I Wasn’t a Superpredator. I Was a Kid Who Made a Terrible Decision.
At age 14, Derrick Hardaway took part in the murder of an 11-year-old. The media used the crime to build the myth of the superpredator—and stuck him with a label he struggles to shed.
In Chicago, late on the night of Aug. 31, 1994, Derrick Hardaway and his brother Cragg took part in the execution of Robert Sandifer, whose nickname was “Yummy.” Cragg, who pulled the trigger, was 16 years old. Derrick, 14, drove the car. Yummy, a fellow Black Disciples gang member who was being hunted by police for the murder of a teenage girl, was 11. The three boys, all Black, became exhibits in the sensational media myth of the juvenile “superpredator.” That myth held that a percentage
