Those of us working to keep people out of the criminal justice system lost a dedicated and powerful ally when Halbert Sullivan died on April 15th at 69 years of age. In his absence, we must all work that much harder to provide opportunities for struggling individuals to turn their lives around and stay out of jail or prison.
Mr. Sullivan was the founder and CEO of Fathers & Families Support Center, which promotes parents’ involvement in their children’s lives through job training, group therapy, community service and parenting workshops. Many of its clients have had experiences with the criminal justice system, including for criminal non-support of their children. In 2017, the St. Louis American reported that since its inception in 1997, the center had served more than 14,000 fathers and their families, transitioning nonparticipating parents to greater involvement in the lives of over 40,000 children.
Though he later expanded the center’s support services to include mothers as well, its founding mission was directed at rehabilitating and supporting delinquent fathers, not only for their own sake but for the health of the whole family and indeed the entire community.
“The dad is very important to the child’s psychological and emotional development,” Mr. Sullivan told the American. “If we could draw the dad’s strength and involvement, then we could get rid of a lot of issues that our youth are facing today, and we’d help to break the cycle of poverty.”
Having earned a master’s degree in social work from Washington University at the age of 47, Mr. Sullivan had the research to back up this claim. About 82 percent of all teenage girls who get pregnant come from fatherless homes, he taught us. About 73 percent of all high school dropouts, 70 percent of all juveniles in detention, and 65 percent of all homeless and runaway youth have no father in their lives, he would point out.
My friend Halbert often shared his own story, how he learned these lessons the hardest way. He had been one of the troubled young men he would later help. He struggled with drug addiction for 11 years. In those years he was in and out of prison for drug-related offenses until his sister guided him to a drug rehabilitation program.
The people leading that program were former addicts who had turned their lives around. They now had jobs, homes and intact families. They gave him hope that he could have those things too, and he transformed himself into a leader who built programs that helped tens of thousands of people struggle their way out of addiction, poverty and the crimes enmeshed with addiction and poverty.
When I introduced Prosecutor-Led Diversion to the St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office, I established a community-based Diversion Advisory Committee to advise us and to help us find community resources to help those who suffered from addiction and were in need of mental health care. Halbert was one of the first to volunteer to serve on our committee. Diversion is an initiative very close in spirit to the Fathers & Families Support Center. We identify low-level, non-violent offenders who would benefit from support services and offer them treatment as an alternative to criminal charges. Our work will be that much harder to do without Halbert, and we rededicate ourselves to this difficult work in his honor and name.
Halbert left us on the 73rd anniversary of Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier in Major League Baseball. I think of something that Jackie Robinson said as we mourn the loss of a true public servant in Halbert Sullivan:
“A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.” Here’s to an important life that impacted and transformed the lives of so many. Rest in peace and power; you will be missed.
Wesley Bell is St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney.
Funeral services for Halbert Sullivan will be held Tuesday, April 27, 2021 at Schrader Funeral Home and Crematory, 14960 Manchester Road, Ballwin, MO 63011. First Viewing 1:00pm – 6:30pm; Service: 6:30pm – 7:45pm; Last Viewing 7:45pm – 8:00pm
