3 men held in Mass. in election night church fire

[Joanne98]

Source: AP

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. - Three men who authorities say were angered about Barack Obama becoming the first black president were arrested Friday on civil rights charges for allegedly torching a predominantly black church hours after the election.

The Nov. 5 fire destroyed the Macedonia Church of God in Christ in Springfield, causing $2 million in damage to the building, which was under construction.

The suspects, Benjamin Haskell, 23, Michael Jacques, 24, and Thomas Gleason, 21, who are all white, were held without bail after a hearing in federal court in Springfield later Friday. No pleas were entered at the hearing, which was continued until Wednesday.

Magistrate Judge Kenneth Neiman called the crime "heinous" but said he was inclined to allow the men $100,000 bail with electronic monitoring depending on further information from next week's session.

The men were charged with violating a civil rights conspiracy statute that makes it illegal to injure, threaten or intimidate anyone from exercising their civil rights.



Read more: http://www.seacoastonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090117/NEWS/90117001/-1/NEWS19

[TheCowsCameHome]

1. I wonder what the station presets are on their radios

Limbaugh, Hannity, Savage maybe?

[pipi_k]

2. Just goes to show

that stupid, cowardly, racist acts can be done anywhere.

I was born and raised in Springfield, MA. That church is in the same general area where my mom used to live some 15 years ago. It's a real nice suburban area. Or it used to be, anyway. Anyone expecting violence or hatred toward a minority group on that night might have thought, like I did, that it would be in a different place...not in a nice, quiet little community such as where it happened.

Sad...

[Mopar151]

3. I'm with ya

The Springfield area is a good deal more cosmopolitan than the Boston end of the state, which is a big part of why I like to go to events there(going tomorrow!) - but whiny little turds like these are everywhere....

[GoddessOfGuinness]

6. As long as slime like Coulter and Limbaugh infest the airwaves...

there will be deranged morons available to listen to them spew their trash.

[acmavm]

4. I hope there's DECADES of prison time ahead for these guys. Three

little girls burnt to death once in a church fire. Maybe that didn't happen here, but who knows, it could have.

Fifty years, no parole minimum!

[bitchkitty]

10. I will never forget that.

I was just a child when I read one of the father's accounts of being on the scene, and seeing his daughter's shoe. It broke my heart.

[Milspec]

12. Actually the church was bombed

The Sept. 15, 1963, bombing at the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, was one of the most abhorrent crimes of the civil rights movement. Four young girls attending Sunday school—Denise McNair, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, and Addie Mae Collins, aged 11 to 14—were killed when a bomb exploded at the church. Twenty others were injured. The church was a center for civil rights meetings, and just a few days earlier, courts had ordered the desegregation of Birmingham's schools.

[acmavm]

14. Yes, that's true. I forgot that, just remembered that they died in a

burning building.

But regardless, innocents could have died in that fire.

Fifty years, no parole.

[proud2BlibKansan]

5. Wouldn't arson be considered a terrorist attack?

And when I checked my calendar, I noted it is now AFTER 9/11/01 and I believe Bush is still in office. :evilgrin:

[dcindian]

9. Naw probably wrong religion

Or perhaps their skin was not dark enough?

[GoddessOfGuinness]

7. Members of a filth-based organization, no doubt

[fascisthunter]

8. dumb asses... have fun in prison

[uppityperson]

11. k&r.

[struggle4progress]

13. "... Investigators got a break in the case when a witness came forward and said he'd been driven ...

... to the site of the fire by two of the accused men. He said Jacques asked him who he had voted for in the election; when he responded 'Obama,' Jacques replied with a profane racial epithet, then said he thought Obama would be assassinated, the unidentified witness told investigators.

The suspects initially denied involvement when questioned by police and then blamed each other for the idea to torch the church, according to an affidavit filed in federal court.

Haskell told authorities Jacques said he was angry the country was going to have an African-American president ..."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/feedarticle/8272981

This story -- and others like it -- represent the inevitable fruit of decades of a Republican strategy that reached out to the Neanderthals among us, from Nixon's 1968 "southern strategy," to Philadelphia, county seat of Mississippi's Neshoba County, ... where three civil rights workers -- Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman -- were murdered in 1964. And ... where, in 1980, Republican presidential candidate Ronald Reagan chose to launch his election campaign, with a ringing endorsement of "states' rights" (Raspberry WaPo 14 Jun 04), to Bush's 2000 campaign stop at Bob Jones University (which then prohibited interracial dating), to the disgraceful hate-mongering of the 2008 McCain-Palin campain

[Sydnie]

15. um ... why aren't they being charged with arson as well?

Seems like a strange charge when arson would do and the other charge could have been added later, doesn't it?

So, burning a church is not arson, just a civil rights infraction now?

[Bombero1956]

16. I can't wait til Tuesday morning

just a couple of weeks ago a coworker was spouting off on his personal take on how the investigation was going. He said that in his personal opinion the fire was set by a member of the church for financial gain. I am just going to have to ask him what happened to his theory.