Scanner : hispanics

Racist Small Town Hoodlums Getting Away with Murder

Brian Fairbanks — Fri, 15 May 2009 17:10:00 GMT

Brandon Piekarsky entering court before his acquittal on third-degree murder charges. Piekarsky's level of involvement in the killing is unclear, as he wasn't believed to have helped in the beating.

On July 12th, in Shenandoah, Pennsylvania, a group of white teenagers were walking home when they came across a young Hispanic man in the park with a teenage girl. One of them yelled out, "Isn't it a little late for you to be out? Get your Mexican boyfriend out of here."

The Mexican man, whose name was Luis Ramirez, became enraged and screamed back at them and began calling for backup. Eighteen-year-old Brian Scully then traded punches with Ramirez, with no one ever agreeing on how the fight actually got started. Derrick Donchak, then 19, jumped on top of the badly-beaten Ramirez and, with a piece of metal between his knuckles, began pummeling Ramirez's face. Miraculously, Ramirez was able to recover and the boys ran off, hurling more racial slurs back as they ran. This enraged Ramirez, who chased after them until a quick blow to the head from Colin Walsh, a 17-year-old component of the all-white group, wiped him out. While Ramirez was down, Scully (it is said by witnesses) kicked Ramirez in the head, causing him to foam at the mouth and convulse. He died as a result of that brutal blow.

At the boys' trial, no one seemed to dispute these facts (except which boy did what.) Nonetheless, the jury acquitted the accused of third degree murder and various other charges while convicting them of simple assault. The defendants and their families emerged from the courtroom triumphant, while legal observers say this was on obvious miscarriage of justice:

"There's been a complete failure of justice," said Gladys Limon, staff attorney for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, who attended the trial and informed Ramirez's family of the verdict. "It's just outrageous and very difficult to understand how any juror could have had reasonable doubt."

She said the evidence "clearly established that Luis Ramirez was brutally beaten."

Prosecutors cast Ramirez as the victim of a gang of drunken white teens motivated by a dislike of their small coal town's burgeoning Hispanic population. But the jury evidently sided with defense attorneys, who called Ramirez the aggressor and characterized the brawl as a street fight that ended tragically. [New York Daily News]
As Avery Friedman argues persuasively in the video from CNN yesterday, this was a pretty clear-cut case of jury nullification: the weight of evidence against the accused was so powerful that it's clear the all-white jury -- like similar juries in the South during the Civil Rights struggle -- was not going to convict two young white men of murdering a Mexican. Even if, as Friedman says, "the only reason he is dead is because he was Mexican." [Crooks and Liars]

Now, some activists are putting pressure on the state's Democratic Governor, Ed Rendell, to speak out about the hate crime. They believe the worst is still to come from a town that is almost 100% Caucasian and only 1% Hispanic...

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Arizona House Candidate Apparently Refuses To Speak English

Brian Fairbanks — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 19:03:00 GMT

Is this guy for real?

He's named Juan Valdez (true story), became a citizen of the US in 2007, and has legally changed his first name to John so he can ~~assimilate to the U.S~~. run for political office in the great and open-armed state of Arizona. That's just the lead, people.

Valdez is running aginst two candidates for the Arizona State Legislature in a competitive Democratic primary. During Monday night's Clean Money Clean Elections debate in Phoenix

With aid from an English translator, Valdez proceeded to answer every question the moderator tossed at him—on topics ranging from health care and immigration to neighborhood graffiti—in Spanish.

Despite living in Phoenix for the past 15 years, Valdez, who owns a pool-plastering business, is simply more comfortable speaking his native language, he said.

“This was my first time speaking in front of important people,” Valdez told Insider in English after the hour-long debate. “I thought maybe I would get nervous.”

Now, we're on the left side of the immigration "debate" for sure, but not learning English after a decade and a half of living in Arizona, even if your district speaks it in large numbers, is pure stupidity if you're running for political office. But it gets better, way better:

When asked if his English-language skills would prevent him from being an effective legislator, the 15-year Phoenix resident asked Insider to repeat the question—twice.

Nope, better than that, as a friend notes in an e-mail attached to this story:

Note the extra irony in that AZ has adopted an English Only requirement for official state business, which this was.

However, Juan Valdez (the politician, not the heroic Hispanic rebel and coffee brewer), does have one excuse:

About half of the residents who live in the west-central Phoenix district speak either Spanish and English or only Spanish.

Wouldn't it be great if this guy somehow pulled off an electoral trimuph? Hell, they'd build a border fence around his neighborhood...

Via AZCentral.

UPDATE: Typo in the opening sentence fixed. Valdez became a citizen last year.

Obama Button Makes Us Want To Mess With Texas

Brian Fairbanks — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 14:55:00 GMT

You're gonna wanna see the rest of this Texas Republican Party State Convention pin...

The GOP really wants to make an ass of itself this year, doesn't it?

Hmmm... you don't think this will come back to bite them in the ass, come the nomination of Condi Rice for Vice President? Morons.

(And how is it that Perez Hilton, of all people, was the one to break this story nationally? What does that say about the mainstream media that this was a big deal in Texas over the weekend, but it took three days for anyone outside of the state to hear about it?)

There were other pins that weren't necessarily conveying the positive, inclusive, united front that has been portrayed during the convention. One said, "Press 1 for English. Press 2 for Deportation" and another, "I will hold my nose when I vote for McCain"

Via TrailBlazers.