This coverage was provided by CNN.
But naturally this doesn't much matter to Sean Hannity who ignores each and every one of the incredible abuses in cases like The Jena 6, because he'd rather justify the initial charge of attempted murder for what was essentially a schoolyard brawl and whine about those Poor Victimized Duke Boys. Nice.
From USA Today.
Last year, the department charged 22 people with hate crimes. That was down 71% from 76 in 1997.
Meanwhile, the department has charged more people with police misconduct and human trafficking. For example, since 2001, the department has prosecuted 360 people on charges of human trafficking, compared with 89 in the six years before that.
FBI figures show that hate crime reports fell 11% from 1997 to 2005, the most recent year available.
Ablin says the Justice Department is committed to investigating and prosecuting civil rights cases. It charged a record 201 people with civil rights violations last year.
The number of reports doesn't necessarily reflect the number of hate crimes, says Steve Wessler, executive director for the Center for the Prevention of Hate Violence. Victims are often scared to report the crimes, and police agencies report inconsistently, he says.
"Racial violence is not decreasing," Wessler says. "Either the resources are not going in to prosecute these cases or there isn't a willingness to bring these cases."
Ten-year Justice Department figures show a 60% drop in annual referrals of hate crime investigations to prosecutors.
More from the Seattle-PI on the downward trend of cases brought by the FBI.
The FBI touts civil rights enforcement as a top priority, but the number of investigations into such cases -- from hate crimes to the actions of rogue police officers -- has fallen sharply, raising concerns that victims are left with nowhere else to turn.
Pressed by the Bush administration to beef up counterterrorism ranks, the FBI has pulled agents off civil rights and slashed the number of criminal investigations conducted nationwide.
The bureau has tacitly adopted more-stringent standards governing which cases to open. That move has contributed to two-thirds fewer investigations targeting abusive police officers, cross-burners and other purveyors of hate from 2001 to 2005, according to a Seattle P-I analysis of Justice Department data.
The downward trend began in 1999 and accelerated after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the analysis found.
Civil rights experts -- and even one of the Justice Department's top civil rights lawyers -- are troubled by the trend. They say hate-crime enforcement is too important to ignore, and there is a deterrent effect to federal review of police misconduct that is being muted.
"You're going to have officers getting away with, in some cases, literally, murder," said Jesselyn McCurdy of the American Civil Liberties Union's legislative office in Washington, D.C.
But in truth it's far worse than just what these numbers show. Under Brad Schlozman and Hans Von Spakovsky the Bush Civil Rights Division of the DOJ has been pushed radically to the right and have...
- Implemented Grossly Partisan Highering Practices, shoving out the other people (Blacks, Women) in favor of "Good Americans" (Republicans), prompting the inclusion Black Attorney's in the Division to reach the same level it had in 1978. (2 attorneys out of 50)
- Blocked an investigation into Voter Suppression of Native Americans
- Implemented a New Poll Tax and other restrictions on Minority Voters.
- Appointed as interim U.S. Attorney a former RNC staffer (Tim Griffin) who participated in Voter Caging (Suppression) of African-American Soldiers Fighting in Iraq!
- Implemented extensive investigations into alleged minority "Voter Fraud" when there wasn't any!
From H&C
Threatening someone with a Noose and a Shotgun? No problem. How could a noose or a shotgun hurt anybody? Pfft But hitting someone with a tennis shoe? Attempted Murder!!!
And Hannity is fine with that.
Hannity: This kid that was beaten - who was white - by these kids in the Jena 6 case. He was beaten brutally. And then stomped on after he was cold-cocked from behind. Let me ask you (Reverend), if that was your son - what should the penalty be?
Like anyone taking the Liberal position on Fox, the guest of course stammered and hemmed and hawed barely able to generate a reasonable answer. Then Hannity changed tactics...
Hannity: There have been cases where young African-American men have been accused of crimes and they have been exonerated. What should happen in the case, when that happens - should there be a severe penalty?
Reverend: Sure the people should be held accountable.
Ok, that make sense right? Perfectly reasonable. Then Hannity lowers the Big, Bang - BOOM!
Hannity: You mean Reverend [Jessie] Jackson who offered, on this program, a Scholarship to the woman who was the accuser in the Duke Case? Or Reverend Sharpton who falsely accused Steven Pegonas, who was held liable, in the Tawana Brawley case?
You see what he did there? The little tit-for-tat you bring up some anti-black injustice and I'll raise you some anti-White injustice?
- Why don't you care when Injustices Rain down on poor beset-upon white kids (who happen also to Rich and easily able to afford legal representation)?
Why do you Hate Whites?
Don't you care about the children you hypocrit!?
Slick isn't he?
The problem with trying to "level the playing field" between black and white injustice is that in both the Brawley and Duke case, those wrongly accused never served any jail time. It may have been painful, embarrassing and expensive - but the justice system ultimately worked in their favor in both these cases. Sharpton was even required (according to some admittedly pro-Imus sources) to pay $65,000 in restitution to Steve Pagonas for defamation in that case.
(Wouldn't it be great if Hannity has to pay for every time he shot off his damn fool mouth? Ok, ok, I'm dreaming I know...)
But is that also true that Justice is ultimately served in most cases of anti-black bias and false accusations?
Let's not even get into the petty stuff like Michael Richard's 19th Nervous Breakdown of N-Words, Don Imus and his Nappy-H0-ness, Bill O'Reilly having a conniption over Sylvia's lack of MF-ing Ice T or Senator George "Macaca-Man" Allen with the Noose and Confederate flag He Kept in his Office. It's not like any of that just might be signs of like - a trend, or something.
Naw... let not get into all that "He Said, He Said and HE Said" stuff.
If we're talking about Crimes Against the Innocent and we just stick purely with New York - just to keep this diary under 10,000 words - we can find the case of Abner Louima who was tortured and sexually abused by NYPD officers who - get this - mistook him for someone else. You want to make people feel the pain and outrage of the victim Sean? Try describing in graphic detail what happened to Louima. Then there's the shooting murder of Amadour Diallo - for brandishing a cell phone. As well as the shooting death of Patrick Dorismond after he grew upset with an undercover office who was trying to solicit marajuana from him when he didn't have any.
You wanna talk about the wrongly accused Sean?
You wanna talk about restitution and being held accountable?
What do you think should be done to the guy that shoved a broomstick up Louima's rectum?
According to The Innocence Project over 200 wrongly convicted people have been exonerated and released using DNA Evidence over the last decade and a half. Indications are that this is only a fraction of the number of those wrongly accused and convicted. Their data shows that 50% (37 of their first 75 exonerations) were the result of Police Misconduct.
Note to Sean, one of the primary goals of the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department is to Implement Accountability for exactly these wrong accusations and prosecutions.
The Racial Breakdown of those Exonerated? Read and Weep Sean.
Of the 208 exonerees:
125 African Americans
58 Caucasians
19 Latinos
1 Asian American
5 whose race is unknown
By the way the average amount of time spent behind bars for these exonerees has been 12 Years.
An average of 12 Long Years Each.
How much jail time did the Duke Boys do again? What's that? None? Do tell...
According to the Sentencing Project the above type of misconduct, combined with racial profiling, manditory minimum sentences and gross disparities in sentencing for drug crimes has lead to dire consequences for minorities in America.
More than 60% of the people in prison are now racial and ethnic minorities. For Black males in their twenties, 1 in every 8 is in prison or jail on any given day. These trends have been intensified by the disproportionate impact of the "war on drugs," in which three-fourths of all persons in prison for drug offenses are people of color.
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Statistics (not that they seem to be investigating these crimes anymore) the vast majority of victims in the cases of racially biased crimes - are not a group of Rich Telegenic White Kids from Duke University.
Among the single-bias hate crime incidents in 2005, there were 4,895 victims of racially motivated hate crime.
* 67.9 percent were victims of an anti-black bias.
* 19.9 percent were victims of an anti-white bias.
* 5.3 percent were victims of a bias against a group of individuals in which more than one race was represented (anti-multiple races, group).
* 4.9 percent were victims of an anti-Asian/Pacific Islander bias.
* 2.0 percent were victims of an anti-American Indian/Alaskan Native bias.
(Based on Table 1.)
Although the Brawley and Duke cases were unfortunately for those who were mistakenly accused - let me repeat, no one went to Prison as a result. No one was Raped. No one Died. The idea that their is any sort of parity between these cases and those of Louima, Dorismond, Dualla, the Jena 6, the Liberty City Seven or any number of literally hundreds of cases which are both more severe and more frequent is just plain ridiculous.
Yes, there are clearly incidents of anti-white and anti-Hispanic and anti-Asian bias. And it's absolutely true and crystal clear these should be persued, but it's also true that the DOJ has not being meeting any of it's responsibilities in this area not just for Blacks, but also Whites to the level that we all should expect and demand.
Oh, and it's also clear that Sean Hannity is an AssClown.
Vyan
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