Police Spying on Black Activists

CoIntelPro activities continue in the 21st century under the current Washington and local government administrations. See a letter below from a human rights advocate complaining about CoIntelPro-like activities that are still happening in Memphis, Tennessee, where Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated and my mentally, physically disabled brother, Larry Neal, was kidnapped and murdered in Shelby County Jail. The report that Memphis Black Autonomy Federation attached to the letter is at the first url among seven(7) below in this article.

Hello,

The Memphis Black Autonomy Federation (MBAF) has prepared a special written report, attached, containing detailed information about the Memphis Police Department's spying and other illegal activities to co-opt, disrupt and destroy our group's First Amendment right to write about and speak out, organize and protest against police brutality.

The illegal activities of Memphis cops against the MBAF violate a 1978 federal court order that prohibits the local police from ever interfering with the First Amendment rights of Memphis residents. Is it any wonder, then, that a police force that willfully violates a 35-year-old court order has killed at least 23 people since February, 2012?

Peace and love,
JoNina Ervin, Acting Co-Coordinator
Memphis Black Autonomy Federation

“COINTELPRO (an acronym for Counter Intelligence Program) was/is a series of covert, and often illegal, projects conducted by the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) aimed at surveilling, infiltrating, discrediting, and disrupting domestic political organizations. COINTELPRO tactics included discrediting targets through psychological warfare, planting false reports in the media, smearing through forged letters, harassment, wrongful imprisonment, extralegal violence and assassination. Covert operations under COINTELPRO took place between 1956 and 1971; however, the FBI has used covert operations against targeted individuals and domestic political groups since its inception. The FBI's stated motivation at the time was ‘protecting national security, preventing violence, and maintaining the existing social and political order.’” (Wikipedia and other sources.)

 The "social order" that CoIntelPro protected was/is dominance by white elitists with a Nazist manifesto. Dr.Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, and many people who protested the Viet Nam War or systemic racism were targeted by COINTELPRO, especially members of the Black Panther Party. Most of COINTELPRO's budget went to suppressing African Americans' quest for civil and human rights. One of the FBI program's main goals was to "prevent the rise of a black Messiah," but whites and Jews were also punished and some died for protesting racism and war. Consider the Kent State massacre on May 4, 1970.

CoIntelPro supposedly lost its budget and ended after the Church Committee Hearings in 1972. However, the Patriot Act was passed by President George Bush in 2001. On May 26, 2011, President Barack Obama signed the PATRIOT Sunsets Extension Act of 2011, a four-year extension of three key provisions in the USA PATRIOT Act: roving wiretaps, searches of business records (the "library records provision"), and conducting surveillance of "lone wolves"—individuals suspected of terrorist-related activities not linked to terrorist groups. (Wikipedia)

Thanks to revelations by whistleblower Edward Snowden and others, we know that surveillance is not really limited to "individuals suspected of terrorist-related activities." Literally everyone in America and many foreign nations, and even the United Nations, are surveilled by the National Security Agency (NSA). All emails, telephone calls, and online activities are recorded by NSA, which operates out of the War Department budget. Furthermore, the controversial NDAA law gives NSA war powers to conduct a cyberwar against the communication of targeted individuals, groups, and companies. The cyberwar can be (and is) initiated against individuals and groups that are not engaged in any terrorist-related activities, but they threaten to "disrupt the social order," which still is world dominance by white elitists with a Nazist manifesto. 

Unprecedented surveillance against American citizens is not going forward without challenges in courts. Civil liberties groups like the ACLU say the mass telephone call-tracking program is “perhaps the largest surveillance operation ever carried out by a democratic government against its own citizens.” The group has filed suit against the NSA, and the hearing occurred Friday morning, November 22, in New York. On Monday, November 18, the Supreme Court declined an unusual request from the Electronic Privacy and Information Center asking the Supreme Court to hear a challenge to the NSA surveillance even before the issue could play out in the lower courts. Without comment, the Supreme Court refused the request.

Whereas the Government admits to conducting surveillance, the fact that there is a cyberwar being conducted against communication among certain individuals and groups is hardly mentioned by civil and human rights groups that bring court challenges. Censorship is the object of this cyberwar. Africans in America are the primary targets, just as they were the primary targets of the FBI's CoIntelPro program. As stated by the Memphis Black Autonomy Federation in the letter above, spying and other illegal activities are done to co-opt, disrupt and destroy First Amendment rights to write about and speak out, organize and protest against police brutality and mass incarceration. 

My computer and phones are monitored and controlled because writing, speaking, and protesting to support victimized mentally challenged Americans and condemned inmates are treated like terrorist activities in America. The prospect of all Americans, including blacks, having free and open communication terrifies wrongdoers. The cyberwar against such activism must be conducted sneakily, since discrimination against people based on their race, ethnicity, or health disability violates the U.S. Constitution and U.S. Code.

Local governments conduct surveillance, censorship and persecution against targets probably on orders from federal agencies, which will neither assist nor instruct local police departments and citizens police to desist from such gregarious violations against the constitutional rights of African Americans. The U.S. Government's "War on Black America" continues in this age of technology. Join Mary "Loves Justice" Neal for a Video Hangout at Google+ on December 11, when this writer will attempt to play videos that evidence the fact that First Amendment rights are denied to black people who use those rights to advocate for justice. 

Freedom of press and free speech are chief among other human rights denied to the Neal family as we ask how and why Larry Neal, a mentally, physically disabled man from Memphis, Tennessee, died under secret incarceration - a murder that was covered-up by the Shelby County Jail, Shelby County Government, the United States Department of Justice, and The (Johnnie) Cochran Firm. Wrongful deaths of black people by police are given the same response in 21st century America that a slave mistress gave a distraught, black mother who was sold separate from her children in the hit movie "12 Years a Slave." The slave mistress said, "Dry your eyes and don't take on so. You will forget all about them in a few days." The slave mistress thought of the black woman's children as lost pets. Elitist, white supremacists and their black Confederate soldiers still think that way today and insist on silence about police violence against black people and the mentally ill. Visit online my "Dog Justice for the Mentally Ill" blog.

See data at these seven(7) urls (if they let you):

Police Counterinsurgency Against the Memphis Black Autonomy Federation

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jD-vMM1pBwAZUEevq_Cp5BCP1vRgVBPMQWV9Utwr9Pc/edit?usp=sharing
Radio show: Counterinsurgency in Memphis, TN, with Bro. Lorenzo Ervin
http://blackautonomyfederationradio.blogspot.com/2013/11/the-iron-fist-and-velvet-glove.html

12 Years a Slave: A Case for Reparations
http://freespeakblog.blogspot.com/2013/11/12-years-slave-case-for-reparations.html

U.S. Government Racism Exposed Despite Censorship

http://justicegagged.blogspot.com/2013/11/us-government-racism-exposed-despite.html

Wrongful Death of Larry Neal
http://WrongfulDeathofLarryNeal.com
NSA Surveillance Challenge Lands in Federal Court

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2013/11/nsa-surveillance-challenge-lands-in-federal-court/

PATRIOT Sunset Extensions Act of 2011
http://www.opencongress.org/bill/s990-112/actions_votes

Repeat of Paragraph 1 (because CoIntelPro often codes my articles to begin after paragraphs 1 on cellphone view) CoIntelPro activities continue in the 21st century under the current Washington and local government administrations. See a letter below from a human rights advocate complaining about CoIntelPro-like activities that are still happening in Memphis, Tennessee, where Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated and my mentally, physically disabled brother, Larry Neal, was kidnapped and murdered in Shelby County Jail. The report that Memphis Black Autonomy Federation attached to the letter is at the first url among six(6) below in this article.

Retribution Against Co-chair of Memphis Black Autonomy Network for Planning Anti-Klan Rally in Memphis

Lorenzo Kom'boa Ervin

UPDATE from Bro. Ervin March 29, 2013:  New Assembly Point for Memphis Anti-Klan March 
Due to the police security zone, we will assemble at 12 noon [on March 30] in Court Center Square (between Madison and Jefferson) in downtown Memphis. Spread the word. Email organize.the.hood@gmail.com if more information is needed.

Governments use different techniques to censor activists. Memphis, Tennessee plans its KKK rally on March 30, 2013. The NAACP and Sons of Confederate Veterans agreed they would respond by ignoring the Klan. The Memphis Black Autonomy Federation and Ida B. Wells Coalition Against Racism and Police Brutality have a different response: They plan an anti-Klan protest and invited all people of conscience to rally against the Klan in Memphis on March 30. Obviously, the expectation was that everyone would follow the lead of the NAACP and Sons of Confederate Veterans. A fugitive summons was issued for Lorenzo Ervin, who co-chairs Memphis Black Autonomy Network. Memphis is the city where Larry Neal, my mentally, physically disabled brother, and Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. were murdered. Larry was secretly arrested (kidnapped) and murdered after 18 days of secret incarceration in 2003. Please see below a request for assistance from JoNina Ervin, chairperson of Memphis Black Autonomy Network, and help if you can. See also a March 3, 2013 press release after the initial article entitled "Black Autonomy Vice Chair Seeks To Overturn 2001 Conviction."

Greetings,

In an attempt to disrupt the anti-police brutality work in Memphis, Tenn., and the city's March 30 Anti-Klan protest, the Hamilton County Sheriff's department in Chattanooga, Tenn. (very likely working with other law enforcement agencies in Tennessee), has issued a fugitive summons for Lorenzo Ervin. Lorenzo is the vice chair of the Memphis Black Autonomy Federation, which has organized several protests against police brutality and put out the national call for the upcoming Anti-Klan protest in Memphis.

Background

The summons stems from court costs the county claims that Lorenzo owes in connection with a 12-year-old misdemeanor conviction. Damon McGee, Mikail Musa Muhammad (Ralph P. Mitchell), and Lorenzo were convicted in January, 2001, for disrupting a Chattanooga (Tenn.) City Council meeting in 1998 where they went to protest against police brutality. At the time, Chattanooga had the highest number of people killed by police in U.S. cities with populations under 200.000..

Damon has also received a “fugitive” summons. Mikail died in 2006. There is no statute of limitations in the U.S. on the collection of court fees and fines, and Damon and Lorenzo could be arrested at any time.

The Chattanooga 3, as they were called, were convicted for violating Tennessee's “Disrupting Meetings Law,” which makes it illegal for anyone by “physical action or verbal utterance” to interfere with a lawful meeting. The law should be declared unconstitutional because it violates the First Amendment rights of free speech and assembly.

At the May 19, 1998 city council meeting, the chairman of the council had agreed to allow Lorenzo to speak on behalf of the Coalition Against Police Brutality to present a proposal for community control of the police. More than 100 people packed the meeting to back the proposal. But when the time came, the city council president would not allow Lorenzo to speak. Police arrested him when he attempted to read the proposal from the speaker's podium. Damon and Mikail, who were at the podium with Lorenzo, were also arrested.

The Chattanooga 3 went on trial in a kangaroo courtroom. For one thing, the jury pool was tainted. One juror was a neighbor of the prosecutor. Worse, a married couple was on the same jury pool! The judge refused to allow defense attorneys to use the First Amendment in arguing their cases.

The conspiracy against the Chattanooga 3 became crystal clear after sheriff's deputies allowed a black man to bring a gun into the courtroom. The man, who said he was a supporter of Osama Bin Laden, claimed that Lorenzo told him to bring the gun to the courtroom. The defendants had to remove some of the jurors prior to jury deliberations because of this prejudicial orchestrated event.

The Chattanooga 3 had support from activists around the world, who sent hundreds of emails to the Hamilton County district attorney. This international support and the fact that two days prior to sentencing, supporters held a big rally in Chattanooga that was widely publicized in the ruling class media, forced the judge to give the three activists suspended sentences.

The Chattanooga 3 case was Lorenzo's second conviction for violating the disruption meetings law. In 1994, he and another activist were convicted for protesting against police brutality across the street from a memorial service for police held in Chattanooga in 1993. In this case, the Tennessee Supreme Court refused to hear Lorenzo's appeal.

What You Can Do To Help:

1. Contact Criminal Court Judge Rebecca Stern, who presided over the Chattanooga 3 trial. Email , call or fax her and demand that she withdraw the “fugitive” summonses issued for Lorenzo Ervin and Damon McGee. Send email using the URL below.
http://www.hamiltontn.gov/EmailForm.aspx
Call Stern at (423)209-7500 or send a fax to her at (423)209-7501.

2. Protest to Hamilton County Sheriff Jim Hammond, who enforces summonses at the direction of the courts.

http://www.hcsheriff.gov/feedback/feedback.php
Call the sheriff at ( (423)209-7000, or send a fax to (423)209-7001.

3. Write a letter to the Tennessee Board of Judicial Conduct (see link below), complaining about Judge Rebecca Stern's 12-year harassment of Lorenzo Ervin and Damon McGee in the Chattanooga 3 case.
http://www.tsc.state.tn.us/sites/default/files/docs/updated_judicial__complaint_form_ia_final_save_enabled_06282012.pdf

Peace and love,
JoNina Ervin
Acting Chair
Memphis Black Autonomy Federation
P.O. Box 16382
Memphis, Tennessee 38186-0382
email: organize.the.hood@gmail.com
(901)674-8430

Since slavery was "abolished" in the United States, the very criminal justice system has been used to keep Africans in America in our "place." Persons like Lorenzo Ervin who actively resist oppression are ordinarily subdued by misuse of that system. See Part 4 of a Press TV documentary embedded below that illustrates how mass incarceration is used to subdue millions of Africans in America and relegate the race to a permanent underclass: "FAÇADE of the American Dream," http://youtu.be/uSiLTmmFS7Q

Thank you for your attention, prayers, and practical support for Lorenzo Ervin. The struggle continues.

A biography for Lorenzo Ervin, former Black Panther Party member and internationally known freedom fighter is available in BuggStories blog
http://buggstories.wordpress.com/2012/07/10/3-anarchists-gold-book-lorenzo-komboa-ervin-chattanooga-1947/

Additional articles in the Memphis Klan rally series (a growing list):

Memphis Hosts KKK Rally March 30
http://freespeakblog.blogspot.com/2013/02/memphis-hosts-kkk-rally-march-2013.html

Memphis Anti-Klan Protest March 30 
http://justicegagged.blogspot.com/2013/02/memphis-anti-klan-protest-march-30-2013.html

Retribution Against Memphis Black Autonomy Network's Co-Chair, Lorenzo Ervin (this article)
http://justicegagged.blogspot.com/2013/02/retribution-co-chair-of-memphis-black.html

Black Genocide - Maafa21
http://freespeakblog.blogspot.com/2013/02/black-genocide-maafa21.html

MaryLovesJustice
Website: Wrongful death of Larry Neal.com
http://WrongfulDeathOfLarryNeal.com

UPDATE March 3, 2013

Black Autonomy Vice Chair Seeks To Overturn 2001 Conviction 

(Memphis, Tenn.) - Charging that Tennessee's “disrupting meetings” law violates the First Amendment rights of free speech and assembly, a veteran black anti-police brutality activist has asked the federal court in Memphis to overturn his 2001 misdemeanor conviction for breaking the law.

Lorenzo Ervin, vice chair of the Memphis Black Autonomy Federation, seeks a hearing in the U.S. District Court of Western Tennessee to challenge the law, which he says is “blatantly unconstitutional.”

Ervin, Damon McGee, and the late Mikail Musa Muhammad (Ralph P. Mitchell) were convicted in January, 2001, for disrupting a 1998 meeting of the Chattanooga City Council where they had gone to protest against police brutality. Last month, fugitive warrants were issued for Ervin and McGee for failure to pay the court fees and fines related to their trial 12 years ago.

There is no statute of limitations in the United States on the collection of court fees and fines, Ervin said, and he and McGee could be arrested at any time. The fugitive warrants have, in effect, reopened the case, allowing Ervin to request a hearing in federal court. His previous appeals in state court failed.

Ervin said he's been branded a fugitive to sabotage his current work as the coordinator of Black Autonomy Copwatch in Memphis, where he is organizing a March 15 protest and a March 16 conference against police brutality and an anti-Klan protest on March 30.