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Thread 7002

Thread ID: 7002 | Posts: 4 | Started: 2003-05-30

Maximillian [OP]

2003-05-30 17:37 | User Profile

**

[url=http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/ny-uslync253300542may25,0,1561471.story?coll=ny-nationalnews-headlines]http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/na...lnews-headlines[/url]

Blacks Now Face Anti-Lynch Law They are charged more than whites in S.C.

By Allen G. Breed THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

May 25, 2003

Jenkinsville, S.C. - From the time his son was old enough to understand, Kamau Marcharia has been telling Ramon the story of an ancestor tied to the bumper of a Model T Ford and dragged to his death. Lynching is part of the Southern heritage.

But Marcharia was not prepared for the call that came three years ago when Ramon and three other black boys got into a fight with a white boy at middle school and were summoned to court - to answer charges of lynching.

"I was outraged," the veteran civil rights activist said. "See, a 13-year-old fighting because somebody either pushed him or punched him is not lynching. ... When I hear that term, psychologically I cannot get that out of my mind, the picture of some horrible event."

South Carolina's lynching law was enacted to end the state's history of white vigilante justice against blacks. But that law has borne strange fruit.

Today in South Carolina, blacks are most often charged with lynching - defined in the statute as any act of violence by two or more people against another, regardless of race.

Though they make up just 30 percent of the state's population, blacks account for 63 percent of the lynching charges, according to an Associated Press analysis of crime statistics. Blacks are charged with lynching at 4 1/2 times the rate for whites, out of proportion to their representation in the population.

Prosecutors and police argue there is no racial profiling, noting that blacks are charged with other violent crimes more than whites. Trey Walker, a spokesman for state Attorney General Henry McMaster, said the law does not mention race and he contended there was nothing racial about its application.

But it's the use of the word "lynching" that trips Marcharia and others. For many, the term "lynching" conjures specific images - of black men, accused of some real or perceived crime, seized by torch-carrying white mobs, strung up from trees and mutilated.

When South Carolina's legislature passed the law in 1951, it was responding to the highly publicized murder of Willie Earle, who was dragged out of jail by a white mob and gunned down in retaliation for the death of a cabbie.

It was in Greenville County that Earle's slaying occurred, and that is where the statute is invoked most. Between 1998 and 2002, 446 county residents were charged with lynching. Blacks make up 18 percent of the county's population; they comprised 47 percent of defendants whose race was specified.

At the other end of the state lies Charleston County, which charges more blacks with lynching than any other county - 271 in the past five years. That county is 34 percent black; blacks accounted for 69 percent of those charged.

Of nearly 4,000 adults charged with lynching since 1998, only 136 have been convicted. Most charges are amended to assault or dismissed . But two-thirds of those convicted were blacks.

During the same five-year period, nearly 1,400 juvenile lynching charges were filed statewide; it was unclear how many ended up in adult court. Still, the statistics suggest the racial gap among minors is even wider than for adults. In 2002, 231 black youths were charged with lynching - more than 10 times the number of white juveniles.

"It's ironic at least," said William Gravely, a University of Denver history professor who was a 7-year-old in Greenville County when Earle was lynched. "In one sense it's a kind of denial of the large historical record going back to the late 19th century."

"There's an attempt to minimize the seriousness which the word 'lynching' carries with it," said Tom Broadwater, who used to practice law in the state.

Of course, some charges under South Carolina's lynch law have involved brutal attacks, and the penalties for convictions are stiff - up to 40 years for first-degree lynching, involving a death, and 20 years for second-degree. (The statute does allow for the death penalty in first-degree cases.)

In 1996, a white couple in Clarendon County were charged with lynching after tying a 9-year-old black boy to a tree, shooting a gun past his head, beating him, and tying a belt around his neck until he passed out. They were convicted of aggravated assault and served less than 2 years.

Three years later in North Charleston, several black high school students were arrested on lynching charges after a 35-year-old white man was beaten into a coma. One of the attackers was allegedly heard saying: "Yeah, we're going to get us a white boy." Six pleaded guilty and were sentenced to 20 years in prison. Copyright ÃÂ© 2003, Newsday, Inc. **

N.B. Forrest

2003-05-31 02:14 | User Profile

Jenkinsville, S.C. - From the time his son was old enough to understand, Kamau Marcharia has been telling Ramon the story of an ancestor tied to the bumper of a Model T Ford and dragged to his death. Lynching is part of the Southern heritage.

This tick sets the tone right off the bat, eh?

Denial? What denial?

"There's an attempt to minimize the seriousness which the word 'lynching' carries with it," said Tom Broadwater, who used to practice law in the state.

Yes, calling it a lynching when a group of understandably outraged African-Americans kills a mere "white boy" is simply unconscionable! How dare those redneck scum accuse their historic victims of the same sort of brutality inflicted on them every hour of every day for 400 years!

:gun: :hit: :gun:

Faust

2003-05-31 19:42 | User Profile

N.B. Forrest,

"Lynching is part of the Southern heritage." Is that a bad thing? Blacks kill more Blacks in month, than Whites in did 50 years of lynching.

My thread on the same subject.

"anti-lynching law now used mostly against blacks" [url=http://forum.originaldissent.com/index.php?act=ST&f=12&t=7928]http://forum.originaldissent.com/index.php...=ST&f=12&t=7928[/url]

Eendracht Maakt Mag

2003-05-31 22:04 | User Profile

Of course, the irony of the fact, that this law, like so many others, originally designed to put Congoids above the law and give them special privileges is backfiring, will in short time be twisted into another story of "white racism" by the media.