State prosecutor Lonnie Braxton retires, reflects on law, life and learning
Jan. 2—By 1966, segregated schools had been deemed unconstitutional and were few and far between. But not in Greenville, Mississippi.
When Lonnie Braxton, now a legendary prosecutor in New London, donned his cap and gown at Coleman High School, his school was still segregated, and he was kept apart from his white peers. It wasn't until he enlisted in the Navy — the first step on his road to New London — that he saw what life could be outside the segregated South.
On Friday, he retired after a law career spanning decades that ended with 10 years as senior assistant state's attorney for juvenile matters in New London.
But his dreams of being a lawyer began in a little white "shotgun shack" with a brown door and black roof in a small Southern town.
When Braxton was young, his parents, Lonnie and Lenora, worked on a plantation. Their own educations had halted in the third grade, but that didn't stop them from instilling a lifelong love of learning in the younger Lonnie and his sister, Katheryn.
Words of wisdom from his parents weave themselves into conversation as Braxton recounts the way he's lived his life and led his career.
"As my father would often remind me," he said, "anybody can eat cake but not everybody can go into a kitchen on a hot day, with bad utensils and make their own."
And his mother's musings on gratitude: "Some soup's better than no soup."
The lessons he learned from his parents created what he describes as "a Captain America type shield" around him throughout his life, one made of love. Their moral compasses helped strengthen his own, which he used every day in the justice system. And they were determined to teach him and his sister the ways of the world, despite never having seen much of it themselves.
"These are people who taught two people to fly when they didn't know how to fly themselves," Braxton said. "My mother and father were two people who somehow met and formed the catalyst that put my sister and I in the position where we were able to accomplish stuff. If they had had the opportunities I have had, I wonder what they would have been able to accomplish."
Though they weren't in a position to bring their children on extravagant adventures, they wanted them to know how to travel. So they traveled to the town of Leland, Mississippi, 10 miles away from home. Just to learn how to use the train.
A few years later, in 1956, his parents wanted them to see a bit more. So he, his sister and mother boarded a bus to Memphis. It was on that bus, Braxton said, that he was able to glimpse the progress unfolding in other parts of the country.
As they crossed into Memphis, Braxton and his sister were able to move to the front of the bus — something they'd never been allowed to do before, a moment that still brings him to tears decades later.
Back in Greenville, Braxton's world was expanding by way of a radio his parents bought him; he listened intently as news came in from countries all over the globe. "My world was a lot bigger than Mississippi even though I had hardly ever left," he said.
And the desire to change the world he was learning about was growing.
"I knew, too, that in order to change things for real you needed the ability to impact it," he said. "And most of the change that came about was through laws."
So, he decided to become an international lawyer. But as he grew wiser, he said he realized that "laws don't change the hearts and minds of anybody."
"We like to think so, but it doesn't happen. So I was hoping I could earn the amount of money that I could take that money and effect change," he said. To do that, he decided to work before enrolling in law school.
Braxton, now 73, said he's often asked how he ended up in New London.
"When I was a kid, I always liked to read and I was curious about things. I would always flip things over to see where they were made, and they would say manufactured in Norwich, Norwalk, Stamford or New London." So he came where he figured the jobs were.
"I arrived in New London a couple days after Thanksgiving in 1968. I had $156 and a few pennies," he recalled.
He got two jobs, one at Electric Boat and one at a stereo store, and enrolled in night classes Monday through Friday at Connecticut College. He left briefly to open a store of his own in New Hampshire, learning the ropes of business ownership, and graduated in 1986. He finished law school at the University of Connecticut two years later.
But his course wasn't without challenges. He failed the bar several times and learned that he was dyslexic and had attention deficit disorder, or ADD. These things, he said, taught him a lesson: "People often think that things run smooth. In real life, things don't run smooth, but what you have to be equipped for is to persevere and to have a little tenacity."
"I remind people when I talk to them that we have a lot of myths in this country and some of them are very destructive to people. One of the myths that we tell people is that if you work hard, really hard, you're going to succeed," he said. "I beg to differ, because there are people that work hard every day, they make all the sacrifices I've made, if not more, and one thing can go wrong and destroy it. The real thing we should be saying is that if it doesn't work out, you have to stay at it. You have to stay in the fight to persevere."
And persevere he did.
His first internship was at New London Superior Court G.A. 10, working with motor vehicle cases. He then returned to UConn, where he worked at the law school until he passed the bar and eventually was hired as a housing prosecutor, then a line prosecutor, then a juvenile prosecutor.
He said he felt like he was working in a lab as he watched what was happening to people moving through the justice system — if a person committed a crime as a juvenile, even if they commit no other offenses and serve their time, they often live their life marked with "almost like a scarlet letter."
He said he realized that if you can set someone on the right course in juvenile court, you can "save us all."
"I look at this job I've had all these years as a sacred trust. My job wasn't to judge people, it was to do justice. And I always looked at being a prosecutor like being a doctor: do no harm, we have all the power," said Braxton, which led him, of course, to another of his parents' sayings: "Power can only be used one of two ways, to lift or to crush. Very powerful people use power to lift, tyrants use it to crush."
So, he worked to help society as a whole, to seek justice every day. He hopes that work will continue on without him.
Days ahead of his retirement on New Year's Eve, Braxton penned a statement he hoped would summarize his emotions, memories and hopes. In it, he said he is looking forward to starting the next chapter of his life.
"Before I fade into the sunset, I have a few things I not only want to say but I feel for me personally need to be said," he wrote. "The first thing I want to say is thanks. As my father and mother would often ask my sister and me: 'Who makes it through life without someone's help?' And the answer was always 'nobody,' because to get through life at some point someone helps you whether you see it, know it or acknowledge it. We are all at some point in our lives given a hand. So I say, thank you to the people of New London County for their hand in giving me the honor and privilege of representing them as one of your Senior Assistant State's Attorneys. Thanks also to those of you who extended a hand or even just a smile in making my life and career such a great one."
He thanked his colleagues, his wife, his sister, his professors, his parents. He thanked his elementary school teacher, Sister Carmelita Steinn, whom he still calls every night before bed.
He thanked the people of New London — the owners of a stationery shop who always made sure he had legal pads and pens, the framer at Studio 33 on Bank Street who congratulated him on his degree — and said the list could go on forever.
"But what this list would really represent is New London. A city which if you cut through some of the not so very kind things that are all too often said about it, it's really a great place to live," he said.
In his retirement, he plans to dedicate time to his hobbies, from greenhouse gardening to the African American Film Festival he hosts at the Public Library of New London. He'll spend time with his wife, Gwen, and his son Lonnie Braxton III, a Special Olympics athlete and champion. He will cook, and enjoy, a lot of Southern soul food. And he'll continue his lifelong quest of learning.
"Change has come and it's my time to now bow out gracefully," he ended his letter. "So again to all I give my most heartfelt thanks. And may we all live happily ever after."
