Interest groups plan to exploit another family's tragedy for political gain, despite apparently overwhelming evidence and a public hearing. Most citizens will only hear or see the word "lynching" and then assume the worst. The "Civil Rights" commission, operating under a noble charter, is abusing the truth -- in Florida again.
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights will review the death of a black man who was found hanging from a tree in this poor, rural farm town because of lingering suspicions that his hands were tied behind his back.Sevell Brown, the Florida president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, called for the civil rights commission's intervention following a judge's ruling Tuesday that 32-year-old Feraris "Ray" Golden committed suicide and could not have been lynched by a mob, as had been rumored.
Brown told a newspaper that the organization, which the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. helped found, found "serious inconsistencies" during testimony. "Historically, (with) hangings of black males, inquests have always found suicide," Brown told The Palm Beach Post for its Wednesday edition. He would not elaborate on the inconsistencies.
Smith and others say they do not trust the state's evidence presented during the hearing, including wall-size pictures of Golden's body and police videotape footage showing him dangling from a noose, his arms swaying at his sides.
Experts testified that Golden was likely depressed and a police officer's statement indicated his grandmother initially said Golden told her, "Nobody loves me. I'm going to kill myself." Golden was an alcoholic, and he had traces of cocaine in his system and a blood-alcohol level of 0.334 percent when he died.
via the Miami Herald
What we might call "the rest of story" will likely not be reported as widely:
Presentation at the inquest of the knotted green bedsheet that police cut from around Mr. Golden's neck surprised some relatives even before the verdict, and led them to change their minds and accept the suicide theory. An Associated Press report on lynching claims as recently as Sunday said Mr. Golden's noose was fashioned from his own shirt and that his hands were bound behind his back.Posted by Alan at July 30, 2003 12:03 PMShresee Lumpkin, an aunt of Mr. Golden's, recognized the twin-size bedsheet as coming from his room at his grandmother's house. "It changed my view," Miss Lumpkin told reporters. "That means he got it out of his room and used it," said Henry Drummer, Mr. Golden's stepfather. "Today the issue was 'A suicide was committed.' Period," Florida NAACP President Adora Obi Nweze said after hearing the first 14 witnesses.
Chief Miller said the investigation was led by Detective Steve Sawyer, a white officer supervised by Detective Sgt. Jeffers Walker, who is black. He said another black uniformed officer, Kenwood Campbell, was the first to arrive at the scene.
"I understand and respect the Golden family's grief and their right to ask questions and get answers to those questions. But we never found one piece of information. We never got one phone call, one witness, one scintilla of evidence that indicated it was anything but suicide," Chief Miller said.