On New Year’s Day 2009, 22-year-old Oscar Grant was shot and killed by former transit officer Johannes Mehserle on the platform of Fruitvale BART station in Oakland. Video of the shooting, recorded on cell phone by bystanders, spread virally, sparking protests in Oakland and gaining national attention. After a jury trial in Los Angeles last summer, Mehserle was convicted of involuntary manslaughter and received the minimum sentence of two years in state prison. Mehserle returned back to court on June 1st and Judge Robert Perry ruled that Mehserle will be released on Monday. He has served 11 months of his two year sentence.
Tracy Bell-borden, community activist of Onyx, an Oakland group that has been organizing ongoing protests related to the case, says Mehserle’s release is the beginning of a new chapter. “We have been waiting for this because the civil lawsuit is just starting.”
The shooting stirred up racial tensions in the city, reigniting Oakland's long history of tension between its police force and the community. Mehersle, a white man, was videotaped from multiple angles, shooting Grant, a black man. The incident was followed by violent protests and looting in downtown Oakland.
Onyx is putting together a peace rally this Sunday at Fruitvale Bart Station at 3pm.
Karina Vargas, who testified on the first day of former BART police officer Johannes Mehserle's preliminary hearing, returned to the scene of the shooting for the first time in this interview.
The following originally aired on KCBS.
By Sam Fuller
It’s good we are talking about gun control in the wake of the Tucson shooting, and the LA school shooting last week, but are we talking about the right things?
Both sides are wrong when it comes to gun control. Arming every soccer mom and retiree will not deter crime the way the far right suggests. Have you ever heard of someone with a concealed weapon stopping a killing?
The far left’s idea isn’t much better. If we were to ban guns outright, there’s still no way we could deal with all the guns out there. And a ban would just create a firearms black market.
The real issue is that people want to kill each other, and guns just make it easy. In Switzerland, every military-age male is issued an assault rifle for national defense. And yet they have a lower per-capita homicide rate then the U.S.
The debate should be about preventing homicides, not regulating firearms. Guns are just a tool we use to kill each other. We don’t know the best way to prevent people from wanting to kill. That’s the question we need to be asking.
Previously:
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As the country learns more about the lives of the people at the center of the shootings in Tucson, many of the stories are about young people. While the bullets were aimed at U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords, who currently remains in critical condition, snapshots of four young personalities are beginning to emerge from the tragic events. Victims Christina Green and Gabe Zimmerman, 9 and 30 respectively, were shot and killed. The man behind the trigger, Jared Lee Loughner, was only 22 years old, and Daniel Hernandez, 20, jumped in to lend a hand, possibly saving Giffords' life.
Accused: Jared Lee Loughner, 22
Loughner is charged with shooting Rep. Gabrielle Giffords on Saturday in a Safeway parking lot in Tucson, Arizona, along with 18 other people, killing six.
Media sources have been looking for signs in Loughner’s background that point to mental instability or aggression towards Giffords and the government. They found several, according to the New York Times.
The Wall Street Journal reports that one incident back in 2007 apparently sparked Loughner’s hatred towards Giffords. At a public congressional event, Loughner asked Giffords, “How do you know words mean anything?” and she responded to him in Spanish. A threatening letter to Giffords was later found in Loughner’s apartment.
2007 was also the year that Pima County charged Loughner with possession of drugs and drug paraphernalia, though the case was dropped. Loughner also released YouTube videos about government officials brainwashing people, and how he planned to invent a new form of currency.
In addition, Loughner was the source of substantial discomfort in his classes at Pima Community College. He would interrupt seminars with disoriented comments. According to the WSJ, his math instructor tried to remove him from class several times because he was frightening students. Eventually, the college required Loughner to take a mental health examination, and he withdrew.
Rescue Assist: Daniel Hernandez, 20
Hernandez had only worked with Rep. Giffords for five days before he was in a position to save her life. CBS News reports that Hernandez ran over to Giffords who was lying on the ground, and used meat smocks from Safeway to apply pressure to the wound on her forehead. He also held her upright to prevent her from choking on her own blood until the ambulance arrived.
Hernandez was identified as the man who “saved Giffords’ life," according to Yahoo News.
Victim: Christina Green, 9
Christina’s life began and ended with tragedy. She was born on September 11, 2001 and killed in the Tucson shootings over the weekend. Her father told the Arizona Daily Star that he could have easily seen the outgoing, friendly girl as a politician one day. She was even elected to the student council at Mesa Verde Elementary School, and was invited to meet Rep. Giffords on Saturday. Green was one of a kind- literally being the only girl on her baseball team.
Victim: Gabe Zimmerman, 30
Zimmerman worked for Giffords as her community outreach director, and had organized the public appearance on Saturday. He was also killed in the shooting.
Zimmerman was a graduate of University of California at Santa Cruz where he got a bachelor’s degree in sociology, and went on to get his master’s in social work from Arizona State University. According to his friends, he was an extroverted person with great talent for communicating and cooperating with other people. He could deescalate conflicts between opposing groups very well.
After he finished his undergraduate studies, he worked at the Arizona Children’s Association, before going to Arizona.
The four other victims killed in the shooting include Federal Judge John Roll, Dorothy Morris, Dorwan Stoddard, and Phyllis Schneck, according to the New York Times.
OAKLAND-Turning a community's outpouring of emotion into art, Miguel "Bounce" Perez created a tribute to Oscar Grant and other victims of police brutality on a building in downtown Oakland the night before the two year sentence was delivered for the transit cop who was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in Grant's death.
The building at 1701 Broadway is the home of youth organization and production company Youth Radio, which has been covering the story for almost two years. In July, when the verdict was announced, many businesses in the downtown area boarded their windows. Youth Radio invited muralists from the group "Trust Your Struggle," to paint on its boards, and the group created an iconic picture of Grant's face that supporters of Grant's family replicated for Facebook avatars and tribute posters.
The new mural, created by Perez in just hours, also has a rendering of Grant's face. Check out the video to hear him describe how concepts from Youth Radio students contributed to the rest of the piece.
The trial for Johannes Mehserle, former Oakland BART Police Officer, had California buzzing over the controversy. Mehserle shot 22 year-old train rider Oscar Grant in the back on New Year’s Day 2009 after pinning him to the ground on the Fruitvale BART platform. Mehserle was convicted in early July of involuntary manslaughter. The sentencing for Mehserle takes place on Friday, Nov. 5, at 8:30 a.m. in Los Angeles, CA.
The verdict of involuntary manslaughter had Oscar Grant supporters up in arms. Mehserle's main defense presented to the jury was that he mistakenly pulled his gun instead of his taser, but the prosecution argued otherwise. In the pending civil case, John Burris, the Oakland attorney representing the Mehserle family, claims that pulling the gun was not an accident, and that Mehserle should have been convicted of murder. (View Youth Radio's extensive coverage of the Oscar Grant / Mehserle case including an original photo magazine of the event.)
Mehserle could face between five and 14 years in prison. However, there are several complicating factors for Judge Robert Perry to consider. SF Gate reported, “Although one state law requires an increased prison term for using a gun during a felony, another law allows a judge to grant probation for involuntary manslaughter... In ordinary circumstances, state law says anyone found to have used a gun during a felony must serve extra time in prison. If Perry decides that the law applies to Mehserle, the ex-police officer could get as much as 14 years and would have to serve at least 85 percent of his term.”
Other factors that Judge Perry will take into account include the fact that Mehserle has no prior legal record, as well as the opportunity to send a message to the community in such a high-profile case.
In the days following the 2009 shooting, Oakland streets erupted in multiple violent protests. Angry citizens overturned cars, broke store windows, and lit fires in dumpsters. Tensions were high throughout the Mehserle trial with many comparing the case to the Rodney King case, and while thousands took to the streets on July 8th when the verdict was announced, violence and looting wasn't as widespread as had been projected.
With Friday's sentencing just days away, some downtown Oakland businesses are again boarding up windows in anticipation of possible rioting. Most residents we've spoken to, say they aren't sure quite what to expect.
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Being young in today’s society, means finding any way possible to communicate with your peers. Be it blogging, Facebook, texting, twittering... youth get inspired by what other youth have to say. And in many parts of the world, youth have important things to say. The role of new forms of media is growing.
Camera Phones in Kashmir
A documentary was created by Suvojit Bagchi, a correspondent with BBC World Service based in India, called, “New Media in Kashmir.” It tells the story of cyber activists - young people in Kashmir who use their camera phones to film violent protests, and then post them on YouTube to spread the images beyond their borders.
According to an article in the New York Times, there were three landmark moments in Kashmiri cyber-activism:
- A YouTube video of protest images set to the song, “Revolution,” by Chris de Burgh in 2008.
- A YouTube video posted by a 15-year-old boy of the shooting of a salesman.
- A YouTube video of protest footage set to Everlast’s song, “Stone in My Hand” (see below). The creator was sought after by the police.
Who are these cyber-activists? According to the article, Indian police try to make them out to be: “illiterate pawns of jihadist forces across the Pakistan border and have suggested that economic development and jobs are the key to getting young people off the streets.”
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