Inside the Black Panther case Anger, ignorance and lies

[Jeanfromfillmore]

ADAMS: Inside the Black Panther case Anger, ignorance and lies
On the day President Obama was elected, armed men wearing the black berets and jackboots of the New Black Panther Party were stationed at the entrance to a polling place in Philadelphia. They brandished a weapon and intimidated voters and poll watchers. After the election, the Justice Department brought a voter-intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party and those armed thugs. I and other Justice attorneys diligently pursued the case and obtained an entry of default after the defendants ignored the charges. Before a final judgment could be entered in May 2009, our superiors ordered us to dismiss the case.
‘The New Black Panther case was the simplest and most obvious violation of federal law I saw in my Justice Department career. Because of the corrupt nature of the dismissal, statements falsely characterizing the case and, most of all, indefensible orders for the career attorneys not to comply with lawful subpoenas investigating the dismissal, this month I resigned my position as a Department of Justice (DOJ) attorney.
The federal voter-intimidation statutes we used against the New Black Panthers were enacted because America never realized genuine racial equality in elections. Threats of violence characterized elections from the end of the Civil War until the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965. Before the Voting Rights Act, blacks seeking the right to vote, and those aiding them, were victims of violence and intimidation. But unlike the Southern legal system, Southern violence did not discriminate. Black voters were slain, as were the white champions of their cause. Some of the bodies were tossed into bogs and in one case in Philadelphia, Miss., they were buried together in an earthen dam.
Based on my firsthand experiences, I believe the dismissal of the Black Panther case was motivated by a lawless hostility toward equal enforcement of the law. Others still within the department share my assessment. The department abetted wrongdoers and abandoned law-abiding citizens victimized by the New Black Panthers. The dismissal raises serious questions about the department's enforcement neutrality in upcoming midterm elections and the subsequent 2012 presidential election.
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights has opened an investigation into the dismissal and the DOJ's skewed enforcement priorities. Attorneys who brought the case are under subpoena to testify, but the department ordered us to ignore the subpoena, lawlessly placing us in an unacceptable legal limbo.
The assistant attorney general for civil rights, Tom Perez, has testified repeatedly that the "facts and law" did not support this case. That claim is false. If the actions in Philadelphia do not constitute voter intimidation, it is hard to imagine what would, short of an actual outbreak of violence at the polls. Let's all hope this administration has not invited that outcome through the corrupt dismissal.
Most corrupt of all, the lawyers who ordered the dismissal - Loretta King, the Obama-appointed acting head of the Civil Rights Division, and Steve Rosenbaum - did not even read the internal Justice Department memorandums supporting the case and investigation. Just as Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. admitted that he did not read the Arizona immigration law before he condemned it, Mr. Rosenbaum admitted that he had not bothered to read the most important department documents detailing the investigative facts and applicable law in the New Black Panther case. Christopher Coates, the former Voting Section chief, was so outraged at this dereliction of responsibility that he actually threw the memos at Mr. Rosenbaum in the meeting where they were discussing the dismissal of the case. The department subsequently removed all of Mr. Coates' responsibilities and sent him to South Carolina.
Mr. Perez also inaccurately testified to the House Judiciary Committee that federal "Rule 11" required the dismissal of the lawsuit. Lawyers know that Rule 11 is an ethical obligation to bring only meritorious claims, and such a charge by Mr. Perez effectively challenges the ethics and professionalism of the five attorneys who commenced the case. Yet the attorneys who brought the case were voting rights experts and would never pursue a frivolous matter. Their experience in election law far surpassed the experience of the officials who ordered the dismissal.
Some have called the actions in Philadelphia an isolated incident, not worthy of federal attention. To the contrary, the Black Panthers in October 2008 announced a nationwide deployment for the election. We had indications that polling-place thugs were deployed elsewhere, not only in November 2008, but also during the Democratic primaries, where they targeted white Hillary Rodham Clinton supporters. In any event, the law clearly prohibits even isolated incidents of voter intimidation.
Others have falsely claimed that no voters were affected. Not only did the evidence rebut this claim, but the law does not require a successful effort to intimidate; it punishes even the attempt.
Most disturbing, the dismissal is part of a creeping lawlessness infusing our government institutions. Citizens would be shocked to learn about the open and pervasive hostility within the Justice Department to bringing civil rights cases against nonwhite defendants on behalf of white victims. Equal enforcement of justice is not a priority of this administration. Open contempt is voiced for these types of cases.
Some of my co-workers argued that the law should not be used against black wrongdoers because of the long history of slavery and segregation. Less charitable individuals called it "payback time." Incredibly, after the case was dismissed, instructions were given that no more cases against racial minorities like the Black Panther case would be brought by the Voting Section.
Refusing to enforce the law equally means some citizens are protected by the law while others are left to be victimized, depending on their race. Core American principles of equality before the law and freedom from racial discrimination are at risk. Hopefully, equal enforcement of the law is still a point of bipartisan, if not universal, agreement. However, after my experience with the New Black Panther dismissal and the attitudes held by officials in the Civil Rights Division, I am beginning to fear the era of agreement over these core American principles has passed.
J. Christian Adams is a lawyer based in Virginia who served as a voting rights attorney at the Justice Department until this month. He blogs at electionlawcenter.com.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...e-and-/?page=1
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...e-and-/?page=2

[ilbegone]

Are there actually Black Panthers still around?

Or is it a racial clown infested wannabe copycat version, similar to the modern "Nazi" a-holes who put on the Riverside spectacle some months ago?

[Jeanfromfillmore]

Former Justice Attorney Set to Testify in New Black Panther Case
A former Justice official who claims the administration backed off a voter intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party for racial reasons is set to testify Tuesday before the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
The testimony from J. Christian Adams, who resigned from the Justice Department last month in protest of the administration's handling of the case, comes after he made a series of explosive allegations during an interview with Fox News last week. He said the administration abandoned an open-and-shut case of voter intimidation and that Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez gave false testimony before the commission in May.
Adams claims the administration has failed to prosecute non-whites when it comes to voting intimidation cases and that the New Black Panther incident demonstrates that.
"I don't think the department or the fine people who work there are corrupt, but in this particular instance, to abandon law-abiding citizens and abet wrongdoers constitutes corruption," Adams told Fox News.
The case stems from an incident on Election Day in 2008 in Philadelphia, where members of the New Black Panther Party were videotaped in front of a polling place, dressed in military-style uniforms and allegedly hurling racial slurs while one brandished a night stick.
The Bush Justice Department brought the first case against three members of the group, accusing them in a civil complaint of violating the Voter Rights Act. The Obama administration initially pursued the case, winning a default judgment in federal court in April 2009 when the Black Panther members did not appear in court. But then the administration moved to dismiss the charges the following month after getting one of the New Black Panther members to agree to not carry a "deadly weapon" near a polling place until 2012. The department boasted that justice had been served.
But Adams, the former administration lawyer, accused the Justice Department of not continuing the case for political and racial reasons.
Adams called the case "a slam dunk," telling Fox News that "nobody thought there was any doubt that this was the clearest case of voter intimidation that I've seen since I've been practicing law."
The Justice Department disagrees, saying it enforces voting rights laws equally. In a written statement, the department questioned the motives of Adams, now an attorney in Virginia and a blogger for Pajamas Media.
"It is not uncommon for attorneys with the department to have good faith disagreements about the appropriate course of action in a particular case, although it is regrettable when a former department attorney distorts the facts and makes baseless allegations to promote his or her agenda," the statement said.
But Bartle Bull, who was a poll watcher in Philadelphia in 2008, doesn't buy the Justice Department denials.
"I find it deeply offensive," Bull said. "I know people who died over these issues, like Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr. If we can't defend their legacy, it's shameful to us and this administration."
Bull is a prominent New York Democrat and longtime political adviser. He was Robert F. Kennedy's New York campaign manager, went to the south in the 1960s to protect the voting rights of black voters and just came back from Afghanistan where he traveled with the troops.
He says the administration's actions amount to protecting the New Black Panthers.
"If Americans can't vote honestly, and the government doesn't protect their right to vote, we don't live in a democracy. Last year Obama complained when the government in Afghanistan did not run the election properly. What about Pennsylvania?" he said, claiming the president "violated his oath of office."
Bull has already testified before the Civil Rights Commission, and the commissioners also want to hear from Christopher Coates, the former chief of the Justice Department's voting section who has since been transferred to the U.S. attorney's office in South Carolina. But the commission claims the Justice Department is blocking Coates from testifying about why the case was dropped.
Bull said that in 2008, one of the Black Panthers turned to him and said "now you will know what it means to be ruled by the black man, cracker."
The result of the Justice Department action, or lack of it, he said, is that "these guys now think it's safe for them to bully voters and citizens. And that's why the Department of Justice must stand up."
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010...-panther-case/

[Jeanfromfillmore]

Civil Rights Panel to Renew Subpoenas, Pursue Federal Probe in Black Panther Case
The bipartisan panel investigating allegations that the Justice Department wrongly abandoned a case against the New Black Panther Party plans to issue a new round of subpoenas and call for a separate federal probe following explosive testimony from an ex-Justice official, a commissioner said.
As the case heats up, members of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights may even travel to South Carolina to track down one witness.
Former Justice attorney J. Christian Adams on Tuesday testified before the commission that his former employer not only abandoned the voter intimidation case for racial reasons, but had instructed attorneys in the civil rights division to ignore cases that involve black defendants and white victims.
Commissioner Ashley Taylor said the panel will send out a letter as early as Wednesday calling for the Justice Department to open an investigation into the charge. The letter will go to Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez, who in May told the panel to bring any such claims "to our attention" if there's evidence.
"I think (the testimony) provided the evidence of the policy he said he was unaware of," Taylor said, calling Adams' allegations "serious" and "shocking."
Further, after Adams repeatedly urged the commission to pursue testimony from former voting section chief Christopher Coates -- whom the Justice Department
is accused of shielding -- Taylor said the commission will renew its subpoenas for Coates and others. He expressed optimism that the attention and interest building in the case would put pressure on Justice to free Coates to testify.
"I could tell just from the reaction of the other commissioners, we want to hear from him," he told FoxNews.com on Wednesday. "I am confident that if we just keep asking the right questions ... all the facts will come out."
Taylor said the Coates subpoena would go out within the month, and that commissioners may even travel to South Carolina, where Coates has been transferred, to issue the subpoena. The rules require that the commission be within 100 miles of a witness in order to issue one.
Adams, who has been accused by the Justice Department of distorting the facts and promoting his own "agenda," repeatedly claimed Tuesday that Coates would be able to corroborate his story.
The department abandoned the New Black Panther case last year. It stemmed from an incident on Election Day in 2008 in Philadelphia, where members of the party were videotaped in front of a polling place dressed in military-style uniforms and allegedly hurling racial slurs while one brandished a night stick.
The Bush Justice Department brought the first case against three members of the group, accusing them in a civil complaint of violating the Voter Rights Act. The Obama administration initially pursued the case, winning a default judgment in federal court in April 2009 when the Black Panther members did not appear in court. But then the administration moved to dismiss the charges the following month after getting one of the New Black Panther members to agree to not carry a "deadly weapon" near a polling place until 2012.
In a statement Tuesday, a Justice spokesman said the civil rights division determined "the facts and the law did not support pursuing claims" against the two other defendants and denied Adams' allegations.
"The department makes enforcement decisions based on the merits, not the race, gender or ethnicity of any party involved. We are committed to comprehensive and vigorous enforcement of both the civil and criminal provisions of the federal laws that prohibit voter intimidation," the spokesman said.
Taylor, a Republican, served as Virginia's deputy attorney general from 1998 to 2001.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010...est=latestnews

[Don]

Fox is really hammering away at the Black Panther case, although MSM have completely ignored the story. Thank God for Fox's coverage of this story. With the video it's simple enough for anyone to understand and the message is clear: Obama and his regime hate the US and most of its people.

If you want some insight into the vicious America hating traitor in the White House, read his book, Dreams of My Father. Obama is a monster, separate and apart from being a morally and intellectually confused deviant who belongs in a mental health clinic. Thank God the American people are turning against this self admitted racist and neurotic.

[Jeanfromfillmore]

Black Panther Leader Defends Group in Voter Intimidation Uproar
The chairman of the New Black Panther Party, in an interview Friday with Fox News, defended his group amid an uproar over a voter intimidation case dropped by the Obama administration, a move that an ex- Justice Department official alleges was for racial reasons.
Malik Zulu Shabazz distanced himself from the actions of Minister King Samir Shabazz, seen in an amateur video from November 2008 brandished a billy club at a Philadelphia polling station, an incident that led to charges of coercion, threats and intimidation. The Black Panther chairman told Fox News' Megyn Kelly that the actions caught on video "were outside of organizational policy."
"We still do not condone the carrying of nightsticks at polling places and we have been consistent on that since Day One," he said. "Any individual member that violates organizational policy cannot be attributed to the organization any more than any individual member of the Catholic Church, one of their acts can be charged to the Vatican."
Malik Shabazz's comments come after J. Christian Adams, who quit the Justice Department last month over the handling of the case against the Black Panthers and its members, accused his former superiors of instructing attorneys in the civil rights division to ignore cases that involve black defendants and white victims.
Adams' allegations have led the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights to plan a new round of subpoenas and call for a separate federal probe.
But Shabazz alleged that the story is being "overhyped and overblown" as "part of a right-wing Republican conspiracy to demonize President Obama, his administration, to demonize the New Black Panther Party and blacks in order to drum up white dissatisfied support for the midterm elections."
Asked whether he agreed with the sentiments of Samir Shabazz, seen in other video footage calling white people "crackers" and urging blacks to kill them and their babies, the chairman said "no." But he acknowledged he may have called whites "crackers" himself.
As chairman, Malik Shabazz was one of three Black Panthers charged in a civil complaint with violating the Voter Rights Act in the November 2008 incident, and Samir Shabazz specifically was accused of brandishing what prosecutors called a deadly weapon.
The Obama administration won a default judgment in federal court in April 2009 when the Black Panthers didn't appear in court to fight the charges. But the administration moved to dismiss the charges in May 2009. Justice attorneys said a criminal complaint against Samir Shabazz, which resulted in the injunction, proceeded successfully.
The injunction states that Samir Shabazz cannot appear at a polling station in Philadelphia until after 2012.
Malik Shabazz said that it was "right" for the Justice Department to drop the charges against the organization and the party's leadership.
He also said Samir Shabazz was suspended for his actions before he was reinstated as a Black Panther member.
When asked whether Samir Shabazz is a racist, Malik Shabazz said, "I can't speak for him on that. I would say the New Black Panther Party is not a hate group or a racist organization."
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010...midation-case/

Karl Rove on Black Panther Case: White House 'Thumbing Its Nose' at Voter Rights
The White House is "thumbing its nose" at one of the most fundamental American rights by not investigating allegations that the Justice Department wrongly abandoned a 2008 voter intimidation case, former Bush adviser Karl Rove charged on Friday.
In an interview with Fox News' Megyn Kelly on 'America Live,' Rove accused White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs of "not telling the truth" when he said Thursday that he was not looking into allegations that the DOJ wrongly dismissed a case against the New Black Panther Party. He also accused the administration of "thumbing its nose at one of the most essential rights Americans have."
"Of course they're aware of this," Rove said. "I can't imagine that when the attorney general makes such a controversial decision, that they would have not discussed this with the White House."
Former Justice attorney J. Christian Adams testified before the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights on Tuesday that his former employer not only abandoned the voter intimidation case for racial reasons last year, but had instructed attorneys in the civil rights division to ignore cases that involve black defendants and white victims.
Commissioner Ashley Taylor said the bipartisan panel investigating the allegations will send a letter as early as Wednesday calling for the Justice Department to open an investigation into Adams' charge. The letter will go to Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez, who in May told the panel to bring any such claims "to our attention" if there's evidence.
"I think (the testimony) provided the evidence of the policy he said he was unaware of," Taylor said, calling Adams' allegations "serious" and "shocking."
Gibbs, however, appeared to dismiss the New Black Panther case on Thursday, telling a reporter who questioned him on the matter that "I haven't paid any attention to it."
The case stemmed from an incident on Election Day in 2008 in Philadelphia, where members of the party were videotaped in front of a polling place dressed in military-style uniforms and allegedly hurling racial slurs while one brandished a night stick.
The Bush Justice Department brought the first case against three members of the group, accusing them in a civil complaint of violating the Voter Rights Act. The Obama administration initially pursued the case, winning a default judgment in federal court in April 2009 when the Black Panther members did not appear in court. But then the administration moved to dismiss the charges the following month after getting one of the New Black Panther members to agree to not carry a "deadly weapon" near a polling place until 2012.
In a statement Tuesday, a Justice spokesman said the civil rights division determined "the facts and the law did not support pursuing claims" against the two other defendants and denied Adams' allegations.
"The department makes enforcement decisions based on the merits, not the race, gender or ethnicity of any party involved. We are committed to comprehensive and vigorous enforcement of both the civil and criminal provisions of the federal laws that prohibit voter intimidation," the spokesman said.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010...-voter-rights/

[Jeanfromfillmore]

New Black Panther’s Shabazz: Fox News Stoking Racial Fears
New Black Panther Party Chairman Malik Shabazz told a Russian TV reporter that Fox News should be ashamed of themselves and that the charges of voter intimidation leveled against them by the Justice Department had no merit.

(Go to the website and watch the video of the leftist media doing its spin)
http://www.aim.org/don-irvine-blog/n...-racial-fears/

Shabazz also said the Fox News audience was made up of mostly white right wingers, some independents, confederates and racist organizations and that their base are mostly dissatisfied whites who want to take back America.
If anything one could accuse Shabazz of fomenting violence as he talked about a potential confrontation with the Tea Party Movement in September saying that “We’re ready to rumble”.
That may have been an unfortunate choice of words considering what the party is accused of doing during the 2008 elections and may only give more credence to the charges of voter intimidation rather than the victims of some right wing racist plot to discredit them.
Here is an interview from last July with Shabazz
https://mail.google.com/mail/?hl=en&...9b9660b0b2675e

[Jeanfromfillmore]

Interview on PJTV

http://www.pjtv.com/v/3844

J. Christian Adams: The NAACP Lobbied the Obama Administration to Dismiss New Black Panther Case|14min

[Jeanfromfillmore]

Black Panthers Grateful to Holder For “Payback Time”
http://www.thefoxnation.com/black-pa...r-payback-time

[tim55]

I just hope Fox will hammer this enough to bring Holder down, and splatter Obama with enough dirt to cause even his base to abandon him. MSM has to pick this up at some point, it's viral now.