Political Correctness in Buffalo.....

[tomac]

In today's Buffalo News:



3 held in attack with racial overtones are due in court today
City officials claim it wasn't a hate crime
By T.J. Pignataro
News Staff Reporter
Updated: November 24, 2009, 11:48 PM


Three Buffalo teenagers arrested Tuesday are accused of the savage beating of a 19-year-old white man last August, after he walked his black girlfriend home on the city's far East Side.
Police charged two Newburgh Avenue brothers — Donte A. Lee, 18, and Antoine Blackmon, 16 — along with a 13-year-old male in the Aug. 18 attack on Brian Milligan Jr., who suffered severe head trauma, a fractured jaw and broken teeth. The incident occurred just before 11 p.m. in the 2100 block of Genesee Street near Floss Avenue. At one point, Milligan was struck with a chunk of concrete, police said.
During a news conference, city officials reiterated that no facts or evidence suggest the attack was a "hate crime," despite the fact that Milligan and family members told police he and his girlfriend had been the target of verbal abuse in the neighborhood in the weeks prior to the attack.
"It wasn't what many people thought it was and the facts and the evidence prove that this was just stupid, senseless and unprovoked violence," said Mayor Byron W. Brown.
Milligan has no recollection of the actual beating, authorities said, and the police investigation revealed that Lee, Blackmon and the juvenile didn't know Milligan and were not among those who previously targeted them with racially derogatory remarks.
"The victim was walking one way with the suspects coming the other way," said Daniel Derenda, deputy police commissioner.
"We believe that words were said to the victim that led to this act of violence. The facts or the evidence do not support the allegations this was, in fact, a hate crime," he said. "Whether it was white, black had nothing to do with it other than stupidity."
Derenda said there was no apparent motive for the attack.
Milligan's parents, when reached at their Depew home Tuesday evening, were elated about the arrests and expressed gratitude to Buffalo Police Detective Barbara Lark, who tirelessly worked on the case.
"She played her cards right. She kept everything "hush, hush,' knowing that sooner than later, she'd crack the case," said Brian Milligan Sr., the victim's father.
The family still believes Brian Jr. was targeted because of his race.
"If it wasn't a hate crime, what was it?," Milligan Sr. asked. "They didn't take his money. They didn't take his jewelry. He was wearing very expensive shoes; they didn't take those. How can it not be?"
The Milligans plan to see Lee and Blackmon for themselves at 9 a.m. today when they are arraigned in Buffalo City Court on felony charges of first-degree gang assault.
The two were being held in the Erie County Holding Center. The juvenile was in custody at the East Ferry Detention Center and is scheduled to be taken into Family Court as a delinquent.
The Rev. Darius G. Pridgen, pastor of True Bethel Baptist Church, made a plea to his congregation in the week following the attack to help police in finding those responsible. Lark believes Pridgen's help inspired some to come forward.
After spending four days in the trauma Intensive Care Unit at the Erie County Medical Center and several more days hospitalized with two fractures to his jaw, a broken tooth and a gash to his neck requiring seven staples to close, Milligan Jr. was discharged on Aug. 26.
That was only the beginning of his long road to recovery.
His jaw was wired shut for 8½ weeks, he lost three bottom teeth, still has numerous others out of place and will require braces to fix his teeth. Furthermore, Milligan Jr. still has some bleeding on his brain that is expected to subside eventually, his father said.
Milligan Jr., on Tuesday evening, was also in his third day back at work at the Walden Avenue McDonald's, which kept his job open for him while he healed.
"It's good to have him back," said Jody Purpura, the manager at the McDonald's. "I heard someone in the back saying to him earlier, "Everything's coming together, you got your job back and they caught the guys.' We're all glad."

tpignataro@buffnews.com

So once again the Buffalo Police make a "politically correct" statement and claim that those thugs that attacked the white kid weren't racists because they didn't know their victim.
Did the Klansmen of Alabama know the African-Americans they strung up because they were "uppity"?
If it wasn't a Hate Crime, why weren't any of the kid's possissions stolen? And didn't the fact that the kid and his African-American girlfriend were subjected to harrassment for the simple crime of being together make any impression on the cops?
Or is the Brown Adminisration trying to keep an extra number of years from being added to these punks' potential sentences for the Federal charges?

[run4it]

They are not being charged with a hate crime because there is zero positive evidence that they did it over any kind of racial interest. They hadn't threatened the victim before over race, and there was no evidence that at the time the perps made any reference to race.

In fact, the only way race CAN be brought into this is by insinuating that what OTHER people in the community had said should necessarily be imputed to these individual perps.

Using your analogy, this means that the attitudes of the Klan should be imputed to you because you, like them, are white and middle-class. Oh yeah, you're also showing that you're actually aware of racial tensions. So the next time you commit a crime or infraction that has anything to do with someone of a different race you should be assumed to have acted out of racial bias, because you share characteristics with others who ARE blatant racists.

Even if you want to assume racial reasoning behind this (and I would agree that it's at least an arguable suspicion) we're talking about what these people are being charged with. Why (and indeed HOW) can they be charged with something for which there is zero actual evidence, other than purely circumstantial (not sufficient for PROOF of guilt)? That would be a waste of a prosecutor's time and muddy any actual trial.

[Mr. Lackawanna]

Brian Milligan Jr. was savagely beaten by a group of youths. During a news conference Buffalo Mayor Brown reiterated that no facts or evidence suggested that the attack was a hate crime.

If the roles were reversed I wonder what if statements by Mayor Brown would still be the same.

Do you think that the youths while beating Mr. Milligan did not shout out any racial slurs. Thinking if they got caught they could be charged with a race crime. I hope another agency (FBI) investigates the savage beating of Mr. Milligan.

[PickOranges]

They should of charged them with attempted murder.

They left the kid for dead.

[FMD]

its a hate crime pure and simple.

Also, 3 against one is gang assualt in the first degree.

if it was 3 white males against 1 black male, it would make front page news acrossed the country.

This sort of pure blindness to the facts at hand and the fact that our criminal justice system REFUSES, outright REFUSES to charge crimes comitted against whites, by blacks as hate crimes, like they would if it were white vs black, will eventually bite us ALL in the ass.

[tomac]

They are not being charged with a hate crime because there is zero positive evidence that they did it over any kind of racial interest. They hadn't threatened the victim before over race, and there was no evidence that at the time the perps made any reference to race.

Sorry, not true. The kid and his girlfriend both said that they had been harrassed by these punks in the weeks before the attack because of the kid's racial background.


In fact, the only way race CAN be brought into this is by insinuating that what OTHER people in the community had said should necessarily be imputed to these individual perps.

By your analogy then the Hate Crimes Bill is a toothless and meaningless piece of paper, unless the perp is a straight, white guy. Minorities are emotionally incapable of commiting hate crimes......


Using your analogy, this means that the attitudes of the Klan should be imputed to you because you, like them, are white and middle-class. Oh yeah, you're also showing that you're actually aware of racial tensions. So the next time you commit a crime or infraction that has anything to do with someone of a different race you should be assumed to have acted out of racial bias, because you share characteristics with others who ARE blatant racists.
Even if you want to assume racial reasoning behind this (and I would agree that it's at least an arguable suspicion) we're talking about what these people are being charged with. Why (and indeed HOW) can they be charged with something for which there is zero actual evidence, other than purely circumstantial (not sufficient for PROOF of guilt)? That would be a waste of a prosecutor's time and muddy any actual trial.

Except that I haven't attacked anyone recently, except maybe verbally. The only "characteristics" I share with a member of the Klan is the color of my skin and even then my neck isn't as red.

Also did you notice that although witnesses stated that there were a dozon or so punks that attacked this kid, the cops only found three? And the "one" who did the aggravated assualt with the concrete was 13? That means that if he's found guilty, he'll still be out from Juvenile Detention in a couple of years.
Face facts, if that had been a couple of white kids ganging up on a black kid, they'd be staring at 20 years in at least medium security prison.

My niece (who knows more about these attitudes that you ever will as she's married an African-American) has told me that her son (who along with his sister, share their father's coloring) has had no problems with living with a white girl and having a kid with her, either from the whites or the blacks that they know. His sister, on the other hand, has had to put up with a lot of harrassment because she is living with a white guy from the neighborhood blacks - both men and women. But according to you, these people aren't being racist because they're incapable of it.
Wake up.......