I read that article a few weeks ago when it was first posted. It really made me look a few of the things concerning the case differently.

I saw this article too... and even at the end, it addresses the root of this issue: the punishment did not fit the crime. And the only visible answer for why this is so is that the people doing the prosecuting are racist.

I really think this is the bottom line.

I can answer one question...where were the parents?

I listened to the Michael Baisden show a few weeks ago...the father was on there being interviewed...he states that when this went to court...that he nor the boys mom were allowed into the courtroom...they didn't have access to the and it was the grandmother(I believe, if I remember correctly....) that told THEM about the jail sentence

I can agree with basically all of that.

I don't think I've commented in this thread very much about the LA justice system except to say that I don't know enough to be able to say such harsh things about unequal treatment, etc.

The media reports I've read have been incredibly slanted to one side of the facts. It's hard in light of the fact that I know the information I'm receiving is slanted to be able to judge whether the prosecutors in this case are doing the right thing. I can easily fit the facts of the case to attempted murder in the 2nd degree. Whether or not that's justified? I dunno.

As to the public defender not calling a single witness, it's a fairly common defense tactic, especially when the prosecution has just called a litany of eye witnesses to simply rely on a vigorous cross examination (if that's even possible) and a plea for mercy in closing. Given the facts, I don't think there is any way to put on a really, really strong defense.. so since I wasn't there, I don't really think it's right to say the defense attorney did a bad job.

I got a few pics to show...once I get them in photobucket they will come out better

http://groups.msn.com/isapi/fetch.dl...xVyKhDe9vKsd3Q


http://groups.msn.com/isapi/fetch.dl...Q6rEN!cT17gsJw

http://groups.msn.com/isapi/fetch.dl...ICXG0o4qNW11gg

It's not.

Easy to say that, since you weren't there and you have no experience with public defenders. For those of us with family members who have been through the public "justice" system... well, we know that public defenders often do a shoddy job of defense. Granted, it's not always out of malicious intent, sometimes they are simply overworked and underfunded.

Public defenders + Justice = JUST US


and you saying "I don't know" really means you really should have kept your mouth shut and fingers off the keys until you were up to speed with what is happening before you showed your @ss today.

see how easy admitting "I don't know" works?

Okay.. and it was reduced to 2nd degree aggravated battery. So I guess the prosecutor agrees with you.

You tell me what a winning defense strategy would be when there are dozens of eye witnesses to the crime?

Sure... after thousands of people had to come together to decry this foolishness. If this had slipped under the radar of the public (like 100 other cases do every day) then I'm sure that boy and the others would have been completely SOL.

I have no idea. I didn't go to law school.

I just think its sad that its taken THIS level of scrutiny to have this case looked at in such a manner.

The less said about Sharpton and Jackson, the better. They DO NOT speak for me, as a black person.

It just seems to me that something was very wrong in how this case was prosecuted, that's all.

I try not to call racism when I see a wrong, but sometimes that's what it is.

Couple of things...

#1 We really do have to take a step back and realize that the attention and momentum that the Jena case is receiving is really a culmination of many injustices that seem to have occurred within our 'justice system'. While it may be true that rallying/protesting/etc. may be a bit much for ONE questionable case...you have to realize that this is really ONE MORE questionable case in a long line of questionable cases. People are simply fed up with 'some people' receiving punishments for a crime that in many cases would never be passed down to 'other people'. I mean, let's think about this...what these students did was wrong without a doubt. Will sending them to prison for 20 (or even 5 yrs) help them to grow, see the error of their ways, and become a productive and contributing member of our society? Probably not. Many of these students have no prior record or history of disobedience. Arguably to punish them in this way is to throw away their futures. Perhaps what we are seeing here is that some people's future is simply viewed as more valuable than others.

Certainly 'thug' and 'punk' are likely not the 1st words that pop into one's mind when they see the average white or asian young person...even when they are in a negative situation. Since we are referencing the NC Lacrosse case, then certainly some of the same ppl who have condemned the Jena students did not refer to those Lacrosse players as 'thugs' or 'punks' (never once-from the day of the 1st accusation to the day they were cleared). Even if we look to instances where white students have been clearly identified as the guilty party, the focus tends to be more so on addressing the issue and getting them back onto the right path. However, we are not seeing much evidence that this focus in both the victim and the culprit's well-being in highly regarded in all cases. Why is this? Perhaps it is b/c when some individuals look at a troubled black or latino person they say "Well clearly they are just a thug...looking for trouble as usual. Lock them up and throw away the key. It was just a matter of time anyway. This is all they know or can ever know." rather than "Gee, this kid has their whole life ahead of them. There is no indication that they are a chronic behavior problem, so we really need to look at the spirit of the law and whether this was the way that it was intended to be applied. Let’s see how we can teach these individuals a lesson and get them back on track." At least this is what their actions are saying.

We can look at the young man in GA who was tried as a sex offender for having consensual sex with a girl one year younger than him. We can look at the young lady in Texas who was almost sentenced to over 10 years in prison for shoving a teacher. Now let’s add to that six students tried for attempted murder of someone who didn't spend more than three hours in the hospital. I am certainly not saying that these kids don't deserve any punishment. However, I also don't agree with taking their lives and futures and tossing them down the drain.

#2 KDdani - I just wanted to address your comment about not pointing and bringing attention to injustice, but rather simply working to address it. There are many ways of fighting injustice. Sometimes it is through specific actions and efforts to build relationships and create solutions, and other times it is simply through shining a spotlight on the infraction. There are so many people in this world who don't even acknowledge or believe that there is still racism...yet alone a need to solve it. There is a place for simply bring these situations to the attention of others. Additionally, so many offenses are done in the dark and simply go unnoticed. If you think of the three situations noted above, these are all a product of small towns where those individuals would have been hung out to dry had not the national media gotten a hold of the stories. We can even look at the situations in Darfur or Rwanda, or the AIDS crisis in Africa, or the conflict in Israel. Without someone to shine a spotlight on these tragedies, there is very little large scale support generated b/c people simply aren't aware. I'm not saying all of that to argue...I'm just mentioning it b/c I hear comments like those often, and we need to be aware that discussion/protesting/rallying/media has its place.

When this case was at trial, was it even all that controversial? The charge would have been reduced either before the trial or during it. I hadn't heard of it. Prosecutors reduce charges for a variety of reasons. that it was in response to public outcry is mere speculation on your part.

Ah.. but you can tell me that the public defender did a piss poor job? I'm having a hard time reconciling that statement with the above. Apparently, the P.D. did a bad job, but you don't know why. Is that accurate?

So could you tell us then, what a good strategy would be when there are a couple of hand fulls or eyewitnesses to the crime?

Perhaps. Your supposition that the charge would have been reduced due to "a variety of reasons" is also speculation.

Kevin, you're the king of saying you don't know the answer. I don't either. I never said this defender did a "piss poor job," I simply brought up the fact that it's not uncommon for defendants who can't afford an awesome team of lawyers to get the shaft, due to the PD's lack of resources.

Nope. As I said before, I didn't go to law school.

Ah... so rather than discuss the actual problem, you rally around a bunch of thugs (yes they are) who beat the snot out of a kid because he talked a little crap. Nice.

Rehabilitation is only one of the aims of the penal system. Another is to punish behavior which society condemns. Last I checked it was illegal to blindside someone then repeatedly kick them in the head. You do the crime, you do the time.

I read that some (if not most or even all but one) have priors.

Wrong, they throw away their futures when they decided to break the law. It is not "society" it is their own dumb choice that put them where they are.

Speak for yourself.

I believe they were out of control jocks.

-- basically the same thing.

Basis?

What do you mean by "troubled"?

You need to check your facts. No one was ever "tried" for attempted murder.

Glad we're on the same page... or at least the same chapter :)

I'm not sure that even the late Johnny Cochran could have exonerated this kid. How do you overcome a group of eye-witnesses going into the double digits? If such a thing could be done, then I'd *really* think the justice system was broken.

While Whitlock has a pretty bizarre history as a sports writer, this article certainly is more thorough than most . . . the veiled football aspect aside (he really doesn't support it at all in this situation, although it happens all over the place), it shows this is a much more complex situation than most here are saying, by quite a ways.

The Jena case doesn't exist in a vacuum. These cases you mentioned are exactly why so many African Americans are up in arms. It's the CONSISTENT use of over punishment that is so frustrating. I'm definitely not celebrating these boys as martyrs or heroes... they broke the law. But this case just another link in a long chain.

Agree or disagree...it is more profitable to imprison someone than it is to educate them.....

the eyewitnesses are NOT credible....

let's not forget that for ONE...he didn't get a fair trial?

why not....look at his jury....


Kevin...why don't you quit while you are way behind.

Why are we protesting?
 

because it just doesn't stop....


NEXT UP

http://www.wsbtv.com/news/14157648/detail.html


in GEORGIA

The answer depends on whether you take a utilitarian or retributive approach to punishment. I take the later.

They saw these six people who they knew from school attack their classmate savagely. How are they not credible? You're right -- eye witness accounts are historically some of the least accurate witnesses around. When you have a whole gaggle of them though, given the conditions, etc., I can't see how you could come to that conclusion.

No one has even talked about whether or not these kids actually did what they're accused of. I've heard no alibi, no claims of innocence, etc. Are you saying that the Jena 6 were at the Dairy Queen when all this took place?

His jury was all white. Why? Jena, LA is 88% white. 100 jury summons were sent out. 50 people showed up. Of those 50, all were white. The jury was chosen from that pool.

Of course, now you have to make the argument that because these jurors were white, they were incapable of being unbiased.

I'm not saying this to in any way insinuate that the jury was "fair", but what could they have done? According to an earlier post, of the 50 or so people who showed up for jury duty, none of them were black. If it takes having black jurors in order to have a fair jury (in a case involving a black defendant), then why didn't any of the black people who were called for jury duty report? If none were called, then what's the option (I'm asking because I have no law experience, so I honestly don't know what a solution to this problem could've been)? In a town of 2800 people, only 12% of whom are black, it's not hard to see how the jury could easily be all white.

NOBODY IS SAYING ANYONE IS INNOCENT!!!!

But correct me if I am wrong....the law as it stands in this country, supposedly gives everyone the RIGHT to have a fair trial by a jury of his peers....?

Think about that logic...you are trying this boy as an adult, with an inept PD and a jury NOT of his peers.....please tell me WHY you think that is fair.....and they are trying to sentence him for 80 YEARS??????

I wanna meet the asswhupping that lets someone go party several hrs later that is worth 80 years!!!!

Now if they killed the boy....then hey.....80 years would be fair.

And you think after all that has happened and knowing that this place still has a 1950's mentality that he stand a fair chance of them being UNBIASED?

Man, please.....

again....just quit while you are behind.

Sidney....good point......here is my question too, if that was an issue...then why didn't they change the venue? (rhetorical question BTW)


Scott Peterson got that option if I remember...and all he did was kill his pregnant wife and colored his hair.

You guys can argue all you want, but this statement makes no sense. The most profitable thing to do is to educate someone so that they can contribute and make money.

I heard that Jesse Jackson called Obama white, and Obama said rainbows are gay. I'm not sure if that happened, but it needed to be said for a long time. Rainbows are gay.

-Rudey

He got one. The law doesn't say those peers have to be of the same or similar skin pigmentation as the accused.

There's no logic in your statement. Just a bunch of disjointed assumptions. The "inept PD" (a black guy if that matters to you) is inept because he didn't call any witnesses. You have failed to comment on the fact that several here consider that to be (given the facts of the case) a decent strategy for the defense. In fact, the U.S. Supreme Court has held that a defense attorney calling no witnesses is not per se ineffective (and that was in a murder trial I believe). Calling no witnesses, relying on a vigorous cross (if possible) and a good close is actually not a bad strategy at all given the facts of this case.

And before the first trial, as the facts clearly point out, the charges were reduced to conspiracy (do do something, I don't know what which was later dropped by the judge) and 2nd degree aggravated assault. 80 years wasn't ever really on the table once the trial started. I believe the maximum sentence from what I have read is 22 years.

I imagine if my grandfather had survived being beaten to death (with shoes, maybe gloves) he could tell you what that sort of an "asswhupping" would be like.

Have you been there? Again, it appears you are projecting your racial persecution fantasy onto this community.

I realize it's a rhetorical question, but it's one that merits an answer. I'd honestly like to know why that didn't happen (assuming, of course, it is a viable option).

I guess "great minds" think alike...Jena Justice and Woodworth Justice
 

The Road to Jena:

www.khoutv.com
KHOU - TV

Instead one group of men stuck out badly.

They were dumped at a gas station in a very small town.

Elmo Parker was one of those men. "Hour two or three, I believe, in
front of a gas station like a bunch of vagabonds."

That's the time he said he spent after being stopped by police in
Louisiana.

In fact, Parker used his cell phone to captured images of Spergeon
Holly on the ground.

Holly didn't know Parker was shooting the until both of them ended up
in Woodworth, Louisiana.

"They're stopping people all along 49, and they have checkpoints up
the street so basically any out of state plates they're following them
for several miles. Black shirts, I don't know if you know but today is
supposed to be a day where everyone wore black where they were going
to show support. Any black shirt that's who they were profiling," said
Parker.

Parker, 21, was driving with two friends when he was pulled over.

Parker's mother, Kim Hudson, warned him not to speed in Louisiana.

Parker says he was going 50.

The police said, 70.

"Being pulled over for a traffic ticket and having your car towed and
being left on the side of the road? That's mighty harsh punishment for
a ticket," said Hudson.

Then Parker says the officer told him his Texas drivers license was
suspended. His mother says it was briefly a year and a half ago.

The officer took Parker's license, impounded his car and he and his
friends got into the tow truck.

"We get about a mile and a half down the road. The tow truck driver
just stops the tow truck, like basically at the edge of the gas
station and was like, this is as far as I can take you. Get out of my
truck," said Parker.

That's where they met Spergeon Holly. Almost exactly the same thing
had happened to him.

"They're trying to discourage people from going to Jena. And they can
physically see you're black they can physically see you have on a
black shirt," said Holly.

An hour up the road, a rally to end racism.

In Woodworth, four Houstonians say their struggle is just beginning.

"I don't know anybody in this town so I basically have to sit here and
wait until somebody drives from Houston," said Holly.

The Woodworth Police Department did not returned our calls made by 11
News.

By the way, both Parker and Holly appear to have valid Texas drivers
licenses.

Holly says he tried to show police his concealed weapons permit, which
you can only get with a valid license, and Parker says he had brought
court paperwork and insurance, proving his license had been reinstated.

Instead the Woodworth police took their licenses, and their cars, away.

I guess it's just a prank?

I'm guessing because no one asked for a change of venue? I suppose the court could have raised the issue sua sponte. I could see a good case for that. Again though, a P.D. would probably only do that if he thought his client had a snowball's chance at an acquittal. Considering the number of witnesses for the state (which would make it an expensive case to do somewhere else), the fact that there was probably a lot of media coverage all over the state, etc., it'd be pretty hard to find another venue which wasn't plagued by all of the same problems of exposure.

At any rate, the kids are guilty as hell. The only real question should be punishment.

Well I would like to meet your gandfather...oops you said that asswhuping killed him...otherwise you get no sympathy from me sir...I have seen it one too many times already.

I'd ask you to meet Emmitt Till and his mama but....alas...they are gone too and the people that killed Mr Till walked...

Amadu Diallo got filled with lead...yet the cops that killed him walk the streets.

I once saw a man killed in Lexingtom Mkt by cops because he was having a mental breakdown and all he had was a box cutter.....6+ cops made sure that he got 6feet under....the most horrific thing I have seen in my 30+ years here.

fantasy huh...I guess that means you are slightly hurt over what I have said today....

get over it.

19th century mentality in a 21st century world.....thanks

I only respond again to highlight my earlier comment to Kddani. Imagine how difficult it is to work to find solutions to today's problems when faced with individuals who despite your best efforts to be diplomatic, positive, and reasonable only want to argue, judge and create conflict. I certainly hope that we will get to a point where we can speak candidly and acknowledge one another's view point. However, GC seems to be far from that place.

Emmit Till and Amadu Dialo? I can't even believe you're bringing these up. They couldn't possibly be less relevant to the guilt or innocence of the "Jena 6."

It's obvious you've seen a lot of bad stuff. I think you're projecting a lot of that here. I can't blame you for that. That doesn't mean that you're right for doing it though.

Yes, soror, I wore black today. No rallies though because of work. Did you go to the actual rally in Jena?

Prove that they are irrelevant to this thread....

http://s213.photobucket.com/albums/c...oloq/Jena%206/


my pics have been loaded up

So now, it is a major difference in some small red neck town, not a city, in La. when there were 3 nooses hanging from the so called white tree which has been cut down, and the brutal beating of and individual who is of a different color!:rolleyes:

BS. An attack on an individual is still assault. I am sure they did not arrest these young boys out of the blue.

I do not need a history lesson of how the black person was degraded when none of us were born. How they were sold by blacks to usualy Dutch slave traders and brought to the USA to toil in Da Cotton Fields.

Many of you promagate the hatered that is still out in our society.

Thanks a lot!:(