Thread: Gang Rape of 11-Year-Old Girl Sparks Racial Tensions in Texa

Gang Rape of 11-Year-Old Girl Sparks Racial Tensions in Texas Town
New Black Panthers Rally Is Moved Because of a Death Threat
183 comments By JESSICA HOPPER

VIDEO AT LINK
March 10, 2011

The alleged gang rape of an 11-year-old girl by at least 18 boys and young men has sparked shame and outrage in a tiny Texas town, but it has also stirred racial tensions that threaten to split the East Texas hamlet.

The hardscrabble town of Cleveland, which is 45 miles from Houston, has fewer than 8,000 residents and since the saw mill closed the biggest employers are Wal-Mart and a nearby prison. In a town this small, everyone is a neighbor, but that small town ambience is being severely strained.

The rape allegedly occurred last November, and the list of suspects has been growing as arrests keep coming. It's not clear whether more arrests are in the works.

The suspects range in age from 14 to 26, include stars on the high school's basketball team as well as the son of a school board member.

But as the investigation drags on, the shock and indignation has been tinged with an undercurrent of racial tension.

"I feel sorry for the little girl. I feel sorry for everyone involved...the city is in turmoil," Inez Dickerson said.

Dickerson, 68, is the great-grandmother of one of the defendants in the case. Her grandson has not been publicly identified by police because he is a minor.

Dickerson remembers when her great-grandson called to tell her the crime he's accused of committing.

"When I got on the phone, he was crying. He said, 'Granny, I've been accused of something. I'm scared,'" Dickerson said. "He's pretty tore up about it."

"I'm not going to play the race card on this because my grandson and all the rest were very young men and they could have given a second thought on this," Dickerson said.

While Dickerson believes the flaring of racial tensions isn't warranted, others disagree.

Houston community activist Quanell X will host a town hall meeting this evening called "What's the real truth behind the rape allegations?"

"Every adult male that had sex with this child should go to prison, I don't care what the color is. But I do not believe black males are the only ones that had contact with this young child," said Quanell X, the leader of Houston's New Black Panther Party. "It appears to me there's only been the selective prosecution of one community, which is African American."

Quannell X said the rally has been moved from a church to a community center because, "The church received some death threats."

Gang Rape Charges Raise Race Tensions in Texas Town
The village has a history of racial violence. In 1988, an African American man was arrested in Cleveland for allegedly stealing a fountain pen. The man, 30-year-old Kenneth Simpson, was allegedly beaten to death by white police officers while in prison. The officers were acquitted of murder charges and returned to work.

In addition, Cleveland is embroiled in a political scandal where three city council members are facing a recall election following complaints of corruption. All three of those city council members are African American.

More than half of the town is white, with the rest of the residents split between blacks and Hispanics.

Most of the defendants have ties to Precinct 20, the nickname for the predominantly African-American neighborhood in Cleveland. The black neighborhood is sometimes referred to as "the quarters."

Cleveland police began investigating the rape in December of last year after cell phone video showing the alleged sex attack started circulating among students at Cleveland schools, according to court documents. The video shows the girl engaged in sexual acts with several men.

The girl told authorities that the weekend after Thanksgiving she was asked if she wanted to ride around with three of the defendants in the case. The girl, described as a straight A student by those who know her, rode with the young men to a blue house with white trim, according to court documents.

As the night unfolded, numerous men came to the house and later an abandoned trailer to have sex with the girl, according to court documents.

The video surfaced because some of the girl's attackers used their cell phones to take photographs and to film the assaults.

The girl, who has not been identified because she is a minor and the alleged victim of a sex crime, said that she was told by the men that they "would have some girls 'beat her up' or she would not be taken back to her residence" if she didn't have sex with them, according to court documents.

When a relative of one of the defendants was heard returning to the blue house, the group hurriedly moved to an abandoned trailer. The girl left behind her bra and panties, according to the court documents.

The girl has been removed from the custody of her parents.

Racial Tensions in Cleveland, Texas
Brenda Myers knows the girl and her family. Myers runs the Community and Children's Impact Center in Cleveland, one of the few programs for Cleveland's youth.

The 11-year-old girl and her two sisters frequently attended meetings held by Myers' organization. Myers said the girl was a happy and talkative girl, but something abruptly changed last October.

"This little girl was always hugging and loving and in October, she was really, really quiet," Myers said.

When Myers asked the girl what was bothering her, she said, "It's just something I can't tell you," Myers said.

When Myers heard the news of the alleged crime, she cried.

"I got angry and then...thought where were the parents?" she said.

The girl's mother was recently in the hospital and her father is an unemployed construction worker, Myers said. She said that the family cares deeply about the children.

"The mother was in tears. She feels extremely bad about what happened. She's devastated for her family," Myers said.

"It's becoming a black and white issue because it happened over in the quarters. It's segregating our community again," Myers said. "The reaction is anger, devastation."

Lance Blackwell helps organize weekly prayer sessions for the Cleveland Prayer Center. Recently, an impromptu prayer session included both defendants and family members of the girl.

"It's clear these family members and friends know one another and are in a deep amount of pain," Blackwell said. "The young men that were involved were very emotional...obviously we didn't discuss details, that wasn't what it was about."

http://abcnews.go.com/US/gang-rape-char ... d=13095476

DNA testing delays cases in assaults on Texas girl
Updated 2d 16h ago

By Thomas B. Shea, AP



LIBERTY, Texas (AP) — DNA testing delays prompted a judge Wednesday to push back until October the cases of seven men accused of taking part in a series of sexual assaults on an 11-year-old girl that have horrified and divided their small southeast Texas town.

The seven men, part of a group of 19 individuals charged in the assaults, appeared in state district court for status updates on their cases.

Prosecutor Joe Warren asked for delays in the cases because it could be another four to six weeks before DNA testing of evidence is complete. The testing is being done by the Texas Department of Public Safety.

"I'm going to pressure the state to pressure the DPS lab to get whatever analysis as quickly as possible," state District Judge Mark Morefield said

Morefield reset the seven men's cases for Oct. 3. Seven other men charged in the assaults were to appear before the judge Wednesday afternoon. Five juvenile boys also have been charged.

During the hearing, Warren told the judge his office was in tentative negotiations with at least one of the defendants, Jared McPherson. Warren did not say if he was referring to a possible plea agreement and he declined to comment after the hearing. McPherson's attorney also declined to comment. A gag order is preventing those connected to the case from commenting.

The investigation began in December, after one of the girl's friends told a teacher he had seen a lurid cell phone video that showed the girl being raped in an abandoned trailer. The case became public after arrests were made in February.

Authorities say the girl was assaulted on at least five occasions, sometimes by as many as seven or eight young men or boys at a time, from mid-September to early December in Cleveland, a small town about 45 miles northeast of Houston. Court proceedings are being held in the nearby town of Liberty, the county seat.

The suspects range in age from a middle-school student to a 27-year-old, and include two star athletes at the local high school as well as adults with criminal records.

Most of the adult suspects face charges of aggravated sexual assault of a child, while four face a charge of continuous sexual abuse of a child. Most have pleaded not guilty and are free on bond, while one, 26-year-old Marcus Porchia, was charged after his arrest with sexually assaulting another girl in an unrelated case.

The case shined a sometimes unflattering spotlight on Cleveland after some in the town of about 9,000 residents suggested the girl was culpable in part for what happened, claiming she wore makeup and looked older. Some also accused her parents, immigrants from Mexico, of not watching her more closely. Those suggestions were sharply criticized by many Cleveland residents and by community and religious groups outside the city.

Also complicating the case was a belief by many in the predominantly black neighborhood where several of the suspects live that the arrests were racially motivated. All of the suspects are black, while the girl is Hispanic.

The girl, now 12, remains in foster care while her parents, who have health problems and moved out of Cleveland after receiving threatening phone calls, work with state child welfare authorities to get her back.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/201 ... p=obinsite

19 charged in gang-rapes of 11-year-old Texas girl
http://www.alipac.us/ftopicp-1242180-.html#1242180

" .. since the saw mill closed the biggest employers are Wal-Mart and a nearby prison. "

=====================================

Sounds about right for small-town employment opportunities, USA, circa July 2011.

Great selection! WalMart or prison!

"Every adult male that had sex with this child should go to prison, I don't care what the color is. But I do not believe black males are the only ones that had contact with this young child," said Quanell X, the leader of Houston's New Black Panther Party.

"It appears to me there's only been the selective prosecution of one community, which is African American."

=============================================

If this story keeps growing legs, Jessie Jackson may have to be dispatched to repair the damage and set the record straight.

Jesse Jackson demands mass non-white immigration into Sweden.
http://www.alipac.us/ftopic-242896-0-da ... rasc-.html