Greetings!

I’ve created a new page just about the Jena 6 on our webpage, with ideas to take action. I invite you to forward this page to friends who don’t yet know about the Jena case or want to get involved. If you want to brainstorm with other activists about organizing local protests in your city in support of the Jena 6, the comment section on this page might be a good place to put out your ideas for events and locate other activists.

grace and peace,

Lydia Bean

https://friendsofjustice.wordpress.com/jena-6/

Jena 6

Have you heard about the Jena 6 and looking to take action? Here’s a quick overview on how to get involved with the Jena 6 cause, and with Friends of Justice, the grassroots organization that brought this case into the international spotlight.

Friends of Justice organizes in poor communities across Texas and Louisiana to hold our criminal justice system accountable to our nation’s highest values. This month, we brought international media attention to a dramatic trial in Jena, Louisiana, where a young black teenager was convicted of aggravated assault for a schoolyard fight. The fight was initiated by white students, who hung three nooses in a tree at the high school courtyard, to warn black students not to sit there. After this hate crime was dismissed as a harmless prank by the school administration, black students protested under the tree. The local District Attorney was called in to warn the black students that he could take their life away with the stroke of a pen. After authority figures refused to take a stand against racism, the noose incident led to a series of fights between white and black students. After these fights, only the black students were charged–with attempted murder. The prosecutor and the town have refused to back down in prosecuting these young men, or to admit that hanging nooses is a hate crime. You can read the full report of Friends of Justice here: Jena 6 summary

Are you scandalized that such a thing can happen in this day and age? Here are three ways to show your support for the Jena 6, the young men who sat under that “white only” shade tree, protested the nooses, and are now facing over twenty years in prison.

1. Support Friends of Justice as we continue our organizing for the Jena 6!

Friends of Justice organizes across Texas and Louisiana to generate media scandals around cases of abusive prosecution and civil rights violations in the criminal justice system. We were called by the families of the Jena 6 because we have a reputation for getting justice for cases like theirs.

You can designate your donation for the “Jena 6 Initiative”. Your money will go to our organizing in Jena, where our two big tasks right now are: 1. recruiting pro bono legal assistance, and 2. working nonstop with reporters and editors to get more news outlets to cover the Jena story.

You can donate securely on Paypal by following this link. Alternately, you can send a check to the following address:

Friends of Justice
3415 Ainsworth Court
Arlington, TX 76016
806-729-7889 or 817-457-0025

2. Sign up for Action Updates on the Friends of Justice blog

We post regular updates on Jena on our blog: https://friendsofjustice.wordpress.com/blog/

To sign up for Action Updates, click the link on the right margin of our website, and entering your email. You’ll get an email when we post to the blog and when we have opportunities to take action.

3. Organize a Protest in your City, and invite the media!

If you’re planning a Jena 6 protest in your city, post a comment on our website and we’ll publicize it on the blog. We recommend collaborating with an organization that can send a press release to your regional media outlets and contact reporters–this way, your protest will stoke them to cover the Jena 6 story if they haven’t already.

If you’d like to get diverse faith communities involved in the protest, you might try consulting various online directories and meetup sites for social justice religious groups. We recommend the Sojourners Faith & Justice directory, which gives contact information for congregations and individuals who care about justice: http://www.sojo.net/index.cfm?action=get_connected.directory

4. Write a Letter to the Editor of your local paper

Editors really sit up and take notice when people write in about a particular event! Writing a Letter to the Editor gets more people to read about the Jena 6, and it also lets the media know that this is something their readers really care about!

Thanks to everyone who has already taken action for the Jena 6 and donated to the work of Friends of Justice in Jena! And if you want to publicize an upcoming action on the behalf of the Jena 6, please post a comment to our blog and we’ll publicize it.

Do justice, walk humbly, love mercy.

Friends of Justice

Dear Friends:Friends of Justice (and Nancy and Alan Bean) are relocating to Arlington, TX this week to expand our work and our allies. We will be in transition for the next few days and will no longer have service at the email address: bean@cebridge.net. Please send your messages to the yahoo account: bean_alan@yahoo.com until we can get a new address.  Our new contact information is below.
Do Justice. Love Mercy. Walk Humbly.
Alan and Nancy Bean

Friends of Justice
3415 Ainsworth Court
Arlington, TX 76016
806-729-7889 or 817-457-0025

bean_alan@yahoo.com

http:/friendsofjustice.wordpress.com

Reading through the comments and questions on our site, I thought I should post a quick update. The usual suspects in the civil rights establishment have been contacted and there is considerable interest in this case. I am not at liberty to name names because the legal fight is complex and the central players prefer to remain anonymous for the time being. But please rest assured that some very influential and talented people are working on the legal strategy. All of the defendants now have qualified legal counsel and we are hoping to provide some top flight legal backup. Also, the national media (with CBS News taking the lead) has discovered the Jena story and you should see some major coverage by the end of July if not sooner. Media attention is crucial to the strategy Friends of Justice adopted in the wake of the infamous Tulia drug sting (see our homepage for more). The criminal justice system is thoroughly transformed when the world is paying attention. Finally, plans are in the works for a major event in support of the Jena 6. We will let you know more as the details solidify. Thank you all for your interest and support.

Alan Bean

Alice Woodward published this insightful piece on Jena in Counterpunch on July 10th.  Thanks, Counterpunch!  Y’all really understand the importance of grassroots organizing in this fight, and all of us grassroots organizers at Friends of Justice really appreciate that.
http://counterpunch.org/woodward07102007.html

Great show on Democracy Now on Jena!

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/07/10/1413220

Please consider supporting the work of Friends of Justice, and keep us organizing across Texas and Louisiana! You can donate securely on Paypal by following this link. Thanks to all those who have already given!

Sign up for Action Updates by clicking the link to the right of this post, and entering your email.  You’ll get an email when we post to the blog and when we have opportunities to take action!

Scott Henson writes kind words about FOJ on Grits for Breakfast:

http://gritsforbreakfast.blogspot.com/

Please support Friends of Justice and keep us organizing across Texas and Louisiana!   You can follow this Paypal link to donate securely.  Thanks to all who have given already!

Friends:

This story represents a major step forward. BlackAmericaWeb gets a million hits a day, so this gives our cause terrific exposure. Moreover, a number of critical issues emerge in this article that have not received adequate attention in the mainstream media. The media has the attention span of a two year-old, so we need to keep reaching out to bloggers, independent journalists and conventional print and television people. Keeping a story alive is a lot like stoking an old-time steam locomotive–you can never stop shovelling coal.

My comments were made via cellphone between Jena and Shreveport, and I had no idea I would be quoted directly. So, while my remarks are a bit rambling and imprecise, they are also spontaneous. I touch on some rather sensitive issues that I might have avoided had I realized that my words would end up in print–but that’s probably just as well. The advocacy community is simply not organized to respond effectively to cases like this and that needs to change–immediately!

Alan Bean
Friends of Justice

http:/friendsofjustice.wordpress.com 

3415 Ainsworth Court Arlington, TX 76016

mobile: 806-729-7889 

office: 817-457-0025

bean_alan@yahoo.com

____________________________________________________________________________________________________

http://www.blackamericaweb.com/site.aspx/bawnews/jenasix702

Supporters of Teens Convicted, Accused of Beating White Student Seeking Outside Assistance
Date: Monday, July 02, 2007
By: Sherrel Wheeler Stewart, BlackAmericaWeb.com
Family members and supporters of Mychal Bell, the first of the six black teenagers accused and convicted of beating a white student last December, are calling for outside help with legal representation.

“His court-appointed defense lawyer didn’t present a defense. He rested the case without challenging the prosecution’s story,” Alan Bean of the Texas-based Friends of Justice told BlackAmericaWeb.com. “He never said the young man was innocent. He only told the jury, ‘You should find him not guilty.’”

“It’s as if the lawyer who was appointed was appointed so he could just roll over. He is a black lawyer, but in this case, it didn’t make a difference,” Bean said. “We’ve contacted the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, the Southern Poverty Law Center and the NAACP, but unfortunately those organizations will not get involved until after a conviction.”

Bell and five other black teens are accused of beating Justin Barker, a white student, on Dec. 4, 2006. All students attended Jena High School in a Louisiana town of about 2,900, where only 15 percent of the residents are black.

They accused teens have been dubbed the Jena Six.
For months leading to up to the fight, there was a series of incidences in and around the Jena High School, including the hanging of three nooses in a tree after blacks asserted their rights to sit under it, an area which had been a gathering place for white students.

The students who hung the nooses were suspended from school for a few days, according to published reports.
“When white kids do something, they get a few days out of school. When our kids do something, it’s attempted murder,” said John Jenkins, whose son Carwin Jones, is one of the six accused.

Efforts to reach the LaSalle Parish District Attorney and the school superintendent were unsuccessful.
The 17-year-old Bell is now awaiting a July 31 sentencing on a conviction for aggravated second-degree battery and a conspiracy to commit aggravated second-degree battery. The conviction could carries a sentence of up to 20 years for Bell, who was a standout halfback on the high school’s football team and, as a junior in high school, had already captured the attention of college recruiters.

Bell was convicted by an all-white jury, and no black witnesses were called to testify, Bean said. One of the students, Theo Shaw, has remained in jail since December while his family tries to raise money for bond. The other students — Robert Bailey, Carwin Jones, Bryant Ray Purvis and another student who is unnamed because he still is a minor — await their fate.

Family, friends and supporters say the events leading to Bell’s arrest and conviction began unfolding last August.
On Aug. 31, some black students asked the vice principal at Jena High School if they could sit under a tree on the traditional white side of the square. The vice principal said they could sit wherever they chose, and they did.

The next day, three nooses — including two in the school’s colors one black, one gold — were found hanging from the tree.

On Sept. 6, black students staged a protest under the tree. The next day, police officers patrolled the halls at the school, and on Sept. 8, the school was placed on lockdown.

The school principal recommended expulsion of the three white youths who hung the nooses, but a school committee decided it was a silly prank and gave the boys a few days suspension.

Black parents went to the school board to complain, but the school board said the issue had been resolved.
On Nov. 30, the school’s main academic wing was destroyed by fire, and authorities suspect it was deliberately set.
In the days to follow, a black student was beaten by a white adult and white students when he attended a party with mostly whites, according to accounts. Also around that time, a white graduate of Jena High School pulled a pump-action shotgun on three black high school students as they left a local convenience store.

Several black students reported being taunted at school after those incidents.
On Dec. 4 after lunch, a white student and a black student got into a fight, and the white student, Justin Barker, was reportedly beaten by several black students as he lay on the floor.

There were just too many things that were not handled correctly with the trial, Bean said.
One of the white teens who testified against Bell was one of the youths suspended for hanging the noose, and a girl who testified was the daughter of one of the jurors, Bean said. There was a coach who had a statement that wasn’t introduced as evidence maintaining that Bell did not throw the first punch. And there were others, Bean said, who could have testified to the taunting.

“These are not thugs looking to hurt people,” he told BlackAmericaWeb.com. “We have got to get some help. You know what happens once these kids get into the system.”

National attention on the case grew over the weekend as word of Bell’s conviction spread.
In a news story aired Sunday on CNN, Bell’s parents and relatives of the other accused teens talked of racial tensions that have long divided their town. The parents of Justin Barker, the boy who was beaten, said they considered the beating of their son attempted murder. They said Justin’s medical bills were about $12,000.

However, in an interiew with BlackAmericaWeb.com, one of the parents questioned the seriousness of the injuries.
“We had been told he was in a coma, but about 6 p.m. that night, he was there at the ring ceremony where juniors get their class ring. When they called his name, he walked across the stage,” Jenkins said.

“This was a school yard fight. He was released from the hospital the same day,” he said.
Jenkins said his son received his high school diploma this spring, but was not allowed to march with his class. He’s working now on an oil rig while he awaits trial.

Jones said a private attorney will defend his son in court.

“We’re not going let a public defender do this,” he said.
Last week, Jenkins made several visits to the courtroom. “During these times, we have to try to support each other,” he said.

But Mychal Bell’s parents were not allowed in the court room during the trial.
“At the beginning of the trial, they placed a gag order on all the witnesses. We couldn’t be in the courtroom while the trial was going on, and we couldn’t talk to the press,” Mychal Bell’s father, Marcus Jones, told BlackAmericaWeb.com.

“His mother and I were never called as witnesses. The white kids parents were in there. We tried to tell them we needed to be in there to support our our son. We could only go in there between breaks,” Jones said.

Jones also took issue with the representation his son received in the trial. “Right now, we are just trying to raise some money so we can pay for a lawyer so we can appeal before he gets sentenced on July 31.”

Bell’s convictions comes after months of racial tension, observers say.
“The tension has been between the ‘redneck faction’ and the black male athletes,” said Bean, a white Baptist preacher who is devoting his ministry to helping poor people who are underepresented in legal issues.

“In Louisiana,” he said, “if you’re poor and black in a small town and screwed by the system, you are out of luck.”

This AP story on Jena has been picked up coast to coast, including leading Texas papers like the Houston Chronicle.

↑ Grab this Headline Animator

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/nation/4922831.html
June 26, 2007, 7:01PM
Charges reduced for student in La. fight

By MARY FOSTER Associated Press Writer
© 2007 The Associated Press

JENA, La. — An all-white jury was seated Tuesday to hear the case against the first of a group of black students accused of beating a white schoolmate amid escalating racial tensions at a central Louisiana high school.

Five women and a man are set to hear opening arguments Wednesday in the trial of 17-year-old Mychale Bell in LaSalle Parish, where the black population is only about 12 percent.

“I’m sure I can get a fair trial,” said Blane Williams, Bell’s defense lawyer. “You can’t tell me there aren’t six people in this town who won’t listen fairly and do the right thing. I think people have a tendency to do the right thing.”

Bell and four other black students faced up to 80 years if convicted of attempted murder and conspiracy to commit murder in the December beating, which occurred several months after three white students were suspended for hanging nooses from a schoolyard tree.

But the district attorney Monday reduced Bell’s charges to aggravated second-degree battery, which carries a sentence of up to 15 years, and conspiracy to commit aggravated second-degree battery, which carries a maximum sentence of 7 1/2 years.

“Well, anything is better than murder and a lifetime in prison,” said John Jenkins, whose son, Carwin Jones, is among the charged. “But it’s still strange. All of a sudden they’re talking about a weapon. What weapon? We never heard anything about a weapon before.”

Aggravated second-degree battery involves use of a dangerous weapon, according to state statutes. Parents of the accused say they had heard no previous mention of a weapon.

But attorneys on both sides, during questioning of jurors, indicated prosecutors will try to say that something not usually thought of as a weapon — such as a ring or an ink pen — could be considered a dangerous weapon during a fight.

There was no word whether the charges would be reduced for the other defendants, who will be tried later. Prosecutors refused to discuss the case.

The five defendants and a juvenile, whose identity and charges were not released because of his age, were dubbed the “Jena Six” by supporters who say the attempted murder charges resulted from racism by authorities and were out of proportion to the seriousness of the alleged crime.

The racial tension began in August in Jena — a town of 2,900 with about 350 black residents — after a black student sat under a tree traditionally used as a gathering spot by white students. The next month, three nooses were hanging in the tree when students arrived on campus.

“You didn’t see the district attorney rush out to school to do anything about those nooses in the tree,” said Caseptla Bailey, whose son, Robert Bailey Jr., also was charged in the beating. “You don’t see white kids who beat up black kids charged with attempted murder.

“There’s nothing fair going on here.”

The school’s principal recommended the students who hung the nooses be expelled, but they served brief suspensions instead.

On Dec. 4, Justin Barker, who is white, was attacked at school by a small group of black students. He was treated at a hospital.

“I saw him that night at school for the ring ceremony,” Jenkins said. “I could tell he had been beat up, his face was bruised, but he was out and about, so he couldn’t have been too bad.”

David Barker, Justin’s father, declined comment Tuesday during a break in the trial. “There are two sides to every story. There are two sides to this one. But I just don’t want to talk about our side now,” he said.

Theodore Shaw also had been scheduled to go to trial this week, but his case was delayed. Trial dates for the others — Bryant Purvis, Bailey, Jones and the unidentified juvenile — have not been set. Shaw and Bell have been held since their arrests, unable to post $90,000 bond.