Hip-Hop.com

The Bay Area is still celebrating the aftermath of the SF Giants World Series win and the fact that we kept the Tea Party takeover out of our neck of the woods.. However, everyone is anxious as we await to see if Justice for Oscar Grant will be a reality. Today November 5th is the sentencing day for killer cop Johannes Mehserle.

His family and police departments around California showed total disregard to the family and the scores of people who witnessed the slaying by holding Pro-Mehserle rallies all over the state. They used words like Freedom and Justice to describe the plight of this rogue officer who killed unarmed Grant New Year’s morning 2009.

His family insulted the Bay Area by showing up to the McCovey Cove behind the AT&T Park where the Giants play and hoisting huge banners calling for Mehserle to be free. It made many momentarily forget that Oscar was the victim, not Mehserle who was found guilty.

Today November 5th is the day Killer cop Johannes Mehserle gets sentenced. His lawyers want a re-trial. Grant's family wants the full 14 years.

The photos are from a big rally held last week in front of Oakland’s City hall. The Longshoreman were angered by the Pro-Mehserle rallies and decided to put on one themselves and remind people this is about justice and it should not be mocked by Mehserle and his supporters who even at this late date still try to put blame on unarmed Grant.

Boots Riley of the Coup and his father Civil Rights attorney Walter Riley were on hand at the Longshormen's Justice for Oscar Grant rally

Oscar Grant's daughter Tatiana, her mother Sophina came with the rest of the family to let everyone know how his death had impacted their family. Tatiana's aunt read an open letter which left everyone heartbroken. That day we came to truly understand that a beautiful spirit was taken from us Jan 1 2009 at the Fruitvale BART station

Minister Keith, spoken word artist Kat and organizer Tony Coleman have been on the case from day one. They along with many other Bay Area activists refused to let any obstacles stop theim from seeing this case through.. As Minister keith reminded us the end the goal is Justice!

Former Black Panther Party chair Elaine Brown along with co-founder Bobby Seale were on hand at the rally. Sadly the police killing of young Black and Brown men is an issue they are still dealing with 44 years after the Panthers were formed

We’ll be doing a special broadcast around this sentencing from 4-6pm on 94.1FM KPFA.. You can also hear us on line at kpfa.org. Folks will be gathering down at City Hall in Oakland

You can peep the rest of the photos… by clicking BY DAVEY D

UPDATE 4:05pm ET After an emotional day of tearful testimony from both Oscar Grant’s relatives and Johannes Mehserle, Youth Radio reports that Judge Robert Perry handed Mehserle a minimum two-year prison sentence. Mehserle has already served 146 days in jail.

The AP reported that Mehserle gave a ten-minute statement expressing his remorse for Grant’s killing. “I want to say how deeply sorry I am,” the AP reported. “Nothing I ever say or do will heal the wound. I will always be sorry for taking Mr. Grant from them.”

……………….

After a long summer spent in Los Angeles County Jail, ex-BART cop Johannes Mehserle is back in Judge Robert Perry’s courtroom today to receive his sentence for killing Oscar Grant on New Year’s Day 2009. A Los Angeles jury convicted Mehserle of involuntary manslaughter with a gun enhancement charge this summer, and faces up to 14 years in prison.

Amanda Fuentes, Thandisizwe Chimurenga and Jennifer Courtney report for Bay Citizen that this morning Judge Perry read from a stack of the 1,000 letters he said he received urging him to give Mehserle the maximum sentence. San Jose Mercury News’ Paul Rosynsky reported that Perry was dismayed that many of the people who wrote to him urged him to give Mehserle the harshest jail term but seemed unfamiliar with the legal terminology. No matter what Oscar Grant’s family and outraged community members believe their sonwas murdered, Perry insisted that what Mehserle was convicted of was involuntary manslaughter, an unlawful but unintentional killing.

The Bay Citizen reports that Perry seemed unlikely to grant Mehserle a new trial, as his defense had requested in early October. Mehserle’s defense demanded a new trial based on new evidence they said they uncovered that showed that Taser-gun confusion had indeed happened in the past, contrary to the prosecution’s arguments. Mehserle’s defense relied on a two-prong narrative that Oscar Grant and his friends represented a dangerous threat to Mehserle on the train platform, and also that Mehserle accidentally pulled his gun when he meant to pull his Taser.

Judge Perry also discussed other post-trial controversies surrounding the jury’s controversial verdict. The jury found Mehserle guilty of involuntary manslaughter and attached a gun enhancement to their charge.

In their jury instructions, jurors were told:

If you find the defendant guilty of the crime of second degree murder or the lesser crimes of voluntary or involuntary manslaughter, you must then decide whether the People have proved the additional allegation that the defendant personally used a firearm during the commission of that crime.

Judge Perry’s jury instructions told the jury that a person intentionally used their firearm if they displayed their weapon “in a menacing manner,” hit someone with the gun or fired it. The conviction then says that Mehserle was guilty of a an accidental killing, but that he knowingly pulled out his gun.

However, today Perry seemed receptive to the defense’s motion to throw out the controversial gun enhancement charge, which could tack on an extra ten-year jail sentence jail sentence to the involuntary manslaughter conviction. Involuntary manslaughter alone carries a two, three, or four year sentence. Legal experts suggested that if Perry does not throw out the gun enhancement, he could allow Mehserle to serve his time for both concurrently. Should Perry throw out the gun enhancement, Mehserle could also receive probation.

In deciding Mehserle’s jail term, Perry is expected to weigh victim impact statements, of which the organized community response is one part. Perry also heard testimony from Sophina Mesa, Grant’s fiancee and the mother of their six-year-old daughter as well as Grant’s mother Wanda Johnson.

The trial was moved from the Bay Area to Los Angeles because the defense was worried about the intense local community interest. Oscar Grant’s killing, which was caught on multiple cell phone cameras and immediately uploaded on YouTube, outraged the community and led to several nights of large protests in the Bay Area.

Mehserle shot Grant in the back while Grant lay face down on a train platform. He and his friends had been pulled off the BART train for allegedly starting a fight, and several were in the process of being handcuffed when Mehserle pulled his pistol out of its holster and shot Grant.

SOURCE Davey D’s Hip-hop corner
Looks like the father and un-remorseful police supporters of the killer cop Johannnes Mehserle who killed an unarmed Oscar Grant in front of hundreds New Years morning 2009 will not let up. According to Indy Bay the father and Mehserle’s brother have hung huge ‘Free Mehserle‘ banners from their Yacht in the McCovey Cove which is right outside of AT&T Park where the SF Giants play.

The other night the Yacht and sign made national attention and enraged the community which quickly responded by sending out boats carrying signs calling for Justice 4 Oscar Grant. Yesterday we talked about this on our Hard Knock Radio show and learned from our guests that when folks holding the Oscar Grant banners showed up, Mehserle’s dad tried to run his boat into their smaller craft.

What’s at stake here is that Mehserle who is facing involuntary manslaughter charges is scheduled to be sentenced November 5th. The verdict is seen by many as unfair and way too soft for a guy who has a history of violence both on and off the force. Many feel that Mehserle is literally getting away with murder. The fact that every single police union in California petitioned the California Assembly in support in addition to funding his defense where expert witnesses were being paid 50 and 60 thousand dollars a pop sent a clear message. The police although paid by tax payer dollars are not in step with many of the communities they serve. Read More by Davey D

Today I send my condolences to Oscar Grant’s family and loved ones. It was only on the strength of modern day technology and fearless citizens that this incident was even recorded and made News. We all witnessed and blatantly saw a cop murder this young man in cold blood.
We now know his name and story. But at 4pm on Friday I stopped my sessions in the recording studio, nervously waiting and wondering if I should be praying. There were so many elements and contemplation of my prayers. Should I be praying for Justice in a system that seems to let me/us down all the time? Praying that the media doesn’t just tape the few kids that start rioting if Mehserle gets off? Praying that the police who stood near 14th & Broadway wouldn’t actually use the tear gas I saw them holding when I drove by, or even worse more guns? Perhaps I was praying that people would finally be fueled enough to really want to start a movement, and community leaders would be there to keep it organized. I keep thinking to myself what is the final straw? Not Bush, not 911, not Katrina, not racist immigration laws, not Mumia Abu Jamal on death row, not trillions being spent on wars and jails but the schools get nothing but budget cuts.
We receive little sprinkles of hope here and there to keep us pacified enough to not really want to get involved and change sh*t. We are all people and we should be treated as such. So why is racism still so real? Why did Michael Vick get more time for dog fighting than a police officer gets for murdering an innocent black man?

I wonder whether the country knows that not one single Oakland Police officer has been charged with murder since 1983. Even amidst the fact that there’s a freshly painted mural on 54th Street of another young black man who was shot and killed in the back by a police officer, not too long ago. I wonder whether people know the statistics in Oakland for police brutality. According to a 2007 report by the Bureau of Justice Statistics from 2003 through 2005 at least 2,000 people died during their arrests by state and local law enforcement officers, and there are probably more unreported. The number of arrest-related deaths increased 13 percent from 620 in 2003 to 700 in 2005, that number keeps rising. The Bureau of Justice Statistics report also shows that those who are killed by police are for the most part young Black and Latino men. And almost half of those killed—by the cops’ own admission—were not committing violent offenses.

The cops usually end up trumping up minor charges after the fact like “Littering,” “Obstruction of Justice” or their favorite “Resisting Arrest” which is used when no other actual crime took place. Over the past 7 years Oakland has paid an average of 2.5 million yearly to settle suits against the police, and experts say these Civil Rights lawsuits are the most effective check on the city.

The involuntary manslaughter verdict was disappointing, but not surprising after hearing the case had moved to a Southern California court where the “jury of peers” didn’t include any African Americans. I have to say that this case was even moved out of Oakland, is a testament to how strong citizens of Oakland and specifically youth made their presence known.

The verdict was confusing enough to not quite know how to proceed or react, but it echoed a sense of general hopelessness and disempowerment. It was more proof that cops aren’t treated like people or even tried as people in a court of law. They are given an exorbitant amount of power and permission to commit murder, just because they are people who happen to apply for a dangerous job. I think rioting is not helpful for communities- but standing in and outside courtrooms hearing, and supporting underrepresented citizens like people did, is courageous! And because people did get involved, there was actually some accountability for the killing.

Why is racism, ignorance, and general inhumanity acceptable in this job? Why should we have to fear officers even when we’re minding our own business just because we live in inner cities? The truth is we shouldn’t. Cops need major training before they should even be allowed to hold a gun. The cities must make them accountable for their actions. Really the whole “Cop Culture” needs to shift. I felt a glimpse of that shift once, when I was marching among millions of people in DC, waiting to find my place on The National Mall for Obama’s inauguration. It was only there that day, where I didn’t feel an ‘us and them’ vibe with the police- for the first time I felt like the cops were in place to help and ‘serve’, and I looked at my brother and said, “this is crazy right?…all these people out here and the police are calm”…we were all just people that day…so I know it can exist…unfortunately Oakland feels far from that.

I’ve been feeling proud of Oakland lately, we’ re on the come up and small businesses are doing their thing downtown, we’re getting more good live music venues, and I hope we can keep building this city. I hope organizations like Youth Uprising, Silence the Violence, Watchdog and others keep doing the work to change the system locally at least, because we can’t just stand aside and wait for the world to change.

-Goapale| Goapele.com

the verdict is in “Involuntary Manslaughter”
Oscar Grant’s Family is “disappointed in verdict”.. says Grant’s Family Attorney

Grant’s Family “it’s a Slap in the face by the system” “it’s a Great disappointment”

thoughts from the hood..

“you get involuntary manslaughter when you accidentally kill someone during car crash not when pointing a gun at an unarmed cooperating man?”

@chudog People dont use this a reason or excuse to tear up YOUR city! Thats exactly what they WANT you to do! Use your VOICE not your hands! #PEACE

@jvalentine1 THEY don’t care if U tear up UR own neighborhood, they don’t have 2 live there… U DO !!! #Food4Thought

@DJEROCKSF1 If you’re trained to carry and use a weapon, you can’t make a mistake like that and not PAY FOR IT. I will pray for the Bay Area. Be safe

@Dart_Adams Mike Vick did & Plaxico Burress will do more time than Johannes Mehserle will for murdering Oscar Grant… #WhatsWrongWithThisPicture?

@IamCROS1 Very disappointed and saddened to know that our system is fucked up. This just drilled it home for me I already knew but damn. #OscarGrant

@THOROUGHDairY REST IN PEACE OSCAR GRANT.. PRAYERS TO YOU AND YOUR FAMILY… THIS IS BULLSHIT