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South Carolina

Taken: Police Departments Make Millions By Seizing Property

When a man barged into Isiah Kinloch’s apartment and broke a bottle over his head, the North Charleston resident called 911. After cops arrived on that day in 2015, they searched the injured man’s home and found an ounce of marijuana. So they took $1,800 in cash from his apartment and kept it. When Eamon Cools-Lartigue was driving on Interstate 85 in Spartanburg County, deputies stopped him for speeding. The Atlanta businessman wasn’t criminally charged in the April 2016 incident. Deputies discovered $29,000 in his car, though, and decided to take it.

Photos Show Aftermath Of Lethal South Carolina Prison Brawl That Left Seven Dead

Photos obtained by Prison Legal News appear to reveal the bloody aftermath of a riot that occurred at the Lee Correctional Institution in South Carolina around 7:15 p.m. on April 15. The violence, which culminated in the deaths of seven prisoners, was the deadliest event of its sort in the past quarter-century in the United States. A source who requested anonymity and said he is currently imprisoned at the Lee facility in Bishopville provided PLN with a series of photos that appear to have been taken with a cell phone. The images show dead or badly-wounded bodies covered with blood and a blood-soaked floor. PLN could not verify the photos at press time, and our investigation into the authenticity of the graphic pictures remains ongoing.

Utilities Kill Solar Bill Despite Majority Support In SC House

Under pressure from the state's major utilities, the S.C. House killed a solar bill Tuesday that was intended to protect thousands of jobs and save customers money on their monthly power bills. The bill's defeat, a stunning reversal from a House vote last week, brought withering criticism from many lawmakers, who said the House caved in to opposition by Duke Energy and SCE&G, derailing the legislation. Utilities have expressed concern about how competition from solar could affect them. State Rep. James Smith, the bill's chief sponsor, also blamed Republican Gov. Henry McMaster. Smith, a Democratic candidate for governor and potential opponent to McMaster in November's general election, said the Republican urged some lawmakers not to vote for the bill — a point McMaster's office hotly disputed.

Former Police Officer Sentenced To 20 Years In Prison For Death Of Walter Scott

By Marina Fang for The Huffington Post - Slager, then an officer in North Charleston, South Carolina, shot Scott while Scott was running away from him. A bystander captured the death on cell phone video. The killing was one of many high-profile cases of police killing unarmed black men in recent years. At Thursday’s sentencing hearing, Slager said that he takes responsibility for Scott’s death, and Scott’s mother, Judy, expressed forgiveness. In May, Slager pleaded guilty to violating Scott’s civil rights by using excessive force. Two other federal charges and a murder charge from the state were dropped in exchange for the guilty plea. “Law enforcement officers have the noble calling to serve and protect,” Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement Thursday. “Officers who violate anyone’s rights also violate their oaths of honor, and they tarnish the names of the vast majority of officers, who do incredible work. Those who enforce our laws must also abide by them — and this Department of Justice will hold accountable anyone who violates the civil rights of our fellow Americans. On behalf of the Department of Justice, I want to offer my condolences to the Scott family and loved ones.”

Disputed East Coast Pipeline Likely To Expand

By Sarah Rankin for Associated Press - RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — The developers of a disputed natural gas pipeline on the U.S. East Coast are considering a major expansion of the project into South Carolina, according to remarks made by an energy company executive and interviews with others in the industry. Opponents of the Atlantic Coast Pipeline said that raises questions about whether Dominion Energy, the project's lead developer, has withheld important information from the public and whether the pipeline is even needed as initially proposed. But business leaders say the pipeline would help lower energy costs and boost economic development in South Carolina. Dan Weekley, Dominion Energy's vice president and general manager of Southern pipeline operations, told attendees at a recent energy conference "everybody knows" the Atlantic Coast Pipeline — currently slated to pass through Virginia, West Virginia and North Carolina — is not going to stop there, despite what the current plans say. "We could bring in almost a billion cubic feet (28 million cubic meters) a day into South Carolina," Weekley said, according to an audio recording The Associated Press obtained from a conference attendee. The attendee requested anonymity out of concern for not wanting to harm business or personal relationships. The remarks appear to be the Richmond, Virginia-based company's most direct public signal to date that it intends to expand the pipeline, though industry analysts said the potential has been discussed for years.

The Nuclear Power Rip-Off Billions Lost More Bills Due

By Seanna Adcox for AP News - This week, having spent more than $10 billion, executives with South Carolina Electric & Gas and Santee Cooper acknowledged that all their assumptions were wrong. Worse still: Consumers may have to pay billions more on the rusting remains of two partially-built reactors at the V.C. Summer Nuclear Station north of Columbia. “When we started, there was talk of a nuclear renaissance restarting a whole industry in the U.S.,” said Santee Cooper’s chief financial officer, Jeff Armfield. He was among several executives recommending the project be abandoned. The board of the state-owned utility unanimously agreed at a public meeting Monday. “When we started, there was talk of a nuclear renaissance restarting a whole industry in the U.S.,” said Santee Cooper’s chief financial officer, Jeff Armfield. Most of the 18 nuclear projects pending before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission a decade ago have been aborted or suspended indefinitely. None of the 7 projects the NRC licensed are operational. Only one is still being built, in Georgia, at a cost of $100 million a month. Southern Company financial documents filed Wednesday say the project, slated to cost $14 billion, could cost $25 billion or more if completed.

Trooper Pleads Guilty To Shooting Black Man Who Followed His Orders

By Thandisizwe Chimurenga for Daily Kos - Sean Groubert, a former South Carolina state trooper, has pleaded guilty to assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature for the shooting of Levar Jones at a Columbia gas station in September of 2014. Video from Groubert’s patrol car went viral at a time of heightened scrutiny and anxiety of police executions of unarmed African Americans—immediately after the murders of Mike Brown in Ferguson, John Crawford in Ohio and Eric Garner in New York and just prior to the murder of Tamir Rice in Cleveland and the non-indictment of Darren Wilson for Brown’s murder.

S. Carolina Teen Who Filmed School Cop’s Assault Arrested

By Adam Johnson for AlterNet - WLTX reports that Kenny was trying to "stand up for her friend" when she filmed the assault, telling Loren Thomas of WLTX, "I was crying, screaming and crying like a baby. I was in disbelief." Both Kenny and her mother are understandably skeptical as to why she was arrested for "disturbing schools." "But looking at the video, who was really disturbing schools?" Kenny's mother told WLTX. "Was it my daughter or the officer who came into the classroom and did that to the young girl?" Ben Fields, the South Carolina police officer whose attack on a black student went viral in a video Monday, has faced previous abuse allegations.

Sky High Activism, Wedding Pics, Rainbows & Flags

By Eleanor Goldfield for Occupy.com. Congrats to all the couples who can now tie the knot! But now that you’ve ridden the rainbow to marital bliss, allow me to bring you back down to everything else we gotta fix in this country. A Chinese company stunningly and scarily showcases sky-high activism while a Chinese couple offers up some dystopian and creative wedding pic ideas. Bree Newsome shows the South Carolina legislature it’s actually not that hard to take down the Confederate flag. July 4th is this weekend so go enjoy a celebratory march with some rebels. Let’s get serious and blunt about the global corporate takeover. And finally, Naomi Klein and Pope Francis join forces to battle climate change.

Bree Newsome Took A Stand, Will You?

By Jennifer Farmer in Alternet - Newsome bravely scaled a pole at the South Carolina State Capitol and removed the confederate flag from state grounds. While many of us bemoaned the display of the racist symbol of oppression and white supremacy, Newsome took action. As she was led away in cuffs, she stoically recited biblical scripture. This was not the first, and I suspect it will not be the last time, Bree took a stand for something in which she believed. In 2013, she protested North Carolina's voter suppression law during the Moral Monday protests organized by the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II and the North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP. Newsome exhibits the brand of bravery we should all aspire to gain ourselves.

At Least Five Black Churches Destroyed By Fire In Past Week

By Nick Visser in Huffington Post - At least five predominantly black churches have caught fire in the last week, including at least three that have been the subject of arson, the Southern Poverty Law Center reports. The string of blazes, which have occurred in four Southern states and Ohio, comes a week after nine people were gunned down at a Charleston, South Carolina, church. Dylann Roof, 21, has been charged with nine counts of homicide and possession of a firearm during commission of a violent crime. An arsonist set fire to the College Hills Seventh Day Adventist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee, on Monday. The following day, God’s Power Church of Christ in Macon, Georgia, was gutted by flames.

Protester Climbs Flagpole To Remove Confederate Flag

By Lynette Holloway for the Root, #FreeBree is now trending on Black Twitter and a bail fund has been set up to help Bree Newsome defray the legal costs associated with her arrest for removing the Confederate flag. A woman identified as Bree Newsome was arrested Saturday after climbing the flagpole at the South Carolina Statehouse in Columbia, S.C., about 6:30 a.m. and removing the Confederate flag, Rashad Robinson, executive director of ColorOfChange.org, said in a statement. Robinson, whose group last week started a petition titled “Take Down The Confederate Flag From The South Carolina Capitol,” which has received more than 55,000 signatures, supported the activist. He identified her as a North Carolina educator. A second person was arrested, but his or her identity is not yet known. “The confederate flag was born out of a government defending the enslavement of Black people and resurrected as an emblem for whites violently opposing racial integration,” Robinson said in the statement.

I’m The Rebirth Of The Black Radical

By Riley Wilson for Color Lines. When I was growing up in Columbia, South Carolina, I was awoken by one singular task from my mother. “Get out of South Carolina,” she would sermonize. This would be repeated to me regularly and in different ways. “Get out of South Carolina and don’t come back.” Sometimes she would say, “Don’t get trapped here.” I am not a South Carolinian; I am the re-birth of the black radical and this time, the cause du jour is serving as a catalyst more so than a trending topic. And when the radicalism of my generation fully emerges from behind the curtain of traditional marches and tactics, there will be little acquiesce offered. The seemingly hollow musings of President Obama will go unnoticed, and the gait of the disenfranchised and attacked black youth will move like a levanter out of the concrete. The only thing to stop it will be drastic and unequivocal change in American policies, practices and moral consciousness.

Newsletter – No Justice, No Peace

By Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese for Popular Resistance. Glen Ford of Black Agenda Report writes that “No justice, no peace” is “a vow by the movement to transform the crisis that is inflicted on Black people into a generalized crisis for the larger society, and for those who currently rule.” In reality, given the violence being inflicted upon people, particularly people of color, whether directly or indirectly through rising poverty, unemployment, homelessness, lack of access to health care and more, and the government’s failures to address these crises and listen to the people, disruption is a necessary element of political change. In 1968 the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., spoke outside a prison in California where people were being held for protesting the Vietnam War. In the speech he drew the connections between the Civil Rights movement and the peace movement against the Vietnam War. Today we see the links between racism, inequality, imperialism, militarism and ecocide and his comment on that day continues to ring true: "There can be no justice without peace. And there can be no peace without justice."

The Answers To 5 FAQs About The Walter Scott Shooting

By Jessica Dickerson in The Huffington Post - The fatal police shooting of South Carolina man Walter Scott has, not undeservedly,taken the Internet by storm. But what is it that people want to understand most about the shooting? And where are the people that are searching answers to these questions the most? Google knows. Trends data acquired by the internet search engine -- one that boasts over 100 billion searches monthly -- shows not only the most frequently asked questions in regards to Scott's shooting, but also where the majority of those searches are coming from. In this case, the southern United States take the cake. And so, for those who want to know, here are the answers to the Internet's most asked questions regarding Walter Scott.
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