MILWAUKEE (AP) — A white Milwaukee police officer who was fired after he fatally shot a mentally ill black man in April won’t face criminal charges, the county’s top prosecutor said Monday. Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm said Christopher Manney won’t be charged because he shot Dontre Hamilton in self-defense. Manney is at least the third white police officer to not be charged in the past month after a confrontation that led to a black man’s death. “This was a tragic incident for the Hamilton family and for the community,” Chisholm said in a statement. “But, based on all the evidence and analysis presented in this report, I come to the conclusion that Officer Manney’s use of force…

MILWAUKEE (AP) — A white Milwaukee police officer who was fired after he fatally shot a mentally ill black man in April won’t face criminal charges, the county’s top prosecutor said Monday.

Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm said Christopher Manney won’t be charged because he shot Dontre Hamilton in self-defense. Manney is at least the third white police officer to not be charged in the past month after a confrontation that led to a black man’s death. “This was a tragic incident for the Hamilton family and for the community,” Chisholm said in a statement. “But, based on all the evidence and analysis presented in this report, I come to the conclusion that Officer Manney’s use of force in this incident was justified self-defense and that defense cannot be reasonably overcome to establish a basis to charge Officer Manney with a crime.”

The Hamilton family released a statement through their attorney saying they were “extremely disappointed” with the decision and that the case “cries out for justice, criminal charges against Christopher Manney, and accountability to Dontre Hamilton’s family.”

The family said it has asked the U.S. attorney in Milwaukee to seek a federal investigation.

Manney’s attorney did not immediately return a message seeking comment.

The executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin, Chris Ahmuty, issued a statement saying the decision not to charge Manney left “a cloud of uncertainty over the circumstances of and the responsibility for Mr. Hamilton’s death.”

Manney shot 31-year-old Hamilton on April 30 after responding to a call for a welfare check on a man sleeping in a downtown park. Manney said Hamilton resisted when he tried to frisk him. The two exchanged punches before Hamilton got a hold of Manney’s baton and hit him on the neck with it, the former officer has said. Manney then opened fire, hitting Hamilton 14 times.

Several witnesses told police they saw Hamilton holding Manney’s baton “in an aggressive posture” before Manney shot him, according to Chisholm’s news release.

Chisholm consulted with two experts on the use of force by police officers, and both concluded Manney’s conduct was justified. Emanuel Kapelsohn of the Peregrine Corporation concluded that all the shots were discharged in 3 or 4 seconds and there was no evidence that Manney continued firing after Hamilton hit the ground.

Police have no video of the event.

Manney also suffered minor injuries, including a bite to his right thumb, a neck strain and neck contusion, the report said. He treated for post-concussion syndromes, a mild traumatic brain injury and had physical therapy for bicep and rotator cuff injuries, the report said.

Hamilton’s family said he suffered from schizophrenia and had recently stopped taking his medication.

Police Chief Edward Flynn fired Manney in October. He said at the time that Manney correctly identified Hamilton as mentally ill, but ignored department policy and treated him as a criminal by frisking him.

The Milwaukee Police Association condemned Manney’s firing as a political move, and members voted no confidence in Flynn soon after the firing. Manney has appealed his dismissal.

Hamilton’s death preceded the killings of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and Eric Garner in New York City, but the case hasn’t attracted as much attention. Hamilton’s family has led mainly peaceful protests, trying to raise awareness about mental illness. Other protesters said his death underlined race concerns.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker has said he will call up the National Guard if there is any violent reaction to the prosecutor’s decision. Police arrested 74 protesters Friday who blocked rush hour traffic on Interstate 43.

___

Associated Press writers Scott Bauer in Madison, Wisconsin, and Carrie Antlfinger in Milwaukee contributed to this report.

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Former Milwaukee Officer Won’t Face Criminal Charges In Fatal Shooting Of Black Man

WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General Eric Holder is directing Justice Department officials to expedite death benefits to the families of two New York police officers who were fatally shot inside their patrol car. A Justice Department official said Monday that Holder wants to ensure that the benefits are paid quickly and that the paperwork process begins as soon as possible. The official spoke on condition of anonymity since Holder’s directive had not yet been announced. The two officers, Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu, were ambushed inside their patrol car Saturday and shot to death. The suspected gunman ran into the subway station and committed suicide…

WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General Eric Holder is directing Justice Department officials to expedite death benefits to the families of two New York police officers who were fatally shot inside their patrol car.

A Justice Department official said Monday that Holder wants to ensure that the benefits are paid quickly and that the paperwork process begins as soon as possible. The official spoke on condition of anonymity since Holder’s directive had not yet been announced.

The two officers, Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu, were ambushed inside their patrol car Saturday and shot to death. The suspected gunman ran into the subway station and committed suicide.

The benefits are administered by the Justice Department’s Office of Justice Programs and are paid to first responders who die in the line of duty.

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Department Of Justice Seeks Benefits For Families Of Slain Officers

If anyone’s deserving of an epic home makeover, it’s these kids. Homeless children staying at Bushwick Family Residences in New York were treated to a brand new playroom equipped with a flat screen television, treehouse, couches, comfy pillows and fresh splashes of paint on every wall. The Today Show and the Bright Horizons Foundation for Children teamed up to bring the renovation to life, and the kids’ reactions were caught on camera during the morning program’s live broadcast Dec. 18. Courtesy: TODAY Show New York City is in the midst of a youth homelessness crisis, as rates have spiked 63 percent in the last five years, a report by the Institute for Children, Poverty & Homelessness found in October. Most of the …

If anyone’s deserving of an epic home makeover, it’s these kids.

Homeless children staying at Bushwick Family Residences in New York were treated to a brand new playroom equipped with a flat screen television, treehouse, couches, comfy pillows and fresh splashes of paint on every wall. The Today Show and the Bright Horizons Foundation for Children teamed up to bring the renovation to life, and the kids’ reactions were caught on camera during the morning program’s live broadcast Dec. 18.

Courtesy: TODAY Show

New York City is in the midst of a youth homelessness crisis, as rates have spiked 63 percent in the last five years, a report by the Institute for Children, Poverty & Homelessness found in October. Most of the increase was felt in Queens and Brooklyn, where Bushwick Family Residences is located.

“A child should have a safe, clean place to eat, to study, and to play,” Today Show host Willie Geist, who ran the segment, wrote on a Crowdrise page dedicated to raising funds for the playroom and similar projects by the foundation. “I want to help one shelter go above and beyond to give kids a real sense of ‘home’ for as long as they need to be there.”

As of Saturday evening, Geist’s page had garnered over $21,000.

Watch the segment below:

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To support Willie Geist’s fundraiser for the Bushwick Family Residence, visit the page on Crowdrise.

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Watch The Moment These New York Homeless Kids See Their Brand New Playroom

Americans gathered across the country this year to make their voices heard on issues ranging from the minimum wage to police brutality, gay marriage and abortion rights. Take a look at some of the most powerful images from protests around the nation in 2014.

Americans gathered across the country this year to make their voices heard on issues ranging from the minimum wage to police brutality, gay marriage and abortion rights.

Take a look at some of the most powerful images from protests around the nation in 2014.

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Powerful Images Show Americans Exercising Their Right To Assemble In 2014

Fatu Kekula didn’t have a hazmat suit or physician’s expertise. She did, however, have trash bags, some nursing training and the determination to save lives amid the Ebola outbreak. And she succeeded. Now, with the support of one American university and a growing pool of inspired supporters, the 22-year-old Liberian woman is set to finish her nursing education in the U.S., possibly free-of-charge with the help of donors. Over a two-week period in August, Kekula personally cared for all of her immediate family members — her 52-year-old father, 57-year-old mother and 28-year-old sister — when they contracted Ebola. She used rubber boots, gloves and a mask (along with the trash bags) for protection, as CNN …

Fatu Kekula didn’t have a hazmat suit or physician’s expertise. She did, however, have trash bags, some nursing training and the determination to save lives amid the Ebola outbreak.

And she succeeded.

Now, with the support of one American university and a growing pool of inspired supporters, the 22-year-old Liberian woman is set to finish her nursing education in the U.S., possibly free-of-charge with the help of donors.

Over a two-week period in August, Kekula personally cared for all of her immediate family members — her 52-year-old father, 57-year-old mother and 28-year-old sister — when they contracted Ebola. She used rubber boots, gloves and a mask (along with the trash bags) for protection, as CNN reported. They all survived.

Although Kekula’s 14-year-old cousin died of the disease in her care, Kekula’s efforts produced a 25 percent mortality rate — significantly lower than the 70 percent overall average founded by the World Health Organization.

UNICEF Spokeswoman Sarah Crowe told CNN that Kekula’s tireless work saving her family was remarkable.

“Doctors called and told me to leave them right alone and not go anywhere near them,” Kekula told the Los Angeles Times. “I couldn’t. They’re my only family.”

An IAmProjects fundraising page has been set-up to help Kekula, who has over three years of nursing training from Liberia’ Cuttington University, finish her education in the field. As of Friday afternoon, more than $19,500 has been raised of the $40,000 goal for tuition at Emory University in Atlanta — where she plans on starting classes in January — as well as living and travel expenses.

The epidemic resulted in Liberia having to close schools, which prevented Kekula’s from finishing her education there.

“I’m very, very proud,” Kekula’s father, who was the first in the family to become infected in July, told CNN. Having gone to the hospital for a blood pressure-related issue, his assigned hospital bed had been used previously by a late Ebola patient. “She saved my life through the almighty God.”

Although Liberia is one the hardest-hit nations by Ebola with 3,290 deaths resulting from the virus, progress has been made. United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon visited the West African nation on Friday and voiced praises for Liberia’s efforts halting the virus, as Voice of America reported.

See how you can help Kekula here.

Support UNICEF’s efforts to combat Ebola through the fundraising widget below.

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Woman Who Saved Family From Ebola Will Attend Nursing School In U.S. (How To Help)

So-called Toxic Twitter is made up of marginalized women of color for whom social media started out as yelling into the void and became a grassroots movement. We are Toxic Twitter. The unnamed women frothing at the mouth in our underground internet lair who emerge only during the full moon of each news cycle to drink the blood of your favorite white feminists. Whenever you hear the refrain “Twitter is going to get you!” from the mouths of everyone from Oprah to CNN pundits, we are who they are referring to. We are bad for your career. We are bad for brands. We say good things, but watch out or

So-called Toxic Twitter is made up of marginalized women of color for whom social media started out as yelling into the void and became a grassroots movement.

We are Toxic Twitter. The unnamed women frothing at the mouth in our underground internet lair who emerge only during the full moon of each news cycle to drink the blood of your favorite white feminists. Whenever you hear the refrain “Twitter is going to get you!” from the mouths of everyone from Oprah to CNN pundits, we are who they are referring to. We are bad for your career. We are bad for brands. We say good things, but watch out or we’ll swallow you whole.

Original article: 

Why These Tweets Are Called My Back

STEUBENVILLE, Ohio (AP) — A volunteer football coach whose Ohio house was the scene of a party that preceded the rape of a girl by two high school football players faces nearly six months in jail after pleading guilty to violating his probation. Matt Belardine admitted leaving the state without permission and going to a bar, consuming alcohol, and being arrested on a charge of disorderly conduct in Arizona, said Dan Tierney, a spokesman for Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine. Belardine was arrested last month in Arizona at a protest over the grand jury decision in the Ferguson, Missouri, police …

STEUBENVILLE, Ohio (AP) — A volunteer football coach whose Ohio house was the scene of a party that preceded the rape of a girl by two high school football players faces nearly six months in jail after pleading guilty to violating his probation.

Matt Belardine admitted leaving the state without permission and going to a bar, consuming alcohol, and being arrested on a charge of disorderly conduct in Arizona, said Dan Tierney, a spokesman for Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine.

Belardine was arrested last month in Arizona at a protest over the grand jury decision in the Ferguson, Missouri, police shooting, according to media reports. Scottsdale authorities said Belardine was fighting with protesters.

Belardine “did not conduct himself as a ‘responsible law abiding citizen’ while in Scottsdale, Arizona,” contrary to conditions of his probation, according to a filing in Jefferson County court this month by the attorney general’s office.

Belardine was one of six people charged last year by a grand jury investigating whether other laws were broken in the case of the 16-year-old West Virginia girl who was raped after an alcohol-fueled house party in August 2012.

In that case, Belardine pleaded no contest in April to one count of making a false statement and one count of enabling underage drinking.

Special Judge Patricia Ann Cosgrove suspended a six-month sentence, ordering Belardine to serve 10 days in jail, one year of supervision and 40 hours of community service. She also fined him $1,000.

For violating probation, prosecutors want Belardine to serve the remainder of the six months, minus time already served, Tierney said.

A message was left for Belardine’s attorney.

The judge will continue hearing evidence Monday before sentencing Belardine. He was being held without bond.

Two football players were found delinquent in the rape case; one was sentenced to two years; the other was released after a one-year sentence and rejoined the football team this fall.

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Steubenville-Connected Football Coach To Be Sentenced In Protest Probation Violation

In times of struggle many seasoned leaders remind the parties involved of the Chinese symbol for the word “crisis.” This symbol combines two words: danger and opportunity. The aftermath of the Ferguson situation presents both a dangerous reescalation of racial tension in America and an opportunity. This opportunity consists of changing the conversation about community in America, an issue larger in scope than black youth, police tactics, and race relations. It’s an opportunity to define how we choose to live our lives in community. *** The author Peter Block, in his masterful book Community: The Structure Of Belonging, writes about two different types communities. The first one is the stuck community. The overriding characteristic of…

In times of struggle many seasoned leaders remind the parties involved of the Chinese symbol for the word “crisis.” This symbol combines two words: danger and opportunity. The aftermath of the Ferguson situation presents both a dangerous reescalation of racial tension in America and an opportunity.

This opportunity consists of changing the conversation about community in America, an issue larger in scope than black youth, police tactics, and race relations. It’s an opportunity to define how we choose to live our lives in community.

The author Peter Block, in his masterful book Community: The Structure Of Belonging, writes about two different types communities. The first one is the stuck community.

The overriding characteristic of the stuck community is the decision to broadcast all the reasons we have to be afraid. This is a kind of advertising that exploits the fear we have of violence, of the urban core, of terrorism, of African-Americans and other ethnic groups, of immigrants, of those who are poor or undereducated, of other religions, and of other countries.

Block goes on to say, “When there is a human tragedy, most of the energy goes into finding who was to blame. There is a retributive search for responsibility and a corresponding defense from the players claiming their innocence.”

It sounds as though this piece was written about Ferguson, though the book came out in 2009. We live in a stuck community, and I’m concerned that flash points, such as Ferguson, have the potential impact of deepening our stuckness.

Most of the news stories I’ve see about Ferguson market and sell fear, and many of the community reactions to the events focus on blame and retribution. This deeply concerns me because blame doesn’t heal and revenge doesn’t satisfy.

This isn’t at all to discount accountability. When death occurs all parties involved must open themselves to review and scrutiny. And then we must move forward, and how we move forward makes all the difference.

The other kind of community that Block describes is the restorative community. This is the community that focuses on what it can accomplish.

Block writes:

Restoration is created by the kinds of conversations we initiate with each other. These conversations are the leverage point for an alternative future. The core question that underlies each conversation is “What can we create together?” Shifting the context from retribution to restoration will occur through language that moves in the following directions: from problems to possibility; from fear and fault to gifts, generosity, and abundance; from law and oversight to social fabric and chosen accountability; from corporation and systems to associational life; and from leaders to citizens.

The Ferguson situation contains an abundance of mystery and ambiguity as to what literally happened. People can assign blame in a dozen different directions, to individuals, groups, organizations, systems, and entire nations. And what do we have after all that blame and finger-pointing? Festering wounds that, if we’re lucky, scab over until the next problem arises.

We citizens have the power to change the conversation. We have the choice to focus on possibility. We have the ability to unstick ourselves.

It won’t be easy. We’ve been conditioned by the government, media, and even our own base instincts to point fingers when we’re upset. “If it bleeds, it leads,” is a media axiom that stands squarely in the way of what’s possible.

Yet nothing that’s worth having is easy to get.

In order to do this we must step into a more comprehensive view of our society. We must accept that we all have faults and we all have gifts. We must believe that everyone can strive to be better and everyone is a human being deserving respect. We must see that the systems we live in are broken and flawed and these same systems work in most cases. We must acknowledge that being a police office is an incredibly difficult job that combines danger, sensitivity, and split-second decision making and being a police officer is about engaging a community as much as it is enforcing its laws. And finally, we must embrace the reality that different racial groups in this country have unique challenges and responsibilities; we’re not all the exact same.
We get better by facing the totality of our community, not just the parts that fit neatly into our own individual narrative. We improve when we decide to heal our individual wounds, which may come from our individual circumstances or from broad social forces. We make a positive difference when we choose to open ourselves to disconfirming data and challenge ourselves to question our deeply held assumptions.

We can choose to win an argument or make a better world.

What could Ferguson, Missouri look like in two years? What’s its possibility? We often flock to cities devastated by natural disasters in order to clean up, rebuild, and restore. Sometimes we even make these cities better than they were before the disaster. Why don’t we do the same in Ferguson? We can.

If not in Ferguson, then do it in your community.

I challenge you to do one of four things in the next seven days:

1. Go to Ferguson, Missouri, not to protest but to restore. Engage with the citizenry, meet the politicians, or just be a positive presence.
2. Talk to your local politicians about what a restorative community would look like where you live. Call your city council members or other civic leaders. Challenge them to consider what’s possible.
3. Talk to someone whom you believe has an opposing opinion to yours about what happened in Ferguson. Suspend your assumptions. Ask questions. Show curiosity.
4. Use social media to share your hopes about what good can from from these difficult events. Use the hashtag #FergusonForward.

As flawed as America may be, it has a better track record of engaging its population than most other spots on Earth. America was initially conceived as a nation defined by civic engagement on a scale never before seen, and since it has slowly (sometimes painfully) expanded the groups that get to participate.

We must keep the movement going. We are a good country that can be better. It will be hard.

We’ve all seen in the last week how events in Ferguson can create danger in our society. I challenge you to identify, and assert, how events in Ferguson also create opportunity.

This post was originally featured on the Good Men Project.

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Fallout From Ferguson: The Biggest Opportunity For Our Society

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie disagrees with President Obama’s decision to normalize relations with Cuba and wants the president to demand the immediate return of a convicted cop killer from the country “before any further consideration of restoration of diplomatic relations with the Cuban government.” In a letter sent to the White House Friday and made public by his office Sunday, Christie pressed for the return of Joanne Chesimard, who was convicted of killing a New Jersey state trooper in 1973 during a gunbattle after being stopped on the New Jersey Turnpike. Chesimard was found guilty but escaped from prison and eventually fled …

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie disagrees with President Obama’s decision to normalize relations with Cuba and wants the president to demand the immediate return of a convicted cop killer from the country “before any further consideration of restoration of diplomatic relations with the Cuban government.”

In a letter sent to the White House Friday and made public by his office Sunday, Christie pressed for the return of Joanne Chesimard, who was convicted of killing a New Jersey state trooper in 1973 during a gunbattle after being stopped on the New Jersey Turnpike. Chesimard was found guilty but escaped from prison and eventually fled to Cuba, where she was granted asylum by Fidel Castro. She is now living as Assata Shakur and is the first woman placed on the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorist List.

Christie said Cuba’s decision to grant Chesimard asylum “is an affront to every resident of our state, our country, and in particular, the men and women of the New Jersey State Police, who have tirelessly tried to bring this killer back to justice.”

Bernadette Meehan, a spokeswoman for the White House’s National Security Council, said it will “continue to press in our engagement with the Cuban government for the return of U.S. fugitives in Cuba to pursue justice for the victims of their crimes.”

Christie expressed “profound disagreement” with the president’s decision, but he said the moment marked an opportunity for Cuba to prove it’s serious about change.

“I do not share your view that restoring diplomatic relations without a clear commitment from the Cuban government of the steps they will take to reverse decades of human rights violations will result in a better and more just Cuba for its people,” Christie wrote. “However, despite my profound disagreement with this decision, I believe there is an opportunity for Cuba and its government to show the American people it is serious about change.”

Christie has generally been reluctant to weigh in on contentious foreign policy issues as he mulls a run for president in 2016.

Other potential Republican candidates, most notably Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, have been publicly disputing one another’s opposing stances.

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Chris Christie Wants Obama To Demand That Cuba Return Cop Killer To U.S.