Too many questions in handcuff suicide, say attorney

by: The Final Call
published: 4 September 2012

The family of a man shot while handcuffed behind his back continues to refute police claims that he committed suicide.

As the Jonesboro Police Department in Arkansas released more information, more questions arose about who shot 21-year-old Chavis Carter, said his family and friends. Unfortunately, all of the facts may remain a mystery until a civil or criminal trial, family attorney Benjamin Irwin said.

Police released a dash cam video, of what they called a reenactment of how the alleged suicide could have occurred, and said they interviewed Mr. Carter’s girlfriend. According to police, the girlfriend said the deceased called her saying he had a gun and was afraid.

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Cops snuff out young lives

SWAT Officeroriginally by: Workers World 
published: 2 September 2012

Nicholas Naquan Heyward Jr. was just 13 years old when he was killed by “Robocop” Brian George on Sept. 27, 1994. Nicholas, an honor student at Nathan Hale Middle School, was playing in a stairwell at the Gowanus Houses where he lived in Brooklyn, N.Y.

The 18th annual Nicholas Heyward Jr. Day of Remembrance was held on Aug. 25. The next day Nicholas would have been 31.

People gathered in Nicholas Naquan Heyward Jr. Park, next to the Gowanus Houses. Brooklyn District Attorney Charles Hines refused to even present a case to the grand jury against the shooter cop. But the people in the neighborhood forced the Parks Department to rename their park after their young hero.

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Five examples of civil disobedience to remember

Mahatma Ghandi
Mahatma Ghandi

by: Richard Seymour | Comment is free
published: 20 August 2012

When Spanish mayor Juan Manuel Sánchez Gordillo recently led farmers on a supermarket sweep, raiding the local shops for food as part of a campaign against austerity, his political immunity as an elected assembly member protected him from arrest.

He now asks other local mayors to ignore central government demands for budget cuts and refuse to implement evictions and lay-offs. In this era of austerity, such flagrant disrespect for the law ought to be encouraged. Sometimes, the greatest strength of popular movements is their capacity to disrupt. So here, for the benefit of imaginative indignados, are five examples of civil disobedience.

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