Black nooses hanging from the 'white' tree
Injustice in Jena
Bill Quigley
Guest Contributor
In a small, still mostly segregated section of rural Louisiana, an all-white jury heard a series of white witnesses called by a white prosecutor testify in a courtroom overseen by a white judge in a trial of a fight at the local high school where a white student who had been making racial taunts was hit by black students.
The fight was the culmination of a series of racial incidents starting when whites responded to black students sitting under the "white tree" at their school by hanging three nooses from the tree. The white jury and white prosecutor and all white supporters of the white victim were all on one side of the courtroom. The black defendant, 17-year-old Mychal Bell, and his supporters were on the other.
The jury quickly convicted Bell of two felonies -- aggravated battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated battery. Bell, who was a 16-year-old sophomore football star at the time he was arrested, faces up to 22 years in prison. Five other black youths await similar trials on attempted second-degree murder and conspiracy charges.
Yes, you read that correctly.
The rest of the story, which is being reported across the world in papers in China, France and England, is just as chilling. (read the rest below)
The trouble started under "the white tree" in front of Jena High School. The "white tree" is where the white students, 80 percent of the student body, would always sit during school breaks.
In September 2006, a black student at Jena high school asked permission from school administrators to sit under the "white tree." School officials advised them to sit wherever they wanted. They did.
The next day, three nooses, in the school colors, were hanging from the "white tree." The message was clear. "Those nooses meant the KKK, they meant 'Niggers, we're going to kill you, we're going to hang you till you die,'" Casteptla Bailey, mom of one of the students, told the London Observer.
The Jena high school principal found that three white students were responsible and recommended expulsion. The white superintendent of schools over-ruled the principal and gave the students a three-day suspension, saying that the nooses were just a youthful stunt. "Adolescents play pranks," the superintendent told the Chicago Tribune. "I don't think it was a threat against anybody."
The African-American community was hurt and upset. "Hanging those nooses was a hate crime, plain and simple," according to Tracy Bowens, mother of students at Jena High.
But blacks in this area of Louisiana have little political power. The ten-person, all-male government of the parish has one African-American member. The nine-member all-male school board has one African-American member. (A phone caller to the local school board trying to find out the racial makeup of the school board was told there was one "colored" member of the board.) There is one black police officer in Jena and two black public school teachers.
Jena, with a population of less than 3,000, is the largest town in and seat of LaSalle Parish, Louisiana. There are about 350 African Americans in the town. LaSalle has a population of just over 14,000 people -- 12 percent African-American.
This is solid Bush and David Duke Country -- GWB won LaSalle Parish four to one in the last two elections; Duke carried a majority of the white vote when he ran for governor of Louisiana. Families earn about 60 percent of the national average. The Census Bureau reports that less than 10 percent of the businesses in LaSalle Parish are black-owned.
Jena is the site of the infamous Juvenile Correctional Center for Youth that was forced to close its doors in 2000, only two years after opening, due to widespread brutality and racism including the choking of juveniles by guards after the youth met with a lawyer. The U.S. Department of Justice sued the private prison amid complaints that guards paid inmates to fight each other and laughed when teens tried to commit suicide.
Black students decided to resist and organized a sit-in under the "white tree" at the school to protest the light suspensions given to the noose-hanging white students.
The white District Attorney then came to Jena High with law enforcement officers to address a school assembly. According to testimony in a later motion in court, the D.A. reportedly threatened the protesting black students, saying that if they didn't stop making a fuss about this "innocent prank I can be your best friend or your worst enemy. I can take away your lives with a stroke of my pen." The school was put on lockdown for the rest of the week.
Racial tensions remained high throughout the fall.
On the night of Thursday, Nov. 30, 2006, a still-unsolved fire burned down the main academic building of Jena High School.
On Friday night, Dec. 1, a black student who showed up at a white party was beaten by whites. On Saturday, Dec. 2, a young white man pulled out a shotgun in a confrontation with young black men at the Gotta Go convenience store outside Jena before the men wrestled it away from him. The black men who took the shotgun away were later arrested; no charges were filed against the white man.
On Monday, Dec. 4, at Jena High, a white student -- who allegedly had been making racial taunts, including calling African-American students "niggers" while supporting the students who hung the nooses and who beat up the black student at the off-campus party -- was knocked down, punched and kicked by black students. The white victim was taken to the hospital treated and released. He attended a social function that evening.
Six black Jena students were arrested and charged with attempted second-degree murder. All six were expelled from school.
The six charged were 17-year-old Robert Bailey Junior, whose bail was set at $138,000; 17-year-old Theo Shaw -- bail $130,000; 18-year-old Carwin Jones -- bail $100,000; 17-year-old Bryant Purvis -- bail $70,000; 16-year-old Mychal Bell, a sophomore in high school who was charged as an adult and for whom bail was set at $90,000; and a still-unidentified minor.
Many of the young men, who came to be known as the Jena 6, stayed in jail for months. Few families could afford bond or private attorneys.
Mychal Bell remained in jail from December 2006 until his trial because his family was unable to post the $90,000 bond. Theo Shaw has also remained in jail. Several of the other defendants remained in jail for months until their families could raise sufficient money to put up bonds.
The Chicago Tribune wrote a powerful story headlined "Racial Demons Rear Heads." The London Observer wrote: "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." The British Broadcasting Company aired a TV special report, "Race Hate in Louisiana 2007."
The Jena 6 and their families were put under substantial pressure to plead guilty. Mychal Bell was reported to have been leaning towards pleading guilty right up until his trial, when he decided he would not plead guilty to a felony.
When it finally came, the trial of Mychal Bell was swift. Bell was represented by an appointed public defender.
On the morning of the trial, the D.A. reduced the charges from attempted second-degree murder to second-degree aggravated battery and conspiracy. Aggravated battery in Louisiana law demands the attack be with a dangerous weapon. The dangerous weapon? The prosecutor was allowed to argue to the jury that the tennis shoes worn by Bell could be considered a dangerous weapon used by "the gang of black boys" who beat the white victim.
Most shocking of all, when the pool of potential jurors was summoned, 50 people appeared -- every single one white.
The LaSalle Parish clerk defended the all-white group to the Alexandria, La. Town Talk newspaper, saying that the jury pool was selected by computer. "The venire [panel of prospective jurors] is color blind. The idea is for the list to truly reflect the racial makeup of the community, but the system does not take race into factor." Officials said they had summoned 150 people, but these were the only people who showed up.
The all-white jury that was finally chosen included two people friendly with the District Attorney, a relative of one of the witnesses and several others who were friends of prosecution witnesses.
Bell's parents, Melissa Bell and Marcus Jones, were not even allowed to attend the trial despite their objections, because they were listed as potential witnesses. The white victim, though a witness, was allowed to stay in the courtroom. The parents, who had been widely quoted in the media as critics of the process, were also told they could no longer speak to the media as long as the trial was in session. Marcus Jones had told the media, "It's all about those nooses" and declared the charges racially motivated.
Other supporters who planned a demonstration in support of Bell were ordered by the court not to do so near the courthouse or anywhere the judge would see them.
The prosecutor called 17 witnesses -- 11 white students, three white teachers, and two white nurses. Some said they saw Bell kick the victim, others said they did not see him do anything. The white victim testified that he did not know if Bell hit him or not.
The Chicago Tribune reported the public defender did not challenge the all-white jury pool, put on no evidence and called no witnesses. The public defender told the Alexandria Town talk after resting his case without calling any witnesses that he knew he would be second-guessed by many but was confident that the jury would return a verdict of not guilty: "I don't believe race is an issue in this trial," he said. "I think I have a fair and impartial jury."
The jury deliberated for less than three hours and found Mychal Bell guilty on the maximum possible charges of aggravated second degree battery and conspiracy. He faces up to a maximum of 22 years in prison.
The public defender told the press afterwards, "I feel I put on the best defense that I could." Responding to criticism of not putting on any witnesses, the attorney said, "Why open the door for further accusations? I did the best I could for my client, Mychal Bell."
At a rally in front of the courthouse the next day, Alan Bean, a Texas minister and leader of the Friends of Justice, said, "I have seen a lot of trials in my time. And I have never seen a more distressing miscarriage of justice than what happened in LaSalle Parish yesterday." Khadijah Rashad of Lafayette Louisiana described the trial as a "modern-day lynching."
Tory Pegram with the Louisiana ACLU has been working with the parents for months. "People know if they don't demand equal treatment now, they will never get it. People's jobs and livelihoods have been threatened for attending Jena 6 Defense meetings, but people are willing to risk that. One person told me: 'We have to convince more people to come rally with us. ... What's the worst that could happen? They fire us from our jobs? We have the worst jobs in the town anyway. They burn a cross on our lawns or burn down my house? All of that has happened to us before. We have to keep speaking out to make sure it doesn't happen to us again, or our children will never be safe.'"
Whites in the community were adamant that there is no racism. "We don't have a problem," according to one. Other locals told the media, "We all get along," and "Most blacks are happy with the way things are." One person even said, "We don't have many problems with our blacks."
Melvin Worthington, the lone African-American school board member in LaSalle Parish, said it all could have been avoided. "There's no doubt about it," he told the Chicago Tribune, "whites and blacks are treated differently here. The white kids should have gotten more punishment for hanging those nooses. If they had, all the stuff that followed could have been avoided."
Herbert McCoy, a relative of one of the youths who has been trying to raise money for bail and lawyers, challenged people everywhere at the end of the rally when he said, "You better get out of your houses. You better come out and defend your children because they are incarcerating them by the thousands. Jena's not the beginning, but Jena has crossed the line. Justice is not right when you put on the wrong charges and then convict. I believe in justice. I believe in the point of law. I believe in accepting the punishment if I'm guilty. If I'm guilty, convict me and punishment, but if I'm innocent, no justice." The crowd joined with him and shouted, "No peace!"
What happened to the white guys? The white victim of the beating was later arrested for bringing a hunting rifle loaded with 13 bullets onto the high school campus and released on $5,000 bond. The white man who beat up the black youth at the off-campus party was arrested and charged with simple battery. The white students who hung up the nooses in the "white tree" were never charged.
The people in Jena are fighting for justice, and they need legal and financial help. Since the arrests, a group of family members have been holding well-attended meetings, and have created a defense fund -- the Jena 6 Defense Committee. They have received support from the NAACP, the Louisiana ACLU and Friends of Justice.
People interested in supporting can contact: the Jena 6 Defense Committee, P.O. Box 2798, Jena, LA 71342, jena6defense@gmail.com; Friends of Justice, 507 North Donley Ave., Tulia, TX 79088, www.fojtulia.org; or the ACLU of Louisiana, P.O. Box 56157, New Orleans, LA 70156, www.laaclu.org or 417-350-0536.
What is next? The rest of the Jena 6 await similar trials. Theodore Shaw is due to go on trial shortly. Mychal Bell is scheduled to be sentenced July 31. If he gets the maximum sentence, he will not be out of prison until he is nearly 40. Meanwhile, the "white tree" outside Jena High sits quietly in the hot sun.
Bill Quigley is a human rights lawyer and law professor at Loyola University New Orleans. You can reach him at Quigley@loyno.edu. Audrey Stewart contributed to this article.
Bill Quigley
Guest Contributor
In a small, still mostly segregated section of rural Louisiana, an all-white jury heard a series of white witnesses called by a white prosecutor testify in a courtroom overseen by a white judge in a trial of a fight at the local high school where a white student who had been making racial taunts was hit by black students.
The fight was the culmination of a series of racial incidents starting when whites responded to black students sitting under the "white tree" at their school by hanging three nooses from the tree. The white jury and white prosecutor and all white supporters of the white victim were all on one side of the courtroom. The black defendant, 17-year-old Mychal Bell, and his supporters were on the other.
The jury quickly convicted Bell of two felonies -- aggravated battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated battery. Bell, who was a 16-year-old sophomore football star at the time he was arrested, faces up to 22 years in prison. Five other black youths await similar trials on attempted second-degree murder and conspiracy charges.
Yes, you read that correctly.
The rest of the story, which is being reported across the world in papers in China, France and England, is just as chilling. (read the rest below)
The trouble started under "the white tree" in front of Jena High School. The "white tree" is where the white students, 80 percent of the student body, would always sit during school breaks.
In September 2006, a black student at Jena high school asked permission from school administrators to sit under the "white tree." School officials advised them to sit wherever they wanted. They did.
The next day, three nooses, in the school colors, were hanging from the "white tree." The message was clear. "Those nooses meant the KKK, they meant 'Niggers, we're going to kill you, we're going to hang you till you die,'" Casteptla Bailey, mom of one of the students, told the London Observer.
The Jena high school principal found that three white students were responsible and recommended expulsion. The white superintendent of schools over-ruled the principal and gave the students a three-day suspension, saying that the nooses were just a youthful stunt. "Adolescents play pranks," the superintendent told the Chicago Tribune. "I don't think it was a threat against anybody."
The African-American community was hurt and upset. "Hanging those nooses was a hate crime, plain and simple," according to Tracy Bowens, mother of students at Jena High.
But blacks in this area of Louisiana have little political power. The ten-person, all-male government of the parish has one African-American member. The nine-member all-male school board has one African-American member. (A phone caller to the local school board trying to find out the racial makeup of the school board was told there was one "colored" member of the board.) There is one black police officer in Jena and two black public school teachers.
Jena, with a population of less than 3,000, is the largest town in and seat of LaSalle Parish, Louisiana. There are about 350 African Americans in the town. LaSalle has a population of just over 14,000 people -- 12 percent African-American.
This is solid Bush and David Duke Country -- GWB won LaSalle Parish four to one in the last two elections; Duke carried a majority of the white vote when he ran for governor of Louisiana. Families earn about 60 percent of the national average. The Census Bureau reports that less than 10 percent of the businesses in LaSalle Parish are black-owned.
Jena is the site of the infamous Juvenile Correctional Center for Youth that was forced to close its doors in 2000, only two years after opening, due to widespread brutality and racism including the choking of juveniles by guards after the youth met with a lawyer. The U.S. Department of Justice sued the private prison amid complaints that guards paid inmates to fight each other and laughed when teens tried to commit suicide.
Black students decided to resist and organized a sit-in under the "white tree" at the school to protest the light suspensions given to the noose-hanging white students.
The white District Attorney then came to Jena High with law enforcement officers to address a school assembly. According to testimony in a later motion in court, the D.A. reportedly threatened the protesting black students, saying that if they didn't stop making a fuss about this "innocent prank I can be your best friend or your worst enemy. I can take away your lives with a stroke of my pen." The school was put on lockdown for the rest of the week.
Racial tensions remained high throughout the fall.
On the night of Thursday, Nov. 30, 2006, a still-unsolved fire burned down the main academic building of Jena High School.
On Friday night, Dec. 1, a black student who showed up at a white party was beaten by whites. On Saturday, Dec. 2, a young white man pulled out a shotgun in a confrontation with young black men at the Gotta Go convenience store outside Jena before the men wrestled it away from him. The black men who took the shotgun away were later arrested; no charges were filed against the white man.
On Monday, Dec. 4, at Jena High, a white student -- who allegedly had been making racial taunts, including calling African-American students "niggers" while supporting the students who hung the nooses and who beat up the black student at the off-campus party -- was knocked down, punched and kicked by black students. The white victim was taken to the hospital treated and released. He attended a social function that evening.
Six black Jena students were arrested and charged with attempted second-degree murder. All six were expelled from school.
The six charged were 17-year-old Robert Bailey Junior, whose bail was set at $138,000; 17-year-old Theo Shaw -- bail $130,000; 18-year-old Carwin Jones -- bail $100,000; 17-year-old Bryant Purvis -- bail $70,000; 16-year-old Mychal Bell, a sophomore in high school who was charged as an adult and for whom bail was set at $90,000; and a still-unidentified minor.
Many of the young men, who came to be known as the Jena 6, stayed in jail for months. Few families could afford bond or private attorneys.
Mychal Bell remained in jail from December 2006 until his trial because his family was unable to post the $90,000 bond. Theo Shaw has also remained in jail. Several of the other defendants remained in jail for months until their families could raise sufficient money to put up bonds.
The Chicago Tribune wrote a powerful story headlined "Racial Demons Rear Heads." The London Observer wrote: "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." The British Broadcasting Company aired a TV special report, "Race Hate in Louisiana 2007."
The Jena 6 and their families were put under substantial pressure to plead guilty. Mychal Bell was reported to have been leaning towards pleading guilty right up until his trial, when he decided he would not plead guilty to a felony.
When it finally came, the trial of Mychal Bell was swift. Bell was represented by an appointed public defender.
On the morning of the trial, the D.A. reduced the charges from attempted second-degree murder to second-degree aggravated battery and conspiracy. Aggravated battery in Louisiana law demands the attack be with a dangerous weapon. The dangerous weapon? The prosecutor was allowed to argue to the jury that the tennis shoes worn by Bell could be considered a dangerous weapon used by "the gang of black boys" who beat the white victim.
Most shocking of all, when the pool of potential jurors was summoned, 50 people appeared -- every single one white.
The LaSalle Parish clerk defended the all-white group to the Alexandria, La. Town Talk newspaper, saying that the jury pool was selected by computer. "The venire [panel of prospective jurors] is color blind. The idea is for the list to truly reflect the racial makeup of the community, but the system does not take race into factor." Officials said they had summoned 150 people, but these were the only people who showed up.
The all-white jury that was finally chosen included two people friendly with the District Attorney, a relative of one of the witnesses and several others who were friends of prosecution witnesses.
Bell's parents, Melissa Bell and Marcus Jones, were not even allowed to attend the trial despite their objections, because they were listed as potential witnesses. The white victim, though a witness, was allowed to stay in the courtroom. The parents, who had been widely quoted in the media as critics of the process, were also told they could no longer speak to the media as long as the trial was in session. Marcus Jones had told the media, "It's all about those nooses" and declared the charges racially motivated.
Other supporters who planned a demonstration in support of Bell were ordered by the court not to do so near the courthouse or anywhere the judge would see them.
The prosecutor called 17 witnesses -- 11 white students, three white teachers, and two white nurses. Some said they saw Bell kick the victim, others said they did not see him do anything. The white victim testified that he did not know if Bell hit him or not.
The Chicago Tribune reported the public defender did not challenge the all-white jury pool, put on no evidence and called no witnesses. The public defender told the Alexandria Town talk after resting his case without calling any witnesses that he knew he would be second-guessed by many but was confident that the jury would return a verdict of not guilty: "I don't believe race is an issue in this trial," he said. "I think I have a fair and impartial jury."
The jury deliberated for less than three hours and found Mychal Bell guilty on the maximum possible charges of aggravated second degree battery and conspiracy. He faces up to a maximum of 22 years in prison.
The public defender told the press afterwards, "I feel I put on the best defense that I could." Responding to criticism of not putting on any witnesses, the attorney said, "Why open the door for further accusations? I did the best I could for my client, Mychal Bell."
At a rally in front of the courthouse the next day, Alan Bean, a Texas minister and leader of the Friends of Justice, said, "I have seen a lot of trials in my time. And I have never seen a more distressing miscarriage of justice than what happened in LaSalle Parish yesterday." Khadijah Rashad of Lafayette Louisiana described the trial as a "modern-day lynching."
Tory Pegram with the Louisiana ACLU has been working with the parents for months. "People know if they don't demand equal treatment now, they will never get it. People's jobs and livelihoods have been threatened for attending Jena 6 Defense meetings, but people are willing to risk that. One person told me: 'We have to convince more people to come rally with us. ... What's the worst that could happen? They fire us from our jobs? We have the worst jobs in the town anyway. They burn a cross on our lawns or burn down my house? All of that has happened to us before. We have to keep speaking out to make sure it doesn't happen to us again, or our children will never be safe.'"
Whites in the community were adamant that there is no racism. "We don't have a problem," according to one. Other locals told the media, "We all get along," and "Most blacks are happy with the way things are." One person even said, "We don't have many problems with our blacks."
Melvin Worthington, the lone African-American school board member in LaSalle Parish, said it all could have been avoided. "There's no doubt about it," he told the Chicago Tribune, "whites and blacks are treated differently here. The white kids should have gotten more punishment for hanging those nooses. If they had, all the stuff that followed could have been avoided."
Herbert McCoy, a relative of one of the youths who has been trying to raise money for bail and lawyers, challenged people everywhere at the end of the rally when he said, "You better get out of your houses. You better come out and defend your children because they are incarcerating them by the thousands. Jena's not the beginning, but Jena has crossed the line. Justice is not right when you put on the wrong charges and then convict. I believe in justice. I believe in the point of law. I believe in accepting the punishment if I'm guilty. If I'm guilty, convict me and punishment, but if I'm innocent, no justice." The crowd joined with him and shouted, "No peace!"
What happened to the white guys? The white victim of the beating was later arrested for bringing a hunting rifle loaded with 13 bullets onto the high school campus and released on $5,000 bond. The white man who beat up the black youth at the off-campus party was arrested and charged with simple battery. The white students who hung up the nooses in the "white tree" were never charged.
The people in Jena are fighting for justice, and they need legal and financial help. Since the arrests, a group of family members have been holding well-attended meetings, and have created a defense fund -- the Jena 6 Defense Committee. They have received support from the NAACP, the Louisiana ACLU and Friends of Justice.
People interested in supporting can contact: the Jena 6 Defense Committee, P.O. Box 2798, Jena, LA 71342, jena6defense@gmail.com; Friends of Justice, 507 North Donley Ave., Tulia, TX 79088, www.fojtulia.org; or the ACLU of Louisiana, P.O. Box 56157, New Orleans, LA 70156, www.laaclu.org or 417-350-0536.
What is next? The rest of the Jena 6 await similar trials. Theodore Shaw is due to go on trial shortly. Mychal Bell is scheduled to be sentenced July 31. If he gets the maximum sentence, he will not be out of prison until he is nearly 40. Meanwhile, the "white tree" outside Jena High sits quietly in the hot sun.
Bill Quigley is a human rights lawyer and law professor at Loyola University New Orleans. You can reach him at Quigley@loyno.edu. Audrey Stewart contributed to this article.
Labels: louisiana, race and racism
33 Comments:
This is another disturbing story of the no so latent racism that continues to simmer, just under the surface, and then occasionally boil up down in these parts. Just to put things into geographic perspective consider that in June 1998 James Byrd was dragged to death by racist skinhead Neo-Nazi about 3 hrs southwest of Jena in Jasper, Tx (the three suspects were convicted and sentenced to life and/or long prison terms).
In 2003 a group of white kids at a ‘pasture party’ beat Billy Ray Johnson senseless in Linden, TX (home of ragtime composer Scott Joplin, the Eagles’ Don Henley, and birthplace of blues legend T-Bone Walker [They Call It Stormy Monday’]) about 4 hrs drive northwest of Jena. The “kids” received minimal sentences from an all-white jury in their criminal trial - “Just boys being boys” - but the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Morris Dees recently won a $9 million settlement for Mr. Johnson in Jasper’s civil court . Mr. Johnson is confined to a care facility for the rest of his life as a result of his head injury.
On December 30, 2006 newly elected black mayor Gerald Washington of Westlake, LA - 3 hrs southwest of Jena (right near Lake Charles) was found dead of a single gunshot wound to the chest in a parking lot. Although much controversy arose over this death and the evidently cavalier investigation by the local sheriff’s dept it now appears that his death was a bona fide suicide brought on by the recognition that his new found notoriety would also make public his massive gambling losses and serial marital infidelities and the case has been closed. The family, it must be said, continues to contest the findings of several supporting investigations and a 3rd autopsy by an independent pathologist hired by the family was inconclusive due to insufficient material evidence - a likely result of the poor crime-scene management.
On the 1st Sunday of the New Year, parties still unknown fired two shotgun blasts through the front window of the newly elected black mayor of Greenwood, LA - about 3 hrs northwest of Jena, just west of Shreveport - without injury to anyone. Despite an investigation including the FBI no charges have been filed.
On April 23rd, 2006, two Neo-Nazi skinheads in Spring, Texas - about 51/2 hours southwest of Jena - attacked 17 year-old Latino David Ritcheson for allegedly attempting to kiss a white girl. They beat him senseless, burned him with cigarettes, sodomized him with an outdoor umbrella pole, poured bleach over him, carved a swastika on his chest, and left him for dead. The assailants were both convicted of aggravated assault and imprisoned for life. After enduring more than 30 reparative surgeries, Ritcheson committed suicide earlier this month (delayed homicide?).
Viewed in this perspective, it’s not at all surprising to see the Jena Six charged, and convicted, from the Jim Crow edition of the U.S. Penal Code.
You mean to tell me that all these prominent lawyers in Ameruca would not take this case. You mean Bill Cosby, Oprah, Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson, Bob Johnson Cathy Hughes..couldn't get money for a defebse team for these kids... tehy had to use a Public Defender...my GOD...how my plp has fallen ... where are out Thurgood Marshalls... Johnnie Cochran's....Ida B Wells....
With all the racisim that occurs in America today, it is such a pity that the African-Americans still have no respect. The ones that have been able to prosper and become a success should help, but they can only do so much. It is for "us" as Americans to demand respect and justice for ourselves. We have let our own people down. I live in California where the "young, black males and females" are killing each other at an alarming rate each day. Who do we blame for that?? We need to put respect and God back into our daily lives and stand up and demand that the law makers and politicians give us back our rights to be a parent, then maybe we can help our children to understand the meaning of racisim!
Finally, I saw this on CNN yesterday and it should have been all over the news since this happened........ Racism in its truest form is in this town and people need to stand up against this travesity........ Please somebody help these young boys who have no business in jail!!!!!
we as a people have got to stand up and start screaming from the roof tops about this insult to humanity..... The Governor of LA needs to speak up about this type of racism like she did not speak up about New Orleans and Katrina.... Where are the folks who are always marching and singing we shall overcome, where are you now????? I am but one person who has been to LA and have seen the racism first hand, but never seen it in this most ugly state........everyone who reads this blog, send another blog and make sure this gets on the worldwide news..... once again America is showing the rest of the world how ugly it really is!!!!!!!!
First of all I would like to say that Im highly upset!!! Americans are entiled to a fair trial!!! Everyone knows that if you put all whites on a trial in a place were racism is an issue then thats not a fair trial!!! These boys are serving years in prison when they should walk free!!! Kids fight everyday at school and their taken downtown for a night and then released!!! So how does the police get away with keeping them boys for that long!!! Then posting an outragerous bond!!! I just don't understand how people can be so cold!!! They know that deep down in their hearts (if they have one) that what they're doing is completing uncalled for!!! How do you expect for teenagers to act if they are threatened in that kinda way!!! You hang three nooses under a tree you beat up a black boy at a party and you bring a loaded gun to school!!! Those children were afraid that their lives were put in danger!!! So they attacked before they were killed!!! If it was me and I felt my life was in danger I would have done the same!!! They acted the way reasonable people would have acted!!! And for that they should be released!!! After everything this country has been through after all we fighted for we're still segregated!!! We need to stand up and fight for the rights of our own!!! We need to unite and fight!!!! Bring Peace to this country and to this world!!! We need to fight for the Jena 6 boys!!!!
I must say that this is really not a shock to me that something of this nature has happened to us as a people (African-Americans). For so long after the Civil Rights Movement has been deceased, we have stopped fighting for our own justice and we have stopped properly preparing our children how to do so as well. I wonder what would the fore fathers of Freedom and of Civil Rights say if they were still here. I know they would first and foremost be ashamed of how we have not carried on the fight against racism. We got to get it together and fight on for our children's children. This is just another prime example of how they target our young black males. I hope this is awake up call for all of us in our respective positions. Black life does not have any value in this racist society's mind.
Well this comes to no suprise to me after hearing about the Jena 6 in watching this country from the start of 2001. Racism really showed it's ugly head then and will continue unless we as african americans stand up to the system that has been put in place to see us locked away for life, or not reach finacal comfort. Not scents MLK and Malcom X have we had a leader that has been able to show use to the so called promise land nor have we stepped up to the challege and demanded what's right. We are so caught up in the riches of the world that we only care about what we can do for ourselves, instead of coming together as a culture to all achieve riches and respect(simaliar to the jewish culture). Most of our leaders today are so affaired for their life and fame that they allow the goverment to pasify them to the point that there is no direction for those of use that want to get involed and do something. You show me a leader who is willing to step up to the plate and I promise you that we as a culture will responsed to the challege.
First of all, what the crap is going on with this world? We are human beings people, not savage animals. These boys were defending themselves from a HATE CRIME, that could of turned deadly. The boy should be lucky he aint from COCOA, FLORIDA....cause down here....it wouldnt go down like that. The "white" boy would of been in jail to for what he did. What is happening to these (black) boys is an outrage. Why isn't our law inforced when it comes to hate crimes? And the Northern parts of the USA need to get a grip on life.....WERE ALL THE SAME COLOR WHEN WE BLEED!
I would just like to say that I'm a African American woman, and I just want to say that times have changed..but everyone now a days still have to bring up race in everything.. I'm sorry but the Teens who beat up the white kid should get in trouble.. Violence is not the answer, and what really gets me mad is that rev. Jesse Jackson supports these kids.. Yes Racism is bad, but is violence right? NO, and any preacher or minister should know that God doesn't like violence. Saying is different then doing. If these white kids have actually tried to hang someone, yes then the white kids should get in trouble as well. Yes, I know the message was bad, they shouldn't have put nooses on the tree, but the black kids should know not to use violence, they should have told a someone at the school, which they would have probably suspened the white kids anyways..
We live in a society where all we think about is violence. I'm sorry I don't care who you are you if anyone hurts anyone else I think they should be locked up..I wanted Micheal Vick to get locked up for hurting those dogs. NO one should ever hut an animal like that.
The sad truth is that racism still exists today. The term racism, means that one is being treated differently because of their race. Now think about this for a moment, I knew a white kid who was turned down for a scholarship, He was so dissapointing, thinking that he must have been stupid. He worked so hard in school then when he was turned down, he told me that he had failed in life, he didn't had no way of paying for college, and so on that he ended up killing himself. However when my daughter attended college she was offered an African American scholarship...THIS IS A FORM OF RACISM PEOPLE....the only reason why my daughter got the scholarship is because she is black... she is being treated differently from everyone else because of her race.
We have all these special programs out here now for African American's and we don't sit and realize it's a form of racism.. We are being treated differently, getting different special treatment then everyone else just because of our race...Our great leader such as Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks,, Fought to have EQUAL justice that any white person would have.. they didn't want special treatment.. they wanted EQUAL TREATMENT..
The same is true for women. We have all these special things now just for women. Women have fought so much in the past to have EQUAL rights as men, now it's the opposite, women are over powering men, Black is overpowering white, and I don't think it's right.. WE all should be equal in this world.. Stop having everything focus on racism or sexism... Just punish those who do bad, and award those who do good. Sometimes I'm sick of the way our society has turned out.... STOP COMPLAINING EVERYONE... we have more important things to worry about like, Global warming... Lets all work together to help the endangered species..and help save the planet..Think about it we are all related, we all share this planet.. and we are all created by God... So we are all like brother and sisters..
This is truly amazing. 6 on 1 and everyone is feeling sorry for the ones who did the beating. Doesn't matter what color either side is 6 on one is unfair. Not saying what the victim did was right but what the Jeana 6 did was uncalled for as well. Just wonder what would have happened had it been reversed...6 Whites on one black. Bet there would have been no sympathy for the defendants. It just goes to show that we still are not color blind
Racism is ugly, deplorable.
Am I the only one who thinks fighting racism with violence is even worse? Hanging a noose in a tree is a symbol of racism & hate. Several young men of one race beating one man of another race is an equal manifestation of racism & hate.
Racism is not created and perpetuated by only one race of people.Watch any awards show or any standup comedy program and you'll see that the races are polarized.Let's not support people who commit acts of violence ;let's not make other young people think it's OK to use their fists instead of their brains.It's not OK for several young men to attack an individual, no matter what color he was and no matter what reprehensible thing he said.
To be for real. I feel this is not right.. Fighting is a everyday thing. I think they should just lt it go I mean the boy is still alive, and that'e right America is getting outrageous with this racism i see it with my own eyes everyday...especially with the police officers even black police officers turn agaist their on race. I bet if it was white students they wouldn't have tooken it this far. I thought America was home of hte free. It seems to me like they treat blacks like we dont exist. It hurts my heart to hear about this trial and if i could i would help. This is non sense and un called for. But i guess that's how it is these days..they should remember You dont judge people by there color you judge them by their heart. Put yourself in these boys situation what would you do? Just think,
yes the kids were wrong to do this but they trailed unfairly. Why couldn't they get a better lawyer from another county? Where are all the strong black ppl that help out each other with all the money? Do "we" African American really stick together or is it just when someone gets hurt or something goes wrong? This is a outrage...something needs to be done..you can't live where you want to live or do what you want to do without all the racism around you!!!! USA is not a free country!!!! If things like this can still happen..
no disrespect is intended to anyone but would Michael B do this if it was WHITE KIDS
This absolutely the most absurbed thing I have read. All of these people "knowing" they are being racially biased and know this is fair how the two different races are being treat should be ashamed of themselves... ASHAMED!!!!!! Shame, shame, Shame on them. My gosh it is 2007!!!!! What goes around comes around!!! Shame on them. Shame on them. Shame on them.
white people should not be allowed to say the "n" word...
Is anyone on this board going to really say the white kid who was beaten deserved to be beaten even though he didn't hang the noose?
Is this what the civil rights movement has become?
Can a white person beat up any random black person he wants because he sees a Lewis Farakhan speech demonize his race or if he sees Black Commedians reffering to his race as crackers? etc?
The civil rights movement in this country was founded on NON VIOLENCE. These days violence is perfectly fine as long as your black.
There are measures in place to go after cops and DA's who violate the law. Elected officials have to answer to the people.
By endorsing the so called "Jena 6" you are making black people look uncivilized, incapable of defending themselves without violence and mostly helpless.
While this occurs we ignore the problems we create in our own communities and instead thump or chests for a bunch of criminals.
I for one am ashamed.
no one should use the n word white or black
No one should use be allowed to use the n word white black brown or yellow
NOBODY should be allowed to say the n-word!
When you single out a particular race for arbitrary rules, you are only exacerbating the issue. Rappers and hip-hop artists should be held to exactly the same standards as "white people".
When you base your personal decisions and opinions on the color of another's skin, you are just as responsible for the state of affairs as those mentioned above.
i am deaply upset about the treatment of the jena 6. as a mother of a young black son how do i teach my son to be tolerant to people of different color and at the same time be proud of who he is and to protect himself by any means nessesary if others wont teach their children the same. it is true that violence isnt the answer but sometimes it is the only solution. there are no more Martin Luther Kings , no more Malcolm Xs because what they fought for we thought was resolved there is nothing more to fight for. Just get it through your heads that we are all equal. we are all cut from the same cloth. dont tease a dog and expect not to get bit.
I heard about the Jena 6 from Steve Harvey, Michael Baisden and other black media personalities. Now where were all of the self appointed civil right leaders in the year since the original incident?
Strange fruit has always hung in this land. It just seems to be open season on black males. Just how long will this type of ignorance prevail. WE all know of America's horrors as they pertain to race. Boys being boys seems to mean as long as their victims are non-white. The punishment should be equal for all involved. The prosecutor in this case should be disbarred.
WE've made some gains, but as a people we can never fall asleep at the switch!
Jim-crow then, Jim-crow Jr. now has things really changed. Many faces and many disguises. Justice for all is what they say?????
Greetings, Jena 6 opened up closed doors in America and a whole lot of skelitons fell out!! We woke up the new generation of the kkk and the ugly hate that we all know still exist in this country!! It was swept under the rug and now it's boiling over!! America need to face it's own ugly problems!! We all must remember the same people who lynched, castrated and burned us while still alive, they had children and they had children and some of there children left these small towns and moved to the big cities, they don't were sheets over there heads!!!!
We are greater in number than ever-before,there should be a March on Washington that should make there "Bones"shake in "Fear", Blacks are still in "Slavery", we are just a higher educated level.or are we?
Look at what we have come to. I mean everyone is saying the african american boys were wrong for the beating but what about that they feared for their lives. So they attacked before they were attacked.The white boys recieved no sentencing at all.Its not only about the racism its also about the fairness. PEOPLE YALL NEED TO GET REAL!!!!!!
You don’t beat someone up and maybe kill them because they put a noose in a tree! You could kick them out of school or whip them “with supervision”
and it should not matter what color they are, if you do wrong you must pay the price, but to be kicked and beat is wrong.
i think that it was an unfair they didnt have to take it to such an extreme case i dont think it was so right to lock up all those boys for that one thing like the just suspension i think that was very racial thing todo now if that 6 white student that would havebee put in a very different from the start thenyou had6 black african american and a all white jury tell me if that was fair or that what i have to say about the whole thing
Why hasn't this "White Tree" been cut down? Why aren't the D.A. and Principal on trial? They allowed the Hate Crimes to commence and continue. They know who "the good ole boys" are. They answer at roll call, I'm sure.
Where are our black leaders?
This topic should and must be addressed now! Where else do we need to write, call, yell, march on before someone will do something to bring Jena up to date? Let me know. I am ready.
I have read the news reports over and over again and still don't understand. Are we (meaning "we" as a nation) saying it is okay to almost kill someone depending on the circumstances? I just can't believe that there is such a big deal being made over the fact that students, who tried to kill someone, are being tried and convicted. Isn't that what should be happening? Martin Luther King was a great man, the Black "leaders" today want a fight and want the press coverage. THey don't help to end racism, but add to it.
What are you people talking about....the "n" word. You mean the word that African Americans are allowed to say,but white people who use it ar put on public trial. You all need to get over it. It's only a word. The problem isn't the word, it's the hate or entitlement behind the word.
Swinging*Tree
Suspended upon the limbs and branches of society hangs a self destructive, taut line of inhuman power,
Bound within an illusion of glory and grace on the living tree of mankind,
Crossing a river of uncounted souls, holding on to the hope of a shared love without the fall of color, history nor gender,
Swinging upon the tree of humanity a fabricated innocence of denial, uneasily waiting, silently begging, desperately pleading for the open expression, healing discussion and outward, public display of the true sins hung upon swinging trees across the globe.
©Bruce Larson*Moore
2007
Liz in alabama
I never thought racism was stll this bad now and so close to home. When will it end? I just hope the kids are released and their families compensated for this time of trial so that if it's an option, they can relocate. My prayers are going up for the young black boys whose lives will never be the same.
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