DG- while I disagree with this idea of being "empowered" by racist acts- I just don't see that happening. I deal with skin heads and racists all the time- they are loose canons no matter what the situation. They will be more likely to take thier anger out on white poeple that support "black" or "minority" causes than those very minorities- race traitor is a capital crime to those poeple. I work with many minorities- to the point that I am the minority most of the time- in fact, I am the minority now that I think about it - and those racists types I see pretty much vent thier hatred in my direction more than anyone else.

One thing though- did I miss something here- I believe it was you that the beaten student was taunting the jena six at the time- yet he was struck from behind, as if they snuck up behind him- I have heard conflicting accounts, of course- but do you have a reliable account where the victim was taunting and provoking these Jena 6 kids at the time of the attack?

So you're saying 6 people can beat 1 person into unconsciousness for taunting them? Good to hear. I believe violence can solve all conflicts. If it doesn't work simply try more violence! Glad to gear you have my back on this DG.

Have you ever seen a broken side window? It doesn't take much to gash one's throat, and tempered safety glass is not perfect. Better than a house window, but one jagged piece--or even enough beads--and I would have been done for. Been there, done that.



In high school, two guys I know got into a fight at a local fast food restaurant. One pulled nunchucks and beat the other kid until he had to be hospitalized. The police and DA were all set to press charges for felony assault and battery but since the two kids knew each other and the one on the losing end did not want to press charges, nothing happened except the aggressor's parents picked up the uninsured portion of the hospital tab. Both kids were white. If the kid beaten had chosen to press charges, the other would have been tried. Now, unlike your Jena kids, the beater in my example had no criminal convictions and was generally a good kid, so he likely would have gotten relatively lenient sentencing after conviction, but he surely would have been tried.

This is how it works.

Mychal Bell, however, is not a good kid, to wit:

"Mychal Bell, 17, was unexpectedly sent back to prison on Thursday [October 12, 2007--insert added]after going to juvenile court in central Louisiana's LaSalle Parish for what he expected to be a routine hearing, Carol Powell Lexing, one of his attorneys said.

Instead, state District Judge J.P. Mauffrey Jr. decided Bell had violated probation and sentenced him to 18 months in jail on two counts of simple battery and two counts of criminal destruction of property, Lexing said.

"This matter was unrelated to the December 2006 event at Jena High School, and that case was not even mentioned in the court proceedings," District Attorney Reed Walters said Friday."

http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2007Oct12/0,4...JenaSix,00.html

So, the likely reason the DA was going so hard after Bell on the Jena 6 beating was because Bell had a long and glorious history of being a loser, ne'er do well and lawbreaker. The system we have typically affords several bites at the apple--as a lawyer, I see this every day--Bell has had has bites....





He was knocked unconscious according to the news reports. I was not there. Just because he left the hospital does NOT change the fact he was knocked unconscious, now does it?





There is no evidence of this in mainstream news--steer clear of predominantly black blogs. The beating victim strongly denies using any racial slurs.





I defended a case on "fighting words" once myself. In my state, use of "fighting words" can be punishable as a misdemeanor. Of course, worse things are said on a NFL football field amongst the players, but I can see your point. So, if the Jena 6 were so insulted by this lone young man, they should have made an appointment with the DA and pressed charges under the Louisana "fighting words" statute. I doubt the DA would have tried them, as this is a ticky-tack crime and most DAs won't touch something like this unless it is mixed with lots of other charges, but that is their recourse as law-abiding citizens, which we know the 6 are not. If that doesn't work, then the 6 could sue for damages---some plaintiff's hack would have taken the case. In NO EVENT does the uttering of taunts give these ne'er-do-wells the right to beat the white kid unconscious. Again, the beating victim denies using any racial slurs, anyway.

As to the hanging of the nooses being protected political speech, in MOMA in NYC a few years back an artist displayed a painting of Jesus, covered in dog manure, I believe it was. Despite legal efforts, he was permitted to display the piece under our First Am. If so, then the nooses are protected speech. I would call that painting a fighting words issue, if anything is, but if it can hang on a wall in MOMA, then those nooses should be able to hang on a tree--so long as no necks are in them. Nevertheless, as I said in my previous post, it is tasteless and cruel to hang the nooses, but the hate crime bullsh*t we dredge up in this nation now is ridiculous. Frankly, if the nooses were offensive, then sue for damages--even if they are protected speech, you can still sue for damages if they are offensive to you. We have legal recourse for these issues. Beatings are not required.





See my post above--if the shoe fits, my friend. Facts are facts. These kids are what we used to call juvenile delinquents.

Our jails are very, very crowded. No DA I know will touch ticky-tack school yard stuff until a kid has been in trouble over and over and the kid finally gets so out of hand they have to do something. Mr. Bell had clearly used up his "get outta jail free" cards.



I also understand, as I have shown above, that these kids were well-known in town as delinquents. When you make a name for yourself--know what I mean? In any event, no one denies the Jena 6 kids beat up this kid, even the Jena 6 themselves. Innocent until admitted guilty may be a better phrase here, NT....




Mark my words--within 10 years, Bell will be in jail for a long felony sentence unrelated to the Jena 6 beating. Why? Because he's a thug. He has a history of being a thug. He will behave consistently. If they try him for assault and battery rather than murder, fine, but he's going to badly hurt or kill someone else--mark my words.




Promising young black men...with significant criminal records. He left out that part. What bullsh*t.





No national mainstream media I have heard or seen has said anything about David Duke or the KKK; Jesse and Al get all the press. Some news or blog somewhere may have carried it, but CNN, Fox, NBC, etc., haven't said anything about Duke when I have been watching. Red herring. In any event, David Duke is to this issue like Huey Newton would be--he is so far from the mainstream, except maybe, to some small degree, in his home state of Louisiana, as to be beyond marginal. Sharpton made a legitimate bid for president in a major party, for chrissakes. White folks equivalent to Sharpton--guys like, say, Mitt Romney or John McCain or Fred Thompson--just don't go there. Get it?

We as whites are sick-and-tired of being tarred and feathered every time someone deicdes he must play the race card. I do not care what my forefathers did, I do not care about Jim Crow, I do not care about Selma. This is now, and it is high time we all live by one set of laws in one nation. Each and every time the NAACP, Sharpton, Jesse, et al., run to defend the Mychal Bells, Mike Vicks and Rodney Kings of the world, it just looks foolish. It needs to stop. I live in Atlanta, and many of the blacks I see here drive Mercedes, dress in $1,000 dollar suits, have strong positions in the business world and the community, and live quite well--and some STILL play the race card.

It really, really does need to stop. The playing field is now officially level.

Jesus Christ on a crutch, people, who knew 2 sentences could be so thoroughly picked apart!? My referring to the taunting was from a link provided by someone earlier in this thread. "In front of" may have been incorrect, but it would be sort of odd if he was taunting people who were behind him. Perhaps he continued walking after insulting them, after which he was jumped? I wasn't there; I don't know. And neither do you.

Edited to add: let me make it perfectly CLEAR that I am in NO WAY saying the insult justified the beating. OK, got it? Good.

As for "empowered".

Perhaps that was not the ideal word to use (I was using it in the sense of enable or permit). Perhaps "embolden", "encourage", "inspire", "stimulate", "energize", or "fire up", might have worked better for you? Feel free to animadvert.

All I'm saying is that some wingnut in LA hung a noose, now everyone with a screw loose or a grudge against someone of color is using a noose to make a point also. So, you don't agree. Fine. Nooses are just popping up everywhere (the Post Office, policemen's locker rooms, Columbia University, Queens neighborhoods) for no damned reason at all.

If that is the case- I have a right to open up a can of whup butt on some folks on a daily basis- man, what a great way to get some aggression out- call me a name, say something bad about my mama- and I get to go ballistic on you- and all these years I have been holding back

However- I don't want to say our criminal justice system IS NOT racist- it is very racist. It does punish blacks unequally, it does charge blacks more for lessor crimes and on and on. I have never been stopped for "driving while white"- whereas, I have been in a car full of blacks in South Carolina when just that happened- they all laughed at me in the car (the folks I was riding with in the car) and said "look, a first for the white boy- stopped for driving while black"- hilarious at the moment- but disturbingly true.

Even a seemingly simple thing like drugs- white use and distribute far more drugs than blacks- part of being the majority and all - but blacks are targeted more in drug crimes than blacks- part of it is the way drugs are dealt in this country- takes more effort to bust the suburban white drug dealer than to round up 30 black guys on a corner slingin' rock- but they don't bust all those white customers as much either.

However- my point in all this debate is this- the Jena 6 are a horrendous group of guys to rally around the injustices that happen in this country- I think Rodney King was a good example- but I have to agree with Quick- Michael Bell will have a murder on his sheet within 10 years - I would bet money on it.

I believe we SHOULD reform our criminal justice system- but NOT for Michael Bell- he deserves to spend some hard time in jail, and he needs to be removed from society before he harms again.

No one disputes Bell's prior brushes with the law, but this crap about Bell's "long and glorious history of being a loser, ne'er do well and lawbreaker" is pure hyperbole on your part. You conveniently ignore the fact that Bell was also a honor student and a star football player who was being recruited by colleges. Not exactly the pedigree of a hopeless loser.

link





Right. Nor does it change the fact that you said he was beaten "within an inch of his life" when Barker was well enough to leave the hospital and attend a ring ceremony at school that same night. That is also, "according to the news reports."





Of course he does. It makes him a bit less sympathetic if he admits to taunting or baiting his assailants. But simply because Barker "strongly denies using any racial slurs" doesn't mean he didn't. As you said---you weren't there.

As for your cheap shot at "predominantly Black blogs" this comes from that bastion of racially slanted perspectives, CNN:

Parents of the Jena 6 say they heard Barker was hurling racial epithets. Barker's parents say he did nothing to provoke the beating. link



Get serious. A legal system that would attempt to send a 18-year-old to prison for 22 years for a school brawl is not about to award monetary damages to that kid if they were to bring a lawsuit against the three punks who hung the nooses. What is more typical is unequal justice and over-the-top sentences that are handed down in courtrooms across this country and particularly in the South.

For example:

In Douglas County, Ga., Genarlow Wilson was convicted of molestation and sentenced to 10 years for engaging in consensual sex with a 15-year-old girl when he was 17. He served more than two years before a judge voided the sentence, but Wilson, now 21, remains in prison while the state appeals.

Also in Georgia, the state Supreme Court threw out the conviction of Marcus Dixon, 19, who was serving a 10-year prison sentence for having sex with an underage white girl in 2003.

In Paris, Tex., a special conservator ordered the release of Shaquanda Cotton, 16, who was serving up to seven years for shoving a white teacher's aide in 2005. Months earlier, the same white judge had given probation to a 14-year-old white girl who burned down her family's home.

And just yesterday we saw the latest example of how the justice system fails to protect African-Americans:

PANAMA CITY, Fla. (Oct. 12) - Seven former boot camp guards and a nurse were acquitted Friday of manslaughter in the death of a 14-year-old boy who was hit and kicked by the drill instructors in a videotaped altercation.

The video of a limp Martin Lee Anderson being hit and kicked by the guards after he collapsed while exercising drew protests in the state capital and spelled the end of Florida's system of boot camps for juvenile offenders. Anderson died at a hospital the day after the altercation. link



Cute, but this isn't a game of Monopoly. In fact, it's not a game at all. It's a clear case of a DA overreaching and taking a sledgehammer to kill a fly. When even a Rupert Murdoch-owned rag like The New YorK Post can't stomach an overly aggressive prosecutor going too far, you know it's obvious that unequal justice is being dispensed in Jena.

September 23, 2007 -- Tempting though it is to automatically dismiss any protest led by Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, the fact is that the raging revs this time have found a cause with genuine substance.

Indeed, it's impossible to examine the case of the so-called Jena Six without concluding that these black teens have been the victims of a miscarriage of justice, with a clearly racial double standard at work.

Not that the six Louisiana teens are entirely blameless in this affair: By all accounts, they assaulted a white classmate and beat him senseless (though he was released from the hospital just hours later).

But there was no justification for the decision by District Attorney Reed Walters to charge the six as adults with attempted murder - which could have sent them all to prison for decades.

But schoolyard brawls break out all the time in America - and the brawlers generally don't face decades behind bars.

Indeed, white teens involved in two similar (though less serious) incidents against black victims in Jena itself faced much lower charges, resulting in no jail time. link





"Innocent until admitted guilty" may be how you choose to look at this situation, quick, but yours is a minority opinion and totally out of step with how the process is supposed to work. Nobody disputes the fact that the Jena 6 beat up Justin Barker, but that isn't the whole story and it doesn't preclude their attorneys from putting up the best defense they can to lessen their punishment, reduce the charges or get them set free. I'm sure you wouldn't want to deny them due process if you believe in the fairness of the legal system, now would you?



Are you invoking your powers to see into the future? What is this? Biology is destiny? Most of us can't see any further into tomorrow than one second at a time. How nice to see that the idea of rehabilitation still exists in our vaunted justice system. Just not for young Black males.



It always makes me laugh when people speak as if they are the Official Spokesman for the Great White Race. "We as Whites are sick-and-tired of being tarred and feathered every time someone decides he must play the race card." I believe it was that great Native American philosopher Tonto who said, "What do you mean WE, White man?"

Frankly my dear quick, nobody gives a damn what you are sick and tired of. Nobody is asking for your forgiveness. Nobody needs your understanding. Nobody requires your compassion or patience. The only thing you can possibly do is be part of the solution to the racial inequity that runs rampant in the justice system and if you're not part of the solution, you're just another part of the problem.

Who cares what you think about Jim Crow or Selma? That was then and this is now, but now is not the time to stop protesting, demanding and forcing America in general and the South in particular to cease-and-desist the double standards and unequally enforced justice.

"The playing field is now officially level?" Sez who? Who died and left you in charge? What is your "official" authority to make such a pompous and obviously false statement? White skin and landowning male status?

The playing field is not level. It will never be level until there is ONE standard for ALL instead of different standards for the wealthy and the White another for the poor and the Black.



Here's a hard, cold truth CruisingRam: not every victim of injustice is sympathetic. Sometimes they are real bad guys and gals. Karla Faye Tucker was not a overly sympathetic person but apparently her religious conversion was sincere. That didn't stop George W. Bush from putting her to death. Ricky Ray Rector was an obviously mentally damaged man. That didn't stop Bill Clinton from putting him to death.

Rodney King was no angel before his videotaped beatdown and hasn't been one since that incident. The only thing that made King's situation special was it was filmed for the whole world to see and even then, there were plenty of people who said he had nobody to blame for his troubles but himself.

What happened to former baseball player Willie Mays Aikens is only unusual because his status as a pro athlete. You, of all people, should recognize the foolishness of treating addiction as a criminal offense. Not everyone who suffers from unequal justice brings a sympathetic tear to the eye. But merely because someone may not have an unblemished track record means they deserve to have their lives destroyed in such a heavy-handed manner as the overkill DA Walters tried to punish the Jena 6 with.

If you don't believe the criminal justice system shouldn't be reformed for a Mychal Bell who has had his serious brushes with the law on one hand but on the other possesses the academic acumen to be a honor student and the athletic skills to be a sought-after college recruit, then WHO are you going to reform it for? Only Boy Scouts and choirboys?

Bell deserves---I repeat----DESERVES to pay his debt to society and get his life together if he can. Remove him from society and let him learn a bitter lesson. However, I categorically reject the assertion that he is going to become a hardened killer as you and others seem to be peering into your collective crystal balls and predicting. This kind of "pre-emptive" strike foolishness is the same type of small-minded thinking that gets nations stuck in wars.

Here's another hard truth. You CAN'T lock up and throw away the key on all the Mychal Bells of the world. The vast majority of the men who go into prison are going to come out and when they do will they be better or worse for the experience. Take away everything and leave nothing for a Mychal Bell to aspire to and all you'll create is a worse monster than he was before he was plugged into the penal system. Take a kid who screws up one time too many and turn them into a rock-hard superpredator and you're right: He WILL kill somebody and maybe quite a few somebodies.

The United States incarcerates over half a million people for drug offenses according to The Sentencing Project and three-fourths of those are people of color. At the current rate of incarceration every one in three Black males will at some point go to prison. That is simply obscene and a sure sign that the system has failed. When we are more successful in creating convicts instead of college graduates something is seriously out of whack.

We can wait for a more sympathetic figure than Mychal Bell and the others to come along. This particular miscarriage of justice should be permitted since those ensnared within in aren't the most innocent of victims. Then again, neither was Nelson Mandela.

There are a lot of issues here that go far beyond DA Walters and the Jena 6, but it's pure and deliberate stupidity to pretend that justice is being dispensed here without race factoring into it. That doesn't excuse what Bell and the other boys have been accused of doing. But the issue of racism and inequality in the American justice system casts a long dark shadow over this relatively trivial case.

NT- you won't get me rebutting a single one of your examples as far as drug convictions, white women getting far more lenient sentences that black men or women, heck, I am trying to find some stuff on all the female pedophiles we have in this country that stalk and prey on young men that get no time at all- in fact, many talk about how lucky the kid is!

And Quick's post, for being a lawyer, seems to have an awful hard time seeing the reality of inequal justice when it comes to any crime when you are talking treatment of blacks vs whites in the court system- it is so lopsided even a republican should be able to spot it

But I still maintain- a person with a history of running into the law, well, prior behavior is the best indicator of future behaviors, and for him to have been this far into the system- there are usually ALOT of "bites of the apple" that this guy has already had- how many times has it happened when he WASN'T charged?

You know as well as I do that many times, bad guys get many chances before the heavy hand of the law finally comes down on them- and Micheal Bell has had a few bites.

Doesn't seem true of the other guys though- so some leniency is probaby due them, with hopes of rehabilitation (I also understand that rehabilitation of blacks is not a priority in the south - so shorter jail sentences are probably appropriate)

I agree with you on the injustice, just not in Michael Bells case- we will have to agree to disagree there- I am a bit hardened by what I have seen as far as recidivist criminals in my life- and he sends all kinds of bells and whistles to my brain of "unrepentant and recidivist criminal"

Not “proof” at all actually. Certainly if a group commits more crimes then you will have higher “incarceration rates”. And certainly we can find cases of unfair sentencing but please don’t tell me that inner city criminals of all races, especially minorities, are not put back on the street again and again. This is why the cities like Philadelphia have such ridiculous crime rates – they let them OUT to commit more crimes.

Any cop will tell you that any city that can get the worst 5% of the violent criminals off the street will see a big drop in the crime “rate” and the opposite is true.

New York is a perfect example.

I could care less what the race is – if you carry a gun and/or commit violent crimes you need to be locked up and kept in prison.

I think it interesting in debates like this one to examine why we punish criminals.

There are a few basic theories:

1) Punishment creates a specific deterrent, i.e. the one being punished will be less likely to commit another crime. The death penalty specifically deters permanently.

2) Punishment creates a general deterrent, i.e. all people will be deterred by the punishment meted out to the few.

3) Punishment by segregation in prisons isolates society from lawbreakers.

4) Punishment in prisons enables society to rehabilitate prisoners.

5) Punishment is equitable and fair, i.e. those who wrong another should pay a price for their crimes.

Their may be other theories, but these are among the most cited I have seen in the literature.

Let's look at the Jena 6 and the white kids who hung the nooses in this context.

1) No question but that at least so long as they are in prison, the Jena 6 are specifically deterred. When they get out, as recidivism is very high for most crimes other than murder and some sex offenses, I suspect their deterrence will not last. As to the white kids, there is no statute under which they may be charged, so this is irrelevant.

2) Those who take out their frustrations with violence may well be deterred by the Jena 6 going to jail. If they do not go to jail, the converse should be true. The white kids committed no crime.

3) This is undeniably true--while in prison, the Jena 6 will not be beating up any innocent parties. The white kids committed no crime.

4) Recidivism is so high in the US that most folks chuckle under their breath whenever rehabilitation is mentioned. (See stats below) Rehab has not been successful at any time in our history. Of the felonies, murder and some sex crimes, ironcially, have among the lowest recidivism rates. "Professional" crimes like drug dealing, robbery, theft, etc., has very high recidivism and no rehab attempts have done much about this.

5) Certainly, this applies to the 6--no one should be able to beat someone unconscious, except in self-defense, and get away with it. As to the white kids, this is where most folks get angry--it does not seem "fair" that the noose-hangers should not be jailed. Of course, they committed no crime, but this contention is the source of practically all of this thread.

When anaylyzed from this standpoint, under what rubric should the Jena 6 be freed?




http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/crimoff.htm#recidivism

A lovely job of spinning the case to fit the outcome you desire, quick, but there is a gaping tractor-trailer sized hole in your spurious "logic."

It centers around the crux of your flawed argument. The Jena 6 committed a crime. The White kids committed no crime.

By "crime" if you mean they did not commit an act for which they could be arrested, indicted and faced a trial with the full weight of the judicial system's recourse to enact sanctions and levy fines and possible incarceration, you are right. But they WERE subject to possible sanctions from the school up to and including expulsion. There was no stature where they could be charged, but that did not mean there were not circumstances where they could be punished.

...across the country, opinions regarding the impact of nooses appear to differ widely. When the Greensboro News-Record ran a story about the four nooses at Andrews High School, an anonymous writer posted an angry comment on the newspaper's Web page.

"Once again . . . over reaction to a childish prank," the comment said. " . . With the over reaction will probably come more copycats."

In Louisiana, the LaSalle Parish schools superintendent had similar thoughts when nooses were hung at Jena High School last year.

Three white students tied them to the schoolyard's "white tree" -- where only white students gathered -- after the school's principal told a black student it was okay to sit there.

Rather than expel the offenders, in accordance with the wishes of the principal and black parents, the superintendent and school board members, all white, voted to suspend the students for three days and force them to attend a week of disciplinary classes. link

The three White students---I'll call them "The Jena 3"--could have been expelled from the school, but instead received a few days off and and a week attending classes to correct their evil ways.

So much for Theory #5: Punishment is equitable and fair, i.e. those who wrong another should pay a price for their crimes. The punishment for The Jena 3 was neither equitable and nor fair. They wronged an entire school, not just their
Black classmates and the timid and tepid rebuke they received did NOTHING but fan the flames of racial resentment and created an atmosphere that led to greater and escalating acts of unrest and violence.

This invalidates Theory #1 Punishment creates a specific deterrent, i.e. the one being punished will be less likely to commit another crime. and Theory #2: Punishment creates a general deterrent, i.e. all people will be deterred by the punishment meted out to the few.

Had the school superintendent school board had followed the suggestions of the principal and parents and expelled The Jena 3, it is probable the further escalation in racial tensions that led to the attack on Justin Barker by the Jena 6 could have been avoided. Unfortunately, the wrist-slap to the nee'r do-wells that hung the nooses was apparently taken as a tacit endorsement and a blithe dismissal of their racially inflammatory act as nothing more than a schoolboy prank.

Which led to the beating of Barker by the Jena 6 and DA Walters deciding to make an example of the 6 in stark contrast to the casual indifference of the school officials.

We've had a considerable amount of prognostication on the part of quick, Ted, CruisingRam and others that if Mychal Bell and The Jena 6 aren't stopped now and slapped into reality with some hard time and harsh punishment they will go on to commit more serious crimes and inevitably kill someone.

Fine. Let me get in on the fun.

If The Jena 3 are NOT expelled for their acts which precipitated those of The Jena 6, I predict they will be emboldened by their wholly inadequate "punishment" and go on to become more vicious and hardened racists who will continue to engage in acts of intimidation, bigotry and violence until they too cross the line from being merely bad boys to cold-blooded killers.

If your Theories #1, 2, and 5 are to have any validity or merit at all quick, let the punishment suit the crime including the crimes committed by The Jena 3 as well as The Jena 6. As there is no legal stature that The Jena 3 could be charged with violating a crime, what is there to prevent the school officials from revisiting their earlier decision and expelling them from school? Does double jeopardy exist when no "crime" has been committed?

Don't tell me what satisfies the law. Tell me what satisfies justice.

Though you won't get me disagreeing that a violent criminal needs to be locked up regardless of race- there is this term called "selective enforcement"- and when you agressively prosecute one race and not so agressively pursue another race-well, therein' lies the problem.

First off- the largest percentage of poeple in jail are not violent- you guessed it, drug charges.

http://www.drugwarfacts.org/prison.htm

The Department of Justice reported that at year-end 2003, federal prisons held a total of 158,426 inmates, of whom 86,972 (55%) were drug offenders. By comparison in 2000 federal prisons held 131,739 total inmates of whom 74,276 (56%) were drug offenders, and in 1995 federal prisons held a total of 88,658 inmates of whom 52,782 (60%) were drug offenders.

Source: Harrison, Paige M. & Allen J. Beck, PhD, US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners in 2005 (Washington, DC: US Department of Justice, November 2006), p. 10, Table 14.


State prisons held a total of 1,256,400 inmates on all charges at yearend 2003. "In absolute numbers an estimated 650,400 inmates in State prison at yearend 2003 (the latest available offense data) were held for violent offenses: 151,500 for murder, 176,600 for robbery, 124,200 for assault, and 148,800 for rape and other sexual assaults (table 12). In addition, 262,000 inmates were held for property offenses, 250,900 for drug offenses, and 86,400 for public-order offenses."

Source: Harrison, Paige M. & Beck, Allen J., Ph.D., US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners in 2005 (Washington DC: US Department of Justice, Nov. 2006), p. 9 and Table 12.


"On December 31, 2005, a total of 1,446,269 inmates were in the custody of State and Federal prison authorities, and 747,529 were in the custody of local jail authorities (table 1). (Custody is defined on page 11.) The total incarcerated population increased by 58,463, or 2.7% from yearend 2004. This is less than the average annual increase of 3.3% since 1995."

Source: Harrison, Paige M. & Beck, Allen J., Ph.D., US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners in 2005 (Washington DC: US Department of Justice, Nov. 2006), p. 2.


"Overall, the United States incarcerated 2,320,359 persons at yearend 2005." This total represents persons held in:

Federal and State Prisons 1,446,269 (which excludes State and Federal prisoners in local jails
Territorial Prisons 15,735
Local Jails 747,529
ICE Facilities 10,104
Military Facilities 2,322
Jails in Indian Country 1,745 (as of midyear 2004)
Juvenile Facilities 96,655 (as of 2003)

Source: Harrison, Paige M. & Allen J. Beck, PhD, US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners in 2005 (Washington DC: US Department of Justice, Nov. 2006), p. 1.


"The rate of incarceration in prison and jail was 737 inmates per 100,000 U.S. residents in 2005, up from 601 in 1995. At yearend 2005, 1 in every 136 U.S. residents was incarcerated in a State or Federal prison or a local jail."

Source: Harrison, Paige M. & Beck, Allen J., Ph.D., US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners in 2005 (Washington DC: US Department of Justice, Nov. 2006), p. 2.


According to the American Corrections Association, the average daily cost per state prison inmate per day in the US in 2005 was $67.55. That means it costs states approximately $16,948,295 per day to imprison drug offenders, or $6,186,127,675 per year.

Sources: American Correctional Association, 2006 Directory of Adult and Juvenile Correctional Departments, Institutions, Agencies and Probation and Parole Authorities, 67th Edition (Alexandria, VA: ACA, 2006), p. 16; Harrison, Paige M. & Allen J. Beck, PhD, US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics, Prisoners in 2005 (Washington, DC: US Department of Justice, November 2006), p. 9.


"The United States has the highest prison population rate in the world, some 738 per 100,000 of the national population, followed by Russia (611), St Kitts & Nevis (547), U.S. Virgin Is. (521), Turkmenistan (c.489), Belize (487), Cuba (c.487), Palau (478), British Virgin Is. (464), Bermuda (463), Bahamas (462), Cayman Is. (453), American Samoa (446), Belarus (426) and Dominica (419).
"However, more than three fifths of countries (61%) have rates below 150 per 100,000. (The rate in England and Wales - 148 per 100,000 of the national population - is above the mid-point in the World List.)"

Source: Walmsley, Roy, "World Prison Population List (Seventh Edition)" (London, England: International Centre for Prison Studies, 2007), p. 1.


"More than 9.25 million people are held in penal institutions throughout the world, mostly as pre-trial detainees (remand prisoners) or as sentenced prisoners. Almost half of these are in the United States (2.19m), China (1.55m plus pretrial detainees and prisoners in 'administrative detention') or Russia (0.87m)." According to the US Census Bureau, the population of the US represents 4.6% of the world's total population (291,450,886 out of a total 6,303,683,217).

Source: Walmsley, Roy, "World Prison Population List (Seventh Edition)" (London, England: International Centre for Prison Studies, 2007), p. 1; US Census Bureau, Population Division, from the web at http://www.census.gov/main/www/popclock.html accessed July 8, 2003.


Okay- you following so far Ted?

http://www.hrw.org/reports/2000/usa/Rcedrg....htm#P287_60010

Drug Offenders as a Proportion of Total Black Admissions

The high and disproportionate number of blacks who are sent to prison should be a cause for national concern regardless of the crime for which they are convicted. What may be most troubling about black incarceration, however, is that it is propelled by nonviolent drug offenses. In other words, but for the war on drugs, the extent of black incarceration would be significantly lower.

Drug offenses accounted for nearly two out of five (38 percent) of all black admissions (Table 15). The proportion of sentenced drug offenders among all black offenders sent to state prison ranged among states between a high of 61 percent in New Hampshire and a low of 16 percent in Oregon, with a majority of the states falling in the range of 30 and 40 percent. In contrast, drug offenders constituted 24 percent of all whites sent to state prison nationwide and in more than half of the states that submitted data to the NCRP.

More blacks were sent to state prison nationwide on drug charges than for crimes of violence (Table 16). Only 27 percent of black admissions to prison were for crimes of violence -- compared to 38 percent for drug offenses. If all nonviolent offenses (property, drugs, public order, etc) are combined, 73 percent of all blacks sent toprison were sentenced for nonviolent crimes. Seventy-three percent of whites admitted to prison were also sentenced for nonviolent offenses.

70 BJS, "Prisoners in 1998."
71 The specific reasons for the discrepancy between the black proportion of felony drug convictions and of drug admissions have not been analyzed. They may include such factors as the type of drug offense, the type of drug, and the presence of prior record. For example, blacks comprised 56 percent of persons convicted of trafficking felonies while whites comprised 43 percent. BJS, "Felony Sentences in State Courts," (May 1999), Table 5.


Ted- do you seriously believe that though blacks make up only, say, for arguments sake- around 12-15% of the population of the US, yet, they use and traffic around 56% of the drugs in the US

IF you do, you are either incredibly niave to who use the drugs in this country- and controls most of the drug trade, or actually out and out racist in your thoughts towards blacks/stereotype of the notion that all blacks are drug using criminals.

CR, I posted the basics for this in another link, but it bears repeating.

Black drug dealers deal on the street. On streetcorners. In neighborhoods. In your face. The higher ups in gangs and drug organizations stay under the radar as much as they can. Same with streetwalkers versus callgirls, for example.

When people get sick and tired of seeing drug dealers in BMWs on the streetcorner in their neighborhoods selling to school-age kids, they call the cops. The cops finally do a "Sweep", pick up the street dealers, and put them in jail. These criminals also get longer sentences because what they do is so "in the face" of the community. The community wants them off the street. Recidivism is dealt with very harshly.

The white collar guy who supplies some of his friends in the office or in business is not in your face, and therefore is not likely to go to jail. The higher ups are very hard to catch, as the leaders of organzied crime always have been. They have money, good lawyers, and they try not to get their hands dirty.

Is this selective enforcement? In a sense, but it has been true throughout the history of modern urban policing, which runs only about 175 years or so. More than anything else, this occurs because this kind of policing addresses that which bothers the constituency the most and about which they are most aware. Simple.

In the big cities with which I am most familiar, the mayor is black, the city council is black, and the police chief is black. Many of the cops are black. Check out New Orleans, Memphis and Atlanta, cities with among the highest crimes rates in the nation. Heck, most of the judges are black, and the bulk of the jurors are black. Most of the constituents are black. The neighborhoods in which the dealers work are black. It is to a great degree a black-on-black situation. Rascism has little to do with it.

Oh, and if the perps would quit dealing, they wouldn't go to jail, regardless.

Yep, so you see, it is the selective enforcement that goes to the heart of the debate in the jena debate, and overall prosecution of all crimes in the US.

I don't care if it is because black drug dealers do it on the street corner, or the white dude in the low-income apartment complex doing twice as much biz, Justice is supposed to be blind- and it is mostly blind to white poeple vs eyes wide open for blacks.

If there wasn't this massive discrepency in the law enforcement blacks vs white, we wouldn't even be debating this issue on Jena, because the underlying reason for the outrage by the black community, well the core issue is still the selective enforcement reality of blacks vs whites.

This is where the thread begins to trudge into worthless stalemate.

Why won't anyone address the notion that it may not be race? People have screamed 'racist system' for decades, but nothing has changed? 'Racial Profiling' has been a buzz word for the better part of 20 years. What's different?

Why else might black people be incarcerated more than whites? Is there even a possible other answer?

I've entertained a number of alternate hypotheses on this thread, and no one has really addressed them. Is it a possibility that skin color isn't the cause for these issues?

Funny enough, the stats posted in these threads never discuss at great length (nationally) how many black people are sentenced vs other races and cross referencing repeat offenses? How many of these had public defenders? How many showed up on time, in suits, and made the juries feel empathetic? How many had jury trials and what were the demographics of the juries? (etc)

Um, who cares? I mean, I really don't give a rat's fanny about those other variables as long as blacks are being targeted while letting white criminals doing the same or worse go. That has to be addressed before any of those others are even part of the issue.

No, there is NO possible "other answer"- we are a racist nation, and have racist policies still that need to be adressed. Until justice is equal, then there is no justice, and without justice, you don't have freedom.

And your point is? Criminals also commit violent crimes to get drugs. They also kill over drugs – in fact a major part of inner city violent crime has drugs and drug money as its source.


Should we just let all the drug dealers out and let them fight it out on the street for territory and money?


How much damage to society does drug crim do? Do you care?

Drug Abuse Cost to Society Set at $97.7 Billion, Continuing Steady Increase Since 1975

http://www.nida.nih.gov/NIDA_notes/NNVol13N4/Abusecosts.html

I do not think blacks are being targeted: I think those who are in our face are being targeted, as I described in some detail above. If whites are on the streetcorners selling, they'll be dragged up in the "sweeps", too.

Let me state one truism to you: Police, prosecutors and courts only have so many resources. For this reason, all arrests are selective--you pick that which provide the most general deterrence and those who are most in society's face; all prosecution is selective--you pick the cases with the most general deterrence value, of those most in society's face, and those the prosecution is most likely to win; and most--around 98% or so--of cases will be plea-bargained because no system has the money to try many more than 2% of the cases that could be tried. If that offends your sense of justice, then so be it--truth hurts.

If blacks quit street dealing, their jail time would go down markedly. Also, understand that the black community is demanding the punishments, as the 60 year old grandmother raising three kids for her daughter who is working every day is sick and tired of the dealer on the corner.




You're stretctching to the point of no return. I hope your elastic band is strong.

The kids who placed the nooses, as best I can tell, have no criminal record. None. No arrests. Your slippery slope argument has no basis. They have not shown any propensity for breaking the law, unlike Mychal Bell, who has a series of run-ins with the law. These white kids have expressed themselves graphically, but if they had been black kids who hung dummies wearing white hoods from the tree, the black kids would have gotten an "A" for their art project. Demonstrative, if tasteless, speech or expression is just not the same as beating up people. That is why we have a first amendment.

Expelling the kids from school? I've never seen that as any kind of punishment at all--if anything it just punishes the parents, doubly so in a little town that likely has only one high school--but I have no problem with it.

As so many of the black activists say, you want "justice", not what satisfies the law. In this nation, my friend, our legislatures pass laws. That is how the philosophic assessment of justice is determined in a representative government--by the legislatures. Then, the executive enforces these laws. If the kids did nothing illegal, then under our system, justice demands they be free. If the body politic through its representatives determines that justice demands a new criminal law, then it will be passed, though it cannot be applied retroactively to this incident.

In the meantime, as I have said earlier, let the families of the Jena 6 sue for intentional infliction of emotional distress under the civil, rather than criminal, system and ask for 1 million comp and 10 million punitives. That is how our system works, as it is not just a criminal system.

You've said the system sucks. When you and those who think like you learn to live within the system, then we have really made progress on becoming one nation--which should be everyone's goal. This system is as good as any on earth and you need to learn to appreciate it and use it rather than trash it.

I'm having a really good day... so no more cynical me today. I'll make this easy.

Where do you live again CR? What facts do you have to back this statement? What personal research have you done again?

I think that there are racist people in the US, as I've said a million times. I also believe that the number of black men in jail has little to do with racism. I understand that there are more black people in jail. Ok. Don't need to post more of that.

I think that so long as we regurgitate the same statistics and yell from the roof tops "RACISM", nada changes. It's a common perception, I realize. However, even the Jena thing says volumes in itself. Here we have a kid who has 3 priors for violent crime, and movie stars and rappers go to his defense. The media leaves those details out, and once again, it permeates popular perception that a black man was wronged.

I think my question to you, CR, would be why would there likely be no other reasoning? Is the reason that black men are in jail at higher rates exclusively due to racism? If so- why?

Is racism the reason that Black people commit more crime, or are white people just as likely to be criminals and just don't get caught? Is it because police turn a blind eye to white crime?

How many black people in America are convicted by Black judges and/or Black juries? Are there stats anywhere that discuss that? (I don't have a ton of time to research, so if anyone can help I'd appreciate it)

Your questions in the face of evidence provided demonstrating the racial inequity in the arrest, prosecution and sentencing of African-Americans reflect a refusal to face the facts, Aevans176. You say that you believe racism exists but when presented with proof of that existence your reply is, "There must be some other explanation."

The reason why no one has responded to your "alternate hypothesis" is because you have not presented any credible rebuttal to the evidence that American justice is not colorblind. From different penalties for the usage of crack as opposed to powder cocaine to the imposition of the death penalty, the verdict is in: the punishment does NOT fit the crime when race is factored in.



So in theory, if White drug dealers avoid street corners and sell their drugs in offices, dormitories, gyms, shopping malls and suburban garden parties, they can avoid being dragged up in the "sweeps?" I never knew it was so easy to avoid getting busted. Just go where the cops aren't.

.

Right. That's why so many White people put their meth labs out in the woods. The lesson for the homeboys on the corner is to move out to the sticks and sell drugs to farm kids. Meet a better class of addicts.



Your hypothetical of the Black kids hanging dummies wearing White hoods from the tree is both spurious and a total non sequitur. Isn't that what you legal eagles call, "assuming facts not in evidence?"

Perhaps the ACLU might be interested in taking up the case of The Jena 3 that hanging nooses from a tree is a First Amendment issue, but anyone with any sense of history isn't buying the hype that these punks were engaging in a free speech expression. Hanging nooses from a tree is an expression of racial hatred. It was clear when Billie Holiday sang, "Strange Fruit" and it's still clear now. Whether it's hanging nooses from a tree, spraying "KKK" on the side of a house or burning a cross on a lawn, there are limits and differences between expressing an unpopular opinion and clear-cut acts of bigotry.




Good. Because if punishment is supposed to have any deterrent effect, it has to be applied regardless of whether or not it "punishes the parents." If they live in a little town that has only one high school they always have the option to move, home school or put their precious little darlings in a private school.



As the Black activist, Martin Luther King said, "Law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress." Your pretty little civics lesson aside, just because something is the law doesn't mean it has anything remotely to do with justice. Everything Hitler did in Nazi Germany was legal too.



Ah yes...when all else fails, find an ambulance chaser and sue somebody. If you can't get justice, will you settle for cash?



Sorry, but I don't have your child-like faith in the system. It's inequitable. It's unfair. It's racist and it's broken. The present legal system is the best money can buy, but if you don't have the money you are SCREWED. The system has failed. Rather than trying to paint over rust, I prefer to say it's better to fix the system than shrug and say, "We have to live with it."

I do not appreciate this corrupt system and rather than use it, I think trashing it is a marvelous idea. Jena has been a revelation for many Americans as to how rotten to the core your precious system is, quick. Reforming the system has been long overdue and badly needed. This case may help bring this nation one step closer to the colorblind justice it pretends to dispense.

It's not that I'm saying that these ideas are true... but rather arguing that your evidence doesn't discredit the notions.

NT, I agree that I tend to not believe the "evidence" that you give, in that coming from you it generally and inherently is going to be biased. You're the most "Pro-Black" and racially centered poster on the board. That's ok, and I understand it.

What I'm asking is that someone give real evidence that includes the information I'm asking for.

How do we know how many Blacks are sentenced and convicted by Blacks? How many Black people were sentenced and repeat offenders for similar vs other types of crimes. I'm really just playing devil's advocate, because there are a ton of meaningful variables, that the IT MUST BE RACISM crowd refuses to acknowledge. Science only works this way when it has an agenda to push in my opinion. If drug testing worked like this we'd be dying off left and right.

I don't know that anyone has given any proof anything. It's a lot like the global warming argument to me. We take snippets of data that perpetuate our thoughts. Arguably, no one really knows. All I can say (as I already stated) is that these are the kinds of things that take tons of time to research. I don't have that kind of time today.

Maybe you can prove your theory and argue the hypotheses. I don't know. Until now, all you've done is say that the evidence proves them otherwise, and NT.... your post doesn't include that information. I'm open ears (well- eyes). Good Luck. Here's what we really should see:

1. the demographics of judges and black convictions cross referenced with white convictions by crime and number of offenses and number using public defenders
2. the demographics of white jurors and black jurors cross referenced with convictions by crime and number of offenses and number using public defenders

What I'm getting at is that it's possible and/or plausible that poverty and/or repeat offense and/or type of crime and/or readiness for courtroom antics that cause increases in conviction. It's not fact, just a thought. Feel free to try to disprove it.

First, everything Hitler did in Nazi Germany was NOT legal, either, although some of it was well window-dressed. But, for the sake of argument, let's say your statement is accurate. The difference--rather fundamental, I'd say--was that Germany was not a longstanding, representative government with fundamental freedoms guaranteed by a 218 (or so) year old Constitution and a longstanding legal system. Our system has demonstrated its ability to work to right wrongs for decades. There is recourse at the ballot box and a system that works for redressing grievances. This was simply not true in Germany's fledgling Weimar Republic.

You seem to have some arbitrary definition of "justice". Justice under our system is what we, through our elected reps, say it is, chastened by the notions of fundamental rights under the Constitution. We can have differing notions of justice, say from the Bible, for example, but under our law, what constitutes justice is clear. Are you suggesting you have divined in your infinite wisdom some higher notion of justice you wish to force upon your fellow citizens?





Some of the crap that rattles our of your mouth (or off your fingers) is really astounding.

There are only two ways any legal system addresses wrongdoing or blame--punishment of a wrongdoer bodily, or punishment through property rights, or some combination. (Injunction is available to prevent acts for which there is no remedy, but that isn't really applicable here.) This is true whether in the criminal system or the civil system. This is true from the time of the Code of Hammurabi until today.

If the wrongdoing does not rise to the level of criminal culpability, then you sue for damages. That is all our system, or any other system, offers. Even in the criminal law, convicts are often required to make monetary restitution to victims.

Despite being black, you seem like a cowboy--you want your idiosyncratic notion of justice, which you are in your esteemed wisdom given above all others, enforced at the point of gun by an angry mob. An eye for an eye!... You watch too many movies....





I do not have a "child-like" faith in the system, either, my condescending friend, but I do know that the only alternative to a good system of justice is some form of warfare. Not a good option. I would never argue the system doesn't always need fine-tuning, but is as good as any.

If in this case the parents of the Jena 6 feel wronged, either personally or on behalf of their precious babies, then they have civil recourse. Can you understand that? THE SYSTEM PROVIDES A REMEDY. It's just not the remedy you want, which probably is the public flogging of the kids who hung the nooses, or some other bloodletting, as you in your infinite wisdom deem appropriate to dispense "justice".

I find this so ironic--you are arguing how much the nooses remind you of a time when whites sometimes took "justice" into their owns hands and how much you detest it, and yet at the same time you are arguing that what you really want is some extra-legal remedy that makes you feel better that your arbitrary, ad hoc sense of justice has been served because you do not like "the system".

You cannot have it both ways, my friend. Folks like you are very, very dangerous.

The Christian Science Monitor has an interesting article on the supposed myths of the Jena 6.



Not certain what to think on this whole thing now, the explanation regarding the all white and jury and the DA's comments have yet to be rebutted. It also meakes sense. Things are looking a bit more trumped up.

I think some people have been trying to say that all along.

I can't wait for some of the opposing factions to attempt to rebuke the claims on this article. Seems pretty open and shut if you ask me. At least in the attacks and statements to police, etc. People will argue the noose stories, but whatever. It seems that there is enough factual information to show that these kids, particularly Bell, needed to be thrown in the slammer until they can figure out how to be decent human beings.

Growing up in the deep south, I've been around these kinds of incidents all of my life, of course on a smaller scale. They tend to always get blown out of proportion, particularly by good people who are mislead. Think of poor Ice Cube, Will Smith, and Rickey Smiley who probably don't know the real facts. They think they're doing a 'freedom march' on Jena, only to find out months later that they were defending a repeat offender, a thug, and someone that deserves to be in the place he is.

Okay, okay. Let's start with Myth #1 and Myth #2. So, I'm supposed to believe that there is absolutely no connection between a black student asking about sitting underneath a tree and three nooses appearing on the tree the very next day. Purely coincidence?

The author of the article is obviously white, lives in Jena and has a wife who works at the school; this is not a piece of journalism, this is an commentary piece by a guy who lives in Jena.

Grain of salt, anyone?

Did you read the bits about the police reports?

Funny enough- even the Jena 6 support this person's claims. Go read it again. The thing is that even if you dismiss the noose parts as rhetoric, don't you think the noose claims would've been exhibited in the police reports that they made?

Wow. Read the article, and this just about guts the entire story from the black activist side of the ledger. I am not surprised.

I will just give one example that may illustrate a related point:

I worked as in-house counsel for a major corporation in the south that had a strong affirmative action program. Probably 30% or 40% of their employees were black. During the mid-90s, when I was there, I can tell you the situation inside that corporation was very much unlike the "Selma days" of the 50s and 60s.

When management needed to fire a white employee, they got the file complete with the reasons, did whatever the policy manual required as a prerequisite, and fired them. (FYI--The company was in an "at-will" state.)

A black employee? Well, management, not wanting to be taken before the EEOC, or to be sued, or to get their name dragged through the newspaper, would allow the black employees several bites before being fired, even if the employee were not just incompetent but even a petty criminal. The file had to have well-dcoumented evidence of problems, evidence of compliance with all company policies, and then several more well-documented examples of problems and attempts to remedy the problems before any black employee was fired. Management bent over backwards in this regard. As one of the attorneys, when I got any kind of complaint about an employee I first found out the race of the employee, as we had to be much more careful about how we proceeded with a black employee.

The point? I am not at all surprised with this article about Jena, as I am sure the whites involved knew what could happen (and indeed has happened) when the civil rights mullahs got wind of this situation. This Bell kid surely has been given many, many bites at the apple before he was finally given his just desserts.

The truth usually does come out, but white folks generally need to do a better job of resisting these civil rights lynch mobs in an organized way. We cede the high ground, even when all of the facts are in our favor. We do neither race any favors when we run from the truth to avoid racial controversy, something whites in business and public life have been trying to avoid like the plague for the last 40 years.



The Christian Science Montitor is one of the most well-respected journals in the nation. I am sure they cross-checked facts before this was printed, as their neck is on the line as well. Unlike the NYT or CNN, they are not in the business to slavishly "sell, sell, sell" at any cost.

It may take a while, but the truth will come out into the mainstream....

Which bit about the police reports? The police reports about the fight? I don't see why the noose incident would be in those reports.



Can you provide positive support for this?



I am well aware of the CSM's reputation and I am very fond of the publication, however, this was a commentary article and not one written by a CSM journalist. It would be like fact-checking an op-ed piece. This is one man's opinion. And his opinion is not supported by some of the statements made to police.

For instance, one coach stated - twice - that he saw someone else hit Justin Barker in the back of the head. He very clearly stated that Malcom Shaw hit Justin Barker. He even told another coach that Malcolm Shaw hit Justin Barker imme