Free Republic

Trayvon Martin’s father led the FAMU football team onto the field before the Rattlers’ season opener Sunday at the Citrus Bowl, embracing his role as honorary captain this season. .. “It feels good just to be a part of that, man. I had a son that used to go to FAMU and Trayvon wanted to go to FAMU,” Martin said immediately after taking the field.

SOMERS, N.Y. -- An 82-year-old man died following a three car accident on Route 118 in the town of Somers Tuesday, police said. Dimitrios Caratzas succumbed to injuries sustained in the fatal accident that occurred at around 2 p.m. Tuesday on Route 118. Patterson resident Tomas Salguera-Ramirez, who was driving a Toyota Tundra pickup truck, was headed southbound on Route 118 when he swerved and clipped a 2012 Hyundai Sonata and struck a Hyundai Santa Fe in the northbound lane head-on, state police in Somers reported. Salguera-Ramirez, Santa Fe driver Elaine Mazzeo, of Somers, and Caratzas were transported to Putnam...

A Palm Beach County family went public yesterday with ugly allegations of sexual abuse at West Palm Hospital. According to a lawsuit recently filed in circuit court, a troubled 9-year-old boy voluntarily submitted to the facility for psychological observation was abused by a hospital staffer known as "Mr. Dan." If that's not bad enough on its own legs, the family's lawyer says the alleged abuser had previously been arrested in 2005 for exposing himself in a Lake Worth park. But the earlier pinch wasn't caught by the hospital's administration. "It just violates the basic safety rules, starting with the fact...

The “war on coal” has five new casualties. A lawsuit brought by environmental groups has forced the shutdown of five Indiana coal-fired power plants by 2018, totalling 668 megawatts of power. ... “While today’s settlement is a step in the right direction, more must be done to ensure that Hoosier families are protected from rising energy bills and the enormous health threats posed by Indiana’s reliance on coal-fired power plants,” said Jodi Perras with the Sierra Club’s anti-coal campaign. The Sierra Club and other environmental groups have been targeting coal plants nationwide for retirement, which they say contribute to global...

Snow was the judge that ruled that Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio and his department violated the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by racially profiling Hispanics. This wasn’t enough for Obama and Holder, largely because Arpaio and his Cold Case Posse refused to back off from the investigation into Obama’s birth certificate, Social Security Number and Selective Service Registration form, all of which appear to be forgeries. ... Late last week, Judge Snow rendered an additional ruling against Arpaio and his department. He ordered that a court appointed monitor watch over all aspects of the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Department for...

Dozens of people took to the streets and had their very first March on Richmond Saturday morning. This comes after thousands gathered for the March on Washington this past week. Advocates who rallied for jobs and freedom say change starts at the local level. For these demonstrators, it's all about taking action and securing the future for generations to come. "We can win ladies and gentlemen if you participate," Richmond NAACP Director, King Salim Khalfani.

MARIETTA, Ga. (AP) — A defense attorney for a man accused of fatally shooting a baby in a stroller said the investigation was flawed and police ignored other leads and suspects, while the prosecution said witnesses may have had shifting stories but video and other evidence doesn't lie. The closing arguments Friday in the trial of De'Marquise Elkins gave dramatically different portrayals of the investigation and presented opposing theories of what happened. Elkins, 18, is charged with murder and other crimes in the March 21 killing of 13-month-old Antonio Santiago in Brunswick, along Georgia's coast. He's also accused of shooting...

Former Miss New Jersey USA Janaye Ingram has been appointed acting national executive director of the Rev. Al Sharpton’s National Action Network. Ingram, 33, has been in charge of the NAN’s Washington bureau and spearheaded the group’s historic 50th anniversary March on Washington. “I am deeply impressed with the leadership shown by Janaye Ingram,” Sharpton said Thursday Ingram, who was Miss New Jersey USA in 2004, said she was “honored” by the appointment. She’s taking the place of Tamika Mallory.

“I’m heartened by the signals that Majority Leader Cantor has sent that he might be willing to support [altering the Voting Rights Act], and I’m hopeful that Mr. Boehner will look into his heart, and more importantly, look into the eyes of John Lewis, and recognize that on this one, any sort of recent tradition of we don’t put anything forward unless the majority of the party is in alignment, that in this case it might be worth to let that be the exception,” Jealous said, responding to an audience question about the Republican Party’s political future. . . ....

Earlier, the man who tipped Brunswick police to 18-year-old De’Marquise “Marky” Elkins and co-defendant Dominique Lang, 15, as suspects, testified that his conscience led him to act, not the reward. “I didn’t do this for the reward money. Can I say this? Whoever had the guns to shoot a baby... I’m doing this for my conscience,” Argie Brooks said. ...A psychology professor from Georgia State University testified about how witnesses are often mistaken while identifying attackers because of stress and police suggestions. “When you go to retrieve that memory, it’s been updated and influenced by all these things,” said Dr....

OKLAHOMA CITY - Ten men are arrested after another undercover sex sting near Lake Hefner. A couple of the men arrested are "repeat offenders." You might wonder why any of the men arrested would ever take a chance coming back out to Hobie Point, but they do. We talked to one of them in order to get some insight, but agreed to protect his identity in the process. . . . Many parents are concerned that this kind of adult activity is happening so close to where their children come to play.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Many people in Mecklenburg County are not getting their food stamps on time. The Mecklenburg County Department of Social Services serves 80,000 households on food stamps. No one is giving an exact number on how many of those are having to wait longer than usual. Kristi Adams said it's, "stressful, real stressful." . . . The state admits it's not picking up the tab [food donations], but it is sending out experts to DSS offices across the state to help counties tackle their backlogs. For example, Union, Cabarrus, Rowan, Iredell, and Gaston counties are each getting two...

"You're trying to go up and you're just going down," said protester Shantel Walker, 31, of Brooklyn who makes $7.25 working at a Papa John's in Manhattan. "All of us are in the same financial crunch. We're trying to take care of our families and our livelihood." The strikes mark the latest salvo in a nearly year-long battle to get not only higher wages but also an opportunity to unionize without facing retaliation from employers. . . . U.S. Labor Secretary Thomas Perez told The Associated Press the strikes were a sign of the need to raise the minimum wage....

A group of 25 African-Americans were thrown out of a South Carolina restaurant after a white woman complained to staff that she "felt threatened," it's claimed. Michael Brown alleges that his party, which was celebrating his cousin's last day in Charleston last month, waited for two hours to be seated at the Wild Wing Cafe. But when their time came to order, staff reportedly refused them service and asked them to leave. . . . "The manager looked me dead in the face and said she was refusing us service because she had a right to and simply she...

A Plattsmouth woman's widower has sued Wal-Mart and the maker of its plastic bags, alleging an overfilled bag given to her at a Bellevue store broke, and, in a strange twist, led to her death. William Freis of Plattsmouth said his wife, Lynette, went grocery shopping April 16, 2010, at the Wal-Mart Supercenter on 15th Street and the cashier gave her one plastic bag for two 42-ounce cans of La Choy and a 2-pound bag of rice. On her way to the car, the bag broke and one of the cans of La Choy fell on her right foot, breaking...

Could public colleges be free? Yes, says the head of the union for University of California’s 4,000 instructors and librarians. How? Trim non-essential functions, redirect a bunch of money and end tax breaks that mostly benefit wealthy college-goers’ families, argues University Council-American Federation of Teachers President Bob Samuels. . . . “The major stumbling block is people no longer believe in large government programs.” (Excerpt) Read More at InsideHigherEd.com...

McCain has condemned threats by the likes of Sens. Ted Cruz (R-TX) Rand Paul (R-KY) and Marco Rubio (R-FL) to block any continuing resolution that funds Obamacare and risk a government shutdown. The senior Arizona senator said that many of the Republicans and conservatives who back the defunding effort weren't in Washington in the early 1990s when the GOP suffered a political backlash for a government shutdown. "It is a battle that's going to go on in the Republican Party and we're going to have to have a struggle and a conversation and an open and honest debate about the...

“I think that Dr. King would be amazed in many ways about the progress that we’ve made,” he said. “What he would also say, though, is that the March on Washington was about jobs and justice,” he added. “And that when it comes to the economy, when it comes to inequality, when it comes to wealth, when it comes to the challenges that inner cities experience, he would say that we have not made as much progress as the civil and social progress that we’ve made, and that it’s not enough just to have a black president.

Reid’s guest, former United Nations Ambassador under President Jimmy Carter, Andrew Young, interrupted her when she asked about what kind of problem Martin’s killing represents for the black community. “No,” Young said. “Trayvon is a martyr.” . . Young noted that George Zimmerman’s story is “just as much a tragedy,” because “his life is ruined over a love of guns and a false sense of what manhood is.”

The sheltered existence of hundreds of desert tortoises will come to a sad and tragic end in early 2014. A lack of funds at The Desert Tortoise Conservation Center, located outside Las Vegas, Nevada, will cause the sanctuary to close its doors and euthanize about half of its 1,400 tortoise residents, reports the Associated Press. The facility was created in 1990 when the overdevelopment—namely McMansions, solar plants, and strip malls—of the turtles' native habitats caused the critters to be put on the endangered species list. The center previously upheld a $1 million annual budget, mostly fueled by "raking in funds...