Johnnie Jordan Case

Jordan Thompson

SOCA 233

Jeri Kirby

July 20, 2014

Paper #2

In the novel "What Happened to Johnnie Jordan?" the author illustrates the issues and complications that Johnnie Jordan had to experience throughout his childhood in the first several chapters. Johnnie Jordan was mentally, emotionally and physically abused by both of his parents. Also, Johnnie Jordan was suffering from being neglected and having an unstable lifestyle due to the fact that he was constantly being bounced from foster home to foster home.

In the next couple of chapters following the murder of Mrs. Johnson, and Johnnie Jordan getting caught, the author takes the audience to another place. She takes us to the past so we (the audience) can gain a better understanding about Johnnie Jordan. The author talks about Johnnie Jordan's background in the following chapters. She introduces to two new characters now, John and Lorraine Saunders, the grandparents of Johnnie Jordan. John Saunders was a pimp. He had gotten around with a lot of females. Consequently, he got a girl pregnant and had Johnnie's dad, presently named Johnnie, Sr. Johnnie, Sr.'s mother did not have the money or the resources to take care of her child and with Johnnie Sr.'s dad being a pimp, he was never around to help out. Johnnie Sr.'s mother did the best thing she could do and gave him to the Saunders. Loraine was happy about taking in Johnnie, Sr.; however, John was not. Fortunately, Loraine convinced John into taking Johnnie, Sr.

Throughout the years, Johnnie, Sr. was in the entertainment industry. He finally became a traveling entertainer and later met his future wife. The author then talks about Johnnie Jordan's childhood. Johnnie Jordan did not live a common, typical childhood. His parents had seven children, including Johnnie, Jr. Also, his parents were both drug addicts, who were very abusive and brought negative impacts on their children such as mental damage, physical pain, and prostituting their children in order to get money for their drugs. Johnnie Jordan was not getting much attention from his parents. Due to the lack of attention, Johnnie Jordan shoplifted a lot and sold drugs throughout his childhood. After countless years of abuse and neglect, the Child Protective Services took the children away from their parents and placed them in foster homes. Unfortunately, every time the services placed Johnnie Jordan and his siblings in foster homes, they would run away and find their parents. After many attempts and struggles of finding a foster home for Johnnie and his siblings, the Child Protective Service kept the children and made them see a psychologist, Dr. Baker. Dr. Baker had several meetings with the children throughout their time of being with Child Protective Service. Surprisingly, Dr. Baker stated that from his meetings and results, Johnnie Jordan had the best chance of being successful out of all the children. Finally, Child Protective Service decided to let the children live with their grandmother, Lorraine Saunders. However, the children continued to run away to their parents. Desperately trying to find a solution, the Child Protective Service had no choice but to separate the children so that they could not get in trouble together or run away to their parents.

Johnnie Jordan looked like he was going in the right direction in his life. He recently joined the River Road Group Home. Being in the River Road Group Home became the first time that Johnnie Jordan felt like he was in a family. The group home took care of the group of boys and put them in school so they could become educated. Johnnie Jordan was doing well in school and was enjoying going to school. Unfortunately, the group home had to close due to insufficient funds. Johnnie Jordan then tried to get adopted by one of the group leaders, J.R. Robinson. Johnnie Jordan and J.R. had a good connection and relationship. However, J.R. Robinson did not want to adopt Johnnie and denied Johnnie's