On December 10, 2007, Anita Cochran of the United States Department of Justice was headed toward Fort Wayne, Indiana. Cochran was to meet with the Fort Wayne-Allen County NAACP #3049 and various community leaders. Cochran was scheduled to address community leaders about a racial note that was found at Heritage Junior-Senior High School. The note found at Heritage contained threatening words aimed at African-Americans students wrote AAIW:
On November 12, 2007 two students at Heritage Junior-Senior High School allegedly found notes in their lockers, with the following message: “Hunting deer or/hunting niggers/we’re getting drunk/and pulling triggers/ Welcome to Monroeville. The poorly scribbled hate note included a directive: “to move them north” and “2 bars 13 stars fuck you niggers the south is ours!”
Update: 7:45 p.m. 5 dead.
During her travel by plane to offer her service to assist the community with the racial tension, Cochran received word of a similar racial note found at an Illinois University. Unlike Heritage Junior-Senior High School in Fort Wayne, the University was shut down for a day. According to Reuters on December 10, 2007:
CHICAGO (Reuters) - Northern Illinois University was closed on Monday after the school received an anonymous threat, including a racial slur, that referenced the Virginia Tech shootings in April, according to a university statement.
NIU said in a statement on its Web site that the threat was scrawled on a restroom wall in a residence hall. The note warned that "things will change most hastily" in the final days of the current semester.
The DeKalb, Illinois, university on Sunday notified students, faculty and staff through postings on the school Web site, e-mail, voicemail, fliers and news media
The note found scrawled on the bathroom wall on December 8, 2007, according to MSNBC "The black ink on the stall read, "Tell those n------ to go home," and "ME/OUT … Die Sem Burr 10th … Hmz Sdn Cr," which officials reportedly believed was a reference to Dec. 10 and "Holmes Student Center."
But a day of closing was not enough to prevent the threat. According to MSNBC
Northern Illinois University was shut down for a day in December after graffiti were scrawled on a restroom wall warning of a shooting on campus. A spokesman said the warning, which was discovered Dec. 10, made reference to massacre of 33 people last year at Virginia Tech University, but he said it could not be immediately determined whether the threat was related to Thursday’s shootings
However, the Virginia Tech University shooting bordered on students bullying rather than the growing incidents of racial intolerance that are occuring on Universities and schools. The note’s message of domestic terrorism was viewed as a direct threat to harm African-American students. Especially with the increasing sighting of hanging nooses, violence from numerous students’ rage shooting occurring on school campuses, safety was the immediate concerns for all students at Heritage, according to AAIW
The shooting was the fourth at a U.S. school within a week.
School administration attempts at silencing racial conflicts create silent killing fields. According to Comcast.net It was as if the gunman knew who he wanted to shoot in a situation that would appear chaotic to others really was a planned execution by the gunman.
Update: CNN reports four other dead and killer kills himself.
Watch video interview.
Numbers to call:
Northern Illinois University has set up the following numbers for relatives of NIU students to call for information:
— 815-753 1573
— 815-753-6143
— 815-753-1574
— 815-753-1575
— 815-753-9564
Update: 6 dead
No comments:
Post a Comment