|
2 May 2007 |
Demonstrators shout "Free the Jena Six" from the steps of the LaSalle Parish Courthouse.
|
|
10 May 2007 |
Barker, the 4 Dec victim, is arrested after a .22-caliber rifle is found in his truck on the Jena High campus. He is charged as an adult for possessing a firearm in a firearm-free zone; free on $5,000 bond.
|
|
11 May 2007 |
School Superintendent Breithaupt says he will recommend Barker be expelled; it is reportedly the first time a gun has been found on campus. Expulsion involving a weapon is a minimum of 12 months. According to his dad, in a September interview, Barker dropped out of school and is trying for a GED.
|
|
22 June 2007 |
DA Walters reduces the charges against Bell to aggravated second degree battery and conspiracy to commit battery.
|
|
26 June 2007 |
Only 50 of the 150 jurors called in the Bell case show up; none are black.
|
|
27 June 2007 |
At Bell's trial, the DA calls 17 witnesses; the court-appointed defense attorney, Blane Williams, calls no witnesses and presents no evidence. Bell is a star football player and honor student; he contends he had nothing to do with the fight:
"... everybody yells and crowds around so when I heard that I turned around in (sic) seen what was going on and Justin Barker was on the ground getting kicked by a group of Black boys so when I got in arm reach of Justin a couple of teachers and coaches was getting every body from around him ..."
(Shreveport Times)
|
|
28 June 2007 |
Bell is convicted by the six-person jury. Sentencing is scheduled for 31 July; Bell faces more than 20 years in prison.
|
|
29 July 2007 |
A group of lawyers from Monroe, LA take on Bell's appeal.
|
|
31 July 2007 |
The "white tree" is cut down.
|
|
4 Sept 2007 |
A Louisiana District Court judge dismisses the conspiracy charge against Bell but lets the battery conviction stand; he says Bell should have been tried as a juvenile, not an adult. The DA reduces charges against Jones and Shaw to aggravated second-degree battery and conspiracy to commit battery.
|
|
10 Sept 2007 |
The DA reduces charges against Bailey, Jr. to aggravated second-degree battery and conspiracy to commit battery. Purvis awaits arraignment. Because Beard is a juvenile, it is unknown what charges remain against him.
|
|
14 Sept 2007 |
The Louisiana Third Court of Appeals rules that Bell was improperly tried as an adult and reverses the second-degree battery conviction.
|
|
29 Aug 2007 |
School Superintendent Breithaupt prohibits students from wearing t-shirts on the high school campus bearing the slogan "Free the Jena 6."
|
|
20 Sept 2007 |
Thousands descend upon Jena, LA to protest the judicial treatment of the Jena 6.
The Shreveport Times laments the lack of local and state leadership in the Jena case, noting that both Shreveport and New Orleans have black mayors.
A national black televangelist contributed $6,000 to a Jena 6 defense fund and called on others to do the same.
A white supremist group leader stays with Barker's parents before the protest. The parents say they didn't know the Nationalist Movement was a white supremecy group. Richard Barrett, the leader, says he explained the group's beliefs to the Barkers in advance.
|
|
21 Sept 2007 |
The "FBI said it was looking into an online posting by a neo-Nazi white supremacist group that published the home addresses of all six of the African-American teenagers, as well as the phone numbers of some. The group said on its Web site it is calling on followers to 'let them know justice is coming.'" (CNN)
|
|
27 Sept 2007 |
Bell will be re-tried as a juvenile and is released from prison on bail that has been reduced to $45,000. (USP)
|
