On The Anniversary of George Floyd’s Death, Say Her Name
Her name is Celeste Miller. And she’s not dead.
But she’s not living either, at least not in the way that she did. She’s scared. She’s nervous. She feels unsafe. And no one should blame her.
So, I’m going to tell you a story. There once was a little girl who loved to go to school. She reveled in independence. Eventually, this little girl started sleeping in her parent’s room. They didn’t think anything of it — her brother slept in her parent’s room so she’s probably just wanting to be closer to them. She didn’t like for the lights to be out ANYWHERE. But again, no alarm. On a Monday afternoon, she went to the nurse’s office vomiting. The nurse cleaned her up and sent her back to class. Her teacher, however, felt that there was something wrong. “You’ve been acting out all day — what’s going on with you?” she said. The little girl then offloaded with a scenario that is every parent and teacher’s nightmare. See, Celeste told her teacher that another student — DOUBLE her size — was molesting her in the school bathroom. She told her that the girl had been following her into the bathroom and raping her in the stalls. Suddenly, hindsight became 20/20 and Celeste became the only vision in the room.
I want to tell you that this story is fiction and the people in this story are fake…, but I can’t. That Monday was my worst nightmare. That Monday, I had to come face-to-face with my seven-year-old and try to understand how the violations that she has experienced at the ONE PLACE where she was supposed to be safe had been allowed. I’m no different than most women — I have a #metoo past that I’ve worked hard to push into the back of my mind so that I can operate cohesively during the day. It’s difficult and requires a lot of therapy. But my daughter… my now eight-year-old rape survivor…I wouldn’t wish this on Satan himself.
This road has been hard. The school system that was supposed to protect her has done nothing. They wouldn’t help us find her another school. They wouldn’t ensure us that she will never be subjected to being in the same school as her rapist. They wouldn’t even pay $120/month in therapy costs. They’ll pay $150k to rename five schools in our district that have names that are connected to the confederacy but when little girls get raped on school property? Sorry. SUCKS TO BE YOU.
The Hampton Police Department closed my daughter’s case without saying a word to our family — not because there wasn’t proof. My daughter’s assailant confessed. They closed it because the girls were 18 months apart. If it hadn’t been an audit of sexual assault reports that had occurred during the pandemic, the detective that saw her case wouldn’t have ever touched her file. He would have never had a moment of conscience that said “I can’t let this go.” He would have never asked for a forensic interview. He would have never went to bat for us.
What’s worse? A police detective who reopened a case that should have never been closed, or a Commonwealth Attorney who told him, “We won’t prosecute because of her age?” See, the Commonwealth Attorney in Hampton, Anton Bell thinks that little girls don’t know when they have done something wrong. They do. He thinks that there is no culpability. There is. His office declined to give Celeste a voice. Not a phone call, not a meeting, not a smoke signal to say “We see you.” The Commonwealth Attorney cared more about my daughter’s rapist than he cared about her. He said nothing. The Victims Services Unit of his office said nothing. Since the CA determined that there was not a case, Celeste was not a victim. Her panic attacks say otherwise. Her therapy sessions say otherwise. Waking up in the middle of the night to her screaming her rapist’s name and sobbing in my arms say otherwise.
To add insult to injury, the Hampton City School Board had no choice but to see my face. I stood before them on May 5th, girded with my grief and a fully charged iPad and called them out on their terms. I spoke of our family’s anguish and how Hampton City Schools has failed us. Joe Kilgore, the Chairman of the school board, wasn’t listening to what I said. “Miss Miller, you’ve had five minutes — you need to wrap it up.” Even with that dagger, I wasn’t moved. I refused to allow this man to make me break form so that he could label me as “just another angry black woman.” Since that speech, I’ve spoken to another member of the school board, who even in my positions of advocating for youth in our city, couldn’t say “I know you.” His words: “I’ve seen your face. I know your story.” Then, he smiled, as if I was just another box to be checked off for when he runs for re-election. Best believe, sir — I’m not.
Hampton City Schools suspended Celeste’s rapist for ten days, and then recommended that she be long term suspended or expelled. But then COVID happened, and she wasn’t out of school five days. Now, this child predator is in the same classroom as Celeste’s cousin and before this story became public, her current teacher had NO CLUE about what had happened in the bathroom when she was raping little girls. Her teacher had no idea to put safeguards in place so that she would never be alone in a bathroom again as an invitation to re-offend. Why? Because they didn’t give a damn. When little black girls are being raped in bathroom stalls, Hampton City Schools does not care at all.
How many times do little black girls have to be raped in a school for the school to accept some responsibility? One? Two? Five? OVER TEN? Does it need to be on video? Does she have to commit suicide? DOES MY DAUGHTER HAVE TO DIE? What will it take for someone to accept responsibility? What about her rapist’s parents? Did Celeste’s rapist see something that she shouldn’t have? Was something done to her that made her think that it was okay to do my baby harm? I can’t answer that. All that I can say is that Hampton City Schools owes my family a resolution. All I can say is that the Commonwealth Attorney and his staff owe our community safeguards where her assailant receives as much therapy as possible and enough time away from that school (in alternate placement) so that she can’t do this to someone else’s daughter. They owe us a real response.
I’m not afraid of a fight. I’ll come to their venues with my pretty words and articulate speech and bring it straight to their doors in ways that they can’t dismiss me. But I see now that they aren’t concerned with my presence. They aren’t concerned with the presence of my family. Unless Hampton City Schools and in turn the City of Hampton are embarrassed enough on a national stage, this will be a blip on their radar. One nail won’t break a dam, but ten thousand nails will create a crack and the dam will fall. At least, that is what I believe. I have to believe that to keep going.
My grandfather moved from Lynchburg to attend a little school called Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute, where he met a waitress who’d make his lunches when he came to the restaurant with his classmates. He was obsessed with her and she was playing hard to get. Eventually, however, he got the prize — her hand in marriage, and they built their home from scratch in 1942. They adopted my mother, she threw a rock and hit my dad — a sailor from Louisville, Kentucky on his first duty station. Hampton is a small city. We are a small family. Our demographic is the same as most families in Hampton Roads. I threw a rock and hit a sailor. We’ve been married 16 years and have three children together. My husband retired in August of 2020 with 20 years of service and works for the federal government as a civilian. I own my home and don’t have a mortgage because my grandparents worked their asses off so that my mother had and so that I have. You’d think that with our demographic, people in this city would be more than willing to listen to us. But we aren’t a white family in Willow Oaks, Fox Hill or Michael’s Woods. We are a Black family in Rip Rap. There is so much self-hatred in Hampton that six black and one white members of the school board don’t care about little black girls being raped in elementary school bathrooms. They won’t see her importance until she is laying in someone’s morgue. Then the “thoughts and prayers” will pour in like molasses and they will dismiss her like yesterday’s headline.
That will not be her fate. Desmond Tutu once said, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.” Her name is Celeste Miller and she is going to live.
Her name is Celeste Miller. Say her name.
If you’d like to join the fight, please visit Justice for Celeste #8forCeleste
NOTE: I’d like to thank RhodaYoungLIVE for being the first journalist willing to take a stand for Celeste and allow my family to speak about this on camera. I’d also like to thank Chris Horne and WAVY-TV 10 for speaking with my family and giving air time so that more people in Hampton Roads could learn about this as well. My hope is that more people will share this and it will get the traction it needs to support Celeste and make real change in our community and beyond. MANY THANKS — Nikia
