“Anytime there’s a hate crime the Justice Department should prosecute, and a noose is certainly a hate crime.”
Protesters marched through the streets around the Justice Department Friday to demand federal intervention in the “Jena Six” case and enforcement of hate crime laws against those who hang nooses in public.
On a chilly but clear day, busloads of people packed a downtown plaza seeking a big government response to small town injustices. They were angered by charges they consider overly harsh and unfair against six black teens accused of beating a white high school student in Jena, La. Tensions between black and white students had run high for weeks in Jena, including an incident where a noose was hung from a tree at the high school. No one was charged with a crime for hanging the noose.
If they allow this to be done to these children, they can do it to all children,” said Camela Vines, a local hairstylist who arrived at 8:30 a.m. for the noon march.
The march, organized by the Rev. Al Sharpton, came only a few days into the tenure of new Attorney General Michael Mukasey, a former federal judge.
Organizers said more than 100 busloads came for the march, from as far away as Florida, Michigan, and Washington state.
Mukasey issued a statement saying his agency takes allegations of hate crimes seriously and is working with state and local police, as well as civil rights groups, to “investigate aggressively dozens of noose-hangings and other recent racially and religiously motivated” crimes nationwide. Such investigations, he said, do not occur in the public eye.