7 years in stir for shoving incident?

[JerrBear81]

I don't know if this has been posted here yet:

PARIS, Texas -- The fairgrounds in this east Texas town look like so many other well-worn county fair sites across the nation. Unless you know the history of the place.

There are no plaques or markers to denote it, but several of the most notorious public lynchings of black Americans in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries were staged at the Paris Fairgrounds.

Brenda Cherry, a local civil rights activist, can see the fairgrounds from the front yard of her modest home, in the heart of the "black" side of this segregated town of 26,000.

And lately, Cherry says, she's begun to wonder whether the racist legacy of those lynchings is rebounding in a place that calls itself "the best small town in Texas."

"Some of the things that happen here would not happen if we were in Dallas or Houston," Cherry said. "They happen because we are in this closed town. I compare it to 1930s."

There was the 19-year-old white man, convicted last July of criminally negligent homicide for killing a 54-year-old black woman and her 3-year-old grandson with his truck. He was sentenced in Paris to probation and required to send an annual Christmas card to the victims' family.

There are the Paris public schools, which are under investigation by the U.S. Education Department after repeated complaints that administrators discipline black students more frequently, and more harshly, than white students.

And then there is the case that most troubles Cherry and leaders of the Texas NAACP, involving a 14-year-old black freshman, Shaquanda Cotton, who shoved a hall monitor at Paris High School.

The teenager had no prior arrest record, and the hall monitor -- a 58-year-old teacher's aide -- was not seriously injured. But Shaquanda was convicted in juvenile court of "assault on a public servant" and sentenced by Lamar County Judge Chuck Superville to prison for up to 7 years, until she turns 21.

Just three months earlier, Superville sentenced a 14-year-old white girl, convicted of arson for burning down her family's house, to probation.

Read the rest here:

http://www.commercialappeal.com/mca/us/article/0,2845,MCA_25346_5425681,00.html

Anyone else think that that's way too extreme of a punishment?

From another source:

http://www.ybpguide.com/2007/03/13/paris-texas-in-plain-view/

[Spike-X]

There was the 19-year-old white man, convicted last July of criminally negligent homicide for killing a 54-year-old black woman and her 3-year-old grandson with his truck. He was sentenced in Paris to probation and required to send an annual Christmas card to the victims' family.

WTF? How is that going to do anyone any good?

"Sorry I killed your family members. But I guess you people have such big families that you hardly miss them anyway. Merry Christmas!"

[Spike-X]

And yeah, I think it goes without saying that seven years jail for pushing somebody is ridiculous. Hopefully the decision will be appealed.

Although from the sound of things, they'd probably expect her to be grateful to them for going easy on her and not just stringing her up from the nearest large tree like they did in the good old days.

[J. Robb]

Some days the world depresses the hell out of me.

[Cam63]

Only " some days ? "

[Sir Tim Drake]

In imperial China, there was a rule that if a magistrate was found to have had an innocent person executed, then the magistrate would also be executed. I almost wish we still had that principle in our society. Shaquanda should be pardoned, obviously, but then the judge should be forced to serve the remainder of her sentence.

[Sir Tim Drake]

After doing a little Google research, I discovered that this actually happened last year. I wonder why the case hasn't been appealed yet?

[JerrBear81]

After doing a little Google research, I discovered that this actually happened last year. I wonder why the case hasn't been appealed yet?

Not sure. Maybe they needed to do more than one appeal.

[Joey Friday]

This girl gets 7-years for shoving while the guy in Wisconsin who tried to rape a deer gets probation..........shakes head..........AMERICA!!!

[Johnny_Storm]

This girl gets 7-years for shoving while the guy in Wisconsin who tried to rape a deer gets probation..........shakes head..........AMERICA!!!

I heard about that story and it was a dead deer to boot:eek:

[Spike-X]

As long as it wasn't a dead male deer.

'cuz that'd be sick.

[Jack Zodiac]

This thread should be linked directly to the "society is doomed" thread.

[Kevin M.]

God love the rednecks. The degenerat bastards of our country.

[Michael P]

Wow. I shoved a teacher in second grade. Good thing I'm white, I guess.

[Kid Omega]

Do we know anything about the girl's previous record?

"Up to seven years" could mean six months and probation.

I'm perfectly willing to accept that the judicial system in rural Texas is racist, but I'm also willing to concede that this article is working from an obvious bias.

[heretic]

After doing a little Google research, I discovered that this actually happened last year. I wonder why the case hasn't been appealed yet?I am guessing it has to do with Legal Fees, Lack of Cash for.

HTG

[JerrBear81]

Do we know anything about the girl's previous record?

"Up to seven years" could mean six months and probation.

I'm perfectly willing to accept that the judicial system in rural Texas is racist, but I'm also willing to concede that this article is working from an obvious bias.

From the article:

The teenager had no prior arrest record

[Dan Apodaca]

Gelp Gelp Texas.

[(A)//(E)]

every time I read something like this I die a little inside.

[Spike-X]

She's being released.

HOUSTON -- Shaquanda Cotton, the black teenager in the small east Texas town of Paris whose prison sentence of up to 7 years for shoving a teacher's aide sparked nationwide controversy, was released Saturday.

Her release, ordered by a special conservator appointed to overhaul the state's scandal-ridden juvenile prison system, was the first of what could be hundreds as a panel of civil rights leaders begins reviewing the sentences of every youth incarcerated by the Texas Youth Commission to weed out those being held arbitrarily.

"We have no confidence in the system that was in place," said Jim Hurley, spokesman for the conservator, Jay Kimbrough. "And this case is an example of what we expect to happen if something wrong has been done to youths being held inside that system."

Cotton, who is 15, had no prior criminal record when she was incarcerated a year ago under an indeterminate sentence that could have lasted until her 21st birthday. Her case rose to national prominence and became the focus of ongoing civil rights protests after a March 12 Tribune story detailed how a 14-year-old white girl convicted of the more serious crime of arson was sentenced to probation by the same judge.

Cotton's case occurred against a backdrop of persistent allegations of racial discrimination inside the Paris public schools -- allegations that are the subject of a continuing probe by the U.S. Department of Education to determine whether black students in the district are disciplined more harshly than whites.

"When I learned about this case, I thought, this just looks so bad and smells so bad it made me hurt," said state Rep. Harold Dutton, the influential chairman of the Texas Legislature's juvenile justice committee. "I told [prison officials] I wanted her out of there immediately."

The superintendent of the Ron Jackson State Juvenile Correctional Complex in Brownwood, Texas, where Shaquanda Cotton is being held, called the girl's mother, Creola Cotton, Friday afternoon and told her she could come pick up the youth, Creola Cotton said.

But because it is a five-hour drive from Paris to Brownwood, and the weather in the area on Friday was severe, Creola Cotton said she couldn't reach the prison until Saturday morning.

Later Friday, prison officials, who had not told Shaquanda of her impending release, allowed her to call her mother.


'She nearly fell on the floor'

"She thought they were bringing her to the office to tell her I was not going to be able to visit this weekend like I was planning because of the bad weather, so she was already crying," Creola Cotton said. "I said, 'Oh, I'm still gonna come see you tomorrow. But you're going to be coming home with me.' She nearly fell on the floor."

Officials said Shaquanda Cotton was being released on 60 days' probation to allow her to access state health and counseling services. But after that, she would be completely free, they said. Creola Cotton said her daughter would not return to the Paris public schools but would pursue her GED at home.

What effect her release might have on the pending legal appeal of the youth's case was unclear.

Since she has been in prison, Shaquanda Cotton said that she had grown despondent surrounded by other youths who were hardened criminals, and that she had tried to commit suicide. Her sentence, which ultimately was up to the discretion of prison officials, had twice been extended, first because she would not admit her guilt as required by prison regulations and then because she was found with "contraband" in her cell -- an extra pair of socks.

Those sentence extensions drew the attention of Kimbrough, who was confirmed by the state Senate on Thursday as conservator of the youth prison system, which has been rocked by a sex scandal over allegations that guards and administrators coerced inmates for sex.

Kimbrough, a former deputy attorney general, said last week that he was convening a special committee to examine the sentences of all 4,700 youths in Texas juvenile prisons to determine how many might have had their sentences unfairly extended by prison authorities -- and that Shaquanda Cotton's was the first case he intended to review.

Prison officials said it was Kimbrough who personally ordered the girl's release on Friday.

Since the Tribune's first account of Shaquanda Cotton's case, her story has been circulated on more than 400 Internet blogs and featured in newspapers and radio and TV reports across the country. Two protests demanding her release were held in Paris and a third, to be led by Rev. Al Sharpton, was scheduled for Tuesday.

Even before news of her impending release broke Friday, the Lamar County District Attorney's office, which prosecuted her and pressed for her to be sent to prison for up to 7 years, made an abrupt turnaround and said the youth had served enough time and ought to be freed.


Court discrepancy revealed

"Let her out of TYC," said Allan Hubbard, spokesman for Lamar County District Atty. Gary Young. "Hell, she's done a year for pushing a teacher. That's too long."

Hubbard also backed away from claims he and Young made this week in numerous media interviews that the judge in the case, Lamar County Judge Chuck Superville, had had no choice but to send the youth to prison because her mother had testified that she would not cooperate with probation officials had the judge sentenced the teen to probation.

On Thursday, Young's official Web site contained this assertion: "This juvenile's mother (Creola Cotton) told the judge she would not comply with conditions of probation."

But a review of the full court transcript shows no such testimony. In fact, Creola Cotton repeatedly answered "yes" when asked in court whether she would comply with any conditions of probation that the judge might impose.

On Friday morning, after an inquiry about this discrepancy by the Tribune, the district attorney's Web site was altered to read: "Through her actions of non-cooperation, Ms. Cotton told the judge she would not comply with conditions of probation."

[JerrBear81]

She's being released.

It's good she's being released.

[Xero Kaiser]

Yeah, if nobody knew about this they were gonna leave her ass in there the full 7 years.

But it's good to hear either way

[BoosterBronze]

Gelp Gelp Texas.


God wants nothing to do with Texas.