Friday, January 26, 2007

Guilford Is A Street In Rockford

It is also a Quaker founded college in Greensboro, N.C.

GREENSBORO, N.C. (WGHP) -- Three college students were assaulted on the campus of Guilford College early Saturday morning, according to court documents and the school's Web site.

The Greensboro News & Record reported Tuesday that Faris Khadar, Osama Sabbah and Omar Awartani were the victims of an attack by three others.

According to the newspaper, Khadar and Sabbah are students at Guilford College. Artwani is a student at N.C. State who was visiting friends.

Three football players from Guilford College -- Michael Bates, Michael Six and Christopher Barnette -- were arrested and charged with ethnic intimidation. Bates and Six were charged with three counts of assault and battery each, and Barnett was charged with two counts of assault and battery, according to the News & Record.

Bates is from Reidsville, Six from Greensboro and Barnette from Semora.
Naturally they have the boy's pictures featured at the top of the front page of the story.

Today two more boys were arrested in the case.
From today's News & Record

GREENSBORO — An additional two Guilford College football players were arrested Thursday in connection with a recent attack against three Palestinian students outside a campus dormitory.

The arrests came the same day college officials announced that five people tied to the incident have been charged with violating the school's student code of conduct. And in the morning, students staged a walkout in solidarity with the injured Palestinians.

Police identified the latest people arrested as Jonathan Blake Underwood, of Clinton, S.C.; and Jazz Alfray Favors, of Alpharetta, Ga. Both were released on $5,000 bond.

Their arrests bring to five the number of students arrested in the incident police are treating as racially motivated.

Warrants for Underwood and Favors were issued Sunday but not served until Thursday. The reason for the delay wasn't clear.

Underwood is charged with three counts of ethnic intimidation, two counts of assault and one count of communicating threats. Favors is charged with two counts of assault and two counts of ethnic intimidation.

The charges weren't requested by Greensboro police but instead stem from statements the injured Palestinians made to a magistrate, who issued the warrants. Police said their investigation is ongoing.
Interesting. Police didn't prefer charges.

Here is a press release from the police thinly disgiused as a newspaper report:
The Greensboro Police Department today issued an updated statement regarding the Guilford College case:

As stated in the previous press release, this case was referred to our Metropolitan Criminal Investigation Division and has been assigned to a detective for follow-up. Two interviews have been scheduled with the alleged victims in this case, and the victims have rescheduled on both occasions. As of this time, they have not spoken with us. We have followed up with Guilford College security and have spoken with them about the information they obtained regarding this incident.

On yesterday, warrants were issued on two additional subjects accused of assault. These warrants were not issued as a result of our investigation.

With an assault investigation, we begin by speaking with the alleged victim or victims in the case. At this point, we have not been afforded this opportunity. We will continue to make efforts to interview the alleged victims in this case and anyone who has information that will lead us to the correct version of events. The Greensboro Police Department will conduct a fair and impartial investigation into this matter. We will issue an updated press release as new information becomes available.
You know the police appear a bit sceptical on this one.

Here is a statement from the family of of a football player.

It is very apparent that the media and many uninformed individuals have unfairly prejudged Michael Bates, Michael Six, and Christopher Barnette of the beating of three Guilford College students during an unfortunate altercation involving several students last Friday night. Since media coverage has been so one sided the Bates, Six, and Barnette families issue this statement to allow for more balanced reporting of this event.

None of these accused young men have yet to be interviewed by any college official. The Greensboro Police Department has refused to take their statements and declined to review physical evidence including pictures of a vicious stabbing and belt whipping that was inflicted by Khader (an alleged victim) upon Michael Six during the altercation.

We also believe that a letter emailed on Sunday, by a college official, to all students of color greatly inflamed emotions needlessly. Here is the first paragraph from that letter from the Guilford College Director of Multicultural Education:

"By now, most of you have heard about the situation that occurred on Friday night between some football players and Faris Khader, Osama Sabbah, and Omar Awartini (a student from N.C. State). Faris, Osama, and Omar were defending themselves against students (and possibly perspective students) that were attacking them physically and simultaneously verbally with phrases like "sandnigga," "terrorist," etc. The incident was a hate crime."

We are deeply saddened by the inaccurate portrayal of these young men in this altercation by their school. When all of the FACTS are revealed, we believe that those who are sensationalizing this story will be rightly embarrassed and hope the retractions will receive the same level of visibility as premature and false charges. Under our system of government, our sons are presumed innocent of these charges and we hope that the community and the media will let the system run its course in determining their innocence or guilt.

The Bates, Six, and Barnette families would like to thank those in the communities, who know the true characters of these young men, for their continued support throughout this ordeal.
Isn't that interesting. It appears that the Palestinians may have attacked and then blamed their victims for responding. Where have I heard that story before?

In fact, according to this anonymous reportthat is exactly what happened.
gcstudentathlete, Jan 24, 2007 11:30 PM

As a Guilford College student athlete I have been appalled by the reaction to this incident by not only the student body but also the media. Most of the students that are so intent on screaming hate crime are extremely uninformed about the actual occurance of events that night. No, I did not witness the fight the fight but I withhold judging or condemning the parties of either side until all accounts are fully investigated. It seems that even the news has not refrained from prematurally passing judgement. All of the articles and stories I have viewed on the television have been biased and from the most part over victimizing one party why already passing the other off as guilty. From the eyewitness accounts I have heard it was Osama who struck first, taking off his belt and hitting one of the football player. Osama himself has admitted this Also there were no brass knuckles involved in the fight, these so called brass knuckles were actually a watch. I am not saying that it is ok to beat anyone, I hate violence just much as anyone, but you also have to realize that mistakes were made on both sides. I know both of the parties that were involved. Faris and Osama are good guys, I like them a lot, and no doubt they did not deserve this, but as much as I like them they sometimes tend to look for fights. I also know one of the football players who has been arrested, and he is a good guy. He does not deserve to be slandered all across the news when he has not yet been convicted of anything. So get your story straight, stop being one sided, and stop trying to use this unfortunate event as an excuse to get all riled up and protest a hate crime that didn't occur. Further the student body needs to discontinue their DISCRIMINATION against the athletes of this campus. We are your classmates, and your equals. We get no special treatment, we work hard at our classes, our sports, and our held accountable for all our mistakes just like you. So any divide that has been created on this campus has not been created by me or by any of my teammates. So the question I pose to you is who is hating who right now?
It will be interesting to see if the police get to the bottom of this. So far the accusers don't seem to be very interested in coming forward.

I wonder if the football guys have good lawyers?

This page has a picture of Michael Six's injury alleged to have come from the fight.

Cross Posted at Classical Values

4 comments:

linearthinker said...

Ahhh! Testosterone among the magnolias...

I hope the facts come forth before any more media firestorm blows this into another Duke rape case.

Grief (and other?) counseling has begun. We are concerned about your safety and your mental, spiritual and emotional health. If you feel unsafe, need to talk, or anything else, please do not hesitate to contact us. In addition, we will have a gathering to discuss how this is affecting you/us/people of color Monday, January 21, 2007 (tomorrow) at 9pm in the International House. This meeting is ONLY for students of color. This affects us in a different way than our white allies
and we only need to have a safe place to discuss how we are feeling.
...
Thanks and I see you on tomorrow.

Sincerely,

Sekinah Hamlin
Director of Multicultural Education


Sekinah has bad grammar. What's with the Multicultural Education Director excluding whites from her grief counseling session? We have feelings too, Sekinah. Sounds like reverse discrimination to coordinate witness statements to me.

Karridine said...

Good correlation reporting!

I cannot overemphasize my enthusiastic suggestion for all who seek rational insight into the recent roots of this phenomenon, CHECK OUT Internet Archives: Divide and Conquer

It documents, in living black & white, Hitler's highly effective policy of lying, whining, claiming victimhood while attacking, and other methods for intimidating, cowing and brutalizing into silence all who had the courage to notice his vile tactics!

Watch it NOW! "Divide & Conquer"

(and LinearThinker, there is NO SUCH THING as 'reverse discrimination', as if racial bias only flows one way, FROM whites TOWARD non-whites...
Respectfully, I submit that RACIAL BIAS or DISCRIMINATION is a spiritual disease that knows no bounds, afflicts humans of all colors and races, and is to be confronted wherever it raises its ugly head! Like in the behaviour of the Director of Multicultural Education, whatever THAT is!)

linearthinker said...

Karridine said:

...there is NO SUCH THING as 'reverse discrimination', as if racial bias only flows one way, FROM whites TOWARD non-whites...

At the risk of inciting a semantic pissing contest, I offer:

Reverse Discrimination
A term referring to the practice of excluding a classification or race of people who have not been historically discriminated against, usually whites, from positions that are made available exclusively to persons or groups that have traditionally been the subject of discrimination, or who otherwise benefit from affirmative action programs.


Whites excluded from a "meeting ONLY for students of color" by the Director of Multicultural Education doesn't fit the definition offered? Or maybe you like to make up your own definitions as you go along?

Karridine continues:

I submit that RACIAL BIAS or DISCRIMINATION is a spiritual disease that knows no bounds, afflicts humans of all colors and races, and is to be confronted wherever it raises its ugly head!

I will argue that racial bias and discrimination are normal human traits, and to deny or stigmatize these traits by characterizing them as a spiritual disease is less than I would have expected from a Karridine comment.

Whom the gods would destroy, they first tempt to eliminate racial bias and discrimination.

That such bias and discrimination can lead to excesses is true. I would prefer a society that seeks to protect the individual's rights, liberty, and safety to a society that attempts to dictate how I should think.

Anonymous said...

Simon! Great catch! I remember an AP blurb about this on Yahoo the other day. Certainly wasn't any doubt about the guilty party in that article.

Duke Redux?