Laura Glesby Photos
Jacqueline Beirne (with Kimberly Hart and Laurie Sweet): "The parents are overwhelmed."
“I don’t even want to call them kids,” said Kimberly Hart as she described the visceral fear of watching teen drivers speed, swerve and swirl up Shelton Avenue.
An hour later, after an emotional dialogue about the car-stealing “Kia Boyz” in Newhallville, Hart made the observation: “They’re babies.”
Hart joined a dozen others at a community town hall Thursday evening hosted by Newhallville Alder Brittiany Mabery-Niblack, part of a bimonthly series of meetings for open dialogue about community concerns. Thursday’s meeting took place in the cafeteria of Lincoln-Bassett school.
That night, Mabery-Niblack had convened Assistant Chief Bertram Ettienne and District Manager Jarrell Lowery from the New Haven Police Department to hear residents’ concerns about public safety in Newhallville.
While Hart does not live in the neighborhood, she goes to church there at St. Mary’s UFWB on Shelton Avenue. She arrived at Thursday’s meeting alongside a handful of other St. Mary’s parishioners with one concern in mind: the throngs of teenagers speeding up Shelton, doing donuts and hanging out of car windows.
She recalled one particularly frightening “street takeover” incident in February. “Our parishioners were very afraid.”
Hart referred to the teens as “Kia Boyz” — a term coined by teens inspired by a TikTok challenge to steal Kia and Hyundai cars. The self-identified “Kia Boyz” (or “Kia Boys”) started out in Milwaukee in 2022 and grew via social media throughout the country, including in New Haven.
A surge in car thefts since the pandemic has begun to cool down, according to police statistics. A March 23 CompStat report indicates that car thefts in 2025 are down by 27 percent compared to the same time period last year.
Still, attendees at Thursday’s meeting made clear that the Kia Boyz are affecting their sense of safety in the city.
“We have a lot of elderly people, handicapped people” at church, observed Nathaniel Jones, a trustee at St. Mary’s. “These people can’t get out of the way quickly,” he said. From his vantage point, the drivers don’t seem to care. He said he’s witnessed them “throwing things out of the window” while racing down the street.
Both community members and police at the meeting called for the teens to face harsher penalties from the criminal justice system.
“You can’t just let them” drive recklessly without sufficient consequences, said Mark Barros.
Assistant Chief Ettienne said that police often find themselves arresting the kids only for them to get released soon afterwards.
“We do need stricter laws for the kids,” echoed Sgt. Lowery.
In the meantime, Ettienne and Lowery urged the public not to confront or fight back against the teens.
“You’re talking about teenagers who are reckless,” emphasized Ettienne. “A lot of times, there’s a gun in the car.”
“When I say ‘it’s just property,’ I’m not minimizing what you did to get it,” he added. “I’m saying your life matters more.”
When it was Jones’ turn to speak, he stood up — and fought to keep the waver from his voice. “I’m always trying to keep my boys out of the system — but you don’t get help until you get arrested,” he said.
When one of his relatives recently got arrested, Jones described, the family felt grief for both their loved one and the victims of the crime at hand. “He was a kid. We couldn’t reach him,” he said, holding back tears. “It’s hard being in the middle.”
Jones agreed, however, that the “Kia Boyz” should face firm consequences.
Responding to Jones, Lowery remembered a recent incident where police arrested four “Kia Boyz.”
“Two were 13, one was 15, one was 17,” Lowery said. “Three of the four had guns” — the 15-year-old and the two 13-year-olds, he said.
“What does a 13-year-old know about having a gun?” he asked. The room filled with sighs and shaking heads.
Assistant Police Chief Bertram Ettienne and District Manager Jarrell Lowery.
Jacqueline Beirne, a project manager at Clifford Beers Community Health Care, said she frequently meets kids and teens while knocking on neighbors’ doors after violent events as part of the organization’s Community Healing Support Team.
“So many of these young people, they lacked interaction during key developmental years during Covid,” Beirne said. “The parents are overwhelmed.”
Ettienne recalled once speaking with a kid involved in a crime. Ettienne recalled the kid saying to him, “I’m angry because I can’t read.”
He had “trauma that wasn’t being addressed,” Ettienne said.
“Our kids are seeing things, hearing things,” said Jones. “It’s OK to ask for help.”
Beirne urged attendees of the meeting to let Clifford Beers know if there are any families who may need to be connected to additional resources.
Mabery-Niblack pointed out that there are many existing programs for kids and teens, including through the city’s Youth and Recreation department, that may be able to help them find purpose and support.
She suggested that neighbors join Beirne’s community canvasses in order to reach out to neighbors.
“The wheel is already invented,” she said. “Once they see that people care about their concerns, that is where change happens.”
Hart said that the conversation made her feel more optimistic — as well as motivated to advocate for harsher punishments against the teens’ dangerous driving and car-stealing.
“They’re babies,” she marveled as she left the meeting.
Alder Brittiany Mabery-Niblack: "Once they see that people care about their concerns, that is where change happens.”