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WINNFIELD, La. -- A former police officer who repeatedly jolted a handcuffed man with a Taser before he died has been indicted on a manslaughter charge. A spokesman for the Winn Parish district attorney's office says grand jurors also indicted former Winnfield police officer Scott Nugent on a charge of malfeasance in office. Grand jurors spent two days hearing evidence in the death of 21-year-old Baron Pikes before they handed up the indictments Wednesday evening. Pikes was shocked nine times with a 50,000-volt Taser as he was arrested on a drug possession warrant in January. Nugent was fired but is...

A grand jury will decide whether to bring murder charges against a police officer. A grand jury in rural Louisiana considers Tuesday whether to bring murder charges against a Taser-wielding police officer in what may become a seminal case in the hotly debated history of stun guns. No US jury has ever convicted a police officer in connection with a death related to use of an electroshock weapon. But the number of deaths in which the guns have played a role has been growing, along with their use in law enforcement agencies. Now, the coroner in Winnfield, La., has found...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 24 (UPI) -- A Louisiana teen was indicted on federal civil rights violations for showing nooses to civil rights marchers in Alexandria, La., the Justice Department said. Jeremiah Munsen, 18, was indicted on hate crime and conspiracy charges for his role in intimidating black marchers who attended a rally Sept. 20 in Jena, La., to support six black teens accused of beating a white classmate, the Justice Department said in a news release Thursday. The indictment alleged Munsen and another person attached two nooses to a truck then repeatedly drove past a group of marchers waiting at a...

JENA (TV8) - It's been over a year since the hanging of nooses at Jena High School. And tonight, Jena is in the spotlight again over what's being preceived as a racial symbol that's being sold in a local store. TV 8's Julie Van Eman sits down with one angry customer who can't believe the store would sell what she says is clearly a depiction of a noose. Hilda Keene is appalled by a product on display at this Dollar General store in Jena. Keene says "I cannot believe a business in LaSalle Parish could sell something like this which...

<p>JENA, Louisiana (AP) - The family of Justin Barker, the victim in the «Jena Six» racial beating case in Louisiana, has filed a civil lawsuit against the local school board, the parents of the six young men accused of beating him and the adult members among the six. The lawsuit was filed Nov. 29 in state district court, the Alexandria Daily Town Talk newspaper reported. The case and its racial overtones _ sparked by the hanging on campus of nooses, a traditional symbol of lynch mobs _ have attracted the attention of U.S. civil rights leaders, who led a large protest and said the original charges against the Jena Six were too strict. David and Kelli Barker and their son allege that seven Jena High School students attacked Justin on Dec. 4, 2006, as he walked out of the school's gym. The suit names the attackers as Mychal Bell, Jesse Beard, Theo Shaw, Bryant Purvis, Carwin Jones and Robert Bailey Jr., as well as a seventh student who has not been officially named by law enforcement as a part of the attack. The lawsuit alleges that school employees were not adequately supervising students or maintaining discipline. The Barkers are asking for a jury trial. Bell pleaded guilty Monday to a misdemeanor second-degree battery charge and was sentenced to 18 months in jail. The other members of the Jena Six are awaiting court appearances. Barker spent several hours in the emergency room after the attack but was discharged and attended a school event the night after the attack.</p>

New Orleans, LA (AHN) - A black teenager whose case fueled one of the biggest civil rights protests in the U.S. is expected to enter a guilty to a misdemeanor on Monday. If Mychal Bell, 17, enters a misdemeanor please, he will avoid a second trial for aggravated second-degree battery and conspiracy for his role in attacking Justin Barker, a white student from Jena High School. Barker was unconscious, but survived the attack. Although he was treated in the emergency room for several hours, he managed to attend a school event on the same evening a year ago. Bell's first...

JENA, La. - A judge ruled Wednesday that the public and the news media should have full access to all legal proceedings involving Mychal Bell, one of the teenage defendants in the racially-charged Jena 6 case in Louisiana, whose prosecution had been shrouded in secrecy on orders of the trial judge. Ruling in a lawsuit brought by the Chicago Tribune and joined by a coalition of major U.S. media companies, Rapides Parish District Judge Thomas Yeager ordered that Bell's upcoming criminal trial, as well as any pre-trial hearings, must be open to the press and the public. Yeager also ordered...

New Orleans, La. (AP) -- A state judge has agreed to open the juvenile trial of one of the black teenagers known as the Jena Six. District Judge J.P. Mauffray agreed Thursday to open Mychal Bell's trial but noted in a court filing that he was not required to open pretrial hearings. Bell, 17, is set for trial Dec. 6 on charges of aggravated second-degree battery and conspiracy for his alleged part in an attack last December on Justin Barker, a white student at Jena High School. Typically, juvenile trials are closed to the public. The Associated Press and 24...

This column concerning the reportage from Jena is exactly what I describe in my novel " A Sense of Duty." The protagonist, rookie police officer Mike Carr, shoots a black organized crime figure who unbeknownst to him is an old high school friend. An award winning journalist,Neil Foster ( a liberal elitist who thinks cops are working class scum), and a local civil rights leader (attempting to revive his career), exploit the incident by completely fabricating a narrative of racist and brutal police conduct. Here is an excerpt: (The scene is a corner bar. The reporter Foster met with a...

If the Aryan Nation plotted to develop a media property designed to denigrate and destroy black culture, could they do a better job than Black Entertainment Television (BET)? This question occurred to me after learning that BET executives invited two of the "Jena Six" to present the award for Best Hip-Hop Video last week at their annual hip-hop music awards. The answer ossified into the indisputable after hearing one of BET's newsreaders actually compare the Jena Six to the "Little Rock Nine" from a half century earlier. Let's explore this comparison. In Little Rock in 1957, nine black students were...

JENA, La. (AP) - A teenager at the center of a civil rights controversy is back in jail after a judge revoked his probation because of an old drug charge that had never been tried, his father said Thursday. Mychal Bell, who along with five other black teenagers had been accused of beating a white classmate, had gone to juvenile court expecting another routine hearing, Marcus Jones said. "He's locked up again," Jones said. "No bail has been set or nothing. He's a young man who's been thrown in jail again and again, and he just has to take it."...

At this point, there seems little doubt about the ugliness that has simmered, and then boiled, in a little town in Louisiana called Jena. There is a lot that has already been said, and done, about the latent racism in the town that led to the display of nooses on a tree. Racism that led, in reaction, to six black youths brutally beating a young white man, and then the subsequent disproportionate sentencing, in which those black youths could have served prison time for trumped-up murder charges. Action has been taken, and will be taken, so that those charges, and...

GRAMBLING, La. — Officials at Grambling State University were meeting Monday after the school newspaper ran photographs of adults at a campus-run elementary school putting a noose around at least one child's neck. Kindergarten and first-grade students at Alma J. Brown Elementary School were being taught why nooses are a symbol of racism, an article from the historically black university's student newspaper said. The article said the children also were being taught about the "Jena Six" — black high-school students who are accused of beating a white schoolmate. Court proceedings brought about 20,000 to 25,000 people to Jena, about 70...

October 01, 2007, 6:45 a.m. Orlando Vacation from RealityWhat Patterson got wrong. By Heather Mac Donald The high incarceration rate of black males is not “solely the result of white racism,� wrote Harvard sociologist Orlando Patterson in the New York Times on Sunday. Patterson’s startling admission was occasioned by the media-saturated protests two weeks ago in Jena., Louisiana, over attempted murder charges lodged against five black students who had beaten a white student unconscious. This unusual outbreak of frankness on the pages of the New York Times might seem to signal a breakthrough in the otherwise nonexistent public debate...

Jesse Jackson is getting some richly deserved criticism for charging Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) is “acting like he’s white” when it comes to the racially charged incident in Jena, Louisiana. Since shooting his mouth off, Jackson’s backed away, claiming he either doesn’t remember saying any such thing or that his words were taken out of context, whichever excuse you’ll buy. If you’re as old as dirt like me, the occurrence is reminiscent of Jesse calling Jews “Hymie” back in the mid-1980s. A faulty memory can be so terribly cathartic sometimes. Jackson also asserted last week that if he were a...

.."The walkout is in conjunction with the National Walk-Out Movement created by rapper, Mos Def"..

JENA, La. | Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton and talk-show hosts certainly feasted on the racial unrest in this tiny central Louisiana town. But it would be unfair to claim they threw the match that ignited the Jena Six case into a global blaze of hostility and misinformation. That distinction belongs to Alan Bean, a 54-year-old white, self-proclaimed Baptist minister from Tulia, Texas. “Do I know him?” was LaSalle Parish District Attorney Reed Walters’ sarcastic and dismissive response when I asked about Bean during a 45-minute interview. “People are reluctant to say it,” said Craig Franklin, editor of the Jena Times,...

At this point, there seems little doubt about the ugliness that has simmered, and then boiled, in a little town in Louisiana called Jena. There is a lot that has already been said, and done, about the latent racism in the town that led to the display of nooses on a tree. Racism that led, in reaction, to six black youths brutally beating a young white man, and then the subsequent disproportionate sentencing, in which those black youths could have served prison time for trumped-up murder charges. Action has been taken, and will be taken, so that those charges and...

JENA, La. (AP) - 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...

Only in today's political climate, where so much of the "civil rights movement" is comprised of bottom-feeding race hustlers and shameless liberals who deliberately exploit racial tensions for their own political benefit -- could anyone demean the real civil rights movement that occurred during the sixties by comparing the struggles those brave people faced -- to what has been happening in Jena, Louisiana. That may not be the impression most people have gotten at first glance, but that's because many of the facts about this story have been distorted to such a point that they have little to do with...

Supporters of a black teenager once charged with the attempted murder of a white classmate waited outside a courthouse for his release Thursday after a prosecutor confirmed he would not try him as an adult. Bail was set at $45,000 for Mychal Bell, one of the group known as the Jena Six, according to a spokeswoman for a local bail bonding service. Court officials would not release information on Bell's case since it is now a juvenile court matter. It was unclear when Bell, 17, was to be freed, but civil rights leader Al Sharpton and other supporters of the...

*** I do not question the sincerity or motivation of the 10,000 or more protesters who descended on Jena last week, after riding hundreds of miles on buses. But long before reaching our town of 3,000 people, they had decided that a miscarriage of justice was taking place here. Their anger at me was summed up by a woman who said, “If you can figure out how to make a schoolyard fight into an attempted murder charge, I’m sure you can figure out how to make stringing nooses into a hate crime.” That could be a compelling statement to someone...

Two unconnected events this week left no doubt of the failure of the people of the United States to hold our own in the arena of international public relations – in other words, the winning of hearts and minds in the Muslim world. Those in the Muslim world, at least the ones with access to some form of medium, must have watched in amazed amusement and disgust at the civil-rights field trips to Jena, La., and at the over-the-top protestations against the speech by Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad at a private university. “You want us to be like you, the...

9/25/2007 -- "What we saw here in Little Rock in the Fall of 1957 shocked us and changed us. Mothers and fathers across America saw in those nine children the vulnerability and promise of their own children. They saw in that hateful mob the ugliness of their own prejudices and fears. And they were forced to ask themselves: "Is that who I am? Is that who we are?" The brave men and women on this stage paid a high price for the answers to those questions. And we are all so grateful for their courage and their sacrifice. "Today, fifty...

We black Americans seem to need a major event or outrage every so often to revive our mass energies in ways that remind us of the 1960s civil rights movement. In the 1980s, we had mass arrests at the South African embassy to protest apartheid. In the 1990s, there was the Million Man March to redeem black fatherhood and proper role modeling. In 2007, we have the "Jena 6." Thousands flowed by the busload into tiny Jena, La., last week. They came to march on behalf of six black youths who were originally charged with attempted murder for allegedly beating...

If Bill Cosby walked up to Virginia Smith today, the Roanoke woman would affably extend her hand. Three years ago, Smith would have given him a piece of her mind. She was among blacks who condemned Cosby for calling out the black underclass for its troubling ranks of unwed mothers, absent fathers, disengaged parents, high school dropouts and prison convicts. Smith, 63, was outraged. The entertainment icon was being "uppity," she thought at the time. She stopped watching him on television afterward. "He didn't understand," Smith said last week, recalling her reaction. She was in the camp that believed Cosby's...

Let's assume the worst about Jena, and the charges of attempted murder brought against five black youths for beating a white student unconscious were motivated by the rank racism of the district attorney. That is certainly what the ever-expanding army of racial victimologists and their media enablers would have you believe. Hillary Clinton told the NAACP that "...the scales of justice are seriously out of balance when it comes to charging, sentencing, and punishing black Americans." Needless to say, the Reverends Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have vowed with biblical thunder to avenge the Jena innocents. The reason the black...

The reason that the black incarceration rate is the highest in the country is that blacks have the highest crime rate—by a long shot. Don’t trust the police, prosecutors, or judges to give a fair picture of black crime? Then go where the bodies are. Los Angeles is representative. In the first seven months of 2007, blacks in Los Angeles were murdered at a rate ten times that of whites and Asians. Who’s killing them? It’s not whites and Asians. While a minor proportion of the assailants of blacks are Hispanic, the vast majority are black themselves. Nationally, blacks commit...

In the unlikely event that an American soldier – by definition my hero – purposely shoots Iraqi civilians for no reason, I would want him to rot in jail for the rest of his life, just like anyone else would. If my own cousin robbed a store, I would want him prosecuted to the fullest extent possible, just like anyone else should be. But if six teenagers from my own race beat another teenager unconscious simply because he was taunting them, I would want them to roam the streets freely for the sole reason that they share my skin’s concentration...

Sept. 21: Melissa Bell leaves after a hearing for her son Mychal Bell, one of the Jena Six, at LaSalle Parish Courthouse in Jena, La. The FBI is reviewing a white supremacist Web site that purports to list the addresses of five of the six black teenagers accused of beating a white student in the small town of Jena and "essentially called for their lynching," an agency spokeswoman said. Sheila Thorne, an agent in the FBI's New Orleans office, said Saturday that authorities were reviewing whether the site breaks any federal laws. She said the FBI had "gathered intelligence...

As thousands of people rallied in Jena, La., for six black youths charged with assaulting a white classmate, the FBI was monitoring a neo-Nazi activist in Roanoke who posted their names and addresses on a Web site that proclaimed: "Lynch the Jena 6." William A. White also listed some of the defendants' telephone numbers, urging his readers to "Get in touch, and let them know justice is coming."[snip].......[snip] An FBI official said the agency is aware of White's posting. "The FBI reviews information provided for possible violations under our jurisdiction, and would seek a prosecutive opinion at the appropriate time,"...

Dr. Alveda King, Pastoral Associate of Priests for Life and niece of the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., commented today on the Jena Six case in Louisiana, where six African American high school students involved in a fight with white students have been charged with crimes that could send them to prison for decades. Critics of the prosecutions, citing racial segregation at the school and discriminatory prosecution of only the black students involved in the fight, are asking the Justice Department to investigate. "The call to investigate the Jena Six prosecutions is legitimate," said Dr. King. "There's clear evidence...

Dallas, Texas September 3rd, 2007 One of the most well respected National TV talk show hosts, Reuben Armstrong, is putting action behind his words. On September 20th, 2007 Reuben Armstrong and his producers, and thousands of loyal viewers will March on the Jena Courthouse to demand Justice for Mychal Bell, one of the African American teenagers awaiting sentence in the Jena 6 Case. Mychal Bell could receive up to 22 years in prison for what amounted to nothing more then a fist fight between an African American and Caucasian high school students. Armstrong and his production team will be in...

Last Updated: Thursday, 20 September 2007, 09:17 GMT 10:17 UK Bowie supports US race row teens Bowie said the donation was a "small gesture" David Bowie has made a $10,000 (£4,981) donation to a legal defence fund for six black teenagers charged with assault on a white student in the US. One of the teens, Mychal Bell, was found guilty of second degree battery in June by an all-white jury before the case was overturned by an appeal court.The court said Bell, 16 at the time of the alleged incident in December 2006, should not have been tried as an...

Civil rights groups hope to see tens of thousands of demonstrators descend on a small Louisiana town on Thursday to support six black teenagers charged over a high school fight in a case that activists say reeks of lingering racism in the U.S. South. Many African Americans say the case of the "Jena 6," which started when three nooses were found hanging from a tree at the school that white students considered only they could sit under, is evidence of bias against young black males in the judicial system. They say it shows discrimination in rural southern towns in the...

Deputies carry batons, shields, helmets and mace. Caddo Deputy Matt Perguson doesn't expect the rally to get out of control. "It's suppose to be a peaceful demonstration and I'm personally going down there with that mind set." Deputy James Burnnett is ready to take orders. "When we get there, we're going to do whatever La Salle Parish and Jena police, Louisiana State Police want us to do." The group expects the demonstration to be a non-violent one. If it does turn violent Deputy Pamela Buyers says the group will be ready. "We know each other. We know how we work....

So, let me get this straight. Some local yahoo, say, tags my car with racial epithets or something of that nature. It makes the news and angers black folks. Months later, a white man is beaten nearly to death by some black guys in a bar. Am I to believe that the reasonable upshot ought to be the media and a cadre of professional civil rights activists descending on the city and thousands marching in the streets justifying the beating because my car got tagged? Is that what I'm supposed to believe – and am I supposed to agree that...

A judge on Friday denied a request to release a teenager whose arrest in the beating of a white classmate sparked this week's civil rights protest in Louisiana. Mychal Bell's request to be freed while an appeal is being reviewed was rejected at a juvenile court hearing, effectively denying him any chance at immediate bail, a person familiar with the case told The Associated Press. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because juvenile court proceedings are closed. Earlier, Bell's mother emerged from the hearing in tears, refusing to comment. Bell, 17, was convicted of aggravated second-degree battery, which could...

Police are trying to figure out who hung at least four nooses at Andrews High School in High Point. High Point -- School leaders found and removed four nooses at Andrews High School in High Point Friday morning. Police and school leaders are looking for a fifth noose. Police don't know if it's connected to the Jena 6 incident in Louisiana. They think it could also be a prank from Asheboro High School. Andrews and Asheboro face off Friday night in football. Police are interviewing Andrews football players, students and faculty to try and develop leads. Students will be making...

ALEXANDRIA, Louisiana (CNN) -- Authorities in Alexandria, Louisiana, arrested two people after nooses were seen hanging from the back of a red pickup Thursday night, the city's mayor told CNN. A photograph taken by I-Reporter Casanova Love shows a noose hanging from a red pickup. Alexandria is less than an hour away from Jena, Louisiana, and was a staging area Thursday for protesters who went to the smaller town to demonstrate against the treatment of six black teens known as the "Jena 6" in racially charged incidents.

"But the reality is Thursday’s protests are just another sign that we remain deeply locked in denial about the path we need to travel today for true American liberation, equality and power in the new millennium. The fact that we waited to love Mychal Bell until after he’d thrown away a Division I football scholarship and nine months of his life is just as heinous as the grossly excessive attempted-murder charges that originally landed him in jail." Where was our compassion long before Bell got into this kind of trouble? That’s the question that needed to be asked in Jena...

Dear Rev Jackson, Good to see you back in the news, bro. I caught your new gig at the rally in Jena last night. Got to admit, I've been so busy studying (college is way hard) that I haven't had time to pay attention to the news. I turned up the volume once I saw you on TV, but I only caught the tail end of the segment. Question: What's the deal? The biased [white] media made it sound like six black guys piled onto one white guy and kicked the s*** out of him. Was he the guy that...

<p>August 30, 2006: During a Wednesday assembly of all males at Jena High School, many items were discussed concerning rules and policies of the school for the new school year. Such items included dress codes, etc. Near the end of the assembly, one black student jokingly asked Assistant Principal Gawen Burgess if black students were permitted to sit underneath the tree in the center of the square located in the center of the campus. The question evoked laughter from everyone at the meeting, including the black students, with Burgess responding, “Don´t even go there. You know you can sit anywhere you want.” Burgess and the rest of the students knew the remark was made to gain laughter as a joke, not as a serious question. A couple more jokes were also made (not about the tree) before the lighthearted assembly was dismissed.</p>

... After the decision, black students at Jena High gathered under the tree in protest. Fights between blacks and whites broke out for days, and the principal ultimately called an assembly in which Dist. Atty. Walters, flanked by armed police, addressed the school. "With a stroke of my pen, I can make your lives disappear," Walters said. In a court hearing where an attorney tried to have Walters removed from the beating case on grounds that he was biased, Walters, who is white, admitted making the statement. But he denied that he had been looking at black students when he...

The websites of CNN and USAToday joined their "Big Three" network brethren in covering the march in Jena, Louisiana to support the so-called Jena 6, while at the same time, either burying mention of the teenager who was beaten by the six high school students, or not mentioning him at all. CNN.com’s report, in which CNN correspondents Susan Roesgen, Tony Harris, Kyra Philips and Eliott McLaughlin were contributors, didn’t mention Justin Barker until the twenty-second paragraph of the story. The teens were initially charged with attempted murder after they allegedly knocked out Justin Barker -- a white classmate -- while stomping...

JENA, La. - Thousands of chanting demonstrators filled the streets of this little Louisiana town Thursday in support of six black teenagers initially charged with attempted murder in the beating of a white classmate. The crowd broke into chants of "Free the Jena Six" as the Rev. Al Sharpton arrived at the local courthouse with family members of the jailed teens. Sharpton told the Associated Press that he and Reps. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, and William Jefferson, D-La., will press the House Judiciary Committee next week to summon the district attorney to explain his actions before Congress....

NEW ORLEANS - A state appeals court on Friday threw out the only remaining conviction against one of the black teenagers accused in the beating of a white schoolmate in the racially tense north Louisiana town of Jena. Mychal Bell, 17, should not have been tried as an adult, the state 3rd Circuit Court of Appeal said in tossing his conviction on aggravated battery, for which he was to have been sentenced Thursday. He could have gotten 15 years in prison. His conspiracy conviction in the December beating of student Justin Barker was already thrown out by another court. Bell,...

JENA, La. - Two civil rights leaders urged Jena residents to demand equal justice, and one called for an investigation of the district attorney who is prosecuting six black teenagers charged with serious crimes in the beating of a white classmate. The Revs. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton both said Sunday they would join thousands of people expected in Jena on Sept. 20 to protest the teens' treatment. That is the day that one of the six, Mychal Bell, is to be sentenced on an aggravated second-degree battery conviction. Bell faces up to 15 years in prison. "After that, if...

The Fox News morning show just had on the Reverend Al Sharpton, who was apparently decrying the lack of attention being given to the Jena Six in Louisiana. As most of you know, I've written recently against what I believe is race exploitation by liberals like Amy Goodman at "Democracy Now!". I believe it to be exploitation when one side's plight is regarded as a travesty while ignoring other stories that have other people just as outraged. For that reason, I've always been careful when addressing race issues. The ones I address highlight a double standard, and for that, I...