VOICE OF DETROIT: The city's independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

Jim Casha (center) with mother Anna Casha at left and brother Jerry Casha at right Grand Rapids Press photo/Jon Brouwer

“It’s not just about the Kilpatrick administration”–Jim Casha

Tunnel Inspector battled Feikens, FBI, contractors, mayors, prosecutors, state, to stop nearly half-billion dollars in fraud, pollution linked to Rouge projects

By Diane Bukowski 

DETROIT – Tunnel Inspector Jim Casha lives in Canada now, but after more than a decade he is still waging a war to compensate Detroiters for what he says totals close to $1/2 billion in mismanagement, malfeasance, possible fraud and bid-rigging and environmental hazards perpetrated by the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department (DWSD) and it’s contractors since 1999.

He says that amount was wasted on two projects alone. Their simple purpose was to build a one-mile long rock tunnel near the City of Detroit Wastewater Treatment Plant on W. Jefferson, ironically under the land that scandal-ridden Synagro Technologies meant to acquire. The tunnel, mandated by federal regulations, was to take treated sewage to the Detroit River and eliminate the discharge of raw untreated sewage into the Rouge River.

(Both projects are described at http://dwsdupdate.blogspot.com/search/label/DRO2,  published by the construction law firm of Cavanaugh and Quesada, PLC.)

THE MONEY PIT: Shaft over flooded tunnel, located at W. Jefferson and Brennan, to the right, just before the Rouge Bridge. Wastewater Treatment Plant incinerator stacks are in the background. Casha said, “It is about 300 ft. deep. It was about 10-12 ft. lower before the flood but was raised to try and stop the water. They didn't raise it high enough so the water still flows over the shaft a little. The black staining on the concrete is due to the hydrogen sulfide. A cover could have then been placed over the water surface to stop the emission of the hydrogen sulfide gas and eliminate the 'rotten egg' odor.”

Despite huge expenditures, the tunnel, which the federal government required to be built to comply with its environmental regulations, was never completed. It flooded in 2003, which Casha said resulted from contractor malfeasance. The city terminated a second contract in 2009. Casha says its remnants are leaking poisonous hydrogen sulfide into the DelRay community.

To add insult to injury, a DWSD contact has reported that the second contractor recruited for the project asked the city for $150 million for terminating its contract, which Casha says was bid at three times what it should cost to complete the project. Although the contractor was contacted regarding the payment, its representative had not responded before press time and it is currently unknown if that amount was paid.

“I am sick that people have had their water shut off and have lost their homes because their water bills were attached to their tax bills,” Casha said.  “Meanwhile greedy contractors, politicians and managers have been wasting billions of dollars. Over the last 33 years of federal oversight, the revenue ‘wasted’ was enough to pay off the Water Department’s entire debt of over $5.4 billion. Detroit can and should provide water free to its residents who cannot afford to pay.”

Mary Shoemake and other protesters against water shut-offs at Michigan Welfare Right Organization action

Casha grew up on Detroit’s southwest side and went to Holy Redeemer grade and high schools and graduated from the University of Detroit with a degree in Civil Engineering .

His family took their religious heritage to heart, he said, bringing him up to be honest. Their dedication caused them to adopt two beloved brothers who were Detroit foster children and victims of fetal alcohol exposure (FAE), in addition to their six biological children. Casha said both adopted brothers ended up in prison because their brain disabilities precluded them from being properly educated. and the State does not adequately deal with this issue. They went to school in St. Clair Shores. 

Casha has never ceased a separate battle to free his brother Terry, who he says did not commit the crime he was convicted of. He has fought to make the nation aware of the effects of FAE and the need for increased revenue to address this problem, even walking from the Lansing, Michigan’s Capitol Building to Washington, D.C. to carry out that campaign.

Terry Casha as a youth

Terry Casha in prison MDOC photo

Casha said that Governor Jennifer Granholm and the state’s current legislators, as well as state officials over the last 30 years, have failed to deal properly with foster care, another battle he has taken up related to his brothers and thousands of others.

“Governor-elect Rick Snyder will have to act quickly to avert a federal takeover of the foster care system,” he recommended. See http://detnews.com/article/20101208/METRO/12080372

“We need dollars to deal with the effects of fetal alcohol exposure and to see so much money wasted or stolen on construction projects and mismanagement is a shame,” said Casha. “Fighting these two battles side by side has been an eye opener in the way the government works, or I should say – doesn’t work.”

Jay-Dee Contractors worker in tunnel (Photo from Jay-Dee website)

Ironically, his classmates at U of D included members of the DiPonio family. Tom DiPonio is President of Livonia-based Jay-Dee Contractors. Former State Police Director, and now U.S. Marshall, Pete Munoz was a close childhood friend and classmate at Holy Redeemer. Andrew Arena, current head of the Detroit office of the FBI also has ties to Southwest Detroit and Holy Redeemer. DiPonio, Munoz and Arena all played roles in the cast of characters Casha describes.

Jay- Dee was part of the joint venture of Traylor/Jay-Dee, the contractor on the failed DRO-2 project. Traylor Brothers from Evansville, Indiana, managed the project. 

Casha said the first tunnel project, Detroit River Outfall–2, contract PC-709, a $100 million venture, began in 1999 under the Archer administration. The contractor designed the grouting program, used to stop inflows of water into the tunnel, which failed. The tunnel flooded in 2003.

He said he observed the general contractor Traylor/Jay-Dee deliberately pumping “hundreds of thousands” of gallons of a very “thin slurry” of water and cement (commonly referred to as grout) into cracks in the rock walls instead of the proper thick concentrate which would have sealed the cracks. He added that the JV charged DWSD $250 a cubic foot (cf) for the useless slurry, when it actually cost only $2.50 per cf to mix. Even when you add in labor and equipment, he said, the unit cost is excessive. 

Atty. George Washington and Local 207 Pres. John Riehl announcing lawsuit against city over Synagro contract

“At the time, we tried and tried to get the engineers in the WaterDepartment to tell us what had happened, but we couldn’t get anyone to say anything,” said John Riehl, President of Local 207 0f the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME). That local represents hundreds of DWSD workers.

“What really happened on this project is Detroit’s ‘best kept secret’,” Casha said. “No one wants to talk about it. But if the new city and state administrations want to fix the problem, both with this project and DWSD in general, we need to talk about it. Contractor abuse and government malfeasance are widespread and there are ways to stop it.” 

Casha acted as an inspector for a subcontractor on the DRO-2 project.

Thomas Traylor, CEO Traylor Brothers

“It’s a common trick,” he said. “Bid low, get the job, then the general contractor has control of the grouting costs. They knew how to rape the City of Detroit and they did. They just wanted to increase the size of their bank account. I wrote about it every day on my reports for one and a half years. I complained so much I was just about to get fired, but the next day the tunnel failed; just before it got to Zug Island, it flooded, and it’s currently under 300 feet of water. All that money was wasted.

“This would have been the time to hold the contractor accountable.  It was their grouting program – they should have been required to fix it, or compensate the city. Instead, they turned the tables on an inept and/or corrupt city/DWSD management.”

After that, Casha said, the department was going to award an $85 million change order to the same contractors to redesign the project and raise the tunnel up, but the order was not awarded.

Instead, after five years, according to the Cavanaugh law firm, “On November 17, 2008, DWSD issued Notice to Proceed to Vinci/Frontier-Kemper JV for construction of the Modified Detroit River Outfall No. 2 (MOD DRO2) project (DWSD Contract PC-771). DRO-2 is a $299 million project and is intended to meet a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Permit requirement to construct and place into operation a second Detroit River outfall for discharge of treated municipal wastewater from the Detroit Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP).

Vinci/Frontier-Kemper employees gather around tunnel shaft in Brightwater Project near Seattle, 2007

. . . construction of [the] initial project was halted following a flood event during tunneling activities in April 2003. To date, the tunnel excavation remains flooded and the construction contract (PC-709) has since been terminated.”

Casha said Traylor/Jay-Dee had the “audacity” to try and bid again, but subsequently withdrew; leaving only two groups left bidding for the project.

“The tunneling business is a very small world,” he said. “Eventually one of those bidders ‘dropped out,’ and the sole bidder Vinci bid $299 million, which was 45 percent over the city engineer’s estimate. The bid should have been thrown in the garbage and an investigation conducted to see if the two contractors colluded.”

At this point, Casha said he was fed up.

“The design for the Modified DRO-2 was extreme, in part, based on the misinformation and alleged difficulties perpetrated by the first contractor. I was there and I know this tunnel could have been completed the same way two other water intake tunnels had been completed in similar conditions in the 30’s and 50’s, one just down the road in Wyandotte. This was blown way out of proportion.”

U. S. District Court Judge John Feikens

In 2003, shortly after the ‘flood’, he said he tried to contact U.S. District Court Judge John Feikens. Under a federal consent decree, Feikens oversaw Wastewater Treatment Plant compliance with federal environmental regulations for 33 years, from 1977 until his recent retirement at the age of 93 this November. (See coming story on “Uncharged Criminals Destroying DWSD.” for further info on Feikens.)

“He wouldn’t return my calls,” Casha said. “I couldn’t get through to his Special Master Tom Lewand, the day before Feikens resigned, either. What is the point of having someone overseeing the water department for 33 years if they’re going to let contractors get away with robbing the city blind?”

He said he also contacted the Detroit FBI office, headed by Andrew Arena, to no avail. He emailed and wrote then City Council President and soon to be Interim Mayor Kenneth Cockrel, Jr., and Councilman Kwame Kenyatta to tell them not to approve the contract, that it could be done a lot cheaper, but neither responded.

He said he went to the offices of Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy and State Attorney General Mike Cox without results

AG Mike Cox

Pros. Kym Worthy

“I eventually had to go to State Police Director Pete Munoz to get anyone to look at it – the same as I had to do with my brother’s case in Grand Rapids to get the Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) to do their job. This is not the way it should be. If law enforcement wants the cooperation of good citizens to stop crime and corruption they need to stop treating them like ‘crap’”, Casha said.

Anthony Adams, who was acting director of DWSD because Victor Mercado had just left in the waning days of the Kilpatrick administration, attended a City Council meeting trying to get approval for the project as well as another unrelated $300 million tunnel project, Casha said.

Former Water Dept. Director Victor Mercado

“The last thing Mercado did was get the Water Board to approve the contract and Anthony Adams went to the City Council to get that $300 million contract approved. Why? I was living in Virginia then, but I drove all the way to Detroit to testify against it at a hearing only to learn that even though it was on the agenda for that day, City Council, under Monica Conyers as President, had already approved it!”

He said Steven Chester, who at the time was head of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ), pushed the Council to approve the contract, even complaining to Feikens to get it passed, which Council finally did. Casha tried to get to Chester but was only able to convey his message to subordinates.

 “MDEQ was well aware of my concerns with both DRO-2 contracts,” Casha said.

Steve DiPonio

John DiPonio, CEO of Jay-Dee Construction, and the Traylor Brothers administration were contacted for comment on this article, but had not responded by press time. (DiPonio is the brother of Steven DiPonio of Corktown, currently facing charges for assaulting and dragging a neighborhood homeless man behind his truck on Oct. 6.)

Messages were also left with a Vinci/Frontier-Kemp official for comment, but he did not respond.

Feikens, who retired in November, was not available for comment, and Lewand’s office did not respond. Chester, who is now a lawyer in private practice, said he does not know anyone by the name of Jim Casha and referred the question back to the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment, as it is now known. Their representative Mary Dettloff said she would investigate the matter with their staff, but had not gotten back to the Voice of Detroit by press time.

Union and community protest against Kilpatrick, Mercado

Sandra Berchtold, spokesperson for the Detroit office of the FBI, said, “Information received from the public is forwarded to the appropriate squad for assessment.  For the specific questions about an investigation, DOJ/FBI policy is we cannot confirm [n]or deny the existence of an investigation. You can file a FOIA if you wish to see if there are records of a complaint or information on an investigation.”

The Voice of Detroit is filing such a request.

Worthy’s spokesperson Maria Miller said their policy is to refer all reports related to the “Kilpatrick investigation” to the federal government, while Cox’s office did not respond at all. Ironically, out-going Attorney General Mike Cox’s brother, Judge Sean Cox, has assumed Feikens’ duties.

Casha says, “This is not just related to the ‘Kilpatrick Administration’, this represents a total failure of city, state, federal as well as the county governments trying to wrestle control of DWSD from doing their duty to protect the public.”

Casha contacted several of the mayoral candidates, including sending a letter to Bing. Word must have gotten through to Mayor Dave Bing’s administration, because former DWSD Interim Director Pamela Turner canceled that project and another one unrelated to it shortly after Bing was elected.

The cancellation letter is at “DWSD Contract No. PC-771 Notice of Termination — March 30, 2009”.

That would be a good thing, Casha said, except for the fact that the contractors are now likely to get millions of dollars in compensation for termination of contract.

Hinshon Environmental Consulting authored the “Alternative Rouge River CSO [Combined Sewer Overflow] Program Executive Summary,” currently on the DWSD website. According to that report, a total of $1.2 billion in contracts for the Upper Rouge CSO Storage Tunnel, for $880 Million, and the New WWTP Outfall (DRO-2) for $400 million, both of which began construction in 2009, were terminated.

It is unclear if the additional $100 million Hinshon added to the DRO-2 contract includes compensation to Vinci/Frontier Kemp for its termination.

Detroit Wastewater Treatment Plant

More frightening is the fact that Hinshon charted an estimated $1.8 billion worth of similar projects on the drawing board over the next twenty years.  Casha said the practices which led to the flooding of the Rouge tunnel in 2003 and the possible bid-rigging in 2008 are common. Who will see to it that the city of Detroit is not raped again, if it indeed has any control left over its Water and Sewerage Department by that time?

“I could have saved (and still can) the DWSD ratepayers, both Detroit and suburban,  hundreds of millions of dollars had the people I contacted, including suburban officials, talked to me instead of thinking they know everything,” Casha said. “I feel for the people, especially the children, who lost their homes because of this and for all those who need help, like my brothers, who can’t get it because there is no money. Snyder needs to talk to me, along with the Rakoltas, if he wants to straighten out this mess.”  

Walbridge Aldinger CEO John Rakolta, a major city contractor, contributed the maximum amount to Snyder’s campaign. His daughter Lauren Rakolta, a Walbridge executive, worked for Snyder on the campaign. (See coming story for more on the Rakoltas and Walbridge’s connection to another large Water Department contract.)

“The solution is False Claims (Qui Tam) Legislation for all municipal, state and federal contracts,” Casha said.

Such legislation already exists at the federal level, and in some states, according to Wikipedia.

U. S. Pres. Abraham Lincoln

“The False Claims Act (31 U.S.C. § 3729–3733), also called the “Lincoln Law“) is an American federal law that allows people who are not affiliated with the government to file actions against federal contractors they accuse of committing claims fraud against the government. The act of filing such actions is informally called “whistleblowing.” Persons filing under the Act stand to receive a portion (usually about 15–25 percent) of any recovered damages .  .  .  . The government has recovered nearly $22 billion under the False Claims Act between 1987 .  .  .  and 2008. (http://www.taf.org/FCA-stats-DoJ-2008.pdf ).

Several states including California have versions of the False Claims Act. Michigan’s version currently is limited solely to the Medicaid program. The act is known as the Lincoln law because it was passed by Congress during U.S. President Abraham Lincoln’s administration on March 2, 1863, to counteract rampant contractor fraud related to military spending during the Civil War.

Mary and Erma on DTE picket line

“Do justly, love mercy and walk humbly in our God”

 

By Diane Bukowski

DETROIT – As Agnes Hitchcock put it. “It was Mary Shoemake herself and the life she lived that made her funeral service so wonderfully inspiring.”

The life-long activist and fighter for the people of Detroit was laid to rest after stirring eulogies at Cantrell Funeral Home Dec. 19. Though Mary appeared quiet and self-effacing during her lifetime, her profound impact on the struggle in this city was clear in the turn-out for the service.

Mary's special friend Erma Thomas and Agnes Hitchcock after funeral

Those who came to celebrate her life included everyone from prominent politicians to the leaders and members of Call ‘em Out, the Michigan Welfare Rights Organization, Keep the Vote No Takeover, UAW Local 6000, Hood Research, the NAACP, and the Voice of Detroit, as well as grass roots Detroiters.

Her beloved aunt Eva Woodford along with other family members and her special friend and fellow activist Erma Thomas listened to the eulogies with pride. (See entire funeral program on Memorials page.)

Helen Moore, leader of Keep the Vote No Takeover and a member of the Council of Elders, stepped out of that role to tell a little-known chapter of Mary’s life when both were state social workers and militant members of UAW Local 6000.

Mary supports striking UAW workers at American Axle

“Long years ago, we worked together,” said Elder Moore.  “I was a union steward. Mary and I with the others fought the state together over our building conditions and the racism there, and even though they were writing us up like crazy, we won. At one point, everybody at their desks began to sing spirituals, and Mary was singing louder than anyone. They had a meeting with us later to ask who had cut up the supervisors’ sweaters and coats. No one admitted it, but Mary had a sly grin on her face.”

Moore added, “It’s people like Mary that lead the whole battle just by standing there and keeping the focus, and telling us what to do.”

Mary's family members outside funeral homes

She said Mary and 31 other activists with Keep the Vote No Takeover have passed since the first state school takeover in 1999.

Agnes Hitchcock, steward of Call ‘em Out, addressed Mary’s family.

“Thank you for giving us the opportunity to see what was so wonderful about Mary,” Hitchcock said. “Mary was unselfish, she never complained, she was always thinking about other people. Even when she was in the nursing home and Jimmy Thornton was visiting her, she got worried about him and called Erma (Thomas) to have her check up on him, and it turned out he had passed away after seeing her. When I told her in the nursing home that the court had just ruled against [Detroit Public Schools czar] Robert Bobb, she just smiled and said, ‘It’s about time.”

MWRO leader Maureen Taylor leaves after servicew

Hitchcock said Mary was very proud of the Warrior Award that Call em Out presented to her.

“Our hearts are broken, because Mary fought for the end of the corporate class,” said Maureen Taylor of the Michigan Welfare Rights Organization. “Wherever there is resistance, you can always expect assistance from the women of our class like Mary, they are sister soldiers. She understand what the task was, and wherever she is now, I know that Jimmy Thornton, John Brown and our other fighters that went before her are greeting her.”

Pastor Jerome Poole of Messiah Baptist Church brought to mind what everyone remembered Mary for.

Mary marching with MWRO against water shut-offs

“She was a champion for the rights of the poor and oppressed,” he said, and she exemplified the biblical advice, ‘Do justly, love mercy and walk humbly in our God.’

Pastor Poole said he first met Mary when he showed up at the Call em out picket outside the Council of Baptist Pastors meeting.

“We were asking them, ‘Are you  bought and bossed and selling out for cash?’ What I remember Mary best for, though, is that white bucket. Mary wasn’t pushy, she was just determined. The first time I came to a meeting and she passed it around, I didn’t have any money. The second time, after she got through with everybody else, she brought the bucket to me and stood there and just looked. When I told her I had only five dollars to get home with, she said, ‘Put it in the bucket.’”

City Councilwoman JoAnn Watson presented the Spirit of Detroit award, signed by all Detroit councilmembers, to Mary’s family.

Gwen Gaines and Maude Willis of Call em Out after service

“Mary was a symbol for around the world,” Watson said. “She was a person who, when you spent time with her, she added value to your life. Beyond calamity lies invincibility if you go out and seize it.”

State Representative Coleman Young, Jr. presented an award from the Michigan House of Representatives. An award was also presented from the U.S. House of Representatives through U.S. Representative John Conyers.

“Mary left her footprint everywhere she fought for human rights and dignity,” said another award from Wayne County Clerk Cathy Garrett. “She was a precinct delegate for many years in the 14^th Congressional District, a community warrior driven to educate the community with the need for social awareness and involvement.”

(Anyone who wants copies of 23 photos taken at Mary’s funeral service emailed to them, please contact Diane Bukowski, diane_bukowski@hotmail.com. –underscore between first and last names.)

Former mayoral candidate Tom Barrow

From Tom Barrow

 On November 3rd of last year, the city conducted its general election for mayor at which 120,951 votes were cast.  Afterwards, we asked for a recount of 500 of the 600 precincts comprising 114,718 of the votes cast.  The recount revealed that of the 114,718 ballots we attempted to recount, 59,135 (54.5%) were tainted including 49,486 ballots which could not be recounted at all because the seals on their cases had been changed and were not the seals recorded by election night workers. (ed. note: that included ALL the absentee ballots.)

We all know well that election workers are often senior citizens who take take ENORMOUS pride in their jobs.  They wrote down the seal number that they themselves put on the case.  It is painfully obvious that the cases were entered after election night.  A change of only 9,692 ballots would have altered the outcome of the contest. 

Every objective and fair minded person should be angry and demand accountability as it is clear that only the passage of time it takes to now go to fight legally gives Mr. Bing a false appearance of legitimacy.  He was not elected!  The law is CLEAR and no winner could ever be valid when 54% of the votes can’t be recounted and are tainted.   

Jimmie Thornton (r), who has since passed, listens to Tom Barrow at Call em Out summer 2010 backyard picnic

Two judges in the circuit court recused themselves and did not want to touch this case.  It was a third judge, set to retire in July, who finally refused to allow us to file our complaint for Usurpation (writ of mandamus) as clearly allowed under the law.  The Court of Appeals also refused to allow US to proceed but laid out a road map for the next person.  No…..they are wrong…the system is protecting itself and I know what we saw at the recount when I got on my hand and knees and caught the fraud.  It is being hidden because it is so huge.

Accordingly, we have filed an Emergency Appeal  to the Michigan Supreme Court.  This Court has the option to hear or not hear the case so it up to them to intercede.  If what we discovered here had happened in someone else’s city,  the news media  and others would be all over this and there would be investigations galore…but it didn’t happen somewhere else,  it only happened in Detroit.

Go to the link below to read the facts given to the Supreme Court.  Share this email with your friends and tell your friends to do the same…the public has to know what happened or it will continue by the same official who has likely been doing it for a long time.  We as a city must demand answers and accountability for what is compelling evidence of electioneering .  Someone either sitting in the office or remotely is selecting our leadership and using the law to frustrate the truth.  I am only the messenger who uncovered the crime and has chosen to fight rather than lay down!

To read the facts, GO TO:

http://www.anewvisionfordetroit.com/pdf/12_20_2010_Facts_for_Application_for_%20Leave_to_Appeal.pdf

To obtain a copy of the entire appeal to the Michigan Supreme Court, email your request to glgarfield@aNewVisionForDetroit.com . 

Warmest personal regards,

Tom Barrow

VOD: The Michigan Supreme Court later denied Barrow leave to appeal. Ruling is at MSC denial of Barrow leave to appeal.

By Julia Rosenbaum, http://boldprogressives.org

BREAKING: Minutes ago, the FCC — led by Obama appointee Julius Genachowski — sold out Net Neutrality and the future of free speech online. The rules — written by Comcast and AT&T, the companies the FCC is supposed to regulate — broke Obama’s campaign promise¹ and allow corporate censorship. 

Read the 3 reasons why — then sign the petition protesting this action by going to this link:

http://act.boldprogressives.org/sign/sign_netneutrality_3things/?akid=3040.6887.R6pR04&rd=1&source=e1-nonetflix&t=3

1: Corporate censorship is allowed on your phone

The rules passed today by Obama FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski absurdly create different corporate censorship rules for wired and wireless Internet, allowing big corporations like Comcast to block websites they don’t like on your phone — a clear failure to fulfill Net Neutrality and put you, the consumer, in control of what you can and can’t do online.²

AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson

2: Online tollbooths are allowed, destroying innovation

The rules passed today would allow big Internet Service Providers like Verizon and Comcast to charge for access to the “fast lane.” Big companies that could afford to pay these fees like Google or Amazon would get their websites delivered to consumers quickly, while independent newspapers, bloggers, innovators, and small businesses would see their sites languish in the slow lane, destroying a level playing field for competition online and clearly violating Net Neutrality.³

3: The rules allow corporations to create “public” and “private” Internets, destroying the one Internet as we know it

Comcast CEO Brian Roberts

For the first time, these rules would embrace a “public Internet” for regular people vs. a “private Internet” with all the new innovations for corporations who pay more — ending the Internet as we know it and creating tiers of free speech and innovation, accessible only if you have pockets deep enough to pay off the corporations.⁴

The FCC could have reclassified and regulated these greedy corporations in an enforceable way, but instead, they sold out. This isn’t Net Neutrality, this is a historic mistake.

Sign to hold President Obama accountable to his promise — and then share with your friends!

Sources:

^{1:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/13/net-neutrality-obama-see_n_681695.html}

^{2, 3, 4: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/craig-aaron/the-fccs-guide-to-losing_b_795061.html}

Dr. Boyce Watkins

 Progress made, negotiations still underway, but national leadership should have done much more to support prisoners 

By Boyce Watkins, PhD on Dec 18th 2010 6:12PM

http://www.bvblackspin.com/2010/12/18/georgia-prison-strike-comes-to-an-end-but-its-not-over-yet/

The heroic prison strike that took place in Georgia this month has finally come to an end. Other than the inmates who are still holding out, most of the others have been released from the massive lock down and agreed to go back to work. Progress was made during the strike, and negotiations are still underway.

GA prisoners of all races pray together at Calhoun State Prison

I was scheduled to meet with Elaine Brown, one of the leaders of the movement last night. For some reason, we weren’t able to find her. But I’m sure that whatever she was doing was more important than talking to me. Tomorrow morning I’ll be speaking with Rev. Jesse Jackson on the matter, and then Monday, I speak with Rev. Al Sharpton. In fact, I’ll be speaking to everyone I know about this issue for as long as I possibly can.

One of the things that I believe, and I’m sure Elaine agrees, is that the strike was a significant step in getting the public to recognize the urgent need to reform our criminal justice system. It’s important for people to realize that supporting the human rights of prison inmates is not a matter of being soft on crime. Instead, it’s a matter of being intelligent about how systems operate so that those who are willing to rehabilitate themselves can return to their communities in a productive capacity. We cannot afford to keep throwing away every black child who makes a mistake.

Even though reports are stating that the strike is effectively over, the momentum created by the activities of these inmates cannot be understated. By coming together in such an amazing way, the individuals in the Georgia State correctional system have made a strong statement for human rights around the world. They have also taught us a few things about America, the prison system and ourselves. Here are a few lessons to ponder:

1) Prison inmates are not dumb and worthless human beings: The same brilliance that it took for the Georgia inmates to coordinate their protest, write public statements and become conscious of their human rights can be applied to nearly anything they try to do. Our society has been trained to believe that anyone who breaks the law is somehow worthless to society, but if that’s the case, then we can say the same thing about Oprah Winfrey, Martha Stewart, Martin Luther King and even Jesus. The truth is that while there are certainly inmates who deserve to be punished, the punishment should not be for life for most of the individuals who are convicted. By marginalizing prison inmates and not creating opportunities for them to add to our society, we are only throwing away potentially productive human capital and destroying families, making the problem worse and more expensive over time.

2) Prisons should be used to rehabilitate, not to make our society worse than it is: I’ve never understood the mindset of those who don’t feel that prison inmates deserve access to an education. Do you really want an uneducated, unemployed ex-convict living in your neighborhood or raising children who attend school with your child? I thought not. Giving inmates access to quality education gives them a choice of returning to a life of crime or doing something better. I can tell you with all sincerity that if I had no education, no job and no way of providing for my family, I’d be willing to consider all alternatives to get my children what they need. Instead, a little opportunity and divine intervention turned me into a college professor instead of a menace to society.

3) There should be additional oversight in the prison system: Prisons are like universities in that they are given the ability to operate without sufficient checks and balances on their behavior. As a result, many universities are among the last bastions of serious segregation in our society (my business school at Syracuse didn’t grant tenure to an African American in any department in over 100 years of existence), and prisons are also allowed to consistently violate the human rights of their inmates. As much as the United States criticizes nations like China for their human rights violations, consider this: China has only 3/4 as many of its citizens in prison relative to the United States (2.1 million to 1.6 million), and they have a population that is four times greater than our own. When it comes to violating the human rights of minorities and the poor, the United States has become a global leader.

4) The black community is being destroyed by our prisons: Nearly every black person I know has been affected by the prison system in one way or the other. If you haven’t been in the criminal justice system, you probably have a parent, brother or cousin who has. If that’s not the case, then you’ve possibly mentored or helped raise a child whose parent was incarcerated. Out of the 1.8 million African American men that live in the United States, nearly 200,000 of them are in state or federal prison, or in a local jail. According to a 2003 report by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, 32 percent of black males born in the year 2001 can expect to spend time in state or federal prison during their lifetime. This means that the little boy you’re raising right now has a prison bed already made out for him. Your daughter is going to try to find a husband and end up meeting several men who have interacted with this system. Therefore, it is not only in our incentive to teach our kids how to avoid these systems, we must also confront the systems themselves so that making a mistake at an early age does not lead to a death sentence on an individual’s entire future.

5) Black politicians and public figures must get involved: I wrote an article recently about how the Congressional Black Caucus was as quiet as a church mouse during the Georgia prison strike. While I get quite a few statements about the fabulous work they are doing for the Hispanic community (i.e. the DREAM Act), the war in Afghanistan, and much more, I don’t see much in terms of fighting for the human rights of prison inmates. I’d love to see black politicians stop acting as if ex-convicts are sub-human individuals who deserve to be raped and beaten, and start realizing that many of them (not all) are fractured souls who made bad choices at an early age. Also, as much as rappers love to bust rhymes about selling dope, going to prison and getting shot, leading hip hop artists should be issuing statements in support of the Georgia prison protest and offering to help.

Actor Wesley Snipes, imprisoned for political resistance to tax system

One of the reasons that the Nazis were able to execute so many Jews was because the good-hearted members of society were convinced that those being exterminated deserved their fates. By separating people into the “us” and “them” groups, the powers that be are able to slowly but surely eat away at civil liberties for us all. When Jesus was thrust upon the cross, many mistook legality for morality to believe that he must have been doing something wrong because he was being punished. But we must understand that applying the arbitrary label of “convict” onto someone does not imply that we have the right to disrespect ourselves, our society and our freedom by making that person into a slave. In fact, most of us are not as far away from this system as we’d like to believe, just ask Wesley Snipes.

Bradley Manning

Soldier in solitary confinement indefinitely, accused of aiding Wikileaks

By Dr. Publico

The American Tribune

The ideal version of justice is that, before the law, a person is innocent until proven guilty.  But for those of us who have any jail and prison experience, the reality is quite different. 

The current experience of Bradley Manning puts the lie to that idealism and, indeed, reveals the neo-liberals as little more than political stooges (or otherwise ineffectual before conservative corporate power). 

Bradley is the 22-yr-old soldier who is accused–but not charged–with supplying WikiLeaks with the secret documents being distributed around the world. 

He spent two months in a military jail in Kuwait, and has now been in the infamous Marine brig in Quantico, VA, for the past five months under extraordinary conditions. 

The fundamental concept of  innocent until proven guilty predates even the American republic and the US Constitution.  It comes to us from English jurisprudence and is considered as bedrock common law. 

The Constitution codifies the concept implicitly through several provisions, including the “right to remain silent,” and “the right to a jury.” 

 Jails in the US are used essentially for three basic reasons.  1. To hold persons deemed to be a direct predatory threat to the public, 2. to hold persons who are unable to raise their bail, and 3. to serve as prisons for those sentenced to terms under a year. 

However, again, reality intrudes.  Jails in fact are also used as the coercive means to induce “cooperation” with one’s prosecution and/or the prosecution of others.  Many of us, including myself, have had that experience. 

According to a Marine brig officer, Lt. Brian Villiard, Bradley Manning is confined in solitary for 23 hours a day, barred from exercising (and under 24-hour direct surveillance), denied a pillow or sheets, and denied any news. 

 As one who has undergone such experiences (albeit, not for that length of time), and as a doctor of psychology (PsyD), I’ll cite the Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law (JAAPL), “…psychological stressors such as isolation can be as clinically distressing as physical torture.” 

From a psych standpoint, the denial of exercise (being forbidden in your cell from pushups, knee-bends, etc.) is to enhance the effects of torture (i.e., the denial of sublimation).  Other than as punishment (for what? he’s been a model prisoner), it serves no other purpose. 

Given the young age of Manning, his imprisonment by Marine brig personnel, the open-ended commitment without charge, and the excessive conditions of his confinement, it should be expected that his condition is deteriorating, which Lt. Villiard admits.  Bradley is being given anti-depressants by medical personnel. 

Whatever the crimes that Manning may become charged with, clearly there is already a crime being committed:  All those who impose these conditions, along with all those in the chain-of-command, are criminals themselves and should be so charged, up to and including the Commander-in-Chief.  Let them argue the Constitutional merits… 

 Small wonder that, instead of pursuing the prosecution of the war criminals from the previous Administration, Obama & Co., are further incorporating those crimes into the current one. 

Under the conditions of Manning’s confinement, anything he may say is the fruit of torture and not worth warm spit…

To hear radio interview with Elaine Brown on Democracy NOW! go to

http://www.democracynow.org/seo/2010/12/14/prisoner_advocate_elaine_brown_on_georgia

To hear radio interview between Glen Ford, Elaine Brown and striking prisoner, go to

http://www.blackagendareport.com/?q=georgia_prison_strike_interview_update_dec15)

Bruce Dixon

Wed, 12/15/2010 – 04:50 — The Editors, Black Agenda Report

Georgia prisoners who began a courageous, peaceful and nonviolent protest strike for educational opportunities, wages for their work, medical care and human rights have captured the attention of the world. Black Agenda Report intends to closely cover their continuing story. Glen Ford recorded a conversation with activist Elaine Brown and one of the striking inmates in Georgia on Wednesday, December 15.

Story by Bruce A. Dixon, audio interview by Glen Ford

The historic strike of Georgia prisoners, demanding wages for their labor, educational opportunities, adequate health care and nutrition, and better conditions is entering a new phase. Strikers remain firm in their demands for full human rights, though after several days many have emerged from their cells, if only to take hot showers and hot food. Many of these, however, are still refusing their involuntary and unpaid work assignments.

A group that includes relatives, friends and a broad range of supporters of the prisoners on the outside has emerged. They are seeking to sit down with Georgia correctional officials this week to discuss how some of the just demands of inmates can begin to be implemented. Initially, Georgia-based representatives of this coalition supporting the prisoner demands included the Georgia NAACP, the Nation of Islam, the National Association for Radical Prison Reform, the Green Party of Georgia, and the Ordinary Peoples Society among others. Civil rights attorneys, ministers, community organizations and other prisoner advocates are also joining the group which calls itself the Concerned Coalition to Protect Prisoner Rights.

Prisoners have stood up for themselves, and the communities they came from are lining up to support them. Today, at a groundbreaking for a private prison 300 miles southeast of Atlanta in Millen GA, residents of that local community opposed to the private prison are greeting the governor and corrections brass with a protest. They will be joined by dozens more coming in from Atlanta who will respectfully urge state authorities to talk to the prisoners. We understand that one person there has been arrested. Black Agenda Report will have photos and footage of that event on Thursday.

The broad-based Concerned Coalition to Protect Prisoners Rights fully supports the heroic stand of Georgia’s prisoners. “This isn’t Attica,” one representative of the coalition explained. “No violent acts have been committed by any of the inmates involved. We hope state corrections officials will be as peaceful and respectful as the prisoners have been, and start a good faith dialog about quickly addressing their concerns.”

Prisoners in Georgia are conducting a peaceful protest; their supporters are calling on authorities not to turn it into another Attica Rebellion, during which law enforcement officials murdered and tortured hundreds of prisoners, including guards inside the complex; Attica was a symbol of resistance for a generation of prison activists.

Right now, the ball is in the hands of state corrections officials, and reports are that in some of the affected prisons, authorities are fumbling that ball, engaging

“They transferred some of the high Muslims here to max already,” one prisoner told Black Agenda Report this morning. “They want to break up the unity we have here. We have the Crips and the Bloods, we have the Muslims, we have the head Mexicans, and we have the Aryans all with a peaceful understanding, all on common ground. We all want to be paid for our work, and we all want education in here. There’s people in here who can’t even read…

“They’re trying to provoke people to violence in here, but we’re not letting that happen. We just want our human rights.”

The transfers are intended to deprive groups of leadership and demoralize them. In some cases they may be having the opposite effect, stiffening prisoner morale and making room for still more leaders to emerge.

“The prisoners insist that punitive transfers are an act of bad faith, the opposite of what we should be doing,” said Minister Charles Muhammad, of the Nation of Islam in Atlanta. “The coalition supports them and demands no punitive transfers, either within or between institutions, and absolutely no transfers to institutions outside Georgia.”

Members of the public should continue to call the prisons listed below, and the GA Department of Corrections and the office of Georgia’s governor, Sonny Perdue. Ask them firmly but respectfully to resolve the situation non-violently and without punitive measures. Tell them you believe prisoners deserve wages for work and education. Ask them to talk to prisoners and the communities they come from.

It’s simple. With one in twelve Georgia adults in jail or prison, parole or probation or other court and correctional supervision, prisoners are us. They are our families. They are our fathers and our mothers, our sons and daughters, our nieces and nephews and aunts and uncles and cousins. Most prisoners will be back out in society sooner, not later. It’s time for us all to grow up and realize that warehousing, malnourishing, mistreating and abusing prisoners does not make us safer. Denying prisoners meaningful training and educational opportunities, and forcing them to work for no wages is not the way to do.

It’s time to fundamentally reconsider prison as we know it, and America’s public policy of mass incarceration.

Bruce Dixon and Glen Ford are reachable at bruce.dixon@blackagendareport.com and glen.ford@blackagendareport.com, respectively. Black Agenda Report intends to provide ongoing coverage several times per week of the ongoing struggle of Georgia prisoners.

To read “Lockdown for Liberty,” the article on the prison strike by Charlene Muhammad in The Final Call, the Nation of Islam’s national newspaper, go to http://www.finalcall.com/artman/publish/National_News_2/article_7498.shtml.

People who had lost their homes to foreclosure, or have been battling banks over loan modification, and their supporters, including Alvivon Hurt, protest outside a Chase bank branch in downtown LA Dec. 16. Police arrested 22 protesters who blocked the doors to the bank in acts of civil disobedience. (AP Photo/Reed Saxon)

By JACOB ADELMAN, AP

Posted 12/16/2010 Silicon Valley Mercury News.com

LOS ANGELES—Police arrested 22 demonstrators who blocked entry to a downtown Chase bank branch Thursday to protest what they said were unfair home foreclosures.

The demonstrators, which included homeowners facing foreclosure, community advocates and labor leaders, silently allowed officers to bind their wrists behind their backs with plastic restraints and guide them into a police van.

Sitting in a makeshift living room, people who had lost their homes to foreclosure, or have been battling banks over loan modification, and their supporters, pray as they protest outside Chase in LA Dec. 16 AP Photo/Reed Saxon

Dozens more demonstrators chanted and marched on a nearby sidewalk holding signs that said “Stop Bank Greed, Save Our Neighborhoods” as the 12 men and 10 women were taken into custody.

Detective Gus Villanueva said there were no injuries to police or protesters. All the demonstrators were released by late afternoon after all but one of them received citations for trespassing, he said.

Villanueva did not immediately know why the one protester had not been cited.

Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment member David Mazariegos said the demonstrators hoped to bring attention to the plight of people who were unjustly losing their homes.

84-year-old Julia Boteo is led away under arrest during the protest at Chase in LA Dec. 16. Photo/Reed Saxon

He said banks’ failure to modify many borrowers’ loans puts them in violation of the Home Affordable Modification Program in which lenders agreed to participate as part of the bank bailout.

“The banks are not helping anyone stay in their homes,” Mazariegos said. “It’s highway robbery, what they’re doing to these people.”

ACCE director Amy Schur said the groups were singling out JPMorgan Chase & Co. because most of the borrowers whose foreclosures and evictions they are contesting are serviced by that bank.

Chase spokeswoman Eileen Leveckis disputed that the bank was denying help to distressed mortgage borrowers.

“Chase is committed to helping struggling borrowers remain in their homes,” she said in a statement, stressing that the lender had completed more than 250,000 modifications since early 2009.

Frank DeCaro is taken into custody during protest. AP Photo/Reed Saxon

Before the protesters blocked the doors leading to the Chase branch, homeowners at risk of losing their homes to foreclosure used a microphone to tell of their difficulties getting help from Chase and other banks.

Among them was Esperanza Casco, 47, who said her Long Beach home was foreclosed on even though she’d been making all the payments required under modification and forbearance deals worked out with Chase.

A Chase spokesman said in an Associated Press story last month that the bank gave Casco and her husband as many opportunities as it could to qualify for a modification, but that the couple was unable to do so.

The Cascos were scheduled to be evicted this month, but on Tuesday, Chase rescinded its eviction threat and offered them a new modification.

Fellow protesters awaiting their own arrests cheer as Javier Sarmiento is led away by police. AP Photo/Reed Saxon

Chase spokesman Tom Kelly on Thursday declined to detail why the bank changed its mind, saying only that it reviewed the case again “with updated financials” and was able to approve the modification.

But Esperanza Casco said the financial information they sent the bank most recently was identical to the paperwork they previously provided.

“They saw that we were putting pressure and the publicity we were getting. But this is not just about us,” she said in Spanish through an interpreter. “There’s lots of people facing the same situation we’re in.”

(Ed. note: Chase Bank is also the target of a national boycott initiated by the coalition People Before Banks, which includes the United Autoworkers, the Farm Labor Organizing Committee, and Detroit’s Moratorium NOW! Coalition against Foreclosures, Evictions and Utility Shut-offs. The group has been leafletting Chase banks throughout the metro area. To contact People Before Banks, email peoplebeforebanks@gmail.com, or call 313-319-0870.

Aiyana Jones Family photo

Show filmed Detroit police killing of 7-year-old child

By Diane Bukowski

DETROIT – “There were two people out there, a man and a lady, and they had videocameras and were filming while the police raided our home and killed my 7-year-old niece Aiyana,” LaKrystal Sanders said. “It was wrong. I begged them to stop filming, but they wouldn’t stop. They knew there were children in the house, there were toys all over the front yard. I asked them and the police for a warrant and they couldn’t come up with any.”

Aiyana's grandmother Mertilla Jones, who was sleeping with the child when Detroit police shot her to death, grieves with Aiyana's aunt LaKrystal Sanders at press conference in May (Photo by Diane Bukowski)

Aiyana Jones’ father Charles Jones, mother Dominika Stanley, and grandmother Mertilla Jones filed suit in federal court Dec. 14 against the A&E Television Network, the First 48 Television Show, and a contractor, who were filming a police raid on Aiyana’s home May 16. The suit asks for 10 types of monetary compensation, including “hedonic damages” related to the intangible value of life.  

Detroit police officer Joseph Weekley, at the time a regular “star” on the program, shot Aiyana in the head after he and a partner threw an incendiary “flash-bang” grenade through the front window of the family’s home without warning, according to the family’s attorney Geoffrey Fieger. Fieger filed suit against Weekley and an unnamed partner in May, in state court. That suit is currently ongoing.

The Jones home was located in a poor east-side Detroit neighborhood that is over 90 percent Black, with a 33 percent poverty rate according to 2000 US Census records. Weekley, who is white, lives in one of Detroit’s wealthiest suburbs, Grosse Pointe Park, according to court records. He has not been disciplined or charged, and is still active on the police force.

Detroit cop Joseph Weekley, a Grosse Pointe Park resident, aimed at and shot Aiyana through the head May 16, according to family's attorney

A&E Television Network (AETN), raked in $1.05 billion in revenue in 2005, according to Advertising Age, an industry publication, AETN is jointly owned by NBC Enterprises, which made $12.44 billion, Disney, which made $17.14 billion, and Hearst Enterprises.

The AETN suit, filed by Fieger’s firm, cites a written agreement between A&E’s contractor, Kirkstall Road Enterprises of New York City, with Detroit’s police chief at the time, Warren Evans.

“The Agreement gave Defendants unprecedented access to work with the Detroit Police Department and video tape and record, in the words of the Agreement, ‘an innovative and documentary experience.’ This ‘innovative’ experience ended up being the tragic and senseless death of Aiyana.”

The written agreement, attached to the lawsuit, provided no payment to the City of Detroit or its police department and reserved all ownership rights for the program to the producers.

Aiyana's father Charles Jones, attorney Geoffrey Fieger, mother Dominika Stanley, and grandmother Mertilla Jones at press conference shortly after child's murder Photo by Diane Bukowski

The suit adds, “Prior to the decision to illegally assault Aiyana’s home, there were discussions about the fact that television cameras would be present and the desire to create a ‘good show’ and/or to create ‘great video footage.’”

Sanders said she and her fiancée, Chauncey Owens, and many of her mother’s 18 grandchildren were outside the house all day. They saw what attorney Fieger later described as an undercover police vehicle watching their two-family flat.  

Aiyana, Charles and the grandmother Mertilla Jones, along with three younger children including an infant, lived downstairs from Stanley and Owens.

Police claimed they were looking for Owens on a murder warrant when they assaulted the building. But Sanders said police came to their door looking for “Chinaman,” Owens’ brother, who used to live there but had moved.

“When they knocked on my door, I let them in,” she said. “They had no reason to assault my mother and brother’s home and kill my little niece. And A&E had no reason to try to make my family look bad for something we didn’t do. If the police hadn’t been showing off for the cameras, my niece would still be alive.”

None of the defendants in the suit returned calls for comment.

For further information, contact the offices of Fieger, Fieger, Kenney, Johnson & Giroux at 1-248-355-5555.