black teenagers – praag.org

Racial violence a US national problem

Most of the victims are white

Teen mobs at city events is not a Cincinnati thing, and it’s been going on for years. Evidence of teen violence goes back to the Wisconsin State Fair in 2011, Philly, Chicago and spring 2014 in Louisville. They all have in common the attacks are by black, teenaged boys and girls. And most of the victims are white. The race factor is not something officials like to talk about. One UC criminology professor says that silence could be deadly. To some who called 911, the race factor was obvious. 11 victims filed reports saying they were kicked, punched or stomped by a group of black teenagers or young adults, boys and girls. Ten of the victims were white, one was Asian. Two reported racial slurs. Noelle Findlay was so certain the assault was racially motivated; the police report says hate crime. At 12th and Clay, Noelle says about 15 teenagers stepped in front of the car her husband was driving, “Everyone swarmed the car; I was like, ‘Go, go, go, get us out of here.'” Noelle’s husband, Chad Findley, told Local 12 News, “I had my window down four or five inches, he punched me in the left side of the face, someone else was on my wife’s side.” He said, “They were laughing the whole time having a great time” Noelle Findley used to live in Over-The-Rhine. Her job was about helping mostly young black men find careers. She filed the police report as a hate crime because she believes there was no other motive. “I feel like it needs to be addressed, people need to speak out say something not sweep it under the rug,” Noelle said. Dr. John Wright, a criminal justice professor at UC, said, “I think it is racist behavior, racist behavior when you target a group based on their race, sexual orientation, it’s the very nature of a hate crime.” Dr. Wright has tracked what he considers mob behavior across the country over the last five years. Most recently in Louisville a mob of teenagers terrorized downtown. They looted a store, vandalized cars and assaulted passersby. Most of the victims were white. Louisville officials say there is no evidence crimes were racially motivated. “We are unwilling to speak about race when it comes to crime because it is a sensitive matter,” said Wright. “Allegations of racism ruins careers, ruin lives. The media remains silent or targets the people who bring up the issue.” Cincinnati police and city leaders publicly condemn the violence. Law and public safety committee chairman, Chris Smitherman, said those responsible will be held accountable. In a statement to the Southern Poverty Law Center, a civil rights organization, Mayor John Cranley said nothing justifies, “hate speech or racial prejudice.” Pastor Peterson Mingo of Evanston said, “Not too many ways to explain that behavior, have to condemn it, can’t be tolerated.” Pastor Peterson Mingo’s community programs help young people become responsible, productive, respectful adults. Programs include “The Bulldogs,” Evanston’s football team, Boy Scout troop and a summer lawn care business. Sociologists weighing in suggest high unemployment and resentment fueled by segregation are possible causes. Mingo says there is something else, “There is a thing about loyalty. You with me or you ain’t. If you with me I’m getting ready to knock dude up side head lets go. It’s not where you can say I’m not going to. You’re either with me or you’re not.” Everyone agrees prosecuting those responsible will send a powerful message. Dr. Wright says there is more to do; it’s simple, talk about it.

Source: local12.com

The return of Trayvon Martin

A Florida man who shot and killed a black teenager in a dispute over loud music defended himself in court at a racially-charged trial which has revived memories of a notorious case that gripped the United States last year.

The murder trial of Michael Dunn has drawn comparisons to that of neighbourhood watch volunteer George Zimmerman, who was cleared of killing teenager Trayvon Martin after claiming self-defence under Florida’s controversial ‘stand your ground’ law.

Dunn, 47, who is white, insisted he was in fear for his life when he opened fire on a red sport utility vehicle after exchanging words with the black teenagers inside when he asked them to turn their music down.

“I was just going ‘oh my God, where is all this hostility coming from?’” Dunn told the court as he described seeing one of the teens pull out what looked to him like a shotgun.

Police did not find evidence of a gun in the vehicle and the three surviving teens testified that they never threatened Dunn.

Dunn insisted he was “in a panic” when he yanked his pistol out of his glove box as one of the teens started to get out of their car and come towards him.

“This is the point where he is coming to kill me, coming to beat me,” Dunn testified. “He made it quite clear what his intentions were.” Dunn said he kept firing as the sport utility drove away because he was afraid that he or his fiancé — who had rushed out of the gas station shop when she heard the shots — might get hit by returning fire.

On the night of the fatal gas station shooting, Dunn said the music from a red Dodge Durango parked next to him grew ‘really loud’ after his fiancée went into the store.

‘My review mirror was shaking, my eardrums were vibrating. It was ridiculously loud,’ Dunn said.

‘I said, ”Can you turn that down please?”’ he testified. ‘They turned it off. I said thank you.’

Dunn claimed that the music had not made him angry but described it as ‘rap c***’ and ‘obnoxiously loud’.

The young men in the Durango soon began using expletives, the word ‘cracker’ and then turned the volume back up, Dunn claimed.

‘I start hearing things like F-him and F-that,’ Dunn said. ‘It was mean-spirited.

‘When they turned the music on the second time i wasn’t going to ask them for any more favors again.

‘Now it got ugly. I had no reaction–I’m looking forward and hoping Rhonda comes out [of the store].

‘Now there’s thumping bass and he’s yelling over the bass. I hear ”I should kill that m***********.”’

‘I’m flabbergasted. Now I’m paying attention to what they are saying. Then I hear in a more elevated voice: ”I should f****** kill, that m**********.”’

Dunn added: ‘At this point, I think I should try and deescalate this.’

Dunn then claims that a young man, identified as Jordan Davis, who was seated in the rear of the car, bent down and appeared to pick up something by his feet.

The accused said that at this point, he did not reach for his pistol stored in the glove compartment of his car.

Dunn said Davis ‘came back up and slammed whatever it was against the door’.

He said: ‘I saw sticking above the windowsill about four inches of a barrel. It was a thump I heard against the door. It looked like a 12-gauge or maybe 20-gauge [shotgun].’

Dunn testified: ‘I was in fear for my life and I was stunned. I’ve never been threatened, let alone threatened with a firearm. I was incredulous–I couldn’t believe what I was hearing and seeing.’

The accused said that Davis began to get out of the car and yelled at him: ‘This s*** is going down now.’

Dunn said: ‘This is the point where my death is imminent, he made it very clear what his intentions were. I’ve never been in that position.’

Dunn testified that he had no idea that he had shot and killed Jordan Davis, 17, until he saw a news alert on his phone once he got back to his hotel.

He explained that he did not immediately contact local police because he wanted to get the advice of a neighbour who works in law enforcement and was convinced it was an open and shut case of self-defence.

Unlike Zimmerman — who did not face charges for weeks after claiming self-defence in the shooting of an unarmed teenager — Dunn was arrested and charged with murder the day after the shooting. He has been held in jail pending his trial.

Brazilian Apartheid

One of the leaders of Brazil’s flashmob movement that is sweeping across shopping centres, sparking violent clashes with police, is a soft-spoken 55-year-old piano teacher that has never organised a protest in his life.

Around 1,000 people are expected to turn up at São Paulo’s upmarket JK shopping centre on Saturday for a gathering – known as a ‘rolezinho’ – which he has organised over Facebook.

He was motivated by a crackdown on other flashmobs, which began last month as parties but have become more political. “I couldn’t bear to see the criminalisation of poor, black kids,” he says.

Similar protest-cum-rampages are planned in at least eight other states across Brazil this weekend, with more than 8,000 expected at one shopping centre in Rio de Janeiro. Popular among poor, largely black, Brazilians, the flashmobs have begun to snowball into a nationwide movement against racism and inequality, threatening the government with further violent mass protests just as the country prepares to host the football World Cup, academics say.

In June the biggest protests in 20 years spread across Brazil following complaints over a bus fare increase, bringing businesses in Latin America’s biggest economy to a standstill and prompting a plunge, albeit temporary, in President Dilma Rousseff’s popularity.

Rousseff called an emergency meeting, worried that the protests might spiral out of control, local media reported.

Many say the government has good reason to be worried, pointing to a similarity with the London riots of 2011.

São Paulo’s first major rolezinho took place at the beginning of last month, when about 6,000 teenagers occupied Shopping Itaquera in the city’s poor eastern suburbs.

Similar gatherings followed across the city but muggings and robberies prompted a tough response from the police. Last Saturday, military police used rubber bullets and tear gas to break up the crowds and were caught on camera beating teenagers with truncheons.

Messages of outrage spread quickly over social media in Brazil, which has the second biggest Facebook community in the world, turning the mass parties into a nationwide political movement.

At least four shopping centres across the city secured court orders to ban suspicious teenagers from entering, leading to accusations this week of racial segregation and even a “Brazilian apartheid”.

In spite of Brazil’s image as a harmonious melting pot of races, racial tensions run deep. The country still suffers from one of the most acute income divides. “Although Brazil has progressed in reducing poverty, we note that there’s still a great contrast between the situation of black Brazilians and the country’s rapid economic growth,” the UN concluded in a report last month on racism.

Income growth has inspired a sense of social ascension, leading to demands for greater equality, as well as allowing people to buy their first mobile phones, giving them access to social media.

The movement might also be the symptom of a disenchanted youth that is facing a slowing economy and a shrinking job market.

While Brazil’s unemployment rate remains at a record low of about 5 per cent, research by Ipea, a government agency, has shown many young people in poorer regions are dropping out of the workforce and are not going into higher education either.

Source: FT

Three caught for raping, stabbing three-year-old

Police arrested three black male suspects after a three-year-old girl escaped death when a resident found her crying hours after she was allegedly raped and stabbed in Thaba Nchu.

The little girl, found rape and abandoned at an old industrial site in Thaba Nchu, was apparently attacked by three teenagers aged between 15 and 18.

Police said it is alleged that the victim was raped before the suspects stabbed her several times all over her little body. Police could not confirm the number of times the victim was stabbed.

According to the information given to police, it is alleged that on Sunday a woman residing in Sakanyoka township left the three year old with an older sibling when she went to a tavern.

“It is alleged that three suspects came in the house and took the victim to an old industrial area in Thaba Nchu, where they started to exchange raping her, before they stabbed her several wounds and left her, thinking that she was dead,” said police spokesperson, Consolation Mokoale.

“At about 10:00 in the morning a community member heard a child crying from the building and went to investigate. She found the girl in a pool of blood,” said Mokoale in a statement on Tuesday.

She said police and paramedics were called and the girl was found alive but in a critical condition.

“She was taken to Pelonomi medi-clinic for treatment. Police received a tip off and three suspects aged between 15 and 18 were arrested for kidnapping, attempted murder and rape,” Mokoale said.

They will appear before Selosesha Magistrate Court on Wednesday.

Racial motive in white killing denied despite tweets

US prosecutors handling the case of two black teenagers accused of shooting dead a white Australian baseball player said Friday there was no evidence to suggest the killing was racially-motivated.

The murder of Chris Lane, 22, in the small Oklahoma town of Duncan has triggered a race debate in America after it emerged that one of the victim’s alleged killers had posted racist comments on Twitter earlier this year.

Several commentators have questioned why authorities had not pressed to have hate crime charges added to the indictment of James Edwards, 15, and Chancey Luna, 16, who are both charged with murder.

However Stephens County District Attorney Jason Hicks said while authorities were aware of the comments made by Edwards, there was not enough evidence to pursue extra charges.

“At this point, the evidence does not support the theory that Christopher Lane was targeted based upon his race or nationality,” Hicks said in a statement.

“The evidence is insufficient to establish that race was the primary motive in the murder of Christopher Lane.”

In separate posts on Twitter earlier this year, Edwards spoke of his “hatred” of white people.

“90% of white ppl are nasty. #HATE THEM,” read one tweet.

In another post Edwards claimed to have assaulted several “woods” — a derogatory slang term for white people — following the acquittal of George Zimmerman for the killing of black teenager Trayvon Martin in Florida.

Hicks later reiterated to CNN that he did not believe the crime was racially motivated. He noted that Luna came from a mixed race family, and that the third teenager arrested with the duo, 17-year-old Michael Dewayne Jones, was white.

“I have nothing in my files, paperwork or audio recordings that suggest that Christopher Lane was killed because of his race or nationality,” Hicks said on CNN.

Police have said Edwards and Luna shot Lane because they were “bored.”

“They were bored and just wanted to see someone die,” Duncan police chief Danny Ford told US media.

Hicks agreed that Ford’s explanation appeared to be the most likely.

“I tend to think that the police chief’s comments, that is they did it out of boredom are probably accurate,” Hicks said.

Both Edwards and Luna were charged with first degree murder, a crime punishable by death in Oklahoma.

Jones has been charged with use of a vehicle in the discharge of a weapon and acting as an accessory after the fact. – Sapa/AFP