Volume 21, Number 6
Mississippi’s SB 2988
David Bacon
StratCom
Bruce k. Gagnon
A War on Communities
Cynthia Peters
Commentary
Letters
Z magazine Readers
Campaign Issues
Lydia Sargent
Aircraft Maintenance
Carl Finamore
Racial Profiling
Margaret Kwoka
Sean Bell Verdict
Rosa Clemente
Religious Right
Bill Berkowitz
Water Crisis
Alex Stonehill
Culture
Damming the Flood
Ben Terrall
Review: Takeover
Jeffrey Frank
Features
Triumph of Lunacy
Edward Herman
Dr. Wall Street
Jeremy Brecher
Market Madness
A.k. Gupta
Financial Crisis and Financialization's Appropriations
William Tabb
Epic Recession?
Jack Rasmus
Colombia Trade Deal
Roger Bybee
Zaps
Zaps
Various submissions
NOTE: Z Magazine subscribers and sustainers have access to all Z Magazine articles here and in the archive. The latest Z Magazine articles available to everyone are listed in the Free Articles box at the top of the table of contents, and are starred in the list below. Questions? e-mail Z Magazine Online.
The Sean Bell Verdict
A few hours after three New York City police detectives killed 23-year-old Sean Bell and wounded Trent Benefield and Joseph Guzman on November 25, 2006, my husband, a Black man, asked, "If the cops murdered me, do you really think you could get justice?" I wanted to say yes. I wanted to say that I knew what I would do, how I would organize, whom I would call on.
On April 25, in a country where beating and killing a dog gets you a 23-month sentence, Judge Arthur Cooperman ruled that the 3 detectives who fired 50 bullets—4 killed Sean Bell; 19 and 3 hit Guzman and Benefield respectively—at an unarmed Black man on the eve of his wedding were not guilty and free to walk our streets.
April protest—photo by Michael Gould-Wartofsky
Nicole Paultre-Bell, the victim's fiancé, ran out of the standing-room only court room. Valerie Bell, Sean's mother, fainted and had to be carried out. Guzman and Benefield broke down crying. Once outside, Sean's father, William Bell, said quietly but forcefully, "We will shut this city down."
So, two years after he asked, to answer my husband's question, "No, I couldn't get him the justice he deserved." In the United States of America, there will never be justice for Black or Brown men when the police are their murderers.
Every day, in the back of my mind, I fear that my husband (whose name is Justice) won't come home. I fear that some trigger happy cop who is institutionalized to fear Black men will murder him, think up a justifiable reason, and the system will pat him on the back and say, "That's all right. Justice deserved to die."
Like the Bells and the Paultres, my family will live through months of protest, rallies, and petition signing to get an indictment—which is not guaranteed. There will be a trial and the prosecution will be ineffective. The defense will bring up our past arrests—as they did with Benefield and other witnesses—and say that because we were not law-abiding citizens, we cannot be trusted. The judge will blame the victim, just like Judge Cooperman did when he cleared the detectives of all charges.
The Sean Bell case happened in New York, but every day in the U.S. police harass, brutalize, set-up, and murder young men of color. We must launch a national movement against police brutality. Justice will not come from a federal probe and investigation, as some civil rights groups are now calling for. Justice will only come when we the people not only demand, but fight for it. As Frederick Douglass wrote: "Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what a people will submit to, and you have found out the exact amount of injustice and wrong, which will be imposed upon Them; and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress."
Z
Z Magazine Archive
Announcements
Events from Zaps
OCCUPY TOGETHER - Occupy Together is the unofficial hub for the various occupations springing up across the country in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street. Over 1,000 cities and towns are currently participating.
Contact: http://www.occupytogether.org/.
LEONARD PELTIER - February 4 is the International Day of Solidarity with Leonard Peltier. The Leonard Peltier Defense Offense Committee calls on supporters worldwide to protest against the injustice suffered by the Indigenous activist.
Contact: http://www.whois leonardpeltier.info/index1.htm.
EVOLUTION - February 10-12 will be the sixth annual celebration of Evolution Weekend, intended to demonstrate that religious people from many faiths and locations understand that evolution is sound science and poses no problems for their faith (affiliated with the Clergy Letters Project repudiating anti-science fundamentalism).
Contact: http://theclergyletter project.org/.
AFRICA - The Priority Africa Network will host the Second Annual Ubuntu Awards’ Dinner, February 11, in
Contact: http://www.priority africa.org/.
FOOD - Registration is open for the Ohio Ecological Food and Farm Association’s (OEFFA) 33rd annual conference, Sowing the Seeds of Our Food Sovereignty, February 18-19, in
Contact: http://www.oeffa. org/.
JUSTICE - The Justice Conference 2012 will be held February 24-25 in
Contact: http://thejusticecon- ference.com/.
SHUT DOWN - Occupy Portland has called for a Shut Down Corporations Day on February 29—a day of non-violent civil disobedience targeting corporations who are members of ALEC (the American Legislative Exchange Council), one of the most successful mechanisms that the 1% uses to control legislation.
Contact: http://occupyport- land.org/.
ISRAEL/PALESTINE - Israeli Apartheid Week is an annual international series of events held in cities and campuses across the globe. The aim is to educate people about the nature of
Contact: http://apartheidweek. org/en.
WOMEN/AFGHANISTAN - Global Exchange Reality Tours and Afghans4Tomo- row have prepared a program to begin March 1, called
Contact: http://www.globalexchange.org/tours; http://www. afghans4tomorrow.org/.
WOMEN’S STRIKE - March 8 is International Women’s Day and events are planned worldwide. Global Women’s Strike also organizes protest, education, and direct action around this day to redress the ongoing oppression of women who do two-thirds of all the world’s work— most of it without pay or formal benefits and often in slave conditions.
Contact: http://www.global womenstrike.net/; http://www. internationalwomens day.com/about.asp.
OCCUPY/CAPITALISM - The 2012 Left Forum is scheduled for March 16-18 at
Contact: 212-817-2003; panels@leftforum.org; http:// www.leftforum.org.
FOOD NOT BOMBS - Food Not Bombs is currently organizing several projects in communities, including: free food distribution to local people in need; literature tables to provide information about food, peace and justice; hot meals at demonstrations and events; and creative actions in protest of war and poverty. The group invites all to join.
Contact: Food Not Bombs,
LABOR/COMMUNITY - The
Contact: info@thestrategy center.org; http://www.thestrategy center.org/.
PROCESS - No Labels is currently accepting new stakeholders. The group aims to build a network of supporters in every congressional district at the grassroots level.
Contact: backoffice@nolabels. org; http://nolabels.org/front.
PEACE/DEMOCRACY - The Campaign for Peace and Democracy is currently fundraising. The organization does not receive any foundation or government grants.
Contact: cpd@igc.org; http:// www.cpdweb.org/.
MEDIA - Toward Freedom is currently fundraising. The organization organizes public events aimed at raising awareness of and discussions about global issues.
Contact: admin@towardfreedom.com; http://towardfreedom.com/.
PEACE & JUSTICE - S!PAZ is currently fundraising. The group seeks to promote actions that contribute to the process of a non-violent transformation related to the ongoing armed conflict in
Contact: http://razapressasso- ciation.org/.
MEDIA/RAZA - The Raza Press and Media Association (RPMA) has issued its 2012 New Year Messages of Resistance, and is currently seeking new members. The group holds the position that Raza are colonized, indigenous people and that the
Contact: chiapas@sipaz.org; http://www.sipaz.org/fini_eng.htm.
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