Prison Closes After Female Inmate Forced To Give Birth In A Toilet

The Texas prison that came under fire last summer after a female inmate filed a lawsuit agains them for forcing her to give birth to her daughter in a toilet has now closed down.

The inmate, who’s newborn baby girl sadly died 4-days later as a result of the horrific incident, claimed the prison staff didn’t take her seriously when she said she was pregnant. Check out the details of the incident below.

via Dallas News

Just weeks ago the Texas Observer branded the Jesse R. Dawson State Jail on the banks of the Trinity River near downtown Dallas as “Texas’ worst state jail,” citing, among other things, poor conditions and inadequate medical treatment that “in a few cases led to deaths.” Among them: Autumn Miller’s premature baby, a girl named Gracie born after just 26 weeks of gestation.

Autumn told KTVT-Channel 11 in July 2012 that guards at the privately operated jail, which is owned by Corrections Corporation of America, refused her cries for medical attention. She says the guards gave her a menstrual pad and locked her in a cell. She says they told her she just had to go to the bathroom.

As a result, Miller says in a lawsuit filed Friday in Dallas federal court, on June 14, 2012, “She looked down and watched, in horror, as she delivered baby Gracie into the toilet.” The infant lived for four days and died in her mother’s arms. “Within an hour of Gracie’s death,” says the suit, “CCA employees took Autumn back to Dawson.”

The suit alleges CCA guards did nothing to help Miller, before or after she gave birth to her baby; she claims it took guards 15 minutes just to find the key to get into her cell, and that “several CCA employees came into the holding cell while Gracie lay there helpless next to her bleeding mother.”

Your Black World news has since reported that the prison in question has been closed down in accordance with an investigation into the unsatisfactory practices and treatment at several prison facilities across the country.

What a horrible story! In prison or not, no woman deserves to be forced to do such a thing….and the child certainly didn’t deserve to lose her life for it.

Footage Released Of Two White Cops Caught On Video Beating A Black Woman Like Slave Owners!

Two white police officers have been fired for brutally man-handling a black woman in the Texan town of Jasper – which is no stranger to racial tensions.

Keyarika Diggles was slammed into a counter by two officers of Jasper Police Force in Texas.

Officers Grissom and Cunningham have been dismissed following the May 5th incident.  Criminal charges could be brought against both men.

The incident occurred on May 5th at the police headquarters and surveillance footage from the day shows Keyarika ‘Shea’ Diggles, 25, having her head rammed into a shoulder height counter by officers Ricky Grissom and Ryan Cunningham before she is dragged to a cell handcuffed by her feet.

‘The amount of force used was abominable,’ said, Diggles’ attorney Cade Bernsen. Diggles was brought to the jail for an unpaid fine and was on the telephone with her mother to arrange the delivery of $100 when Officer Grissom slammed his hand onto the phone – cutting off the call.

While Diggles begins to remonstrate with Grissom, Officer Cunningham comes from behind her and attempts to handcuff her, but not before he pushes her forward and slams her head onto the countertop.

See more at: http://bossip.com/788256/pigs-footage-released-of-two-white-cops-caught-on-video-beating-an-black-woman-like-slave-owners-video/#sthash.ciDFS5cr.dpuf

High School Student Gets Tased, Maced, & Punched While on the Ground

Sheriffs show up in Riot gear for Black Beach party

Sober Black Man Arrested For DUI Despite Blowing A 0.00 Breathalyzer Test!

Jessie Thornton sleeps during the day and runs errands and works out during the night.

“My wife, she’s an ER nurse and works three 12-hour shifts, so I adjusted my schedule to be like her schedule,” Thornton told our Phoenix sister station KNXV.

The 64-year-old retired firefighter moved to a retirement community in Surprise, Arizona from Ohio.

Jessie says his late hours have put him in the police spotlight.

“I’ve been stopped 10 times in Surprise and given four tickets, it’s amazing,” said Thornton.

In his latest incident with the bacon brigade…

Around 11 p.m. Thornton, according to Surprise Police Department paperwork, was pulled over for crossing the white line in his lane.

“He (the officer) walked up and he said ‘I can tell you’re driving DUI by looking in your eyes,’” said Thornton.

The 64-year-old says his eyes could have been red because he had just left LA Fitness where he was in the pool swimming.

“I take my glasses off and he says, ‘You’ve got bloodshot eyes.’ I said, ‘I’ve been swimming at LA Fitness,’ and he says, ‘I think you’re DUI,’” said Thornton. “He (the officer) goes, ‘Well we’re going to do a sobriety test.’ I said, ‘OK, but I got bad knees and a bad hip with surgery in two days.’”

Medical documents show Thornton was scheduled to have hip replacement surgery two days after the incident.

According to the police report, the officer notes that Thornton does have a hip and knee problem.

Thornton said two other officers arrived and he conducted the sobriety test.

“At one point, one of the officers shined the light in my eye and said, ‘Oh, sorry,’ and asked the other officer if he was doing it right,’” said Thornton.

Thornton said he was then placed in handcuffs and told to sit on the curb.

“I couldn’t even sit on the ground like that and they knew it and I was like laying on the ground, then they put me in the back of an SUV and when I asked the officer to move her seat up ’cause my hip hurt she told me to stop whining,” said Thornton.

Sounds like the cops had their mind made up that they were going to arrest Thornton as soon as they pulled him over.

According to documents provided to ABC15 from the City of Surprise, Thornton was taken to police headquarters where he took a breathalyzer test.

The test, according to the police documents, came back with a blood alcohol level of 0.000.

“Yes, I do the breathalyzer and it comes back zero, zero, zero,” said Thornton.

While in custody, a “DRE” or drug recognition expert is called to test Thornton.

“After he did all the tests, he says, ‘I would never have arrested you, you show no signs of impairment,’” said Thornton.

- See more at: http://bossip.com/786356/f-the-police-sober-black-man-arrested-for-dui-despite-blowing-a-0-00-breathalyzer-test-43081/#sthash.HWtb1hqw.dpuf

Black People Arrested For Marijuana Possession At Higher Rate Than Whites According To ACLU Study

Blacks Arrested For Marijuana Possession At Higher Rate Than Whites

According to USA Today:

Black people are arrested for possessing marijuana at a higher rate than white people, even though marijuana use by both races is about the same, the American Civil Liberties Union reports in a new study. The analysis of federal crime data, released Tuesday, found marijuana arrest rates for blacks were 3.73 times greater than those for whites nationally in 2010. In some counties, the arrest rate was 10 to 30 times greater for blacks.

An overall increase in marijuana possession arrests from 2001 to 2010 is largely attributable to drastic increases in arrests of black people, the ACLU said. The report comes at a time when Colorado and Washington have become the first states to legalize adult possession of small amounts of non-medical marijuana. A number of states and Washington, D.C., allow medical marijuana. Federal law still prohibits its use. Some states and some cities have eased punishments for possession of smaller amounts.

Blacks were arrested at a rate of 537 per 100,000 people in 2001. In 2010, their arrest rate rose to 716 per 100,000. The 2001 number for white people was 191 per 100,000 and rose to 192 per 100,000 in 2010, the ACLU said. Despite the disparate rates, far more whites were arrested in 2010 for marijuana possession, 460,808, compared to blacks, 286,117.

Police simply operate from the standpoint that “the use of marijuana is a crime,” said Jim Pasco, executive director of the National Fraternal Order of Police, who had not yet seen the ACLU report. The ACLU supports legalization of marijuana and regulation through taxation and licensing. It also supports eliminating criminal and civil penalties for marijuana possession. If those two options are not possible, the group supports punishment for marijuana possession with only civil penalties.

The unequal arrests rates are not confined to a single U.S. region or to urban areas with larger black populations, the ACLU said. That discrepancy is found throughout the country, regardless of the size of the black population of the location and at all income levels, the data shows. African Americans living in counties with the highest median household incomes, $85,000 to $115,000, are two to eight times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than whites. In counties with median household incomes of $22,000 to $30,000, the arrest rate for blacks is 1.5 times to five the rate as for whites, the report said.

When it comes to marijuana use, about 14% of blacks and 12% of whites reported in 2010 that they had used the drug during the previous year, according to data that the ACLU obtained from the federal National Drug Health Survey. Among people ages 18-25, use was greater among whites.

The findings are hardly surprising to the African-American community. Ben Jealous, president and CEO of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, said arrest disparities have led to mass incarceration and criminalization of African Americans. “Any arrest, even for marijuana, is a blot on someone’s record and an impediment to future jobs and opportunities,” Jealous said. “For these reasons, a number of NAACP state conferences (chapters) have supported the decriminalization of marijuana.”

White Cops Fired For Beating Black Woman Over $150 Fine, Police Pull Her Hair And Teeth Out

White Officers Beat Black Woman

According to Raw Story

Two police officers in Texas have been fired after they were caught on video beating a woman who was being arrested for an unpaid traffic ticket.

In an interview with KBMT last week, 25-year-old Keyarika “Shea” Diggles said that Jasper Officer Ricky Grissom was polite at first, allowing her to call her mother from the police station to raise the $150 needed to pay the fine.

But Grissom eventually became impatient and cut off the call.

“He said, ‘I’ve been waiting here all this time when I could have been out patrolling, waiting on you. This is stupid,’” Diggles recalled. “He just went to cussing. And then I was like, ‘Well, you don’t have to yell at me.’”

Video obtained from the Jasper Police Department shows Grissom pushing Diggles up against a wall before Officer Ryan Cunningham comes from behind and slams her head against a counter top. Diggles is then forced to the ground and dragged by her ankle into a nearby cell.

“The amount of force used was abominable,” attorney Cade Bernsen, who is representing Diggles, told Yahoo News. “She got her hair pulled out, broke a tooth, braces got knocked off… it was brutal.”

On Monday, the Jasper City Council dismissed Grissom and Cunningham. A charge of resisting arrest against Diggles was also dropped.

In a famous 1998 case, an African-American man named James Byrd Jr. died after being tied to the back of a pickup drug and dragged and decapitated by at least two white supremacists in Jasper. And in last year, the city’s first African-American police chief, Rodney Pearson, was fired by the majority-white city council. He is now suing.

“It’s a different part of the world, man, it’s crazy,” Bernsen explained to Yahoo News.

Because He’s Black? Atlanta Man Arrested During Test Drive Because Police Suspected He Stole Luxury Car

“Even if you in a Benz, you still a ni**a in a coupe”

Black Man Arrested During Test Drive

Via The Grio reports:

Jon-Christopher Sowells took a test drive that he’ll never forget!

The Gwinnett County, Ga., man went shopping for a BMW and decided to take the car for a test drive. What happened next was disturbing. The cops pulled him over and cuffed him for obstruction, according to the GA Daily News.

It all started when Sowells drove a BMW out of Philips Motors in Snellville for a test run. He drove onto a highway and was stopped by police officers soon after. According to Sowells, the officer said he didn’t have any tags on the car.

“I said, ‘No problem.’ I don’t have any tags on this car because it’s not my car,” Sowells said he told one of the officers. “The dealer is right there. We can get it all clarified.”

When Sowells asked the officers repeatedly to call and confirm his test drive with the dealership, they allegedly refused. Sowells said the officers asked to view a document that was strewn across the vehicle’s back seat. Not knowing what it was, he refused.

Bad move!

The officers then resorted to using bully tactics, Sowells claims. “They asked me to get out of the car. I said ‘I don’t feel comfortable.’ They commenced to open up the car door and they tried to drag me out of the door by my left arm,” he contends.

It was at this point that the officers called for backup.

The police report states that Sowells tried pulling away from the policemen. When the lawmen pulled out their tasers, Sowells then acquiesced and was arrested on the spot.

Sowells is upset by the incident because, “they’re treating me like I’m a criminal and I hadn’t done anything.”

Here’s what the Snellville police department had to say about the matter.

BTW, Sowells ended up purchasing the BMW after all!

Do you think the cops were right to arrest the man on the test dive?

Their were no plates on the vehicle. And if he would have given them the document on the rear seat which proved the vehicle belongs to the dealership he would have probably been on his way.

- See more at: http://bossip.com/783801/because-hes-black-atlanta-man-arrested-during-test-drive-because-police-suspected-he-stole-luxury-car/#sthash.CKtYILsH.dpuf

Mom gets life sentence for non-violent first offense: Her Attorney speaks with Dr. Boyce

Sharanda Jones received life with no parole for a non-violent first time offense.

Police CHOKE 14-Year Old Holding Puppy for 'Dehumanizing Stares' (Video)

"The mother of a 14-year-old arrested over Memorial Day weekend on a Miami beach is accusing police of brutality, after officers forced her son to the ground and put him in a choke hold. Police accuse the teen of "clenching his fists" and giving officers "dehumanizing stares."*

Miami police slammed and choked 14-year old Tremaine McMillian. Why? Was it the threat he posed by walking away? The puppy he was holding? The lack of being armed? The "dehumanizing stares" he made at them? Cenk Uygur, Ana Kasparian, and Ben Mankiewicz break it down.