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Vol. 14 No.
27…Dedicated to the Dialogue on
Race…July 4, 2011
Intuit's Vibe
Blind Justice
By Steve C. Bolton
Concrete below my shoes,
Steel around my wrists.
They lock the shackles on my feet
Check that I'm on the list.
They rush me down the corridor,
Small steps that I must take.
They crush me into a mirrored van
Shoved next to my fellow inmate.
They drive me out of a tunnel,
Fresh into a bright sunshine.
My eyes are used to months of dark,
My sight, for a second, blind.
For minutes we see real world,
Fellow beings about their chore.
They do not know what we're up against
Or what we have in store.
We reach our fates destination into a box we go.
They leave the steel around our limbs,
and time it moves so slow.
A click, I hear the deadbolt.
a man is standing there.
"I am the lawyer holding your time,
but 2 minutes is all I can spare.
Into an elevator,
'put your face against the wall'.
Up we go into another box.
Slam the door and click the locks.
I see the door come open,
the baliff calls my name.
I slink my way into the court,
to accept or reject the blame.
My attorney who knows nothing
about my life to date.
The DA sitting, the judge above,
together they hold my fate.
My hope to all that find themselves
in court to face a charge,
that in their wallet they might find
ten thousand dollars large.
If not, I hope you remember,
when 'JUSTICE' catches you.
that money talks and fairness walks
far
away from you.
Associate Justice
Clarence Thomas
Born June 23, 1948 in the black enclave of
Educated
in Savannah, first at an all-black Roman Catholic primary school run by white
nuns and then at a boarding-school seminary, where he graduated as the only
black in his class, Thomas considered entering the priesthood. He attended
Immaculate Conception Abbey from 1967 to 1968 and then transferred to
On September 13, 1974, Thomas was admitted to the
In the Republican presidential administrations of Ronald Reagan and George H.
W. Bush, Thomas served as assistant secretary in the U.S. Department of
Education (1981-82) and chairman of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
(EEOC) from 1982 to 1990. As EEOC Chairman, Thomas promoted a doctrine of
self-reliance, and halted the usual EEOC approach of filing class-action
discrimination lawsuits, instead pursuing acts of individual discrimination.
On October 30, 1989, Thomas was nominated by President George H. W. Bush to a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Thomas gained the support of other blacks, but he was struck when meeting with the white Democratic staffers in the United States Senate "by how easy it had become for sanctimonious whites to accuse a black man of not caring about civil rights." Thomas was confirmed by the Senate on March 6, 1990.
On July 1, 1991, after serving
one year and four months on the DC Circuit, Thomas was nominated by Bush to
fill the seat on the United States Supreme Court vacated by Justice Thurgood Marshall. Thomas' confirmation hearings were
bitter and intensely fought, centering on an accusation that he had made
unwelcome sexual comments to attorney Anita Hill, a subordinate at the
Department of Education and subsequently at the EEOC. Of the allegations and
Senate hearing, Thomas remarked, "This is not an opportunity to talk about
difficult matters privately or in a closed environment. This is a circus. It's
a national disgrace. And from my standpoint, as a black American, it is a
high-tech lynching for uppity blacks who in any way deign to think for themselves, to do for themselves, to have different ideas,
and it is a message that unless you kowtow to an old order, this is what will
happen to you. You will be lynched, destroyed, caricatured by a committee of
the US Senate rather than hung from a tree." The U.S. Senate confirmed
Thomas by a vote of 52-48, the narrowest margin for approval in more than a
century.
Since joining the Court, Thomas has been among its most conservative members,
"seeking to uphold what he sees as the original meaning of the United
States Constitution." Thomas' extremely conservative bent makes him and
In 1971, Thomas married college sweetheart Kathy Grace Ambush. The couple had
one child, Jamal Adeen. They separated in 1981 and
divorced in 1984. Thomas married Virginia Lamp, a lobbyist and aide to
Republican Congressman Dick Armey in 1987.
In January 2011, the liberal
advocacy group Common Cause reported that between 2003 and 2007 Thomas failed
to disclose $686,589 in income earned by his wife from the Heritage Foundation.
Thomas amended reports going back to 1989 to include non-investment spousal
income.
In 2007, Thomas received a $1.5 million advance for his memoir, My
Grandfather's Son, a bestseller. (Sources: www.biography.com/articles,
http://en.wikipedia.org/ and www.aaregistry.com)
Murky Rulings from a Bent Bench
Supreme Court Justices are not bound by the code of conduct for federal judges.
However, justices voluntarily follow those rules, including the code barring
judges from participating in raising money for charitable endeavors out of a
concern that donors might feel 
pressured
to give or entitled to special treatment.
US Supreme Court Justice Clarence
Thomas is no stranger to ethical entanglements. According to The Times, Harlan
Crow, a Dallas real-estate magnate, a big contributor to conservative causes
and a friend and benefactor of Justice Thomas paid $1.5 million for the
purchase and restoration of the cannery on coastal land in Georgia, featuring a
museum about the culture and history of Pin Point, the birthplace of Justice
Thomas and one of his pet projects. Harlan Crow is the third son of Trammell
Crow and the head of Crow Holdings.
Apparently, Thomas and Crow met after Thomas became a member of the bench.
Since then, Crow has helped finance a Savannah library project dedicated to
Thomas, presented him with a Bible that belonged to Frederick Douglass and
reportedly provided Virginia Thomas with half a million dollars to start her
Tea Party-affiliated group Liberty Central, which opposes various progressive
causes, including Obama's health care overhaul, an issue likely to come before
the Supreme Court. Virginia Thomas has stepped down as head of the organization
to take more of a back seat role, ostensibly removing the appearance of any
conflict of interest.
In addition to his questionable
ethical entanglements involving Crow, Thomas acknowledged in January that over
the last six years, he failed to disclose his wife's employment income in
violation of the 1978 Ethics in Government Act. According to Common Cause,
Virginia Thomas earned over $680,000 from conservative think tank the Heritage
Foundation over five years, but Justice Thomas did not include it on financial
disclosure forms, consistently checking no spousal income. Once the news broke,
Thomas amended thirteen years of disclosure reports, claiming a
"misunderstanding of the filing instructions."
In January of 2008, Justices Thomas and Antonin Scalia attended a political retreat funded by the Koch
brothers. Subsequently, they ruled in favor of the Citizens United campaign
finance case, a ruling that reportedly benefitted the Koch brothers'
conservative political activities. In early 2011, Common Cause asked the
Justice Thomas' ethical
entanglements have apparently not violated any laws, but they suggest that
Supreme Court justices should be bound by more than a willingness to abide by the
code of conduct to which other judges are forced to adhere. Without such
bounds, justices appear above the law in a society that metes out justice based
on socioeconomic and political status. Such a system allows Justices, like
Thomas, to become involved in questionable ethical arrangements and issue murky
rulings from a bent bench that benefit his
benefactors. (Sources: http://old.news.yahoo.com, www.nytimes.com, and
www.theroot.com)
A Prank, a Death -- and Another Injustice
By Leonard Pitts, Jr.
Consider two recent examples of
American justice. In 2009, after a night of bar hopping, a man named Ryan LeVin plowed his speeding Porsche into two British tourists
in
About
three weeks ago, Tyell Morton, a kid from
LeVin was recently sentenced: He got house
confinement at his oceanfront condo. Morton, who is 18, was jailed with a
$30,000 bond and faces trial on charges that could put him away for eight
years. Morton has no record. LeVin was on probation,
has a string of traffic violations and a cocaine conviction. It ought not surprise you to learn that LeVin
is white and fabulously wealthy, while Morton is black, and not.
Jaye
Davis would reject the implications of that observation. She wrote a letter to
the editor of the Rushville Republican that said in part, "I want and need
someone to please tell me this case is not going to become a huge deal because
of race! I feel very strongly that skin color had nothing to do with these
charges ..."
Morton's father doesn't want it to be about race, either. Several times during
a telephone conversation with me, Walter Nelson, a barber who owns a shop near
Rushville, he explained, is a small, predominantly white town. Most of his
son's homeboys are white. Many of those who contributed to pay his son's bond
are white. "My son's life is more important than some racial issue that
people can't seem to get over. That's what I want to focus on, man."
Tyell, he said, is a good kid who brings home A's and
B's and the occasional C. He dreams of going to college. He wants to be a
doctor -- or a video game tester.
"He's a teenager," his dad said. "He's a young man trying to
find his way in life."
Nelson knows Tyell pulled a knuckleheaded stunt. But
the overreaction to that stunt frustrates him. Once upon a time, a Tyell Morton might have suffered only a chewing out by the
cops and his folks. But, said one official, things are different
post-Columbine. Indeed, the initial charge was "terroristic
mischief."
"They labeled my son as a terrorist," Nelson said. "They referenced Columbine with my son. Columbine, those guys had intent to harm. My son did not have any intent to harm anybody at all. That's what angers me." He wonders how six days spent in shackles with car thieves and drug dealers might scar his child.
And Jaye
Davis is right, after a fashion. This is not an issue of race. It is an issue
of race and class. To believe otherwise is to believe a Ryan LeVin would now be facing eight years in jail, and that
requires a level of naivete inaccessible to me.
I asked Nelson if he thought his son would be in this jeopardy if he were
wealthy and/or white instead of a black kid whose family had to pass the hat to
raise the $3,000 the bondsman required.
This man who doesn't want to cloud matters with side issues snorted a bitter laugh. "That question has been answered way before this happened to my son. Do I need to even answer that? Come on."
About
Me: Leonard Pitts, Jr. is a columnist for the Miami Herald. Email him at
lpitts@miamiherald.com
By Greg Bluestein
The thrashing, jerking death of Roy Willard Blankenship has lawyers for death row inmates plotting fresh arguments against the drug used to execute him, even though they may never be able to prove that it caused the spasms in his last moments.
Medical experts say it is
possible
Blankenship jerked his head
several times, mumbled inaudibly and appeared to gasp for breath for several
minutes after he was pumped with pentobarbital in
Whatever conclusions the state reaches, defense attorneys said they are planning to invoke Blankenship's execution in court filings as evidence that pentobarbital could violate the ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
To read the entire article, see www.kboi2.com/news/national/124664764.html.
Greg Bluestein can be reached at http://www.twitter.com/bluestein.
Follow the Prison Money Trail
By Silja J.A. Talvi
Governor Bill Richardson (D-NM)
has already received more contributions from a private prison company than any
other politician campaigning for state office in the
While
Supposedly, states turn to private companies to cope better with chronic
overcrowding and for low-cost management. However, a closer look suggests a
different rationale. A recent report from the Montana-based Institute on Money
in State Politics reveals that during the 2002 and 2004 election cycles,
private prison companies, directors, executives and lobbyists gave $3.3 million
to candidates and state political parties across 44 states.
According to Edwin Bender, executive director of the Institute on Money in
State Politics, private prison companies strongly favor giving to states with
the toughest sentencing laws--in essence, the ones that are more likely to come
up with the bodies to fill prison beds. Those states,
are also the ones most likely to have passed "three-strikes" laws.
Those laws, first passed by
In
Things may no longer be quite as sunny as they once were in
The key shift, Bender explains,
is that "the prison industry has gone from a we-can-save-you-money
pitch to an economic-development model pitch."
In other words, says Bender, "you need
[their] prisons for jobs."
If political donations are any measure, economically challenged and
poverty-stricken states like
Another $30,000 went from GEO to
the Richardson-headed Democratic Governors Association.
But don't get the idea that GEO has any particular love for Democrats: $95,000 from the corporation went to the Republican Governors Association last year alone. What companies like GEO do love are the millions of dollars rolling in from lucrative New Mexico contracts to run the Lea County Correctional Facility (operating budget: $25 million/year), and the Guadalupe County Correctional Facility ($13 million/year), among others. CCA also owns and operates the state's only women's facility in Grants ($11 million per year).
To make sure that those dollars
keep flowing, GEO and CCA have perfected the art of the "very tight
revolving door," says Bender, which involves snapping up former
corrections administrators, PAC lobbyists and state officials to serve as
consultants to private prison companies.
In fact, the current New Mexico Corrections Department Secretary Joe Williams
was once on GEO's payroll as their warden of the Lea
County Correctional Facility. Earlier this year, Williams was placed on unpaid administrative
leave after accusations surfaced that he spent state travel and phone funds to
pursue a very close relationship with Ann Casey. Casey is a registered lobbyist
in
It appears that even for a prison industry enchanted by public-private
partnership, Williams and Casey may have gone too far. (Source: www.godlikeproductions.com/forum1/message1503187/pg1)
Disgruntled says: When I read the article
that Ryan LeVin, the scion of a wealthy Chicago-area
family would receive house arrest after killing two British businessmen with
his 
Porsche,
I was appalled. The very idea that someone could commit such a crime, lie about
it and try to cover it up and not spend time in jail assaulted my senses, when
so many people are punished harshly for minor offenses. If justice is truly
blind, then the fact that this man is rich and white should have made no
difference in his treatment before the court. So what if he paid off the widows
of his victims. Justice should have treated him like Joe Blow. You do the
crime, you do the time! Ryan LeVin should have been
sentenced to do time in prison and/or on death row!
Disgruntled wants to know: Unlike the
GOP, I do not blame President Obama for the jobless numbers among black people.
I do, however, fault him for failing to address the problem, even if he is
limited to using the bully pulpit. Black people have always had unemployment
rates greater than the national average and historically have endured rates
more than twice those suffered by whites. This points to a structural problem
that the president has failed to mention; it is a problem than dates back to
the nation's founding and calls for a revolution in the way this society values
black human capital. I understand that this is a monumental undertaking, but
desperate times call for desperate measures, and these are desperate times.
With unemployment at depression levels in black communities across this
country, millions of black hands and minds are idle. Will this society choose
to constructively employ these hands and minds or will it choose inaction and
suffer the consequences of the destruction devised in devilish workshops?
Disgruntled feels: Typical! On learning
that the sexual assault case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn was on the verge of
collapse, I immediately thought, another social deviant will escape punishment.
Dominique Strauss-Kahn is white and well-connected, while his accuser is a
Guinean maid. Just like the young woman who accused the Duke lacrosse
team of sexual assault, she will be raked over the coals until she is so
sullied that the prosecutor will rush to wash his hands of any involvement,
much less bring charges against her attacker, who by now appears as pure as
freshly fallen snow. This is so typical and unfair. It is why some women are so
reluctant to report instances of sexual assault, because they end up being
treated as criminals rather than their attackers.
Mailbox: E-Mails, Faxes and Telephone Calls
Email
www.federalradionews.com...Curfew imposed in Columbia, SC, after teen
attack...COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - After an 18-year-old was severely beaten by a
group of teens in Columbia, S.C., an emergency curfew has been imposed on young
people in one of the city's popular nightspot districts. The curfew requires anyone
under 17 to be off the streets from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. in the city's Five Points area west of downtown and two parks nearby.
Carter Strange was jogging home the night of June 20 when the group of teens
attacked and beat him. Eight people are charged in the beating, including a
13-year-old, a 14-year-old and four 16-year-olds. His family told NBC's
"Today" show that he needed two surgeries, including one to remove a
blood clot in his brain. The case has stoked racial tensions. Strange is white,
and his attackers are black.
Email www.federalradionews.com...Police shooting victim testifies he wasn't
armed ...By Michael Kunzelman...NEW ORLEANS (AP) - A
man who survived a police shooting on a New Orleans bridge in Hurricane
Katrina's aftermath has testified he already was wounded and lying on the
ground when somebody leaned over a concrete barrier and shot him twice in the
stomach. Testifying Wednesday at the federal trial for five current or former
officers, Jose Holmes Jr. said he didn't know police were shooting at him, a
friend and several relatives as they walked across the
Email www.latimes.com...Black student in CA says he was bullied with noose...
Email http://news.yahoo.com...By
Jared Spurbeck...According to The New York Times, the
FBI just raided a data center in Virginia and seized many of its servers,
causing websites owned by "tens of clients" to go offline --
including those belonging to people who hadn't broken a law, and were not
suspected of any crime. It may seem silly to get upset about the police taking
down websites you don't use. A certain quote may come to mind, though, as we
look at other ways that the police in