It looks like htey got a legit argument....they shoulda just told SharpTon
JENA, La. - Thousands of chanting demonstrators filled the streets of this little Louisiana town Thursday in support of six black teenagers initially charged with attempted murder in the beating of a white classmate.
The crowd broke into chants of "Free the Jena Six" as the Rev. Al Sharpton arrived at the local courthouse with family members of the jailed teens.
Martin Luther King III, son of the slain civil rights leader, said the scene was reminiscent of earlier civil rights struggles. He said punishment of some sort may be in order for the six defendants, but "the justice system isn't applied the same to all crimes and all people."
The six teens were charged shortly after the local prosecutor declined to charge three white teens who hung nooses in a tree on their high school grounds. Five of the black teens were initially charged with attempted murder, but that charge was reduced to battery for all but one, who has yet to be arraigned; the sixth was charged as a juvenile.
"This is the most blatant example of disparity in the justice system that we've seen," Sharpton told CBS's "The Early Show" before arriving in Jena. "You can't have two standards of justice."
"We didn't bring race into it," he said. "Those that hung the nooses brought the race into it."
Sharpton, who helped organized the rally, said this could be the beginning of the 21st century's civil rights movement, one that would challenge disparities in the justice system.
The district attorney who is prosecution the teens, Reed Walters, denied on Wednesday that racism was involved in the charges.
He said he didn't charge the white students accused of hanging the nooses because he could find no Louisiana law under which they could be charged. In the beating case, he said, four of the defendants were of adult age under Louisiana law and the only juvenile charged as an adult, Mychal Bell, had a prior criminal record.
"It is not and never has been about race," Walters said. "It is about finding justice for an innocent victim and holding people accountable for their actions."
The beating victim, Justin Barker, was knocked unconscious, his face badly swollen and bloodied, though he was able to attend a school function later that night.
Bell, 16 at the time of the attack, is the only one of the "Jena Six" to be tried so far. He was convicted on an aggravated second-degree battery count that could have sent him to prison for 15 years, but the conviction was overturned last week when a state appeals court said he should not have been tried as an adult.
Thursday's protest had been planned to coincide with Bell's sentencing, but organizers decided to press ahead even after the conviction was thrown out. Bell remains jailed while prosecutors prepare an appeal. He has been unable to meet the $90,000 bond.
"We all have family members about the age of these guys. We said it could have been one of them. We wanted to try to do something," said Angela Merrick, 36, who drove with three friends from Atlanta to protest the treatment of the teens.
Dennis Courtland Hayes, interim president and CEO of the NAACP, compared the outcry to the controversy that followed racial remarks by radio personality Don Imus.
"People are saying, `That's enough, and we're not taking it any more,'" Hayes said.
The rally was heavily promoted on black Web sites, ****s, radio and publications. State police declined to give crowd estimates, but participants at the park and the courthouse appeared to number in the thousands.
Students came from universities across the region, including historically black colleges like Morehouse College, Spelman College, Clark Atlanta University, Howard University, Hampton University and Southern University.
Tina Cheatham missed the civil rights marches at Selma, Montgomery and Little Rock, but she had no intention of missing another brush with history. The 24-year-old Georgia Southern University graduate drove all night to reach tiny Jena in central Louisiana.
"It was a good chance to be part of something historic since I wasn't around for the civil rights movement. This is kind of the 21st century version of it," she said.
In Jena, with only about 3,500 residents, some people worried about safety. Hotels were booked from as far away as Natchez, Miss., to Alexandria, La.
Red Cross officials manned first aid stations near the local courthouse and had water and snacks on hand. Portable toilets and flashing street signs to aid in traffic direction were in place. At the courthouse troopers chatted amiably with each other and with demonstrators who began showing up well before dawn.
Sharpton met with Bell on Wednesday and said he was heartened by the show of support.
"He doesn't want anything done that would disparage his name — no violence, not even a negative word," Sharpton said.
Posted by BooDog on :
quote:Originally posted by rimasco: "It is not and never has been about race," Walters said. "It is about finding justice for an innocent victim and holding people accountable for their actions."
that's about the best part of that whole article imo. The boys were suspended for their actions, the "Jena six" were way out of line for their actions and should be charged accordingly. The measure of severity should be the only question.
imo
Posted by glassman on :
that article doesn't even begin to cover what 's happened... this thing has been percolating for a long time, and it might not be illegal to "hang nooses" in trees, but there's a lot of inconvenient facts to support charging people who do that with federal hate crimes... that never happened.. as a matter of fact? the local district attorney actually appeared to threaten people uspet about the noose incident...
so if you wanna blame somebody for this thing getting outa hand? you can blame the DA for being an idiot.
Posted by The Bigfoot on :
I gotta agree with Glass.
There should have been a hate crime charge for th nooses.
As to the beating? Yeah, those kids were outta line. But if the kid could attend a function latter that night...It's no worse than a backyard tussle IMO. Let em clean up garbage for a few weeks and then get on with life. Those nooses should have been a huge mitigating factor in the sentencing. I'm glad the sentance was thrown out.
Posted by rimasco on :
Who knows... maybe the media will incite a riot?They would love a story like that
Posted by glassman on :
i wouldn't rim...
that crap has been on my local news for a year...
for people who don't know southern history? this story might sound flaky, but i COULD find you plenty of newspaper photographs and other well chronicled public events to show you why the noose hanging is hate crime no matter what the DA says.. i won't, cuz the pix are disgusting, and they were mostly taken as if everything going on was "normal"....
Posted by glassman on :
what the the DA seems to be overlooking is that public schools receive federal funding... any institution recieveing fedearl funding is subject to federal oversight, including universities....
that's why Yale lost thier bid to keep military recruiters off their campus, and rightly so IMO...
Yale Profs Lose Military Recruiter Appeal
Posted Sep 18, 2007, 07:38 am CDT By Debra Cassens Weiss
A federal appeals court has ruled that the federal government may deny funding to Yale Law School for barring military recruiters from campus.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals cited a 2006 U.S. Supreme Court ruling upholding the Solomon Amendment, which bars certain federal funding to schools that reject military recruiters. Yale professors had argued the Supreme Court did not consider the issue of whether the statute violated the First Amendment right to academic freedom, the New York Law Journal reports.
should kids be prosecuted under federal hate laws? NO... but only because i'm willing to concede that they probably don't know real history..
should they be required to go to classes teaching them some real history? yes.. the fact that anybody would think of it as a "prank" should indicate just how far we HAVEN'T come in the last 40 years.
Posted by BooDog on :
agree glass. it should have been marked as a hate crime - but it wasn't - it was dealt with in another way ~ not the kids fault how the authorities handled it. The jena six "could" have made a national standing of the event without violence and impressed even myself by handling it in a more professional manner. but they didn't. and for that i was disgusted. the credibility of this rally imo is undermined by the lack of discipline demonstrated.
Posted by rimasco on :
Its a catch 22. It might not have recieved media attention unless it escalated
Posted by glassman on :
look at this map.... Jena is well within it..
there's no place in the rest of the country like the Delta... you just can't imagine how different it is..
the good news is that rising agricultural product values will be making this place very wealthy in the next ten fifteen years...
and there's alot of people making a difference one person and one day at a time...
Posted by Machiavelli on :
I know I'll get alot of flak over this but imo the Noose hanging should fall under the freedom of expression... they didn't hang anyone... I know the history of lynches in the South etc. but imo no crime was committed... We may hate what the noose stands for as much as we hate Neo-Nazi's and their hate speech but we should all defend their freedom to say or express it because the day we don't is the day we say only certain people can say or express something and not others... and if so then why bother saying to the world about our so called "freedoms"...
as for the Jena 6... they did a battery/assault and should be jailed though not long (2 years perhaps?) so they learn their lesson that violence is never tolerated ever except in the event of self defense... as for saying that he only got some bumps/scratches and the Jena 6 deserve community service only... that is kind of stupid to say because it's like advocating violence and they will not learn their lesson... they would thumb their noses at the justice system in the future much like O.J. does... also on another note there have been assault victims in the past who only had scratches/bumps but died later on as a result of the assault because it ruptured something inside that people were not aware of... not that it happened in this case but trying to show why letting the Jena 6 or anyone who commits assault off the hook with only community service is definetly not the way to go...
As a side note I dislike the so called "Rev." Al Sharpton and his opportunistic ways when a case like this gets national media attention... once the story dies out in the press you will not see him defending the Jena 6 and he will move on.... Does the "Rev" contribute to their defense fund (if there is one)? ... nah he contributes to himself with the expensive suits he wears..
Posted by glassman on :
i agree about sharpton and jackson Mach... they're here now and in the spotlight, but they're gone tomorrow, and the town still has to deal with the problems...
one of the things worth noting is that that school cut down the tree and did make attempts to deal with the situation....
IMO the DA is the one who who let everybody down...
one of the things that's not coming out is how poor the area is... if you look at a demographic map of poverty you'll see a big red splotch covering the whole Delta..... there's a lot of generalised frustration about lack of opportunity...
as for the nooses? no flack from me, but, i think a noose is a direct threat.. no different from sending someone a dead fish or a bullet...
Posted by Machiavelli on :
or divorce papers? lol
Posted by CashCowMoo on :
i am not saying hanging a noose is a good thing, but why would leaving a rope in a tree regardless of what it means be a hate crime punishable by hate crime grids? people get in a lot less trouble for much worse crimes. i bet you could be a wife beater and get less punishment than if you were to leave a noose in a tree.
Posted by glassman on :
it's a long story CCM... sometime when you are on leave take a ride through the Natchez Trace and the Blues trail, check out the real Crossroads..
Posted by glassman on :
some dumb chick from MIT (prolly soon to be expelled) strapped a circuit board to her chest today and went to Logan airport...
nobody is gonna question whether she should be charged....
Posted by Machiavelli on :
That is a little different imo... she had it strapped on herself and could of or did cause panic in a airport...
A noose on a tree did not have a human attached to it and didn't cause any panic or violence then let's say a Neo-Nazi skinhead music CD which expresses their views...
You have to be messed up in the head in the first place to do such things as violence. Music, Nooses, books etc. that are expressions are just excuses for society's ills. Nevertheless they should have the freedom to express themselves even if we do not like it or agree with what they are expressing. That is the foundation of this country. Freedom of thought and to express it via words or images.
Posted by BooDog on :
deleted
Posted by glassman on :
OK you guys asked, i'll answer..
but don't click here if you have a weak stomach...
and this is just a tiny sampling , i can give you hundreds..
your not showing me anything new in terms of photographs... i've seen those same exact photographs in documentaries and such over the years and im well aware of the lynching history in the South... it's still not a crime to hang a noose on a tree... one that does not have a human attached to it any more then drawing a swatiska somewhere (unless it's vandalism)....
But assaulting another human being till his face is bloodied is a crime regardless of race... and should not get a slap on the wrist... it sends the wrong message... Two wrongs (whites getting off easy in the past and trying to do the same with the Jena 6) do not ever make a right... when that happens it is then injustice and makes you no different then the whites of the past...
Posted by glassman on :
it's not a crime to wear a printed circuit board on your shirt either...
Posted by Machiavelli on :
in a airport where it looks like a bomb and you do not convey to security that it isn't one then you deserve anything you get.... though I would say reduced charges of disorderly conduct or something...
but a Noose on a tree is not a hate crime by any definition of the word because no violent act was committed with THOSE particular nooses... the day you convict others for their messages that you do not agree with is the day this country will fall into the hypothetics of 1984, Farenheit 451 and similar novels.
I hate the messages of the KKK, Neo-Nazi's etc. but I will defend their right to say it as well as anyone else's expressions and thoughts i disagree with including Begeesus, Bush Jr., etc.
Why hasn't Sharpton and his opportunists cited any LA or Federal Law defining a noose on a tree as a hate crime? Because it's not and their is no such passage imo. It's no more a hate crime then burning the American flag to protest something. What the Jena 6 did do is a hate crime. It was a violent act committed on a different race due to their hatred of said race. That is a hate crime. The Noose hangers should just get suspended or expel and not anything more.
Posted by CashCowMoo on :
quote:Originally posted by glassman: it's not a crime to wear a printed circuit board on your shirt either...
it is now with the patriot act! i bet the patriot act was designed to be so large that it would be almost impossible to actually go through each and every page within a reasonable amount of time. im sure that was done on purpose to hide highly questionable practices and measures.
Posted by glassman on :
Mach, i'm not defending the guys that beat the kid up.
but i know for a fact that hanging a noose in a tree in public school yard is a threat.. the threat is plain: sit here and we'll kill you..
as the situation stands right now, the kids bail was REMAND. that's going to be found uncostitutional if this goes federal... he isn't even under charges right now and a writ of habeus corpus will be filed....
if this doesn't go federal we are looking at a pretty big mess....
hey CCM! glad to hear from you... glad you're OK.
Posted by Machiavelli on :
anything can be construed as a threat... i can give someone the middle finger and shout racial slurs but until i commit the violent act it is not a crime... you cannot arrest and convict someone for possible future crimes without definite proof... and a noose on a tree is not definite proof they intended to hang someone or worst...
You should watch the movie ,if you haven't already, Minority Report starring Tom Cruise and directed by Steven Spielberg that tackles the morality of jailing people before they committ a violent crime.
Posted by glassman on :
i actually read the short story 30 years ago....
are you familiar with all of the details of this case? there was alot more going on than a few nooses hanging in a tree...
i don't know how it can be construed as anything else...
as for your understanding of what assault is? maybe this will help:
MISSISSIPPI CODE OF 1972 As Amended
SEC. 97-3-7. Simple assault; aggravated assault; domestic violence.
(1) A person is guilty of simple assault if he (a) attempts to cause or purposely, knowingly or recklessly causes bodily injury to another; or (b) negligently causes bodily injury to another with a deadly weapon or other means likely to produce death or serious bodily harm; or (c) attempts by physical menace to put another in fear of imminent serious bodily harm;
yes, that's correct, (c) attempts by physical menace to put another in fear of imminent serious bodily harm;
simple assualt does NOT require anybody to be hurt...
OJ will probably be convicted of simple assault in the recent Las Vegas case based ont he tape recordings..
the town/school cut down the tree cuz they KNEW what it all represents...
Posted by Machiavelli on :
C. is very outdated... putting fear into someone is not assault... assault is physical not mental... or else we all would be criminals sometime in our life of it lol ...
Posted by glassman on :
thats' the law of the land dude...
it's not outdated at all..
if you threaten somebody and make them reasonably beleive they are in danger from you? you have committed simple assault..
even pointing an unloaded gun at somebody is simple assault (at minimum)...
Definition of Assault - Texas Penal Code
§ 22.01. ASSAULT.
(a) A person commits an offense if the person:
(1) intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly causes bodily injury to another, including the person's spouse;
(2) intentionally or knowingly threatens another with imminent bodily injury, including the person's spouse; or
(3) intentionally or knowingly causes physical contact with another when the person knows or should reasonably believe that the other will regard the contact as offensive or provocative.
from Blackstone:
Assault and Battery
Assault and battery. Any unlawful touching of another which is without justification or excuse. It is both a tort, Trogun v. Fruchtman, 58 Wis.2d 569, 207 N.W.2d 297, as well as a crime, Scruggs v. State, Ind.App., 317 N.E.2d 807, 809. The two crimes differ from each other in that battery requires physical contact of some sort (bodily injury or offensive touching), whereas assault is committed without physical contact. In most jurisdictions, statutes have created aggravated assaults and batteries, punishable as felonies, and worded in various ways. See Battery.
SOURCE: Black's Law Dictionary, Sixth Edition
aggravated assault or assault and battery is when someone actually does hurt someone...
simple (usually misdemeanor)asault is threatening someone...
under federal guidelines? simple assault includes black eyes and injuries requiring less than two days hospital stay.. so nothing more than simple assault has occurred in this case so far, unfortunatley? the whole situation MAY be spinning out of control....
Posted by Machiavelli on :
say what you want but the Noose's were expression and not assault.. not even simple assault... was more like vandalism...
Posted by Relentless. on :
Nooses were a threat. You don't hang a noose in a tree in the delta without knowing EXACTLY what it means. That threat could... and obviously DID lead those six and definitely more to believe that serious harm was on it's way. Those six are guilty of assault... but so is the bruised chap. He's lucky to have escaped with his life much more being only mildly damaged.
Posted by glassman on :
it gets better Mach, like said earlir? i've followed this for along time.. the DA was actually asked to come to town to talk to the students as awhole, and he threatened them...
the African American student felt that the threats were directed at them...
A few of the black athletes, the stars of the football team, took the lead in resisting. The day after the nooses were hung, they reportedly organized a silent protest under the tree.
The school called an assembly and summoned the police and the district attorney. Black students sat on one side, whites on the other. District Attorney Reed Walters warned the students he could be their friend or their worst enemy. He lifted his fountain pen and said, "With one stroke of my pen, I can make your life disappear."
That evening, black students told their parents that the DA was looking right at them. Walters denies that. Billy Fowler, a member of the school board, doesn't believe it, either.
you think the DA was there to help? the whites were jubilant...
this is a long story and i'm not gonna write it all out now, but it involves guns and fires in the school buildings.. charges of theft when somebody disarmed somebody else with a shotgun... (every pickup down here has at least one gun in it) it's about as convoluted as a Grisham novel...
how the DA decided to charge the kids with attempted murder is gonna end up like the Duke LaCrosee thing... it won't stand up under scrutiny.. the kid got a black eye and "maybe" a concussion. but he walked right out of the hospital and went out that same night...
sure something happened, but it happened because the LEADERS didn't LEAD when the time came to stand up and lead...
i said before and i'll say it again, i don't want to see the kids charged with hate crimes, but for the DA to say he couldn't find a crime to charge the noose hangers with is total BULLCHIT..
Posted by glassman on :
Breaking News- Another Noose Incident Near Jena by Nathan Stubbs (excerpt)
Breaking News- Another Noose Incident Near JenaINDEPENDENT WEEKLY
The national spotlight was on the small town of Jena yesterday, where thousands of demonstrators rallied in support of six African-American teens charged with aggravated battery for beating up a white student after a series of racially-charged confrontations that started after white students hung nooses from a tree near the school. While the rally was a peaceful affair, and many locals went on national TV defending their small town and stating that the Jena 6 case was being blown out of proportion, an incident not far away in Alexandria is further inflaming racial tensions.
CNN reports that not far from Jena, police arrested two teenagers driving a red truck with nooses tied to the back who drove by a group of Jena 6 demonstrators in Alexandria. Alexandria city officials say the two teens were from the Jena area. According to CNN:
Police say the 18-year-old driver of the truck was charged with driving while intoxicated and inciting to riot and also may be charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor -- the 16-year-old passenger. As police were questioning the driver, he said he had an unloaded rifle in the back, which police found. They also found a set of brass knuckles in the cup holder on the dashboard, according to the police report.
The passenger told police he and his family are in the Ku Klux Klan, the police report said. He also said he had tied the nooses and that the brass knuckles belonged to him, the report said. At least one of the nooses was made out of an extension cord, according to the police report
like i said? this thing is beginning to spiral out of control...
Posted by BooDog on :
the attempts of sharpton and the naacp to circumvent the locals and persuade law enforcement through their demonstrations to back down on their duty imo should not be tolerated. I would assume it won't be long before a grand jury is asked to intervene. I would hope that the case is heard and found that the locals are in line and doing the right thing.
Posted by glassman on :
they'll make it worse boo, the locals will be harsher to show they can't be bullied...
is cross burning a hate crime? cuz the cross was burned first, as a warning that the noose was next...
Posted by BooDog on :
"The public at large basically thinks that these cases are aberrations, and that's one reason why so much attention is paid to them," says Professor Nunn. "It's the idea that it's the redneck sheriff doing this and not the way we sort of stack the odds against black criminal defendants. We can point to a few bad apples, say, 'See, it's them,' and the rest of us feel great because we're demonstrating how we disagree with racism."
The Associated Press Monday, September 10, 2007; 12:18 PM
COLLEGE PARK, Md. -- University of Maryland police on Monday were investigating as a possible hate crime what appeared to be a noose hanging in a tree near a building that houses several black campus groups.
The rope was found between the student union and the Nyumburu Cultural Center, where organizations that include the Black Faculty and Staff Association and the Black Explosion newspaper are based.
----------------------------------------------
Nooses Found At Downtown Fire Station
POSTED: 10:43 am EST February 17, 2006
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- The fire station at Duval and Jefferson streets downtown became the scene of a hate-crime investigation Friday morning when two black firefighters arrived at work to find nooses on their gear.
Firefighter Rufus Smith found a noose on his suit when he reported to work at 7 a.m. Smith immediately reported it to his superiors.
Smith said finding the noose made him angry and scared.
At Oceanside Sewage Treatment Plant August 15, 2001
Carmi Johnson, is a San Francisco stationary engineer and member of IUOE Local 39 who works at the Oceanside sewage treatment plant near the San Francisco Zoo. Carmi on July 26 was confronted with a "hanging noose" that was placed on the property to terrorize and force her to leave the plant. Carmi had the union file a grievance and also called the police department. She also complained to the Public Utility Commission management about this incident but apparently the PUC bosses and Mayor Willie Brown have not gotten the message. On Tuesday September 11, 2001 another noose was put up on the property. This outrage must be exposed and stopped. On Monday September 10, 2001, the San Francisco Labor Council passed a unanimous resolution condemning these hate crimes including the incident at the Oceanside sewage treatment plant and calling for a national labor political education campaign by all of labor including the AFL-CIO to stop this epidemic of "hanging noose" incidents. Posted by T e x on :
gotta keep things in context...endeavor for perspective.
If my lariat loop somehow gets blown/lifted over my tailgate, can any and every minority who sees it claim "fear" ?
Gawrsh, I hope not...
On the other hand, there's some seriously bad actors in these parts; if I somehow got crosswise with one of them, a certain kind of wink might default me into pre-emptive mode. Wormy as our justice system is, I'd still rather deal with a jury than a killer operating on a private agenda.
A noose in a tree, here--say, at Halloween (for context)--implies no threat whatsoever. A noose elsewhere, elsewhen might be easily interpreted as a kiss of death.
imo, what needs to happens in this case is a massive infusion of cooler, calmer heads. Get these kids together and posit a situation in which they all win, or they all lose... nip the grandstanding.
Posted by BooDog on :
quote:Originally posted by T e x: imo, what needs to happens in this case is a massive infusion of cooler, calmer heads. Get these kids together and posit a situation in which they all win, or they all lose... nip the grandstanding.
like that M8. that's the first thing I thought of as they were loading 3 buses in route to la from norfolk a few days ago. I don't think I've stopped shaking my head since.
Posted by glassman on :
Hate crime shocks, puzzles
After a dead raccoon is found in a noose at a predominantly black church, community leaders ponder how to respond.
By ABBIE VANSICKLE Published January 26, 2006 On Saturday afternoon, someone found a dead raccoon hanging from a hangman's noose on the porch of the Mount Carmel Methodist Church, a predominantly black church, on U.S. 41 just south of the stoplight in Floral City. There was a note with a racist message next to the animal, according to the Citrus County Sheriff's Office. http://www.sptimes.com/2006/01/26/Citrus/Hate_crime_shocks__pu.shtml
this is happening alot...
Metro Briefing | Connecticut: Avon: Man Charged With Hate Crime
By STACY ALBIN (NYT) (COMPILED BY ANTHONY RAMIREZ) Published: July 25, 2002
A man accused of leaving a clothesline formed into a hangman's noose on a black co-worker's car has been charged with a hate crime. On Tuesday, the man, Timothy W. McDonald, 26, of Granby, turned himself in to the police and was charged with intimidation by bias or bigotry, and threatening. Melvin Johnson, who is black, found the noose on the door handle of his car on July 2 while working on a house. Mr. McDonald and Mr. Johnson work for a roofing company, L S Remodeling. It was not clear what prompted the incident, but the police said Mr. Johnson confronted Mr. McDonald, who removed the noose. Mr. McDonald has an unlisted telephone number and could not be reached for comment. Stacy Albin (NYT) http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=990ce3d81038f936a15754c0a9649c8b6 3 Posted by glassman on :
Nooses, Symbols of Race Hatred, At Center of Workplace Lawsuits
By SANA SIWOLOP
Published: July 10, 2000
Gloria Hamilton never saw a double-looped noose hanging on her door in 1992. Friends at the Detroit cargo facility where she worked as a service manager for Northwest Airlines took the noose down before she came to work that day, she said, so that she would not be upset seeing it.
Many companies still prefer to settle such cases out of court, but officials at the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission say they have at least 20 noose-related lawsuits pending or recently resolved. For an agency that files only a few hundred lawsuits a year, they add, that is a disproportionately high number. Jeff Lanza, a special agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation in Kansas City, Mo., says his office is investigating two cases of nooses left in workplaces. The regional office of the equal employment agency in Charlotte, N.C., has three racial harassment lawsuits pending where nooses were said to be involved.
The Miami office has an equal number, including one in which a Sanibel Island, Fla., country club has been charged with failing to act against several workers accused of holding up a hangman's noose to a black groundskeeper before asking him whether he wanted ''to go for a ride.'' Art Cassell, a member of the board of governors of the Sanctuary Golf Club in Sanibel, said the suit was ''completely without merit.'' The Dallas office of the commission is investigating four such cases. In Detroit, the agency is continuing to pursue a lawsuit on behalf of Ms. Hamilton. And the agency has one current lawsuit in California. Mr. Lanza, the Kansas City F.B.I. agent, said that until recently cross burnings seemed to be the ''hate crime of choice,'' in his area, but that noose incidents are now appearing instead.
''I've been here 12 years and I can't remember any other noose cases that preceded the two we now have,'' Mr. Lanza said. The Justice Department considers noose incidents to be federal crimes of intimidation, punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
The Justice Department considers noose incidents to be federal crimes of intimidation, punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
so much for the DA not being able to find a law to support prosecution...
No doubt Glass. These cases will continue to happen imo. And when they are caught I would hope those in charge would deal with each case diligently.... And I add with extra effort competently
Posted by T e x on :
quote:Originally posted by BooDog:
quote:Originally posted by T e x: imo, what needs to happens in this case is a massive infusion of cooler, calmer heads. Get these kids together and posit a situation in which they all win, or they all lose... nip the grandstanding.
like that M8. that's the first thing I thought of as they were loading 3 buses in route to la from norfolk a few days ago. I don't think I've stopped shaking my head since.
ya, the real problem now is *not* the original problem...
Posted by glassman on :
FBI, Pitt close Wheelock case By: SAM ANDERSON Staff Writer Issue date: 1/10/03 Section: News Because of a lack of evidence, the FBI and Pitt police have ended their investigation into the events surrounding the noose found behind the lectern of black professor Stefan Wheelock.
The noose, which Wheelock discovered before his Nov. 21 class, was found next to a copy of Ralph Ellison's "The Invisible Man." Ellison's novel concerns race relations in America, and was required reading for Wheelock's introduction to critical reading course. Upon finding the book and noose, Pitt police were notified and conducted a joint criminal investigation with the FBI.
i think the feds will step in before it gets too outahand...
there's dozens of FBI cases involving nooses
Posted by BooDog on :
it depends on how "original" you want to get imo. law as it is now or how it was originaly. past or present. last week or today. the demonstrators imo are a part of "grandstanding" to be seen as a force that is meant to be heard for equality and justice. but are they paying heed to todays law? or are they grandstanding against what the law was decades ago in attempts of fortifying support for current agendas?
Posted by T e x on :
quote:Originally posted by glassman: i think the feds will step in before it gets too outahand...
there's dozens of FBI cases involving nooses
well, hopeably that will be the cooler, calmer heads... this reminds me not of another race-problem incident, but of nuclear-power protesters at Glenrose, TX, when local law enforcement was overwhelmed by "topics" they were neither prepared for (to discuss authentically) nor willing to understand...
Posted by T e x on :
quote:Originally posted by BooDog: it depends on how "original" you want to get imo. law as it is now or how it was originaly. past or present. last week or today. the demonstrators imo are a part of "grandstanding" to be seen as a force that is meant to be heard for equality and justice. but are they paying heed to todays law? or are they grandstanding against what the law was decades ago in attempts of fortifying support for current agendas?
all I'm saying here is this: obviously, there's a local problem. Outside forces might be calming--leading to better understanding--or outside forces may be agitant...leading to more conflict...
Posted by glassman on :
quote:Originally posted by BooDog: it depends on how "original" you want to get imo. law as it is now or how it was originaly. past or present. last week or today. the demonstrators imo are a part of "grandstanding" to be seen as a force that is meant to be heard for equality and justice. but are they paying heed to todays law? or are they grandstanding against what the law was decades ago in attempts of fortifying support for current agendas?
here's a link to the town paper, Town Talk, complete with b-log...
quote:Originally posted by BooDog: it depends on how "original" you want to get imo. law as it is now or how it was originaly. past or present. last week or today. the demonstrators imo are a part of "grandstanding" to be seen as a force that is meant to be heard for equality and justice. but are they paying heed to todays law? or are they grandstanding against what the law was decades ago in attempts of fortifying support for current agendas?
all I'm saying here is this: obviously, there's a local problem. Outside forces might be calming--leading to better understanding--or outside forces may be agitant...leading to more conflict...
Agitant because all Sharpton is, is a media whore. He doesn't care about justice though he likes everyone to think he does. By being outspoken and in the spotlight like he is, he gets more donations or however he contrives a salary so he can wear expensive suits and claim tax exemption. Once the spotlight dies down he moves on. Would Sharpton have gotten involved and cared if it wasn't in the spotlight in the first place? The answer is a big fat NO.
As for Glass citing all those Noose incidents. We'll not one that I read consisted of violence. Here in NY we get youths who are just bored and drinking beer spray painting swatiska's , upside crosses or what have you on synagogue walls, grave markers, churches etc. In all the cases I read they were charged with vandalism and not a hate crime. And none of the cases resulted in violence even for the ones in which they were not caught.
This case in Jena was blown out of proportion and then came the opportunists like Sharpton. The nooses can be contrive as a threat but I would bet nothing would of came of it in terms of violence from the whites. They were just being stupid phucks who were probably bored & someone came up with the bright idea of doing that much like the ones who vandalize synogogue's here in NY with Swatiska's.
The point is they have the right to express themselves in a non violent way as long as they are not committing a true crime like physical assaults. Because if we arrest everyone for such things then you have to fear what you express in this country and not have free thought just because it's unpopular.
Plus where will it end? Charge rednecks for hate crime because they wave the Confederate flag?. Arrest a Red Sox fan that has a noose around a Yankees doll? Get my meaning. And on and on.
Posted by T e x on :
quote:Originally posted by Machiavelli:
quote:Originally posted by T e x:
quote:Originally posted by BooDog: it depends on how "original" you want to get imo. law as it is now or how it was originaly. past or present. last week or today. the demonstrators imo are a part of "grandstanding" to be seen as a force that is meant to be heard for equality and justice. but are they paying heed to todays law? or are they grandstanding against what the law was decades ago in attempts of fortifying support for current agendas?
all I'm saying here is this: obviously, there's a local problem. Outside forces might be calming--leading to better understanding--or outside forces may be agitant...leading to more conflict...
Agitant because all Sharpton is, is a media whore. He doesn't care about justice though he likes everyone to think he does. By being outspoken and in the spotlight like he is, he gets more donations or however he contrives a salary so he can wear expensive suits and claim tax exemption. Once the spotlight dies down he moves on. Would Sharpton have gotten involved and cared if it wasn't in the spotlight in the first place? The answer is a big fat NO.
As for Glass citing all those Noose incidents. We'll not one that I read consisted of violence. Here in NY we get youths who are just bored and drinking beer spray painting swatiska's , upside crosses or what have you on synagogue walls, grave markers, churches etc. In all the cases I read they were charged with vandalism and not a hate crime. And none of the cases resulted in violence even for the ones in which they were not caught.
This case in Jena was blown out of proportion and then came the opportunists like Sharpton. The nooses can be contrive as a threat but I would bet nothing would of came of it in terms of violence from the whites. They were just being stupid phucks who were probably bored & someone came up with the bright idea of doing that much like the ones who vandalize synogogue's here in NY with Swatiska's.
The point is they have the right to express themselves in a non violent way as long as they are not committing a true crime like physical assaults. Because if we arrest everyone for such things then you have to fear what you express in this country and not have free thought just because it's unpopular.
Plus where will it end? Charge rednecks for hate crime because they wave the Confederate flag?. Arrest a Red Sox fan that has a noose around a Yankees doll? Get my meaning. And on and on.
well spoken, articulate, etc...
much as I hope my response earlier might be taken.
However, I do think you're glossing over context...
Just for instance, I had a very, very close friend when I was in college-textboook publishing. One night this gorgeous black woman gave me a ride to my local pool-hall, and I invited her in. She saw the huge, Confederate flag on the interior wall and politely declined. Even though she knew me well enough to know she would not be injured in my company, she still declined.
I don't blame her a bit...
Posted by glassman on :
i bet the LOCAL African Americans will be cursing Sharpton before long too Mach... IMO? he made it worse... but we'll just have to wait and see...
he is after all, a politician, and you know how much i love politicians and i don't care about their race, creed, or party, i'll critisize 'em all....
Posted by Machiavelli on :
He's not a politician at all... he's never been elected to office that I know of though he has tried and he's suppose to be a "Rev". I'm sure to get tax free donations.
The African Americans, and especially from the South are not aware of what a manipulator Sharpton is. He always makes situations worst. You can just look at his past history in famous racial cases. I wonder whose paying his travel accomadations and such. But mark my words he will leave when the media loses interest.
Posted by Machiavelli on :
quote: Just for instance, I had a very, very close friend when I was in college-textboook publishing. One night this gorgeous black woman gave me a ride to my local pool-hall, and I invited her in. She saw the huge, Confederate flag on the interior wall and politely declined. Even though she knew me well enough to know she would not be injured in my company, she still declined.
I don't blame her a bit...
I don't blame her neither but it still was not a crime to have that Flag up there any more then Lynyrd Skynyrd waving that flag at their concerts.
Btw you end up dating her if she was that gorgeous? Did she look like Vanessa Williams?
And btw I always find your posts articulate even in your texas twang tawk Posted by BooDog on :
No immediate release for 'Jena 6' teen A court ruled Friday that Mychal Bell, the sole defendant who remains behind bars from the group of teens known as the "Jena 6," will not be released immediately. Bell's mother left the courthouse in tears. full story
Top Stories Arrests near Jena over nooses Hearing ordered for jailed teen as thousands rally On the road to Jena with protesters 'Jena 6' member, mom interview (5:12) Martin: 'Jena 6' rally was about justice, not race D.A.: Case isn't about race (10:23) Jackson criticizes Obama on Jena 6 reaction Court: It's 'premature' to release Jena 6 defendant U.S. attorney: Nooses, school beating not related Timeline of events in Jena
Posted by rimasco on :
quote:Originally posted by Machiavelli:
quote:Originally posted by T e x:
quote:Originally posted by BooDog: it depends on how "original" you want to get imo. law as it is now or how it was originaly. past or present. last week or today. the demonstrators imo are a part of "grandstanding" to be seen as a force that is meant to be heard for equality and justice. but are they paying heed to todays law? or are they grandstanding against what the law was decades ago in attempts of fortifying support for current agendas?
all I'm saying here is this: obviously, there's a local problem. Outside forces might be calming--leading to better understanding--or outside forces may be agitant...leading to more conflict...
Agitant because all Sharpton is, is a media whore. He doesn't care about justice though he likes everyone to think he does. By being outspoken and in the spotlight like he is, he gets more donations or however he contrives a salary so he can wear expensive suits and claim tax exemption. Once the spotlight dies down he moves on. Would Sharpton have gotten involved and cared if it wasn't in the spotlight in the first place? The answer is a big fat NO.
As for Glass citing all those Noose incidents. We'll not one that I read consisted of violence. Here in NY we get youths who are just bored and drinking beer spray painting swatiska's , upside crosses or what have you on synagogue walls, grave markers, churches etc. In all the cases I read they were charged with vandalism and not a hate crime. And none of the cases resulted in violence even for the ones in which they were not caught.
This case in Jena was blown out of proportion and then came the opportunists like Sharpton. The nooses can be contrive as a threat but I would bet nothing would of came of it in terms of violence from the whites. They were just being stupid phucks who were probably bored & someone came up with the bright idea of doing that much like the ones who vandalize synogogue's here in NY with Swatiska's.
The point is they have the right to express themselves in a non violent way as long as they are not committing a true crime like physical assaults. Because if we arrest everyone for such things then you have to fear what you express in this country and not have free thought just because it's unpopular.
Plus where will it end? Charge rednecks for hate crime because they wave the Confederate flag?. Arrest a Red Sox fan that has a noose around a Yankees doll? Get my meaning. And on and on.
Well put Mach... You've inspired me to put my Jenna Jameson poster back over our bed.
Doesnt mean I want to sleep with her... Posted by BooDog on :
vanessa williams too don't forget tina in that outfit in "Sgt peppers lonely hearts club band" the movie
Posted by glassman on :
an update:
i heard that the kid still in jail is not being held on remand..
his bail is 90 grand, and nobody has posted it yet..
but i can't verify this...
Posted by Machiavelli on :
I wonder if Sharpton will use the donations he gets to bail him out?... NOT LoL
Posted by glassman on :
it wouldn't be in Sharptons best interest to bail him out...
the problem trying to understand the facts here is that the kids is a juvenile, with the privacy right of a juvenile, but he was tried as an adult, so they can't release alot of info...
the DA never should have put him up as an adult.
apparently the charges were attempted murder with a deadly weapon... the weapon was a tennis shoe...
Posted by andrew on :
Now we love Mychal Bell, the star of the 2006 Jena (La.) High School football team, the teenage boy who has sat in jail since December for his role in a six-on-one beatdown of a fellow student.
Thursday, thousands of us, proud African-Americans, expressed our devotion to and desire to see justice for the “Jena Six,” the half-dozen black students who knocked unconscious, kicked and stomped a white classmate.
Jesse Jackson compared Thursday’s rallies in Jena to the protests and marches that used to take place in cities like Selma, Ala., in the 1960s. Al Sharpton claimed Thursday’s peaceful demonstrations were to highlight racial inequities in the criminal justice system.
Jesse and Al, as they’re prone to do, served a kernel of truth stacked on a mountain of lies.
There are undeniable racial and economic inequities in our criminal justice system, and from afar the “Jena Six” rallies certainly looked and felt like the righteous protests of the 1960s.
But the reality is Thursday’s protests are just another sign that we remain deeply locked in denial about the path we need to travel today for true American liberation, equality and power in the new millennium.
The fact that we waited to love Mychal Bell until after he’d thrown away a Division I football scholarship and nine months of his life is just as heinous as the grossly excessive attempted-murder charges that originally landed him in jail.
Reed Walters, the Jena district attorney, is being accused of racism because he didn’t show Bell compassion when the teenager was brought before the court for the third time on assault charges in a two-year span.
Where was our compassion long before Bell got into this kind of trouble?
That’s the question that needed to be asked in Jena and across the country on Thursday. But it wasn’t asked because everyone has been lied to about what really transpired in the small southern town.
There was no “schoolyard fight” as a result of nooses being hung on a whites-only tree.
Justin Barker, the white victim, was cold-cocked from behind, knocked unconscious and stomped by six black athletes. Barker, luckily, sustained no life-threatening injuries and was released from the hospital three hours after the attack.
A black U.S. attorney, Don Washington, investigated the “Jena Six” case and concluded that the attack on Barker had absolutely nothing to do with the noose-hanging incident three months before. The nooses and two off-campus incidents were tied to Barker’s assault by people wanting to gain sympathy for the “Jena Six” in reaction to Walters’ extreme charges of attempted murder.
Much has been written about Bell’s trial, the six-person all-white jury that convicted him of aggravated battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated battery and the clueless public defender who called no witnesses and offered no defense. It is rarely mentioned that no black people responded to the jury summonses and that Bell’s public defender was black.
It’s almost never mentioned that Bell’s absentee father returned from Dallas and re-entered his son’s life only after Bell faced attempted-murder charges. At a bond hearing in August, Bell’s father and a parade of local ministers promised a judge that they would supervise Bell if he was released from prison.
Where were the promises and supervision before any of this?
It’s rarely mentioned that Bell was already on probation for assault when he was accused of participating in Barker’s attack. And it’s never mentioned that white people in the “racist” town of Jena provided Bell support and protected his football career long before Jesse, Al, Bell’s father and all the others took a sincere interest in Mychal Bell.
You won’t hear about any of that because it doesn’t fit the picture we want to paint of Jena, this case, America and ourselves.
We don’t practice preventive medicine. Mychal Bell needed us long before he was cuffed and jailed. Here is another undeniable, statistical fact: The best way for a black (or white) father to ensure that his son doesn’t fall victim to a racist prosecutor is by participating in his son’s life on a daily basis.
That fact needed to be shared Thursday in Jena. The constant preaching of that message would short-circuit more potential “Jena Six” cases than attributing random acts of six-on-one violence to three-month-old nooses.
And I am in no way excusing the nooses. The responsible kids should’ve been expelled. A few years after I’d graduated, a similar incident happened at my high school involving our best football player, a future NFL tight end. He was expelled.
The Jena school board foolishly overruled its principal and suspended the kids for three days.
But the kids responsible for Barker’s beating deserve to be punished. The prosecutor needed to be challenged on his excessive charges. And we as black folks need to question ourselves about why too many of us can only get energized to help our young people once they’re in harm’s way.
I’ve been the spokesman for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater Kansas City for six years. Getting black men to volunteer to mentor for just two hours a week to the more than 100 black boys on a waiting list is a yearly crisis. It’s a nationwide crisis for the organization. In Kansas City, we’re lucky if we get 20 black Big Brothers a year.
You don’t want to see any more “Jena Six” cases? Love Mychal Bell before he violently breaks the law.
Posted by Machiavelli on :
quote:Well put Mach... You've inspired me to put my Jenna Jameson poster back over our bed.
Doesnt mean I want to sleep with her...
Liar... u would sleep with Jenna lol Posted by rimasco on :
I dont know about the sleep part.. Posted by T e x on :
Now we love Mychal Bell, the star of the 2006 Jena (La.) High School football team, the teenage boy who has sat in jail since December for his role in a six-on-one beatdown of a fellow student.
[ skip to summary -- tex excerpt]
You don’t want to see any more “Jena Six” cases? Love Mychal Bell before he violently breaks the law.
But it would be unfair to claim they threw the match that ignited the Jena Six case into a global blaze of hostility and misinformation.
That distinction belongs to Alan Bean, a 54-year-old white, self-proclaimed Baptist minister from Tulia, Texas.
“Do I know him?” was LaSalle Parish District Attorney Reed Walters’ sarcastic and dismissive response when I asked about Bean during a 45-minute interview.
“People are reluctant to say it,” said Craig Franklin, editor of the Jena Times, “but there is no doubt that Alan Bean created all of this.”
This is different things to different people. To some, this is a long overdue civil-rights reawakening, which points out pervasive racism in the South and in our justice system. To others, this is a horrific public-relations crime against the white people of Jena and irreparable damage to race relations in the poor oil town. And to some dispassionate observers, this is an unfortunate situation being exploited by white and black racial extremists.
On Sept. 20, when Jackson, Sharpton and Jena Six family members led competing rallies in support of six black youths accused of brutally attacking a white classmate, this — more than 20,000 marchers — was something no one in Jena could ever imagine.
But Alan Bean could.
Bean — the creator of Friends of Justice, an organization primarily dedicated to helping poor minorities victimized by our justice system — had warned prominent members of the Jena community as early as January that the town would be painted as racist by the national media if Walters didn’t back down.
“I told them I was going to bring media attention to this situation, and it was likely the same thing would happen to them that happened to my little hometown,” Bean said by phone on Friday. “Tulia got a bad rap, a rap it probably didn’t deserve. But the media doesn’t do its job. It’s in the entertainment business.”
“Tulia” refers to the case that made Bean and Friends of Justice a player in the world of American criminal justice. In the late 1990s, Bean exposed a corrupt cop in his hometown. More than a dozen drug convictions against minorities were overturned because of Bean’s work. Tulia was labeled as racist, and Bean became the person to call if you thought the police and/or a prosecutor were exploiting you.
A lawyer in New Orleans put Bean and parents of the Jena Six in contact with each other in December. Within three months, Bean had researched Jena and the events surrounding the assault, and published a 5,400-word narrative titled “The Making of a Myth in Jena, Louisiana” and a 2,400-word, media-friendly narrative titled “Responding to the Crisis in Jena, Louisiana.”
These two pro-defense narratives form the outline for most of the world’s understanding of the case. Bean connected the December assault on Justin Barker to the September noose hangings, to Reed Walters’ infamous “I can ruin your life with the stroke of a pen” statement at a hastily called school assembly, and to separate off-campus confrontations between Robert Bailey and white men on the Friday and Saturday before the attack on Barker.
Walters said Wednesday he’d never heard that the attack on Barker had anything to do with the noose hangings until the defense filed motions in the spring to recuse him from the case.
Bean said he first spoon-fed his narratives to Tom Mangold of the BBC because Mangold had worked with Bean on the Tulia drug cases. The BBC filmed a documentary on the Jena Six titled “Race Hate in Louisiana.” Bean said he then gave the Jena Six story to newspaper reporter Howard Witt of the Chicago Tribune, which published a similar story on May 20.
“I put it in the hands of people I knew would do a good job with the story,” Bean said.
Bean also gave his story to a ****ger, Jordan Flaherty, and a law professor, Bill Quigley. From all of these sources the story mushroomed and became fact.
The Jena Six beat up Justin Barker because they were still angry about the lack of sufficient punishment given to white kids who hung nooses on a whites-only shade tree, and the six were railroaded by an overzealous district attorney who failed to properly prosecute white men who viciously assaulted Robert Bailey and later pulled a shotgun on Bailey and two others at a convenience store.
Walters, police investigators, school officials and some Jena residents say Bean’s story is hogwash. There is at least some legitimacy to those claims. Bean’s story and subsequent posts on his Web site contain factual errors.
The three kids responsible for hanging the nooses were given more punishment than just a “few days of in-school suspension.” They went to an alternative school for nine days and received two weeks of in-school suspension, LaSalle Parish school superintendent Roy Breithaupt said.
But more than the factual errors, Bean’s story is framed — by his own admission — as an indictment of the criminal justice system and the people in power in Jena and, therefore, the story is unfairly biased. Bean never examined the other forces at work that contributed to the Jena Six assault and Walters’ heavy-handed approach to justice as it relates to the alleged perpetrators.
“I didn’t know,” Bean said when asked whether he knew of defendant Mychal Bell’s violent juvenile history when he was crafting his narratives. “I never talked to Mychal’s family, and I never talked to Mychal. He was in jail. I knew he had a history for getting into trouble. I knew he was a kid at a crossroads.”
Bean also didn’t know that in fall 2006, Bell, who 16 at the time, was living with his then-18-year-old best friend John McPherson and McPherson’s then-16-year-old wife, Ashley, in a three-bedroom trailer. The McPhersons are white. Bell is the godfather to their 18-month-old daughter.
Bean has a very idealistic view of the Jena defendants.
“These are fun-loving, impetuous, athletically gifted black males that don’t drink and don’t smoke, and they go to church as well,” he told me.
The church-going contention flies in the face of what Rev. Jimmy Ray Young, pastor at L&A Baptist Church, said Wednesday.
“None of these boys have been in church except when Al Sharpton was in town,” Young complained. “I’ve told the ministers we need to get these boys back in church.”
Walters claims that Bean and the media have distorted other key elements in the case.
Bean reported that Walters directed his “stroke of the pen” remark at black students when the school called an assembly to quell protests of the noose hangings. Some pro-Jena Six chain e-mails create the impression that Walters met privately with black students and threatened them. Not true, Walters and police say.
Paul Smith, Jena’s chief of police, says he and sheriff’s investigator Jimmy Arbogast called Walters to the school after a student took a swing at Smith when he was breaking up a fight between students.
“Tensions were high. Everybody was upset,” Arbogast said. “We wanted Reed to explain to them that, ‘Hey, look, you have to think for a minute. Look what age you are. Y’all are in high school.’ ”
Flanked by Arbogast and Smith, Walters addressed the entire student body. He said he began by telling the students about an aggravated rape case (possible death penalty) that he was considering.
Walters recalls saying: “ ‘I can be your best friend or your worst enemy. With the stroke of a pen I can make life miserable on you or ruin your life. So I want you to call me before you do something stupid.’ That last part doesn’t get reported. It doesn’t make good press.”
Bean also wrote that three days before the Jena Six assault a white man, Matt Windham, pulled a shotgun on Bailey and two others. He wrote that they wrestled the gun away from the man and ran off, and that Walters charged them with a crime rather than the white man.
The police contend that Windham — not the boys — called the police, claimed the boys threatened him, chased him back to his vehicle and wrestled his gun away. The police also say that two uninvolved female witnesses backed Windham, and that’s why the boys were charged.
Bean also mischaracterized the simple battery that Bailey suffered at the Fair Barn party four days before the attack on Barker, according to Walters, police, several witnesses and Bailey’s statements to police.
“Robert Bailey Jr. was attacked by a savage white mob at a local dance,” Bean wrote. “True, he wasn’t knocked unconscious — but that is just a matter of aim and good fortune. He was punched, he was kicked, and he was smacked over the head with a beer bottle (and he’s got the scars to prove it).”
Walters, who prosecuted Bailey’s lone attacker (Justin Sloan), said there was no mob attack. It was simply a dispute at the door of a mixed-race, invitation-only party that Bailey was denied access to.
“It wasn’t a fight,” Walters said. “Robert Bailey didn’t swing. He didn’t do anything. The kid hit him, knocked him down. No beer bottle, no anything. There was no statement of the victim at that time indicating any weapon was used. … The defendant (Sloan) was arrested on a simple battery. He was prosecuted on a simple battery. He pled guilty to a simple battery.
“It was only after the fact that I learned that a beer bottle was involved, that stitches were involved,” Walters continued. “And I checked after the fact with my local hospital: Did this happen? The information (about a beer bottle) came up in a motion to recuse me from the current charges. That’s the first time I’d heard about that.”
Ironically, Bean is now growing frustrated with the way the case has turned, particularly since Jackson and Sharpton got involved. He said they wouldn’t return his calls. He indicated there was a riff between the Bailey (Bean camp) and Bell (Sharpton camp) families.
People in Jena say the feud is over money. The families are handling the donations to the Jena Six defense fund. Robert Bailey recently posted and took down MySpace photos of himself and another Jena Six defendant with wads of $100 bills stuffed in their mouths and splashed across their bodies.
“I can tell you there is no misappropriation of the funds,” said Bean, adding he was not being paid for his services. “I’ve been there and seen them handling the checks. Where Robert got his hands on that money, I don’t know. He’s a kid. It was a stupid thing to do.”
As for Bean’s thoughts on Jackson and Sharpton?
“I’m not at all comfortable with the way this has been handled by the Jackson and Sharpton folks,” Bean said. “What’s wrong is that Jesse and Al have tried to turn this into an old civil-rights story in which Mychal Bell emerges like Rosa Parks, and that’s not right. These guys (Jackson and Sharpton) have lost their gravitas, lost their credibility. People are really tired of the same old 1960s shtick.”
Based on the crowds in Jena on Sept. 20, I’m not so sure.
Posted by rimasco on :
Sharpton was in my neck of the woods this weekend.......YAYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!
Hate Crime Charges Dropped Against Two Suspects In SI Attack
The two men arrested in connection with an attack on Staten Island earlier this week were charged Thursday with gang assault, despite calls from some for hate crime charges.
Mark Maleto, 21, and Daniel Avissato, 24, pled not guilty to gang assault in the second degree charges. Two other suspects have been questioned and a fifth person is still being sought.
Hate crime charges against the two were dropped because the district attorney says there is not enough evidence to support that claim.
"Based on the evidence provided to my office by the NYPD, we are trying to establish whether [the victim] was targeted for this alleged assault on the basis of his race as the hate crimes statute requires. At this point, I believe the evidence provided to my office by the police is legally insufficient to support hate crimes charges,” said Staten Island District Attorney Daniel Donovan. “Our investigation is ongoing and as our efforts move forward I am not excluding the possibility of presenting to a grand jury evidence in support of an indictment under the hate crimes statute."
Both suspects were released without bail and face up to 15 years in prison if convicted.
The charges stem from Tuesday night's attack on 20-year-old Skylar McCormick, pictured above, in Mariner’s Harbor. Police say McCormick was beaten by a group of white men shouting racial slurs.
McCormick is unable to speak because his jaw was broken in two places, but he appeared Thursday with Reverend Al Sharpton, who called for action in the wake of the incident.
"We cannot live in a city, state or nation where people cannot safely be in the streets or anywhere else because of the color of their skin,” he said. “There's no reason this young man should be in this condition. And the only way these attacks will stop is when someone pays for hate crimes and for racism."
Lawyers and friends of the suspects both dismissed charges from Sharpton and others that the attack was racially motivated.
"These are good kids they are not racists at all,” said Avissato’s friend “L-Dot.” “I believe it was just a little misunderstanding, you know, a little retaliation but nothing serious."
“Al Sharpton and myself have both been defending civil rights for a long time, but this individual also has civil rights,” said Maleto’s lawyer Mark Fonte.
“The people here is Staten Island, particularly in that community, have lived in harmony for years,” said John Murphy, the attorney for Avissato. “It’s an integrated community and, as you can see from the people out here, this is not a crime of hate."
At a press conference earlier Thursday, Kelly explained the circumstances leading to the assault.
"It appears that three individuals were having a race in the street - they ran in the street - and one of them, an African American, put his hand on a car or perhaps stepped on the car. They then left the scene,” said Kelly.
From there, Kelly says the group of white men followed the victim in a silver Cadillac. They caught up with him a few blocks later.
One neighbor – who asked to remain anonymous – says he saw what happened.
"I heard some screaming, and I looked out and one guy was surrounded by three,” said the neighbor. “And one came from behind and pushed him, another one punched him and another one started going down and another one kicked him in the face."
Sharpton says McCormick could face permanent damage as a result of his injuries.
Posted by J_U_ICE on :
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