NFL arrests raise questions of racial profiling

Wmaz

A police officer in Cincinnati watched a large black man get into his car and turn on the engine after being told it was illegally parked.

The officer thought the man was trying to avoid a parking ticket and told him to stop. So the man — Matthias Askew, at the time an NFL player — stopped his Cadillac Escalade, got out and was arrested in a scuffle with several officers. Police used a stun gun on Askew four times, alleging he resisted arrest.

A judge rejected the police account and cleared Askew of all charges.

"They tased him simply because he was a big black man, not because he did anything to make them fear for their safety," Askew's former attorney, Ken Lawson, told USA TODAY Sports about the 2006 incident.

For many black players in the NFL, it's a familiar scene. Of 687 NFL player arrests since January 2000, Askew's was one of 294 that came in a traffic stop, according to a USA TODAY Sports investigation. In a league in which 66% of the players are black and 31% are white, black players were arrested nearly 10 times as often as white players (260 to 28), accounting for 88% of those NFL traffic-stop arrests.

That percentage is consistent with the overall NFL arrest numbers: Of the 687 total player arrests in the USA TODAY Sports database that spans 14 seasons, 607 involved black players — 88%, a disproportionate rate sociologists attribute to several social factors in the black population at large, including a disproportionate rate of poverty and single-parent backgrounds. Those factors also include profiling, civil rights experts and NFL players say.

White Anson County deputy resigns after saying "nigger" over police radio

wsotv

An Anson County sheriff's deputy handed in his resignation on Tuesday after allegations he used a racial slur over police radio while out on call.

The sheriff is not releasing the name of the deputy involved (to do so would violate the 'white code'), but he confirmed that the deputy resigned on Tuesday after he admitted to using the n-word on the radio during a call for help.

The deputy, who had been with the department for less than three months, was answering a call about a fight at a trailer park south of Wadesboro late Saturday night.

"They all started surrounding, getting up close to my car," said Samantha Flowers.

She showed Eyewitness News where she was hit on the arm by a large chunk of brick that is still on the gravel road. It was clearly tense, she said, when the deputy got on the radio, frantically calling for help, and used the n-word.

"If he said it, it was down low because at the time I was talking to my son and I couldn't hear what he was talking about at the time. I was upset, I was shaking," she said.

But others on the radio did hear it. After an internal investigation that started on Monday, Sheriff Tommy Allen released a statement on Tuesday afternoon saying that the deputy had resigned.

King County Council puts race on the table for examination

Sentencing Project

Columnist Jerry Large writes that “the Metropolitan King County Council went on a field trip Monday to the Pacific Science Center in Seattle where Bryce Siedl, the center’s CEO, led council members and other officials on a brief tour of the exhibit, ‘RACE: Are We So Different?’.

“In October, the county released its second Equity and Social Justice annual report, which captured in numbers wide gaps in health, wealth and school-graduation rates that correlate with race or with geographic patterns that reflect racial segregation.

“The report said: ‘The 10 ZIP codes with the highest diversity have more than 7 in 10 people of color’ while the 10 ZIP codes with the lowest diversity have, on average, fewer than 1 of every 10. There are strong connections between place, race, health and income.

“Government — and the public whose support it requires — needs to understand the role race plays in creating or sustaining inequalities in order to improve the prospects for more residents.

 “Last year in King County, people who are African American represented 30 percent of all (criminal justice) bookings even though they only represent seven percent of the total population.

“Similarly, according to The Sentencing Project, ‘three-fourths of all persons in prison for drug offenses are people of color.’

“More alarmingly, in Seattle, blacks were more than 21 times more likely to be arrested for selling serious drugs than whites in 2005-2006, despite the fact that multiple data sources suggest that whites are the majority of sellers and users of serious drugs in Seattle.”

'She Shall Not be Moved': Jewish School Wants to Force Elderly Black Revolutionary Out of her D.C. Home

From [HERE] and [HERE] The Jewish Primary Day School (JPDS) was constructed and began operation in 09/2010 in a black neighborhood in Washington, D.C.  To expand, apparently, the school bought some of the homes of black neighbors immediately adjacent to their original lot. One neighbor, however, Dr. Frances Cress Welsing, didn't budge. Dr. Welsing has lived in her NW DC home for the past 40 years. Welsing is a Black revolutionary [MORE] and her brilliant works have forever changed the discussion of race and may yet be a catalyst or vehicle for social transformation.

Working around Welsing's property, the school constructed a playground immediately adjacent to her home. Prior to the creation of the playground the JPDSD promised to not encroach or interfere with Welsing's home. In fact, hearings were held with JPDS, Dr. Welsing and the Board of Zoning Adjustment (BZA) about the need for noise protection for Dr. Welsing’s home. The BZA mandated that a noise buffer of 15 feet from Dr. Welsing’s property line which included 40 ft. tall evergreen trees and other trees were to be added. Nevertheless, in disregard to such agreements or public promises, the JPDS instead elected to bulldoze the existing line of 40 ft. tall trees and not put up any noise buffers.  

Fortress Israel. In photo Israel’s wall will effectively annex an area of the West Bank the size of Chicago. 

The new playground area comes up to Dr. Welsing’s fence. Many people have personally witnessed the extreme levels of noise that enters Dr. Welsing’s property from this playground even when all of the windows and doors are closed. Now Dr. Welsing must leave her home to escape the noise.

(The next court date is 12/19/13 in the D.C. Superior Court on 500 Indiana Ave. NW. Sign peitition [HERE] and contact Councilwoman Muriel Bowser to complain [HERE] and [MORE]) 

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ACLU files lawsuit challenging Kansas voter registration system

[JURIST]

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU [advocacy website] on Thursday filed a lawsuit [petition, PDF] in Shawnee County District Court [official website], challenging Kansas' two-tiered voter registration system. The US Supreme Court [official website] has ruled that laws requiring proof of citizenship for federal elections are unconstitutional, but it has preserved the states' rights to control who will vote in state and local elections. Kansas has set up a two-tiered voter registration system, which requires voters to show proof of citizenship to register to vote in local and state elections. The ACLU petition charges that eligible voters are being divided into separate and unequal classes [ACLU press release], in violation of the Kansas Constitution's equal protection guarantees.

The Kansas Secretary of State has, without statutory authority and without engaging in mandatory requirements for administrative rulemaking, unilaterally established an unprecedented and unlawful voter registration system that divides registered voters in Kansas into two separate and unequal classes, with vastly different rights and privileges (the "dual 2 system"), based on nothing more than the method of registration that a voter uses and the date on which the voter submits the form.

Arizona has adopted a similar two-tier voter registration system in response to the Supreme Court's ruling.

Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach and Arizona Secretary of State Ken Bennett [official profiles] filed a complaint in August in the US District Court for the District of Kansas [official website] demanding that the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) [official website] modify federal voter registration forms to allow states to require proof of citizenship. The two-tier system in question allows voters who use the National registration form, which does not require proof of citizenship, to vote only in national elections. Voters must use the Kansas voter registration form in order to be eligible to also vote in local and state elections. Kobach lists "Stopping Voter Fraud" as the number one issue on his platform [personal website] on his political website.

Wisconsin Supreme Court to consider arguments in two voter ID cases

[JURIST]

The Wisconsin Supreme Court [official website] on Wednesday agreed to hear arguments in two separate cases concerning Act 23, the state's voter ID law [text]. One case will review a decision by the Madison-based District Four Court of Appeals while the other will be heard by the supreme court [AP report] prior to being ruled on by the appeals court, reversing its past stance against taking such action. Prior to Act 23, a Wisconsin voter was not required to present identification except, in some circumstances, proof of residency. Under the act, a voter is required to present identification that bears his or her name, which must match the name on his or her voter's registration form, as well as a photograph. The law, which was blocked in 2012, was later ruled constitutional [JURIST reports] by the Wisconsin Court of Appeals in May of this year, but will have to overcome further legal challenges in order to be put back into place.

Voter ID laws [JURIST backgrounder] have become increasingly controversial and commonplace throughout the US. There are now more than 30 US states [NCSL backgrounder] that require voters to present some form of ID at the polls, including multiple states that have passed laws requiring photo ID. In October the Tennessee Supreme Court unanimously rejected [JURIST report] a movement to overturn the Tennessee Voter Identification Act, ruling that a requirement of government-issued photo ID for voters is constitutional. Texas rights groups filed [JURIST report] a complaint in September in conjunction with the Department of Justice (DOJ) alleging that photo ID requirements discriminate against poor minorities and those in rural areas. A Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court renewed [JURIST report] an injunction in August that will block the state's voter ID law for the third consecutive election.

White Party Goers at Randolph-Macon College Dress as Border Patrol Agents & Illegal Non-White Immigrants

NBC12.com - Richmond, VA News

From [HERE] Administrators at Randolph-Macon College are investigating several students and groups who reportedly held and attended a "USA versus Mexico" party this past weekend after photos surfaced showing students dressed like "illegal immigrants" and "border control agents."

Students contacted NBC12 saying they believe the party was racist. 

A member of Kappa Alpha, the fraternity that hosted the party, said the party wasn't meant to be offensive.

"It was definitely not meant to be racist whatsoever," said Randolph-Macon sophomore and Kappa Alpha member Mark Heideman.

Students at the party tell NBC12, a drinking game was played where those dressed as "Americans" tried to catch those dressed as "illegal immigrants."

Noose Found Inside Amtrak Office

NBCPhili

Grosse Pointe Park Police Protest Demands Investigation Of Racist Videos Allegedly Made By White Cops

HuffPost

A local Detroit minister is demanding that police conduct a swift and independent investigation after demeaning videos surfaced online allegedly showing public safety officers compelling African-American men, to sing, dance and make animal sounds.

Malik Shabazz, head of the Marcus Garvey Movement/New Black Panther Nation and a frequent critic of race relations in metro Detroit, led a group of protesters and media through the Department of Public Safety offices in Grosse Pointe Park on Wednesday to photograph his meeting with police leadership.

Shabazz's protest comes about a week after a blog called Motor City Muckraker published videos and a photograph demonstrating the alleged harassment of African-Americans by police officers in this upscale neighborhood bordering Detroit. The Huffington Post reported on Friday the police department had opened an internal investigation.

Shabazz said that as a result of the meeting, officers of the public safety department -- which provides police, fire and EMS services to the town -- will all be individually questioned.

3 SJSU White Students Facing Hate Crime Charges For Harassing Black Roommate

CBS

Three white students at San Jose State University face misdemeanor hate-crime and battery charges after authorities say they harassed a black roommate by outfitting their dormitory suite with a Confederate flag, barricading him in his room, and fastening a bicycle lock around his neck and claiming they lost the key.

Santa Clara County prosecutors filed the charges late Wednesday against Logan Beaschler and Colin Warren, both 18, and Joseph Bomgardner, 19. The young men each face up to a year in jail if convicted.

University President Mohammad Qayoumi said in a statement Thursday that the suspects have been suspended.

The victim, now 18, moved into the four-bedroom suite in August with seven other young men, all of whom are white. The harassment began after all the roommates had attended an orientation that included cultural sensitivity training, the San Jose Mercury News reported.

Black Friday Shopping Advice? Don't be Black

Mediate

To help make Black Friday easier for shoppers, Daily Show correspondent Jessica Williams offered some helpful hints on how to get in the store easily. Chief amongst them? “Don’t be black.” 

Launching a plan to send white people to Mars

WashPost

Billionaire Dennis Tito, tired of being told that we can’t send humans to Mars just yet, on Wednesday revealed his scheme for launching two astronauts to the red planet as early as December 2017.

Dubbed “Inspiration Mars,” the flyby mission would exploit a rare alignment of Earth and Mars that minimizes the time and the fuel it would take to get to Mars and back home again. The astronauts would come within 100 miles of the Martian surface before being slung back to Earth.

“It would be a voyage of around 800 million miles around the sun in 501 days,” Tito testified Wednesday at a hearing of the House subcommittee on space. “No longer is a Mars flyby mission just one more theoretical idea. It can be done. Not in a matter of decades, but in a few years.”

Tito is a former engineer who made a fortune in investment management and, in 2001, became the first person to pay his way into space, buying a seat on a Russian rocket. Now he’s pitching Inspiration Mars as a national priority for the United States. Grab this rare chance to go to Mars quickly or risk seeing China or Russia get there first, he told members of Congress.

Tito mentioned a backup plan that would offer Inspiration Mars four more years of development time. Another alignment of planets in 2021 offers a second chance to go to Mars fairly quickly, but the journey would last 80 days longer and require that the astronauts fly much closer to the sun, within the orbit of Venus, in one portion of the trip. That would add to the already considerable radiation hazards.

When Tito broached the idea of Inspiration Mars early this year, he thought he could use primarily private rockets and minimize the need for NASA involvement. But the feasibility study led Tito back to NASA. NASA is building a jumbo rocket, the Space Launch System, that is supposed to be ready for its inaugural, uncrewed test flight in 2017. The second launch, carrying a crew in NASA’s new Orion capsule for the first time, isn’t scheduled until 2021. [MORE]

Warrantless Surveillance Continues to Cause Fallout

NYTimes

The Justice Department has notified a Somali-American man who was convicted this year of trying to detonate a bomb in Portland, Ore., that his trial included evidence derived from warrantless wiretapping, a move that could disrupt plans to sentence him next month.

Three United States senators also sent a letter on Tuesday to Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr. accusing the government of misrepresenting surveillance policy to the Supreme Court in a case last year.

Together the developments show that fallout continues over the Justice Department’s handling of warrantless surveillance issues in court, which has come under scrutiny since leaks from Edward J. Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor. The Justice Department did not comment on the letter.

Federal prosecutors filed the notice to the defendant in the Portland case, Mohamed Mohamud, late Monday. It was the second time that the Justice Department had made such a disclosure, after a similar move last month in a Colorado case that had not gone to trial. Mr. Mohamud was convicted of trying to use a weapon of mass destruction at a Christmas tree-lighting ceremony in 2010.

The notices could lead to a Supreme Court test of whether such eavesdropping, approved by Congress in the 2008 FISA Amendments Act, is constitutional. The Supreme Court rejected a challenge this year by Amnesty International on the grounds that the plaintiffs could not prove that their communications had been intercepted under the law.

The Justice Department had urged the Supreme Court to reject that case. It said the law would still be subject to judicial review, because criminal defendants facing evidence derived from warrantless surveillance would be notified of that fact and have standing to challenge it.

But it has since emerged that it was not the practice of National Security Division prosecutors to tell defendants when warrantless wiretapping had led to evidence in a case, something Mr. Verrilli had not known at the time of the Supreme Court case, even though his briefs and arguments assuring the justices otherwise had been vetted by the division. After the discrepancy came to light, Mr. Verrilli fought an internal battle to bring department policy in line with what he had told the court, ultimately prevailing.

But the senators — Ron Wyden of Oregon, Mark Udall of Colorado and Martin Heinrich of New Mexico — raised a new issue in their letter: A government brief, a statement by Mr. Verrilli during oral arguments and a line in the majority’s ruling appeared to rely on the premise that Americans had to be in direct contact with someone abroad who had been targeted for surveillance for the N.S.A. to collect their communications without a warrant.

However, it surfaced in August that the N.S.A. was also systematically scanning Americans’ cross-border emails without warrants and saving copies of any that contained discussion of a surveillance target.

Thus, the senators wrote, Amnesty International “would not necessarily have had to have communicated” with a target for its emails to be collected.

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NYC sets deadline for stores in racial profiling probe

Probing allegations of racial profiling, New York City is giving 17 major retail stores until Friday to submit information on how they've dealt with shoppers suspected of stealing. 

NBCNews

The City Council tackled the emotional issue Wednesday at a hearing that included statements from Macy's and Barneys New York denying allegations by customers that they had been singled out and followed. 

City Council member Jumaane Williams calls the problem "staggering." 

The stores did not send representatives to the session in the City Council's main chamber. 

"I'm offended that Barneys New York and Macy's is not here. I think it's insulting, not just to the City Council, but to the city of New York and the people who shop there," Williams said. 

The NYC Commission on Human Rights has sent letters to 17 retailers — including Macy's and Barneys — requesting the following information: loss prevention policies; procedures for approaching and detaining individuals suspected of theft; records regarding all individuals accused of theft in the past two years; and what, if any presence, NYPD officers have in the retail locations. 

The stores are: Century 21, Loehmann's, Sephora, Target, Bloomingdale's, Bergdorf Goodman, Banana Republic, Old Navy, Sears, Lord & Taylor, Neiman Marcus, The Gap, CVS, Saks Fifth Avenue, Barneys, Macy's, Bath & Body Works/Limited Brands/Victoria's Secret. 

NY Times Opinion Page: "The Optics Have Changed. White Supremacy Remains"

NYTimes

The election of the first African-American president scared some white folks who were comfortable with the racial status quo, and made many people of color optimistic about the prospect of change. But, so far, neither the fear nor the hope has been warranted – and that’s not a good thing. We needed a game changer but instead got more of the lackluster same.

The problem isn’t “race relations”; it is white supremacy – the ideology that white people are superior to people of color, and that whiteness is integral to the United States’s identity. White supremacy is the reason for the backlash against this year’s Miss America, who is of South Asian descent. It’s why the former slave-holding states are passing laws that make it harder for minorities to vote. White supremacy explains how a grown man can shoot an unarmed black teenager and successfully claim self-defense.

Yes, there’s Oprah. But a few successful African-Americans do not change the fact that we have one black president, and nearly one million black people in prison. Jay Z and Beyonce don’t represent the average black family, which has one-sixth the wealth of the average white family. [MORE]