• 20Aug

  Canada: Racist Rapist Only Gets 4 Years

  Canada, Crime, Racism, Sexism No Comments

  This is such a sad story, this woman of color was sexually assaulted by a white man while he shouted racial epithets at her.  And after this violent crime, which was only stopped when two young boys came to the woman’s aid, the judge felt that the attacker was “remorseful” and gave him about 4 years (including the 8 months time served).  Here’s what the article says about how the victim felt about the ’slap on the wrist’ sentence:  “the victim angrily stormed out of the courtroom, calling the sentence a ‘joke’ and saying the judge had ’spat on her face.’”  We at Malcolm-Che will absolutely go so far as to say this is a hate crime.
  

  ‘Cruel’ racist jailed in sex assault

  

  T.J. Turcotte had seen a man struggling with a young woman near 106th Street and 38th Avenue, forcing her toward Charles Anderson Park. He ran to get his brother at a friend's house, then they raced back to search for the attacker. The twins searched and interrupted a violent sexual assault that ended only when the rapist, Ian Drako Bruce, saw the twins approach. The rapist tried to run, but the brothers chased him, struggled with him, and finally pinned him to the ground until police arrived.

  
  

  http://www.torontosun.com/news/canada/2010/08/19/15071576.html

  http://www.vancouversun.com/life/Edmonton+twins+stopped+brutal+sexual+assault/3415453/story.html

  By TONY BLAIS, QMI Agency

  EDMONTON – It’s off to prison for a racist Edmonton man who sexually assaulted a woman at knifepoint and then went ballistic on police after being taken down by twin teenage boys.

  Ian Drako Bruce, 22, was handed a five-year sentence Wednesday after pleading guilty to 11 charges stemming from the alcohol-and-drug-fuelled Oct. 17 incident.

  However, after Bruce was given 20 months credit for the 10 months he spent in pre-trial custody – leaving him with three years and four months to serve – the victim angrily stormed out of the courtroom, calling the sentence a “joke” and saying the judge had “spat on her face.”

  According to agreed facts, Bruce had been at a friend’s wedding party that night at Duggan Community Hall, 3728 106 St., but was asked to leave after becoming highly intoxicated and causing a disturbance.

  He then approached the then-25-year-old victim as she was walking home from her bus stop and placed a knife at her neck and demanded her digital music player.

  He then forced her to go to a nearby park, saying he would “cut her throat” if she refused, and then made the pleading woman perform a sex act on him at knifepoint.

  He then ordered her to lie on her back, took off his pants and was removing her pants when Joe and T.J. Turcotte, twin 16-year-old boys, came to the rescue.

  Bruce fled after seeing the twins – who later were given awards for bravery by police – but they chased after him and pinned him to the ground following a fight.

  Police then showed up and the struggling Bruce, who threatened to find out where the twins lived and kill them and spat on the victim after saying “Canada is for whites, not blacks,” was eventually put into a police cruiser.

  Bruce spat on one of the officers and began swearing and yelling at them. He also began banging his head on the glass and kicking the door before finally being hobbled.

  He was then taken to hospital where he became belligerent to staff and attempted to bite a police officer and kick a security guard in the groin before spitting on the pair.

  Bruce later told a detective he had drank a lot of alcohol and taken crack cocaine, codeine and Valium. He also said that he hates women and was angry and depressed.

  He stated that after being kicked out of the wedding, he felt “betrayed and the need to smash someone.”

  The victim told court the attack taught her “there is evil everywhere” and said she no longer trusts people. She then confronted Bruce, telling him he had made her stronger and his life would be ruined without change.

  She also told him that she had forgiven him.

  Bruce thanked the victim and the twins after telling court he had disgraced himself and his family.

  Justice Eric Macklin slammed Bruce for humiliating and degrading the victim and called his racist remarks “callous, repugnant, cruel and intolerable in this country.”

  The judge said a sentence of five years and eight months was appropriate, but deducted eight months for Bruce’s guilty plea, remorse and lack of a prior criminal record.

  Tags: Canada, Racism, Sexism

• 18Aug

  US – California: Judge Frees Man Locked Up For Life For Trying To Steal Food, After 13 Years

  Crime, Economics, Prison State, Racism No Comments

  These 3 Strikes Laws are outrageous!!!!   25 years to life in prison for TRYING TO STEAL SOME FOOD TO EAT?!?!  What were his previous charges?!  Stealing a purse with 10 bucks in it and trying to rob someone (without a weapon).  He did 13 years for this!!!!!!!!!!!  Rarely do you see such a story where it is so painfully obvious that economics dictates who is locked up and who isn’t, that economics it he root of all this crap.  Please read this article.
  

  LA judge frees thief who got 25 yrs on 3rd strike

  

  From left, Stanford law school students Gabriel Martinez and Reiko Rogozen listen with Gregory Taylor as he wipes away tears during a hearing in Los Angeles Superior Court Monday, Aug. 16, 2010. A judge on Monday ordered the release of Taylor, a man serving a potential life sentence for stealing food from a Los Angeles church. (AP Photo/Anne Cusack, Pool)

  http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5heJ-iitiJR_RYwIjOjOIiybw7Q0QD9HL4OOO0

  LOS ANGELES — After 13 years behind bars for trying to break in to a church kitchen to find something to eat, a man who became an example of the harsh sentences allowed by California’s three-strikes law has been ordered released from prison.

  A Superior Court judge amended Gregory Taylor’s sentence to eight years already served and the 47-year-old, who was sentenced in 1997 to 25 years to life, will be a free man in a few days.

  Tears streamed down Taylor’s face and Judge Peter Espinoza asked a bailiff to get him a tissue.

  “I thought I was going to cry too,” said law student Reiko Rogozen, who started working on the case in January as part of Stanford Law School’s Three-Strikes Project, which filed a writ of habeas corpus seeking freedom for Taylor. “He was scared up until the last minute that it wasn’t actually going to happen.”

  The district attorney did not oppose the group’s move.

  Taylor quietly thanked the court and his lawyers for “giving me another chance … and my family for sticking by me.”

  Taylor was arrested in July 1997 while trying to get into the kitchen of St. Joseph’s Church in downtown Los Angeles. He told officers that he was hungry.

  The church’s pastor, the Rev. Alan McCoy, testified at the original sentencing that Taylor was often given food and allowed to sleep at the church. The priest described him as a peaceful man struggling with homelessness and crack addiction.

  Taylor was convicted of third-strike burglary due to two robbery convictions in the 1980s, once for stealing a purse containing $10 and another time for trying to rob a man on the street. He didn’t use a weapon in either case, and no one was injured.

  During an appeal, a dissenting state Supreme Court justice said Taylor was a 20th-century version of Jean Valjean, a character imprisoned for stealing bread in Victor Hugo’s novel “Les Miserables.”

  Judge Espinoza said the church break-in was not a crime of violence “but drug addiction and homelessness.”

  The three-strikes sentencing policies of the 1990s “produced inconsistent and disproportionate results,” he said.

  Taylor was taken back into custody and will be released when his paperwork is completed in at least two days.

  His mother and siblings applauded during the hearing and beamed in the hallway afterward. His sister, Angela Taylor, remembered the day her brother called with details of his sentence.

  “I thought he was lying. Twenty-five to life? That’s crazy,” she said.

  Taylor got his GED at the California Men’s Colony in San Luis Obispo.

  “Even in conversations over the phone, he sounds way more mature,” his sister said.

  His 78-year-old mother, Lois Taylor, said her son was hungry for a home-cooked meal, so she’s planning a huge barbecue to celebrate.

  He plans to live in Pomona with his younger brother who runs a food pantry where he’ll get a job.

  Michael Taylor said he and his brothers are planning a West Coast cruise and if Gregory Taylor gets out before they depart Aug. 23, they’ll take him along.

  When running for office in 2000, District Attorney Steve Cooley often used the case as an example of how unfair he believed the three-strikes law was. Cooley said if the third strike wasn’t serious and wasn’t violent, three strikes should not apply.

  Cooley said Gregory Taylor’s release is “justice long overdue” because his crime was a minor offense.

  But Cooley said the three-strikes law doesn’t need to be repealed as long as prosecutors apply it “proportionally,” taking into account the nature of the offense and the defendant’s previous criminal record.

  Tags: California, Prison Industrial Complex, Prison State, Racism

• 17Aug

  US – Tennessee: Judge Seeks To Move Trial Of Killer Cop To Whiter Area

  Police Brutality, Prison State, Racism No Comments

  We first covered this story here, back in May 2009. The fact that this trial is being moved is yet another injustice in this tragic story of one more murder of an unarmed man by police. Roy Glenn Jr.’s father said it right:  “Everything is crooked; it has been from day one. They want to send this trial somewhere where there is nobody but whites. My son is not going to get justice.”

  Trial of officer moved

  

  A march in Humboldt, Tennessee in support of Roy Glenn Jr., an unarmed black man who was murdered by a white police officer after running from a "routine traffic stop."

  

  Officer Paul Carrier

  http://www.jacksonsun.com/article/20100814/NEWS01/100814004/Trial-of-officer-moved

  TRENTON — The judge who ordered a change of venue in the reckless homicide case against Humboldt police officer Paul Carrier said people have told him they would be afraid to serve on a jury for the trial.

  “They are afraid if the defendant were not found guilty, there would be a problem,” Judge Clayburn Peeples said during a hearing Friday in Gibson County Circuit Court. “I don’t blame the family, but saying they are going to get justice can have a chilling effect … I do think the atmosphere in the community has been such that we could not pick a jury in this court.”

  After the hearing, family members of Roy Glenn Jr. said they are upset about the change of venue and the implications that they would cause trouble at the trial.

  “We are not threatening anyone,” Steve Jennings said. Jennings is married to Glenn Jr.’s cousin and has served as a spokesman for the family on various occasions. “They are stereotyping us. Not once have we spoke about doing anyone harm … I don’t get it. It’s sad.”

  Glenn Jr.’s father, Roy Glenn Sr., added, “Everything is crooked; it has been from day one. They want to send this trial somewhere where there is nobody but whites. My son is not going to get justice.”

  Carrier is charged in the Feb. 22, 2009, shooting death of 29-year-old Glenn Jr. His trial is scheduled to begin on Sept. 8.

  Police have said Glenn was a passenger in a car stopped by officers and that he jumped out and ran when officers stopped the car. They said Carrier chased Glenn to Mitchell Street, where the shooting occurred.

  Members of Glenn’s family and the driver of the car have said Glenn had already gotten out of the car when officers pulled up. They say Glenn was unarmed and was running from Carrier when he was shot in the back.

  Carrier is suspended from the Humboldt Police Department without pay and is free on $15,000 bond,

  In February, Peeples moved the venue from Humboldt to Trenton after Carrier’s lawyer, Randy Camp, filed for change of venue. Camp filed a second change of venue motion in June to request the trial be moved out of the local media coverage area.

  Carrier was not in court on Friday. Camp said he had advised his client not to attend the hearing because he didn’t think it was in Carrier’s best interest.

  During the hearing, Camp argued his client can no longer receive a fair trial because of the media coverage, the fact that Carrier’s statement to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation was made public after it was filed in a court document and the question of whether Glenn Jr. was shot once or twice.

  “The seed has been planted, and people forget about facts,” Camp said when talking about the question of the second gunshot wound.

  Glenn Jr.’s body was exhumed in March for a second autopsy. Peeples noted in court that the second autopsy conclusively showed only one gunshot wound.

  District Attorney General Garry Brown argued jurors could be trusted to decide the case based on facts presented during the trial.

  “We need to at least try to pick a jury in this area,” Brown told the judge. “I don’t think any juror will be shocked that the family of the victim is demanding justice.”

  Peeples said at least eight people have approached him about the case, a number he called “unprecedented.”

  “Almost everyone of them said, ‘I’d be afraid to be on that jury’ or ‘I sure hope I don’t get picked on that jury,’” Peeples said.

  After the hearing, Peeples met with lawyers to decide where the trial should be held. He said he would announce the venue on Monday.

  As he was leaving, Camp said he and Brown gave their opinions on where it should be held, but the judge will make the final decision.

  “I told the judge it should be similar demographics to the Trenton district but not in this area,” Camp said.

  Several members of the Glenn family wiped away tears as the judge ordered the trial moved.

  “He (Carrrier) has gotten everything,” Jennings said, sounding angry and frustrated. “This family is a good, decent, wholesome family. We want justice.”

  Tags: police murders, Racism, Tennessee

• 16Aug

  Africa – South Africa: Students Fined For Racist Video

  Africa, Racism, Students No Comments

  Ex-students fined in South Africa racist video case

  

  One clip showed a young man apparently urinating into a bowl of stew and then serving it to the housekeepers. It ended with the words: "That, at the end of the day, is what we think of integration."

  
  

  http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5g674Uy93XfBaNoBRBoIgGAQexHzQ

  http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5i8VzuRHB0aE77QptaWTriNjljkoQD9H9CMBG1

  BLOEMFONTEIN, South Africa — Four white South Africans Wednesday faced a fine in court after pleading guilty to humiliating five black housekeepers in a video depicting racial abuse at their former university.

  They made the video in 2007 as students at the University of Free State in protest at plans to integrate student housing.

  One clip showed a young man apparently urinating into a bowl of stew and then serving it to the housekeepers. It ended with the words: “That, at the end of the day, is what we think of integration.”

  The video sparked an international scandal when it landed on the Internet in February 2008.

  In a sentencing hearing Wednesday, both the defence and the prosecution said the four should face only a fine as punishment, after they pleaded guilty to the charge of crimen injuria, or seriously impairing the dignity of the five housekeepers.

  Defence lawyer Kemp J Kemp requested a 5,000-rand (680-dollar, 525-euro fine) fine, while prosecutor Johan Kruger sought three times that amount.

  “They deliberately manipulated the five cleaners because they are illiterate,” Kruger told the court….

  JOHANNESBURG — A South African court on Friday ordered four white former students to pay fines of nearly $3,000 each for a video they made that humiliated black university employees and drew global attention to entrenched racism on the campus.

  The young men had pleaded guilty to charges of illegally and deliberately injuring another person’s dignity. The video, made in 2007, showed the five employees being forced to consume food and drinks that appeared to be tainted with urine. The students later described it instead as a “harmless” liquid.

  In a sentence broadcast live on nationwide television, Magistrate Mziwonke Hinxa said it was “disheartening” such offenses have continued in the country.

  However, he said he found imprisonment was not appropriate, and he ordered the four to pay $2,720 (20,000 South African rand) each. He also imposed a six-month jail term suspended on condition of good behavior for five years.

  The four must not repeat “discrimination against any other person on grounds of race” over the next five years, Hinxa said.

  Tags: Africa, Racism, South Africa

• 13Aug

  US – Louisiana: NOPD, A History Of Abuse

  Crime, Police Brutality, Prison State, Racism No Comments

  This is a good article that is an overview over more than a decade of police terrorism in New Orleans.  And by police terrorism, we mean police terrorizing the communities.  For a great book about life coming up in and around New Orleans (among many other things) please check out From The Bottom Of The Heap:  The Autobiography Of Black Panther Robert Hillary King .  This article mentions Adolph Grimes, the young brother who was murdered by police a little while back upon his return from Texas to New Orleans.  Please check out what we posted on this brother before. A lot of people are familiar with names like Sean Bell, Oscar Grant, Rodney King, and Amadou Diallo, but there are a lot of others as well; this not a rare occurrence.  The police perform the role of the modern day occupation colonial army.  They have to hold us down and protect the rich, this job will never be tidy, clean and neat.   Check out what we have to say about police on our About page for more.
  

  New Orleans Police Struggle In Post-Katrina Era

  

  Sherrel Johnson, the mother of James Brissette who was killed on the Danziger Bridge in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, speaks to reporters on April 7 outside a federal court in New Orleans. Former New Orleans police officer Michael Hunter pleaded guilty that day in connection with a police cover-up of their shooting of unarmed civilians.

  http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129090179

  Five years ago this month, a powerful hurricane crashed into the Southern coast of the U.S., killing more than a thousand people. Katrina wiped out whole towns in Mississippi and left a major American city under water. New Orleans and the Gulf Coast have recovered in surprising ways since 2005, but many scars remain.

  One New Orleans institution that was already in deep trouble when the storm hit was the police department. The NOPD has long battled a bad reputation. But after Katrina, the department’s flaws unraveled: Officers deserted their posts, others got caught looting — even the police chief quit.

  In the weeks following the storm, things went from bad to awful — and the city and its people continue to pay a heavy price.

  With lawlessness engulfing the city and the cops’ leadership absent, individual acts of police heroism were overshadowed by allegations of brutality.

  In a tape shot by an NBC News crew, police officers were filmed in a chaotic scene on the Danziger Bridge. Unarmed residents were shot. Two died of their wounds. Seven New Orleans officers would be accused in the shootings and a subsequent cover-up. In another case, five more officers were implicated in the death of a man whose burned body was found in an abandoned car near a police station. Both cases were never fully prosecuted by local officials.

  Continued Mistrust

  That perceived impunity and a persistent murder rate that remains more than eight times the national average have led to five years of increasing mistrust in New Orleans police.

  You can see it on the streets as cops like Lt. Michael Brenckle work a minor burglary case.

  “Did you all witness who stole this gentleman’s speaker?” Brenckle asks more than a dozen neighbors sitting on their porches.

  “No, no, we just came from Bible school,” a kid replies.

  Brenckle, a 20-year veteran of the force, grew up in this rough St. Roch neighborhood near the Mississippi River. He says people are afraid to be seen talking to the police, let alone coming forward as witnesses.

  But times are changing.

  Federal prosecutors have come to town and are looking into as many as eight unresolved police cases, including the Danziger Bridge shootings. Eighteen officers have been indicted.

  And New Orleans’ new Mayor Mitch Landrieu has asked the federal officials to stay on and help clean up the department.

  “The level of danger on the streets of New Orleans — the number of murders — is unnatural. We have to find an answer to it, and we’re going to work really hard to see if we can,” he says.

  Landrieu also hired a new police chief — Ronal Serpas.

  “We are going to make a difference, we are going to turn this police department around. We are going to make New Orleans safer,” Serpas says.

  Serpas was an assistant chief in New Orleans before leaving to head the Washington state police and later the force in Nashville. He says his nine years away from New Orleans have given him the experience he needs to clean up the NOPD once and for all.

  “We are going to support the officers who are professional in every way,” he says. “But I can’t be more crystal clear than this: If you have a different agenda as a member of this department of being professional and service-oriented, you might as well leave now, because I will go to bed every night thinking of ways to get rid of you.”

  Misconduct, Murders

  But many in New Orleans have heard this tough talk before.

  In the mid-1990s, Len Davis was a cop who ran a cocaine ring out of the Lower Ninth Ward. When a resident filed a complaint with the police department, Davis called in a hit man — and it was caught on an FBI wiretap:

  “Brown skin with light brown eyes … I’ve got the phone on and the radio … after it’s done go straight uptown and call me.”

  Local civil rights lawyer Mary Howell says corruption on the force was unbelievable — you couldn’t make this stuff up.

  “We had police officers involved in kidnappings, rape, murders, drugs, bank robberies. There was a guy who used to do, like, bank robberies on his lunch hour. It was just astonishing — at one point we had four police officers facing first-degree murder charges,” she says.

  Back then, a reform mayor and police chief came in and pledged to work with federal officials. Changes were implemented; nearly 100 cops were fired. The murder rate dropped, community relations improved — but sadly the reforms didn’t stick.

  By 2001, a different mayor and police chief took over and federal oversight began to wane. By 2005, when Katrina struck, the department had returned to its old ways.

  And residents today say the misconduct and murders just keep coming.

  In the back room of a community organization that protests police violence, relatives of family members who say they’ve been victims of the police were eager to tell NPR their stories.

  Patricia Grimes talked about her son who was shot New Year’s Day in 2009 by nine plainclothes cops. She says the entire confrontation lasted minutes.

  “I heard all the shooting — and it only took three minutes. That ain’t nothing but somebody ganging up on you. That’s hate, torture, murder,” she says.

  Another mother told about police beating her son to death after a traffic stop. One man recalled how cops shot and killed his mentally ill brother in their home.

  Theresa Elloie says her son was beaten by police inside the family-owned bar. There were 12 witnesses. The lead lieutenant in her son’s case has recently been indicted by federal prosecutors.

  “If they would have handled my son case, not swept it underneath the rug and got those officers off the force, then these other people kids would be living,” she says.

  Elloie’s family won a judgment against the NOPD, but can’t disclose the terms of the award.

  Mounting Lawsuits

  In addition to the significant human cost, the city is bearing a huge financial liability as the lawsuits mount.

  Police Chief Serpas says he will get better training for his officers and new technology. He wants an early warning system to alert supervisors about potentially abusive cops — a standard in most big city departments.

  And he says this time he’ll make sure that federal overseers stay longer, so reforms stick.

  “This time, the difference is gonna be when we work collaboratively at the end of this process, there is going to be a document signed with the force of law so that if I won the lottery three years from now and I left, the next chief behind me couldn’t go back and change the stuff that we put in place,” Serpas says.

  Serpas says all this will take time — especially if the culture of the NOPD is to be changed. At a minimum, he says, give him five years — right around Katrina’s 10-year anniversary.

  Tags: Adolph Grimes, Louisiana, Police Brutality, police murders, Racism

• 13Aug

  US – Louisiana: BP uses prison labor and tax breaks to clean up its mess

  Economics, Environment, Prison State, Racism No Comments

  “First, prisoners don’t have any rights, they can’t complain about inhaling fumes from oil-slicked and dispersant chemicals for 12 hours a day, or report any abuses on the part of their employers due to BP’s notorious “gag order.” Further, if they refuse the work they can lose “time off for good behavior” on their sentencing. Louis­iana, the state that has the highest percentage of their population in prison, is now using that population as slave labor for BP.”

  BP uses prison labor and tax breaks to clean up its mess

  

  “If they say no to a job, they get that time that was taken off their sentence put right back on.”

  http://www.newpittsburghcourieronline.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2648:bp-uses-prison-labor-and-tax-breaks-to-clean-up-its-mess&catid=40:opinion&Itemid=54

  http://www.ilookfly.com/black-celebs-gossip/bp-gets-louisiana-inmates-to-do-their-dirty-work-cleaning-up-oil-spill/

  (REAL TIMES MEDIA)—The consequences of the Deep Horizon BP oil spill will likely not be fully known for years and by then most of the men and women who are responsible for this disaster will either be out of office, in new jobs or retired. However, that shouldn’t stop us from paying attention to some of the newest and most disturbing aspects of the spill, which are not only environmental and health-related. Would it shock you to know that BP is using modern slavery to clean up the Gulf, and better yet, the American taxpayer is paying for it? That might make you want to buy your gas somewhere else.

  One of the most disturbing impacts of the BP oil spill has been the multi-headed impact it’s had on the local economy. Let’s not forget that metro New Orleans and the Gulf region lost over 200,000 residents in the year after Hurricane Katrina and that loss of customers and employees has left the region struggling to find a new identity. The spill has essentially ended summer tourism and fishing in the region, putting thousands of seasonal employees out of work. In fact, one of the only companies in position to hire anyone is actually BP which has been tasked with the massive multi-billion dollar clean-up that in the region. Every other day you see a new spate of commercials from BP with earnest looking hardhats claiming that they’re working hard to clean up the mess and how nobody could be any sorrier than BP that this all happened. Dozens of websites have sprung up in the last several months advertising paying jobs, in the Gulf region as part of the cleanup. You would think that at least someone is getting work out this disaster, but you’d be shocked as to who’s working most.

  A recent article by Abe Louise Young in the Nation magazine points out that BP is engaging in the most despicable of shell games (pun intended) in the coast region. Rather than hiring local citizens for cleanup duty, or just deploying more of their own staff, British Petroleum has been using prison labor to clean up some of the most dangerous and toxic regions of the gulf.

  The problem with BP hiring prison labor is multi-layered. First, prisoners don’t have any rights, they can’t complain about inhaling fumes from oil-slicked and dispersant chemicals for 12 hours a day, or report any abuses on the part of their employers due to BP’s notorious “gag order.” Further, if they refuse the work they can lose “time off for good behavior” on their sentencing. Louis­iana, the state that has the highest percentage of their population in prison, is now using that population as slave labor for BP.

  But the problem is even worse when you look at the benefits for BP and the impact on the American taxpayer. Hiring prison labor means that BP, the fourth largest corporation in the world can pay as little as 10 cents an hour rather than paying locals real wages. Worse, due to Bush era tax laws companies who hire at-risk employees like prisoners or welfare recipients receive tax breaks up to $2,500 per hire or up to 40 percent of the wages paid. Meanwhile prison laborers who get sick inhaling toxic fumes and waste on the job will go back to prison where our tax payer dollars will have to cover their limited medical care. BP does it again! Destroying a region with irresponsible drilling, cleaning it up by supporting the racist and classism prison industrial complex and then getting tax breaks and health care to cover it all up provided by the U.S. taxpayer. They could not have planned this better if they intended to.

  While British Petroleum has pledged $20 billion to a fund to for displaced and economically harmed locals in the region, their use of prison labor and Bush era tax loopholes to cut down their own expenses will continue unabated unless the U.S. public becomes aware and does something about it. Every American citizen should call their local congressperson or senator and ask that they close the tax loophole which allows companies like BP to benefit from prison labor to clean up messes that they have created on their own. BP needs to clean up their own mess and not get tax breaks to do it.

  Tags: Environment, Louisiana, Prison Industrial Complex, Prison State

• 11Aug

  US – Race To More Racism As Florida Governor Hopeful Seeks Immigration Law Harsher Than Arizona

  Immigration, Racism No Comments

  Governor hopeful Bill McCollum wants Florida to copy Arizona law, but be harsher than SB 1070

  

  Racist Jingo: Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum

  http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/2010/08/11/2010-08-11_governor_hopeful_bill_mccollum_wants_florida_to_copy_arizona_law_but_be_harsher.html

  A Republican running for governor in Florida wants the state to follow in Arizona’s footsteps … then go “one step” further.

  Bill McCollum, the Sunshine State’s attorney general, has proposed legislation that would mimic the Grand Canyon State’s controversial anti-illegal immigration law but also grant more powers to judges in punishing illegal aliens.

  “This legislation will provide new enforcement tools for protecting our citizens and will help our state fight the ongoing problems created by illegal immigration,” McCollum said in a statement Wednesday.

  “Florida will not be a sanctuary state for illegal aliens,” he said.

  The bill, drafted with the help of fellow Republican Rep. William Snyder, would require “aliens to carry immigration documentation” or face up to 20 days in jail. Illegal immigrants also would be barred from seeking work in the state.

  Although those points are similar to the Arizona law, which is now mired in court battles with the federal government and other groups, McCollum’s proposal goes further to punish illegal immigrants.

  Under his legislation, judges would be allowed to specifically consider a defendant’s immigration status while setting bail. The legislation also would allow judges to grant harsher prison times for illegal aliens who commit a crime in Florida.

  Changes were made to the bill in the aftermath of Arizona’s legal troubles regarding SB 1070, but the bill likely still would face the same scrutiny should it be passed by the state legislature.

  “Floridians want to see their elected officials provide leadership to the challenges of illegal aliens living our state,” Snyder said in the statement. “This proposal is a significant step forward in confronting illegal immigration.”

  “I think Arizona is going to want this law,” McCollum said in Orlando during a press conference to announce the bill.

  Florida is a major U.S. migration destination for nationals from the Caribbean and Latin America. According to the Migration Policy Institute, more than 700,000 illegal immigrants reside in the Sunshine State, and an estimated 2.7 million foreign-born residents call it home.

  McCollum is locked in a primary battle with rival Rick Scott. Most polls have put Scott ahead in the race, but by how much varies.

  “Today’s immigration proposal from Bill McCollum serves as just another example of why he can’t be trusted,” Scott’s campaign communications director Jennifer Baker said in a statement on Wednesday. “Besides flip-flopping on his support of Arizona’s legislation, the desperate career politician rushed to present a plan that on Monday he said would be coming in ‘a couple of weeks.’”

  “It’s clear the only way to get McCollum to take any action on anything is when he’s down in the polls,” she added.

  The Republican primary is Aug. 24.

  Tags: Florida, Immigration, Racism

• 11Aug

  Europe – France: Police Brutalize Immigrants During Eviction

  Europe, Housing, Immigration, Police Brutality, Racism, Video No Comments

  Point 4 of the Black Panther Party’s 10 Point Program:  “We Want Decent Housing Fit For The Shelter Of Human Beings.”

  Europe – France:  Police Brutalize Immigrants During Eviction

  Sarkozy’s racist scapegoating

  http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=22045

  French President Nicolas Sarkozy is using vicious scapegoating to try to distract attention from a government expenses scandal and a revolt against his pensions attacks.

  He is part of a trend across Europe to spread hatred and division in an effort to blunt opposition to our rulers’ plans to make us pay for the crisis. Such manoeuvres can pave the way for open racists and fascists to prosper.

  Over the last week Sarkozy called for a new “war on crime”. He said that foreign-born individuals would be stripped of their French nationality if they attacked police or public officials, cynically meshed ideas of “immigrant” and “criminal”, and lashed out at Roma people and travellers.

  “We are suffering the consequences of 50 years of insufficiently regulated immigration which has led to a failure of integration,” he said.

  Sarkozy is no stranger to virulent and racist scaremongering. He has repeatedly used the idea of a feral and alien “racaille” (scum) to scare voters into backing him.

  He divides France into those who work hard and respect the law and those who are criminal and worthless. But his latest comments went further than ever before.

  Several of the measures he called for ape the policies of Jean Marie Le Pen’s fascist National Front party. Several French commentators criticised the plan as similar to measures used against the Jews by the pro-Nazi Vichy regime in the 1940s.

  Sarkozy hopes to scoop up far right voters, but is more likely to strengthen and legitimise the National Front.

  His tough rhetoric was followed by the interior minister, Brice Hortefeux, who warned that citizenship could also be revoked for those found guilty of other offences such as polygamy or other “serious criminal acts”.

  Actions

  Words lead to actions. When the president gives a lead, the state’s attack dogs know what’s required.

  Police drove about 50 Roma from a squat in Montreuil, east of Paris, on Friday of last week.

  Even before the “get tough” campaign, police broke up a demonstration by 150 people, mostly African immigrant women, protesting against their eviction from squats in a council tower block in a suburb of Paris.

  Almost all were completely legal and had lived in France for a decade or more.

  A video of the eviction (available at www.socialistworker.co.uk) shows police assaulting women, children and men. One particularly vile episode shows officers dragging off a woman with a baby on her back.

  The onslaught was on the same estate where Sarkozy threatened to use an industrial hose to clean out drug gangs. The local police authority rejected charges of brutality—a spokesman said that the woman with a baby on her back had “thrown herself on the ground which meant the officers could not at first see her baby”.

  The opposition Socialist Party criticised Sarkozy’s most extreme phrases. But its own representatives have demanded more spending on the police and said that Sarkozy was not doing enough to tackle criminality.

  And Sarkozy would have been encouraged by the 335 to one vote in the French parliament to ban the wearing of the Islamic full-face veil.

  France shows the danger of the right coming up with divisive measures to break resistance to the cuts.

  Some of those victimised are already hitting back. In the small town of Saint-Aignan, in central France, a group of around 50 Roma armed with axes attacked a police station after police shot and killed a 22-year old.

  There has to be clear resistance to racism and Islamophobia, and a class alternative to the idea that workers must pay for the crisis.

  Millions of French workers are set to take part in strikes and protests on 7 September against pension “reform”. That unity, combined with political arguments against racism and the cuts, can defeat Sarkozy’s strategy.

  Tags: France, Housing, Immigration, Police Brutality, Racism

• 09Jul

  US – Cali: Oscar Grant’s Mom Says “The System Has Failed Us” As Killer Cop Gets Found Guilty of Lesser Charge

  Activism, Police Brutality, Racism No Comments

  NO BLACKS ON THE JURY?!?!  THAT MUST BE WHY THEY MOVED THE TRIAL OUT OF OAKLAND.  INVOLUNTARY MANSLAUGHTER?!  AS IF THE COP’S ACTIONS WERE AGAINST HIS OWN WILL??!?!  HE MURDERED OSCAR GRANT IN COLD BLOOD!!!!

  Tags: Police Brutality, police murders

• 29Jun

  US – Illinois: Officer Guilty Of Lying About Torture

  Crime, Police Brutality, Prison State, Racism No Comments

  Perjury?!  Lying under oatch?!  Where are the criminal charges?!?!?!  These cops were running an Abu Ghraib on Americans in Chicago and the best a prosecutor can do is convict him of perjury?!  I mean it’s good to see some type of blame be put out there, but this is too little and too late.  We need real prosecutions for the real violations of human rights that have gone on – and are going on – in this country!  We first covered this story here and here.

  Ex-Chicago Officer Guilty Of Lying About Torture

  http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128175844

  A federal jury on Monday found a former Chicago police commander guilty of lying under oath about the abuse and torture of criminal suspects.

  The jury deliberated over parts of three days before finding former Chicago police Lt. Jon Burge guilty of perjury and obstruction of justice.

  Burge, who did not react as the verdict was read, can remain free on bond until his Nov. 5 sentencing, when he faces up to 45 years in prison. Attorney Flint Taylor, who represented some of the torture victims, hugged people around him.

  Burge had long been suspected of abusing and torturing mostly African-American suspects, and allowing detectives under his command to do the same, during the 1970s and ’80s.

  Suspects complained of being beaten, burned, shocked, having loaded guns stuck in their mouths and being suffocated with plastic bags held over their heads. Burge testified in his own defense at the four-week trial, denying he ever physically abused suspects or witnessed any other officers doing so.

  The Chicago Police Department fired Burge in 1993 amid torture allegations, but neither he nor anyone else was ever criminally charged with torture.

  An investigation by a special prosecutor in 2006 found evidence Burge and his underlings very likely tortured suspects, but the statute of limitations had run out. Federal authorities finally charged Burge two years ago with perjury and obstruction for lying about torture in a civil case.

  U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald said “a message needs to go out that that conduct is unacceptable” and asked others who feel they have evidence of torture to come forward.

  “It’s a measure of justice; it’s not a perfect sense of justice,” Fitzgerald said of the verdict.

  He also said “it’s sad that it took until 2010 for that to be proven in a court of law.”

  Former Illinois Gov. George Ryan released four condemned men from death row in 2003 after Ryan said Burge had extracted confessions from them using torture. The four later reached a $20 million settlement with the city.

  The allegations of torture and coerced confessions eventually led to a still-standing moratorium on Illinois’ death penalty and the emptying of death row — moves credited with reigniting the global fight against capital punishment. But they also earned Chicago a reputation as a haven for rogue cops, a place where police could abuse suspects without notice or punishment.

  Tags: Illinois, Police Brutality

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