PHOTO/BRETT JELINEK
CHICAGO IL — On May 11, Rev. Pinkney’s appeal was heard before a three-judge panel of the Michigan Court of Appeals. The courtroom was packed with supporters. Each lawyer’s arguments were immediately followed by questions and comments from the judges on the panel. Rev. Pinkney’s lawyer, Tim Holloway, as well as Mark Fancher of the ACLU, presented arguments in support of Rev. Pinkney. The prosecutor presented arguments against.
The prosecution would very much like this case to be about forgery on a recall election petition (to oust a corporate mayor) even though there is no real evidence of this. The prosecution would have people believe that Rev. Pinkney’s free speech and activism are evidence of a crime. This is nothing but a legal slight of hand, meant to shift everyone’s attention away from the political nature of this case.
But, it also opens the door to asking, wouldn’t Mayor Hightower and his friends at the Whirlpool Corporation desire to keep Hightower in office as his popularity was slipping? And, if so, did any of these corporate forces ever get their hands on those recall petitions? If this has no merit, then why was the jury instructed that they could convict without evidence?
This couldn’t work on just any jury. It had to be a special jury. An all white jury for an all Black town. In addition to this, there had to be the less visible class differences. That jury was from affluent areas with incomes many times greater than Benton Harbor, which is the poorest municipality in the state. Lastly, no one on that jury has had to live under the rule of the dictatorial emergency manager system like the rest of Benton Harbor and other cities in Michigan. If you are from Benton Harbor, this is as far away from a jury of your peers as you can get.
This is how open corporate dictatorship in Michigan silences opposition.
Their evidence, their juries, their courtrooms, and their emergency manager system, are all the very danger that Rev. Pinkney’s activism in Benton Harbor has been trying to warn the American people about.
America is in danger of a complete dictatorship. We can and must win this case— and every other attack on the leaders of the people—in the courtroom of public opinion. Our first argument must be: How can a corporate governor poison the entire city of Flint and ruin the future of its children and remain free while an innocent country preacher is railroaded to prison, doing felony time for a trumped up misdemeanor?
