Jena, LA (Jena 6) - Thoughts

[Redworm]

No,I'm not.It is obnoxious behavior that everybody outside of a gated community is very aware of.

You must have associated it with blacks for some reason.

I made a comment regarding skin color then you went into that diatribe.

 

[ZeroJunk]

Whites and blacks hang out in different groups for the most part.And then you have different sub groups.If I go to a class reunion I will end up with the same group I was with 35 years ago.
If you have a group that has been gathering under the same tree and another group tries to take it over,what do you think is going to happen?
If the blacks had been using it do you think they would have let the whites root them out?
"white tree" is a media creation.

 

[BoringAccountant]

The kids that were arrested were the 6 young black men who perpetrated the assualt.

JAXX, I was referring to the incident last night when 2 youths were driving a red pickup with 2 nooses hanging from the back of it, they were stopped by police and arrested for charges of inciting a riot, see link in previous post.

 

[JAXX]

Oh, gotcha

 

[JuanCarlos]

They chose to beat a young man into unconsiousness, then continue to kick and stomp him in the head. I don't care if you're wearing flip flops, when you choose to stomp someones' head into the ground when they cannot defend themself, you have crossed the line and wether you thought about it or not you are now trying to kill that person.

You cannot be "trying to kill" somebody without the intent to do so. You may manage to kill them despite a lack of intent...unless I'm mistaken that's why charges such as criminally negligent homicide, manslaughter, etc. exist. But, and this is not just technicality but a substantial issue, you cannot "try" to do something without intent. Period.

JuanCarlos, would it make any difference to you if the deadly weapons in this case were the 6 guys feet and hands and not their shoes? You're hung up on a technicality I think. The emphasis shouldn't be on what was on their feet during the incident as much as what they were doing with their feet and what their goal was. It certainly wasn't to say hello.

Indeed it wasn't. And I'm happy to see these kids charged with battery. I'm just not sure the level of battery they're charged with (which, at least in my understanding, requires the use of a deadly weapon) is appropriate.

Somebody has informed me that, at least in some jurisdictions, bare hands and feet can be qualified as deadly weapons. I suppose at that point the law's the law, and if that's that law in this jurisdiction, so be it...but I can't say I agree with it.

To me the use of a weapon should require a decision, conscious or not, to actually use a separate weapon to injure somebody. My body should not count as a weapon, nor should a common article of clothing that I just happen to be wearing (and doesn't necessarily increase harm done).

I may need to start a different thread for this, but it coincides with the story. Isn't what these kids doing free speech?

Parading around town with nooses hanging from their truck, how is this any different than a KKK rally being allowed to organize and present their views. How is this any different than the Westboro Baptist Church picketing soldier's funerals and not inciting a riot? I am not saying these kids were right by any means, but the fact remains, even if the speech is not popular its still free.

Well, there is the possibility that with nooses specifically there is an implied threat...which wouldn't be covered by freedom of speech. But I'd agree that this probably occupies a big fuzzy gray area.

 

[Al Norris]

Enough!

Eighty-five posts and many of you are still arguing over whether a noose, hung in a tree, in the south, was or was not an implicit threat; or whether or not it racially based; or whether or not a 6 on 1 fight was such a disparity of force as to warrant "use of deadly weapons" charges; whether or not those who hung the nooses were properly adjudicated and whether or not that was racially based.

Sometimes you folks can't see the forsest for the trees....

Closed - with extreme prejudice.