Racism goes on trial again in America's Deep South

Zeke

Source: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,2083762,00.htmlRacism goes on trial again in America's Deep South[/b]The prosecution of three black Louisiana youths reveals the rise of discrimination by stealthTom Mangold in Jena, LouisianaSunday May 20, 2007The ObserverIn the cool and beflagged small courtroom in Jena, Louisiana, three black schoolboys - Robert Bailey, Theodore Shaw and Mychal Bell - are about to go on trial for a playground fight that could see them jailed for between 30 and 50 years.Jena, about 220 miles north of New Orleans, is a small town of 3,000 people, 85 per cent of whom are white. Tomorrow it will be the focus for a race trial which could put it on the map alongside the bad old names of the Mississippi Burning Sixties such as Selma or Montgomery, Alabama.Jena is gaining national notoriety as an example of the new 'stealth' racism, showing how lightly sleep the demons of racial prejudice in America's Deep South, even in the year that a black man, Barak Obama, is a serious candidate for the White House.It began in Jena's high school last August when Kenneth Purvis asked the headteacher if black students could break with a long-held tradition and join the whites who sit under the tree in the school courtyard during breaks. The boy was told that he and his friends could sit where they liked.The following morning white students had hung three nooses there. 'Bad taste, silly, but just a prank,' was the response of most of Jena's whites.'To us those nooses meant the KKK [Ku Klux Klan], they meant, "Niggers, we're going to kill you, we're going to hang you till you die,"' says Caseptla Bailey, a black community leader and mother of one of the accused. The three white perpetrators of what was seen as a race hate crime were given 'in-school' suspensions (sent to another school for a few days before returning).Jena's major industry is growing and marketing junk pine. Walk down the usually deserted main street and you will not find many black employees. Bailey, 56, is a former air force officer and holder of a business management degree. 'I couldn't even get a job in Jena as a bank teller,' she said. 'Look at the banks and the best white-collar jobs and you'll see only white and red necks in those collars.'Billy Doughty, the local barber, has never cut black men's hair. 'They just don't come here,' he mumbled. 'Anyway, their hair is different and difficult to cut.'The majority of blacks live in an area known as Ward 10. Many homes are trailers, or wooden shacks. Rubbish lies in the streets. On 'Snob Hill', where the whites live, the spacious gardens and lawns are trimmed, the gravelled drives boast SUVs and nice new saloons. Only two black families live there. A teacher from Jena High had enough money to buy his way in. But when he arrived local estate agents refused to show him a 'white' property even though several were advertised in the local paper ('they're all under contract,' the agents lied). The teacher eventually went to see one white owner and offered him cash. 'The guy preferred green [dollars] to black, so I got the property,' laughed the teacher, 'but since we moved in three years ago we haven't been invited by a single neighbour.'On 30 November, someone tried to burn Jena High to the ground. The crime remains unsolved. That same weekend race fights between teenagers broke out downtown, and on 4 December racial tension boiled over once more in the school. A white student, Justin Barker, was attacked, allegedly by six black students.The expected charges of assault and battery were not laid, and the six were charged with attempted second-degree murder and conspiracy to commit second-degree murder. They now face a lifetime in jail.Barker spent the evening of the assault at the local Baptist church, where he was seen by friends to be 'his usual smiling self'.Nine days later, with the case technically sub judice, the District Attorney made the following public statement to the local paper: 'I will not tolerate this type of behaviour. To those who act in this manner I tell you that you will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law and with the harshest crimes that the facts justify. When you are convicted I will seek the maximum penalty allowed by law. I will see to it that you never again menace the students at any school in this parish.'Bail for the impoverished students was set absurdly high, and most have been held in custody. The town's mind seems to be made up.But now the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the American Civil Liberties Union - 'damned outsiders' - have become involved and have begun to recruit, enthuse and empower the local black population. Reporters from the BBC and the New York Times have been drawn to the story. Jena does not like this publicity and shifts uncomfortably in the glare. It is 42 years since President Lyndon Johnson closed the loopholes that allowed southern states to discriminate against blacks. When the accused shuffle into court tomorrow, it's Jena that will be on trial.I don't own a television. Has this has made a single national news network here in the US?

CousinLarry

I had not heard about this, but it does not surprise me. There are still a lot of towns like this.

DJPrestige

'They just don't come here,' he mumbled. 'Anyway, their hair is different and difficult to cut.'

HairyBelafonte

I don't own a television. Has this has made a single national news network here in the US?

this is the first I've heard of it. none of my friends scattered around louisiana have said anything either.

Zeke

Teen victim in Jena fight allegedly brings gun on campus[/b]
High school melee last December landed six students in jail
By Abbey Brown
Louisiana Gannett News

JENA -- The victim in the December attack that landed six Jena High School students in jail was arrested Thursday afternoon after being accused of bringing a gun onto the high school campus.

Justin L. Barker, 17, of Jena was booked at around 12:30 p.m. into the LaSalle Parish Jail on a charge of possession of a firearm in a firearm-free zone, according to the jail's booking log.

Jena Police Chief Paul Smith would say only that Barker was arrested at the high school. He said LaSalle Parish District Attorney J. Reed Walters had told him not to release any additional information. Repeated calls to Walters' office went unreturned.

Jena High sophomore Sammy Nash said Thursday that during his English II class, another student notified the teacher that Barker had a gun in his vehicle. The teacher took the student to the school's office, the vehicle was searched, and police were notified, Nash said.

Nash said Barker and the other student are friends and often jokingly tell on each other for having chewing tobacco. When Barker told the teacher about the other student's chewing tobacco on Thursday, the other student said, "If you are going to search me, you oughta search (Barker's) truck. He's got a gun in it," Nash said.

Barker's friend and classmate Brandon Holley said the entire situation has been blown out of proportion.

"If you checked all the cars at the high school, you would find a lot more guns," the Jena High freshman said. "There was no kind of plot to do anything. It was just a gun. This has nothing to do with what happened in December."

Kelly Barker, Justin Barker's mom, confirmed that her son was the victim in the Dec. 4 fight. She declined to comment any further.

Following the fight at the school in December, six students were arrested and charged with attempted second-degree murder and conspiracy to commit second-degree murder.

Theodore Shaw and all-star athlete Mychal Bell remain in jail in lieu of $90,000 bond. Shaw, Bell and Robert Bailey Jr. are scheduled for a jury trial on May 21.

Trial dates have not been set for Carwin Jones and Bryant Purvis. If found guilty, the boys could face 25 to 100 years in prison.

Bailey and Shaw also have been charged with theft of more than $500, aggravated second-degree battery and conspiracy to commit second-degree battery, according to court documents. A jury trial for those charges is scheduled for June 25.

The sixth boy's case is being handled by juvenile court, and records weren't available.

Barker's charge carries a sentence of as many as five years in prison, according to the state criminal code. Bond had not yet been set as of late Thursday night.

"(Barker) is not at all a violent person," Holley said. "He would never hurt anyone. He is a real good person to be around. I know he would never hurt anyone or the school. And nobody's scared at school because we all know he wouldn't do anything."

Calls to Principal Glen Joiner and Superintendent Roy Breithaupt went unreturned Thursday.

source: http://www.thenewsstar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200770511012

Okem

I don't own a television. Has this has made a single national news network here in the US?

I just watched a documentary/news program about this on UK tv.

Shit is crazy!

Bail for the impoverished students was set absurdly high, and most have been held in custody. The town's mind seems to be made up.

The local newspaper reported the attacks as fact, it never once referred to the accused, as having 'allegedly' done anything. They were automatically treated as guilty.

Worse still, is the fact that the D.A. was responsible for getting the charges brought up, from assault and battery, to attempted second-degree murder and conspiracy to commit second-degree murder.

The rest of your life in jail for getting in a fight at school. And the dude they beat on, was 'his usual smiling self' that very night.

deej

The town of Jena is the parish seat of La Salle Parish, in the US state of Louisiana. The population was 2,971 at the 2000 census.

Jena and La Salle Parish have been heavily Republican since a two-party system took root in Louisiana. The town is 85 percent white, an unusual high white composition in Louisiana. In the 2003 gubernatorial race, however, La Salle Parish voted heavily for the Democratic Lieutenant Governor Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, rather than the young Republican challenger Bobby Jindal, an Indian American[/b] now a U.S. Representative from Metairie in Jefferson Parish. Blanco received 2,974 votes (61 percent) to Jindal's 1,917 ballots (39 percent)

we're talking some serious racist nuts here, for whom
racism > politics

spelunk

"If you checked all the cars at the high school, you would find a lot more guns," the Jena High freshman said. "There was no kind of plot to do anything. It was just a gun. This has nothing to do with what happened in December."

Now that shit is scary.

HairyBelafonte

"If you checked all the cars at the high school, you would find a lot more guns," the Jena High freshman said. "There was no kind of plot to do anything. It was just a gun. This has nothing to do with what happened in December."

Now that shit is scary.

i honestly don't think that is too far off from alot of small southern towns, kids are gonna shoot up their school, they're just hicks.

deej

"If you checked all the cars at the high school, you would find a lot more guns," the Jena High freshman said. "There was no kind of plot to do anything. It was just a gun. This has nothing to do with what happened in December."

Now that shit is scary.

yeah this is pretty standard rural shit dude

whats scary is the detail in this article

"There was White Kids that Hung Up a Noose, But It was Black Kids in the Fight."
Looking for Justice in Jena, Louisiana

By JORDAN FLAHERTY

Speaking to a crowd of demonstrators in front of a rural Louisiana courthouse last week, Alan Bean, a Baptist minister from the Texas panhandle, inveighed against injustice. "The highest crime in the Old Testament," he declared, "is to withhold due process from poor people, to manipulate the criminal justice system to the advantage of the powerful, against the poor and the powerless."

Bean was speaking at a rally organized by residents of Jena, Louisiana. In the space of a few weeks, more than 150 of this small town's residents have organized an inspiring grassroots struggle against injustice. The demonstrations began when six Black students at Jena High School were arrested after a fight at school and charged with conspiracy to attempt second-degree murder. The students now face up to 100 years in prison without parole; in a case that King Downing, National Coordinator of the ACLU's Campaign Against Racial Profiling, has said "carries the scent of injustice."

Local activists say that this wave of problems started last September when Black high school students asked for permission to sit under a tree at an area of the high school that had, traditionally, been used only by white students. The next day, three nooses were hanging from the tree.

The following week, Black students staged a protest under the tree. At a school assembly soon after, Jena district attorney Reed Walters, appearing with local police officers, warned Black students against further unrest. "I can make your lives disappear with a stroke of my pen," he threatened.

According to many in Jena, tensions simmered in the town over the fall, occasionally exploding into fights and other incidents. No white students were charged or punished for any of these incidents, including the students found to have been responsible for hanging the nooses. Bryant Purvis, one of the Black students now facing charges, explained to me that, after the incident, "there were a lot of people aggravated about it, a lot of fights at the school after that, a lot of arguments, a lot of people getting treated differently."

In the first weekend of December, a Black student was assaulted by a group of white students, and a white graduate of Jena High School threatened several Black students with a shotgun. The following Monday, white students taunted the Black student who was assaulted over the weekend, and one of the white students was beaten up.

Within hours, six Black students were arrested. "I think the district attorney is pinning it on us to make an example of us," said Purvis. "In Jena, people get accused of things they didn't do a lot."

Soon after, their parents discovered that these students were facing attempted murder charges. "The courtroom, the whole back side, was filled with police officers," Tina Jones, Bryant's mother, recalls. "I guess they thought maybe when they announced what the charges were, we were gonna go berserk or something."

At last week's demonstration, family members and allies spoke about the issues at the center of the case. "I don't know how the DA or the court system gets involved in a school fight," said Jones. "But I'm not surprised--there's a lot of racism in Jena. A white person will get probation, and a black person is liable to get 15 to 20 years for the same crime."

Alan Bean, director of an organization called Friends of Justice, began his activism in response to a string of false arrests in 1999 in Tulia, Texas, where he lives. Since then, he has dedicated himself to supporting community organizing around cases of criminal justice abuse in rural Texas and Louisiana. Small towns like Jena--which has a population of 2,500, and is 85 percent white - are often left out of the organizing support, attention, and funding that struggles in metropolitan areas receive.

This disparity was not always the case. Rural southern towns were the frontlines of the 60s civil rights movement. Groups like CORE (Congress of Racial Equality) and SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee) were active throughout the rural south. And these rural towns have been important sites of homegrown resistance. In 1964, in Jonesboro Louisiana, just north of Jena, a group of Black veterans of the US military formed the Deacons for Defense, an armed self-defense organization, in support of civil rights struggles. The Deacons went on to form 21 chapters in rural Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama.

Outrageous violations still occur in many of these towns. A few months ago, Gerald Washington of Westlake, Louisiana was shot three days before he was to become the town's first Black mayor. Less than two weeks after that, shots were fired into the house of another Black mayor, in Greenwood Louisiana. Jena itself is a mostly segregated community that was also the site of the Jena Juvenile Correctional Center for Youth, a legendarily brutal prison that was shut down in 2000.

Jena residents formed their own defense committee, without the support of national organizations. They have been holding weekly protests and organizing meetings that have attracted allies from near and far. A gathering last week was attended by Bean, as well as allies from other northern and central Louisiana towns, and representatives from the ACLU, NAACP, and National Action Network.

Many parents questioned why the noose and other threatening actions were not taken seriously by the school administration. "What's the difference," asks Marcus Jones, the father of Mychal Bell, one of the students, about the disparity in the charges. "There's a color difference. There was white kids that hung up a noose, but it was black kids in the fight." Sentencing disparity is a big issue in many of these small towns, where many see it as the modern continuation of the ugly southern heritage of lynching.

Jones explains a litany of reasons why the children should not be charged with attempted murder. "The kid did not have life threatening injuries, he was not cut, he was not stabbed, he was not shot, nothing was broken. There is no evidence of conspiracy to commit attempted murder. You talk about conspiracy to attempt second-degree murder, you think about the mafia, you think somebody paid a sniper or something. We're talking about a high school fistfight. The DA is showing his racist upbringing, his racist acts and his racist nature, and bringing it into the law."

For three of the youth, Robert Bailey, Theo Shaw and Mychal Bell, their trial starts May 21. I asked Bryant Purvis how this has affected him. "One of my goals in life is to go to college, and not to go to jail, and that changed me right there," he tells me. "That crushed me, to be in a jail cell."

When asked how her life has changed, Purvis' mother described the sadness of having her son taken away from her without warning. "You wake up in the morning and your son is there. You lay down at night and he's there. Then all of a sudden he's gone. That's a lot to deal with."

batmon

33thirdcom

The town of Jena is the parish seat of La Salle Parish, in the US state of Louisiana. The population was 2,971 at the 2000 census.

Jena and La Salle Parish have been heavily Republican since a two-party system took root in Louisiana. The town is 85 percent white, an unusual high white composition in Louisiana. In the 2003 gubernatorial race, however, La Salle Parish voted heavily for the Democratic Lieutenant Governor Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, rather than the young Republican challenger Bobby Jindal, an Indian American[/b] now a U.S. Representative from Metairie in Jefferson Parish. Blanco received 2,974 votes (61 percent) to Jindal's 1,917 ballots (39 percent)

we're talking some serious racist nuts here, for whom
racism > politics

Unfortunately no this is not nutjobs more status quo... welcome to the deep south.

HarveyCanal

THIS KIND OF THING DOES NOT ONLY HAPPEN IN THE DEEP SOUTH.

EVER BEEN TO IDAHO?

deej

The town of Jena is the parish seat of La Salle Parish, in the US state of Louisiana. The population was 2,971 at the 2000 census.

Jena and La Salle Parish have been heavily Republican since a two-party system took root in Louisiana. The town is 85 percent white, an unusual high white composition in Louisiana. In the 2003 gubernatorial race, however, La Salle Parish voted heavily for the Democratic Lieutenant Governor Kathleen Babineaux Blanco, rather than the young Republican challenger Bobby Jindal, an Indian American[/b] now a U.S. Representative from Metairie in Jefferson Parish. Blanco received 2,974 votes (61 percent) to Jindal's 1,917 ballots (39 percent)

we're talking some serious racist nuts here, for whom
racism > politics

Unfortunately no this is not nutjobs more status quo... welcome to the deep south.

i am willing to say that status quo there = 'serious racist nuts'


i donno what batmon's yawning at exactly but my interest in this piece is largely considering the narrative that folks have been pushing lately about some random murders in Knoxville.

These two white folks were killed by some black folks and a bunch of racists have made it into an example of 'protecting the white race' blah blah blah .. which is 'yawn' as well. Except that some people, prominent rightist folks like michelle malkin and john leo of u.s. news and world report are using the report as an example of 'liberal bias' in the mainstream media, inferring that the mainstream media isn't covering this case because of some PCisms or some shit, lingering 'i told you so's from the duke rape case

Which is bullshit; the case is pretty open-shut, no one is on the lam, its no different from the hundreds of rape-murders that occur across the country. But its getting coverage on fox news, an attempt to use this 'mainstream media/secular progressive' thing to reframe racism yet again ... anyway i think its interesting. esp. cause cases like this aren't getting 'mainstream media attention' either

DB_Cooper

THIS KIND OF THING DOES NOT ONLY HAPPEN IN THE DEEP SOUTH.

EVER BEEN TO IDAHO?

Thankfully, no. They export their potatoes, so there's really no reason to go.

batmon

THIS KIND OF THING DOES NOT ONLY HAPPEN IN THE DEEP SOUTH.

EVER BEEN TO BENSONHURST?

deej

THIS KIND OF THING DOES NOT ONLY HAPPEN IN THE DEEP SOUTH.

EVER BEEN TO IDAHO?

archaic is on point but please don't derail thread

Rockadelic

These two white folks were killed by some black folks

Do they have "hate crime" laws in Tn.?

If so, are(would) these murders be prosecuted as such?

deej

These two white folks were killed by some black folks

Do they have "hate crime" laws in Tn.?

If so, are(would) these murders be prosecuted as such?

there was no evidence that the crime was racially motivated, so no.
kind of irrelevant tho since they're pursing the death penalty

HarveyCanal

THIS KIND OF THING DOES NOT ONLY HAPPEN IN THE DEEP SOUTH.

EVER BEEN ANYWHERE?

mannybolone

THIS KIND OF THING DOES NOT ONLY HAPPEN IN THE DEEP SOUTH.

EVER BEEN ANYWHERE?

deej

gas face to everyone
can't we just ignored these little dudes blaming the south? anyone with any sense knows this already

CousinLarry

These two white folks were killed by some black folks

Do they have "hate crime" laws in Tn.?

If so, are(would) these murders be prosecuted as such?

there was no evidence that the crime was racially motivated, so no.

kind of irrelevant tho since they're pursing the death penalty

I don't think anyone was killed. WTF? Where did that come from?

deej

These two white folks were killed by some black folks

Do they have "hate crime" laws in Tn.?

If so, are(would) these murders be prosecuted as such?

there was no evidence that the crime was racially motivated, so no.

kind of irrelevant tho since they're pursing the death penalty

I don't think anyone was killed. WTF? Where did that come from?

i'm talking about this
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channon_Christian_and_Christopher_Newsom_murder

which i was holding up in contrast to the post that started this thread

Rockadelic

These two white folks were killed by some black folks

Do they have "hate crime" laws in Tn.?

If so, are(would) these murders be prosecuted as such?

there was no evidence that the crime was racially motivated, so no.

kind of irrelevant tho since they're pursing the death penalty

I don't think anyone was killed. WTF? Where did that come from?

i'm talking about this

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channon_Christian_and_Christopher_Newsom_murder

which i was holding up in contrast to the post that started this thread

Unless I didn't read your link right it said the crimes WERE ultimately racially motivated??

Although it could have just been your average everyday torture, cut off breast/penis non-hate crime??

This case WAS covered by the National media when it happened......but I have not seen anything about the subsequent "controversy" around the case.

Scum is Scum regardless of race.

mannybolone

There's disagreement over that point:

"Police Chief Sterling Owen IV said that there is no indication the crimes were racially motivated, and that the murders and assault "appears to have been a random violent act."[12] The parents of Channon Christian also do not believe the crime was racially motivated. [13] The father of Chris Newsom said he didn't believe the murders started out as race-motivated crimes. "I don't think it started out that way but from all indications we have, it developed into that," Hugh Newsom said."

deej

These two white folks were killed by some black folks

Do they have "hate crime" laws in Tn.?

If so, are(would) these murders be prosecuted as such?

there was no evidence that the crime was racially motivated, so no.

kind of irrelevant tho since they're pursing the death penalty

I don't think anyone was killed. WTF? Where did that come from?

i'm talking about this

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Channon_Christian_and_Christopher_Newsom_murder

which i was holding up in contrast to the post that started this thread

Unless I didn't read your link right it said the crimes WERE ultimately racially motivated??

Although it could have just been your average everyday torture, cut off breast/penis non-hate crime??

This case WAS covered by the National media when it happened......but I have not seen anything about the subsequent "controversy" around the case.

Scum is Scum regardless of race.

you have reading comprehension issues

Police Chief Sterling Owen IV said that there is no indication the crimes were racially motivated

"Claims made over the Internet that the couple were sexually mutilated are absolutely not true," said John Gill, special assistant to District Attorney Randy Nichols.

and it was covered by michelle malkin on o'reilly two nights ago, and john leo from us news and world report just wrote about it as well

it was covered by the national media the same way most rape/murders are; a brief piece in AP, unless something spectacular happens behind it

mannybolone

Just so we're clear - anti-white hate crimes DO get prosecuted. See the recent and controversial case in Long Beach, CA involving a group of Black teens accused to beating the crap out of three white woman last Halloween.

Eventually, most of the teens were found guilty, though, b/c they were tried as juveniles, most of them got some variation on probation.

And in general, 20% of all hate crime victims, nationally, are White. However, that compares with 68% of victims who are Black. Adjust that for per capita and the rates really contrast.

Rockadelic

you have reading comprehension issues

No, I really don't.....like ODub said above, there are varying opinions on this. I didn't hallucinate or make up the shit below.[/b]

Police Chief Sterling Owen IV said that there is no indication the crimes were racially motivatedThe father of Chris Newsom said he didn't believe the murders started out as race-motivated crimes. "I don't think it started out that way but from all indications we have, it developed into that," [/b] Hugh Newsom said.

it was covered by the national media the same way most rape/murders are; a brief piece in AP, unless something spectacular happens behind it
It was given BIG coverage here mainly because it was a kidnap/torture with all the juicy penis dismemberment and titty disfigurement that sells papers.

deej

you have reading comprehension issues

No, I really don't.....like ODub said above, there are varying opinions on this. I didn't hallucinate or make up the shit below.[/b]

Police Chief Sterling Owen IV said that there is no indication the crimes were racially motivatedThe father of Chris Newsom said he didn't believe the murders started out as race-motivated crimes. "I don't think it started out that way but from all indications we have, it developed into that," [/b] Hugh Newsom said.

it was covered by the national media the same way most rape/murders are; a brief piece in AP, unless something spectacular happens behind it

It was given BIG coverage here mainly because it was a kidnap/torture with all the juicy penis dismemberment and titty disfigurement that sells papers. THERE WAS NO PENIS DISMEMBERMENT. REREAD MY POST

i also find conjecture from the victim's father to hardly be an example of hardhitting evidence.

Rockadelic

you have reading comprehension issues

No, I really don't.....like ODub said above, there are varying opinions on this. I didn't hallucinate or make up the shit below.[/b]

Police Chief Sterling Owen IV said that there is no indication the crimes were racially motivatedThe father of Chris Newsom said he didn't believe the murders started out as race-motivated crimes. "I don't think it started out that way but from all indications we have, it developed into that," [/b] Hugh Newsom said.

it was covered by the national media the same way most rape/murders are; a brief piece in AP, unless something spectacular happens behind it

It was given BIG coverage here mainly because it was a kidnap/torture with all the juicy penis dismemberment and titty disfigurement that sells papers.

THERE WAS NO PENIS DISMEMBERMENT. REREAD MY POST

i also find conjecture from the victim's father to hardly be an example of hardhitting evidence.
From your link, and what was reported when the crime occurred....

"One media report has suggested that prior to their deaths Newsom's penis was severed and one or both of Christian's breasts were cut off."


THIS is what was reported....do I need to go find archive articles??

NOTHING should distract anyone from the heinous crimes that were committed and all anyone should care about is that these people are punished.