Famed Civil Rights Photographer Identified As FBI Informant

Ernest Withers, the late veteran freelancer for America’s black press and known as “the original civil rights photographer,” was secretly an FBI informant who passed information to the feds about the civil rights movement in Memphis.

Per the Commercial Appeal…

Withers covered it all, from the Emmett Till murder that jump-started the movement in 1955 to the Little Rock school crisis, the integration of Ole Miss and, now, the 1968 sanitation strike that brought King to Memphis and his death.

The grief-stricken aides photographed by Withers on April 4, 1968, had no clue, but the man they invited in that night was an FBI informant — evidence of how far the agency went to spy on private citizens in Memphis during one of the nation’s most volatile periods.

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Lawyer: Strangled Inmate's Kin 'Outraged'

By: Stephen Manning, Associated Press

UPPER MARLBORO, Md. - (AP) The family of a 19-year-old man found strangled in his cell a day after he was jailed on charges of running over and killing a police officer is "outraged" over his death, their attorney said Tuesday.

Ronnie White's death is being investigated as a homicide by the FBI and Maryland state police. He died Sunday in the Prince George's County Correctional Center from asphyxiation and strangulation, the state medical examiner said.

Officials said seven guards had access to White at the time of his death, as did an unspecified number of supervisors. Authorities are also investigating whether anyone from the outside had access to the inmate.

Bobby G. Henry Jr., the attorney representing the inmate's family called for "a thorough and exhaustive investigation." The family is "absolutely, unequivocally outraged and incensed and deeply saddened for the loss of life of their loved one," he said.

Lawyer: Strangled Inmate's Kin 'Outraged'....

FBI SAYS DOCS IN TIMES STORY LOOK FAKE: Plus, Afeni Shakur's TASF releases statement in the wake of discredited article.

FBI reports referenced in a recent Los Angeles Times story linking associates of Sean "Diddy" Combs to a 1994 attack on rapper Tupac Shakur appear to be fakes, the agency said Friday.

James Sabatino, a convicted con man in federal prison sentence for fraud, filed the documents last fall in Miami federal court as part of a $19 million lawsuit against Combs, claiming Combs never paid him for arranging a recording and video session by the late Notorious B.I.G.

The documents were said to be an FBI agent's reports on interviews conducted in 2002 of confidential informants linking Sabatino and associates of Combs to the 1994 shooting of Shakur in New York City.

"We have no record of these documents in our system," Agent Stephen Kodak told the Associated Press. "They don't appear to be legitimate."

Howard L. Weitzman, Combs' attorney, said his client and Sabatino never had a business relationship. "It should be clear that Mr. Sabatino has a vivid imagination, to say the least, and his credibility quotient is zero," Weitzman said in an e-mail.

Sabatino, 31, is currently serving an 11-year sentence for identity theft and fraud at a federal prison in Pennsylvania. His father once said in a letter to a judge that his son "is a disturbed young man who needed attention like a drug."


Meanwhile, a statement was released over the weekend from the Tupac Amaru Shakur Foundation containing what it says is a response from the late rapper's mother, Afeni Shakur, to the Los Angeles Times article.


"We will continue to work to save the lives of our young people and to offer peaceful alternatives to violence and conflict resolution," the statement quotes Afeni Shakur as saying. "That is what we have done since the murder of my son, and that is exactly what we will consciously continue to do."

FBI Looking at Civil Rights Charges in Death of Woman Shot by Officer While Holding Baby

By: Jackie Jones, BlackAmericaWeb.com

The FBI is looking into possible civil rights violations in the shooting death of Tarika Wilson, a black woman mortally wounded by a white police officer in Lima, Ohio while holding her infant son, who was also shot.

Sgt. Joseph Chavalia has been indicted on a misdemeanor charge of negligent homicide in the death of 26-year-old Wilson after she was shot during a SWAT raid at her house in January while police were looking for her boyfriend. Chavalia also was charged with misdemeanor negligent assault in the wounding of Wilson’s son Sincere Wilson, whose finger had to be amputated.

The NAACP chapter, ministers and other local leaders in Lima have said the charges against Chavalia should have been more serious.

Chavalia, who has pleaded not guilty to the charges, was released on $50,000 bond and faces up to eight months in jail if convicted of both charges.

According to reports, police bashed in the front door of Wilson’s home and entered with guns drawn. Neighbors who saw the raid told reporters that moments later officers opened fire, killing Wilson and wounding the 14-month-old baby, who she was holding in her arms.

Details of what happened between the time police entered the home and when gunfire erupted are unclear. Police and the prosecutor’s office have not released details of the investigation report.

Family members have said Wilson was an innocent, unarmed bystander in the incident.

Police arrested Wilson’s boyfriend, Anthony Terry, on drug charges and said they found suspected marijuana and crack cocaine in the house. He was later indicted on three counts of trafficking in crack cocaine, six counts of permitting drug abuse, and four counts of trafficking in marijuana for incidents occurring between September 2007 and Jan. 4, the day of the raid. He is scheduled to go to trial April 1, according to The (Toledo) Blade.

The Blade also reported that Chavalia had been on the Lima police force since January 1977 and was promoted to sergeant in 1990. A member of the department’s SWAT team since 1986, he wrote a comprehensive use-of-force policy for Lima police in 1990, the newspaper said.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson visited Lima in February and met with Lima and Allen County officials. In a news conference after the meeting, he called for charges against Lima police in the incident, saying they used unnecessary and illegal force.

“There must be a deterrent, not just for the man who pulled the trigger, but for those who planned [the raid],” Jackson told reporters.

Mayor David Berger said at the time that while he welcomed Jackson’s visit, he thought the comments about the shooting were divisive and heightened tensions.

“It’s inappropriate and unjustified. He doesn’t have all the facts to make that kind of judgment,” the mayor told The Blade.

Jackson also visited Lima Senior High School to deliver a message of hope to students and met with local clergy and community leaders during the visit.

The grand jury indictments against Chavalia were announced last Monday. He has been suspended with pay pending the conclusion of the case.

Rev. C.M. Manley, pastor of New Morning Star Missionary Baptist Church, said last week that a major protest rally was being planned, but no date had been set.

Several smaller protests had been held weekly after the Jan. 4 shooting and many black residents testified at a forum about the shootings led by the Ohio attorney general about what they called abuse at the hands of local police and inequities in the justice system.

Organizers hope a larger rally will result in substantive change.

“We haven’t set a date yet, but we’re going to protest,” Manley told BlackAmericaWeb.com. “We’re very disturbed about that because it’s not right. The NAACP and the black ministers are getting together. White people are supporting us, too. They all see this isn’t right.”

Manley said there had been a long history of racial tensions between the black community in Lima, the police and the prosecutor’s office.

“There always has been with young black men,” Manley said. “Almost every young black man in our town has been to prison. You know how they do, the whites get off and the blacks go to prison for things you should get probation on.”

Jason Upthegrove, president of the Lima NAACP, said the chapter asked the FBI to investigate and determine whether the case was handled fairly.

"Any time a man shoots through a baby and kills an unarmed woman, and is charged with two misdemeanors, I think it would be an understatement to say that that's unacceptable," he said. "I think it says a lot about the judicial system here in our county, it says a lot about the grand jury."

In addition to her injured son, Wilson is survived by five other children, aged eight and under.

FBI TO PROBE CIVIL RIGHTS-ERA COLD CASES

The FBI is investigating 26 unsolved civil-rights era cases out of nearly 100 referred to the bureau over the last year, according to Director Robert Mueller.

In a statement on Tuesday, Muelller offered the first details about the FBI's efforts to reopen decades-old civil-rights cases since the successful prosecution last summer of a Ku Klux Klansman for his role in the 1964 abduction and killing of two black teenagers.

Of the more than 100 unsolved cases referred to the FBI early last year, Mueller said 95 of them were sent to investigators in 17 field offices around the country. Ultimately, 52 cases were opened and 26 of those were being reviewed by the Justice Department "to determine if additional investigation is necessary," he said.

"For those cases in which we can move forward, we will," he added.

SHARPTON CAUGHT ON TAPE CUTTING CAMPAIGN DEAL

The Philadelphia Inquirer is reporting that Al Sharpton was caught on tape in 2003 offering to help a fund-raiser win a multimillion-dollar business deal in exchange for helping him raise $50,000 for his presidential campaign.


FBI agents tapping White's phones in 2003 recorded more than 20 conversations between Sharpton and Philadelphia fund-raiser Ronald A. White, most of them related to fund-raising for the presidential campaign and an effort to secure a $40 million pension-fund deal in New York.


Instead of offering to help raise the requested $50,000 for Sharpton's campaign, White offered $25,000, according to the Inquirer.

"If you bring my guys up on this hedge fund, and I have the right conversation," White said on the tape, "I'll give you what you need."

"Cool," Sharpton replied.

The Inquirer obtained an account of the May 9, 2003, conversation, which was recorded as part of the Philadelphia City Hall corruption case. The tape helped spark a separate inquiry into Sharpton's 2004 campaign and his civil-rights organization, the National Action Network. The FBI-IRS probe resurfaced publicly Wednesday, when Sharpton aides received subpoenas.


The video was recorded by an FBI camera hidden in a lamp inside Suite 34A at the Waldorf Astoria hotel in Manhattan. Sharpton and White were introduced by La-Van Hawkins, a Detroit businessman.

At the time, FBI agents were investigating White and Hawkins, suspecting that they were involved in pay-to-play in Philadelphia - raising campaign funds for Mayor Street and others in order to win municipal contracts for favored donors.

About a year later, White, Hawkins and a dozen others, including former City Treasurer Corey Kemp, were indicted in Philadelphia on federal pay-to-play corruption charges. White died before trial. Hawkins was convicted of fraud and perjury and sentenced to 33 months. Kemp is serving a 10-year sentence for corruption, bribery and fraud.

No charges were brought related to Sharpton or the proposed New York pension-fund deal, which never materialized. However, as The Inquirer reported in 2005, the New York-based investigation of Sharpton has continued. Sources said agents in that case are examining whether Sharpton violated campaign-finance laws or used money donated to his National Action Network for personal use.