June 22, 2023
By Bianca Vázquez, Ed White and Adrian Sainz
Associated Press
Americans across the country this past weekend celebrated Juneteenth, marking the relatively new national holiday with cookouts, parades and other gatherings as they commemorated the end of slavery after the Civil War.
While many have treated the long holiday weekend as a reason for a party, others urged quiet reflection on America's often violent and oppressive treatment of its Black citizens.
And still others have remarked at the strangeness of celebrating a federal holiday marking the end of slavery in the nation while many Americans are trying to stop parts of that history from being taught in public schools.
"Is #Juneteenth the only federal holiday that some states have banned the teaching of its history and significance?" Author Michelle Duster asked on Twitter this weekend, referring to measures in Florida, Oklahoma and Alabama prohibiting an Advancement Placement African American studies course or the teaching of certain concepts of race and racism.
Monday's federal holiday commemorates the day in 1865 when enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, learned they had been freed - two years after the Emancipation Proclamation was issued during the bloody Civil War.
On Juneteenth weekend, a Roman Catholic church in Detroit devoted its service to urging parishioners to take a deeper look at the lessons from the holiday.
"In order to have justice we must work for peace. And in order to have peace we must work for justice," John Thorne, executive director of the Detroit Catholic Pastoral Alliance, said to the congregation at Gesu Catholic Church in Detroit.
Standing before paintings of a Black Jesus and Mary, Thorne said Juneteenth is a day of celebration, but it also "has to be much more."
It was important to speak about Juneteenth during Sunday Mass, the Rev. Lorn Snow told a reporter as the service was ending.
"The struggle's still not over with. There's a lot of work to be done," he said.
Most Black Americans agree, according to a recent poll. A full 70% of Black adults queried in a AP-NORC poll said "a lot" needs to be done to achieve equal treatment for African Americans in policing. And Black Americans suffer from significantly worse health outcomes than their white peers across a variety of measures, including rates of maternal mortality, asthma, high blood pressure and Alzheimer's disease.
Although end-of-slavery celebrations are new in many parts of the country, in Memphis, where the slave trade once thrived, the Juneteenth holiday has been celebrated since long before it became a designated federal holiday in 2021. The Tennessee Legislature passed a bill earlier this year making it a state holiday, as well.
Festivities there include a multi-day festival including food, music, arts and crafts, and cultural exhibitions in a tree-lined park in the city's medical district. The Memphis park once held an equestrian statue and the grave of slave trader and Confederate general Nathan Bedford Forrest. The statue and the body were moved in recent years.
Memphis is home to the National Civil Rights Museum located at the site of the old Lorraine Motel, the former Black-owned hotel where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was killed in 1968. The museum is offering free admission on Monday to mark the holiday. At the museum, visitors can hear recorded speeches from civil rights leaders including King, Fannie Lou Hamer, Medgar Evers and others.
Ryan Jones, the museum's associate curator, said Juneteenth should be celebrated in the U.S. with the same emphasis that July 4 receives as Independence Day.
"It is the independence of a people that were forced to endure oppression and discrimination based on the color of their skin," Jones said.
The Juneteenth holiday, Jones said, should also be viewed as more than a day when people attend parties and cookouts. In fact, he said, it is a time to reflect on the past.
"It acknowledges the sacrifices of those early civil rights veterans between World War I and World War II, and of course in the modern society, the protests, the demonstrations, the non-violence, the marches," Jones said.
As Americans gathered to mark the holiday, it wasn't without incident. In a Chicago suburb late Saturday night, one person was killed and 22 were injured in a shooting still being investigated Sunday by police. One witness said the party in the parking lot of a Willowbrook, Illinois, strip-mall was a Juneteenth celebration.
The White House released a statement on Sunday, June 18, saying: "The President and First Lady are thinking of those killed and injured in the shooting in Illinois last night. We have reached out to offer assistance to state and local leaders in the wake of this tragedy at a community Juneteenth celebration."
The holiday observance continues Monday with Vice President Kamala Harris appearing on a CNN special with musical guests including Miguel and Charlie Wilson.
June 08, 2023
LAWT News Service
KPA Constructors has played a noteworthy role on the $1.8 billion LA Metro Regional Connector project, which opens on June 16, due in large part to the LA Regional Contractor Development and Bonding Program (CDABP), which assists small and diverse firms in overcoming barriers, building their capacities, and winning government contracts. The LA Regional CDABP is a three-pronged effort that includes LA Metro, the City of LA, and the County of LA.
For the two-mile line in downtown LA that links three Metro rail lines (i.e., Gold, Blue, Expo), KPA Constructors was awarded a $3.7 million contract. The company’s staff furnished and installed the project’s radio communication system, a critical infrastructure component that allows Metro and first responders to communicate with the outside world from inside the underground stations and tunnels.
The CDABP was instrumental in enabling KPA Constructors to win and execute the Metro contract. For example, the CDABP helped the firm obtain the required bond, other financial support, and technical assistance.
Karl Percell, the president of KPA Constructors, said, “The program has played an integral role in the ongoing success of my company. It is a great program that helps small and diverse firms like mine.”
The CDABP provides bonding assistance, contract financing, technical support, education and training, networking and matchmaking facilitation, and more. The program services are offered at no cost to participants and is administered by Merriwether & Williams Insurance Services.
The LA Regional CDABP wants to help more small and diverse firms like KPA Constructors access construction contracts. For more information on the program’s benefits and enrollment process, go online to www.LAConDev.com.
June 08, 2023
Danny J. Bakewell, Jr.
Executive Editor
On Monday, June 26, Judge Dale S. Fischer will hear two motions by former Councilman Mark Ridley-Thomas’ defense team to reconsider the jury’s guilty verdicts, which were rendered in March of this year.
These Rule 29 and Rule 33 procedural motions are considered long shots by legal experts and are prerequisites to Ridley-Thomas’s August 21st sentencing and appeal.
In the court filings, the Ridley-Thomas defense team asserts that the prosecution’s case relied on false testimony and incomplete investigations of the facts by the FBI’s lead investigator and government’s star witness. Defense lawyers for Ridley-Thomas have filed two motions with the court arguing that his conviction be overturned and that he deserves a new trial.
His defense team argues in the court filings that the government’s star witness, FBI Agent Brian Adkins, gave false testimony on at least three occasions.
In their second filing, the defense team outlines multiple instances where the government failed to present sufficient evidence on the charges and in some cases, argues “a total failure of proof,” which should lead, according to the filings, to an outright acquittal of the jury’s conviction.
On March 30, the jury found Ridley-Thomas guilty of four counts of honest services wire fraud and one count each of bribery, conspiracy and honest services mail fraud. The case stemmed from his time as a member of L.A. County’s powerful Board of Supervisors and involved his support of a contract with USC’s School of Social Work for Tele-Health, a virtual mental health treatment program run by the university.
The jury, however, did find Ridley-Thomas not guilty of all fraud counts related to Probation University and the Vermont Street Reentry Center, as well as all counts related to the USC admission, scholarship, and Professor of Practice appointment of his son, former Assemblymember Sebastian Ridley-Thomas.
In all, Ridley-Thomas was found guilty on seven counts and not guilty of 12 of the 19 charges brought against him by the government.
The conviction brought an immediate end to Ridley-Thomas term as an L.A. City Council member and sent shockwaves throughout Los Angeles’ African American community where Ridley-Thomas served and been a fearless advocate for over three decades.
A group of Ridley Thomas supporters calling themselves CD10 Voices has once again called for “public demonstration of support for MRT.” They allege that community support remains critically important to illustrate wide skepticism about the verdict, the depth of interest in the case and the strength of solidarity with the defendant.
In an urgent plea for backers, CD 10 Voices wrote in an email that “in the interest of fairness and justice, please plan to attend the hearing on Monday, June 26.”
June 08, 2023
By Mark Sherman and Jessica Gresko
Associated Press
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson disclosed Wednesday, June 7, that she received a $1,200 congratulatory floral display from Oprah Winfrey and $6,580 in designer clothing for a magazine photo shoot in her first months as the first Black woman on the Supreme Court.
The details of gifts given to Jackson were among the reports provided by most members of the court in their annual filings, which give a partial window onto their finances. The reports were released Wednesday.
But the report that was most anticipated — that of Justice Clarence Thomas, who has been under scrutiny for his receipt of undisclosed gifts from a Republican donor — was not among the filings. Thomas, along with Justice Samuel Alito, sought an extension for up to 90 days.
Thomas’ receipt of gifts, valued at several hundred thousand dollars, from the Republican donor Harlan Crow has prompted calls for ethics reform on the nation’s highest court. It was not clear why either man needed more time.
Once a year the justices join with other federal judges in providing a look at their finances. They are supposed to disclose paid travel, outside income, investments, significant gifts and the source of their spouses’ income.
Among the reports Wednesday, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said she received nearly $150,000 in royalties for two children’s books last year and another $12,000 in payments for possible stage and video versions of “Just Ask! Be Different, Be Brave, Be You.” The book, intended for kids age 4 to 8, introduces readers to children who face what Sotomayor, who was diagnosed with diabetes as a child, calls “life challenges.” Sotomayor, the court’s first Latina justice, has been paid more than $3 million in advances and royalties for her books, including her memoir, ”My Beloved World.”
Less than two months after Jackson joined the court in late June, she was featured in a Vogue story first posted online that took note of her historic role. In one accompanying photo taken by Annie Leibovitz, Jackson is wearing a blue coat and dark dress by Oscar de la Renta. A second Leibovitz photo shows Jackson in a brown Aliette jacket.
The report did not specify the size or composition of the pricey gift of flowers from Winfrey.
The justices are being paid $285,400 this year, except for Chief Justice John Roberts, who earns $298,500.
Other justices reporting outside income were Amy Coney Barrett, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, who all brought in nearly $30,000 for law school teaching assignments. Barrett taught at Notre Dame, her former employer and alma mater, while Gorsuch and Kavanaugh were at George Mason University.
The heightened focus on ethics at the high court stems from a series of reports revealing that Thomas has for years received undisclosed expensive gifts, including international travel, from Crow, a wealthy businessman and benefactor of conservative causes. Crow also purchased the house in Georgia where Thomas’s mother continues to live and paid for two years of private school tuition for a child raised by Thomas and his wife, Ginni.
Supreme Court justices do not have a binding code of ethics and have resisted the idea that they adopt one or have one imposed on them by Congress. All nine justices recently signed a statement of ethics that Roberts provided to the Senate Judiciary Committee. Roberts recently acknowledged that the justices can do more to address ethical concerns.
New reporting guidelines adopted by the federal judiciary in March make clear that transportation provided to judges should be disclosed in all instances. Food, lodging or entertainment received as “personal hospitality of any individual” does not need to be reported if it is at the personal residence of that individual or their family.