Via AP, we find that the the Lousiana courts are anticipating reaching a plea deal today with five of the six black students from Jena High School in Lousiana who were being outrageously being charged with attempted murder, the outcome of a series of racist events which in turn led to a huge civil rights movement against the charges. Here's a good sum-up of what happened:
The only thing that's outdated in the video is that the sixth defendant, Mychal Bell, ended up pleading guilty in December 2007 to a misdemeanor second-degree battery charge and was sentenced to 18 months in jail.
There's no doubt that the movement that arose out of this injustice led to the plea deal expected to be made today, but we're not sure yet what that lesser charge will be. We'll keep you posted.
Related:
The Jena 6.
Jena 6: Mychal Bell Conviction Vacated
Jena 6 Information and Day of Action
Um, wow.
Jena 6 Revisited
Still awaiting justice in Jena.
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I was seriously disappointed by the media coverage on the Jena 6 debacle. Facts were wildly distorted and exxagerated. The story was fueled by the stereotypical image of all Louisianans as uneducated, racist rednecks. You have no idea how many times, in the weeks after the story became a media sensation, I encountered comments like, "well, what can you expect from Louisiana?" or "Everyone knows the whole state is racist". It was so utterly disgusting. To hear the guy in this video tell it, you'd assume that every white person in Jena was conspiring to get black people tossed in jail for no reason.
Yeah I mean don't they realize the white people were the victims.
Seriously, a huge civil rights movement, a blatant display of racist punishment in both the educational and legal system and the first comment is how white people were being treated unfairly.
I don't think that twisting facts and distorting reality is acceptable, regardless of what your cause is. The criminal justice system in the United States is set up to favor the rich and the white, and that's unacceptable and needs to change. Instead of focusing on the changes that need to take place within the justice system, the media took the opportunity to portray Louisiana as a state full of ignorant, uneducated, racist hicks. That's unfair to the entire population of Louisiana, which is a very diverse place.
I"m not saying the media did a crappy job of reporting. But guess what, that's how black communities are portrayed all the time. Completely homogenous with no attention to detail. I just find it telling that what was commented on was not about the major issue, which was the court case and the plea bargains, but how the media treated "us" unfairly
I didn't have a comment to make about the plea bargains..as of yet, there's not much to comment on (we don't know what the plea bargain is).
And are you saying that, because black communities are portrayed unfairly in the media, that negates my right to defend my community when it's portrayed unfairly? It's not like this was the first time Louisiana was depicted as backwards klan-country. That's kind of the standard. It frustates me, and I like to say something when I see it happen.
no I'm saying that it seems like the only thing you were focused on and thought worthy enough to comment on was about "your" issues. Which is consistently brought up as a problem where people take a post and twist it to what best relates to them and then minorities and other oppressed groups get left out.
I have no desire to minimize the opportunity of other posters to comment about how this issue affects them. None at all.
I simply had a desire to post about how this issue affects me. I apologize if doing so offended you. I only wanted to voice my opinion on how the media coverage has affected Louisiana. That is all. I did not intend to silence or belittle anyone else's interpretation of the events.
seriously?
Had the overzealous prosecutor not threatened students in the assembly and not wildly overcharged the Jena 6 in the first place, the table would not have been set for the distortions that occurred, including those by omission in the video linked in this piece.
It sounds like the right result finally occurred, with convictions on minor battery charges.
A lot of people on both sides of this story took unjustified beatings, literally and figuratively, except for maybe the prosecutor, who mishandled it the most.