Texas Civil Rights Review

Category: Uncategorized

  • Ramsey Muniz: El Diez y Seis de Septiembre in the 21st Century

    Dear Friends:

    The enclosed writings of Diez y Seis de Septiembre
    from my beloved husband, Ramsey, are dedicated to the
    youth. You are welcome to share his message in
    Diez y Seis de Septiembre celebrations.

    Irma Muniz

    ************

    By Ramsey Muniz

    It is with great pride and love that I share the
    following message from this mode of darkness, which
    imprisons my body to this day, though my soul continues
    to be in an interior realm of spiritual freedom.

    Everywhere from the roots of Mexico throughout
    the entire Southwest within the United States of
    America, Hispanics, Latinos, Chicanos, and Mexicanos
    – whatever we decide to call ourselves – will be
    celebrating one of our most profound historical days
    of liberation. All the way from the mountains of
    Mexico we will hear in our hearts “El Grito” which
    symbolizes the struggle of a people against enslavement,
    oppression, injustice, and death sentences through
    imprisonment.

    Mexicanos throughout will celebrate
    this day like never before. For that reason it is
    important for those who seek the enlightenment of
    historical freedom to make sure that history is
    recorded once again in the hearts and minds of the
    masses. Does history repeat itself, or are its
    repetitions only penance for those who are incapable
    of listening to it? No history in the world is mute.

    No matter how much they change it, destroy it, break
    it, and lie about it, human history refuses to be
    silent. Despite deafness and ignorance, the time that
    WAS continues to tick inside the time that IS. Now
    more than ever we must insist on it and act on it so
    as not to repeat the past of oppression and injustice,
    but to keep it from being repeated. The memories of
    El Dies y Seis de Septiembre are in the air we breathe,
    and from the air of liberation it breathes us.

    During this incarceration of fourteen (14) years
    I have many times been in solitary confinement where
    I found the true spiritual enlightenment of our ancient
    historical past regarding spiritual leaders and
    heroes who carried liberation in their hearts.

    With little light to read in a mode of darkness I
    embraced our Mexicano sacred, indigenous spirituality and
    was transformed by the humanistic passion I discovered about
    our past. Now I perceive it in my own Mexicano soul, with
    the destiny of sharing it with the entire world. From this
    cold darkness I was destined and given access to a great and
    profound secret. Now I know from the celebration of El Diez y Seis
    de Septiembre the suffering, sacrifice, sorrow, sadness,
    grief, and imprisonment of our ancient ancestors, our
    warriors and our heroes, and it has become my own.

    “For they had always known within themselves the
    length of their days. The moon, the year, and the day
    and the night, the breath of life were fulfilled and
    they passed. The blood was fulfilled and came to the
    place of its rest. As also it had come to its power and
    its dignity. During their time they had repeated the
    good prayers; they had sought the lucky days when the
    good stars watched over them. Then they kept vigil, when
    the good stars watched over them. Then all was good.”

    Chilam Balam of Chumayel

    Celebrations of this most glorious day in the history
    of our lives will be received with an embrace of
    spirituality, harmony, kindness, faith, courage, dignity,
    forgiveness, and love for all humanity on this earth,
    as we invite on behalf of our people. It was written in
    our ancient manuscripts and symbols that we would encounter
    oppression and injustices in the existence and essence of
    our history. Within the hearts and minds of destined brothers
    and sisters, however, we were to overcome and rise once again,
    benefiting not only our people but ALL of humanity.

    In the past, our entire ancient spiritual history was
    composed and cultivated by our youth. I share with you the
    spoken words of our last Mexicano Emperor, Cuauhtemoc.
    On August 13, 1521, he stated the following just before his
    death:

    “Now we mandate our children also not to forget to
    transmit to their children how it will be, how we will
    reunite, how we will rise again, how we will reach out,
    and how we will fulfill the great destiny of our race.”

    From within this imprisonment of my life I dedicate
    this Diez y Seis de Septiembre to our youth. Our freedom,
    the Rising of the Sixth Sun, and the termination of
    oppression and injustices against humanity will one day
    end with the acceptance of our youth as our leaders today,
    tomorrow, and in our next world. From the chains
    and shackles that bear their marks on my body I ask youth
    organizations in the barrios, community centers, and high
    schools to prepare themselves culturally, spiritually,
    with a hunger for intelligence. I have constant dreams of
    young Hispanic/Latino/Chicano/Mexicano
    brothers and sisters becoming the voice politically,
    socially, economically of nuestra gente.

    MEChA chapters and other organizations throughout universities
    and colleges must now step forward and accept their destinies.
    History is on our side and gradually the prophecies are
    fulfilled by those who were chosen and destined from the
    beginning.

    I share spoken words from one of Mexico’s greatest
    heroes of freedom and humanity. At times I feel that his
    presence within this confinement, for he was incarcerated
    not only in the prisons of Mexico, but in the end of his
    most glorious powerful spiritual life he died at the
    Leavenworth United States Penitentiary. In his writing
    he once stated, “My dream of beauty and my beloved visions
    of a humanity living in peace, love and liberty will
    not die with me. While there is on earth a painful heart
    or an eye full of tears, my dreams and my visions will
    live” (Ricardo Flores Magon; March 16, 1922).

    Almost eighty years later here I am, Ramiro Ricardo
    Muniz, also confined but sharing with the entire world
    that his dreams and visions were fulfilled as mine, will
    be with our youth — our young Hispanics,
    Latinos, Chicanos, and Mexicanos will one day embrace the
    same dreams and visions for the life of freedom and justice
    in his world and in our future.

    Constantly the visions and
    the message of our youth embracing, accepting and finally
    becoming a part of our reawakening of our spiritual consciousness.
    In our ancient writings it is called Mexicayotl. On September 16,
    our heroes, those who took destiny into their hearts were also
    recreating power of Mexicayotl. Celebrate this most profound day
    of our history and know that on the 16th I will personally be in
    meditation, seeking our ancient spirituality so that love for humanity
    becomes a part of the lives of our youth.

    In exile,
    Ramsey – Tezcatlipoca

    “We want only to show you something
    we have seen and tell you something
    we have heard .. that here and there
    in the world and now and then in ourselves
    is a new spiritual Mexicano creation.”

    Ramsey Muniz

    ****************

    www.freeramsey.com

  • Albanian Refugee Set for Deportation Trial August 2008

    For the information of you who are interested in the efforts of the US government to deliver Rrustem Neza, who identified the killers of Azem Hajdari, into the hands of those killers, here is an update.

    Congressman Louie Gomert has promised to introduce a private bill in the Congress to stop the deportation.

    The judge in whose court the government filed suit for permission to drug Rrustem has set a pretrial deadline of August 2008, and will set the trial for a date after motions for summary judgment have been submitted. I expect the government will be filing its motion for summary judgment any day now.

    John Wheat Gibson
    Dallas

  • Laptop Lab for Palestinian Students

    Email from Riad Elsolh Hamad–gm

    Dear Friends,

    Palestine Children’s Welfare Fund is pleased to announce that Bir Zeit University in Ramallah, Palestine received 10 laptops and the peripheries for a wireless network.

    The university dedicated the Physics Laboratory where the computers are to Palestine Children’s Welfare Fund as you see in the link below.

    We extend our deep gratitude and appreciation to our generous donors, buyers of arts and crafts through our website and to our volunteers who work very hard to sell the arts and crafts at events around the United States.

    We could not have done this without them and without their dedication to the well being and safety of the children in Palestine . PCWF intends to extend this program to other colleges and universities in Palestine and to provide young men and women with the opportunity to continue their education and to work towards a free Palestine with peace and justice.

    Please consider making a donation towards our effort to support Bir Zeit University and other academic institutions in Palestine or by forwarding this message to your family, friends and colleagues and asking them to do the same.

    Also, you can help by buying Palestinian arts and crafts through our website and one hundred percent of the proceeds will go towards job creation in Palestine and to support our projects in Palestine.

    Looking forward to hearing from you and thanks again for your generosity, work and support for the children of Palestine.

    Salamat
    Riad Elsolh Hamad
    Coordinator

    www.flickr.com/photos/8914880@N05/

    Palestine Children’s Welfare Fund. 201 W. Stassney # 201, Austin, Texas 78745 Support the children of Palestine by buying Palestinian arts and crafts. Sustain the Palestinian economy and provide jobs for the men, women and farmers in Palestine to live with pride and dignity TILL WE RETURN.

    www.pcwf.org

    www.marhabafrompalestine.com

    The Uni*n of Arab News Agencies awarded its prize for the best photograph of 2007 to the Syrian News Agency (SANA) for a picture of a seven year old girl busy studying while sitting on a sidewalk in Damascus as she was selling candies.

    Challenge

    The young photographer Wasim Kheir Beik 27 was able to take the photo only after many trials because the girl refused to be photographed and covered her face with her small hands every time he tried to snap a picture. Wasim said that he was able to photograph her with a zoom lens at 30 meters when he was accidentally at her usual place to sit while working and studying.

    As for the message that he wanted to relay though the photo, Kheir Beik said, “I want to prove that a human being by will and toil can defeat poverty and deprivation.”

    The Uni*n called the photo “Education and Work”

    Wasim called it: “Challenge.”

    Translated by Adib S. Kawar with some idiomatic modification by Joachim Martillo. Forwarded by thorsprovoni@aol.com–gm

  • Prosecutorial Misconduct: Justice as Red Meat

    By Nick Braune
    Special to the Texas Civil Rights Review

    Back in mid-July, I wrote a column on a poor Oklahoman, Curtis McCarty, who was released from 20 years of incarceration (mostly on death row) because a crime lab supervisor, forensic expert Joyce Gilchrist, was too eager to help prosecutors. She slam- dunked evidence against McCarty. She originally wrote in her notes that his hair samples did not match evidence found at the crime scene; after McCarty was charged with murder, she changed those original notes and insisted it was a “match.” Although she eagerly wanted to nail bad guys and be on the good guys’ team, she finally was fired in disgrace in 2001.

    Prosecutors, I pointed out, were said to love having Gilchrist testify: she had some showmanship and style that swayed jurors. The prosecutors called her “Magic.” In my column I mentioned that the prosecutors who kept calling on her to work her magic had to be blamed too, but I did not have any specifics to base it on.

    I recently found an excellent quote on this, however, when I was recently combing the Innocence Project (I.P.) web site. (I.P. is a group of legal experts, with supporting chapters in 30 law schools, who have shown over 12 years that over 200 convictions were false, using the newest DNA technology. Curtis McCarty was in touch with them from prison.) On I.P.’s site, I found the following paragraph linking Gilchrist and the prosecutor, confirming my view that she alone was not the problem.

    “By itself, Gilchrist’s misconduct would have derailed justice, but it practically guaranteed a wrongful conviction when paired with the outrageous conduct of District Attorney Robert Macy, who exaggerated the evidence against McCarty and misled the jury. Over two decades, Gilchrist and Macy together sent hundreds of people to prison and two dozen, including McCarty, to death row. Macy has said publicly that executing an innocent person is a risk worth taking. It’s a risk that he and Gilchrist took when their misconduct sent McCarty to death row, but DNA testing in 2002 and 2007 proved McCarty did not commit the crime.” (Website: The Innocence Project in Print; Summer/Fall, 2007)

    (In my mid-July column I reported a study by the Chicago Tribune a few years ago that analyzed 381 cases of prosecutor misconduct ranging back to 1964, where the misconduct was serious enough to overturn a conviction, but not one prosecutor was convicted of a crime. And some moved up the ladder to be top district attorneys or judges. And to my knowledge, neither Prosecutor Macy nor forensic expert Gilchrist have been given jail time for what they did to McCarty.)

    Keeping in mind how lab problems and prosecutor problems were connected in the unethical Oklahoma City situation, let’s shift to Texas. Now, this summer the results came in from a two-year study of Houston’s crime lab. (This is very important because Houston’s Harris County is the only county in America to have sent more people to death row than Oklahoma County, where Gilchrist and Macy operated.)

    In Houston, the Chronicle (June, 17, 2007) ran an article speaking of “troubling” cases: “Investigations in the four and a half years since the HPD’s crime lab woes first arose have highlighted…years of incompetence and uncovered hundreds of unidentified cases with potential problems.” HPD’s DNA lab was closed after 2003 because of allegations of flaws in the data collected, misinterpretations of data, evidence being improperly stored, etc. Later a [two-year] study was commissioned and its results are in: about 600 cases handled by the HPD “deserve further scrutiny.” Houston’s forensic lab has a muddied name now.

    Here is an interesting case mentioned in the Chronicle…note that the muddied lab isn’t too far from a mud-splattered prosecutor. Listen to what the prosecutor will tell Ronald Cantrell who was in custody. Cantrell was accused of a shocking sexual assault on an eight-year-old girl. With an “indecency” incident on his previous record, he was terrified when the prosecutor told him that the HPD crime lab had matched his DNA to the crime scene and that he had better confess to avoid a massive sentence.

    Cantrell confessed, plea bargaining down to six years in prison. But during the recent investigations of the lab, a private lab redoing the tests did not get the same results; there were no conclusive lab results about Cantrell one way or the other. The prosecutor was mistaken, or was lying. Some foolish people might say it doesn’t matter if Cantrell was confused about how much evidence the government had against him…he did confess to the crime and we nailed the perpetrator. But it matters if we think rights matter. And what if this Cantrell story is part of a pattern? Then it is either a pattern of lab and prosecutor mistakes or a criminal modus operandi on the part of prosecutors.

    The Chronicle had another story in the same article, but notice the same pattern in this case: A man is arrested and told there is conclusive forensic evidence against him; the man confesses and is given a lighter sentence; later, the evidence was found not to be so conclusive. But by that time the man had confessed. Leroy Lewis, an 18-year-old high school student in 1991, accused of slaying a bank teller, was told by the prosecutor that a HPD analyst reported that forensic evidence linked Lewis to the crime scene. “Facing a capital murder charge and a possible death sentence, the young man pleaded guilty,” said the Chronicle. A decade later retests show no forensic evidence connection. (Well, he confessed, so he probably did it; so what does it matter?)

    I.P., which has overturned 29 convictions in Texas in 12 years through DNA, knows this reveals only the tip of the iceberg, because physical evidence that can be subjected to DNA testing only exists in 5 or 10% of all cases. Nationally, there have been “decades of overzealous prosecution and forensic science negligence and misconduct,” according to I.P.’s newsletter, so more work needs to be done.

    A beginning: Thanks to I.P., Texas now has a Forensic Science Commission to investigate state labs, and the legislature this last session gave it some funds to work with. This is good; but we will also need now some legislative action checking the power of “red meat” prosecutors. They do not check themselves and the judiciary doesn’t seem to do it.

    If readers are eager to find out more about overzealous prosecutors, there is an excellent story in the current (September, 2007) Texas Monthly about Dallas, which had the same prosecutor (of the “red meat” variety) from the 1950’s, where blacks did not have a chance at all in Dallas, all the way to 1986, where things had improved somewhat. The name of the article is “Craig’s List,” and it tells the story of a new prosecutor, Craig Watkins, who is black and is trying to undo some of the decades-long prosecutorial misconduct, like keeping blacks of juries and treating defense lawyers as enemies.

    Craig Watkins is not perfect — he still supports the death penalty, for instance — but he is moving in a good direction on some matters. He is now allowing the I.P to review hundreds of Dallas county cases dating back to 1970. Dallas has had 13 exonerations from DNA, and I suspect there will be many more people found to be wrongfully incarcerated in Dallas because of “overzealous” prosecutors and the various technicians propitiating them.

    Note: This is an expanded version of an article first appearing tin the Mid-Valley Town Crier.

  • Hutto Archive: 8-year-old Girl Held Without Mother

    Houston Chronicle
    AP Texas News

    Nov. 15, 2007, 5:17PM
    Immigrant child separated from mom at family detention center

    By ANABELLE GARAY Associated Press Writer
    © 2007 The Associated Press

    DALLAS — An 8-year-old girl was separated from her pregnant mother and left behind for four days at a detention center established to hold immigrant families together while they await outcomes to their cases.

    U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials say they had to transfer the Honduran woman because she twice resisted attempts to deport her and was potentially disruptive. ICE spokesman Carl Rusnok said guards and ICE staff watched over the child after her mother was removed from the T. Don Hutto Family Residential Facility, a former Central Texas prison where non-criminal immigrant families are held while their cases are processed.

    But others are critical of the agency’s handling of the case, saying it put the girl at risk and is yet another example of why the controversial facility should be closed.

    “Here, it’s the government itself that has the custody of this child and then leaves her without proper supervision,” said Denise Gilman, who oversees the Immigration Clinic at the University of Texas School of Law, which provides legal services to Hutto detainees. “We certainly don’t want to see it happen again.”

    The 28-year-old mother and child lost a bid for asylum and are back in Honduras. But Immigration Clinic attorneys plan to file a complaint with the federal government.

    “There is something to complain about, because we’re talking about a child’s welfare,” said Michelle Brane, director of the detention and asylum program at the Women’s Commission for Refugee Women and Children. “This is a perfect example of why family detention just doesn’t work.”

    Since opening last year near Taylor, the Hutto facility has been exempt from state child-care licensing requirements. ICE officials told the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services that parents would be at the facility with their children and would be responsible for their care, so state regulation wasn’t needed.

    But if the state’s child care licensing division receives a complaint indicating child care is being provided, it could investigate, said Patrick Crimmins, a spokesman for the Department of Family and Protective Services.

    ICE officials have previously said detaining families at the facility is meant to help “children remain with parents, their best caregivers” while they are processed for deportation.

    But Irma Banegas of Fort Worth said that’s not what happened in the case of her sister and niece. She asked that they not be identified by name due to concerns for their safety in Central America.

    Banegas said the mother and daughter told her they cried inconsolably after they were awakened and separated.

    “They’ve never been apart,” Banegas said of her sister and her niece.

    Banegas said the pair fled Honduras earlier this year to escape an abusive relationship and growing gang violence in that country, including attacks that scarred her sister.

    The girl and her mother had traveled from El Balsamo, Honduras to Mexico and then crossed by boat into South Texas, where they were apprehended in August.

    The two were sent to Hutto, where they were held for about two months. They were waiting for a decision on their bid for asylum, which they eventually lost.

    The agency attempted to deport the woman twice in October, but she wouldn’t comply. ICE officials didn’t reveal specifics about her efforts to resist deportation.

    But as a result, Rusnok said, she was considered a high risk for disruptive behavior and moved to a South Texas detention center in Pearsall on Oct. 18.

    “Such family separations at Hutto are extremely rare. ICE personnel took extraordinary care to minimize family disruption and separation time, while at the same time ensuring the good order of the family residential center,” Rusnok said in a statement.

    Advocates agree that detainees who endanger themselves or others should be removed, but decry the lack of guidelines for transferring or punishing troublemakers.

    “What that standard is, I think, is a gray area,” Brane said. “This is part of our concern with there not being any standards.”

    During the separation, the girl continued her regular routine at Hutto and “felt comfortable and safe” at the facility, according to ICE.

    Lawsuits filed earlier this year accused Hutto’s uniformed, handcuff-toting correctional officers called “counselors” of threatening to separate misbehaving children from their families. A settlement reached in August bans the practice and called for improving conditions at Hutto.

    Those concerns have been rekindled as word of the most recent case spread through the facility, advocates say.

    “That kind of fear it strikes to the heart of all other children,” Gilman said.

    SEE ALSO

    Breastfeeding mom separated from baby in illegal immigration case

    Friday, November 09, 2007
    Robert L. Smith
    Plain Dealer Reporter

    When federal agents encountered Sayda Umanzor in a house in Conneaut two weeks ago, the 27-year-old woman admitted to being in America illegally, “without papers.”

    She also pointed to her 9-month-old daughter, Brittany, whom she had been breastfeeding when agents rapped on the door.

    The baby wailed as mom and dad were led away. And she cried incessantly over the next several days as she went without breast milk while mom was in jail, sick with worry.

    Nursing Mothers and Asylum Seekers — Both Groups Need Alternatives To Detention!

    Cite as “AILA InfoNet Doc. No. 07111462
    (posted Nov. 14, 2007)”

    WASHINGTON, DC – In a welcome guidance memorandum this week, ICE Assistant Secretary Julie Myers highlighted the importance of ICE agents exercising discretion when making arrest and custody decisions for undocumented immigrants who are nursing mothers. The guidance arose after a case was brought to ICE’s attention in which a nursing mother was separated from her 6-month-old nursing baby and two young children, and imprisoned for more than 2 weeks before finally being released with an electronic monitoring device affixed to her ankle. The nursing mother was not even the object of ICE agents’ action, but was accidentally discovered by them in a home they came to search in pursuit of another undocumented person.

    The Myers memo also reinforces and references a previous agency guidance memo regarding prosecutorial discretion that states that “officers are not only authorized by law but expected to exercise discretion in a judicious manner at all stages of the enforcement process-to promote the efficient and effective enforcement of the immigration laws and the interests of justice.” (DOJ/INS Memorandum, November 17, 2000.)

    We applaud ICE and Ms. Myers for attempting to restore a modicum of reason and discretion to a system that seems bent on “enforcement at all costs” without the accompanying changes in the law that are necessary to make enforcement effective.

    At the same time, we must question and object to another new policy memo, released Monday, that turns away from the sort of professional and reasonable approach contained in Ms. Myers November 7th memo.

    The Monday memorandum turns away from the existing policy that favors release from detention for arriving asylum seekers who are determined to have a “credible fear” of persecution, who have established their identity and community ties, and who are deemed not to be a flight risk. The current policy makes eminent sense, applied as it is to individuals who are among the most traumatized of arriving immigrants-those fleeing persecution which often includes arrest, imprisonment and even torture-who are seeking safety and the preservation of their very lives by appealing to our government for protection.

    The new policy will
    r
    equire these traumatized individuals to jump through yet a new set of hoops, and to fit into one of five very narrowly defined groups, in order to be released from detention. The new policy will severely limit the exercise of discretion and will prevent most credible asylum applicants from being released from detention while their claims are being considered. This turns the standard that should be applied upside down, is punitive, and serves no rational interest.

    We urge ICE to reexamine its two recent memos, and to apply the thoughtfulness embodied in the policy guidance regarding nursing mothers to another deserving group-those seeking asylum in the United States.

    The American Immigration Lawyers Association is the national association of immigration lawyers established to promote justice, advocate for fair and reasonable immigration law and policy, advance the quality of immigration and nationality law and practice, and enhance the professional development of its members.