The Case of the Jena Six - Racism in Louisiana

[groovedaddy]

The Case of the Jena Six: Black High School Students Charged with Attempted Murder for Schoolyard Fight After Nooses Are Hung from Tree...

Six black students at Jena High School in Central Louisiana were arrested last December after a school fight in which a white student was beaten and suffered a concussion and multiple bruises. The six black students were charged with attempted murder and conspiracy. They face up to 100 years in prison without parole. The fight took place amid mounting racial tension after a black student sat under a tree in the schoolyard where only white students sat. The next day three nooses were hanging from the tree.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/07/10/1413220

[ThomCat]

1. If racism this blatant can stand then all the

people who deny that racism is still a common, serious issue are either seriously deluded, or complicit.

It's amazing. Racially motivated segregation determining where black students can sit, racial threats (threatening lynching), charges that are clearly racially motivated... The charges haven't been thrown out, and the prosecutor hasn't been repremanded by the judge... How much worse could this get?

Will they have a show trial and a lynching soon too? x(

Where do I pick up my sign. I think it's time to start marching in the streets again.

[BridgeTheGap]

2. Remember the Greensborough, NC trial? 1980 or so?

What began as a protest ended up in a Klan/Nazi shooting spree, killing a number of the unarmed protestors. All of the klansmen/nazis were acquitted on grounds of self-defense. One of the groups participating in the demonstration had distributed flyers that read "death to the klan." The shooters claimed they feared for their lives and their ambush of the protestors was an act of self-defense.
Maybe these 6 young men should make the same claim: the nooses represented a threat to their lives and they were merely acting in self-defense. Unfortunately, I doubt that an all white jury will go along with that, simply based on skin color.

[SemiCharmedQuark]

4. Oh they'll always be some.

Or those that argue to defend them is "reverse racism" or some garbage.

[meowomon]

3. More About the Case:

On Thursday, June 28, 2007, At the LaSalle Parish Courthouse in Jena, Louisiana, Mychal Bell was convicted of aggravated second degree assault and conspiracy to commit secondary degree aggravated assault. Mykal was convicted because jurors believed he had knocked a white student named Justin Barker unconscious with a single devastating blow to the head.

Mychal Bell was accused of participating in a conspiracy because his alleged victim was stomped by several other students as he lay on the ground. It was explained that the young black males who stomped Justin Barker were co-conspirators with Bell even if they had never agreed to a coordinated attack. According to law, because Bell’s single blow made the stomping possible, an informal conspiracy, or “combination” could be implied.

The alleged assault was “aggravated” because a dangerous weapon was used-namely tennis shoes. According to this reasoning, every fight
participant is guilty of aggravated assault unless he shows up naked. The law is designed to make it as easy as possible to put defendants away for as long as possible.

The Mychal Bell trial has attracted interest from around the globe-accounts have been published in South Africa, Russia, China, Australia and every flagship newspaper in America-with the curious exception of the New York Times. Correspondents invariably note that Jena has been the subject of public scrutiny since the morning in late August, 2006 when three nooses were found hanging from a tree in the high school square. The fact that Mychal Bell was tried by an all-white jury has fanned accusations of racism.

http://friendsofjustice.wordpress.com/2007/07/02/ineffective-assistance-of-counsel-what-blane-williams-should-have-known/

http://www.whileseated.org/photo/003244.shtml

To send a letter to Governor Blanco: http://www.colorofchange.org/jena/

[CitizenRob]

5. 6 kids beat 1 kid until unconscious....

And under Louisiana law that counts as attempted second degree murder. The law says in section one that "When the offender has a specific intent to kill or to inflict great bodily harm;"

The six kids undoubtedly had the intent to inflict great bodily harm. That is enough to charge somebody with attempted second degree murder. If they had killed the kid it would have been flat second degree murder. This is not racism, it's application of applicable law. You do a real disservice to the cause of civil rights when you claim otherwise.


Here's the law in its entirety if you don't believe me:

Louisiana Second Degree Murder
LA R.S. 14:30.1

A. Second degree murder is the killing of a human being:

(1) When the offender has a specific intent to kill or to inflict great bodily harm; or

(2)(a) When the offender is engaged in the perpetration or attempted perpetration of aggravated rape, forcible rape, aggravated arson, aggravated burglary, aggravated kidnapping, second degree kidnapping, aggravated escape, drive-by shooting, armed robbery, first degree robbery, or simple robbery, even though he has no intent to kill or to inflict great bodily harm.

(b) When the offender is engaged in the perpetration of cruelty to juveniles, even though he has no intent to kill or to inflict great bodily harm.

(3) When the offender unlawfully distributes or dispenses a controlled dangerous substance listed in Schedules I or II of the Uniform Controlled Dangerous Substances Law* which is the direct cause of the death of the recipient who ingested or consumed the controlled dangerous substance.

(4) When the offender unlawfully distributes or dispenses a controlled dangerous substance listed in Schedules I or II of the Uniform Controlled Dangerous Substances Law* to another who subsequently distributes or dispenses such controlled dangerous substance which is the direct cause of the death of the person who ingested or consumed the controlled dangerous substance.

B. Whoever commits the crime of second degree murder shall be punished by life imprisonment at hard labor without benefit of parole, probation, or suspension of sentence.

[noiretextatique]

7. the victim spent three hours in the emergency room

he was released and he went to a party later that night.
on the other hand, a black student was attacked at a party by a group of white students. only one person was arrested and he was charged with a misdemeanor. same town, but very different treatment.

[flashl]

6. The 6-1 allegation was NEVER proven in court

I believe that the 6-1 story serves only to give justification to the miscarriage of justice. Mychal Bell's coach gave written testimony that Bell stood before him AS the fight was going on.

And, the coach identified, by name, the individual who punched Justin Barker.

The other white witnesses DID NOT KNOW the names of the black students alleged to be in the fight and could on testify in their written testimonies that it was a black kid in a GREEN jacket. Well, Bell was wearing a BLACK jacket on the day of the incident.

The only "witness" at Bell trial that named him as the attacker was one of the noose hangers. He also gave testimony that would INCLUDE himself in the alleged 6-1 fight.

If the witness was involved in the fight, then it wasn't 6-1 was it?

[Name removed]

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