Feds: Nightstick at polls 'not prosecutable'
Feds: Nightstick at polls 'not prosecutable'
WND ^ | May 18, 2010 |
Posted on Wednesday, May 19, 2010 2:11:31 AM
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights is demanding to know why the Obama administration Justice Department dropped a civil complaint accusing three members of the New Black Panther Party for Self-Defense of wielding a nightstick and threatening voters at a Philadelphia polling place last Election Day.
The commission, an independent body charged with investigating civil-rights complaints and making recommendations to the federal government, held a hearing on the case May 14. Thomas Perez, assistant attorney general of the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department, gave testimony, stating that "the facts did not constitute a prosecutable violation of the federal criminal civil rights statutes."
As WND reported, two men, Minister King Samir Shabazz and Jerry Jackson, wearing paramilitary uniforms and armed with a nightsticks, blocked a doorway to a polling location to intimidate voters. Shabazz is leader of the Philadelphia chapter of the New Black Panther Party.
The following is one video of the incident posted on YouTube:
After a poll watcher saw one of the men brandishing a nightstick to threaten voters, he called police.
"As I walked up, they closed ranks, next to each other," he told Fox News. "So I walked directly in between them, went inside and found the poll watchers. They said they'd been here for about an hour. And they told us not to come outside because a black man is going to win this election no matter what."
He said the man with a night stick told him, "'We're tired of white supremacy' and he starts tapping the nightstick in his hand. At which point I said, 'OK, we're not going to get in a fist fight right here,' and I called the police.
WND ^ | May 18, 2010 |
Posted on Wednesday, May 19, 2010 2:11:31 AM
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights is demanding to know why the Obama administration Justice Department dropped a civil complaint accusing three members of the New Black Panther Party for Self-Defense of wielding a nightstick and threatening voters at a Philadelphia polling place last Election Day.
The commission, an independent body charged with investigating civil-rights complaints and making recommendations to the federal government, held a hearing on the case May 14. Thomas Perez, assistant attorney general of the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department, gave testimony, stating that "the facts did not constitute a prosecutable violation of the federal criminal civil rights statutes."
As WND reported, two men, Minister King Samir Shabazz and Jerry Jackson, wearing paramilitary uniforms and armed with a nightsticks, blocked a doorway to a polling location to intimidate voters. Shabazz is leader of the Philadelphia chapter of the New Black Panther Party.
The following is one video of the incident posted on YouTube:
After a poll watcher saw one of the men brandishing a nightstick to threaten voters, he called police.
"As I walked up, they closed ranks, next to each other," he told Fox News. "So I walked directly in between them, went inside and found the poll watchers. They said they'd been here for about an hour. And they told us not to come outside because a black man is going to win this election no matter what."
He said the man with a night stick told him, "'We're tired of white supremacy' and he starts tapping the nightstick in his hand. At which point I said, 'OK, we're not going to get in a fist fight right here,' and I called the police.
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