A delegation of the human-rights arm of the Organization of American States received an earful Monday from alleged victims of police abuse in Miami-Dade County, during the first leg of a fact-finding mission into racial discrimination and police violence in the U.S.
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The testimony came during a two-hour community meeting coordinated by the Community Justice Project at the St. Thomas University School of Law.
Miami, FL, September 21, 2015 – Today, Miami will be the first stop in a tour of five U.S. cities for a delegation of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) of the Organization of American States charged with investigating into the issues of police violence and racial discrimination in the U.S. Commissioner Rose Marie Belle-Antoine, President of the IACHR and Rapporteur on Racial Discrimination/Rights of Afro-descendants, will be leading the delegation.
A small but vocal group of protesters marched through Miami late Friday afternoon, chanting “black lives matter” and saying they were upset about alleged police brutality.
They said they were particularly upset about a recent incident in which cell phone video was posted on social media earlier this month that showed a man who appeared to have been punched by a Miami Police officer after he was handcuffed and placed in to the back of a police car.
Lawyers and activists from across the country are convening in Harlem from Friday for a conference aimed at strengthening the legal strategy of the Black Lives Matter movement.
Three women — Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tometi — founded the Black Lives Matter project in 2013 following the acquittal of George Zimmerman, who shot and killed Trayvon Martin, an unarmed black teenager, in 2012. The movement began as a online campaign to raise awareness and organize responses to what it said was racial profiling and police brutality but soon grew into an influential coalition of activists, rallying around the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter. Now with Black Lives Matter chapters popping up across the nation, advocates are seeking to “build a stronger, more cohesive legal arm” of the young but growing movement.
“One of the aims is to unify efforts across the country. Usually, there’s a last minute scramble to formulate a response and identify lawyers immediately after a tragedy,” Carl Williams, a conference organizer and racial justice attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts, told Al Jazeera.
NNPA Washington
Jazelle Hunt
August 4, 2015
WASHINGTON (NNPA) — The United Nations Human Rights Committee has given the U.S. a series of failing grades on human rights, including failing to meet international human rights standards on gun violence; the uneven implementation of controversial Stand Your Ground laws; violating personal privacy; and doing a poor job of caring for victims of gun violence.
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“The human rights community also pays attention to disparate effects of these laws,” said Meena Jagannath, who testified in Geneva and is the co-founder of the Florida-based Community Justice Project, Inc.
“In our reports, we tried to highlight that there are strong interest groups that have been behind the proliferation of these laws. We’ve also strongly emphasized that SYG laws disproportionately impact Black and Brown communities because of inherent racism in the U.S. justice system, and because they allow for people to use deadly force based on their subjective fears.”
In the coming days thousands of Haitians and Dominicans of Haitian Descent could be stateless! As the horrific moment in our history continues to unfold much of the international community has remained completely silent on the inhumane treatments of Blacks in the Dominican Republic. It is time that we stand with our sisters and brothers to DEMAND that the Dominican Government STOP THE MASS DEPORTATIONS! Tomorrow, we will join cities across the country, including, New York, Washington, DC, Chicago, Los Angeles and Boston for a National Day of Action to stop the deportations of Dominicans of Haitian descent and Haitian migrants.
Join us this Wednesday, July 1st at 10:30am. We will be hosting a press conference from Fanm Ayisyen Nan Miyami, Inc (FANM), Haitian Women of Miami’s, office at 181 NE 82nd Street #101. We will then descend to the Dominican Republic Consulate 1038 Brickell Avenue at 12pm to request a meeting with officials to present a resolution demanding that the Dominican government take action to protect the rights of Dominicans of Haitian descent and Haitian workers in the Dominican Republic.
Alana Greer and Meena Jagannath Win Coveted Echoing Green Fellowship
Community Justice Project, Inc. provides legal support for the Movement in Florida and beyond
MIAMI – Global nonprofit Echoing Green today announced that Alana Greer and Meena Jagannath have been awarded a highly competitive and coveted Fellowship to help launch Community Justice Project, Inc., a racial justice and human rights organization providing legal support to grassroots organizations. The Black Male Achievement Fellowship will provide seed funding, mentoring and leadership opportunities as the project launches on July 1. The Harvard Public Service Venture Fund is also a founding investor in the organization.
It was a big week for the movement in S. Florida. From standing up to private prisons like Florida-based GEO group, to speaking out against structural racism in policing in Ft. Lauderdale, and rising up in solidarity with Baltimore, grassroots leaders like the Dream Defenders, FLIC, and Power U Center for Social Change are keeping justice in the public eye. Check out some news coverage of their work:
CJP Attorney Meena Jagannath at Harvard Law School Human Rights Program Panel, April 2015
CJP was proud to stand with the Broward Squad of the Dream Defenders on March 25, 2015 as they fought for justice for the family of Lavall Hall, who was killed by Miami Gardens Police.
Geneva- Human rights advocates from the U.S. met Friday in Geneva with the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders, to call for support for human rights advocates in the U.S. who face police harassment, arrest and other state violence for their efforts to stand up for their rights and the rights of others. The advocates were part of a U.S. Human Rights Network delegation in Geneva that is educating the UN Human Rights Council about rights violations in the U.S. in advance of its review of the U.S.’ human rights record in May. ....
“We are pleased that the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders is taking note of the harassment that people in the U.S. face, simply for standing up for human rights,” said Meena Jagannath, attorney with the Community Justice Project based in Miami, which works with the Dream Defenders and helped submit a report to the UN Committee Against Torture on behalf of the parents of Mike Brown and Ferguson-St. Louis groups last November. “We hope the global community can impress upon the U.S. government the importance of respecting the right to dissent.”
Three Miami public interest lawyers received a grant from a Harvard Law School fund to open the Community Justice Project, focused on working with South Florida community organizations on racial, poverty and human rights issues.
The Community Justice Project, already in the works, will officially open its doors July 1 at space leased in downtown Miami from Florida Legal Services. Its being launched by Alana Greer, Meena Jagannath and Charles Elsesser, all currently lawyers at Florida Legal Services.
Two recent Harvard Law School graduates, Shannon Erwin ’10 and Alana Greer ’11, have been selected as recipients of grants from the Public Service Venture Fund, a unique program that awards up to $1 million each year to help graduating Harvard Law students and recent graduates obtain their ideal jobs in public service.
Shockingly, for South Florida, the United Nations included in its report a scathing indictment of a police killing that occurred in Miami barely a year ago. Included in its concluding observations, the Committee on Torture wrote that it was “appalled at the number of reported deaths after the use of electrical discharge weapons, including the recent cases of Israel ‘Reefa’ Hernández Llach in Miami Beach.” Electrical discharge weapons are commonly known as tasers.
Miami attorney Meena Jagannath brought Hernandez’ case to Geneva last month to give testimony in front of the United Nation’s Committee on Torture on behalf of Hernandez’ family and Dream Defenders. Jagannath testified along with activists from Ferguson, Missouri and Chicago.
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“Clearly, we have a problem in communities across America that must be addressed with urgency and deliberate purpose,” said Miami attorney Marlon Hill, in an emailed response. “It’s time for institutions to change,” said Alana Greer who works with Jagannath in Miami’s Community Justice Project. “We’re asking for accountability.”
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (FMCC) will start making payments that could total hundreds of millions of dollars annually into a fund for affordable housing.
Melvin L. Watt, who oversees the companies as director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, instructed them today to start setting aside a portion of their revenue for the National Affordable Housing Trust Fund, the only source of U.S. housing money earmarked for the lowest-income families.
The fund has been empty since Congress created it in 2008 because Watt’s predecessors said the financial condition of Fannie Mae (FNMA) and Freddie Mac prevented them from making payments.
For the third day in a row, hundreds of people took to the streets of South Florida to decry police violence — shutting down major thoroughfares, blocking traffic and chanting slogans including “No Justice No Peace” and “Hands up Don’t Shoot.”
As part of the Shut it Down rallies popping up across the nation, the peaceful protest — which swelled from 70 to over 300 - began at the corner of Northwest Second Avenue and 25th Street and weaved its way through Wynwood and Midtown Miami as art lovers flocked to the area for the final day of Art Week Miami.
