March in Miami protests cop killing of Haitian man

By Mary Ann Schmidt

Miami, Florida— More than 1,000 people marched here June 2 to protest the killing of Marc Dorvil, a Haitian-American carpenter, who died in the custody of the North Bay Village police. The marchers’ high-spirited chants included “Justice, Justice, Justice, Justice,” as they crossed the causeway from Pelican Bay Park to the North Bay Village police station.

Protest signs filled the air demanding: “Justice for Marc Dorvil!” “Stop the Cover-up,” “Justice for Blacks,” “Stop Police Brutality/Stop Racial Profiling,” “Jail Killer Cops,” “We Demand a Federal Investigation,” and “Remember Rodney King, Abner Louima, Amadou Diallo.”

“People think the police killed Marc Dorvil. That’s why I’m here today. I believe the police of this city are hiding the truth,” said Yvon Jacques.

Dorvil was involved in a minor car accident on the causeway May 14. The police claim when they approached him, he acted “strange” and it took up to eight cops to “subdue” him. Dorvil was hog-tied and placed face down in the back of the patrol car. According to the Miami Herald, “He kicked the door” of the patrol car and “banged his head against the window.” An ambulance was called to treat the police, but Dorvil was left untreated in the back of the police car. The cops took him to Jackson Memorial Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

Initial press accounts of Dorvil acting like a person in a “cocaine fit” were amended when the medical examiners ruled out any presence of drugs in his system. The examiners also rejected any blame of the police. The allegation of drug use outraged working people in the community.

A flyer passed out by the Coalition Against Police Brutality and Brothers of the Same Mind reported that the State Attorney’s “summary of events” claims Dorvil broke out of flex cuffs three times. A force of 400 pounds is needed to do this, which would have caused bruising and scarring on Dorvil’s ankles, the flyer said. However the official autopsy found no evidence to support this claim. The flyer explained that this is part of the “animalization” of Dorvil by the cops and city authorities.

The official conclusion presented at a public meeting at the Miami-Dade medical examiner’s auditorium on May 25 was that Dorvil died of a “rare brain chemistry malady” that caused his behavior to resemble that of a violent reaction to cocaine. The county investigator concluded that he died of “acute exhaustive mania.”

The Haitians and African Americans present at the meeting expressed skepticism. “I sense a cover-up here,” Islande Salomon told the Miami Herald.

“Today is just the beginning. VeyeYo will go back to its base and plan future activities,” stated Lavarice Gaudin of VeyeYo, the Haitian rights organization that initiated the march that was then embraced by other organizations. The list of sponsors included the American Civil Liberties Union, the Coalition Against Police Brutality, Brothers of the Same Mind, People United to Lead the Struggle for Equality, and others.

The majority of the protesters were Haitian, and most of them workers. A few women sported UNITE union T-shirts.

Dorvil worked 10-hour days as a carpenter and was a part-time minister. Some of the demonstrators were from his church. Marie Aurelus Bien-Aimee, a 33-year-old medical worker, expressed a common sentiment at the march. “We need justice for the death of Reverend Marc. I’ve known him for two years and I’ve never seen him act like that,” she said.

There were also protesters from New York, including Abner Louima, the Haitian immigrant who was brutalized by New York City cops in 1997. Lavarice Gaudin said, “Abner Louima called us when he heard about the case. He wanted to be a part of this, and he’s here with his brother.” Louima addressed the rally at the end of the march.

Also present were family members of Patrick Dorismond, a 26-year-old Black man gunned down by a plainclothes New York City cop after he rebuffed the policeman’s request to buy some marijuana from him in March 2000.

Jacqueline Thomas-Jean, a 72-year-old Haitian retired teacher, also came from New York for the event. “There is only one way to make your voice heard, to demonstrate, demonstrate again, and demonstrate more!” she said, “[Nelson] Mandela taught us this.”

Two weeks before Dorvil’s death, Nicholas Singleton, a young Black man, was killed by the police April 30 in the nearby community of Overtown. Signs at the June 2 march called for “Justice for Singleton” and also commemorated other victims of police terror here over the years. The march swelled to 1,000 people as the overcast skies turned to a downpour. One woman shouted, “We don’t care about the rain, we want justice!” Under a canopy of umbrellas and sagging placards the protesters marched back to the park. The speakers program went on despite the rain, and was conducted mostly in Creole.

Source: The Militant: www.themilitant.com

Latinos rip US policies, say immigration rules ‘immoral’

By Daniel González

June 7— Panelists addressing the mounting number of migrant deaths along the border blasted US immigration policy as “mean-spirited” and “immoral” during a convention of Latino activists Wednesday in Phoenix.

The Rev. Robin Hoover, founder of Human Borders, a Tucson human rights group, joined Douglas Mayor Ray Borane in pinning blame for the mounting deaths on an immigration policy that in recent years has funneled migrants away from populated areas into deadly desert regions.

“Using the desert as a deterrent to cross is morally wrong,” Hoover said. “Far too many people have died crossing the desert.”

Hoover’s group assists migrants by placing water stations in the desert. The goal, he said, is to deploy stations along the entire length of the border. The deaths, including at least 19 in Arizona over the past two weeks, underscore the need for a “long-term vision,” including the possibility of a guest worker program linked to specific economic sectors like the hospitality and construction industries.

Wednesday’s workshop, called “Death on the Border,” drew a standing-room crowd of more than 125 people on the third day of a gathering by the League of United Latin American Citizens. The group is holding its national convention at the Phoenix Civic Plaza through Saturday.

The discussion, meant to generate both short- and long-term solutions to a problem that several panelists emphasized has existed for decades and may never disappear completely, was held two weeks after 14 border crossers abandoned by smugglers perished in the Arizona desert in the deadliest illegal crossing in state history. Since then, at least four more migrants have died.

Ruben Beltran, Mexico’s consul general in Phoenix and one of five panelists, said the recent deaths had forced Mexican President Vicente Fox and President Bush to conclude that “something had to be done.”

He pointed out that while the issue was being debated in Phoenix, high-level representatives from Mexico and the United States were meeting in San Antonio to search for ways of making the border safer.

Source: Arizona Republic

US black leaders demand war on AIDS

By Paul Simao

Atlanta, Georgia, June 11— Black leaders urged the Bush administration on Friday to spend an additional $190 million, or 54 percent more than currently budgeted, to fight AIDS among blacks, who account for more than half of all new HIV infections in the United States.

“In the 1400s the black plague killed a lot of people, but more people are dying today [from AIDS] than then,” former New York City Mayor David Dinkins said after the National Black Leadership Commission on AIDS finished a two-day conference in Atlanta with an urgent request for federal assistance.

Dinkins and other activists called on President George W. Bush to accept a comprehensive action plan that, among other things, would expand federal funding for housing designed for people with HIV-related disabilities and that would establish outreach programs for gays, bisexuals and others at high risk of being infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

The federal government allocates about $350 million a year for the Congressional Black Caucus’ minority HIV/AIDS prevention efforts. Black leaders said at least $540 million was needed to combat what they described as an “HIV/AIDS state of emergency” in black America.

Blacks had most of new cases

Blacks, who make up about 13 percent of the US population, represented 56 percent of the approximately 40,000 new HIV infection cases reported last year to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the federal agency tracking the epidemic.

The CDC estimates that one out of every 50 black men and 1 in every 160 black women are infected with HIV, making blacks 10 times more likely than whites to die of the disease.

The plea for more money came just one week after a CDC study said that almost 15 percent of black gay and bisexual men between the ages of 23 and 29 were becoming infected with HIV each year, infection rates alarmingly similar to those in sub-Saharan Africa and other regions hard-hit by AIDS.

The new data have led some black activists to question the Bush administration’s commitment to fighting AIDS and prompted fears that Washington could freeze federal funding for the disease near current levels.

“This is not the time to cut back, when our people are dying,” said Rep. Donna Christian-Christensen, a Democrat from the Virgin Islands and a member of the Congressional Black Caucus.

Still US health priority

Despite speculation that he would place the AIDS war on the back burner, Bush has not scrapped the White House AIDS office or taken any other steps to indicate that the disease is not a health priority for the new administration.

Bush has announced that Tommy Thompson, the secretary of health and human services, and Colin Powell, the secretary of state, will head a task force on fighting AIDS overseas. Powell made the fight against AIDS one of the themes of his recent four-nation tour of Africa.

The Bush administration also recently pledged $200 million to a global trust fund to fight AIDS. AIDS has killed an estimated 21 million people around the world, including nearly 450,000 Americans, since first being noticed in 1981.

Black leaders, however, concede that an increase in federal funding alone will not be enough to combat the epidemic in the United States. They say that changes in the mind-set of the black community are also needed.

Health experts have noted that the stigma attached to gays and the HIV-infected in the black community has prevented many people from being tested for the virus, allowing the disease to spread.

“We have to launch a national campaign against homophobia in the black community,” said Coretta Scott King, widow of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., the slain civil rights leader.

“Let us assure that homophobia, ignorance and low self-esteem no longer feed the spread of AIDS,” she said.

Source: Reuters

Prosecution seeks to deny Abu-Jamal counsel of choice

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, June 7— The Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office is once again seeking to prevent Mumia Abu-Jamal from exercising his right to be represented by counsel of his choice. Jamal’s case is currently pending before Judge William H. Yohn in the United States District Court of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania in a federal habeas corpus action.

The District Attorney’s office has objected to Jamal’s selection of Nick Brown, Esq., a pre-eminent British barrister, as a member of his defense team. Attorneys from foreign nations, including Britain and Canada, are routinely admitted to practice before various American courts, including the US Supreme Court, for the purposes of a particular case. Generally speaking, the only issue with respect to such admissions is whether an attorney is qualified to practice law.

“It is indisputable that Nick Brown is qualified to be a member of Mumia’s defense team and to appear before the court,” said Jamal’s attorney Marlene Kamish. “In fact, it seems that the real issue for the District Attorney’s Office is that he is too qualified.”

Brown graduated in the top 5% of his class at Cambridge University’s law school, and has been a barrister at one of London’s leading law chambers for more than ten years. Barristers are members of an elite society of specialized trial attorneys. Mr. Brown’s chambers are the equivalent of a top “AV- rated “ law firm in a major American city. Brown has tried hundreds of civil and criminal cases.

Brown not only has extensive experience in the legal system from which the American judicial system was born, but also has a thorough understanding of Jamal’s case and relevant American constitutional provisions and laws. He was the author of a comprehensive amicus brief submitted by 22 members of the British Parliament in Jamal’s case.

The irony of this latest move by the D.A’s office is not lost on Jamal or his defense team. One of the 29 constitutional violations which took place during the original trial, and one of the grounds for Jamal’s pending habeas corpus petition, is the denial of the constitutional right to represent himself and be represented by counsel of his choice.

“Throughout the history of this case, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and its counsel have defended the ineffective representation of counsel afforded [Jamal] at trial and on appeal,” Jamal’s attorneys state in a brief on the issue filed with the court on Monday, June 4, 2001.

“Opposition to motions for admission of attorneys from outside a court’s jurisdiction are almost unheard of,” Eliot Grossman, also a member of Jamal’s new legal team, stated. “If the D.A.’s office is so sure of its case against Mumia, why is it so concerned about who represents him in a habeas corpus proceeding?”

Another individual, Arnold Beverly, has admitted to committing the crime Jamal was charged with in 1981. Mr. Beverly’s sworn confession was filed with the court on May 4th, 2001, and corroborated by a polygraph examination.

Mumia Abu-Jamal remains on death row.

Source: Pan-African News Wire

Bush says no to Gay Pride Month

By Barbara Dozetos

June 4— Gay pride celebrations around the country will have to proceed without acknowledgment from the White House this year.

President George W. Bush will not proclaim this June to be Gay Pride Month, breaking the custom established in 1999 by predecessor President Bill Clinton. White House spokesman Scott McClellan said that while Bush feels all people should be treated with “dignity and respect,” he “does not believe in politicizing people’s sexual orientation.”

“[Bush’s] refusal to reach out to our community calls into question his promise to be president of all the people,” David Smith, a spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign (a GLBT rights organization), told the Associated Press. Smith said that since he took office in January, Bush has reached out to other constituencies by signing proclamations for Black History Month, Women’s History Month and Irish-American Heritage Month.

The new president’s office will also take a pass on sponsoring any activities or observances marking the month, according to a memo e-mailed to administration managers last week.

“The executive office of the president will not sponsor an observance for Gay and Lesbian Pride Month,” read the memo. “The executive office of the president will continue to observe, in some form or manner, the special emphasis programs that are traditionally recognized through the Affirmative Employment Program. Those programs recognize minorities and women that have been traditionally underrepresented in the work force.”

In addition to issuing the presidential proclamations that designated Gay Pride Month in 1999 and 2000, the Clinton administration sponsored observances such as related speakers’ forums.

According to an AP report, some other executive branch offices, including the Transportation and Interior Departments, are still planning their own observances for Gay Pride Month.

Source: Gay.com: www.gay.com

City marks anniversary of gay rights movement

Boston, Massachusetts— Tens of thousands of people gathered on the Boston Common on Saturday to celebrate the 31st anniversary of the birth of the modern gay and lesbian rights movement.

Boston Pride 2001 began at noon at Copley Square with a parade of bedecked floats and spangled marchers that snaked through city streets, ending with entertainment, food and dancing on the Common.

Boston Mayor Thomas Menino welcomed the crowd, praising the “courageous individuals” who organized the first event more than three decades ago and saying the city is a better place because of gay and lesbian visibility.

“The rainbow flag is flying down at City Hall right now,” he said. “This city is a wonderful city because of you folks and thousands of others.”

Organizers estimated that 55,000 people had poured onto the Common by the event’s peak mid-afternoon, and that some 4,700 participated in the parade itself.

Part parade, part picnic, part politics, the event marks the anniversary of a riot in New York City that many consider a historic turning point for homosexuals.

During a raid in 1969, police arrested gay men and drag queens at the Stonewall Bar in Greenwich Village. But bar patrons resisted, sparking a riot that many consider the birth of the movement.

Preston Horton, a Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority police officer and the president of the Gay Officers Action League of New England, said police have long had a “terrible image” in the eyes of gays and lesbians.

The image has only recently begun to change as police, straight and not, learn to deal with issues such as hate crimes and same-sex domestic violence.

“People realize that we’re trying to change things and make a difference,” he said.

He said visibility of gays and lesbians is the most important element of the event.

“My whole life can be out on the forefront, and it sends a message to gay and lesbian youth that they can be whatever they want,” he said.

Source: Associated Press

US plans for missile defense test in July

June 9— The United States plans to conduct the fourth test of a planned missile defense system by the end of next month, a Defense Department spokesman said Friday.

This will be the first Bush administration flight test of the controversial multi-billion dollar ballistic missile defense system.

The test would involve the same components as the last one - a dummy warhead and decoy launched from California’s Vandenburg Air Force Base and a prototype interceptor with a 54-kilogram “kill vehicle” launched 6,919 kilometers away, from the Kwajalein Atoll in the Republic of the Marshall Islands.

“And hopefully, they’ll meet somewhere over the Pacific,” said Rick Lehner, spokesman for the Pentagon’s Ballistic Missile Defense Organization. The test will likely be done in “mid to late July, based on current planning,” he said.

Two of three US missile defense tests have failed to prove the system would work, most recently on July 8 last year when an attempt to intercept and destroy a dummy warhead in space failed because the weapon did not separate from the second stage of its liftoff rocket.

Arms control experts said that the US missile defense plan, opposed by the international community, will not only spark a new arms race, but also threaten world peace and security, and stimulate nuclear proliferation.

Source: www.stopnato.org.uk