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The Jena Six; Jena, LA
Topic Started: Sep 27 2007, 08:28 PM (53 Views)
24thcenstfan
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Jena 6 defendant released on bail

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JENA, La. - A black teenager whose prosecution in the beating of a white classmate prompted a massive civil rights protest here walked out of a courthouse Thursday after a judge ordered him freed.

Mychal Bell's release on $45,000 bail came hours after a prosecutor confirmed he would no longer seek an adult trial for the 17-year-old. Bell, one of the teenagers known as the Jena Six, still faces trial as a juvenile in the December beating in this small central Louisiana town.

"We still have mountains to climb, but at least this is closer to an even playing field," said the Rev. Al Sharpton, who helped organize last week's protest.

"He goes home because a lot of people left their home and stood up for him," Sharpton said as Bell stood smiling next to him.

"There's only one person who could have brought me through this and that's the good Lord," Bell told reporters later in front of his father's house.

District Attorney Reed Walters' decision to abandon adult charges means that Bell, who had faced a maximum of 15 years in prison on his aggravated second-degree battery conviction last month, instead could be held only until he turns 21 if he is found guilty in juvenile court.

The conviction in adult court was thrown out this month by the state 3rd Circuit Court of Appeal, which said Bell should not have been tried as an adult on that particular charge.

Walters had said he would appeal that decision. On Thursday, he said he still believes there was legal merit to trying Bell as an adult but decided it was in the best interest of the victim, Justin Barker, and his family to let the juvenile court handle the case.

"They are on board with what I decided," Walters said at a news conference.

Bell faces juvenile court charges of aggravated second-degree battery and conspiracy to commit that crime.

He is among six black Jena High School students arrested in December after a beating that left Barker unconscious and bloody, though the victim was able to attend a school function later that day. Four of the defendants were 17 at the time, which made them adults under Louisiana law.

Those four and Bell, who was 16, all were initially charged with attempted murder. Walters has said he sought to have Bell tried as an adult because he already had a criminal record, and because he believed Bell instigated the attack.

The charges have been dropped to aggravated second-degree battery in four of the cases. One defendant has yet to be arraigned. The sixth defendant's case is sealed in juvenile court.

Bell's lawyer, Carol Powell Lexing, said his next hearing is set for Tuesday.

Critics accuse Walters, who is white, of prosecuting blacks more harshly than whites. They note that he filed no charges against three white teens suspended from the high school over allegations they hung nooses in a tree on campus not long before fights between blacks and whites, including the attack on Barker.

An estimated 20,000 to 25,000 protesters marched in Jena last week in a scene that evoked the early years of the civil rights movement.

Walters said the demonstration had no influence on his decision not to press the adult charges, and ended his news conference by saying that only God kept the protest peaceful.

"The only way — let me stress that — the only way that I believe that me or this community has been able to endure the trauma that has been thrust upon us is through the prayers of the Christian people who have sent them up in this community," Walters said.

"I firmly believe and am confident of the fact that had it not been for the direct intervention of the Lord Jesus Christ last Thursday, a disaster would have happened. You can quote me on that."

The Rev. Donald Sibley, a black Jena pastor, called it a "shame" that Walters credited divine intervention for the protesters acting responsibly.

"What I'm saying is, the Lord Jesus Christ put his influence on those people, and they responded accordingly," Walters responded.

After the news conference, Sibley told CNN that Walters had insulted the protesters by making a false separation between "his Christ and our Christ."

"For him to use it in the sense that because his Christ, his Jesus, because he prayed, because of his police, that everything was peaceful and was decent and in order — that's not the truth," Sibley said.

Walters has said repeatedly that Barker's suffering has been lost in the furor over the case, and that what happened to the teen was much more severe than a schoolyard fight.

Walters also has defended his decision not to seek charges in the hanging of the nooses, which he said was "abhorrent and stupid" but not a crime.

I have only recently learned about this incident.

My personal opinion is leaning towards them being tried as juveniles. Which it appears they will be now.

I hope in all of their (the protest marchers) zeal to see these guys charged as juveniles, that they don't put the six up on a pedestal and excuse them of the crime they appear to have committed.
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ImpulseEngine
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This case is a complex one and there are multiple issues. I think it has been completely mishandled on both sides. Hanging the nooses was wrong and, because of the obvious racial symbolism in it that these teens are old enough to be aware of, it seems much more serious to me than, say, name-calling. I wouldn't go so far though as to call it a hate crime or even hate motivated. It's not a crime and hate is a possible motive, but not necessarily a given. Kids can be vicious and sometimes they'll use anything they can think of to pick on another kid. There may be nothing more to it than that. But the matter needs to be addressed much more seriously than it seems to have been so far IMO. A simple suspension from school (for I believe just a couple of days?) doesn't seem appropriate. The matter needs to be thoroughly reviewed to determine whether it's true racism or simple bullying and either way needs a more complete approach to dealing with it.

As for the Jena 6 kids, what they did was even more wrong IMO. There's a big difference between symbolic harm and physical harm. Physical assault, especially of the severity that this one entailed, certainly should be addressed through the legal system. However, the initial charge of "attempted murder" was ridiculous IMO. I can't even fathom where they came up with that. The "weapon" was just some sneakers and all they did was beat up the white kid with them. The fact that the charge was changed also supports that the evidence for attempted murder wasn't there. Without the attempted murder charge, I also don't see any justification for trying these juveniles as adults. So I think the protesters were right in complaining about those two aspects of the case.

However, I think the protesters are overly downplaying the seriousness of what these six juveniles did and simultaneously overplaying the seriousness of the hanging of the nooses. As such, they are only hurting their own cause.
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24thcenstfan
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ImpulseEngine
Sep 28 2007, 10:37 AM
This case is a complex one and there are multiple issues.  I think it has been completely mishandled on both sides.  Hanging the nooses was wrong and, because of the obvious racial symbolism in it that these teens are old enough to be aware of, it seems much more serious to me than, say, name-calling.  I wouldn't go so far though as to call it a hate crime or even hate motivated.  It's not a crime and hate is a possible motive, but not necessarily a given.  Kids can be vicious and sometimes they'll use anything they can think of to pick on another kid.  There may be nothing more to it than that.  But the matter needs to be addressed much more seriously than it seems to have been so far IMO.  A simple suspension from school (for I believe just a couple of days?) doesn't seem appropriate.  The matter needs to be thoroughly reviewed to determine whether it's true racism or simple bullying and either way needs a more complete approach to dealing with it.

I think I would need to know more about what led up to the nooses being put up, but in general I do think with the symbolism (as rich in symbolism and history as a noose is in this country can be ), I do think it could be construed as a hate crime.

The terms "malicious mischief" were used by one commentator and I think if there are laws on the book for this, then that is another direction that could be taken in possibly prosecuting the actions of the hanging of the nooses.


Quote:
 
As for the Jena 6 kids, what they did was even more wrong IMO.  There's a big difference between symbolic harm and physical harm.  Physical assault, especially of the severity that this one entailed, certainly should be addressed through the legal system.  However, the initial charge of "attempted murder" was ridiculous IMO.  I can't even fathom where they came up with that.  The "weapon" was just some sneakers and all they did was beat up the white kid with them.  The fact that the charge was changed also supports that the evidence for attempted murder wasn't there.  Without the attempted murder charge, I also don't see any justification for trying these juveniles as adults.  So I think the protesters were right in complaining about those two aspects of the case.

However, I think the protesters are overly downplaying the seriousness of what these six juveniles did and simultaneously overplaying the seriousness of the hanging of the nooses.  As such, they are only hurting their own cause.

I agree. Hanging the nooses may have been wrong and insulting, but it didn't pysically harm anyone. A gang of guys beating on one person is an entirely different ball game.
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