Tag: Oscar Grant

On the first of January this year, 2009, Oscar Grant was murdered by a BART police officer. This crime gained national media attention and united a community as people from various walks of life came together to demonstrate, voice their righteous indignation and demand justice. People protested, marched, rallied and attended numerous community meetings. Thirty days later, on Jan. 30, my son was shot 17 times and his friend was murdered. There were no marches. There were no rallies. There were no protests.

Los Angeles – In the tradition of the Black Press working as an opponent of racial injustice, we as chairmen of the California Black Media, West Coast Black Publishers Association and National Newspaper Publishers Association stand with President Obama in his original assessment of the arrest of Dr. Henry Louis Gates.

Rekia Mohammed Jabrin has been involved in the Justice for Oscar Grant Movement in more than one way. She has been a consistent spectator at the Johannes Mehserle indictment hearings, taking notes, as well as one of the cofounders of Oakland Cop Watch. We are talking to her to get our audience prepared for the July 24 hearings in Oakland’s Superior Court, where Mehserle’s lawyer will be arguing to get the murder trial taken out of Alameda County.

This video will change your life by giving you the strength to commit - and organize others to commit - to ending the police war against Black and Brown communities and especially our youth, our future. The BART board will hold a special meeting Thursday, July 30, 6:30 p.m., in the MetroCenter auditorium, 101 Eighth St. in Oakland, across from BART's Lake Merritt Station, to discuss citizen review of BART police. Be there!

On other coasts, you could just put on a red, black and green bandana or arm band and be talking to all white people but call your yourself a Black conscious or political rapper. Conscious of what I don't know, but the Jacka, on his new album "Tear Gas," shares the knowledge that he has with what revolutionary theoretician Frantz Fanon called "The Wretched of the Earth" instead of thinking that the information that he has makes him more elite, or better than someone else.

The murder of a 22-year-old unarmed Black man, Oscar Grant, by a transit cop in Oakland during the early hours of New Year's Day sparked national indignation. Onlookers captured the shooting on cell phones, and their video footage was transmitted to millions via the Internet and TV.

Their force did not wait for a mediator or a trained police dog. Asa was cornered, trapped and shot down, with no chance to defend himself. The SFPD force was not in any way equal to the only thing Asa had with him - just his words. That is all Asa had to defend himself with that evening: HIS WORDS.

Right now, Adimu is working on a new documentary called "Operation: Small Ax" about the POCC: Block Report Radio show and its role in organizing in the terrible but fine year of 2009 in the Bay Area in the eye of the storm of controversies like the murder of Oscar Grant, the Oakland Rebellions, the trials of the Oakland 100, the murder of Lovelle Mixon and four OPD and more. It also includes exclusive interviews with Emory Douglas of the Black Panther Party, Chairman Fred Hampton Jr. of the POCC, Umar Bin Hassan of the Last Poets, rappers Beeda Weeda, J. Stalin, Mahasen and Chela Simone and an exclusive Block Report Radio interview with Angela Davis that was used to promote Mumia's new book.

On New Year's morning BART police officer Johannes Mehserle fired his gun at point blank range into Oscar Grant's back, killing him as he lay face down on the train platform, hands behind him. A preliminary hearing is now underway to determine whether Mehserle will be charged with murder or whether the charges against him will be lowered.

T-Kash, the former local television star from KRON's First Cut turned internationally known rap star on Paris' political label Guerrilla Funk Recordings, is a very under-rated voice and mind in Bay Area and international hip hop. His international debut, "Turf War Syndrome," is a classic that not many people in the hood are up on.

Hardworking is an understatement when you talk about Acktup, who has released a new album every three months since he started releasing music. All of his albums have sold at least a thousand copies a piece, with "1000 Degrees" selling 3,000 copies. "No Competition" and "King Mentality" is currently in stores, while he is still in the lab cookin' up "Mobbin Like Me," which is due out in August.

"Our success here to secure justice for Oscar Grant will no doubt be that line in the sand that will say to all police officers, ‘If you kill or break the law, you will go to jail,'" wrote Oscar Grant's Uncle Bobby, Cephus Johnson, in a message of thanks to supporters. Watch Davey D's video on the week's events. Oscar Grant's family asks supporters to return to the courthouse next week.

Supporters of justice for Oscar Grant gathered Monday morning outside the Alameda County Courthouse while the preliminary hearing inside dealt with Johannes Mehserle's defense attorney Michael Rains attempting to reduce charges from murder, to move the venue to a less diverse county, or to otherwise stifle Mehserle being held to account for murdering Oscar Grant.

Build the new civil rights movement to stop police brutality. Rally Monday, May 18, 8 a.m., at the Rene C. Davidson Courthouse, 12th Street and Oak, near the Oakland City Center and the 12th Street BART Station.

On March 21, 2009, a sunny Saturday afternoon, Lovelle Mixon killed four Oakland police officers before being shot to death. Featured in this broadcast quality video are Lovelle's cousin, Minister of Information JR and Bakari Olatunji.

Everybody out Monday, May 18, 8am-5pm, when the cop who killed Oscar Grant goes to court at 12th & Oak, Oakland, and Thursday, May 21, for Minister of Information JR Valrey's next hearing in the trumped up felony arson case from Jan. 7, when he was covering the first of three Oakland Rebellions protesting the police murder of Oscar Grant.

The United States is in the midst of the most radical privatization agenda in its history. We see this in schools, health care, prisons and certainly with the U.S. military/ national security/ intelligence apparatus.

Ras Ceylon is a very unique artist that lives in the Bay. He's politically active, his family is from Sri Lanka, he reps Rastafarianism and has linked with Askari X, Tajai of Souls of Mischief, Chairman Fred, Stic.man and a whole host of others to create a piece of audio art.

Oakland has always been filled wit' a gang of lyrical MC's that "gas" ever since Hip Hop really got started in the Bay. Shady Nate is somebody that I could easily see being the King of Bay Area rap in a couple of years.

On a windy April 24th, hundreds gathered into Humanist Hall on the periphery of downtown Oakland to celebrate the 55th birthday of Mumia Abu Jamal, a former Black Panther who has been a political prisoner for the last 28 years, as well as celebrate the release of his newest book, "Jailhouse Lawyers," published by City Lights (www.citylights.com).