Posted on 04/30/2006 8:47:13 AM PDT by JaggedEdge
DURHAM - The national chairman of the New Black Panther Party for Self-Defense says his group intends to march at Duke University on Monday to "deal directly" with lacrosse players about charges of rape of an escort service dancer at a team party.
Duke's campus police are coordinating with the Durham Police Department to prepare for the black-separatist group, which has a reputation for coming to its protests armed.
Malik Zulu Shabazz, a Washington lawyer who is the leader of the New Panthers, said he will be in Durham to rally with local black leaders and monitor progress of the criminal case against Collin Finnerty and Reade Seligmann, the two students charged with raping and kidnapping the dancer.
"We are conducting an independent investigation, and we intend to enter the campus and interview lacrosse players," Shabazz said Thursday. "We seek to ensure an adequate, strong and vigorous prosecution."
Duke is a private institution, and its campus is private property. Shabazz said he has not sought permission to enter but that his group has "received no word that we are not welcome."
John Burness, Duke's vice president for public affairs and community relations, said Thursday that the university will allow a controlled march on campus, as long as the New Black Panthers follow specific rules.
"As an institution we support free speech, and we will treat them like any other group," Burness said. "But we do not permit weapons. We will take necessary steps to keep the campus safe."
One of the key tenets of the New Black Panthers is owning firearms and knowing how to use them, according to the Anti-Defamation League, a national Jewish group that has monitored Shabazz and his followers for years.
"They are a racist and anti-Semitic group," said Myrna Shinbaum, a spokesperson for the New York-based league. "These guys come armed. They carry shotguns to demonstrations. The authorities down there should know this."
Asked whether his followers will be armed when they come to Duke, Shabazz chuckled and said, "I don't know if I can comment on that."
A flier distributed by the group this week displays photos of Finnerty and Seligmann and calls for those who have "had enough of disrespect and racism from Duke" to assemble at the front gates of the university's West Campus at 10 a.m.
"We as black men cannot sit idly by and allow white men to rape black women, regardless of what our sister (who by nature is a queen and a divine black woman) was doing," Shabazz is quoted as saying in a media release announcing the event.
In a telephone interview Thursday, Shabazz said he and several local black leaders will meet with Durham District Attorney Mike Nifong about the case Monday. Nifong did not return a message late Thursday seeking to confirm that a meeting is planned.
A "town hall" meeting is also planned at 6 p.m. Monday at St. Joseph's African Methodist Episcopal Church on Fayetteville Street. Shabazz is set to be the keynote speaker. The Rev. Philip R. Cousin Jr., the minister of the church and a Durham County commissioner, did not return calls about the event. Representatives of the NAACP and the Nation of Islam are also expected to attend.
New Panthers' origin
The New Black Panthers is listed as a racist hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center, an organization more often cited for its efforts to monitor the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis and other white supremacists. The Panthers is also disavowed by the Dr. Huey P. Newton Foundation, named for the activist who helped found the original Black Panther Party in 1966.
According to the Anti-Defamation League, the New Panthers are a black separatist militia founded in 1990 by Khallid Muhammad, who was removed from a top leadership post at the Nation of Islam after Louis Farrakhan reportedly found his statements against Jews, Catholics and homosexuals too radical.
Shabazz became the group's leader in 2001, after Muhammad's death. He has drawn media headlines in recent years for claiming that Jews were evacuated from the World Trade Center before the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and voicing support for Zacarias Moussaoui, the so-called "20th hijacker" who was found eligible for the death penalty this month for his role in the Sept. 11 plot.
Shabazz, who said the group's current membership numbers in the "low thousands," backed away from claims published in a Durham newspaper Thursday that the New Black Panthers are providing security for the dancer and her family after she received death threats.
The accuser's mother told The News & Observer on Thursday that Panthers came by the family's house Wednesday and offered their protection, but the family decline
Makes you wonder....
With what standing, Shabazz?
"We as black men cannot sit idly by and allow white men to rape black women, regardless of what our sister (who by nature is a queen and a divine black woman) was doing," Shabazz is quoted as saying in a media release announcing the event."
Can you imagine if a white group (following what more and more looks like a trumped up charge) marched with weapons and stated that they weren't going to sit by while black men raped white women?????? What a double standard. As a matter of fact, with the "by nature is a queen" stuff, this guy sounds like a nut job!
Just what in the world would be too radical for calypso louie?
But it's just no fun if you can't blame Whitey
If they wait until Tuesday, they can get illegals to do this for them.
Doing the job American New Black Panther Party members won't do.
Duke allows this? They have jumped the shark. No credibility in the world. Malik and his terrorists also should NOT be allowed, they are agitators...the Durham PD should just ring the place...sorry Shabby, no entrar!
ping
Nothing like having the kooks come out in force.
Thread already here...
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1623046/posts
It would be interesting to review the rape statistics for Durham County, and the race of the perps/victims, for, say, the last 5 years.
And he changed the headline.
Go visit Durham and engage them in a polite conversation explaining your position to them. See what happens.
If the mayor of Durham doesn't get a grip on Nifong and these black panthers, this whole thing might errupt. If it is true that Nifong is planning to meet with this thug, Shabazz, he will be very very sorry. Durham has indeed become a powder keg and I blame Nifong 100%.
These people are idiots who do one thing well: get other idiots to follow them.
what do they need to do the interviews for if they already decided there needs to be a prosecution?
"We as black men cannot sit idly by and allow white men to rape black women, regardless of what our sister (who by nature is a queen and a divine black woman) was doing," Shabazz is quoted as saying in a media release announcing the event.
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If the accuser is the Black Panthers' idea of a divine queen, it is scary to imagine what kind of woman they consider pond scum.
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