{news} Racism goes on trial again in America's Deep South

[clifford thornton]

Racism goes on trial again in America's Deep South

by Tom Mangold in Jena, Louisiana

The Observer (UK) - May 20, 2007

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,2083762,00.html<http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,2083762,00.html>

The prosecution of three black Louisiana youths
reveals the rise of discrimination by stealth

In the cool and beflagged small courtroom in Jena,
Louisiana, three black schoolboys - Robert Bailey,
Theodore Shaw and Mychal Bell - are about to go on
trial for a playground fight that could see them jailed
for between 30 and 50 years.

Jena, about 220 miles north of New Orleans, is a small
town of 3,000 people, 85 per cent of whom are white.
Tomorrow it will be the focus for a race trial which
could put it on the map alongside the bad old names of
the Mississippi Burning Sixties such as Selma or
Montgomery, Alabama.

Jena is gaining national notoriety as an example of the
new 'stealth' racism, showing how lightly sleep the
demons of racial prejudice in America's Deep South,
even in the year that a black man, Barak Obama, is a
serious candidate for the White House.

It began in Jena's high school last August when Kenneth
Purvis asked the headteacher if black students could
break with a long-held tradition and join the whites
who sit under the tree in the school courtyard during
breaks. The boy was told that he and his friends could
sit where they liked.

The following morning white students had hung three
nooses there. 'Bad taste, silly, but just a prank,' was
the response of most of Jena's whites.

'To us those nooses meant the KKK [Ku Klux Klan], they
meant, "Niggers, we're going to kill you, we're going
to hang you till you die,"' says Caseptla Bailey, a
black community leader and mother of one of the
accused. The three white perpetrators of what was seen
as a race hate crime were given 'in-school' suspensions
(sent to another school for a few days before
returning).

Jena's major industry is growing and marketing junk
pine. Walk down the usually deserted main street and
you will not find many black employees. Bailey, 56, is
a former air force officer and holder of a business
management degree. 'I couldn't even get a job in Jena
as a bank teller,' she said. 'Look at the banks and the
best white-collar jobs and you'll see only white and
red necks in those collars.'

Billy Doughty, the local barber, has never cut black
men's hair. 'They just don't come here,' he mumbled.
'Anyway, their hair is different and difficult to cut.'

The majority of blacks live in an area known as Ward
10. Many homes are trailers, or wooden shacks. Rubbish
lies in the streets. On 'Snob Hill', where the whites
live, the spacious gardens and lawns are trimmed, the
gravelled drives boast SUVs and nice new saloons. Only
two black families live there. A teacher from Jena High
had enough money to buy his way in. But when he arrived
local estate agents refused to show him a 'white'
property even though several were advertised in the
local paper ('they're all under contract,' the agents
lied). The teacher eventually went to see one white
owner and offered him cash. 'The guy preferred green
[dollars] to black, so I got the property,' laughed the
teacher, 'but since we moved in three years ago we
haven't been invited by a single neighbour.'

On 30 November, someone tried to burn Jena High to the
ground. The crime remains unsolved. That same weekend
race fights between teenagers broke out downtown, and
on 4 December racial tension boiled over once more in
the school. A white student, Justin Barker, was
attacked, allegedly by six black students.

The expected charges of assault and battery were not
laid, and the six were charged with attempted second-
degree murder and conspiracy to commit second-degree
murder. They now face a lifetime in jail.

Barker spent the evening of the assault at the local
Baptist church, where he was seen by friends to be 'his
usual smiling self'.

Nine days later, with the case technically sub judice,
the District Attorney made the following public
statement to the local paper: 'I will not tolerate this
type of behaviour. To those who act in this manner I
tell you that you will be prosecuted to the fullest
extent of the law and with the harshest crimes that the
facts justify. When you are convicted I will seek the
maximum penalty allowed by law. I will see to it that
you never again menace the students at any school in
this parish.'

Bail for the impoverished students was set absurdly
high, and most have been held in custody. The town's
mind seems to be made up.

But now the National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People and the American Civil Liberties Union -
'damned outsiders' - have become involved and have
begun to recruit, enthuse and empower the local black
population. Reporters from the BBC and the New York
Times have been drawn to the story. Jena does not like
this publicity and shifts uncomfortably in the glare.
It is 42 years since President Lyndon Johnson closed
the loopholes that allowed southern states to
discriminate against blacks. When the accused shuffle
into court tomorrow, it's Jena that will be on trial.

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