Washington Afro-American Newspaper June 28 2014

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Volume 122 No. 47

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June 28, 2014 - JULY 4, 2014

D.C. Woman Presses for Answers After Husband Mysteriously Dies in Jail

Freedom Summer 1964:

President Obama Acts to Ease Student Loan Debt Story on A6

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Remembering Fannie Lou Hamer – Part II

By Zenitha Prince Senior AFRO Correspondent

By Marsha Rose Joyner Special to the AFRO It seems that all of my life I have been infected with the participatory democracy bug. In segregated schools and being a daughter of the Afro-American Newspapers, I was taught the United States was my government and I had a right to participate in the direction and operation of political systems. So I did, and still do. Therefore, to protest Senator Douglass from Illinois over a project that had nothing to do with the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP), I drove from Highlands, Air Force Base, N.J. to the Democratic Convention on the boardwalk in Atlantic City. Being nearly nine

Officials are investigating the death of a 49-year-old man at Prince George’s County Jail in Upper Marlboro, Md., even as his wife is demanding answers. “I just want the truth of why my husband is dead,” Regina Shields, a Northeast Washington, D.C. resident, told NBC 4 Washington. Metro Transit Police said they got into an altercation with Samuel Shields over a $2 fare at Addison Road Metro station on June 17. They pepper sprayed him and took him into custody. According to the statement of charges against Shields, he Continued on A3

Fannie Lou Hamer being interviewed by an AFRO reporter in 1964. months pregnant, with a toddler in the stroller, my husband objected to my daring exploit, saying, “Do not even call me if you have this baby down there.” Armed with baby and protest signs, I was off. Not having a clue what to expect, and

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with the sudden realization that I would never locate the other Air Force Wives who were also driving from various parts of New Jersey loaded down with children and with protest signs, I arrived on the Boardwalk to immense crowds. I walked

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Linwood Barnhill, 48, a former officer with Washington D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) pleaded guilty June 20 to two counts of pandering (prostituting) of a minor and one count of possession of child pornography, law enforcement officials announced. The 24-year veteran, who was attached to the Seventh Police District resigned before the hearing, entered the guilty plea in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia before Judge Rosemary M. Collyer. Linwood Barnhill is a 24“Linwood Barnhill betrayed his duty to year veteran of the MPD. protect the community by trying to exploit teenage girls,” said U.S. Attorney Ronald C. Machen Jr., who announced the plea agreement along with Valerie Parlave,

Florida Reignites Voter Suppression By Zenitha Prince AFRO Senior Correspondent

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Continued on A4

Photo courtesy of NBC 4 Washington

D.C. Cop Pleads Guilty to Pimp Charges By Zenitha Prince Senior AFRO Correspondent

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Samuel Shields died while detained in the Prince George’s County Jail.

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Seventh in a series detailing states’ effort to keep citizens from voting. The root of modernday voter suppression is buried in Florida, and it grew and blossomed during the 2000 presidential elections. “Florida is the state where awareness of how serious flaws in elections administration could result in voters being disenfranchised developed,” said Marcia Johnson-Blanco, coordinator,

assistant director in charge of the FBI’s Washington Field Office and Cathy L. Lanier, MPD chief. “As a result of his deplorable conduct,” Machen continued, “he will now be headed to prison to join the criminals he spent his career locking up. We appreciate the tremendous work of the MPD detectives and FBI agents who worked so hard to bring Mr. Barnhill’s betrayal to light.” The AFRO previously reported that Barnhill was arrested on Dec. 3, 2013, when officers with the MPD’s Youth Investigations Division located a missing 16-year-old girl at his residence on the 3000 block of Stanton Road in Southeast Washington. According to court documents, the officer had picked up the teenager at the mall, and, similarly, recruited a 15-year-old and 17-year-old at bus stops, offering them modeling jobs. When the underage girls agreed, Barnhill took them to his apartment, where he cultivated them for prostitution, including taking clothed and unclothed photographs of them and, later, paying for new hairstyles and clothes. Barnhill admitted to charging customers $80 for sessions with the girls. He said he kept $20 of each charge. Continued on A4

Voting Rights Project, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. The critical role of 88 percent of the eligible Florida in deciding the voters removed were Africanpresidential contest American. between Republican candidate George W. registrations, deceased Bush and Democrat Al Gore, voters, and people believed and the narrow margin by to be ex-felons – the state is which the outcome was distinguished by its permanent decided shined a globalfelon disenfranchisement sized spotlight on the state, policy. However, thousands revealing several election of eligible voters’ names irregularities. Before the were scrubbed in the process, elections, state officials and 88 percent of the voters decided to purge the voter list of duplicate Continued on A4

Amendment Could Block D.C. Pot Decriminalization The Associated Press Advocates for local autonomy in the District of Columbia are vowing to fight any effort by Congress to undo the District’s recent liberalization of marijuana laws. Democratic Mayor Vincent Gray signed a bill in March that decriminalizes possession of small amounts of pot. The bill would become law in July if Congress doesn’t intervene. District advocates say Rep. Andy Harris, a Maryland Republican, plans to introduce an amendment to a spending bill on Wednesday that would block the nation’s capital from implementing the new marijuana law. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, a Democrat who represents the District in Congress, says Harris “is acting contrary to the laws of his own state,” which recently decriminalized marijuana. It’s one of 18 states that have some form of decriminalization.

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