Great news, folks!
Kelley Williams-Bolar was released from the Summit County Jail Wednesday morning after serving all but one day of a 10-day jail sentence for improperly enrolling her children in Copley-Fairlawn schools.

A jail official confirmed Williams-Bolar was released at about 10 a.m.

Common Pleas Judge Patricia Cosgrove gave Williams-Bolar credit for one day of time served when she was arrested and jailed on multiple felony charges in November 2009, court records show.

On Jan. 18, Williams-Bolar was sentenced to 10 days in jail after a jury convicted her of two felony counts of tampering with records.

The offenses involved several instances of signed or sworn school registration forms, applications for reduced or free school lunches and other official documents authorized by Williams-Bolar when she enrolled her two girls in Copley-Fairlawn schools in August 2006.

In other developments in the case, Akron City Council President Marco Sommerville said he planned to meet with Summit County Prosecutor Sherri Bevan Walsh at 2 p.m. Wednesday to discuss the issue of why the case could not have been resolved without the filing of felony charges.

Williams-Bolar, a single mother who was going to college and working as a teaching assistant at Buchtel High School, had no previous record.

Within hours of the sentencing hearing, Cosgrove spoke out after becoming the target of public outcry over the case, which threatens the mother’s job and her hopes to become a school teacher.

Cosgrove said the prosecutor’s office refused to consider reducing the charges to misdemeanors during numerous closed-door talks to resolve the case outside of court. (source)Now we need to hear from the over-zealous prosecutors office as to why this matter wasn’t dealt with appropriately and at least counted as a misdemeanor and not a felony. Big congrats to all the people who took to the internet by signing the petition at change.org. And a hearty thank you to Judge Patricia Cosgrove for doing what was right and just. See folks, with a little bit of work, we can make things happen. Hopefully she’ll be able to fulfill her dream of being a school teacher; she shouldn’t have had it come to this.

I’m not gonna say too much on this one. In fact, I’m gonna let you so-called freedom, justice, and equality lovers have at it. Most of you said recently that John Harris White’s suspended sentence by outgoing New York governor, David Paterson was justice as was the release of the Scott Sisters by Mississippi governor, Haley Barbour – actually, none of you said anything about that (read it here). But anyway, I’d like to hear if the reduction of the sentence of Esteban Nunuz is indeed just or not. I would reeeeaaally love to hear your thoughts.

This via Mediaite:
On Sunday, California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger rang in the New Year – and, in essence, closed out his term – by reducing the manslaughter sentence of one Esteban Nuñez, son of former Assembly Speaker Fabian Nuñez. Schwarzenegger reduced 21-year-old Nuñez’s sentence from 16 to seven years. The decision has some law professors and other political experts (armchair political strategists included) wondering what role Nuñez the Younger’s political ties might have had to do with his commutation. Nuñez’s father now works as a political consultant along with Adam Mendelsohn, the Governor’s Schwarzenegger’s former communications director. Previously, he had worked closely with Governor Schwarzenegger to push legislation aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

In October of 2008, 24-year-old Ryan Jett, a friend of Nuñez’s, stabbed 22-year-old Luis Dos Santos to death after the young men became embroiled in an argument near San Diego State University. Nuñez stabbed another young man – a friend of Dos Santos’ – who survived the attack. Nuñez and Jett both pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and received sentences of equal length. Schwarzenegger’s commutation, The Sacramento Bee reports, has now deemed Nuñez’s original sentence “excessive.” Wrote the Governor:
I do not discount the gravity of the offense,” the governor’s statement said. “But given Nuñez’s limited role in Santos’ death, and considering that … Nuñez had no criminal record prior to this offense, I believe Nuñez’s sentence is excessive.”
Dos Santos’ family is less than thrilled, to put it quite mildly, with the Governor’s decision, accusing him of waiting until the end of his term to reduce Nuñez’s sentence so that he would be less likely to deal with the consequences and any resulting backlash. The Dos Santos family is also pointing to other big names who voiced their support in favor of reducing Nuñez’s sentence, including Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.

The San Jose Mercury News brought the issue before various law professors, some of whom agreed that, Nuñez’s connections aside, the Governor’s decision to trim the young man’s sentence is valid. One noted that “disparity of sentence when you’ve got a divergence of responsibility is an entirely reasonable basis for a commutation of this sort.”

Of course, that doesn’t mean that Nuñez’s father – and his powerful friends – didn’t play some sort of role in Schwarzenegger taking a look at Nuñez’s case in the first place. According to another professor “it’s clearly a political act,” given the facts surrounding Nuñez’s sentence didn’t “boggle the mind” in terms of its perceived injustice.

Nuñez’s was one of ten commutations made by Schwarzenegger throughout his term. Lemme guess: Him being Hispanic and not Black makes a difference?

I’ve been on information overload so I’ve purposely unplugged from all news sources and media for the holidays. Call it a mini-vacation, but it was much needed; hell, even professional racism chasers get worn down from time to time. So when at 3am this morning I read that Mississippi governor Haley Barbour announced that he was going to free the Scott Sisters, I was excited and overjoyed. No seriously, at 3am, such a feeling is a major occurrence.

But when I read the part in the article that their release was contingent on one of them donating a kidney to the other, I was like, “tha f@#k kinda shit is that?” Yeah, I got just a tad bit pissed off. I mean, spending 16yrs of a life sentence for “allegedly” committing a robbery that net $11 seemed to be injustice enough that warranted their release. But no, not in Mississippi, you gotta give up an organ? That is, unless you’re sitting on death row…

Ah yes, the kidney for clemency program!

“Today, I have issued two orders indefinitely suspending the sentences of Jamie and Gladys Scott. In 1994, a Scott County jury convicted the sisters of armed robbery and imposed two life sentences for the crime. Their convictions and their sentences were affirmed by the Mississippi Court of Appeals in 1996.

“To date, the sisters have served 16 years of their sentences and are eligible for parole in 2014. Jamie Scott requires regular dialysis, and her sister has offered to donate one of her kidneys to her. The Mississippi Department of Corrections believes the sisters no longer pose a threat to society. Their incarceration is no longer necessary for public safety or rehabilitation, and Jamie Scott’s medical condition creates a substantial cost to the State of Mississippi.

“The Mississippi Parole Board reviewed the sisters’ request for a pardon and recommended that I neither pardon them, nor commute their sentence. At my request, the Parole Board subsequently reviewed whether the sisters should be granted an indefinite suspension of sentence, which is tantamount to parole, and have concurred with my decision to suspend their sentences indefinitely.” (source)At any rate, I’m glad that after all the years of hard work by the members of the public as well as their families, that they’ll soon be released. Yeah, I know a kidney is a heck of a bargaining chip though a win-win in this instance. But how about the governor just releasing them for time served, much like John Harris White, whom y’all say was justified in his crime on Long Island in 2006?

Of course a part of me thought that this was a major public relations damage control move by Barbour given his recent not-so-quite-racist statement not too long ago. I mean, what better move is there to get in the good graces of black folks when you’re thinking of running for the position of president of the United States in 2012 when the current president is himself a black man?

With black folks not having a short memory (some of us today still remember like yesterday the time we got off of those slave ships in Mississippi), when someone says, “F@%k Haley Barbour!” Winning them over and getting their vote will be a lot easier when someone says, “Like Lincoln, he freed all of the slaves in Mississippi, including the Scott Sisters, fool!”

But according to the NAACP president, Ben Jealous who appeared on CNN today. Barbour had been working with the civil rights org on this case prior to his controversial remarks two weeks ago. And according to Jealous, they had been anticipating this announcement weeks ago. I’m not sure what to believe as this could be yet another opportunistic move by the organization – if anybody can confirm this I’d love to hear it – however, I’m doubtful that it was.

Though I’m happy for their pending release, I have to wonder: would this be happening if Jamie Scott were healthy and not in need of a kidney transplant? A kidney transplant that only her fellow imprisoned sister, Gladys, can can assist her with, as opposed to the cost of daily dialysis incurred by the state of Mississippi? Either way, it must suck for other preposterously sentenced inmates of petty crimes (read: poor folks) who aren’t as luckily blessed with kidney problems while their governor contends with a racial revisionist history.

With the kidney transplant clause, I guess I now know how it feels to “compromise” with the lives of “poor people” much to the benefit of the wealthy like Barack did, and say to myself that it’s a good deal, and the thing to do.

An estimated 20 percent of the adult population in the US is functionally illiterate. That figure SKYROCKETS to over 60 percent when you examine the literacy rates of the inmate population in jails and prisons across the country. And even more appalling is the fact that over 85 percent of juvenile offenders have literacy issues.

Considering that illiteracy commonly leads to lengthy and repeated bouts of unemployment (over 75 percent of unemployed adults have some problems with reading and writing) the low rate of literacy among the inmate population is a recipe for explosive recidivism rates. After all, if an ex-prisoner is unable to find or keep a job due to literacy issues, where else can he turn but back to the behaviors that landed him in jail in the first place?

Although a lot of people take the “lock them up and throw away the key” attitude toward prisoners, and would rather REDUCE the services available to prisoners, there is PROOF that literacy programs in prison CAN and DO help reduce the rates of recidivism, and can lead to an overall reduction in incarceration rates.
A comprehensive study by the Washington State Institute for Public Policy, the research arm of the Washington Legislature, found that general education programs reduced the recidivism rate by 7 percent and vocational programs by 9 percent, among the best records of in-prison programs.

The academic and vocational programs cost the state about $1,000 a year per inmate but, the study concluded, vocational education produced a net benefit to the state of $13,738 per participant, and the educational programs $10,669 per inmate, in the form of lower crime rates, fewer victims and less criminal justice spending. Source

The US spends $40 billion annually on incarceration and less than 2 percent of that goes towards educating prisoners. Prisons need to find innovative ways to implement literacy programs using the resources they are given.

Inmates at the New Jersey State Prison took matters into their own hands and created the L.I.F.E. (Learning is For Everyone) program, which was documented in the film “How do you Spell Murder?” In this innovative program, inmates are the managers and are supported by volunteers from the community. Each inmate volunteer is certified by Literacy Volunteers of America and learns the skills necessary to teach adult literacy. They are paired up with a student inmate who is in need of literacy education services.

Many of the students in the L.I.F.E. program share similar stories. Undiagnosed learning disabilities. Frustration and humiliation in public schools. Held back time and time again, or, alternately, promoted without being prepared for the next level. Almost all are high school drop outs. Most were barely able to comprehend the legal documents involved in procedures against them that led to their incarceration. In fact, in one case, the murder conviction of a student was reversed when it was discovered that he had an undiagnosed learning disability and was unable to comprehend the confession he had signed.

So far the L.I.F.E. program has 46 tutors, has taught 236 men to read, and has helped 52 men receive their GED. And, as an added benefit, the students in the program have been able to learn enough skills to write and receive letters from home, thus strengthening their connections with family and community.

In addition to the L.I.F.E. program, the New Jersey State Prison has a program called Prose and Cons, a poetry workshop under the guidance of community volunteer Bill Carhart. The participants in this program do not have the same issues with illiteracy as those in the L.I.F.E. program, although a new poetry workshop has been started for L.I.F.E. program participants as well.

The L.I.F.E. program can serve as an example of a successful, inmate run, literacy program. With reduction in recidivism rates proven to be caused by educational programs in prisons, it is my hope that such services will be offered to all inmates across the country. Educating prisoners can only bring out positive results, and I believe that the investment is well worth the returns.

So while everyone was focused on the appropriateness of the DOJ seeking an “Ebonics Linguist” in Atlanta yesterday; or the obvious publicity stunt that was Fantasia’s VH1 Behind The Music broadcast last night. Totally unnoticed and ignored by the media (and court of public opinion) was a judges ruling in the Troy Davis case to determine his innocence yesterday:
A federal judge on Tuesday emphatically rejected Troy Anthony Davis’ claims that he was wrongly convicted of killing a Savannah police officer in 1989.

In a 172-page order, U.S. District Judge William T. Moore Jr. said Davis failed to prove his innocence during an extraordinary hearing in June ordered by the U.S. Supreme Court. Davis, on death row for 19 years, now has one final appeal before his death sentence can be carried out.

“Ultimately, while Mr. Davis’ new evidence casts some additional, minimal doubt on his conviction, it is largely smoke and mirrors,” Moore wrote. “The vast majority of the evidence at trial remains largely intac t, and the new evidence is largely not credible or [is] lacking in probative value.”

Having reviewed the voluminous court record, Moore concluded, “Mr. Davis vastly overstates the value of his evidence of innocence.”

Davis, 41, was convicted of killing off-duty police Officer Mark Allen MacPhail 21 years ago as MacPhail ran to the aid of a homeless man being pistol-whipped outside a Burger King. The case has attracted international attention because a number of key prosecution witnesses either recanted or backed off their trial testimony. Other witnesses have come forward and said another man at the scene told them he was the actual killer.

The Supreme Court’s order for a hearing on Davis’ innocence claims was the first time in 50 years the high court had issued such a directive. In a footnote in his order, Moore suggested Davis should appeal directly to the U.S. Supreme Court.

[…] Danielle Garten, one of Davis’ lawyers, said she still believes in Davis’ innocence. “We’re obviously extremely disappointed with the court’s ruling and we strongly disagree with its findings and conclusions,” she said.

MacPhail, 27 and a father of two, was gunned down before he could draw his weapon. After the killing, Sylvester “Redd” Coles went to the police with his lawyer and told them he and Davis were at the scene. At trial, he testified he was fleeing the scene when shots were fired, leaving Davis as the culprit. Coles denied being the triggerman.

At the June hearing, Davis’ lawyers wanted to call witnesses who had given sworn statements that Coles had told them after the trial he was the actual killer. But Moore did not allow these witnesses to testify because Davis’ lawyers did not subpoena Coles to testify. If they had, Moore wrote Tuesday, he could have tested the validity of Coles’ alleged confessions.

If Coles had in fact confessed to these witnesses, Moore suggested there could be an explanation –“he believed that his reputation as a dangerous individual would be enhanced if he took credit for murdering Officer MacPhail.” Davis failed to prove the alleged confessions were truthful, Moore noted.

Moore answered one question posed to him by the U.S. Supreme Court. He found that executing an innocent person would violate the Eighth Amendment’s ban against cruel and unusual punishment.

“However, Mr. Davis is not innocent,” Moore wrote.

Of the seven witnesses Davis’ legal team say recanted their trial testimony, “only one is a meaningful, credible recantation.” The value of this recantation — given by a jailhouse snitch who testified Davis told him he killed MacPhail — is diminished because it was already clear the witness testified falsely at trial, the judge said. (source) Though I’m no legal expert, I haven’t fully wrapped my head around this one. Hearing the news it was like someone had kicked me in the stomach. But I’m pretty sure whatever the feeling, it must be one hundred times worse for the Davis family, their closest friends and supporters.

CLICK HERE TO SEND A LETTER OF SUPPORT TO AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL!

Of course there’s going to be an appeal of this decision. But one has to wonder, at this point, will his conviction ever be overturned? Does anybody care? How else can he prove his innocence? I gotta admit, the silence from the people enraged by the Oscar Grant verdict sole’is deafening…

Evelyn Rasco has been living a nightmare for more than 15 years.


“It’s torture,” she sobs over the phone from her Pensacola, Florida home. “It tortures me on a daily basis.”


The nightmare began on Christmas Eve in 1993 when Rasco’s two daughters, Jamie and Gladys Scott, left a mini-mart near their home in Scott County, Mississippi. Their car broke down, and they hitched a ride from two young men, one of whom they knew. But later that evening, the men were robbed at gunpoint by three teenagers in another car. The robbers got away with an estimated $11 and no one was hurt, but police accused the Scott sisters of setting the victims up.


Although the young women denied having any involvement and had no criminal record, a jury found them guilty of armed robbery. On October 13, 1994, a judge ordered them to each serve double-life sentences in the Central Mississippi Correctional Facility, where they remain today.


“It is about race,” says Chokwe Lumumba, a political activist and attorney who’s now representing the Scotts. “I think it would be unimaginable that two white women would be in this situation.”


Lumumba is now in the process of filing a request to Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour, asking for clemency for the Scotts, who are not eligible for parole until 2014. He’s also working to appeal the conviction, which was first denied in 1996. He says his hope is to find the two co-defendants in the case who initially testified against the Scott sisters under police pressure (and served 10 months through a plea bargain), but later recanted their statements.


“That could give life to another post conviction motion… that would be significant,” says Lumumba.


But time is of the essence.


Jamie, 38, suffers from kidney failure, and according to Rasco, will likely die if she doesn’t receive a kidney transplant. She says Gladys, 34, even offered to donate her own kidney, but the Mississippi Department of Corrections (MDOC) will not allow the procedure. It also denied requests from Rasco and other family members to grant Jamie a medical release, stating an inmate must be classified as terminal or totally disabled.
My heart breaks for these women, their children and their families. Yet, I remain hopeful that we can do something. My only question is WHY haven’t we done something yet?

Bloggers were instrumental in creating and pushing the Jena Six (or Jena 6) movement which culminated in some modicum of fairness for the six teens who were going to be royally hosed for some old bullshit.

I know that we can make that kind of change happen, but the response in regards to these two sisters has been “cool.” Is it because they are women? I hate to say it, but I think so.

Mind you, I don’t want to take on the tone of “Us vs. Them” as it relates to black men and black women, but I am pointing out that once again, black women are shown to be the least protected, least cared about group in this country (and the world in general). Maybe it’s age old stereotypes about us that have helped to doom the Scott Sisters, what with people clutching to those as truth and eventually believing this two women were up to no good.

People are asking to “Free Weezy” but there’s little fanfare from us as a black community to “Free the Scott Sisters” and that is being watched. We are capable of achieving great things, and achieving fairness. It may take more work, but we’re good for it. We can make a difference in 2010 that could end such a great offense to justice. Whoever sentenced these two women launched a personal attack on black women, and fully intended for them to die or waste away in prison; break them in prison.

I wasn’t there, and I don’t know what happened. However, I am 100% sure that a robbery of $11 by these sisters–this is hypothetically speaking–did not and does NOT warrant this excessive, and obscene sentence, even if they did do it.

Write to your representatives, congressmen, and write everyone you think could be of assistance and bend their ear to look into these sisters. Let’s see if we can build up a big enough movement and web presence to let Mississippi know that we are watching and we do care about these women.

For more information on how to help the Scott Sisters, please check out FreeTheScottSisters.Blogspot.com.

Source

This Women’s History month, make it a priority to see how you can help the Scott Sisters, especially when a serious health problem like kidney failure is at play.

“People here are afraid of the police. They harass black people, they stop people for no reason and rough them up without charging them with anything.” – Terry Willis (Vice President of the Homer NAACP chapter)

You may remember the story surrounding the death of 73yr old Bernard Monroe around this time last year. Out here in the blogosphere there was much chatter about after he was gunned down by a police officer in his front yard in Homer, Louisiana. At the time, there was much outrage within that small community, which heightened racial tensions beyond the norm. If you’re not familiar with the story, check out the following clip:

Now this was last year, and as the report above noted, there was an investigation by several agencies at the local, state, and federal level. Well guess what? After all those tax-payer funded man hours dedicated to the investigation, a grand jury decided last Thursday not to indict the police officer of any criminal wrong doing.
NEW ORLEANS – A grand jury on Thursday declined to indict a white police officer who shot an elderly black man in the small Louisiana town of Homer in a case that heightened racial tension and sparked protests.

The panel returned a “no true bill,” meaning the case won’t go to trial, after considering and rejecting a range of charges including murder, manslaughter and negligent homicide against former police officer Tim Cox.

Many in the rural town of 3,800 were outraged by the shooting last February of Bernard Monroe, a 73-year-old left voiceless by cancer. Police said Monroe was armed when he was shot outside his home, but witnesses said he didn’t have a weapon.

The grand jury heard testimony from 20 witnesses over two days, said Kurt Wall, director of the criminal division of the state attorney general’s office. The attorney general handled the case after the local prosecutor recused himself.

“We believe it was a full, complete, accurate and thorough presentation conducted at a neutral site. We respect the grand jury’s decision,” Wall said.

An FBI spokeswoman said the bureau is continuing to investigate the case. (click to read more)You know it’s hard to remain hopeful when you hear the outcome of stories such as this one. For people of color in this country this has become all too common. But yet we’re supposed to believe the idea that we now have the glorious distinction of being able to be living in a post-racial society? Why? Because a black man was elected president of these United States? The same black man who coincidentally hasn’t uttered a word in the face of tragedies such as this? Man please!  White folks saying that we’re “post-racial,” is like hedge fund managers saying that we’re “post-poverty.” Try telling that shit to the relatives of Bernard Monroe.

Hopefully Attorney General Eric Holder and the Department of Justice can step up in the interest of justice. They were able to do just that in the case of Luis Ramirez. Ramirez if you remember was a Mexican immigrant who was beaten to death by a group of white teenagers in Shenandoah Pennsylvania. The teens in that case were acquitted of murder charges last May. But in December, they along with police officers who investigated the case were indicted by the Justice Department under the hate crimes statute, as well as for obstruction of justice, conspiracy, official misconduct and extortion charges.

Clearly something isn’t right with this case, but hey, that’s just me.

Today, just like last year, there are bloggers all over the world dedicated to posting today to raise awareness to an issue that is overlooked: taser torture. In this virtual medium it’s great that we can come together to raise awareness to what I consider to be government sanctioned murder. There are blogs out there who chronicle countless daily news stories which involves a loss of life at the hands of police officers by the use of tasers; a supposed non-lethal weapon employed by police departments here in the United States and abroad.

The one incident I’d like to focus on today to highlight this problem, involves the gentleman pictured at the beginning of this post – Oscar Grant. You do remember him, don’t you? Sure, I know not very many people are talking about him these days and he may be a distant memory for some. But just to remind you, he was the young man killed by a police officer at a train station in Oakland California. Yeah, his murder was caught on tape and spread across the internet like wild fire. Remember him now? Uh-huh, it happened last New Year’s Eve; yes, it has almost been a year – hard to believe, right?

Well I read recently that the trial of the officer in question, Johannes Mehserle, has been moved to Los Angeles for fear of the threats of violence, and the pre-trial publicity of the case. If you remember, there were riots out in Oakland for a day or so after the incident where Grant was killed by said officer. OK, so I know you’re wondering what the hell does this have to do with taser torture, right? I mean surely Oscar Grant didn’t die because several thousand volts of electricity was purposely sent through his body by a police officer, no? Well, the accused police officer, in his defense, is alleging that he was reaching for his taser and accidentally drew his gun; a defense that is plausible I might add, although some may not agree.

You see, with taser being considered as a “non-lethal” weapon, it was easy for this officer to consider using this in a manner so as to gain control of a situation. Never mind the fact that there have been at least 50 taser related deaths this year at the hands of police officers here in America alone; 21 of the victims were African American males But, none of this is important, because, well, tasers are non-lethal. And guess what? Oscar Grant isn’t even mentioned as one of these victims, but indirectly he is.

Had the police officer actually used his taser on Oscar Grant, there’s a chance he may be be alive today as opposed to being shot at point blank range with a service revolver which was mistaken for a taser. Maybe Grant may have been luckier than the 450 people who have died from taser use in North America  by police to date. Maybe if tasers were seen as a lethal weapon more caution would be taken in applying them to civilians?

The real question is: how much longer will we allow taser use by the police to continue at the rate that it has, all the while being responsible for the loss of lives before something is done? Do we need more Oscar Grant-like cases before this becomes a serious enough issue? What needs to happen is a Congressional hearing on the subject. If you’re interested in making this happen, do yourself and the love of humanity a favor and help by signing the petition below as has been done by 2000 other people.

SIGN THE PETITION

Nelson Mandela once said “It is said that no one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails. A nation should not be judged by how it treats its highest citizens, but its lowest ones.” I guess with 1% percent of our population currently incarcerated one could say that all is well in our nation. After all, it’s only 1% – a very small number. Sure, who cares that our jails and prison population just happens to lead that of any country in the free world – uh-huh, that’s right, pun intended.

Yeah I know, you really don’t care because, well, as long as they’re locked away your world seems a bit safer, right? Yep, as long as you or your kids are safe is all that matters, right? Well if I tell you that currently there’s an estimated 2,570 juveniles serving life without parole in America today, how would that make you feel? Would that number also seem small and insignificant so as to not warrant any concern?

OK, screw the numbers, let’s put a face to this:

So how did it get this way? Well, somewhere in the mid 90s when our first Black president Bill Clinton was in office, state and federal legislators created policy irrationally motivated by fear – which in turn was federally signed by Clinton – to address a perceived new wave of crime. Crimes that were committed by what political scientist John DiIulio  (a Neo-Conservative Bush-ite) termed “super-predators”. Yep, Clinton had Black people happy alright. Not only did he give them jobs, legislation he signed helped to throw a bunch of them in prison.

The only juveniles we hear about doing crazy sh*t are white kids!

I realize that’s the perception, but just like the obvious reality that is the racial disparities with  incarcerations in America. One wouldn’t be off target suggesting that the same is true when it comes to juvenile offenders and life sentences. As a matter of fact, according to a 2005 report from Human Rights Watch, black youth receive life without parole at a rate about 10 times greater than the rate of white youth. Hmm, imagine that; yeah, things don’t look too good for those kids in Chicago that killed Derrion Albert. As a matter of fact, the kids involved in the Jonesboro Arkansas school shooting from 1998 are out of prison after serving time as we speak; one of them was just released last month. If only those kids in Chi-town would be so privileged.

The way I see it RiPPa these kids are monsters and should pay!

Yeah, I realize that’s often the attitude when it comes to crime and punishment. Yep, don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time is what they always say, right? Heck, there are people among us who believe in the age old biblical idea of an eye for an eye. That said, why don’t we just go right ahead and kill these little monsters. Surely that would save tax payers a lot of money doing so, right? Uh-huh why waste time with any attempts at rehabilitation; these kids are beyond repair. I mean that was the idea pushed by conservative policy makers back in the 90s, right?

Well it’s a good thing we have the Supreme Court presiding above all other courts in the land. I say that because back in 2005, in the case of Roper v. Simmons, the Supreme Court ruled that the execution of juveniles in America is unconstitutional. Back then, Justice Anthony Kennedy served the decisive swing vote, and was heavily persuaded by research that showed that teenage brains are less capable than adult brians of evaluating decisions. Research also suggested that adolescents’ “characters” are not “fully formed.”

OK, so that said, why even house them for the rest of their natural lives? Surely not because it serves the need for rehabilitation, no? I mean how will we ever know if they’re successfully “rehabilitated” if they’re never released? How exactly can we then come to a conclusion that they eventually come to a point where they become capable of evaluating decisions as adults should, or do? Something tells me that rehabilitation is not the primary interest when it comes to these juvenile defendants. Neither is the idea of helping their brains becoming fully formed either. There is no scientific method that gives us the ability to predict which 13-year-olds will become high-rate offenders over the rest of their lives as is the assumption.

The example of Kruzan in the above video which involves a brutal killing committed by an abused and frightened child who is now a remorseful adult, suggest an equally obvious conclusion: that juveniles who commit heinous crimes are capable of being rehabilitated. If it’s unconstitutional to execute a juvenile defendant, should the same be true when it comes to giving them life sentences?

Currently the Supreme Court is hearing arguments to come to a determination in the cases of two Black men – Terrance Graham & Joe Sullivan (both pictured directly above) – sitting in Florida prisons, both serving life sentences for serious crimes which never resulted in homicides that they committed before they were both 18yrs old.

Considering that the United States and Somalia are the only two countries in the world who have failed to sign the United Nations convention on Rights of the Child, which explicitly forbids “life imprisonment without possibility of release” for “offenses committed by persons below 18 years of age.” One has to wonder just how civilized a society we really are here in the U.S. – from the looks of it, we’re in great company, don’t you think? The irony of that, is that there is a teenage captured Somali national currently sitting in a U.S. prison currently awaiting trial and a possible life sentence for an act of piracy on the high seas earlier this year.

Nelson Mandela was right when he shared that opening quote I used in the beginning of this piece. Equally as profound was when he said this: “For to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.”  With that said, I hope the Supreme Court thinks long and hard on this one, because in my view, it just doesn’t seem right.

SUGGESTED READING: The Myth of the Super-Predator


QUESTION: Where do you stand on juveniles receiving life sentences, and why?

On the day that the president of the United States signed the Mathew Shepard Hate Crimes Bill into law, it’s ironic that I run with this story. Imagine that, a Black man as president signing a federal hate crimes bill. If that doesn’t make our ancestors proud I don’t know what would, but I guess I’m just sentimental like that.

Sadly, the smiling lady in the picture above may not be smiling too brightly these days. No she’s not one of those angry sisters unhappy because some guy took a hike leaving her to raise children all by her lonesome. Instead, she’s a pre-med student with a promising future who stands the chance of being sentenced to 15yrs in prison for cutting in line at a Wal-Mart shopping center in her hometown.

Check it out:

Wait a minute; did somebody say something about the KKK?

Dang, and here I thought the Klan was dead in this here post-racial America…

These fools have business cards? Stepping up in the world aren’t they?

Oh well, as always, there are two sides to every story, and as for the Klan angle:

“It has been a total nightmare,” said her father, Rev. Nate Ellis, a Church of God in Christ pastor. “My daughter has been mistreated. She has been convicted before trial.”

“The police went out, found them and picked them up and took them and showed them to one of the family members organizing the thing and told them, ‘we’ve found these laying on the ground, we picked them up and we thought you might want to know about this.’ They instantly accused the police of actually distributing them.” (Read more here)

Look, my name isn’t Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson or Michael Baisden; I’m not a celebrity with a Black radio-show with the ability to drum up enough support to have thousands converge on the small town where this woman lives. Of course I’m not sure if something like that has been done before. But it seems like with enough attention it can be done. I first came across this story via my local Memphis newscast (as shown in both above videos) and The Big Black News Blog last week (shout-out to my man Timothy Fitz who runs that blog).

In an effort to spread the word and make it happen, can you do me a favor to pass on this information? There is a scheduled march in the city of Kennett Missouri on November 12th in support of Heather. If you’re not able to make it, the least you can do is post a blog if you have one (or even link back to this post) to get more people involved; spread the word people. Yes, we need to make some noise about this one all across the country folks.

Also, if you’re in the local Memphis area; the SCLC (Southern Christian Leadership Council) is hosting a benefit concert at 7PM on October 30th at Greenwood C.M.E. Church here in Memphis TN. If you’re able to attend, I’m sure your support will be greatly appreciated.

Lastly, while you’re here, be sure to visit the site saveheatherellis.com and sign the petition requesting U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder’s intervention, as well as the Missouri State Attorney General Chris Koster, to ensure that justice is served. Remember, it’s not about how much you do, or what you do, it’s about making a difference

Thanks