The accounting and disbursing of at least $500,000 donated to pay for the legal defense of the six black teenagers in Jena, Louisiana has been called into question, just weeks after 20,000 demonstrators protested what they decried as unequal justice for the defendants.
The Chicago Tribune reports that parents of the "Jena 6” teenagers have refused to publicly account for how they are spending most of the cash, estimated at up to $250,000, in a bank account they control.
Michael Baisden, a nationally syndicated black radio host who is leading a major fundraising drive on behalf of the Jena 6, has declined to reveal how much he has collected. Attorneys for the first defendant to go to trial, Mychal Bell, say they have yet to receive any money from him.
Meanwhile, photos and videos are circulating across the Internet that raise questions about how the donated funds are being spent. One photo shows Robert Bailey, one of the Jena 6 defendants, posing with $100 bills stuffed in his mouth. Another shows defendants Carwin Jones and Bryant Purvis at the Black Entertainment Television Hip-Hop Awards in Atlanta last month.
Civil rights leaders who helped organize support for the youths say they are concerned about the perceptions that are spreading.
Only one national civil rights group, Color of Change, has fully disclosed how the $212,000 it collected for the Jena 6 via an Internet campaign has been distributed. The grass-roots group has posted images of canceled checks and other signed documents on its Web site, showing that all but $1,230 was paid out to attorneys for the Jena youths.
Exactly how much money has been collected for the Jena 6 defendants is impossible to know, because many donors contributed directly to the defendants’ families. Many Internet operators raised funds by selling T-shirts or otherwise invoking the Jena 6 cause, but much of that money disappeared without a trace.
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