TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Marchers Demand Boot Camp Justice

COLIN HACKLEY / The Tampa Tribune

The NAACP organized a march in Tallahassee in protest of the not guilty verdict handed down in the boot camp death of Martin Lee Anderson.

ADVERTISEMENT

By CATHERINE DOLINSKI, The Tampa Tribune

Published: October 24, 2007

Photos | Video | Special Report

TALLAHASSEE - The death of Martin Lee Anderson could have the same galvanizing effect across the country as the 1955 murder of Emmett Till, protesters said Tuesday on the steps of the capital city's federal courthouse.

About 700 people traveled from across the state to the downtown Tallahassee Civic Center for the Florida NAACP's protest of the not guilty verdicts that an all-white jury gave seven drill instructors and a nurse charged in the death of 14-year-old Martin Lee Anderson. The black teenager collapsed in January 2006 at a Bay County boot camp after instructors restrained and beat him, with a nurse looking on. He died at a Pensacola hospital.

Dark clouds drifted along the protest route Tuesday morning toward the U.S. Courthouse on North Adams Street, where speakers were ready with microphones. Singing 'We Shall Overcome,' the largely black crowd began winding its way at 11:15 a.m. between the Florida Supreme Court and Capitol toward their destination.

Signs and slogans on T-shirts raised the specter not only of Anderson, but of Till, a black 14-year-old killed in 1955 in Mississippi after whistling at a white woman. That case, in which an all-white jury acquitted two white men who later confessed, sparked protests and has often been cited as the cornerstone of the 1960s civil rights movement.

'Maybe what God is saying to us is, Martin Lee Anderson is our Emmett Till of 2007,' said the Rev. Bishop Victor Tyrone Curry of Miami, the keynote speaker, to strong applause. 'And it's going to take what happened to Martin Lee Anderson to galvanize this country.'

Michael Vick, the black Atlanta Falcons quarterback charged in an illegal dogfighting case, likewise arose in speeches by Curry and others. One group of protesters carried a banner reading, 'Kill a Dog, Go to Jail; Kill a Black Child, Go Free.'

'How easy it is for us to be convicted of something; how hard it is for us when we're the victims to have others convicted,' said Benjamin Crump, attorney for the Anderson family, who stood at the podium with parents Gina Jones and Robert Anderson.

Tuesday's crowd included dozens from the Tampa Bay area who had hopped on buses that morning.

'I'm hoping we can get some kind of closure with this whole incident, get some answers out of it and find out what's really going on in our justice system,' said Donald Bowens Sr. of St. Petersburg. 'These people were in a controlled environment, on video; we watched them do what they were doing. I was appalled by the situation. And nothing was done.'

As the protest geared up, National Association for the Advancement of Colored People representatives met at the courthouse with U.S. Attorney Gregory Miller and lawyers from the U.S. Department of Justice's civil rights division. Black leaders and student groups have demanded the Justice Department investigate possible civil rights violations in the case.

Anderson's death followed his restraint and beating by drill instructors. Prosecutors argued that sickle cell trait might have contributed to Anderson's death, but that the drill instructors' heavy-handed tactics caused him to suffocate.

Defense attorneys countered that physical exertion brought on by an aggressive exercise routine had aggravated Anderson's sickle cell condition to the point that death was likely, regardless of the instructors' actions. The instructors, the defense said, followed procedure and had no way of knowing of Anderson's sickle cell trait. The jury sided with the defense.

NAACP legal adviser Charles Hobbs said Tuesday that he was encouraged by the meeting with the federal attorneys, in which they outlined plans to request court transcripts and question witnesses.

Other Florida NAACP representatives, such as president Adora Obi Nweze, were less effusive. Nweze told the crowd she had walked out of the meeting after handing the lawyers a complaint about Miller's handling of a past civil rights case and inadequate attention paid to this one.

'Mr. Miller responded to these concerns by assuring representatives of the NAACP that his office and the Civil Rights Division are currently conducting a thorough and independent review of all of the evidence,' Justice Department spokesman Erik Ablin said in a statement. 'Should the U.S. Attorney's Office and the Civil Rights Division determine that there is sufficient evidence to establish a prosecutable violation of any federal criminal civil rights statutes, appropriate action will be taken.'

Ablin said the department could not comment further on an open investigation. A call to Miller's office was not returned.

The NAACP's orderly rally contrasted with the student protest that erupted in Tallahassee on Oct. 12 when the verdict was announced. Students from Florida A&M University, Tallahassee Community College and Florida State University took to the streets of downtown Tallahassee, flirting with possible arrest until local authorities persuaded them to stop blocking traffic.

FSU graduate student Cendino Teme, a member of the Student Coalition for Justice who attended Tuesday's rally, said he and other students had a promising meeting with federal attorneys Oct. 17. But the students intend to keep pressing their message and have not ruled out some form of civil disobedience.

'We don't plan on doing anything to harm anyone; we just want to make sure we are heard,' said Teme, declining to elaborate. 'We're definitely not ruling out a degree of unrest.'

Reporter Thomas W. Krause contributed to this report. Reporter Catherine Dolinski can be reached at (850) 222-8382 or cdolinski@tampatrib.com.

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT