White Christmas

To all of my friends out there who celebrated Christmas, I hope that you had a merry one. The weather forecasters inform us that the next 48 hours will make lots of the Eastern Seaboard, from Washington to New England, very white indeed, albeit after the holiday.


As is making the newsrounds, John White and his family received a very nice Xmas present from Governor David Paterson. White was convicted of manslaughter in the killing of Daniel Cicciaro Jr., as Cicciaro and his friends converged on White's home in Miller Place, NY. Governor Paterson, the lame duck Chief Executive of the State of New York, commuted White's sentence to time served, and White was home for the holiday.

Cicciaro and his friends were white, and White is black, and the whole matter has lots of racial overtones and undertones. One mitigating factor in White's original sentence was that White said, with some degree of credibility, that he feared a lynch mob. Cicciaro & company did, after all, converge on White's house to send a message to White's son, who had been alleged (apparently falsely) to have issued a rape threat against a white girl.

I have mixed feelings on this one. First of all, Paterson's failure to alert Cicciaro's family that he was issuing the commutation belies a severe disregard for the rights of victims. And as blogged previously in connection with this case, any matter in which Fat Al Sharpton issues a commendatory statement is always, always suspect unless demonstrated otherwise.

But one test I apply to determine my objectivity is to inquire what the stance would be if the religious, ethnic and/or social groups were to be switched or shifted. And so, I now inquire of myself what my position would be if John White were Jewish. I have had some occasions in my formative years to face gangs of Gentile kids (their specific ethnicities are not particularly relevant) with violent intentions against me and/or my companions. And I know a number of Jewish people who have actually been on the receiving end of violence by gangs of Caucasian non-Jewish gangs coming up to their homes.

[While I make no claims to being totally free of biases, I do not automatically side with Jewish criminals. This Blog's past postings regarding the recent Florida execution of cop-killer Martin Grossman should bear that out.].

If John White had been a Jewish man whose family was threatened by a mob of white Gentile teenagers who came to his house, then, under the circumstances, I would have some empathy for John White. Yes, Mr. White did overreact in trying to protect his family from what he believed was lethal danger, and so, he certainly deserves some sort of punishment. There also was a settlement for an undisclosed sum in a civil lawsuit by Cicciaro's parents against White. But what Cicciaro and his mob did was wrong!

On Long Island, law enforcement agencies and community activists are always talking about the problem of criminal gangs of youths. And almost all of those gangs are Black and/or Latino. Why do white gangs pose less of a threat to society?

Were I the Governor, I likely would have let John White's sentence of 2 - 4 years stand. In that regard, Paterson commuted White's sentence to time served; he did not pardon White. John White can go right back to the slammer to resume his original sentence if he commits any further crimes.

But Paterson's commutation states what Cicciaro's family and friends have yet to acknowledge: Cicciaro's mob behavior was wrong and unacceptable!

There is plenty of blame to go around on this one, and no ideal resolution to the tragedy. But Paterson, with only days to go before leaving the Governor's Mansion, sent out a message that does need to be sent.

Fat Al for a Pal

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There are a number of individuals who oppose racial harmony. The Reverend Al Sharpton is one of them.

Can you blame him? If racial harmony were to break out, then Sharpton would be out of a job. Racial strife is Fat Al's meal ticket. [N.B. This isn't just an African-American thing. Plenty of people from diverse other groups would be similarly challenged in their livelihood if there were racial, religious and ethnic concord in America.].

Fat Al was on Long Island yesterday, fomenting trouble in the John White case. John White is an African-American resident of Long Island. It seems that on 9 August 2006, some white youths whose blood alcohol content was not necessarily zero showed up in front of White's house, apparently angry with White's son Aaron. John White went out and confronted them. John White's gun discharged, killing Daniel Cicciaro Jr. John White was convicted of manslaughter and now awaits sentencing.

White's defense was that he is a product of the segregated South during the era of Jim Crow laws, and he instinctively reacted to the white youths outside his home as though they were a lynch mob, and therefore had not formed the mens rea to commit the crime. Shades of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird.

I consider Fred Brewington, who was one of White's attorneys, to be a very able counsel (though he does push towards the left of the political spectrum). Many of Brewington's cases are employment discrimination cases, and his clients are not all necessarily African-American. I attached no negativity to White's case on account of Brewington's handling it; as contrasted with all of Lynne Stewart's clients. Throughout the trial I kept an open mind, and even after White's conviction, was waiting to see how matters developed on the promised appeal before passing any judgment of my own.

But Sharpton's involvement in the case (and, more specifically, John White's embrace of Sharpton) has put to rest all doubts I had heretofore been willing to tentatively accord John White.

The right to keep and bear arms carries the responsibility to discharge those arms prudently and justly. John White did not do this. John White could have called the police when the gang appeared at his door, but did not. This may well have been a factor in the jury's deliberations.

Another undeveloped theme in the trial was the white youths' dispute with John White's son Aaron. He supposedly had threatened to rape a white girl (other than color, how does this really differ from his father's claim of a lynch mob?). He arrived to testify in court under escort by bodyguards, and wearing a bulletproof vest. Query: Was he any better than his father's defense painted the white youth gang?

My take on it: This case exemplifies the worst of Long Island. Cicciaro and his surviving cronies are nothing to write home about, and certainly do not make the roads any safer with their ethanol-powered temperaments. Though Cicciaro's death was tragic and unnecessary, it cannot be said that he was not cruising for a bruising. Aaron White's presence in society is not a particularly stabilizing force. And John White got a little too trigger happy.

And on this latter score, the verdict, I believe, was appropriate.