than two weeks after distancing himself from suggestions the Cardinals need public funding for Busch Stadium, or else, team President Bill DeWitt III is back at it, floating another trial balloon with the Post-Dispatch. Weird how someone so rich is so incapable of reading the room Meanwhile, Wash U fences off its campus and says it will require university-issued IDs to enter. The security measures have the intended effect: a protest just outside campus ends without major incident.

St. Louis’ Charter Commission has a big mandate — to modernize city government in a municipality that could well use it. That’s why it was so disappointing to see its chairperson more interested in score-settling than the hard work of reimagining St. Louis. As the RFT’s Ryan Krull reported last week, former Alderwoman Christine Ingrassia apparently angered Chair Jazzmine Nolan-Echols last month by noting that the Reverend Darryl Gray, who’d recently testified before the commission, is married to the city’s director of personnel. In response, Nolan-Echols blasted Ingrassia for her role in a fatal car crash eight years ago. “If we’re not discussing the death of a Black person by way of your participation … I don’t believe anybody’s personal relationship or personal involvement with the government or lack thereof to be discussed here, either,” Nolan-Echols lectured.

Five of nine commission members swiftly called on Nolan-Echols to apologize, suggesting her attack on Ingrassia is only the latest in a series of antics. She has also allegedly sent inappropriate emails to staff, tried to sic Andrew Bailey on her fellow commissioners and even suggested the commission hire (gasp!) a Republican-allied political consulting firm based in California. (Nolan-Echols, BTW, declined comment.)

Predictably, Nolan-Echols’ tenure didn’t last long. On Monday, the commissioners voted to remove her — and her vote was the only one in opposition. The only silver lining here is that, by St. Louis standards, the end to her distracting mess came swiftly.

TUESDAY, APRIL 30. At a press conference, pro-Palestinian activists detail the story of Steve Tamari, a professor at Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville who filmed police as they arrested students and other protestors at Wash U on Saturday. That’s when police turned on him; his wife says he suffered broken ribs and a broken hand. Yet more local dysfunction: St. Louis Public Schools parents are now getting paid to drive their kids to school — $75/week. From private policing to parents as Uber drivers, it’s increasingly every person for themselves in this broken city … a worrying trend.

WEDNESDAY, MAY 1. May is here, and the weather is near-perfect. Pro-Palestinian protestors take their mission to the streets in and around Saint Louis University, and the university handles it beautifully, allowing peaceful protest and dispatching everyone back to their homes as evening falls. A little of President Fred Pestello’s humility would have gone a long way at Wash U. Meanwhile, the Post-Dispatch reports that state Senator Steve Roberts is up to no good, refusing to sign off on qualified local candidates for highprofile state boards, including former Mayor Lyda Krewson to the University of Missouri Board of Curators, even while allegedly trying to finagle a board appointment for himself or his father. Pretty pathetic.

THURSDAY, MAY 2. A judge says municipalities can stack cannabis taxes; consumers in incorporated parts of St. Louis County should prepare to pay through the nose. Hope you saved your dealer’s digits! Mean-

SATURDAY, MAY 4. It’s the Barbenheimer of St. Louis spring: Derby Day + Cherokee Street’s Cinco de Mayo + May the Fourth’s Star Wars Day, all rolled into one. Too many parties and too much sporadic rain to enjoy any without interruption! Alas, it’s no holiday for the Cardinals: The hapless Redbirds trail 6-5 in the bottom of the 10th with bases loaded when rain starts pouring down. After a three-hour delay, it takes less than two minutes for the Cards to lose. The redhot Battlehawks beat Houston 22-8, but for City SC, it’s yet another 0-0 tie.

SUNDAY, MAY 5. Today is actually Cinco de Mayo, and Mexican restaurants are packed. Alas, it’s bad news for Little Joe. The Western lowland gorilla and Saint Louis Zoo resident was 26 and died of a heart attack, not long after officials moved his bestie to a zoo in Chicago. RIP.

Jazzmine Nolan-Echols was a divisive presence. | SCREENSHOT

Slate Roof Woes Lead to Suit

Lindsay Dausman was ordered to scrap a new $48K roof, but she’s fighting back

BY RYAN KRULL

Anyone who has ever had a labor of love turn into a major headache should be able to relate to Lindsay Dausman.

In 2015, she and her husband bought a century-old, three-story home on Westminster Place in the Central West End. Dausman, a nurse, hoped to fix it up, restore its original beauty and add a few modern elements before selling it to someone who wanted to live in the city.

Eight years later, the house — its roof and gutters, specifically, which the city says she needs to spend a quarter-million dollars to replace — is an albatross for her and her family.

“I couldn’t afford to own this home, and I couldn’t afford to sell it,” she said at the June 2023 hearing of the St. Louis Preservation Board, a hearing that did not go in her favor.

The Dausmans initially bought the house in 2015 for $492,000, and the couple spent half a million dollars rehabbing the property for the next two years.

But the housing market proved unfavorable. In 2018 and again in 2020, Dausman put the house on the market. Both times it failed to sell, even though at one point she was willing to take a sixfigure loss to get it off their books.

Needing to staunch the financial bleeding from the property, Dausman formed an LLC, Elevi Holdings, and in March 2020, began renting out the house as an Airbnb.

Despite being a reluctant short-term rental host, she says she’s been heartened by all the people who have stayed there, in particular families whose children are receiving treatment at St. Louis Children’s Hospital and a group of people who’d come at the end of every month to receive treatments from Siteman Cancer Center. She says that she recently hosted travelers from Denmark and a group of people working for a bioethanol start up.

Though her goal remains to sell the house, in the meantime, she says, “I have to do the best I can.”

But the process of selling the home is being weighed down by its roof.

In March of last year, Dausman arrived at the house to find a chunk of plaster had fallen from the ceiling, and water was coming into the master bedroom. It was an emergency situation.

The Westminster house sported a slate

roof, and a roof of the exact same material would cost around $175,000, plus another $100,000 for copper gutters.

She ended up going with a cheaper option, a faux-slate material that in some ways is superior to the real deal (it’s more weather-resistant and makes the house more energy efficient, for instance). It cost $48,000, for which she obtained a loan. It could also be put up quickly, before more severe weather rolled in. (One quote she got for a slate roof indicated it would take 10 months to install.)

As the new roof was being installed, however, a city building inspector noticed the repair taking place and told Dausman she needed a permit. Because Dausman was in a historical district, she needed to apply for a variance to the district’s requirements.

“They put on a high-quality product. An inspector came by and said, ‘Look, it’s not in compliance, but all you have to do is file for a variance,’” says Pete Woods, the attorney Dausman has since retained.

Dausman did just that, but the city’s Cultural Resources Office denied the variance request. So she appealed to the city’s Preservation Board, asking for a variance on the basis of a financial hardship.

Dausman came to the June 2023 Preservation Board meeting prepared, bringing photos and exhibits and even state Representative Peter Merideth (D-St. Louis) to vouch for her character.

variance.

“Even if it’s your first project, you got to do your due diligence and research,” one board member said. “I feel like everyone just watches HGTV and then gets into this business.”

Given that she was appealing for a variance on financial hardship grounds, Dausman didn’t gain any favors when one of the board members pointed out that, according to the financials she submitted, she’d netted a profit from the Airbnb business in 2021. Also counted against her was the fact that she’d had the work done before seeking a permit — and that she didn’t actually live in the home.

In October, Elevi Holdings filed a lawsuit in St. Louis City Circuit Court asking for an administrative review of the Preservation Board’s decision.

Woods, who filed the lawsuit, calls the board’s decision “arbitrary and capricious.”

Less than a third of the houses on the Westminster home’s block and the adjacent one are made of actual slate, he says in the lawsuit. Many have patchwork repair. Many others have asphalt shingles.

“The requirement of a slate roof is a relic of older guidelines,” Woods tells the RFT. “Materials now available are actually an improvement over the original slate roofs.” Also, for what it’s worth, the Westminster house abuts what appears to be a vacant lot and is caddy-corner to an automotive shop.

Meredith and Dausman are neighbors in Tower Grove East. Merideth told the Preservation Board that she is one of the most diligent homeowners on the block.

“I’m a policy maker, so I look at policy. I think it’s really important to look at why the exception for economic hardship exists,” Merideth said. “And it’s for a situation like this. We’re not trying to use the code to bankrupt someone who’s done everything they can to restore and maintain a home.”

He added, “I don’t want to punish someone for investing a great deal of time and money into restoring a home that was falling into disrepair when she bought it.”

However, much of the conversation at the hearing got bogged down in the specifics of the Airbnb being run out of the house. That was in the middle of a summer when out-of-control parties at short-term rentals were wreaking havoc across the city. Dausman did her best to distinguish her operation from those, saying that she talks directly with everyone who rents from her, has security cameras on the property and generally doesn’t even rent to locals.

Two months later, Dausman appeared in front of the Preservation Board again. Leaning on her 9 to 5 nursing job, she compared her business to that of a patient slowly bleeding out.

Despite some dissent, in August, the Preservation Board decided to uphold the denial of Dausman’s appeal for a

Woods says he thinks that “basically the city is shooting itself in the foot” by chilling potential investment. Dausman puts it this way: “Is the chemical composite of the roofing material what makes it historic? It looks identical.”

Woods tells the RFT that the property that had already proven difficult to sell is even more so because who would want to buy it only to have to rip off a functional and good-looking roof and replace it with a roof and gutters that together will cost $250,000.

Dausman says that she acknowledges many of the neighbors on Westminster Place don’t like the house being used as a short-term rental. She stresses that ideally she wouldn’t be using it as such. The original plan was to sell it to a family.

“When someone has already put in, as my client has, $50,000, and in the big picture they’ve put in a half a million dollars improving this property and basically you’re going to dump on them? It makes no sense,” Woods says.

That suit filed by Woods most recently had a hearing on April 9. There was some question as to whether the suit could proceed in circuit court or if they needed to take the matter to the city’s Planning Commission first. That matter resolved, the suit is now proceeding in circuit court.

Woods says he’s optimistic.

“There’s nothing to complain about here, other than these people are sort of stuck in the past.” n

Lindsay Dausman paid to have a new roof installed — but the city says she should have known better and it needs to go. | ZACHARY LINHARES

Aldermen Aim to Ensure Jail Access

A new bill would make sure defense lawyers can visit their clients — and officials can inspect the jail, too

BY KALLIE COX

Two bills introduced with the St. Louis Board of Aldermen aim to ensure that attorneys can visit their clients in jail and allow city officials to visit the jail without prior notice.

As controversy after controversy roils the St. Louis City Justice Center, jail administrators have responded by blocking attorney access and barring them from bringing cellphones with them to visit clients.

The bills seek to mitigate that. Introduced by Ward 7 Alderwoman Alisha Sonnier and Ward 14 Alderman Rasheen Aldridge, they have both been assigned to the Public Safety Committee.

Sonnier’s bill, Board Bill 11, co-sponsored by Aldridge, would allow attorneys to have non-contact meetings with their clients without advance notice or restrictions at any time from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m.

“Non-Contact Visits between the hours of 9 p.m. and 7 a.m. may be arranged with the Commissioner or Sheriff with at least one (1) hour’s notice provided by the Attorney in advance,” the bill adds.

The bill also states “an Attorney shall not be prohibited by Detention Facility staff from bringing their cellular telephone, laptop computer, cameras, or any other equipment needed for visitation with a Detainee.” And, it says they will not have to provide documentation proving that they represent their client.

Board Bill 11 puts into law that attorneys must be able to pass their clients documents even on non-contact visits and states that any detainee in segregation or solitary confinement will have

non-restricted attorney visits.

If an attorney is denied a visit for any reason, the commissioner or sheriff must provide written notice within an hour of the denial explaining the specific reasons for denial — a document that will be considered an open public record.

Sonnier did not respond to messages seeking comment.

Board Bill 12, sponsored by Aldridge and co-sponsored by Sonnier, allows authorized individuals — including the mayor, members of the Board of Aldermen, attorneys and members of the jail oversight board — to access the jail at any time without prior notice.

Aldridge told the RFT that the two bills are another way to have oversight of the jail, which he notes has had many recent problems.

“When you schedule something that gives an opportunity for people to clean it up,” Aldridge says. “And not saying that anything negative is going on, but there’s been several articles of how we could just be doing a lot better in our jail. So this would provide additional oversight.”

Some of the recent coverage by the RFT includes a story about a paralyzed detainee who was allegedly left lying in his own feces for days and denied access to a shower, and a man shot by police whose family says he was denied medical care in jail.

“We know that jail is not a place of luxury, but it also shouldn’t be a place that is inhumane where people are sitting in jail for months at a time and then dying on the city’s watch,” Aldridge says.

Aldridge says he is also looking at ways to strengthen the detention facility oversight board. Several members resigned after saying that jail administration blocked them from being able to provide any meaningful oversight.

“We continue to hear that the detention facility oversight board is continuing to be stonewalled by the administration or the jail commissioner by not allowing them to do their job,” he says.

Aldermen made progress on this last session, Aldridge says, referring to his bill giving the oversight board more teeth. But, he adds, aldermen can continue to strengthen legislation surrounding the issue. n

‘There are no more universities left in Gaza’

Aldermen Alisha Sonnier and Rasheen Aldridge are trying to use legislation to tackle access problems at the City Justice Center. ZACHARY LINHARES

On April 27, protestors marched to Wash U and briefly set up an encampment before police ordered them to disperse. When they refused, police arrested 100 people, including 23 students and 4 faculty members. Complete coverage of the subsequent fallout is online at riverfronttimes.com. | ZACHARY LINHARES

‘Traumatized Children

A

dysfunctional juvenile correction system is failing youth, families and the state. But solutions seem a long way off

BY TAYLOR TIAMOYO HARRIS

Ta’janette Sconyers, a psychologist hired to work with youth at the St. Louis Juvenile Detention Center, found herself grappling with her own anxiety and despair over conditions inside the facility. It got so bad that she took a leave to protect her mental health.

Finally, in 2019, she simply resigned, becoming part of the turnover at the detention center, which seemed to do so little to provide youth with treatment, rehabilitation or even sunshine and fresh air.

“They said it was a revolving door. But I always asked, did anyone ever take the time to figure out why the door kept revolving,” says Sconyers.

Sconyers specializes in treating the effects of anxiety, trauma and OCD, and those were also some of the issues she diagnosed and treated while working at the St. Louis Juvenile Detention Center on Enright Avenue. It’s one of 18 juvenile detention centers in Missouri operated by the circuit courts that hold

minors accused of crimes and deemed threats to public safety. Administrators say rehabilitation and treatment are the goals for the approximately 2,000 youth in the state who funnel in and out of the detention centers annually.

If a youth is found guilty of a crime, the courts can commit them to a more permanent secure facility operated by the state’s Division of Youth Services, which has about 20 residential facilities and housed more than 1,200 youth last year. Youth can also end up at state facilities if they are repeatedly caught committing crimes. While legal terminology refrains from referring to these institutions as youth jails and prisons, they are still forms of incarceration, Sconyers points out.

Many of the youth never spoke to her, although some would check to make sure she was around every day. Others would open up to her about why they made the decision they did — money and a dissociation from their actions, she says.

But Sconyers ultimately concluded that her attempts to make a difference were futile.

“I felt I had more of a chance of helping them by not being a part of the system,” says Sconyers, who resigned from the facility in 2019 and is now in private practice. “If people’s basic needs aren’t being met, how do you think I’m going to be able to sufficiently address their trauma?”

A series of escapes in recent years has changed the policies at St. Louis area detention centers. It’s one reason why St. Louis area facilities, most which have outside recreational areas, have stopped allowing detained youth to use them.

Amanda Sodomka, who led the city’s juvenile detention center as chief juvenile officer for the 22nd Circuit Court until a recent promotion, says the city’s juvenile facility is working on upgrades to the doors and a higher fence in order to consider allowing youth outside again.

“We have very smart youth,” says Sodomka. “It poses enough risk, we just can’t have them outside right now.”

Yet Sconyers says the lack of fresh air was one of many things that disturbed her. Some youth were only there for days, but others for months or years as their cases played out. She and other staffers attempted multiple times to organize letting youth go out for even a few minutes each day, but those efforts were always shot down.

And that was even before her facility saw an unprecedented number of escapes, as did many other St. Louis area detention facilities. Juvenile administrators and staff point to the recent “Raise the Age” state law that requires 17-yearolds not to be tried as adults, which went into effect in 2021. Data from the Missouri Supreme Court confirms most of the escapes from the juvenile detention facilities were from youth just a year shy of being legal adults.

News reports about the system’s failures, like escapes, can spark outrage and prompt reactive policies, says Gina Vincent, a juvenile justice expert who also co-directs the law and psychiatry pro-

Karmahn Leach of Shine Bright Like a Diamond Youth Organization gives a presentation at New Spring Church. Leach hopes to mobilize parents to advocate for youth in juvenile detention. | THEO WELLING

Children in Cages’

gram as a professor at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School.

“Judges aren’t paying attention to what works to rehabilitate juveniles, they’re paying attention to public perception,” says Vincent, who sees a concerning national trend. Lack of activities and more time in cells mean, she says, “You’re going to see an increase in aggression in facilities.”

For a system designed to provide rehabilitation, the juvenile justice framework has left many of the people who interact with it frustrated. Parents say they are left in limbo and often feel hopeless once their child is in the system. Some juvenile officers feel neglected by administrators and also say youth are given few resources to help them deal with their trauma.

For one youth who escaped and was recaptured, his accountability and rehabilitation process started once he received help outside of the system. Sconyers says those stories don’t have to be rare.

“It’s a powerful thing. It didn’t always happen for a lot of different reasons, but it’s possible,” says Sconyers. “People benefit from trauma work when it’s something they choose to do — when it’s something they have the capacity to do, when they are able to moderately engage with it, when it’s controllable for them, when it’s on their terms.”

Inside the Juvenile System

The majority of youth who find themselves in the juvenile system are accused of misdemeanor offenses. That’s true both in Missouri and nationwide.

It’s the minority — those charged with felony offenses — who are typically brought to the court’s juvenile detention center. Their intake process mirrors jail, with a full strip search, shower and change of clothes. The brown, green or orange jumpsuits they are assigned are based on factors such as high risk or trauma.

Each new detainee then waits in a small room with a sliver of light beaming from a small rectangular prism. A metal frame, board, sheet and sink are all they have during the hours they are processed in.

After they are processed, the regimen begins. Calls are limited. Lunches are isolated: one youth to a table. While school is mandated, Sconyers says it often seemed to consist of students watching movies, a claim echoed by other officers.

But that’s not always the climate, says Amanda Williams, who runs day-today operations at the St. Louis Juvenile Detention Center as its superintendent. Youth have limited time out of their cells but are incentivized to earn more.

The center has received multiple grants for arts and recreational activities, even if volunteers are sparse. Still, every day isn’t a crisis, she insists.

“Majority of the kids who come in here, they don’t give us a problem,” says Williams.

But some of the same juveniles cycle in and out of the detention center throughout their youth, says an officer at the St. Louis County Juvenile Detention Center who spoke under the condition of anonymity. “Simply because the detention center has never done anything to help these kids out,” the officer says.

Last fall, a group of parents whose children were incarcerated at the juvenile detention facility in Clayton banded together to demand better treatment of their children, transparency and an investigation into the facility. They said youth were forced to urinate and defecate on themselves or in containers they ate from because no one let them out of their cells in a timely way. They said fights were common and staff members turned to physical restraints to control the youth.

Other officers confirm some of the allegations, saying the safety and wellbeing of youths, as well as staff safety, are at risk.

The unnamed officer doesn’t sugarcoat the situation. He says officers are sometimes attacked by the youth detainees. “We’re not dealing with model citizens,” he says.

He says he remembers every youth who comes through the doors in Clayton. He tries to give them a realistic view of the situation they’re in.

But he says the system can’t help delinquent youth if it’s complacent with problems such as low morale in staff, bullying by administration and a lack of services, programs and activities for youth awaiting decisions on their criminal cases.

The people running the county’s juvenile system declined several requests for an interview. In an email, a spokesperson said, “Juvenile records are generally closed records, meaning they cannot be shared or discussed outside of court proceedings. … And for security purposes, St. Louis County Courts cannot comment on internal detention center policies and Human Resource matters.”

In the city, volunteers have come to talk to youth or help them write, play or teach yoga. But, the county officer says, the majority of the time the youth are just sitting.

“Playing cards and Uno is not going to do anything here,” he says.

While juvenile detention centers in Missouri are under the jurisdiction of the courts, putting them under the pur-

This story was commissioned by the River City

view of the state, they are funded locally. Last fall, the St. Louis County Council leveled some of its only power over the courts and called for juvenile officials to attend a budgetary meeting. Juvenile administrators took the opportunity to request additional funding to address problems related to short staffing.

St. Louis County Councilman Ernie Trakas questioned county juvenile administrators about allegations of physical, verbal and sexual assault on youth by staff. But they denied knowing of any wrongdoing. He then wrote a letter asking Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey to investigate.

Bailey has not responded publicly to the request, and the St. Louis County Council has not addressed the issue since.

Officers at the county detention center have received new walkie-talkies and emergency buttons. But workers still face attacks by their young charges, and the administration often forces staff to work 16-hour shifts and tries to boost morale with gift cards, the officer says.

Even so, it’s hard to get staffers to speak up about systemic issues, the officer says. “You are talking about people that need to eat. They’re not going to push the envelope.”

Catch and Release

When a youth is arrested or detained by law enforcement in Missouri, a juvenile officer submits a referral to the court, similar to the warrant process for adults.

Referrals can result in a formal decision, which comes with either detention or intense supervision, such as GPS monitoring from the courts. The decision can also be informal, which might mean diversion-related alternatives, community service, referrals to treatment services or voluntary recommendations by the court. More than 90 percent of decisions for referrals in the St. Louis area are informal.

Until last year, the overall number of law referrals to the court had decreased dramatically, with about a 71 percent drop from 2011 to 2021.

But data shows St. Louis County and city police together referred almost twice as many youth to the courts in 2023 as 2022. Last year saw the highest number of juvenile referrals in the county since 2016 and in the city since 2015.

The most common charge for youth in the state, as well as the St. Louis area, is property damage, followed by assault. The number of youth accused of homicide has more than tripled in the past 10 years, but still comprises less than 1 percent of all juvenile charges.

Despite the decline in juvenile referrals

in the past decade, and the uptick in the past year, the pattern holds steady: More than 60 percent of the time when youth are referred to the court, their charges are rejected or no action is taken on the referral. The only involvement with the system is the initial contact with police.

In 2012, about 184 youth in the St. Louis area were incarcerated on a daily basis. These days, that’s dropped to about 136 youth on a given day, according to the most recent data from state and court-run facilities.

Experts say that’s a good thing. “When you incarcerate youth, it slows their development and progress of their maturity, their ability to regulate their own behavior and their sense of responsibility,” says Vincent.

Yet advocates and experts say the practice of taking no action after a referral — sometimes called “catch and release” — does nothing to rehabilitate the youth or address their needs, essentially the purpose of the juvenile system. Without good interventions, some youth escalate. And the next time, they may well end up in a detention center. Prior referrals are considered a risk factor by the courts and can increase the chances of a juvenile official ordering a youth to be detained.

“We factor in history. If we have a youth who has multiple referrals to the court, we would treat or recommend a different course than someone’s first referral,” says Sodomka.

Sometimes parents aren’t even aware their children have been given referrals. Qunshea Jennings’ son was fighting charges at the juvenile facility but he was certified as an adult, transferred to the county jail on his 18th birthday. During the certification hearing, she heard about referrals from incidents when he was 12 that contributed to his sentence.

“This is affecting my son’s life and I never even knew about it,” says Jennings. “All these officers had interacted with my son and wrote him up.”

Some officers say they use juvenile interactions to get through to youth before it’s too late. Northwoods Police Chief Dennis Shireff says he feels the area is in a state of emergency when it comes to juvenile crime, but doesn’t support constantly detaining youth. Instead, he tries to work with parents in situations that could result in tickets, summons and arrests.

“Nobody’s watching them, giving them guidance. Instead of giving them guidance, most people think that it’s easy to just lock them up. But when they’re done doing whatever little time they do, they become more of a criminal,” he says. For many youth, being incarcerated

Continued on pg 13

Journalism Fund.

CHILDREN IN CAGES

is the only type of structure they’ve received, says Jeff Esparza, the attorney who leads the public defender’s office for youth in the St. Louis area. However, considering the harm from the system, Esparza says, the intervention needs to happen before it’s too late.

“I don’t know why it has to be the threat of a cage over your head before we can intervene with a kid who has a mental health or substance abuse problem,” says Esparza. “Jail is a horrible place, and I don’t want my clients there.”

Navigation Difficulties

Embarrassed. That’s what Karmahn Leach and many other parents said they felt when their children started getting in trouble. That’s how many parents say they felt when trying to navigate the juvenile system to support their child as best as they could.

“Not knowing my rights. His rights. What was supposed to happen. What’s next for my child? I know I’m going to be judged for it, but I need someone to talk to,” says Leach.

One day when Leach’s son was about 15, he was picked up in a stolen car and brought home, a classic catch-and-release.

“He’d get picked up or brought home and say, ‘They let me go,’” says Leach.

Soon he ended up in the St. Louis County Juvenile Detention Center, where he was held for months and never let outside. One thing Leach noticed: His skin got lighter.

In his younger years, his mom says teachers described him as bright and an old soul. But after being diagnosed with ADHD and other learning disorders, things took a turn.

“On medication he was an A/B student. Off medication it was Ds and Fs,” says Leach.

Over time it got worse. He became too active in class, and he was cited time and again for wandering around the hallways. Citations turned into suspensions. Somehow, Leach says her son found refuge at the Vinita Park Police Department, where he’d help with chores.

After she moved out of Vinita Park, her son’s interactions with the police turned negative. Leach now has one son incarcerated and one whose charges are pending. She started a nonprofit, Shine Bright Like a Diamond Youth & Young Adults, so that other parents wouldn’t end up in her situation.

One way she helps is by connecting parents to the services they need by working with advocates like Janis Mensah, a former member of the city’s civilian jail oversight board and juvenile volunteer with Metropolitan Congregations United.

“A lot of parents come to us not knowing even how to parent and address their youth’s issues. They come to the system thinking it will help in some type of way, not knowing the system just makes things worse,” Mensah says.

One parent, Mensah recalls, called the police when her daughter took her

car for a joy ride. Her daughter ended up being detained in a youth facility.

“We want a system that allows everyone to have a better quality of life and we know this system does not,” Mensah says. “It harms youth. It harms guards. The workers who have turnover cycling through that position.”

Exactly 99.5 percent of youth in Missouri and nationwide are not “offenders” or cited for breaking the law. Vincent says while that may seem obvious, it’s important to note in light of the rhetoric around youth crime. Even in Missouri, nearly 80 percent of youth who are cited for a law violation don’t reoffend.

Data shows more than 90 percent of juvenile referrals in St. Louis and the county stem from municipal police departments. Among such referrals, Black youth in the city are six times more likely to be committed to detention facilities than white ones. In the county the rate for Black youth is four times higher than white ones.

Black youth comprise only about 15 percent of Missouri’s population, but they experience a disproportionate rate of referrals, diversion, detention center sentences and certifications. Black youth also have a longer average and median stay in juvenile detention facilities than white youth.

In Missouri, administrators assess youth looking at risk factors that include parental incarceration, attitude, behavioral issues, school attendance, age at first referral and the nature of the referrals themselves. Black youth are assessed at a higher risk level than their white counterparts, state data shows.

Nearly every state uses risk assessments to determine the outcomes of juvenile referrals, says Vincent. While “risk assessments” can have a negative connotation, Vincent says they can be helpful and that judges who follow risk assessments have a lesser chance of racial bias. It comes down to the factors that are used. They shouldn’t rely heavily on factors like their parents’ incarceration or previous referrals, she says. Often, a complete risk assessment for

a youth is done only after a judge or juvenile administrator has already made a decision on their case.

“Low-risk kids end up on probation, and judges are setting conditions about the services kids should get without any information about the risk factors, which tells you what services they need,” says Vincent. “The accountability level needs to be in line with the level of risk for reoffending. Most of those kids, you’re never going to see those kids again.”

In St. Louis, one way Mensah and Leach started to combat this practice was by creating social biographies for youth in the system for judges. These bios tell a judge about a youth’s background, family support and needs — an idea Vincent applauds.

Leach says that though she’s just getting started, the people affected by the system have to come together. She’s talked to incarcerated youth who are ready to help serve when they are released.

“They just want someone they can trust,” she says. “Other people like me. No one’s going to make me feel ashamed of what I’ve been through.”

Escaping From It All

One teen injured his spine trying to jump out of the St. Louis detention center in 2021. Months before, a youth who escaped from the city’s juvenile detention facility was killed while running away from police on Interstate 70.

Statewide, the number of escapes from Missouri juvenile detention centers are difficult to decipher, as some statistics include runaway data and juvenile detention facilities are not required to report escapes or attempted escapes.

Data released by the Missouri Supreme Court shows 12 escapes from the St. Louis city facility since 2021, but media reports total 15 (the detention center confirms the number at 15). St. Louis County did not report any, but media reports say two escaped. Officers at the county facility say those have been the only escapes in recent times. The Missouri Hills facility on the Bellefontaine campus in North St. Louis County operated by the state’s Divi-

sion of Youth Services has also had nine escapes since 2021.

“They don’t take responsibility for how often that happens,” says Mensah. “That’s not acceptable.”

All Christian Lett could think about was getting away. That’s why he fled the police and crashed a stolen car that police spiked during the chase. He learned to steal cars after being taught by someone a few years older than him. After losing his brother through violence, he turned to anyone who could be a mentor, friend or teach him how to provide.

Transitioning from roaming the streets to being incarcerated at the Hogan Street facility was a big adjustment, he says. Phone calls were never more than about 15 minutes, and time with family was restricted.

“You’re not seeing the rotation of the sun and moon,” says Lett. “All we know is what time breakfast comes and if breakfast comes it must be another day.” He spent both his 17th and 18th birthdays incarcerated at St. Louis juvenile facilities. At 17, Lett escaped the facility, but his recapture happened just months later. His second attempt was thwarted, and he assaulted a guard trying to escape. The guard ended up hospitalized.

This time, Lett landed in “adult jail” at CJC. It wasn’t until he started working with the Freedom Community Center that he thought he could turn his life around. (Full disclosure: The author has done some consulting work for the Freedom Community Center.)

The nonprofit provides a number of wrap-around services to justice-involved people, including therapy, court management, transportation, housing and job assistance. After FCC staff advocated for his release, a judge allowed the organization to serve as Lett’s sponsor, ensuring to the courts he’ll be law-abiding while his case plays out. Lett completed FCC’s six-week program centered in restorative and transformative justice techniques, and remained involved with the organization’s advocacy. He now works in the restaurant industry, and one day, hopes to become a chef.

He often speaks in third-person when addressing his past — remorseful but accountable, he says. His friends, hangout spots and, most importantly, his mentality all changed, he says.

That’s the dissociation Sconyers, the psychologist, worked to address with youth.

“We isolate the behaviors and we don’t look at whether the context and conditions these kids live in are appropriate for their survival,” says Sconyers.

This month Lett turned 20. No longer a teenager, he’s aware his young family members and friends look up to him.

“Instead of showing them the wrong way, having them watch me do stupid and lame things, I have choices and I’m choosing to do better. Not to do those things,” says Lett.

Now on probation, Lett says an intervention was necessary and speaks candidly about his transformation. By no means was it overnight, and Lett

Ta’Janette Sconyers wanted to help youth but worried detention was doing more harm than good. THEO WELLING

CHILDREN IN CAGES

remains on probation working diligently to remain a success story.

“I never had anything against that man,” Lett says of the guard he assaulted. “All I wanted to do was get out. The way I went about it was lame, just wrong. I’m not in those circumstances and I just don’t move like that anymore.”

‘Services Is a Euphemism’ Both courts and municipal governments invest in resources for youth crime prevention as well as programs outside the detention system. Some of the city’s violence prevention programs offer youth a safe place to hang out at night. Some judges assign youth charged with crimes to neighborhood accountability boards.

Kirsten Petty volunteers with the Gravois Park Neighborhood Accountability Board. She and other volunteers assist youth with their school work, community service, job opportunities and the youth’s life and decision-making skills.

“It’s the kids from our own neighborhoods. We see them in the community or when walking our dogs,” says Petty.

She’s seen success stories of teens who went from failing classes to having straight As. She’s also seen cases of youth caught stealing because they wanted to help feed their families. Typically, she’s working with youth accused of nonviolent offenses, but in recent years that’s changed. They’ve had cases where youth have been cited for assaulting their teachers.

But sometimes the charges just don’t make sense. For example, she once learned that a youth facing a weapons offense was trying to take a weapon from someone who was threatening their family.

“There’s definitely been a few times where we wondered, ‘Why are we getting this? Why is this a case?’” says Petty.

Sodomka, the chief juvenile officer of the St. Louis City Juvenile Court, highlights one of the restorative justice models the court has gradually rolled out. For youth found guilty of tampering with or stealing vehicles, if they complete community service, the victim receives restitution, sometimes in the form of a deductible from the courts. But in order to make that work, Sodomka notes, “We have to have buy-in from the family.”

Not all youth are afforded true support. Sometimes providing “services” can mean simply writing down the phone number to a nonprofit or treatment facility. That’s why the head juvenile public defender, Esparza, says “services and programs are more of a euphemism.”

An analysis of state data shows the greatest number of youth in the system were assigned to “monitoring.” Programs around victim services and restorative justice were the second highest category.

In February, St. Louis approved a federal grant for more than $450,000 for a nightwatch court program targeting youth. The program allows juvenile court officers and St. Louis police officers to team up and check in to ensure youth are at home during curfew hours.

Esparza has frequently seen juvenile officers charge youth with low-level offenses or violations, such as truancy or skipping school, in order to connect them to services. He typically sees it with children in the foster care system or child abuse and neglect cases.

“If all you’ve got is a screwdriver, everything is a screw,” says Esparza. “Minor crime turns into a bigger one and bigger one, then all of a sudden they are facing certification [to be charged as an adult].”

Other monitoring options for youth are also problematic, Esparza says. Batteries for youth assigned to GPS monitoring are unreliable and require youth to sit against a wall for hours to charge.

As a public defender, he’s representing youth who are indigent. He says it’s rare for a child to have stable housing. He’s seen youth given violations for not charging their GPS monitor when their parents couldn’t pay the electric bill.

“Our kids are dealing with the problems of poverty,” says Esparza.

State-run facilities can provide treatment services for youth who have behavioral, mental and substance abuse needs to be addressed. For court-run juvenile facilities, available options for treatment vary by the court.

Data from annual reports shows it’s needed. More than 30 percent of youth surveyed in detention centers had moderate to severe substance abuse issues, and more than 45 percent of youth served by the state system in 2023 had serious or significant issues with substance abuse.

Sodomka says she’s met with the police department and mayor’s office to strategize for best solutions for services with and without court intervention. “I think we’re all in agreement that there’s a gap.”

But Amanda Williams, the superintendent running day to day activities at the city’s juvenile detention center, says they can’t do everything. Youth do get visits to the dentist and an initial health screening, but, she says, “We aren’t a treatment facility.”

The center has a hallway that resembles a sunroom that connects to a rec-

reational area for the youth, but as far as plans to utilize the space, “Those are ongoing conversations we are having,” says Sodomka.

But Esparza says staff needs are trumping the needs of youth. “Traumatized children in cages, not getting the right amount of exercise, risk factors for depression and anxiety, and you’re turning that up at a detention facility,” says Esparza. “What they’re trying to do is make their job more manageable.”

But there are examples of officials choosing to divert away from the system. He cites cases where he’s seen city and county prosecutors turn down cases to avoid putting a child in the system because of obvious lack of evidence or seriousness of the charge.

“Some people are trying really hard. And some are getting it right a lot more than you expected,” says Esparza.

“But it’s not good enough. A lot of kids are getting screwed. It’s not a problem that can be fixed by placing a few people here and there.”

‘Everything Is a Screw’

The Hogan Street Regional Youth Center in St. Louis is one of three maximum security juvenile commitment facilities run by the state. It’s where youth can be committed up until they are 21 if found guilty of a crime.

Scott Odum, director for the Missouri Division of Youth Services, says the St. Louis facility faced a number of challenges as the pandemic echoed across the labor market, such as staff shortages. But vacancies have since dropped in the past year from 29 to 13 percent, he says.

But Hogan has also experienced a high number of escapes, similar to the city juvenile detention facility just two miles west.

“This work is always going to be hard,” Odum says. “We could have an incident there tomorrow. That is always on the menu, and it’s possible. It’s the things that keep me up at night.”

Odum says it was not just the escapes, but other security concerns and much-needed repairs that prompted the department to make plans to close the

facility. The cost of repairs, a little more than $4 million, would have been more than half of the cost of renovating or purchasing a new building.

The new facility will stand on 10 acres of land already owned by the state for longterm developmental and disability care. Unlike Hogan, it will operate on one floor for security purposes. Capacity will be up to about 36 youth, around the same number Hogan housed at its prime, which now has about 30 beds. The new space will include a basketball court and fenced-in space for outdoor recreational activity.

But there’s still no enforcement mechanism to ensure youth will be allowed outside.

“We have to change that,” says Representative LaKeySha Bosley (D-St. Louis).

Bosley sought to make an amendment to a public safety bill to require that youth in detention be given time outside, according to juvenile justice guidelines. But Bosley says the proposal failed to gain traction.

Last session, two hearings were held, but the legislature had little discussion before approving HB 19, a bill to appropriate $7.2 million for the new Division of Youth Services facility to replace Hogan.

A number of parents and advocates provided witness statements pleading with the legislature to not pass the bill. They asked instead for youth to have hygiene products, programs to help with emotional trauma, better-trained staff and rehabilitation programs that prevent incarceration and recidivism.

“Building a shiny new jail for kids may be an easy way to create the appearance of supporting vulnerable youth and their communities, but is this actually a solution that the communities affected have called for?” one statement asked.

“What they need is therapy, proper education, public services, job training, and ultimately our support. With a new jail, there will just be more incentive to fill it with our children,” read another. “Our current jails are not working. Why would this one be different? Let us not make the same mistake again.”

After the funding bill was passed by the House and Senate, Missouri Governor Mike Parson signed it into law.

In that same bill, Parson vetoed $750,000 for an educational supply store in St. Louis County, $13 million in improvements for the Riverview Gardens School District, $3 million for a community center in Kirkwood and $100,000 for improvements to a community center in Wellston.

In his veto messages, Parson writes that the programs were a local responsibility with minimum statewide impact.

In the 2023 fiscal year, the St. Louis region saw more youth committed to state detention centers than anywhere else in the state, accounting for more than 25 percent of all Missouri youth committed. Each bed at facilities like Hogan costs around $112,295 annually. n

This story was commissioned by the River City Journalism Fund, which seeks to advance journalism in St. Louis. See rcjf. org for more info.

Jeff Esparza, who leads the public defender’s office for juveniles, says staff needs are trumping those of youth who need fresh air, sunshine and exercise. THEO WELLING

BY RIVERFRONT TIMES STAFF

THURSDAY 05/09

Too Good to Be True

If you’re one of the hundreds of thousands (or should that even be millions?) of theater lovers who thrilled to the glorious falsettos in Jersey Boys, the showstopping Broadway musical that’s barnstormed the nation more or less continuously since its 2005 debut, you really need to catch John Lloyd Young: Broadway’s Jersey Boy at the Blue Strawberry (364 North Boyle Avenue). St. Louis’ only true cabaret venue is a terrific place to catch top talents in an intimate space, and Young didn’t just play Frankie Valli in the original Broadway cast but won a Tony Award, a Drama Desk, an Outer Critics Circle and Theatre World Award for the role. So, yes, he has talent to spare — and we should all thank our lucky stars that Blue Strawberry impresario Jim Dolan puts in the work to bring luminaries like him to the Central West End. Catch him Wednesday, May 8, and Thursday, May 9, beginning at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $45 to $115 at bluestrawberrystl.com depending on whether you want to pony up extra for a meet-and-greet.

FRIDAY 05/10

Jump Up and Get Down

If you associate Sauget solely with strip clubs and heavy industry, prepare to be shook: This weekend, the East Side town originally christened Monsanto, Illinois, is going to be crawling with kids. The Big Bounce America is setting up at the home of the Gateway Grizzlies, Grizzlies Ballpark Field (2301 Grizzlie Bear Boulevard, Sauget, Illinois), beginning Friday, May 10. Unlike last year’s lengthy residency in the Saint Louis Galleria parking lot, this stay lasts just one weekend, so plan accordingly. Big Bounce America includes seven inflatable attractions, including the selfproclaimed (but presumably verified?) World’s Largest Bounce House, which alone clocks in at 24,000 square feet. There’s also a “deep sea foam party inflatable” called OctoBlast, a 900-footlong obstacle course, a “sports arena” and what promotional materials call a “space-themed wonderland.” Suffice it to say, that’s a lot of bouncing. Tickets start at $22 for toddlers, $35 for kids and $45 for adults. Full details at thebigbounceamerica.com. Note that hours don’t begin until noon, so by then all the party people should be long gone from Sauget’s usual attractions. Unless they decide to stick around for a nice hungover bounce session.

CALENDAR

Date of the Art

This Mother’s Day weekend, Friday, May 10, through Sunday, May 12, take mom to enjoy Laumeier’s 37th Annual Art Fair at the Laumeier Sculpture Park (12580 Rott Road, Sappington), featuring handmade artwork from 150 artists from across the country; local food vendors such as Hi-Pointe Drive-In, 4 Hands Brewing Co., Mission Taco Joint and more; live music and entertainment from Samantha Clemons, Brothers Lazaroff, Saint Boogie Brass Band and others; and a Creation Location (open Saturday and Sunday) with family-friendly entertainment from Babaloo and the Circus Kaput Jugglers. Guests of the Creation Location can also take part in several hands-on art activities such as collaborative murals and nature-inspired art projects. Laumeier’s 37th Annual Art Fair is $10 for ages 11 and older and free for the little ones. For a full schedule, visit laumeiersculpturepark.org.

SATURDAY

05/11

What’s Up, Doc?

Your favorite Looney Tunes characters are getting backing by the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra this Saturday, May 11, at Stifel Theatre (1400 Market Street). Starting at 7 p.m., the one-night-only concert presented by Warner Bros. Discovery will feature Bugs Bunny at the Symphony. The evening includes 16 Looney Tunes animated shorts projected on the big screen, including “What’s Opera, Doc,” “The Rabbit of Seville,” “Baton Bunny,” “Zoom and Bored” and “Corny Concerto.” There will also be five new animated shorts that screen while scores

by Carl Stalling, who played the grand theater organ for silent movies in the St. Louis Theater in the 1920s, are played live by the symphony. Bugs Bunny at the Symphony will bring back memories of beloved Looney Tunes characters, including Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, Daffy Duck, Wile E. Coyote, Road Runner (beep beep!), Michigan J. Frog and many more. Tickets start at $45 and may be purchased at slso.org or by calling the box office at 314-534-1700.

All True Scotsmen

Everyone will have a bit of Scot in them this Saturday at Schroeder Park (359 Old Meramec Station Road, Manchester), which will be the site of a day-long celebration of all things hailing from the land that gave the world Sean Connery, Ewan McGregor and seminal 1990s rock band Garbage. The St. Louis Scottish Games will include plenty of Scottish athletic events, including tug of war, competitive sheep herding and the caber toss — which involves very strong people throwing what is essentially the very tall trunk of a very thin tree. Additionally, there will be bagpiping, Celtic dancing, a whole bunch of great bands (the Mudmen are coming all the way from Canada) and plenty of delicious things to eat. Whether you love the history and culture of Scotland or know virtually nothing about it beyond having seen Braveheart, we promise this will be a terrific way to spend a Saturday. The event runs from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Tickets are $25. More info at stlouis-scottishgames.com.

The Grip of the Grape

Does anything go together more natu -

rally than wine and Italy? (Don’t mention Bordeaux.) We’d certainly recommend heading to the airport and then pretty much anywhere in Tuscany to get your fix, but if travel is not an option, don’t sweat it. Instead, head to our very own Little Italy on Saturday, May 11, from noon to 4 p.m. for the Hill Wine Walk . The annual event sees the charming tricolor-bedecked neighborhood open the door to its many stores and restaurants for a plethora of wine tastings and discounts, with plenty of entertainment along the way. Tickets to the Hill Business Association event are $45, but for $100, you can get a fancy tasting glass, Lorenzo’s fare and access to its bathroom. The event tends to sell out, so make sure to head to Eventbrite to pick up a ticket ahead of time.

WEDNESDAY 05/15

Healing Spells

Tarot isn’t just for telling the future — it’s also a powerful tool for self care, author Mary Wissinger argues. And luckily for St. Louisans in need of a little boost, Wissinger will be hosting a workshop on the subject, aptly named Tarot for Self Care, at Betty’s Books (10 Summit Ave, Webster Groves) on Wednesday, May 15 from 7 to 8 p.m. “We’ll dive into a simple style of reading Tarot designed to help us refill our cups,” promises promotional material for the event. “We’ll also learn practical ways Tarot can help us de-stress, cultivate self-compassion and feel more grounded.” The event is free and no preregistration is required. For more information, visit bettysbooksstl.com. n

Bugs Bunny at the Symphony will feature Looney Tunes animated shorts scored by the world-class musicians of the SLSO. | CHRIS LEE

Game On

Smoke over Tower Grove East signals that the Shaved Duck is back to the races

It’s a primordial thing. We’ve been roasting our food over a flame for years. Smoke has twisted in our hair ever since we chimps came down from the trees. The scent of it, in other words, takes us back. We are, of course, the only beasts to cook our food. It’s what separates us (so we like to think) from the animals. We cook it on stoves, in ovens and air fryers, and some of us, those who have hours to invest in the prep of something delicious to eat, head to Lowe’s and buy ourselves a Big Green Egg.

But I can’t be bothered with all that. I’d much rather the Shaved Duck Smokehouse cook my supper because, somehow, with the help of two huge silvery smokers, this neighborhood restaurant in Tower Grove East has harnessed that most ephemeral ingredient, bottled it and is putting it — so to speak — on toast.

So, I wondered last Thursday, why weren’t more people here for this kitchen’s burnt ends, for its luxuriant, fatty meats run through with that taste we viscerally crave? Why were only two tables filled? I theorized a little and decided it might have something to do with a pending liquor license, which the Shaved Duck has been in the queue to get for months on end. Something tells me that if the booze were flowing, the hoards would be here; there’d be a line around the block for a taste of this kitchen’s way with smoke.

The restaurant has new owners: James He-

redia, Joshua Powlishta and Adam Kaufman took over from Ally Nesbit, who was forced to close the business in 2022 after a pipe burst. This threesome (who also inherited Nesbit’s recipes) knocked out a wall, opened up the place and brought it back to life after a year of closure. It feels like a nice spot to be, although — like a living room without its carpet — the acoustics are a little off. I’m not sure how you fix that. Booze maybe. Candles might also be good. Instead of those, each table has a couple of whopper squeeze bottles of homemade sauce.

Our two happened to be bourbon and root beer (there are seven in all). My trouble, my life’s conundrum, is that I’m always wanting the flavor of habanero, but not so much the heat. Yes, I’ll peck out a few drops to enliven a pot of beans, but I want that elusive taste — the more well-behaved back-goût of those furious little peppers. I finally found it when another bottle arrived. It was charmingly yellow, charmingly made with mangoes. “Don’t worry, it’s not that hot,” said our server, who also happened to be Heredia. I put a dot on a finger, tasted it, then — having decided it was the most lovely condiment in all the world — wondered about asking for a bowl, and a spoon.

I love it when confit’s on the menu. It feels like a good sign to me. With roots in Gascogne, this specialty speaks to care, a respect

for a centuries-old, days-long curing process. You don’t find it any-old-where. The leg arrived, a perfectly crispy, fat-braised crook, pinky and tender beneath its skin. Duck is an intense meat, and this was. “It tastes alive,” said my 17-year-old companion. “Gamey,” I corrected. “We say gamey when we talk about duck.” It’s true, this probably isn’t the meat for teenage boys, though it forks nice and easy into juicy shreds, and the pickled red onions on the side are twanged by fennel seed.

But boys do like burgers. Sadly, the Shaved Duck’s “Big Mac” (formed with brisket into two patties) was dry. (Could a single patty and a little less time on the “Foreman” fix this?) Boys also are fond of mac and cheese, as long as it’s Kraft. This mac and cheese, however, bowled my date over. I left him there and polished off the bowl. Scattered with crumbs, creamy and rich, it’s so unlike Kraft, it’s funny.

The smoked pulled pork sandwich was interesting. I want to say “pure” rather than “plain;” I’d rather say “untouched” than “naked.” My son just said, “I wish I could have taken the flavor in the duck and given it to the pork.” I think he’s after my job. However, after a few poots of the 7 Chili Cherry sauce bottle, and with the addition of crunchy pickles, the sandwich was plain and simply and smokily delicious.

It was nice, as well, to find gumbo on the menu. Jeweled with corn and little shrimps,

2900 Virginia Avenue. Open Tues.-Sat., 4-10 p.m.

The Shaved Duck’s legendary burnt ends can be ordered in a sandwich featuring the cherry- and hickorysmoked meat.

BY ALEXA BEATTIE

THE SHAVED DUCK SMOKEHOUSE

PHOTOS BY MABEL SUEN

scallops and okra, its flavor is deep and seafoody. Shrimp appeared again on a pillow of herby jalapeño cheddar grits and had an excellent snap. I am unqualified to talk about the creamed corn; I have never met that loose soup before.

Sorry to go on, but has anyone not yet heard about the Shaved Duck’s marvelous burnt ends? Has the news of these sweet, chubby little slabs yet to reach the ears of any (wo)man or beast in this town? Here are some more descriptors: treacly, devilishly unctuous; bonfireishly fumed; and — as described by the wordsmith across from me — “frickin’ beast.” My son happened to be talking about the sandwich version. Since time began, there may rarely have been a better “bun” than this. Or trope.

Perhaps, once the booze gets going, the Shaved Duck will be able to lower its prices a bit. It seems to me they’re a little high for a place so snugly embedded in a neighborhood, all by itself. It surely would wish to be a no-brainer for dinner — a Cheers-ish fallback when all we have in the freezer is a Stone Age Tombstone. The word is, the license may be only weeks away. And then, as Heredia suggested, it will be all systems go. Inspired, and thinking about my trip to Lowe’s this weekend, I tried my best to peel some tips from Heredia. “So what exactly do you do to make these burnt ends so …” It was no good. He was already shaking his head, zipping a finger across his lips. End of story. n

Favorites at the Shaved Duck include the burnt end sandwich, cornbread, duck confit, mac and cheese, gumbo and smothered fries.

Co-owner James Heredia is part of a trio that brought the Shaved Duck back to life last year.

The smothered fries are topped with pulled pork, pulled ribs and cheese sauce.

Roll the Dice

Dirty 20 Nerd Bar brings a Dungeons & Dragons hub to Ballwin

BY SARAH FENSKE

If you were opening a bar designed to be a hub for tabletop games and nerd culture, you might decide that there could be no better day to open for business than May 4. “May the Fourth be with you” puns have been an important play on Star Wars dialogue going all the way back to 1979 and the reign of British Iron Lady Margaret Thatcher (yes, really).

But as it turns out, that’s not why husband-and-wife team Jason Moughton and Ruth Camburn opened their new Dungeons & Dragons-focused eatery, Dirty 20 Nerd Bar (14051 Manchester Road, Ballwin), on May 4. For that, you can blame the health department.

As Moughton tells it, the couple has worked for months to renovate an old Hotshots franchise and won approval for their plans back in October. But, as they geared up to open two months ago, the health department suddenly had a new demand. “They made us put a ceiling over the bar area,” Moughton says. “They consider it a food prep area.

“If not for that,” he adds, “We would have opened in March or April.”

But not only was the new opening day an auspicious one, Moughton admits the health department’s directive ended up being a good call, aesthetically. Of the ceiling, he says, “I hate how much I love it.”

Moughton and Camburn have been

plotting their restaurant/bar since 2019, when they (along with countless other Americans) fell in love with Dungeons & Dragons. The game saw a huge pandemic-era resurgence, and the couple began to get serious about drawing up plans for a place where people can play not only D&D but any number of tabletop games.

In addition to a full bar, the couple plans to offer a roster of customizable mac and cheeses as well as sliders, flatbreads, salads and some fried food, making Dirty 20 Nerd Bar a place not just to play a game but to hang out for hours.

In these early days, though, they’re offering a stripped-down version of the menu. Moughton notes that they’re holding off on sliders for now: “We want to work out the kinks before we roll out the full menu.” In the week leading up to opening they were also, unfortunately, unable to serve booze, since their liquor license application was still pending approval. “It doesn’t look like we’re going to get it by Saturday,” Moughton said last week.

But what can a nerd do when May the Fourth is looming? The couple is ready to roll the dice and see where the winds of fortune take them. “We’re charging forward,” Moughton promised.

Dirty 20 Nerd Bar is open Tuesday, Wednesday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., with hours on Thursday, Friday and Saturday from 11 a.m. to 1:30 a.m. All of that could change, Moughton notes, depending on what customers want and when they show up.

“We’re going to pay very close attention to what our community wants,” he promises. “If nobody wants mac and cheese, we’ll nix that. Hopefully not, and hopefully people want my mac and cheese. But we want to make sure we’re building this space for the community, not just for ourselves.” n

After extensive renovations, Dirty 20 features a wide open floor plan with both a bar area and a sizable dining room. | ZACHARY LINHARES

Lord of the Rings decor is featured on the walls. | ZACHARY LINHARES

From left, managers Joe Mounce and Justin Mills, along with owners Jason Moughton and Ruth Camburn, before the opening day of Dirty 20. | ZACHARY LINHARES

Gas Station Gastronomy

Olivette Station serves delicious Pakistani food in an unassuming location

BY ALEXA BEATTIE

You know something’s up. There’s a whisk hanging on a pegboard and a couple of slotted spoons. The oil in the multi-gallon vessel under the counter can’t possibly be motor oil. That would be the brownish side of black; this one’s yellow, leaning gold. It’s cooking oil, and those things — over there where the pliers and wrenches should be — are cooking tools.

Welcome to Olivette Station, the best alternative use of space we know, located at 9680 Olive Boulevard in St. Louis County. Nazia Afzal and husband Zaeem Riaz came from the city of Chichawatni in Pakistan in 2014. Shortly afterward, she purchased Olivette Station with her brother Qamar Zaman.

“But we weren’t mechanics,” Afzal says, adding that the mechanic they did hire ended up making off with the tools. “He stole from us. He put us out of business.”

But now, Afzal is in a red apron. One minute she’s issuing lottery tickets, the next she’s dipping back to her makeshift kitchenette to assemble something that looks utterly delicious. It’s samosa chana chaat, a vegetable samosa smothered with chana (chickpea curry), finely chopped tomato, onion, jalapeño and cilantro, and dressed with raita. That’s when, even though you’ve just had your lunch, you feel like another. And after you’ve paid the ridiculously reasonable $8.99 for this food that looks like a feast, you hurry to a side room you spotted when you came in and settle yourself at a retro, lemon-yellow table.

To be clear, this is an unofficial seating area. Afzal explains that all menu items must be ordered to go because of county rules concerning food and gas stations. She looks sad. “I could do so much better, so much more if I had a full restaurant,” she says.

Afzal hasn’t always been a chef. For 12 years before leaving Pakistan, she worked as a high school biology and computer science teacher. She comes by her food experience the best way — by cooking for grandparents and parents, uncles and aunts, siblings and cousins, and also the farmers who operated her family’s dairy farm. “I can do two things: teach and cook,” she says. But if “making do” is a mark of artistry — producing samosas, chicken tikka masala, chana masala and basmati rice from a couple of slow cookers and a fancy deep fryer with a built-in fire extinguisher — then Afzal is an artist as well.

While Afzal and her brother are 50/50 owners of the Olivette BP, she owns a

second BP (on Big Bend Boulevard) with her husband. As she talks about these businesses, assembling as she does so that lovely plate of food, it’s hard not to wonder what on earth brought her here. What made her leave the wheat

and rice plains, the mango and orange orchards of the Punjabi region (which traverses both Pakistan and India) for a shopping strip in St. Louis County?

“We sold everything to come,” she says. “Better opportunity. America is a

beautiful country.”

Olivette Station also serves breakfast items like a veggie omelet with a butter tortilla, and a sausage sandwich with egg. Various renditions of crispy fried chicken also feature on the menu. n

The samosa chaat offers samosas filled with spiced potatoes and peas topped with shredded cabbage, chana masala and tamarind chutney. | ZACHARY LINHARES

Nazia Afzal previously worked as a high school teacher in Pakistan. | ZACHARY LINHARES

Olivette Station is located on Olive Boulevard in St. Louis County. | ZACHARY LINHARES

REEFERFRONT TIMES 25

Infused and Amused

The new Sinse Fire prerolls pack a powerful punch in a flavorful package

BY THOMAS K. CHIMCHARDS

I’ll admit, I viewed the Sinse Fire preroll that had been dropped off at my place of employment with some trepidation.

While I’m a person with a high tolerance, a daily smoker even, my personal tastes tend toward regular ol’ flower, or maybe a couple puffs on a vape pen. Occasionally, I’ll have a gummy. But when it comes to the really potent stuff — the concentrates, the waxes, the dabs, etc. — I usually pass. I don’t want to deal with the paranoia and anxiety that too often comes from getting Way Too High.

So the innovation on hand with the Sinse Fire prerolls — that they are infused with wax, upping their potency considerably while promising a “flavorful, terpene rich, intensely elevated smoking experience,” according to the promotional material — made me a bit nervous. It’s that “intensely” that had me on edge.

A conversation with Sinse’s director of cultivation, Justin Sheffield, did little to assuage my concerns.

“It’s definitely gonna hit harder,” Sheffield told me. “All the potencies are gonna be higher.”

Still, while I had some trepidation, I was also intrigued by what these things have to offer. Sheffield’s explanation of how the flavor of the wax mixes with and enhances the flavor of the flower was

enough to pique my curiosity.

“To me it would be like adding bitters to a bourbon cocktail,” Sheffield explained. “The bitters themselves are adding complexity to the notes the bourbon already has. And I think this is doing the same thing.

“I guess the only difference is these bitters are the same proof as the bourbon,” he added with a laugh.

As a bourbon man, that description spoke to me, and was enough to get me over my hesitance. So I fired up my onegram Sinse Fire preroll on the way to a 4/20-themed BYO Beer/Bud wedding in Defiance, eager to see what the fuss was all about.

The joint was easy to light and burned smooth, exceptionally slowly even, with no runs whatsoever. I smoked about half of it over the course of 10 minutes before I decided it prudent to put it out and assess my state of mind.

Sheffield had told me that the specifics of the flower/wax combo will rotate and change with each release; the preroll I got consisted of Cheetah Piss flower and Grape Gas wax. The Cheetah Piss’ sweetness and dessert-like creaminess contrasted interestingly with the grape and especially diesel notes of the Grape Gas, making for a highly complex flavor profile — and quite an enjoyable smoke.

My sober chauffeur and I arrived at the wedding just moments after the ceremony itself kicked off (we weren’t rude/late; the nuptials actually started a bit early). I floated into the event space on a cloud before settling into my seat. When the officiant asked the bride and groom to say “I do,” an entire childhood’s worth of Catholic mass attendance very nearly compelled me to join in on the call-and-response, signaling beyond a shadow of a doubt that I was thoroughly toasted. Luckily, I was able to catch myself.

Apparently I wasn’t the only one high as a kite on that blessed day. When the ceremony wrapped up, everyone lined

up single file for a sumptuous meal of delightful wedding staples — but everyone also shuffled through the spread backward, myself included. You got your meat before you got your buns. The finger foods and appetizers were last in the line. For me at least, the utensils were impossible to find.

I arrived at my seat eager to dig in, but sans the tools to do so. Far too high to attempt to deal with that line again, I decided to borrow the unused implements from my sober companion’s set of silverware (in her clearheaded state she’d apparently had no trouble finding them). What followed was a farce of a scene wherein I tried and hopelessly failed, for a hilariously long stretch of time, to eat a pile of green beans with a spoon while eyeing the roomful of wedding guests, hoping anyone who might have seen me struggling was at least amused by my stupidity.

I was so blasted high, in fact, that when the time came for the Wedding Toke I graciously declined. Interestingly, though, I didn’t experience any anxiety in my addled state. Grape Gas has a reputation for having calming and tranquil qualities, which I think must have helped to level out the high, even as it blasted me into the stratosphere. That’s a neat trick indeed, Sinse.

The following day I met up with a couple of associates at the Earth Day festival in Forest Park. I brought my remaining half of a joint with me and split it with the two of them; we then agreed to meet up later and compare notes regarding our individual experiences.

That never did happen. While I got so high that I have little to no recollection whatsoever of my time in the park that day, the one thing I can tell you with certainty is that the three of us utterly forgot, in our stoned states, to circle back.

It’s just further testament to the sheer power of the Sinse Fire preroll — a flavorful and well-balanced cannabis experience that I won’t hesitate to revisit. n

Despite some initial trepidation, these unassuming joints delivered a smooth, soaring high. | COURTESY PHOTO

CULTURE

[EXHIBITS]

Just Drawn This Way

A new library exhibit explores the comics scare of 1948-52 that nearly destroyed the art form

BY JESSICA ROGEN

Before there were theories about the devastating effects of social media or video games or Tide Pods on young brains, there was one about comic books.

“Back in the day, Dr. [Fredric] Wertham was really good about scaring parents about what appeared in comics,” says William Harroff. “He decided comic books are responsible for juvenile delinquency in my generation, the Baby Boom generation.”

Wertham’s impact wasn’t subtle. His anti-comics advocacy led to the 1953 U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency, Harroff says.

“They surely did burn a whole gob of comics, and they put the industry basically out of work by about 1953,” he adds.

Harroff and his wife, Charlotte Johnson, explore the comics scare of 1948 to 1952 and the impact of Wertham’s 1954 book Seduction of the Innocent in their exhibit Who Knows What Evil Lurks in the Hearts of Men (and Women) in St. Louis?, which is now open at the St. Louis Public Library’s Central Express branch (815 Olive Street, Suite 160) through the end of the month.

Harroff and Johnson’s work takes the form of borderline psychedelic comic collages that explore comics censorship. To make them, Harroff taps a technique often used by Wertham.

“Dr. Wertham would take tiny snippets from the comics, a shoulder that he said,

‘Oh, look, that’s clearly a vagina. Or, hey, this word balloon. Look at those words. Think of the secret message that’s sending to your kids,’” Harroff says. “I take small, tiny little micro sections of comics from the 1950s, the same ones that were burned and banned. And then I do my little magic, using generally Photoshop and Illustrator, to create the strange little comics that I do today.” Wertham’s impact isn’t just history to Harroff. It’s his personal origin story.

“I learned to read by reading comics, and so I’ve probably been a comic book reader now about 67 years of my 70 years on Earth,” he says. “I’ve loved comics from the very beginning because I just thought there was magic there.”

Harroff loved comics so much that he adopted the moniker “Wascally Wee Willy” as a nod to his role model, Bugs Bunny. (“It just sounded right to be a William and say ‘Wascally Wee Willy’ and other people seem to enjoy that as well.”)

Initially, he read the somewhat bland comics that came in the Wertham’s wake. Then Stan Lee and Jack Kirby got together to form Marvel in 1961.

“Suddenly the industry and the American population was ready for a new kind of comic to come back,” Harroff says. He, like many, was captivated.

But despite Marvel’s popularity, not everyone was into comics, much less took them seriously. In school, people teased Harroff, and in art school he’d literally get his hands slapped for drawing them.

Things have changed with the popularity of the Marvel superhero movies and shows such as the Walking Dead. Comics are now mainstream.

But Harroff says that we should remain vigilant against influences such as Wertham. “[We need to] let creative people be creative whenever we can,” he says.

That’s where his work — a reminder of the mistakes of the past — comes in. n

Wascally Wee Willy (a.k.a. William Harroff) and Charlotte Johnson use censored material to create new art in their new exhibit, Who Knows What Evil Lurks in the Harts of Men (and Women) in St. Louis? | COURTESY PHOTO

MUSIC

Keys to the Kingdom

With successes in standup, radio and a band that just won’t quit, Tim Convy is flying high

BY STEVE LEFTRIDGE

Tim Convy shows up at a Webster Groves restaurant with a heavily wrapped right thumb, a casualty of a moving accident involving a van door, but he doesn’t let it bother him. Things are just going too well. Sure, it’s his microphone-holding hand, the one he uses during his standup routines as one of the area’s top comics. It’s also his melody hand when he’s playing keys in Ludo, the theatrical indierock band that hit major-label success a few years back and is enjoying something of an annual revival here in St. Louis.

The 44-year-old Convy is also familiar to St. Louisans as a member of The Courtney Show, the popular morning radio program on 106.5 the Arch. Along with rocker and fellow radio personality Moon Valjean, Convy also heads up two new, fast-growing concert traditions: A Punk Rock Christmas, a holiday variety show that sold out the Pageant in December, and Can You Feel the Punk Tonight, a high-energy rock & roll take on Disney classics, which has moved to the Pageant in its second year for two shows coming up on May 11.

And if that’s not enough excitement in Convy’s life, he tells me that his wife is expecting the couple’s second child any minute. Five days later, the baby, christened Jack Convy, is born.

According to the proud papa, he was himself about little Jack’s age when the performance bug bit. “It was in my blood from the beginning,” Convy says. Convy grew up in Kirkwood, starting rock bands and working as a DJ while attending Saint Louis Priory School in the late ’90s. At Mizzou, Convy continued to command audiences — as a DJ at classic Mizzou meat market By George and as the singer in a hair-metal cover band — and scored his dream internship, a summer stint at MTV that took him to New York City in 2001 to work in the network’s studios in Times Square.

While the MTV internship continued in subsequent summers, Convy decided that the MTV gig was “the coolest job …. besides being in a band.” After all, playing in a band was what he had always wanted above everything else, and just such an opportunity was waiting for him back in Columbia.

One of Convy’s musical cohorts at Mizzou, guitarist Tim Ferrell, had started collaborating with bespectacled singer-songwriter and Washington University student Andrew Volpe. One night, Volpe recruited Convy to play keys for their burgeoning band, even though Convy had never played the instrument. No matter. Before long, Convy was playing the Moog synthesizer in Ludo.

Convy’s commitment to the band was complete. “Ludo was full time from day one,” he says. “When we were recruiting a rhythm section, we said in our ads, ‘Break up with your girlfriend, quit school, quit your job.’”

The steely focus paid off. Ludo, named after a character from the 1986 film Labyrinth, gained a fast following for their fun, high-energy pop-punk Weezermeets-Queen live shows. In 2006, Ludo signed a five-album deal with Island Records and two years later released You’re Awful, I Love You, a debut that enjoyed critical acclaim and spawned a single, “Love Me Dead,” that jumped into the Billboard Alternative Top 10. Later that year, Ludo landed spots on both Jimmy Kimmel Live! and, the biggie, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. “I got my makeup done next to Michael Caine!” Convy crows.

And then, just as Ludo was hitting the big time, the band’s momentum started to stall. Convy chooses his words carefully. “We wanted different things out of life and where the band fit in,” he says, comparing the band’s trajectory to a road trip in which the passengers agree on the destination but can’t agree on what to do when they get there.

While Convy says the band never of-

ficially broke up, Ludo stopped playing together after a final show in 2012. Convy, who had moved to New York City to work closely with the label, was left trying to make sense of what happened and where he was going next. “Things were bad,” Convy says. “I was miserable. Physically, I was in bad shape.”

So in 2014, Convy returned to St. Louis, moved back in with his parents and focused on getting healthy. It was around this time that his brother Chris’ girlfriend, Nikki Glaser, by then a rising star in the world of comedy, encouraged Tim to take a stab at standup. (Arch listeners today know Chris Convy as his brother’s morning co-host.)

Convy started attending Tuesday open mic nights at the Funny Bone in Westport Plaza, first as a spectator and eventually as a participant. “When I did it the first time, my four minutes, I didn’t tell anyone,” he says. “But that first night, I knew that this was going to be part of my life. This is it.” Eventually, Convy was promoted to hosting Tuesday nights. “The manager gave me $30 to host one night, and I went out to my car and just cried,” he remembers. “It made me feel like I was turning the corner again and that I could do something else. Everything was going to be OK.”

Convy rapidly shook off his depression and has been on a serious roll ever since. This July marks his 10th year doing standup, which has included not just gigs around the country but producing and writing for Not Safe with Nikki Glaser on Comedy Central, opening for Glaser at the Fox and producing and writing music for her upcoming HBO special, Someday You’ll Die. He’s been on morn-

ing radio in St. Louis since 2017, and the annual Punk Rock Christmas and Punk Rock Disney shows scratch his musical performance itch by pairing him with some of the area’s top musicians. For the upcoming Disney blowout, Convy promises crazy set pieces, costume changes and special guests, with an audience dressed as everything from punkers to Disney princesses.

Plus, Ludo never actually went away. “The amount of people who discovered us after we stopped playing is crazy,” Convy says. The first HalLUDOween concert, held in 2018, sold out within minutes, and now the band is up to three nights in an annual Ludo reunion and St. Louis tradition. “People come from all over the country for the Halloween shows,” Convy says. “It’s bananas. I never would have expected it.”

Looking back, Convy says that he now regrets not appreciating milestones like the Tonight Show appearance. “When we were on MTV, I didn’t enjoy it because I wanted to be on a late-night show. When I was on a late-night show, I didn’t enjoy it because I wanted to be on SNL,” he says. These days, he has learned to experience gratitude in the moment. “I make a point to enjoy every single thing,” he says. “I have to keep myself in check.”

And there’s so much to enjoy. “Things are good,” he says with a smile. With standup comedy, daily radio hijinks, regular rock-star turns, his old band still kicking and a growing young family, even a restless dreamer like Tim Convy has to admit that most of those big dreams have come true. But the look in his eyes as he talks about future plans suggests that he’s still just getting started. n

From Ludo to morning radio to writing for Nikki Glaser to standup comedy to, yes, “punk rock” shows reimagining Disney tunes, Tim Convy can do it all. | RYAN CASEY

OUT & ABOUT 28

[MUST SEE]

This week St. Louis sees a stop from the legendary NYC experimental rock act Swans, who will bring an apocalyptic cacophony of hypnotically delivered nihilism and complex soundscapes to Delmar Hall on Friday. Elsewhere, Atlanta’s Mariah the Scientist comes through to the Pageant on Tuesday, fresh off last week’s arrest in which she is accused of attacking a woman at a nightclub. (Gonna need that show money for lawyer fees, lest she end up joining her boyfriend Young Thug in the clink.) Meanwhile, Yonder Mountain String Band is set for a two-night stand at Off Broadway on Friday and Saturday, TikTok sensation Thomas Day tops a free pre-game block party at Citypark, while Boston’s Fleshwater hits the Duck Room on Wednesday to gaze at some shoes. All this and a Star Wars-themed metal band (that would be Galactic Empire, playing Off Broadway Saturday with Bit Brigade) in our picks for this week’s best shows!

FRIDAY 10

DUSTIN LYNCH: w/ Skeez 8 p.m., $35-$55. St. Louis Music Park, 750 Casino Center Dr., Maryland Heights, 314-451-2244.

IRONING: w/ Dour, Esse 8 p.m., $10. William A. Kerr Foundation, 21 O’Fallon St., St. Louis, 314-436-3325.

JEFFREY OSBORNE: w/ Will Downing 7:30 p.m., $42-$146.50. Stifel Theatre, 1400 Market St, St. Louis, 314-499-7600.

JORMA KAUKONEN: w/ John Hurlbut 7:30 p.m., $55-$65. City Winery St. Louis, 3730 Foundry Way, Suite 158, St. Louis, 314-678-5060.

SLEEP TOKEN: w/ Empire State Bastard 8 p.m., $49.50-$79.50. The Factory, 17105 N Outer 40 Rd, Chesterfield, 314-423-8500.

SWANS: w/ Kristof Hahn 8 p.m., $30. Delmar Hall, 6133 Delmar Blvd., St. Louis, 314-726-6161.

YONDER MOUNTAIN STRING BAND NIGHT 1: w/ One Way Traffic 7 p.m., $35-$40. Old Rock House, 1200 S. 7th St., St. Louis, 314-588-0505.

SATURDAY 11

BIT BRIGADE AND GALACTIC EMPIRE: w/ Super Guitar Bros 8 p.m., $22. Off Broadway, 3509 Lemp Ave., St. Louis, 314-498-6989.

CITY BLOCK PARTY: w/ Thomas Day, Lani Rose and DJ Mahf 4 p.m., free. CityparkSt. Louis, 2100 Market St, Saint Louis.

GLITCH GATHERING: w/ 18andCounting, Fatboy Dupree, Superman Damn Fool, Shnolk, Russ Hell, Freaky Steve, Master of Spifness, the Sonic Chthonic, Mook 7 p.m., free. Greenfinch Theater and Dive, 2525 S. Jefferson Ave, St. Louis, 440-666-3228.

HE IS LEGEND: w/ Codeseven, This Is Falling 8 p.m., $25. Red Flag, 3040 Locust Street, St. Louis, 314-289-9050.

PATTI LABELLE: 7 p.m., $59.50-$124.50. The

Factory, 17105 N Outer 40 Rd, Chesterfield, 314-423-8500.

WES HOFFMAN AND FRIENDS: w/ the Chandelier Swing, Uncanny Valley, Bad Planning, Cluless 7 p.m., $10. The Sinkhole, 7423 South Broadway, St. Louis, 314-328-2309. YONDER MOUNTAIN STRING BAND NIGHT 2: w/ Moon Valley 7 p.m., $35-$40. Old Rock House, 1200 S. 7th St., St. Louis, 314-588-0505.

SUNDAY 12

NF: 8 p.m., $42.50-$112.50. Chaifetz Arena, 1 S. Compton Ave., St. Louis, 314-977-5000. SPECTRAL VOICE: w/ Snort Dagger, Furnace Floor 8 p.m., $15-$20. Off Broadway, 3509 Lemp Ave., St. Louis, 314-498-6989.

TUESDAY 14

CALVA LOUISE & VUKOVI: w/ Stellar Circuits 7 p.m., $18. Blueberry Hill - The Duck Room, 6504 Delmar Blvd., University City, 314-727-4444.

CKY: w/ Crobot 7:30 p.m., $30-$54.50. Pop’s Nightclub, 401 Monsanto Ave., East St. Louis, 618-274-6720.

MARIAH THE SCIENTIST: 8 p.m., $37.50. The Pageant, 6161 Delmar Blvd., St. Louis, 314-726-6161.

MEDIUM BUILD: w/ Rosie Rush 8 p.m., $20. Off Broadway, 3509 Lemp Ave., St. Louis, 314-498-6989.

WEDNESDAY 15

FLESHWATER: w/ Modern Color, 9million 8 p.m., $18. Blueberry Hill - The Duck Room, 6504 Delmar Blvd., University City, 314-727-4444.

LACUNA COIL: w/ Oceans of Slumber 7:30 p.m., $29.50. Delmar Hall, 6133 Delmar Blvd., St. Louis, 314-726-6161.

MERLOCK: w/ Scuzz, Kilverez 8 p.m., $10. The Sinkhole, 7423 South Broadway, St. Louis, 314-328-2309. n

SAVAGE LOVE 29

Messed Up

BY DAN SAVAGE

I recently discovered that my on-again/ off-again boyfriend of 10 years has been using online classifieds to schedule encounters with men. He creates posts when he’s out of town for work, and he’s very specific about what he’s looking for. The acts are punitive in nature (but consensual), and he is always on the receiving end of these punitive activities. I wish to note that I am not someone who snoops. Rather, I am the sort of person who notices patterns of behavior and things suddenly come to me when I’m cooking or on a walk. Based on the secular community my boyfriend grew up in, I suspect that his anonymous activities are the result of some early childhood trauma. Based on the activities involved, I believe he was either abused or witnessed abuse while his brain was still developing and these activities — along with his chronic use of pot (on top of painkillers and a couple of drinks each day) are an unhealthy coping mechanism. I don’t judge him for the acts themselves, nor do I judge him for his sexuality. But I am not OK with his lying and cheating, and I very much resent his haphazard attitude toward my sexual health. He refuses to talk with me about this, and the silence is further eroding my trust, to say nothing of the plans we made for our future together. Since he won’t discuss it, I have no way of knowing if he’s sought help, as he has in the past with other issues. I’ve spoken with one trusted friend about this, but I have otherwise kept it to myself. I love him and that will never change. But now what?

Boyfriend Troubling Secrets

Here’s what you know: something about punitive (“inflicting, involving, or aiming at punishment”) theatrics makes your boyfriend’s dick hard, and he’s been seeking out other men who share his kink for consensual encounters. And here’s what you don’t know: why these punitive activities, whatever they are (spanking? flogging? flossing?), make your boyfriend’s dick hard. Backing up for a second: While you claim to have intuited these facts about your boyfriend — the realization came to you while you were making soup or something — the details you shared are too specific for this to be a mere hunch. It sounds like you suspected something was up and snooped on his computer or his phone. So, while you may not like to think of yourself as the kind of person who snoops, BTS, you are the kind of person who snoops. (The proof is in the snooping.) And snooping is always wrong … except when the person who snooped finds something they had a right to know about, e.g., massive debts,

a secret second family, sexual risk taking that puts the snooper at risk, etc. So, if your boyfriend is engaging in sex acts that place your health at risk and/or doing things that violate the spirit of your on-again monogamous commitment, you were right to snoop, and you have grounds for going off-again. But was he doing anything that put your health at risk? If spanking and/or flogging and/ or some other mystery punishment is all he’s been doing with other men — no sexual activities, just punitive ones — he wasn’t putting you at risk, BTS, and your boyfriend may have rationalized his deceit for that reason. He may also have been reluctant to tell you because he thought you wouldn’t understand … and it’s clear from your reaction that you don’t. You’ve made a huge, pathologizing leap from, “My boyfriend likes being spanked by other men,” to, “My boyfriend must have been sexually abused before his brain was fully formed.” Your boyfriend might have a history of childhood sexual abuse — many men sadly do — but not all kinky men were abused, and not all men who were abused are kinky. And while his use of substances is concerning, his substance abuse and his kinks aren’t necessarily linked.

You have a legitimate beef with your boyfriend: He’s been lying to you, BTS, and if his meetups with other men involved more than punitive activities — if spanking and/or flogging was followed up by sucking and/or fucking — he put your health at risk, and he owes you an explanation, an apology, and some lab work. If you can keep the conversation focused on what he was doing, BTS, and stop making up shit up about why, he’s likelier to open up to you about the what and the why.

I broke up with my ex in February after four years together, and he didn’t take it very well even though I was as caring about it as possible. It had just become clear to me that we had totally different goals and visions for how we wanted to live our lives. He is coming back to town next week for work — his boss told me — and he’ll be here a week. I want to see him. Should I ask if he would be willing to meet for coffee or something? I want to know how he is doing and what his plans for the future are. I want to know he’s OK. But he refuses to talk to me. Maybe it’s still too soon? What do you think, Dan? Should I reach out or let him be?

Wishing Him Well

It doesn’t matter what I think, WHW, and it doesn’t matter what you want. If your ex-boyfriend doesn’t want to see you right now, you don’t get to have coffee with him. And since I’m guessing your ex-boyfriend’s refusal to see you wasn’t unprompted — you reached out to him already, he told you to fuck off already — you

Like a drone covered head-to-toe in rubber or a furry in a mascot costume or a woman in Lycra a superhero, you enjoy — from time to time — erasing and/ or transforming yourself. In that, you are far from alone.

already know how he feels about seeing you: He’s not into the idea. He might be devastated right now, he might be doing OK — either way, your ex-boyfriend is under no obligation to make you feel better about your decision to end this relationship. If he changes his mind and wants to meet up and talk, you’ll hear from him. In the meantime, WHW, you’re gonna have to respect his expressed wants and needs: He wants you to fuck off; he needs you to leave him alone.

P.S. What the fuck was his boss thinking when he told you your ex was coming to town? That’s not information any employer should be sharing with the exes of their employees!

I’m a 33-year-old gay man emailing you because I have a kink that I enjoy but have always felt ashamed about. Earth-shattering, right? My kink is called “wet and messy” (WAM) and it involves getting covered head to toe in messy, gloopy substances. People who are into this usually have preferred substances; in no specific order my preferred substances are paint, mud and pies. People enjoy WAM for a variety of reasons; some people like the humiliation aspect, but I just love the feeling of losing myself in the mess. It’s very primal and very freeing. I’ve done this with a couple of men I met through a website that caters to people who are interested in this, and I’ve even told my long-term boyfriend about it. He took it well and even offered to do it with me, but I shot him down. The problem is I feel ashamed about this on some level. I know it’s harmless, if a little weird, but I can’t shake the feeling of shame that keeps me from enjoying this part of my sexuality. I feel like I’ll be branded a freak forever if my boyfriend sees how much I enjoy this. This feels like as much of a struggle as coming out of the closet was. Any sage words? Getting Off On Pies

I’ve talked with a lot of kinky gay men

over the years — ahem — and more than one has described kink as a second coming out. That said, gay people who wanna come out to lovers and friends about kink have an advantage over straight people who wanna do the same: experience and perspective. Because telling lovers you’re kinky is a lot less scary than telling parents you’re gay; lovers that shame can be replaced, parents who shame are forever. But just as coming out as gay has the power to improve lives and relationships, coming out as kinky has the power to improve love lives and romantic relationships.

And speaking of romantic relationships …

Don’t deny yourself the pleasure of exploring your kink with someone who cares about you, and don’t deny your boyfriend the pleasure of giving you this pleasure. It doesn’t sound like he offered to indulge you because he doesn’t want you doing this with other guys — he’s not offering to grimly go through the motions to control you — but that he offered because he’s sincerely invested in your pleasure. And if your boyfriend is one of those guys who gets off on getting people off, letting him get you off will get him off, too. And sometimes kinks are contagious, GOOP, even the weirder ones: a guy gives his partner’s kink a try and something clicks and before you know it’s his weird kink, too.

And your kink isn’t really that weird. While WAM, a.k.a. “gunging” and “sploshing,” isn’t my thing, it’s not that hard to wrap my head around it. You find the sensation of paint, mud and pies running down your skin arousing. Not for me! But easily understood! Additionally, you like being covered in gooey substances because it relieves you — temporarily — from the burden of being yourself. Like a drone covered head-totoe in rubber or a furry in a mascot costume or a woman in Lycra a superhero, you enjoy — from time to time — erasing and/or transforming yourself. In that, you are far from alone.

Look, GOOP, if getting covered in slime gives you joy and doesn’t hurt anyone, take your boyfriend’s yes for an answer! If you could learn to let go of the shame of being a cocksucker, you can let go of the shame of being a wetand-messy player. Get some tarp, bake some pies and invite the boyfriend over to play.

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