Story by Pete Shaw • Photos by Bette Lee A “Fairness Hearing” about the Settlement Agreement resolving the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) lawsuit against the City of Portland is scheduled for February 18th. The agreement arose out the the DOJ’s yearlong investigation that found the Portland Police Bureau (PPB) had “engaged in an unconstitutional pattern…
Tag: Racism
Fred Bryant Crusaded for Police Accountability; Survivors Recommit to Quest for Justice
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Story by Pete Shaw Fred Bryant was laid to rest on November 9, 2013. Bryant, who had suffered a stroke in early October, passed away on October 29th, in the 53rd year of his life. He is remembered by many Portlanders for seeking justice for his son, Keaton Otis, who was killed by the Portland…
Mulugeta Seraw Murder Intimately Woven Into Oregon History
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Story by Pete Shaw How could this happen here? That was the question on many Portlanders’ lips on November 21, 1988, when three white supremacists were arrested in connection with the death of Mulugeta Seraw. Seraw, a 28-year-old Ethiopian immigrant who came to the US to attend college, was beaten with a baseball bat on…
Jobs and Freedom Remain Powerful Touchstones 50 Years after Historic March
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Story by Pete Shaw When Barack Obama took the podium at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, the then Senate candidate from Illinois told the nation, “There’s not a Black America and White America and Latino America and Asian America. There’s the United States of America.” It was an affirmation of the myth of inclusion, hardly…
Portlanders Gather in Support of Justice for Trayvon Martin
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Story and photos by Pete Shaw A crowd of over 400 people gathered in Peninsula Park on Sunday July 14th in response to the verdict that acquitted George Zimmerman of second degree murder and manslaughter charges. Zimmerman was on trial for killing 17 year old Trayvon Martin on February 26, 2012 in Sanford, Florida. At…
People Rally Around the Country in Support of Pelican Bay Prison Inhumanity
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Story and photos by Pete Shaw On July 8th in Chapman Square over 100 people joined numerous rallies around the country in support of the Pelican Bay Prisoners Hunger Strike. The hunger strike–the third called by inmates in Pelican Bay prison in California–was called over the same demands that propelled the other two strikes. Those…
California Inmates Undertake Hunger Strike to Protest Inhumane Conditions
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Story by Pete Shaw In July, 2011, approximately 1000 of the 1100 prisoners in the Security Housing Unit (SHU) of California’s Pelican Bay State Prison began a hunger strike to protest conditions. The strike lasted three weeks, spreading to another 13 state prisons to include over 6600 inmates. The Pelican Bay prisoners issued five core…
State Legislature Lobbied to Extend Driving Rights to All
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Story and photos by Pete Shaw The Oregon DMV currently allows driver’s licenses to be issued only to documented US citizens and immigrants with work permits under Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) a 2012 executive order issued by President Obama. Various immigrant rights groups and other groups supportive of immigrants’ rights have been pushing…
Taking Responsibility for Racial Injustice a Necessity for All Americans
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Story and photo by Pete Shaw Not one person in a Portland crowd of over 1200 dissented when Michelle Alexander recently told them, “We’ve got to admit we’ve allowed a human rights nightmare to occur on our watch.” Alexander, an associate professor of law at Ohio State University and the author of The New Jim…
Sheriff Staton’s Loyalty to ICE Leaves Local Groups Cold
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Story by Pete Shaw Activists Coming Together For Justice and Dignity (ACT) has issued a response challenging Multnomah County Sheriff Dan Staton’s December 20, 2012 statement claiming that he has no discretion in deciding whether or not to comply with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) holds. Speaking for the local faith groups and member organizations that…
