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Members tell La. Governor that 'they and their families have suffered enough.'
The Associated Press is reporting that members of the Congressional Black Caucus called on Gov. Kathleen Blanco to pardon Mychal Bell and the five other teenagers known as the "Jena 6."
Texas Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee said in a letter to Blanco this week that Bell and the other teens have paid their debt to society and should be immediately pardoned.
"They and their families have suffered enough, as has the State of Louisiana and the town of Jena," the letter reads.
Fourteen other members of the caucus joined Lee in urging Blanco to support releasing Bell, who was sentenced to 18 months in a juvenile facility on Dec. 3 for his role in an assault last year on Justin Barker, a white student at Jena High School.
Blanco's press secretary, Marie Centanni, said Friday in a statement the governor cannot grant a pardon or commutation without a recommendation to do so from the state Pardon Board. (Blanco leaves office Jan. 14. The next Pardon Board meeting is scheduled for Jan. 17.)
Although he has only about eight months left to serve in the case, Bell is serving a separate 18-month sentence for previous juvenile charges unrelated to the Barker dispute. He has about 16 months left on that sentence, which runs concurrently with the sentence in the Barker case.
The charges against Bell and the others sparked a huge civil-rights demonstration in Jena in September. The activists said prosecutors treated blacks more harshly than whites.
Charges against Robert Bailey Jr., 18; Carwin Jones, 19; Theo Shaw, 18 and Bryant Purvis, 18 have been reduced from attempted murder to aggravated second-degree battery. The last suspect was charged as a juvenile and not identified.
