Jena Six

For other uses, see Jena (disambiguation).

Template:Current court case The Jena Six refers to a group of six black teenagers who were charged with the beating of Justin Barker, a white teenager at Jena (pronunciation: /ˈdʒiːnə/) High School in Jena, Louisiana, United States, on December 4, 2006. The beating followed a number of racially-charged incidents in the town, of which the earliest that has been reported was when three white students hung nooses from a tree at Jena High School after a black student asked permission from a school administrator to sit under the tree.

The Jena Six case sparked large scale protests by those who view the arrests and subsequent charges as excessive and racially discriminatory, especially as compared with the treatment of white Jena youths involved in other incidents. On September 20, 2007, between ten and twenty thousand protesters marched on Jena in what was described as the "largest civil rights demonstration in years." Related protests were held in other U.S. cities on the same day.

U.S. Attorney Donald Washington — an African American and a Bush appointee — who led an investigation into events in the town, concluded that there was no evidence of unfair prosecution.

Mychal Bell, the only member of the "Jena Six" who was tried, has had his convictions set aside. Bell was originally charged with attempted murder, but the charges were subsequently reduced and he was convicted of aggravated battery and conspiracy. Both convictions were overturned on the grounds that the defendant should have been tried as a juvenile, not as an adult, on the reduced charges. Bell was incarcerated for almost 10 months, before being released on September 27, 2007, after bail was posted on his behalf. Bell’s retrial is scheduled for December 6 2007.

On October 11 2007 District Judge J.P. Mauffrey Jr. revoked Bell’s probation for his four previous juvenile convictions ruling that he had violated his probation (Bell had been placed on probation prior to the Jena Six incident). Bell was sentenced to 18 months in jail on two counts of simple battery and two counts of criminal destruction of property unrelated to Jena 6 beating.

Events in Jena: August 2006 - December 2006

Noose hangings at Jena High School

Jena High School

At Jena High School, about 15% of students are black and more than 80% are white. Early reporting asserted that students of different races seldom sat together, although this has been disputed. According to early reports, black students typically sat on bleachers near the auditorium, while white students sat under a large tree, referred to as the "white tree" or "prep tree," in the center of the school courtyard. According to some teachers and administrators at the school, the tree in question wasn’t a "white tree," and students of all races had sat under it at one time or another.

A school assembly was held on August 31, 2006. According to media reports, a black male freshman asked the principal whether he could sit under the tree. According to Donald Washington — U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Louisiana — the principal stated that the question was posed in a "jocular fashion." The principal told the students they could "sit wherever they wanted."

The following morning, nooses were discovered hanging from the tree. Reports differ as to whether there were three — believed by some to be code for the Ku Klux Klan — or two. According to Craig Franklin, assistant editor of The Jena Times, it was revealed that the nooses were actually a prank by three students aimed at white members of the school rodeo team in school proceedings. As of October 25, 2007, those who hung the nooses have never publicly stated the reasons behind their actions. A black teacher described seeing both white and black students "playing with [the nooses], pulling on them, jump-swinging from them, and putting their heads through them" that same day. The Jena Times reported that the nooses were removed by 7:15 a.m. after school officials were informed.

Repercussions

The school disciplinary process which followed is unclear. It has been reported that Jena's principal learned that three white students were responsible and recommended expulsion, that the board of education overruled his recommendation, and that school superintendent Roy Breithaupt agreed with the overruling. It was initially reported that the punishment was reduced to three days of in-school suspension. However, the three students were isolated at an alternative school for nine days, spent two weeks on in-school suspension, served Saturday detentions, had to attend Discipline Court, were referred to Families in Need of Services, and had to have an evaluation before they were able to return to school as part of the district's Crises Management Policy Procedures.

The school superintendent was quoted as saying, "Adolescents play pranks. I don't think it was a threat against anybody." According to Professor Anita L. Allen of the University of Pennsylvania Law School (who is "recognized for her scholarship in . . . race relations"), "the 'full horror and terror' of the noose's significance may remain unclear to a 16-year-old who would see it as merely an 'intimidating or cheeky' act."

Black residents of Jena have stated that this decision stoked racial tensions, in their view leading to subsequent events.

On July 31, 2007 the school had the tree cut down.

U.S. Attorney Donald Washington stated that the FBI agents who investigated the incident and the federal officials who examined it found that the hanging of the nooses "had all the markings of a hate crime." However, it could not be prosecuted as such because it failed to meet federal standards required for the teens to be certified as adults. In Hearings before the House Judiciary Committee on October 16, 2007, Washington stated that the hanging of nooses did constitute a hate crime but that the federal government could not bring charges because those responsible were juveniles.

District Attorney Walters stated that Washington had found no federal statute under which the teens could be prosecuted, just as he had found no applicable state statute." Walters stated of those who hung the nooses: "The people that did it should be ashamed of what they unleashed on this town."

In late July 2007, Washington noted that of the more than 40 statements taken regarding the assault, none mentioned the noose incident. La Salle Parish District Attorney J. Reed Walters claimed there was no linkage between the noose incident and the beating. "When this case was brought to me and during our investigation and during the trial, there was no such linkage ever suggested. This compact story line has only been suggested after the fact."

District attorney addresses the school assembly

Police were called to the school several times in the days after the noose incident in response to a rash of interracial fights between students. The principal took action by calling an assembly on September 6, 2006. The Jena Police Department asked La Salle Parish District Attorney J. Reed Walters to attend and speak at the assembly. Allegedly, Walters was unhappy with the request because he was busy preparing for a case and, upon arrival, felt that the students were not paying proper attention to him. Walters stated that he warned the students saying: "I can be your best friend or your worst enemy. With the stroke of a pen I can make life miserable on you or ruin your life. So I want you to call me before you do something stupid." Though black students state Walters was looking at them when he made the comments, Walters and school board member Billy Fowler, also present, deny it. Walter said that he was irritated at "two or three girls, white girls, [who] were chit-chatting on their cellphones or playing with their cellphones."

Students attempt to address school board

On September 10, 2006, black students attempted to address the school board concerning the recent events but were refused because the board was of the opinion that the noose incident had been adequately resolved.

Jena High School arson

On November 30 2006, a wing of the main building of the high school was set on fire. That portion of the building was gutted and had to be later demolished. While arson was determined to be the cause, the arsonists have never been identified.

On October 20, 2007, LaSalle Parish voters narrowly turned down a sales tax increase intended to fund several school projects, including the reconstruction of the main building of Jena High School.

Fair Barn party fight

The "Gotta Go" convenience store outside Jena, Louisiana.

On Friday, December 1, 2006, there was a private party, attended mostly by whites but with some blacks, at the Jena Fair Barn. Six black youths, including 16-year-old Robert Bailey, Jr., attempted to enter the party at about 11 p.m. According to U.S. Attorney Washington, they were told by a woman that no one was allowed inside without an invitation. The six youths persisted, stating that some friends were already in attendance at the party. A white male, who was not a student, then jumped in front of the woman and a fight ensued. After the fight broke up, the woman told both the white male and five black students to leave the party. Once outside, the black students were involved in another fight with a group of white males, who were not students. Police were called to investigate. Justin Sloan, a white male, was charged with simple battery for his role in the fight and was put on probation. Bailey later stated that one of the white males broke a beer bottle over his head, but there are no records of Bailey receiving medical treatment.

Convenience store incident

On Saturday, December 2 2006, another incident occurred at the "Gotta Go" convenience store, outside Jena in unincorporated LaSalle Parish, between Matt Windham and a group consisting of Robert Bailey, Ryan Simmons, and Theodore Shaw. Local police reported that the accounts contradicted each other. Windham alleged that Bailey and his friends chased him, that he ran to get his gun, and that the students wrestled it away from him. According to the black students, as they left the convenience store, they were confronted by Windham, with a shotgun. They stated they wrestled the gun away from him and fled the scene. After taking statements from two uninvolved eyewitnesses, the police formed a report based on their testimony and charged Bailey, Simmons, and Shaw with theft of a firearm, second-degree robbery, and conspiracy to commit second-degree robbery.

Jena Six legal case

The attack on Barker

On December 4, 2006, 17-year-old Justin Barker, a white Jena High School student, was assaulted at school. According to court documents, someone hit Barker from behind, knocking him out, and then others began to kick and stomp him. He spent about three hours in a local emergency room for treatment of injuries to his head and face.

Superintendent Breithaupt stated that the attack was no ordinary schoolyard fight. "It was a premeditated ambush and attack by six students against one," Breithaupt said. "The victim attacked was beaten and kicked into a state of bloody unconsciousness."

According to relatives of the accused, the six defendants have all been expelled from school. Jesse Ray Beard, the youngest of the six, has returned to school and is participating in athletics. Bryant Purvis is attending a private school in the Dallas, Texas area.

Barker's injuries

A doctor treated Barker at the local hospital emergency room. He was released after three hours of treatment and observation for a concussion and an eye that had swollen shut. The emergency physician's record shows that he also had injuries to his face, ears and hand. He attended his school's Ring ceremony that evening. He later testified, "I waited 11 years to go to it. I wasn't going to let that get in my way," though he ended up leaving early due to pain.

During the trial, Barker also testified that his face was badly swollen after the attack and that he suffered a loss of vision in one eye for three weeks. He also stated that he suffered recurring headaches and forgetfulness since the attack, though medical tests have not isolated the cause. A nurse testified that Barker had a previous history of migraines.

Trial, prosecution, and legal proceedings

The police arrested the six students, eventually dubbed the "Jena Six," accused of the attack. Five of them (Robert Bailey, Jr., then 17; Mychal Bell, then 16; Carwin Jones, then 18; Bryant Purvis, then 17; and Theo Shaw, then 17) were charged with attempted second-degree murder. The sixth student, Jesse Ray Beard, was charged as a juvenile because he was 14 at the time.

Mychal Bell, aged sixteen at the time of the incident, was charged as an adult. The district attorney has stated that he did so due to Bell's criminal record and because he believed Bell initiated the attack.

Mychal Bell proceedings

On June 26, 2007, the first day of trial for defendant Mychal Bell, Walters reduced the charges for Bell to aggravated second-degree battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated second-degree battery. A charge of aggravated battery requires the use of a "dangerous weapon." Walters therefore argued that the tennis shoes that Bell was wearing and used to kick Barker with were dangerous weapons, an argument with which the jury ultimately agreed. A number of witnesses testified that they saw Bell strike Barker, while other witnesses were unsure Bell was involved. Public defender Blane Williams, himself a black man, had urged Bell to accept a plea bargain, but did not challenge the composition of the jury pool, and rested the defense case without calling any witnesses or offering any evidence.

Coach Benjy Lewis, the only adult witness to the incident, stated that another student, Malcolm Shaw, was the initial attacker, and was only able to positively identify one other student, not Bell. Lewis was not called to testify in Bell's trial.

All six members of Bell's jury were white. The 150-person jury call included black citizens, who make up ten percent of the parish's population, but none of the 50 potential jurors who showed up was black.

The jury found Bell guilty, and he faced the possibility of up to 22 years in prison. The judge scheduled sentencing for September 20, 2007. Following the trial, Bell's new defense attorneys, Louis Scott and Carol Powell-Lexing, requested a new trial on the grounds that Bell should not have been tried as an adult and that the trial should have been held in another parish. A request to lower Mychal Bell's $90,000 bond was denied on August 24, 2007, due to his juvenile record. Bell had been put on probation for a battery that occurred December 25, 2005, and he was subsequently convicted of another battery charge and two charges of criminal damage to property while still on probation. Sources told ESPN that one of the battery charges was for punching a 17-year-old girl in the face, although details of the conviction might be protected under the Louisiana Children's Code. Perhaps due to the protection given juvenile convictions, the media had initially reported that Bell had no prior criminal record. Judge Mauffrey vacated the conspiracy conviction on the grounds that Bell should have been tried as a juvenile, but let the battery conviction stand. However, on September 14, 2007, Louisiana's Third Circuit Court of Appeals overturned Bell's battery conviction, also ruling that the remaining charge was not among those for which a juvenile may be tried as an adult.

Following an order by the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeal, a hearing was held on September 21, 2007, to determine whether to set bond for Bell. Judge Mauffrey denied the request for Bell to be eligible for bail while his appeal was pending. A motion by Bell's attorneys to have Judge J.P. Mauffrey recused was also denied.

On September 26, 2007, Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco announced that the prosecution would not appeal the appellate ruling, but would try Bell as a juvenile. Walters confirmed this on the 27th, and Bell was then released on $45,000 bond with the bail paid by Dr. Stephen Ayers of Lake Charles, Louisiana. Bell was subject to electronic monitoring and was under the supervision of a probation officer.

On October 11 2007, Judge J.P. Mauffray Jr. found that Bell had violated the terms of his probation for previous convictions. The judge then sentenced Bell to 18 months in a juvenile facility on two counts of simple battery and two counts of criminal destruction of property, and Bell was taken into custody. According to Walters, the matter was unrelated to the assault on Barker, and it was not even mentioned during the proceedings. Bell's attorney plans to appeal.

Bell's retrial in the Barker assault is scheduled for December 6, 2007.

The other five

On September 4, 2007, charges against Carwin Jones and Theo Shaw were reduced to aggravated second-degree battery and conspiracy, as were those of Robert Bailey, Jr., on September 10.

Despite the overturning of Mychal Bell's conviction, the charges against the other four teenagers remained unaffected because they were over seventeen at the time of the incident, thus making them adults under Louisiana law. Bryant Purvis was arraigned on reduced charges of aggravated battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated battery on November 7, 2007, pleading not guilty. Motions hearings for two other defendants originally scheduled for the same day have been continued. Purvis's trial is set for March 24, with motions hearings set for December 4 and January 8.

Public response

The case has brought a public response from those alleging that the charges against the Jena Six were disproportionate and racially motivated. Supporters of the Jena Six circulated online petitions, raised money for legal defense, and held a demonstration in Jena on September 20, 2007.

Rallies

Talk show host Michael Baisden and the Rev. Al Sharpton at the front of the September 20 2007 march on Jena, Louisiana.

Rallies in support of the Jena Six and all blacks in the United States who have been unfairly treated by the justice system were held in Jena and elsewhere in the United States on September 20 2007, the date when Bell was scheduled for sentencing. Because of the rallies' large expected size (estimates were up to 40,000 to 60,000) Jena High and schools on the south side of La Salle Parish were closed.

An estimated 15,000 to 20,000 demonstrators eventually attended the rally that day severely overtaxing the facilities of the small town of 3,000 residents. Because of the congestion on the roads leading to Jena, many protesters left their vehicals and walked into town on foot. Among those in attendance were civil rights activists Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, and Martin Luther King III, rappers Mos Def and Salt-n-Pepa, and New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin. Rapper-actor Ice Cube, who also attended, funded buses to bring protesters from California. Darryl Hunt, an African-American who was wrongfully convicted of the rape and murder of a young white newspaper reporter in 1984, was scheduled to be a keynote speaker.

The demonstrators were addressed by Darryl Matthews, General President of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity, who stated "It is sobering to know that in 2007 Martin Luther King’s dream of equal treatment, respect, fairness and opportunity is still not realized."

Several self described white supremacists also attended the rally. Former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke has publicly given support for Jena's "white residents."

Petitions

Multiple online petitions have circulated calling for various actions in response to the Jena Six case. A petition created by Thomas McNamara, which encouraged the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the case, gathered more than 441,514 signatures as of October 18 2007. Another petition created by online advocacy group ColorOfChange called for District Attorney Walters to drop all charges and for Governor Kathleen Blanco to investigate his conduct. The ColorOfChange petition had received 312,880 signatures as of October 18, 2007. A third petition, sponsored by the NAACP and asking Louisiana state officials to investigate the case, has obtained more than 175,000 signatures as of the same date.

Legal defense fund

A legal defense fund was established to pay attorney and other fees for the Jena Six. ColorOfChange raised more than $170,000, largely through online donations. While the NAACP provided a link to the fund through its website, initially, the donation link on the NAACP Jena Six support page steered potential donors to the generic NAACP donation page, with no way to designate funds for the Jena Six. Black bloggers objected, and several days later, the link was altered to reach the defense fund.

Threats and harassment

On September 22, 2007, the FBI opened an investigation of a white supremacist website that listed the addresses of five of the Jena Six and the telephone numbers of some of their families "in case anyone wants to deliver justice." According to an FBI spokeswoman, the website "essentially called for their lynching."

Al Sharpton has stated that some of the families have continuously received threatening and harassing phone calls.

Media coverage

Initial coverage

The Jena 6 were initially largely ignored by the national media, though covered locally and within Louisiana. The first piece on the case ran on May 9 in Left Turn, a small alternative news magazine. The story prompted a report on the BBC program This World on May 24. On July 3, Bill Quigley wrote an column for the website Truthout, which generated more attention from the alternative press. The first mainstream media outlet to cover the matter was the Chicago Tribune, whose Southwest Bureau Chief, Howard Witt, wrote a piece covering the story on May 20. Witt had received from Alan Bean, a Texas minister and the creator of Friends of Justice, an advocacy group, , a summary called "Responding to the Crisis in Jena, Louisiana," which is still available on the Friends of Justice web site.. That document contained the earliest known summary of events in Jena and was also provided to other reporters and bloggers.

Bean indicated that there were three nooses (a tree with three nooses dangling still decorates the Friends of Justice web site), decorated in the school colors of black and gold, that the students were restored to school after a few days of in-school suspension because they were inspired by a hanging scene in Lonesome Dove; that a student (presumably Bailey) was struck "with beer bottles" as he attempted to enter the Fair Barn; and that "a fight" occurred between a white student and several black students which concluded with the white student being knocked to the floor. Bean demanded that the trials be moved elsewhere, the police, district attorney, and judge all be taken off the case, and, since he equates the Fair Barn incident (in which a white man was placed on probation for assault) with the assault on Barker, that any punishment for any student found to have been involved in the assault on Barker be limited to probation.

Widespread coverage

The case began to receive extensive media coverage in September 2007, both from news reporters and columnists. Michael J. Copps, a Commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission noted in a letter to the Washington Post the role of black radio talk show hosts in publicizing the Jena 6 case, and went on to criticize what he sees as a low rate of minority ownership of commercial broadcast television and radio stations. Commissioner Copps wrote that many people of color felt that their concerns were being overlooked by "Big Media."

Many of the news reports from Jena have evoked the Civil Rights Movement, made references to lynching, or evoked Jim Crow.

Some sources have pointed out inaccurate reporting by the media. The Associated Press published an article noting the various reporting errors that have been made, including whether the tree was a "white tree", the number of nooses, and the discipline meted out on the nooses-hanging students. Based on this, MTV posted a retraction for incorrect information that it had reported on the case from other news sources.

Columnists and editorials

The majority of editorial pages and columnists have been sympathetic to the supporters of the Jena Six, and have used the case to discuss broader trends of racism in the U.S. criminal justice system and to call for a renewed civil rights movement.

• The New York Post, in a September 23, 2007 editorial states, "it’s impossible to examine the case of the so-called Jena Six without concluding that these black teens have been the victims of a miscarriage of justice, with a clearly racial double standard at work."

• The Philadelphia Inquirer editorial page wrote on the same day that: "The discrepancy in the original charges sent a chilling message to others in this nation whose race, ethnicity, religion or other distinctions have made them targets of discrimination."

• Byron Williams, writing on the Huffington Post, was one of several to cite the Urban League's 2005 State of Black America report, which states that the average black male convicted of aggravated assault serves 48 months in prison, one third longer than a comparable white man. That report also stated that a black male who is arrested is three times more likely to go to prison than a white male convicted of the same crime.

• Citing the same statistics, syndicated columnist Clarence Page wrote that "The best legacy for the Jena 6 march would be a new movement, dedicated this time to the reduction and elimination of unequal justice wherever it appears. I don't care who leads it, but it shouldn't be for blacks only."

• Writing in the New York Times, Professor Orlando Patterson of Harvard University used the case to highlight the use of the prison system as a means of "controlling young black men," which is one factor in a broader "crisis in relations between men and women of all classes and, as a result, the catastrophic state of black family life."

Columnists critical of the response to the case have argued that inaccuracies in the media coverage unfairly tarnish the town and have led to a national overreaction.

• Dallas Morning News columnist Heather MacDonald, while condemning the noose hangings as a "despicable provocation", expressed her view that "the media, the (race) advocates and pandering politicians have erupted in an outpouring of seeming joy at the alleged proof that America remains a racist country."

• In a column in the Kansas City Star, Jason Whitlock drew attention to what he called factual inaccuracies in reporting of the story. He focused on the piece circulated by Bean to news outlets, "Bean’s story is framed — by his own admission — as an indictment of the criminal justice system and the people in power in Jena and, therefore, the story is unfairly biased."

• Craig Franklin, assistant editor of The Jena Times, who states that he is the only writer to have covered this story from the inception, wrote an opinion essay for The Christian Science Monitor in which he states his version of a number of events and writes of what he deems to be incorrect reporting, "I have never before witnessed such a disgrace in professional journalism. Myths replaced facts . . . The truth about Jena will eventually be known."

Media petition

On October 22, 2007, a petition for intervention was filed in LaSalle Parish District Court in the Mychal Bell case by The Chicago Tribune, The Los Angeles Times and about two dozen other news organizations. The petition is a First Amendment challenge to open previously sealed court records and transcripts, to lift the gag order imposed by Judge Mauffray, and to open the proceedings in the Bell case. The petition argues that juvenile proceedings involving violent crime or subsequent felony-grade adjudication are required by Louisiana law to be open to the public. The lawsuit alleges that the sealing of the records and restrictions imposed upon counsel and the media "substantially limit the (media's) ability to report to the public the facts about this significant case and unconstitutionally stifle the flow of information to the public." As Judge Mauffray was named as a defendant in the case, he has recused himself from hearing the media petition (but not any of the other cases), and the matter is being heard by another judge. A hearing has been set for November 21.

Developments since September 20 rally

Songs about Jena

Multiple songs have been produced in response to the Jena Six case. Bomani Armah, who earlier in the year wrote the controversial internet single Read a Book, released a song called Jena 6. John Mellencamp released a video for a song called "Jena," which got considerably more play in the media, that implied the Jena Six case was unfairly tried due to the racist attitudes of the town. This led to the mayor of Jena, Murphy R. McMillan, issuing a statement rebutting the accusations expressed and implied in the video.

House Judiciary Committee hearing

On September 25, 2007, Representative John Conyers, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, announced that he would hold congressional hearings on what he described as "the miscarriages of justice that have occurred in Jena, Louisiana," with the goal of pressuring the U.S. Department of Justice into taking what Chairman Conyers deems to be appropriate action. On September 27, 2007, the Congressional Black Caucus called upon the Department of Justice to investigate possible civil rights violations in the Jena Six case, saying "This shocking case has focused national and international attention on what appears to be an unbelievable example of the separate and unequal justice that was once commonplace in the Deep South."

The hearing took place on October 16, 2007, with Washington and Sharpton, among others, testifying. Walters was invited to testify but declined. Most Republican members of the committee declined to attend. Representative Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) exclaimed to Washington and other Justice Department officials, "Shame on you . . . As a parent, I'm on the verge of tears," and demanded, "I want to know what you're going to do to get Mychal Bell out of jail!" Washington responded that the federal government had a limited role to play in the matter.

BET Hip Hop Awards appearance

Jones and Purvis attended the BET Hip Hop Awards in Atlanta on October 13, 2007 and presented the award for Video of The Year. When the two defendants came out on stage, they were greeted by a standing ovation. The emcee, Katt Williams joked, "They don't look so tough, do they?" The two members delivered speeches thanking family, friends, the "Hip-Hop Nation," and those who came to Jena. Jones' parents, and the fathers of Bell and Shaw were in the audience.

According to Jones's mother, BET invited the families to come to the awards show for "a relaxing weekend" and a spokesman for the LaSalle Parish District Attorney, said the defendants sought and received the court's permission before going to the event. The (Alexandria, Louisiana) Town Talk reports that, "criticism has been extensive" concerning the appearance.

External links

• Witness statements and other documents in case on private web site
• FAQ of the case and complete local coverage from The (Alexandria, Louisiana) Town Talk
• Washington Post's page on its coverage of the Jena Six controversy
• New York Times page on Jena Six
• ABC News Summary by Jena Newspaper Reporter
• Court of Appeals rulings in State v. Bell
• NPR coverage of Jena Six