Wakanda’s king T’Challa

Margaret Kimberley,

BAR editor and senior columnist

 March 7, 2018 

Eric Killmonger

VOD editor note: VOD earlier published a stock Vanity Fair review of this movie, but I didn’t see it until afterwards. I wish I had, because although I enjoyed the movie itself, I grieved for the death of T’Challa’s young cousin from California, Eric Killmonger, who believed that Wakanda’s resources of vibranium and technology should be spread across the world to his people through armed struggle. As he said, he preferred to die as did his ancestors on the slaveships rather than be taken prisoner.

In the end, T’Challa speaks in front of a United Nations-style forum to call on all nations to join together peacefully with the aid of Wakanda’s technology. Whether that is possible is highly unlikely. What would this murderous U.S. superpower do if it got its hands on vibranium? Same thing it did in Libya, under a Black president, by destroying a country that wanted self-determination for the African continent, and by viciously assassinating its heroic leader, Muammar Gaddafi. As Hilary Clinton gloated, “We came, we saw, he died.”

 “Questioners are ‘hoteps’ who are too woke to have fun.”

South African President Nelson Mandela and Libyan Pres. Muammar Gadhafi after first U.S. bombing in 1987; Hillary Clinton later gave the orders to assassinate Gadhafi in second wave of US/NATO annihilation of Libya.

The desire to see a black face in a high place is a legacy of slavery and the century of Jim Crow segregation that followed. The psychological impact of America’s apartheid is enduring, and unlikely to end without true revolutionary change.

Black people are loath to do anything that might dim the luster that emanates when one of the group becomes rich, famous or successful in some realm that was hitherto off limits. Celebrities, athletes, CEOs and presidents are exempt from question or critique and are protected by millions of people who feel affirmation through their presence.

Anyone who grew up in the 1950s or 1960s can recall when the sight of a black person on television was cause for celebration. The words “There’s a colored person on television,” were like magic. It isn’t difficult to understand why this would be the case. Black people were either absent from mass media altogether or were demeaned and demonized on the rare occasions when their existence was acknowledged.

“A CIA agent is depicted as being an ally to an African nation.”

Black Panther’s CIA agent.

In light of this sad history it is not surprising that the recently released Black Panther film has been such a huge commercial success and emotional touchstone. But the story line is problematic for politically conscious people. Among other things, a CIA agent is depicted as being an ally to an African nation. That plot point alone is questionable.

But any attempt to dissect the plot, discuss its political implications or do anything other than sit in rapt awe is met with contempt and even anger. The Black Agenda Report team is accustomed to the epithet “hater” being applied to any analysis of the black and successful. This time a movie, not even a person, stands in for millions of people and their desire for validation.

The release of this film was anticipated for months. Audiences immediately raced to theaters to ensure they missed nothing before plot spoilers ruined their experience. Some dressed up like characters or wore Afrocentric clothing. The cry went out, “There are colored people on screen!”

This columnist experienced personal blowback from a group who had not even seen the film. After informing them that there was some controversy about it I was immediately met with anger. I was reminded that the black actors and designers and producers and directors and make-up artists were all experiencing great success. I was also informed that advanced African societies did exist. I had not said otherwise but now the fictional land of Wakanda represents Egypt and Zimbabwe and Meroe and Ethiopia and any questions surrounding the fictional nation are now said to reflect on the real ones.

“This time a movie, not even a person, stands in for millions of people and their desire for validation.”

At least one Black Agenda Report reader felt compelled to warn against “picking each other apart.” Others point out it is just a movie and ask why we are opposed to entertainment. Questioners are “hoteps” who are too woke to have fun.

There are even some who decry purchasing bootleg copies of the movie. Millions of people who purchase counterfeit movies now refuse to do so lest the Disney corporation lose a few dollars and stop putting black people on screen. No one should care about their bottom line but millions of people do now because there is a new black face on high.

There are always serious issues surrounding imagery in media. If nothing else, Black Panther exposes the truth of Hollywood’s product. This movie is just one of 18 that are based on Marvel comics characters. Black Panther defenders rightly point out that they have already paid to see characters like Iron Man, a defense contractor, or Captain America, a creation of the military industrial complex, or Thor, a deity who is white and blonde. Do the politically conscious eschew these movies altogether or are they only problematic when black people are included in the dubious politics of fantasy action movies?

“Millions of people who purchase counterfeit movies now refuse to do so lest the Disney corp. lose a few dollars and stop putting black people on screen.”

The reaction to the Black Panther movie is understandable given the overall production quality of the film, and the attractiveness of the setting and the characters. But the lack of political education amongst ourselves is the bigger issue here. Without that the desire for justice and inclusion can be reduced to seeing people who look like us. We may ignore a problematic political message in a film or even worse support a president who destroyed the advanced African nation of Libya. That real life villain was a black face in a high place too.

Patrice Lumumba, revolutionary leader of the Congo, murdered by CIA.

Corporate produced entertainment is just one part of a corrupt system that tells us up is down and bad is good. We can’t separate our movie going experience from anything else. There are very few Americans of any race who know that Patrice Lumumba was assassinated with the help of the CIA. There are few Americans who know his name at all and therein lies the biggest problem.

We can’t stand on historical truth that we don’t know. We can’t decide when to succumb to the desire to have fun and when to ask hard questions if we don’t engage in serious political study first. The liberation movement was crushed two generations ago precisely because the masses questioned everything they had been taught to accept.

“There is no such thing as just entertainment.”

It is natural to want to see ourselves. It is beneficial to the psyche and the words “Wakanda forever!” are proof. But this limited experience can’t substitute for what we need, even in the context of wanting to have fun. In an ideal world black people wouldn’t depend on Disney at all. But we don’t own the means of production and we are left with whatever the corporate markets dictate.

Black Panther is not as defenders say, “Just a movie.” If it were there would not be so much discussion surrounding it and fans would not be so excited. There is no such thing as just entertainment. It is quite political but the politics won’t be good if that fact isn’t acknowledged. Perhaps we do need to reject most of the media we can access. That is a thorny issue and it is not for the faint of heart. And the people who pose the question should not be dismissed as haters because they dare to speak the words.

Margaret Kimberley’s Freedom Rider column appears weekly in BAR, and is widely reprinted elsewhere. She maintains a frequently updated blog as well at http://freedomrider.blogspot.com . Ms. Kimberley lives in New York City, and can be reached via e-Mail at Margaret.Kimberley@BlackAgendaReport.com

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MARVEL STUDIO’S ‘BLACK PANTHER,’ LIBYAN HERO MUAMMAR GADDAFI, U.S. BLACK PANTHERS

Harriet Tubman is depicted in Underground Railroad sculpture by Ed Dwight in Battle Creek, MI

By Eddy “Precise” Lamarre  | 

March 10, 2018 10:59 AM EST

HARRIET TUBMAN

Harriet Tubman walked thousands of Black people out of slavery into freedom. She is truly the greatest freedom fighter to have ever lived. The idea of Harriet Tubman still inspires and motivates to this day. GirlTrek, a national public health nonprofit and movement, is honoring Harriet Tubman with an epic 100-mile trek from the Eastern Shore of Maryland crossing the Mason-Dixon Line into Delaware also known as the Underground Railroad.

This trek is known as “Harriet’s Great Escape” and culminates today, March 10, 2018, on Harriet Tubman’s birthday.

Ten Black women from across the nation set out on March 5, 2018, for this freedom walk. Slavery may not be the main issue these days but freedom from disease, stress, and depression are reason enough to bring awareness to what GirlTrek is accomplishing.

“Now, it is even more important that GirlTrek works to re-establish walking as a healing tradition. We believe that, as women, we are going to have to also liberate, one, ourselves and then come back and be examples and liberate our family. And one of the things we say is that, if Harriet Tubman could walk herself to freedom, we can certainly walk ourselves to better health,” said Vanessa Garrison, co-founder of GirlTrek.

Ten Black women who walked 100 miles to commemorate Harriet Tubman. Photo: Facebook–LeNiece Woods

When we talk about superpowers many times they seem intangible or just out of reach; however, when we take stock of the strength and wherewithal that exists in the DNA of Black women, we have to salute and honor it.

“We realized that we can’t just talk the talk. We will show and prove that 2018 is about radical courage and unshakable sisterhood. We’re walking the Underground Railroad. To reach 1 million Black women by 2020, we knew we needed to be even bolder and hold this unprecedented trek. Harriet Tubman saved her own life first and then went back time after time to save the lives of others giving us the blueprint for the work GirlTrek does today. This is radical self-care at its core,” says GirlTrek co-founder, T. Morgan Dixon.

Today we honor the legacy of Harriet Tubman and support the 10 women who have taken on this great task of this 100-mile walk to freedom. They truly are our superheroes.

BALTIMORE PARK WHERE CONFEDERATE STATUE ONCE STOOD IS REDEDICATED TO HARRIET TUBMAN

Baltimore, MD–3/10/18–A portion of Wyman Park Dell was renamed “Harriet Tubman Grove, ” honoring Maryland native Harriet Tubman, an American hero and celebrated “conductor” on the Underground Railroad. The ceremony was held on the 105th anniversary of her death. At left, Council Member for District 14, Mary Pat Clarke addresses a large crowd. At right is Duane “Shorty” Davis, a founding member of Baltimore Bloc displaying a Harriet Tubman t-shirt he’s wearing. Algerina Perna/Baltimore Sun Staff.

Baltimore Sun

By Kevin Rector 

March 10, 2018

Baltimore, MD–A portion of Wyman Park Dell was renamed “Harriet Tubman Grove, ” honoring Maryland native Harriet Tubman, an American hero and celebrated “conductor” on the Underground Railroad. The ceremony was held on the 105th anniversary of her death. At left, Council Member for District 14, Mary Pat Clarke addresses a large crowd. At right is Duane “Shorty” Davis, a founding member of Baltimore Bloc displaying a Harriet Tubman t-shirt he’s wearing. Algerina Perna/Baltimore Sun Staff.

More than 200 local residents and elected leaders gathered in a tree-lined corner of Baltimore on Saturday to rededicate the space, which had long venerated two Confederate generals, to the famed abolitionist and Underground Railroad conductor Harriet Tubman.

“We stand on the shoulders of this great woman,” said Ernestine Jones-Williams, 71, a Baltimore County resident and a descendant of Tubman who spoke on behalf of the family. “We are overwhelmed. Overwhelmed. Thank you, and God bless you.”

The ceremony in Wyman Park Dell, on the 105th anniversary of Tubman’s death, took place feet from the now-empty pedestal of a large, bronze, double-equestrian statue of Confederate Gens. Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson.

Marvin “Doc” Cheatham demands action on Baltimore police war against the Black community.

The statue had stood in the park since 1948, but was removed in August amid a national reckoning with Confederate symbolism and monuments.

That reckoning began in large part in 2015, after white supremacist Dylann Roof shot nine African-Americans to death in a church in Charleston, S.C. It grew in August after a white supremacist rally to protest the planned removal of a statue of Lee in Charlottesville, Va., led to the death of a counter-protester after a neo-Nazi sympathizer allegedly drove into a crowd.

Mayor Catherine Pugh’s administration removed four Baltimore monuments with ties to the Confederacy — the Lee-Jackson monument, a monument to Chief Justice Roger B. Taney at Mount Vernon Place, the Confederate Soldiers and Sailors Monument on Mount Royal Avenue and the Confederate Women’s Monument on West University Parkway — days after the Charlottesville rally in an unannounced, overnight operation, citing “safety and security” concerns.

At the event Saturday, city officials and local residents acknowledged the events in Charleston and Charlottesville, but largely focused on more local efforts to have Baltimore’s statues removed, including a grass-roots petition drive.

They said the removal of the statues has embued the spaces where they once stood — like the Harriet Tubman Grove — with their own symbolic power.

Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh

“Since the removal of the Lee-Jackson statue, this park has become a gathering place for city residents of all backgrounds to meet, talk and enjoy the location as a space that symbolizes hope and positive change,” said Ciara Harris, a Baltimore Department of Recreation and Parks official. “Harriet Tubman Grove will provide the city an opportunity to correct historic injustice to a Maryland native. Our city is properly recognizing an African-American hero.”

City Councilwoman Mary Pat Clarke called Tubman, who was born a slave on Maryland’s Eastern Shore but went on to lead many other enslaved people to freedom along the Underground Railroad, a “heroine and beacon for all ages.”

Marvin “Doc” Cheatham, a longtime civil rights leader who has been working to get Tubman recognized in more official ways across the city for years, thanked the community for its work in renaming the grove.

“You did what needed to be done to say, ‘Yes, we need to move on,’ ” he said.

Jackson Gilman-Forlini, 28, of Abell, who is studying how society re-contextualizes monuments and memorials over time as part of a master’s degree in historic preservation at Goucher College — and who served on the task force formed by Pugh last year to study the removal of the city’s Confederate monuments — said the rededication was a great thing for the city.

“Monuments are seen as permanent, sort of monolithic structures, but inherently their meanings change over time, and really the removal of these monuments was not so much about monuments in general, but about the kind of values that we as a society want to promote,” Gilman-Forlini said. “This is now the next logical step in the process of asserting those values, those positive values of inclusion, of tolerance, of speaking out against prejudice.

“These kind of gatherings in many ways are much more powerful than new monuments may necessarily be, because these are about community action and about the experience of the individual working in a community to assert positive values,” he said. “In that way I think this is really the best thing that we could be doing right now as a means of healing past injustices.”

krector@baltsun.com

Detroit’s Underground Railroad monument stands on the banks of the Detroit River, commemorating those who escaped slavery by crossing into Canada.

Gwen Mingo relaxes on the porch of her classic Brush Park home in better days.

By Ron Seigel

February 25, 2018

 In her speech after receiving a  Golden Globe Award,  TV personality Oprah Winfrey expressed gratitude to “all the women, who have endured years of abuse, whose names we’ll never know.”

Gwen Mingo (r) talks with Jimmy Cole at Call ’em Out Black History Month Dinner Feb. 2010

On February 20, during Black History Month,  a forum called “What Justice Really Is,” was held to honor an African American woman, Gwen Mingo, who for decades has been valiantly fighting for people abused by those in high places and has recently faced abuse herself from the American legal system. The forum took place at  the Sacred Heart Church Activities Building, 3451 Rivard, in Detroit.

Those at the forum discussed Mingo’s 22 years of efforta to save her home, the homes of residents in her area of Brush Park and the homes of people in all Detroit neighborhoods. 

Last year there has been a new awareness of how Detroit urban renewal programs forced thousands of people, mostly African Americans, out of their homes and left them with no place to go except overcrowded slums. 

Many have said this was the number one cause of the 1967 Detroit Rebellion, including George Romney, who was the Governor of Michigan at the time.

The current Detroit Mayor, Mike Duggan, has urged a quick change of the name of the largest building in downtown Detroit, the Cobo Convention Center, because it was named after the late Albert E. Cobo, who started such racist policies.

Albert Cobo campaigned for Detroit Mayor on platform of limiting housing opportunities for Blacks; Blacks still being forced out of homes under Duggan.

“The Cobo Center is central to the City of Detroit’s image across America and around the world,”  he said, ” and I felt that a center that meant so much to Detroit’s reputation ought not to be named for someone who didn’t provide fair play for everybody.”

However, there has not been much attention paid  to those who have been challenging such policies and those who are still suffering from them.

Gwen Mingo exposed such policies as head of the Citizens District Council representing the historic area of Detroit’s Brush Park and later as the head of the Coordinating Council of all Detroit Citizen District Councils.

Under her leadership, her Brush Park Citizens District Council sued city hall and presented documentary proof that the only residents in their area slated for displacement were African Americans.

Their lawsuit  revealed the city was violating the law, tearing down buildings that were officially designated for. historic preservation.

Years later, Mingo exposed environmental dangers, including the way city demolition procedures spread dangerous levels of asbestos, causing breathing problems and even death. Mingo noted that on a number of blocks people died just as the city tried to take their land.

Some believe Ms. Mingo herself faced harassment due to her campaign. Around 2000, when she was on her way to an important meeting of  her district council, police arrested her, allegedly because of  a late traffic ticket payment.  They took her to a far-off precinct and held her through the night without giving her a chance to let anyone know.

Gwen Mingo (center) speaks during large protest against Detroit bankruptcy May 1, 2014.

Despite police physical resistance, she was able to get a phone call out.  Only after the press and a member of a community organization got wind of it and appeared at the precinct around midnight, was she released.

A few months later the. courts dropped her traffic payment charge. Some felt there was the possibility of attempted assassination.

In 2005 the city’s Economic Growth Corporation started knocking down holes in the gas main near her house.  Employees of the gas company stated this was a fire hazard and continuously fixed it.  In the meantime members of different community organizations came to her home and held a vigil to prevent any further danger to her and her family.

A few years later some expressed doubts that it was sheer coincidence that a hit and run driver just happened to crash her car into a lamp post soon after Mrs. Mingo’s district council filed suit against city policies.

Now some believe that Ms. Mingo is facing harassment from the courts.

About eight years ago the J.P. Morgan Chase Bank foreclosed on her house.  Mrs.Mingo had a document from the bank itself stating her mortgage was all paid up, but she ultimately was not able to get her document accepted as evidence.

Judge Patricia Fresard

Mingo stated she presented a copy of it to the office of the judge, who at that time was handling the case, Judge Robert Ziolkowski and because of this he was ready to dismiss the bank’s suit against her.

Then, she states, for some unknown reason, her case was abruptly transferred to another judge, Patricia Fresard.

About the same time,  Mingo noted, her court file abruptly vanished.  When it was finally recovered months later, all of her documents had disappeared,  notably the one proving her mortgage was all paid off.

Mingo would have made new copies on a Xerox machine, but at that time the Michigan Supreme Court made a new ruling especially for the Detroit area.  The judges forbade courts in Wayne and Oakland County and the 13th District to accept paper documents, and demanded that all documents be e-filed.  In short, the court was ordering judges to reject relevant evidence.

Mrs. Mingo, like many poorer litigants, had difficulty getting  documents e-filed.  In her case, there were particular delays, because of mechanical problems with the machines.  Mingo said that even though Judge Fresard knew that Mingo’s documents had been mysteriously removed from her court file and that she had tried 27 times to e-file copies to replace them, the judge refused to acknowledge  her paper documents that revealed the mortgage was all paid off and even denied her the right to read them into the court record.  Judge Fresard ruled  Mingo lost her case, because her file was empty.

Judge Fresard dismissed the case “with prejudice,” so that this information could not be used on appeal, effectively preventing Mingo’s evidence from ever seeing the light of day in our courts of law.

As a result Mingo is likely to lose the place she  called home for decades.

For further information, call Gwen Mingo at (313) 586-625-2127. or Ron Seigel at (313) 974-8264

Related document: http://voiceofdetroit.net/wp-content/uploads/Brush-Park-articles-1995-to-2004-Michigan-Citizen-Ron-Seigel-1.pdf

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DUGGAN, GILBERT TARGET BRUSH PARK AFTER MURDER, ARSON, EVICTIONS DROVE BLACK RESIDENTS OUT

DUGGAN’S DECADES-LONG DETROIT DEMOLITION DERBY

BRUSH PARK HISTORIC AREA — CAN WE TRUST THOSE WHO WRECKED IT TO RESTORE IT?

Variety

Peter Debruge

February 6, 2018

Now showing in theaters

 SPOILER ALERT: The following review contains mild spoilers for “Black Panther.”

Until now, whether they hail from the DC or Marvel cinematic universes, big-screen superheroes have traditionally been white dudes put on this earth (e.g. Superman and Thor, who each came from other planets) or fashioned by the U.S. military (à la Captain America and War Machine) to defend America from its enemies. Co-written and directed by Ryan Coogler, “Black Panther” is a radically different kind of comic-book movie, one with a proud Afrocentric twist, featuring a nearly all-black cast, that largely ignores the United States and focuses instead on the fictional nation of Wakanda — and guess what: Virtually everything that distinguishes “Black Panther” from past Marvel pics works to this standalone entry’s advantage.

Chadwick Boseman as TChalla in “Black Panther” Photo Matt Kennedy 2018 Marvel Studios

Before we get carried away, let’s be clear: “Black Panther” is still a superhero movie, which means that it’s effectively conceived for 10-year-olds and all those who wish a film like this had existed when they were 10. Except that the latter category is potentially bigger than ever this time around (for a Marvel movie, at least), since there has never in the history of cinema been a film that allows an ensemble of black characters to take charge on a global scale quite like this — and many have waited their entire lives to witness just such a feat (the way that “Wonder Woman” was a hugely empowering game changer for women).That alone would be reason to get excited, and Coogler makes good on the landmark project’s potential by featuring a predominantly black ensemble, casting some of the best young actors around — from Chadwick Boseman (who proved his dramatic chops playing James Brown, Jackie Robinson, and Thurgood Marshall in recent years) to Michael B. Jordan (even more buff, and twice as charismatic, than he appeared in the director’s two previous features, “Fruitvale Station” and “Creed”) — as well as such legends as Forest Whitaker and Angela Bassett. But historical significance aside, what superhero fans want to know is how “Black Panther” compares with other Marvel movies. Simply put, it not only holds its own, but improves on the formula in several key respects, from a politically engaged villain to an emotionally grounded final showdown.

Angela Bassett, Forest Whitaker, Martin Freeman, Michael B. Jordan, Andy Serkis, Chadwick Boseman, Danai Gurira, Lupita Nyong’o, Daniel Kaluuya, and Letitia Wright in Black Panther (2018)

Opening in the mythical kingdom of Wakanda, “Black Panther” effectively anticipates President Trump’s alleged comments about “s—hole countries” whose refugees prefer the American way of life “to their huts.” Without disparaging the rest of Africa, Coogler and his crew suggest what the continent might have become had it never been stripped of its resources — and had those resources included highly advanced alien technology and ultra-efficient energy sources. Hidden from the world, Wakanda is home to the world’s most technologically advanced city, protected by a ruler with special powers (never fully defined, all-too-easily revoked) and a fearsome black panther costume.

Of course, Wakanda doesn’t really exist, but then, Europeans so exploited the continent that we’ll never truly know the full extent of what Africa could have taught the world. (No wonder Wakandans pejoratively refer to white people as “colonizers,” a not-unreasonable epithet that’s virtually certain to enter the national vocabulary from here.) As Prince T’Challa, Boseman plays the latest Wakandan leader to don the catsuit, a matte-black onesie that receives a nice upgrade courtesy of his tech-savvy sister, Shuri (scene-stealer Letitia Wright, whose irreverent delivery makes a welcome counterbalance to Boseman’s dead-serious attitude).

Truth be told, T’Challa is kind of a bore, even if the movie that surrounds him seldom fails to thrill: He’s prince of a utopian city with little interest in the fate of the world beyond his borders — until his father, King T’Chaka (John Kani), is assassinated during a bombing at the Vienna International Centre (a flashback to “Captain America: Civil War”). Though the Black Panther who made his impressive, hyper-acrobatic debut in that film is one and the same as the character seen here, Coogler humanizes him to such a degree that T’Challa doesn’t feel like a superhero so much as a deeply conflicted world leader — albeit one who must defend his title via brutal hand-to-hand bloodmatches (in a ritual that suggests a considerably more primordial, and decidedly anti-democratic, form of governance).

Wakanda owes its utopian status to a precious extraterrestrial resource called Vibranium that the rest of the world covets (it presumably sits somewhere between Kryptonite and Unobtanium on the periodic table of elements, and far out-values the diamonds and uranium for which Africa has been plundered over the past century). Halfway around the world, an MIT-educated former black-ops soldier named Erik Killmonger (Jordan, sporting a modified Basquiat haircut) waltzes into a museum and steals a misidentified Wakandan relic. (When a curator objects to the theft, he quips, “How do you think your ancestors got these?”)

Because Black Panther’s skills seem to rely more on gadgets than fantastical powers, his standalone Marvel outing actually feels more like a James Bond adventure than a conventional superhero movie at times — as in the subsequent set piece, which was clearly inspired by the Macau casino scene in “Skyfall.” Accompanied by two spear-wielding warriors (Danai Gurira and Lupita Nyong’o play members of the Dora Milaje, Wakanda’s elite female fighting force), a tuxedo-clad T’Challa attempts to go incognito while South African gunrunner Ulysses Klaue (a suitably thuggish Andy Serkis, ever the chameleon) makes ready to pass the pilfered treasure to a CIA agent (Martin Freeman, who may as well be playing 007 ally Felix Leiter).

An elaborate shootout ensues, conspicuously choreographed as a single-take “oner.” Unlike “Atomic Blonde” (the best use yet of that approach), the device calls a bit too much attention to itself here, cartoonishly inflating the action, rather than making it more realistic and relatable. Still, if it’s the cool factor Coogler is going for, the scene delivers, segueing into a stunning car chase across Busan, South Korea.

“Black Panther” may not have the most impressive action sequences or visual effects of any Marvel movie, but it boasts the best villains. As an arms dealer whose arm doubles as a Vibranium super-cannon, Klaue makes for a nasty henchman, while Killmonger keeps his cards up his sleeve until relatively late in the film but emerges as the most satisfying comic-book adversary since Heath Ledger’s Joker. Both characters have a ruthless anarchic streak, although Killmonger has more than just wreaking chaos in mind. He’s motivated by a feeling of deep political injustice, plus a “This time it’s personal” sense of vengeance, and he’s convinced that raiding the Wakanda’s stockpile of Vibranium could put genuine firepower in a worldwide black uprising.

“The New Jim Crow”–by Michelle Alexander

It’s a compelling idea (enough to sway a key ally played by Daniel Kaluuya), and a reminder that throughout the African diaspora, the black-white power balance remains as it is courtesy of Jim Crow practices designed to keep minorities in check: persistent segregation, broken drug laws, racially targeted policing, disproportionately high incarceration rates — all of which are identified and indicted by Coogler’s truth-to-power script. Arm the oppressed, Killmonger passionately argues, and it won’t take a century for the system that produced “The Birth of a Nation” to grant a black artist the right to tell this kind of story — not that Coogler endorses the character’s lunatic ideas.

But he’s not about to waste the opportunity either. Rather than simply concocting another generic plan to save the world from annihilation, Coogler revives the age-old debate between Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X — between passive resistance and the call for militant black activism. Think of it as “Black Panther vs. the Black Panthers,” except you can’t have a nonviolent action hero, which puts T’Challa in a strange position. It’s not quite clear what he stands for, whereas his independent-minded ex-girlfriend Nakia (Nyong’o’s character) has ambitious ideas about how Wakanda could help the world — which means it’s up to her to spark his engagement with the outside world.

While far more mainstream — and by extension, kid-friendly — than such blaxploitation classics as “Foxy Brown” and “Cleopatra Jones,” “Black Panther” upholds the same tradition of celebrating strong, assertive black women. At the end of a big rhinoceros battle, a male character submits to Gurira in the film’s single most iconic shot, while an earlier scene in which she tosses aside a bad wig ranks as the most gay-friendly Marvel moment to date.

In their print form, comic books have led the way in terms of representation and inclusivity, long empowering non-white, non-male characters in their pages. Although previous big-screen examples certainly exist — among them Wesley Snipes’ “Blade” and Will Smith’s “Hancock” — “Black Panther” celebrates its hero’s heritage while delivering one of Marvel’s most all-around appealing standalone installments to date. Going forward, Black Panther will join the ranks of the Avengers, further diversifying their ranks. In the meantime, it’s awesome to see Black Power celebrated in such a mainstream fashion.

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Libyan Pres. Muammar Gaddafi with leaders from African continent.

Voice of Detroit is particularly interested in this movie as it brings to mind the plans that Muammar Gaddafi had for the great nation of Libya and a united continent of Africa. Among them were an African currency based on gold that would have competed with U.S. and European currencies on the market, an all-African army, and basically, a United States of Africa. See a sampling of articles published in VOD on the vicious U.S.–CIA invasion of Libya and the brutal assassination of its leader, revered all over the African continent, below.

http://voiceofdetroit.net/2015/02/09/the-covert-origins-of-isis-united-states-cia-in-libya-syria-iraq-afghanistan/

http://voiceofdetroit.net/2012/10/27/human-rights-watch-executions-of-libyas-gadhafi-supporters-a-war-crime/

http://voiceofdetroit.net/2012/08/27/neo-colonialism-chaos-haunt-the-new-libya-2/

http://voiceofdetroit.net/2011/09/02/u-s-nato-guilty-of-war-crimes-in-libya-says-cynthia-mckinney/

THE BLACK PANTHERS #2–BY KENNY SNODGRASS

UPDATE:

Dow closes down 1,100-plus in biggest single-day point loss ever

CNBC

Feb. 5, 2018

 The Dow traded more than 1,500 points lower at one point before swinging back to close down more than 1,100 points. 

The S&P 500 lost more than 4 percent, with health care and energy lagging. The broad index had traded positive earlier Monday as the tech sector briefly rose. The Nasdaq declined by more than 3.5 percent, also off its earlier low.

“Breaking the early lows of the day means the correction could go on for longer,” said Art Cashin, a UBS director of floor operations. 

“We’re not used to getting washouts like this anymore,” said Quincy Krosby, a chief market strategist at Prudential Financial. “The buy-the-dip mentality that has taken over hasn’t allowed for that.” 

“This sell-off, in the bigger scheme of things, is not that big. But it is very important in psychological terms,” Krosby said. 

Frantic Wall Street brokers during 2008 crash.

The Dow fell 665.75 points, or 2.5 percent, Friday, notching its biggest one-day sell-off since June 2016. The S&P 500 had its worst one-day performance since Sept. 2016, and the Nasdaq posted its worst session since August 2017.

Stocks were pressured by a fast rise in interest rates last week. The benchmark 10-year yield rose to its highest levels in four years. Overnight, it reached 2.88 percent before trading around 2.84 percent.

The major indexes also capped off their worst weekly performance in two years Friday after a steep sell-off. The Dow and S&P 500 pulled back 4.1 percent and 3.9 percent, respectively, last week. The Nasdaq lost 3.53 percent.

“What we noticed in January was that stocks and bond yields wanted to run through their year-end targets” to start off 2018, said John Augustine, a chief investment officer at Huntington Private Bank. “I think both markets just need to take a breather.” He also noted these pullbacks in bonds and stocks should be viewed as buying opportunities by investors.

Stocks began the new year ripping higher. The Dow and S&P 500 had their best monthly gains since March 2016 last month. The Nasdaq posted its biggest one-month gain since October 2015 in January. The major indexes had also notched record highs.

Equities benefited from strong economic data and solid corporate earnings growth at the start of the year. But increasing inflation concerns have sent interest rates higher recently, rattling Wall Street.

The CBOE Volatility index (VIX), widely considered the best gauge of fear in the market, hit 21.75 — its highest level since November 2016 — when it reached 23.01.

STOCKS FALL FURTHER AS BANKS SINK; WELLS FARGO PLUNGES AFTER FAKE ACCOUNTS EXPOSED

By Marley Jay, Associated Press

Feb. 5, 2018

Jeffersonian Apts. have been sold to suburban developers Joe Barbat and Arie Liebowicz. Huge rent and parking increases, along with new water/sewerage and other charges may force many residents out.

VOD commentary: Detroit’s economic “boom” may go “bust” along with the stock market, as unbridled development of upscale retail, entertainment, and residential complexes, from downtown Detroit, going east on Jefferson, and in the so-called “Mid-City” (formerly “Cass Corridor”) neighborhoods continues. Such development is financed by bank loans as well as HUD grants and is pushing long-time residents, particularly Blacks, senior citizens and those on fixed-incomes, out of their homes.

Meanwhile, Wayne County’s “mortgage fraud” unit sent Detroit senior citizen Mary Stafford to prison for a year and is now demanding that she pay over $75,000 to Wells Fargo on falsified charges related to a mortgage she was not party to. Wells Fargo has given her sworn affidavits saying she owes them no money.

New York – U.S. stocks are continuing to sink Monday afternoon as banks and health care and energy care companies slip. Wells Fargo is plunging after the Federal Reserve hit the bank with new sanctions over a scandal that involved opening millions of phony consumer accounts.* The market erased a portion of its early losses following a mid-morning report showing more evidence of economic strength in the U.S economy. Bond yields stabilized after moving sharply higher Friday.

Keeping score: The Standard & Poor’s 500 index lost 27 points, or 1 percent, to 2,734 as of 1 p.m. The Dow Jones industrial average gave up 308 points, or 1.2 percent, to 25,201. Early on, it fell 355 points. The Nasdaq composite fell 45 points, or 0.7 percent, to 7,191. The Russell 2000 index of smaller-company stocks was down 15 points, or 1 percent, to 1,531.

Mary Stafford

The S&P 500 is down about 4.5 percent from its latest record high, set January 26.

Investors are worried about evidence of rising inflation in the U.S. Increased inflation might push the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates more quickly, which could slow down economic growth by making it make it more expensive for people and businesses to borrow money. Rising bond yields are also making bonds more appealing to investors compared with stocks.

Wells Fargo plunges: Wells Fargo dropped $4.96, or 7.7 percent, to $59.11. Late Friday the Fed said it will freeze Wells Fargo’s assets at the level where they stood at the end of last year until it can demonstrate improved internal controls. The San Francisco bank also agreed to remove four directors from its board.

Waking up: The stock market has been unusually calm for more than a year. The combination of economic growth in the U.S. and other major economies, low interest rates, and support from central banks meant stocks could keep rising steadily without a lot of bumps along the way. Experts have been warning that that wouldn’t last forever, and after big gains in the first three weeks of January, that stretch might be over.

Stocks haven’t suffered a 5 percent drop since the two days after Britain voted to leave the European Union in June 2016. The market hasn’t gone through a 10 percent drop since early 2016, when oil prices were plunging as investors worried about a drop in global growth that would hurt demand. U.S. crude hit a low of about $26 a barrel in February of that year.

Brexit caused $2 trillion loss from global markets.

Sweetened offer: Chipmaker Broadcom raised its offer for competitor Qualcomm to $121 billion in cash and stock, or $82 per share, and called the bid its best and final offer. It had offered $103 billion for Qualcomm, and that company says it will review the bid. Broadcom rose $4.86, or 2.1 percent, to $240.34.

However Qualcomm dipped $2.27, or 3.4 percent, to $63.80 after analysts said Apple may end a deal with Qualcomm and have Intel make chips for futures iPhone models instead. Intel gained 65 cents, or 1.4 percent, to $46.80.

Energy: Benchmark U.S. crude slid $1.15, or 1.8 percent, to $64.30 a barrel in New York. Brent crude, used to price international oils, fell 72 cents, or 1 percent, to $67.86 a barrel in London.

Exxon Mobil lost $3.51, or 4.2 percent, to $81.02 and Chevron gave up $2.33, or 2 percent, to $116.25. Both companies reported disappointing fourth-quarter results on Friday and are coming off their biggest losses in years.

Banks and mortgage companies created 2008 economic crisis, not Mary Stafford.

Market leaders losing: Almost three-fourths of the stocks on the New York Stock Exchange traded lower. Some of the largest losses went to companies that have done exceptionally well over the last year. Alphabet, Google’s parent company, lost $19.81, or 1.8 percent, to $1,099.39. Chipmaker Nvidia fell $6.i94, or 3 percent, to $226.58. 3M skidded $4.40, or 1.8 percent, to $240.77.

Bonds: Bond prices held steady after moving sharply higher on Friday. The yield on the 10-year Treasury was unchanged at 2.84 percent.

Currencies: The dollar fell to 110.02 yen from 110.28 yen. The euro slipped to $1.2425 from $1.2451.

Survey says: Stocks perked up somewhat after a strong report for the service sector. The Institute for Supply Management released a survey that showed January was the best month for the service sector since 2005 as production, new orders, hiring and new export orders all grew faster in January. Private service companies dominate the U.S. economy and the ISM’s index has showed growth every month for the eight years.

Bitcoin woes: Bitcoin prices and futures continued to sink. According to Coindesk, the price of bitcoin fell 13 percent to $7,082. It reached a high of almost $20,000 in December, and traded under $1,000 in early 2017. Many financial pros warn that bitcoin is in a speculative bubble that could burst anytime. On the CME, bitcoin futures plunged 15.5 percent to $7,255. They tumbled 15 percent to $7,230 on the Cboe.

German coalition talks: Stocks in Europe also fell as German political parties struggled to form a government. Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative Union bloc and the center-left Social Democrats originally set a Sunday deadline to wrap up talks on extending their alliance of the past four years but budgeted two extra days as a precaution when formal negotiations started Jan. 26.

Britain’s FTSE 100 lost 1.5 percent while France’s CAC 40 slid 1.5 percent. The DAX in Germany shed 0.8 percent.

Asia: Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 tumbled 2.6 percent and the South Korean Kospi shed 1.3 percent. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index sank 1.1 percent. 

*Federal Reserve Restricts Wells Fargo’s Growth  in Unprecedented Punishment after Fraud Scandal 

BY Jessica Chia

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

February 2, 2018

Janet Yellen lowered the boom on Wells Fargo on her last day as chairman of the Federal Reserve

The Federal Reserve on Friday imposed an unusually harsh punishment on Wells Fargo for the “widespread consumer abuses” uncovered in the bank’s fraud scandal.

Wells will not be allowed to grow beyond the $1.95 trillion in assets it had at the end of last year “until it sufficiently improves its governance and controls,” the Fed said in a statement.

Regulators have rarely intervened directly in a bank’s operations in the past, and it is unprecedented for the Fed to order a bank to stop growing altogether, officials said.

But Wells Fargo’s aggressive business strategy prioritized growth over effective risk management, leading to serious compliance breakdowns, the central bank said.

In 2016, Wells Fargo forked over a hefty $185 million settlement after employees opened 3.5 million unauthorized bank accounts and credit cards without their customers’ consent.

The Federal Reserve announced it was punishing Wells Fargo on Janet Yellen’s last day as chairwoman of the Federal Reserve.

The employees, pressured by internal sales targets, used fake email addresses and forged signatures in the widespread practice known as “sandbagging.”

The bank also sold auto insurance to customers who did not need it and admitted its mortgage bankers unfairly charged customers fees to lock in interest rates. 

Timothy Sloan, Pres. and CEO of Wells Fargo, testifies before Congress.

Wells Fargo also overcharged their corporate clients on foreign exchanges and levied unusually high transaction fees, according to a Wall Street Journal report in November.

In a cease-and-desist order on Friday, the Federal Reserve blasted the bank’s board of directors for failing to oversee the bank, and ordered three members to be replaced by April.

A fourth board member will be replaced by the end of the year, according to the Fed, without releasing specific names.

The announcement was made on Janet Yellen’s last day as chairwoman of the Federal Reserve.

“We cannot tolerate pervasive and persistent misconduct at any bank and the consumers harmed by Wells Fargo expect that robust and comprehensive reforms will be put in place to make certain that the abuses do not occur again,” Yellen said.

The bank must now submit a plan to the Fed within 60 days, detailing how it has enhanced oversight from its board of directors and improved compliance and risk management functions, and how it plans to improve further.

Once the Fed approves those plans, Wells will hire third-party consultants to review them and monitor its progress until the regulator is satisfied.

Wells Fargo’s balance sheet expanded steadily from the end of 2013 to 2016, but growth slowed dramatically last year as it battled to address the issues raised by the scandal.

The news on Friday sent Wells Fargo shares tumbling by 6.1 percent to $60.10 in after-hours trading.

Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy (center) with San Bernadino County DA Michael Ramos (l) and Orleans Parish DA Leon Cannizzaro (r)

When convictions are clearly wrong, these prosecutors don’t just hinder justice—they actively work against it.

Jan 10, 2018  Excerpt from full story by Lara Bazelon in Slate Magazine. She also discusses California’s San Bernardino County District Attorney Michael Ramos, and Louisiana’s Orleans Parish District Attorney Leon Cannizzaro, but this excerpt focuses on Worthy.

Davontae Sanford (center) beams as his family including (l to r) nephew, sisters, mother Taminko Sanford-Tilmon, stepfather the late Jeremaine TIlmon, and Apostle W. J. RIdeout III applaud his release. at press conference June 9, 2016/Photo by Diane Bukowski

Davontae Sanford was 14 years old when he confessed to murdering four people in a drug house on Detroit’s East Side. Left alone with detectives in a late-night interrogation, Sanford says he broke down after being told he could go home if he gave them “something.” On the advice of a lawyer whose license was later suspended for misconduct, Sanford pleaded guilty in the middle of his March 2008 trial and received a sentence of 39 to 92 years in prison.

Sixteen days after Sanford was sentenced, a hit man named Vincent Smothers told the police he had carried out 12 contract killings, including the four Sanford had pleaded guilty to committing. Smothers explained that he’d worked with an accomplice, Ernest Davis, and he provided a wealth of corroborating details to back up his account. Smothers told police where they could find one of the weapons used in the murders; the gun was recovered and ballistics matched it to the crime scene. He also told the police he had used a different gun in several of the other murders, which ballistics tests confirmed. Once Smothers’ confession was corroborated, it was clear Sanford was innocent. Smothers made this point explicitly in an 2015 affidavit, emphasizing that Sanford hadn’t been involved in the crimes “in any way.”

Vincent Smothers appears in court March 25, 2012.

But Smothers and Davis were never charged. Neither was Leroy Payne, the man Smothers alleged had paid him to commit the murders. (Through his attorney, Payne has denied any involvement.) Instead, Smothers pleaded guilty to the other eight killings. Davis, who was never prosecuted, was convicted of an unrelated felony in 2013 and could be released from prison as early as July. Payne, who remains a free man, left Detroit in 2016. His whereabouts are unknown.

Davontae Sanford, meanwhile, remained behind bars, locked up for crimes he very clearly didn’t commit.

Police failed to turn over all the relevant information in Smothers’ confession to Sanford’s legal team, as the law required them to do. When that information was leaked in 2009, Sanford’s attorneys sought to reverse his conviction on the basis of actual innocence. Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy fought back, opposing the motion all the way to the Michigan Supreme Court. In 2014, the court sided with Worthy, ruling that actual innocence was not a valid reason to withdraw a guilty plea. Sanford would remain in prison for another two years.

In an adversarial legal system, it’s natural to presume that prosecutors and defense attorneys are driven by the same goal: to win. They aren’t. In Berger v. United States, decided in 1935, the Supreme Court famously declared that the prosecution’s ultimate goal “is not that it shall win a case, but that justice shall be done.” A prosecutor, the court wrote, “is in a peculiar and very definite sense the servant of the law, the twofold aim of which is that guilt shall not escape or innocence suffer.”

Some prosecutors—the most powerful actors in the criminal justice system—refuse to correct life-altering errors.

Maryanne Godboldo speaks at church rally after her initial release. She defended her daughter from illegal kidnapping by Child Protective Services and police in 2011 and became world renowned for her courage. But Kym Worthy brought multiple criminal charges against her, which were twice thrown out by District and Circuit Court Judges who called the seizure illegal. But Worthy continued to appeal. Eventually Godboldo sustained a brain aneurysm on the eve of her third criminal trial, which caused her death last year.

Embracing this “twofold aim” is at the core of a prosecutor’s work. The government brings cases it believes are supported by proof beyond a reasonable doubt. A victory at trial proves them right. But if new evidence is uncovered showing the conviction was error-ridden to the point of unreliability, the imperative that “justice shall be done” requires prosecutors to admit they were wrong. This responsibility exists even if a defendant may be guilty—if, for example, crucial evidence was obtained by illegal means. The moral imperative underpinning this precept, though, is brought into sharpest relief when it appears the defendant is actually innocent.

Many prosecutors accept this responsibility and, when proven wrong, ask the judge to dismiss a case or settle by way of a plea bargain. But too many do not. Indeed, there is a class of prosecutors that might fairly be called innocence deniers.

These prosecutors do not “do justice” as the Supreme Court defines it. Instead, they delay justice and in some cases actively work against it. When a prisoner is exonerated by a lower court, these prosecutors double and triple down, filing appeal after appeal. Or they indict and prosecute the exoneree all over again, sometimes under a wildly different theory at the expense of time and resources that should be used to pursue the crime’s actual perpetrator. They may also threaten endless legal challenges to wring “no contest” pleas from innocent prisoners in exchange for time-served sentences. The prisoners, desperate to be free, accept these Faustian bargains, which brand them convicts for life and allow prosecutors to proclaim their guilt and the state to deny them compensation. Some prosecutors are so committed to adhering to the original mistake that they fail to prosecute the actual perpetrators, even when there is evidence to convict them.

Innocence deniers are a diverse group: male and female, young and old, white and people of color. They are Democrats and Republicans from red, blue, and purple states. What they have in common is their insistence—in the face of all evidence to the contrary—that wrongfully convicted people are in fact guilty.

Simply opposing an exoneration effort does not make a prosecutor an innocence denier. Some exoneration claims are bogus and others are murky, requiring rigorous legal testing to be proven conclusively. Increasingly, conscientious prosecutors are working collaboratively with defense attorneys to reinvestigate innocence claims, keeping an open mind and doing the right thing in the end. Innocence-denying prosecutors are different. The cases collected here are extreme, either because the prosecutor in question has a pattern of reflexively denying innocence or because, even in a single case, the evidence of innocence is so manifest as to make the fight against it profoundly misguided.

Eddie Joe Lloyd at hearing in which he was exonerated from a rape/murder of a teenage girl.  Barry Scheck of the Innocence Project is at the left.

In the past quarter-century, the work of dogged attorneys and advances in forensic science have exonerated more than 2,150 men and women, 161 of those from death row. The Innocence Project, a New York–based nonprofit founded by Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld in 1992, has freed more than 200 people and spurred the creation of numerous smaller organizations around the country devoted to the same mission. (From 2012–2015, I was the director of the Loyola Law School Project for the Innocent in Los Angeles.) By some estimates there are tens of thousands more wrongfully convicted prisoners languishing behind bars. Nevertheless, some prosecutors—the most powerful actors in the criminal justice system—refuse to correct life-altering errors. (You can read more about 17 such cases here.) If we are committed to fostering a justice system that is truly just, it is imperative to call out these innocence deniers and hold them to account.

Kym Worthy, a Democrat and the first black woman or man to serve as Wayne County’s lead prosecutor, first took office in 2004 and coasted to re-election for a fourth term in November 2016. The former circuit court judge has a national reputation as a trailblazing progressive—last April, Essence named her to its “Woke 100 List” to honor her efforts “to achieve equality for people of color.” Worthy’s office, however, has repeatedly refused to admit error in cases like Davontae Sanford’s, where there is compelling evidence of actual innocence.

The lid was covered with bloody fingerprints, which had never been tested.

Attorneys Megan Crane and David Moran of two Innocence Clinics announce filing of motion for relief from judgment for Davontae Sanford May 4, 2015, as family members listen.

The Michigan Supreme Court’s adverse ruling in 2014 wasn’t the end of the line for Sanford. The court ruled against him on technical grounds and noted that there was nothing to prevent his legal team from filing a post-conviction motion for relief from the judgment, rather than making a direct challenge to his guilty plea.

In 2015, attorneys for Sanford, who is black, did just that, and the Michigan State Police began to re-investigate the case. One year later, the police issued a 117-page report detailing compelling evidence that Smothers and Davis were guilty; that Sanford was innocent; and that Detroit’s then deputy police chief, James Tolbert, had lied to convict Sanford. It was at that point, nine years into Sanford’s incarceration, that Worthy finally agreed to his release—but only on account of Tolbert’s misconduct. She continues to insist that Sanford is guilty, pointing to his discredited confession. The state police recommended bringing perjury charges against Tolbert and murder charges against Smothers and Davis. Worthy declined in all three cases.

In July 2017 Sanford filed a civil suit under Michigan’s Wrongful Imprisonment Compensation Act, and only four months later the state attorney general conceded that Sanford was innocent, had been wrongfully convicted, and was entitled to compensation, but noted that Worthy’s office “has been consulted and disagrees.” Julie Hurwitz, one of the attorneys who represents Sanford, told me she was “surprised” that the state acquiesced so readily but that given the crush of media attention the case has received, “the attorney general’s office probably knew that fighting this would be a political bombshell.” On Dec. 21, a judge awarded Sanford $408,356.16. 

In reference to her office’s handling of Sanford’s case, Worthy has said, “I don’t know what we could have done differently.”

David Moran, director of the Michigan Innocence Clinic, has tangled with Worthy in a half-dozen cases in which he says her office has fought his efforts to free clients. Moran, who helped lead the fight to exonerate Sanford alongside the Center on Wrongful Convictions of Youth at the Northwestern Pritzker School of Law, also battled the Wayne County prosecutor in the case of Lamarr Monson, who was convicted in the 1996 murder of a 12-year-old girl and sentenced to 30 to 50 years in prison. Monson, who like Sanford is black, claimed he’d been tricked into signing a false confession stating that he’d stabbed the victim to death.

Lamarr Monson, hugs his mother in 2017 after all charges were dismissed against him in the 1996 slaying of 12-year-old Detroiter Christina Brown. Clarence Tabb/The Detroit News

 Nearly 20 years after the murder in question, Moran and his students examined the object that the medical examiner had identified as the likely murder weapon: a ceramic toilet lid used to bludgeon the victim over the head. The lid was covered with bloody fingerprints, which had never been tested. The Michigan State Police found that all the fingerprints matched a man named Robert Lewis, who was living in the same building as the victim at the time of the murder.

Wayne Co. AP’s David McCreedy (top), Valerie Newman (bottom) at forum. Newman switched sides from defense to prosecution.

During a four-month-long evidentiary hearing in late 2016, the Michigan Innocence Clinic presented the fingerprint evidence and called Lewis’ then live-in girlfriend Shellena Bentley as a witness. Bentley testified that Lewis came back to her apartment on the night of the murder “frantic” with “blood on him; it was dripping off his fingernails.” David McCreedy, the assistant prosecutor assigned by Worthy to fight the case, didn’t find this account convincing. He explained that Lewis might have wandered by the apartment while the building manager was on the phone with 911, then moved the toilet tank out of the way to help the paramedics. Moran told me that he responded: “There might be 12 gullible citizens that would buy that, but that’s why we need a new trial: to see if the state can find them.”

The judge granted Monson a new trial; he was subsequently released on bond. Worthy, who agreed to be interviewed about Monson’s case—she declined to comment on Devontae Sanford’s, citing ongoing litigation—told me her office sought to delay the retrial so it could conduct an additional investigation. Two homicide investigators were dispatched to interview Lewis, who denied committing the murder. “His statements were consistent with the evidence that was available in the case,” Worthy says, despite Lewis’ fingerprints being all over the bloody toilet lid, including around the edges, Moran says, suggesting that he gripped it. (Worthy’s deputies do not concede that the toilet tank was the murder weapon; one told me that the victim’s “head could have been slammed against the back of the bathtub,” causing the fatal injury.)

In August, a few weeks before Monson’s retrial, the prosecution dismissed the case. In a public statement, Worthy said Monson had lived with the 12-year-old victim, that he’d had sex with her, and that he’d demanded that she sell drugs for him. The decision to drop the charges against Monson, Worthy said, was not due to a belief in his innocence, but instead due to “the destruction of evidence and the possible coercive conduct of the then-homicide inspector in obtaining statements from the defendant.” Her office, she said, would not be charging Robert Lewis with the murder. Lewis is still free.

Moran says Worthy’s charge that Monson had sex with the 12-year-old victim is “false and disturbing,” adding that “it is unethical for a prosecutor, upon dismissing charges against a defendant, to then publicly defame that defendant.” His client, he says, emphatically denies that any sexual contact occurred. Asked to respond, Worthy cited Monson’s statements to the police—the same statements she has admitted were possibly coerced in a manner that “supports Monson’s defense of a false confession.”

Worthy did tell me, however, that her office is in the process of launching a standalone unit to review possible wrongful convictions. That group will be headed up by Valerie Newman, a longtime attorney at the Michigan State Appellate Defender Office, which represented Sanford before the Michigan Innocence Clinic took over his case. Worthy says that project has been in the works for some time, but became possible only after she obtained funding from the Wayne County Commission.

Moran reacted to the news with cautious optimism, saying, “I hope that the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office is changing its attitude and will seriously consider these cases.” He has cases lined up to present to the unit as soon as it opens for business.

Lara Bazelon is an associate professor at the University of San Francisco School of Law and a contributing writer for Slate. Her book Rectify: A Story of Healing and Redemption After Wrongful Conviction will be published in the fall.

The full story is at https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2018/01/innocence-deniers-prosecutors-who-have-refused-to-admit-wrongful-convictions.html.

Demand ‘Michigan Needs Unions’ as a Solution to a Rigged Economy

 Detroit youth stand out in the movement, fighting their real adversaries, not each other

 January 23, 2018

 By Diane Bukowski and SEIU Staff

DETROIT –  Dozens of State Police cars, with their sirens blaring and emergency lights flashing, flew down the Lodge Freeway Jan. 23, as other drivers got out of the way to save their own lives, wondering what in blazes was going on.

Workers and poor people had taken over the state’s Cadillac Building lobby en masse, chanting, banging drums, and speaking on bullhorns, delivering a “Workers State of the State” address and protest, where Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder’s Detroit office is located. Many were young fast food workers from D15, fighting for a $15 minimum wage. Joining in with them were  janitors and health care workers from the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), demanding higher wages, benefits and the right to unionize in this “Right to Work” up south state.

City retirees and supporters protest outside federal courthouse in downtown Detroit Oct. 28, 2013 as Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, depicted as the devil in signs, testifies in favor of the bankruptcy that has stripped Detroit of its assets, and retirees and workers of their wages and benefits.

“Governor Snyder has spent his two terms in office attacking Michigan’s workers, including hard working janitors, fast food workers, health care workers and others, lowering wages by passing open shop laws, stripping cities of their right to raise the minimum wage and installing emergency managers,” the group said in its press release.

“Now, workers are sticking together and fighting back to let their fellow citizens know the true state of Michigan, after eight years of lowered standards, low wages and, in some places, a lack of basic standard of living, including poisoned water. The number one job of our elected leaders should be to raise the standard of living for working people. SEIU and Fight for $15 workers are fighting to make politicians listen to working people and take action on issues that matter, including leading on raising wages by increasing the state and local minimum wage and ensuring workers have rights to strong unions.”

“Michigan’s working people have long been ignored by their elected officials, but SEIU and the Fight for $15 are changing that this year,” the release continued. “ Workers are joining together to elect officials who will instead raise wages, support the right to join together, build our communities and keep all Michiganders safe.”

D15 and SEIU have announced they are launching a massive “voter engagement” drive to elect candidates who support workers’ rights to unionize, in the wake of the disastrous 2012 state referendum that made “up south” Michigan a Right to Work state, under Gov. Snyder’s urging.

They said  they are volunteering 40 hours of each worker’s time to engage voters in Michigan who have been left out of the political process,  in anticipation of the 2018 elections. Their representatives said they plan to engage in door-to-door canvassing, digital and radio advertising and mail.

“SEIU and the Fight for $15 intend to show that those who have given up on the political process will reengage if politicians speak to issues that improve the lives of working Americans,” said their release.

DMC’s Harper and Hutzel Hospitals

In addition to the barbaric passage of Right to Work legislation, they said Snyder and  state lawmakers have also stripped cities of their right to raise the minimum wage and installed “emergency managers” to disenfranchise communities of color across the state.

Hospital workers in particular are key to the mobilization, organizers said.

“In Detroit and cities across the Midwest, hospitals are at the center of the economy the way factories were for previous generations,” they explained. Two of the three largest private employers in Detroit are health systems: Detroit Medical Center (9,184 employees), the city’s second-largest private employer; and Henry Ford Health System (8,790 employees), the city’s third-largest private employer. While many hospital service workers in Detroit are paid too little to support themselves or their families, the city’s hospital industry made a combined $519 million in profits in 2015 according to the most recent data from the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services. 

# # # 

Service Employees International Union Local 1 unites 50,000 workers throughout the Midwest including janitors, security officers, higher education faculty, food service workers, and others. Local 1 is committed to improving the lives of its members and all working people by winning real economic justice and standing at the forefront of the fight for immigrant, racial, and environmental justice.

# # #

Founded in November of 2012, the Fight for $15 is a movement led by fast food workers, fighting for a $15/hour living wage, the right to form a union without retaliation, and respect in the workplace. Workers live and work in different cities and states across the country. Since the Fight for $15 started, it has won raises for 22 million Americans, including 10 million workers who are on a path to $15.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, CONTACT: 

Kathleen Policy 440-724-9730, policyk@seiu1.org

Izabela Miltko-Ivkovich 708-655-9681, miltkoi@seiu1.org

 Jennifer Owens 312-218-8785, jennifer@fightfor15.org

                             313-653-9288

Our beloved brother and son ‘Loe’ spends his time in Monroe and the east side of Detroit. He was last seen in Monroe. He has been missing since Nov. 22, 2017. 

WE LOVE YOU DEARLY, LOE. PLEASE COME HOME.