LYNCH ME TELL YOU, CHILE: "I'LL GET OVER "IT", WHEN "IT" IS OVER...

The point of ALL Pain, is not profit, exploitation, a quote or anecdote, a #1 Best Seller or Hit; it is COMPASSION. If our trials don't strengthen our capacity for EMPATHY, then life gives us a REDO, in hopes that the next time we are privileged to encounter a complex soul or moment that stretches us out of our comfort zone we won't be so quick to judge and disqualify another life whose struggles are not as hidden as our own. Life's point: That the human will become humane without having to enforce the law or a penalty. (Pearl Ramsey)

Michael Donald was born in Mobile, Alabama, in 1962. He attending a local trade school and worked part-time at the Mobile Press Register. In 1981 the trial of Josephus Andersonan, an African American charged with the murder of a white policeman, took place in Mobile. At the end of the case the jury was unable to reach a verdict. This upset members of the Ku Klux Klan who believed that the reason for this was that some members of the jury were African Americans. At a meeting held after the trial, Bennie Hays, the second-highest ranking official in the Klan in Alabama said: "If a black man can get away with killing a white man, we ought to be able to get away with killing a black man." On Saturday 21st March, 1981, Bennie Hays's son, Henry Hays, and James Knowles, decided they would get revenge for the failure of the courts to convict the man for killing a policeman. They travelled around Mobile in their car until they found nineteen year old Donald walking home. After forcing him into the car Donald was taken into the next county where he was lynched. A brief investigation took place and eventually the local police claimed that Donald had been murdered as a result of a disagreement over a drugs deal. Donald's mother, Beulah Mae Donald, who knew that her son was not involved with drugs, was determined to obtain justice. She contacted Jessie Jackson who came to Mobile and led a protest march about the failed police investigation. Thomas Figures, the assistant United States attorney in Mobile, managed to persuade the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to look into the case. James Bodman was sent to Mobile and it did not take him long to persuade James Knowles to confess to the killing of Michael Donald.

WACO, Texas (AP) - Nearly a century after a black teenager was stabbed, burned and hanged in front of some 15,000 Waco residents, some black residents are calling for the city to make amends. The slaying was just one of the 4,700 lynchings in the South from the late 1800s to early 1900s, but it was one of the few photographed in progress, capturing images of a mob dragging 17-year-old Jesse Washington from the courthouse, cutting him with knives and dangling him over a fire. Newspapers referred to the 1916 killing as the "Waco horror" after the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People's magazine published an article and the rare pictures, now displayed in the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, Tenn. snip City officials did not return calls seeking comment Friday. Three years ago, county commissioners rejected a request to create a plaque to explain a courthouse painting of Waco history that includes a tree with a noose.

Friday, January 28, 2011 LYNCHING BLACK BOYS IN 2010-MISSISSIPPI Frederick Jermaine Carter hanging (Lynching) in Mississippi, NO Suicide according to the NAACP Posted: December 15, 2010 by EOTM Press Room in Breaking News, EOTM News, EOTM Radio Tags: Civil rights, Frederick Jermaine Carter, Greenwood Mississippi, Lynchings in 2010, Mississippi Lynching, NAACP, Racism 19 By: Carla Barnes 26 year old African American Frederick Jermaine Carter was found hanging in a Mississippi tree in a white suburb on Friday, December 3, 2010. The USA Today first reported it as a suicide, however, the NAACP just recently contests the findings, they feel it may actually be a lynching. Fredrick Jermaine Carter Carter, who lived in neighboring Sunflower County, was helping his stepfather paint a building Wednesday. The stepfather went to get tools and when he returned, Carter was nowhere to be found. His body was later found and considering his history of mental illness and no evidence supposedly of anything other than a suicide it was labeled accordingly. Results of an autopsy are still pending. The FBI‘s Jackson field office is monitoring the situation. “The FBI has been advised of the situation in Leflore County,” spokeswoman Deborah Madden says in a statement. “We stand by to provide whatever assistance is necessary to ensure the integrity of the investigation.” State Rep. Willie Perkins, a Democrat from Greenwood and president of the Leflore County branch of the NAACP, says that group also “will keep a high scrutiny and watch on any investigative report regarding what was the cause of death.” “There are a lot of concerns there, No. 1 that this individual could not have (hanged) himself without the assistance of someone, if it’s being declared a suicide,” he says. “Why would someone from Sunflower County come to North Greenwood, the predominantly white housing area of Greenwood? Why would someone that far away come and hang themselves in North Greenwood by a river? That does not pass the smell test to me.” Another local elected official, state Sen. David Jordan, a Democrat, says the African-American community in Greenwood is “very much concerned.” “This is in a white wealthy area, and black people just don’t go over there,” he says. “There’s not a single black that’s talked to us who believes that he hanged himself.” Jordan, who is African-American, suggests there is a historical underpinning for blacks being suspicious about the specter of violence against them: Greenwood is about 12 miles from Money, Miss., site of one of the most infamous lynchings in U.S. history. In August 1955, Emmett Till, a 14-year-old Chicago boy visiting relatives for the summer, was abducted and killed after he allegedly made remarks to a white woman. “We’re not drawing any conclusions,” Jordan says. “We’re skeptical, and rightfully we should be, given our history. We can’t take this lightly. We just have to wait and see.”

Response from a reader: The list of young blacks found hanging in Mississippi, whose deaths have been hastily declared as suicides, seems to grow perpetually. In 2004, Roy Veal a black man who was fighting to keep whites from taking his family’s land in Wilkerson County was found hanging from a tree in Woodville, Mississippi. His death was ruled a suicide. In 2000, Raynard Johnson, a 17 year old black high school student, rumored to have been involved in an interracial dating relationship was found hanging from a tree in Kokomo, Mississippi. His death was ruled a suicide. Between 1987 and 1993, twenty two (22) black men were found hanging in Mississippi jails. All of their deaths were declared to be suicides. All of us are aware of the history of blacks being lynched in Mississippi. Between 1882 and 1968 there were 539 blacks lynched in Mississippi. Their murders were not solved because law enforcement officials made no effort to bring their murderers to justice. In many cases law enforcements were complicit in the murders. Finally, on September 18, 2010, a young Hispanic woman was found hanging from a tree near Philadelphia, Mississippi. Her death was declared a suicide. All of these death by hanging involving blacks and non-white should surely caused rational thinking people to ask questions. Insisting on a thorough and comprehensive investigation is the least any rational thinking person should do. The investigation of the recent hanging in Leflore County seems to be a rush to judgment, and the investigation seemed to be concerned with something other than uncovering the truth. Solomon C. Osborne LYNCHING OF LAURA NELSON AND HER SON

"People crushed by law, have no hopes but from power. If laws are their enemies, they will be enemies to laws; and those who have much to hope and nothing to lose, will always be dangerous." "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." EDMUND BURKE