Judge Frank Caprio asked 12-year-old with autism about mom’s violation—his priceless response left the judge in awe
Judge Frank Caprio is known to give incredibly sensible judgments. For one of the cases, the judge was listening to a woman, Michelle Verdayo’s cases on violations, as shared by a clip from Caught In Providence. Accompanying the woman was her 12-year-old autistic son Arion, who was actively participating in the hearing. As Caprio laid out the case and the violations by the mom, the 12-year-old voiced his unique and transparent opinion. He also rendered a short but honest dialogue about his autism that stole the judge’s heart.
As the mother-son duo made their way into the courtroom, Arion, with much interest introduced himself. “I am Arion. A-R-I-O-N, I am 12 years old, I’m in the seventh grade.” The judge got into a brief conversation with the boy when his mum revealed that he is on the autism spectrum and has ADHD. Caprio was already impressed with the boy’s fluent and articulate speech and said, “He’s very intelligent.” When the boy was asked what he wanted to do after he was out of school, Arion confidently answered that he was still thinking but definitely wanted to be successful.
“It’s hard to decide — when you’re at that age, you don’t know what you wanna do. At some points, you wanna do what you wanna do but you don’t want to disappoint your family in any way,” he remarked. The judge was taken aback by the boy’s thoughts and how he presented himself. “You are speaking with the maturity of an adult,” he remarked. Coming to the violations, the judge revealed that Arion’s mom had 4 red light violations. The boy was shocked but immediately replied, “I still love you, Mom.” As the trio looked at the footage of the mom driving, the boy began giving remarks about which red light violation seemed fairly harmless and which was bad.
When they saw footage where the mom nearly rammed into a car while running the red light, Arion gasped and exclaimed, “How dare you!?” The judge was taken aback by his remark. He couldn’t believe how smart and transparent the boy was. “You are being chastized right now and rightfully so,” he told the mom, with a smile on his face. Caprio added, “You’ve got a great kid.” At this point, the 12-year-old was not afraid to express his opinions. “You think you know your mom and she goes out and blatantly does that,” he said, leaving all present in laughter. His unique nature pushed the judge to ask him and his mom about his autism. Michelle honestly revealed that it was hard and sometimes still is. With his dad out of the picture, things get overwhelming for her at times.
Seeing her get worked up, the boy decided to pitch in. He noted that despite being teased, he doesn’t look at his autism as a problem. "I'm proud to have my autism because it makes me who I am now,” Arion confidently said. “I am so impressed,” Judge Caprio said. He was moved by the boy’s stature and asked him to come up and shake hands too. When he went up, the judge asked him for his verdict. “Case dismissed,” Arion replied while banging the gavel. “You won your case, your boy presented you well,” Caprio said. The judge emphasized one of Arion’s statements, “Just because you’re different doesn’t mean that you should be treated differently because we’re all human beings. Congratulations Michelle for raising such an inspirational son.”