Michigan Cops, DA Wants To Ruin Black College Student's Life Just Because

DeJuawn Wallace being arrested in a February traffic
stop, from a police dash cam. He didn't pull
over immediately, but continued to drive
to a well-lit area, for safety. Cops
and a prosecutor object to this.  

UPDATE: 
As expected because of the negative publicity and the fact that even prosecuting the case made prosecutors a laughing stock, they dropped the charged Thursday agains DaJuawn Wallace.

His "crime," as you'll read below in the original post, was being cautious.

But as the Huffington Post points out, Prosecutor Christopher Boyd offered a plea deal for Wallace to plead guilty to a lesser charge, before the publicity over this stupidity blew up in Boyd's face, and he had to drop the charges.

However, Boyd and very many other prosecutors offer "plea deals" to people charged with crimes, even though many of these people might not have actually committed any crimes.

But, the defendents are often poor and don't have the resources to fight the bogus charges. Or, they've had previous run-ins with the law and realize nobody will believe they are innocent.

Prosecutors usually occupy elected positions. The prosecutors offer these bogus plea deals to innocent defendents because it gives them a higher conviction rate, making them more appealing next time they're up for re-election.

While there are some damn good, honest prosecutors out there, a large number of them, apparently, think their career and their bragging rights is worth ruining the lives of many innocent people by giving them bogus crime records.

One researcher estimates there might be as many as 20,000 people in jail serving time or crimes they did not commit. And some of those crimes actually happened, but were committed by someone else who is still out in the streets.

It's just easier for prosecutors to grab the low hanging fruit and win easy prosecutions against innocent people. Again, just to advance their careers.

Absolutely shameful.


PREVIOUS DISCUSSION

One dark early morning in February, DaJuawn Wallace, 24, was driving along a very poorly lit road in Kockville Township, Michigan.

Suddenly, the blue lights of a police car flashed in back of him.

Wallace knew that there had been incidents in the area in which people pretending to be cops, complete with blue lights pull people over and rob them or even worse.

Wallace said he signaled to the cop that he would keep driving - slowly - until he arrived at a safer, brightly lit area.

People are often advised to do this.  In and near Detroit, there have been recent cases of people impersonating police and stopping people to rob them.

A mile and half down the road, Wallace pulled into the glare of a brightly lit Sam's Club parking lot and stopped.

The cop decided to charge him with a felony count of fleeing and eluding police for not pulling over sooner, reports the Michigan news site MLive.com

This despite the explanation from Wallace. The DA "generously" offered a deal in which Wallace could plead guilty to a misdemeanor with a delayed sentence, meaning the charges would be dismissed if he completed a one-year probation.

But if he does that, he probably would lose his job and almost definitely his college financial aid.

Saginaw County Chief Prosecutor Christoher Boyd said when a police officer in a official police cruiser orders you to stop uou must. "You don't get a driver's license and get to pick what rules you are going to follow and what rules you are not going to follow," Boyd said, as reported at MLive.com.

Well, Wallace DID stop, once he got to a well-lit area, and he didn't try to speed off and outrun the cop. He just didn't know if he was about to be robbed or not. So I guess if you're a young black man in Michigan, you don't get the choice of trying not to be a victim of crime.

Nobody has come up with evidence so far that Wallace did anything other than seek a well lit, public place. The only reason why cops stopped him in the first place is because his car resembled one that had just driven on a sidewalk at a nearby college. It turns out, the sidewalk driver wasn't Wallace.

So what's Boyd's deal? Does he just never want to "lose" a case? Maybe his ego is too fragile to give up on a prosecution when facts present themselves?

Or is Wallace an uppity black kid. After all, he's pursuing a Master's degree in college. You don't want any n*****s being successful, right Prosecutor Boyd? God forbid a white guy like you lets a black guy find success.

The above paragraph might be an over the top accusation. I sure hope it is.

Nonetheless, Mother Jones reported today that the vast majority of prosecutors in the nation are white men. Obviously, most of them aren't racist. Still, when 79 percent of prosecutors are white men, and 14 states have an all white male prosecuting lineup, you do want to see a little more diversity.

This week, the Michigan case has suddenly gotten lots of publicity. When bad PR  happens, the prosecutor will try to find a face saving way out in which Wallace doesn't end up with problems concerning his job or school financial assistance.   He'll just got some sort of toothless warning.

One sign that things might work out in Wallace's favor is public support. MLive.com has an update saying there will be a rally in his behalf tomorrow.

But who knows how many other people get in trouble like Wallace did? For doing something innocent, or at least benign, I bet a lot of people have their lives ruined by the occasional overzealous cop or prosecutor.

Time to fix this problem, maybe?

Homeless Guy NAILS Styx Song; He's Now Suddenly Famous

Donald Gould at the piano in Sarasota, Florida. 

I've seen this kind of thing before, but I always like it when it happens.

A homeless guy, the kind of person a lot of us go out of our way to ignore, does something brilliant.

Here, Donald Gould finds a piano in the street in Sarasota, Florida and starts playing the Styx classic "Come Sail Away." He's brilliant.

The video, just uploaded on June 30,  has gone viral, with nearly 6 million views as of Monday morning.

Everybody's talking about him now. He's been all over social and mainstream media over the past few days.

A star is born!

The pianos, like the one Gould found were placed in various areas around Sarasota by the Art and Cultural Alliance of Sarasota County.

A follow up video features an interview with Gould, who says he plays the piano on the street every day to collect tips. He used to play the clarinet in the Marine Corps.

Gould says he has been homeless for six or seven years, when the economy tanked and he got laid off. Unemployment benefits kept him afloat for a couple years, but that ended. He says he has a construction background and can do that, but I agree with the woman in the follow up video that maybe a career in music would be better.

A GoFundMe page has been set up for Gould, and that has raised about $29,000 as of Monday morning. So that will at least get a roof over his head.

Here's the video of Gould playing "Come Sail Away."

July 4th Weekend Educational Moment With The Muppets

The Muppets, led by Sam The Eagle, guide
us through the Declaration of Independence.  

OK, I know today is July 5th, not July 4th, so I'm a day late and a dollar short with this, (I'm always at least a dollar short) but we can still do this.

The Muppets Sam The Eagle, the conservative one who is always appalled, thought it was appropriate to recite the Declaration of Independence this weekend. I agree!

He got some help, so to speak, from some of the other Muppets, including Gonzo.

So enjoy this educational moment:

 

Duracell Batteries Tugging On Heart Strings?

You need batteries for those flashlights as you make your way home in the dark from tonight's Fourth of July fireworks display?

Go get some Duracell batteries. But before you do, watch their ad. Somehow, a battery ad managed to make me a little weepy.

A little girl receives a special Teddy bear from
her father in a charming new Duracell ad. 

Most advertisements annoy me, so when I find one that's actually kinda compelling, I highlight it.

In the Duracell ad, which you can watch below, a man deployed overseas sends his daughter back home a teddy bear. The bear has recorded message from Dad that plays when the daughter squeezes the bear.

Everytime she gives Teddy a squeeze,  her father's voice comes out and says, "I love you, baby girl"

This goes on for awhile. The ad demonstrates how long Duracell batteries are supposed to last and how important they are.

The Duracell ad is based on a true story. Apparently, people with Duracell were doing market research in peoples' homes when they encountered this arrangement.

At one place, they asked the kids to bring out their favorite battery operated toys. They expected things like toy cars and such, but a girl brought out a teddy bear that had her father's voice.

It turned out Dad was Robert Nilson, a Navy air traffic controller, who put together a battery powered teddy bear to play messages from him to his daughter, says television station WBRC in Birmingham, Alabama.

Nilson said the Duracell ad is pretty close to reality.

Though the Nilson family experienced the scenario in the Duracell ad, , actors stand in for the scene during the commercial, of course.

Here's the sweet ad:

Do I Laugh Or Cry Over Right Wing Despair Over Gay Marriage?

Lots of people were happy over last week's U.S.
Supreme Court ruling regarding gay marriage.... 

I admit I've been pretty snarky the past few days about the over the top reactions among some conservatives regarding the U.S. Supreme Court gay marriage decision.

It started moments after news broke. 

The ever-reliable Bryan Fischer of American Family Association immediately released a seriers of melodramatic Tweets soon after the Supreme Court announced its decision:

First he compared it to the 9-11 attacks on the Twin Towers in New York:

"June 26, 2015. The day the twin towers of truth and righteousness were blown up by moral jihadists."

Then, oddly, he started channeling Don McClean, famous for the song "American Pie"

"I saw Satan dancing with delight the day the musti died in the United States of America."

I know I'm being too literal here, but I heard lots of music once the gay marriage decision came out. Happy partiers, especially gay ones, bring on the music in happy times. But what do I know?

Republican presidential candidates' were quick to follow Fischer and his ilk:

Bobby Jindal had one of the better ones:

"This decision will pave the way for an all out assault against the religious freedom rights of Christians who disagree with this decision.....I will never stop fighting for religious liberty and I hope our leaders in D.C. join me."

That's picking your battles, Bobby! Fight a nonexistent battle against an "assault on religious freedom." As if anyone cares what goes on in the church you go to.

....but Bryan Fischer was one of the right
wingers who was VERY displeased.

Predictably, the activists started blaming bad weather on The Gays. Any time there is bad weather anywhere, be it a storm, flood, drought, heat wave, cold wave or hail, it's because of The Gays.

If we gay people have so much control over the weather, why can't I make it stop raining so I can get some work done out in my garden?

Anyway, the day after the same sex marriage ruling, there was a pretty good thunderstorm in Washington DC. Imagine! A thunderstorm in humid DC in the middle of summer!

The storms caused some local flash floods, and Todd Starnes of Fox News or shall I say Fox "News" had this to say:

"Record breaking floods (editor's note: Not really) have inundated Washington DC just days after the Supreme Court decided they knew better than God. I seem to remember another time in history when there was a record breaking flood."

Uh, yeah, there have been other record breaking floods. I suppose the Biblical Noah's Ark one, if it happened, was probably record breaking.  And........?

The wackadoodles on the right are now expecting a cascade of new awful things now that gay marriage is legal. Tom DeLay probably topped them all, explaining there's a secret Department of Justice memo that will now legalize bestiality and pedophilia.

He hasn't offered any proof, but hey, trust him! Why not?

This all leads me to a Washington Monthly article by David Atkins on why the religious right is so, SO upset over gay marriage.

From their worldview there are a lot of things to be upset about. Why gay marriage especially.

Evangelicals are also upset over abortion. As the Washington Monthly points out, if you go with the evangelicals' line of thinking, this makes sense. They think that life starts at the moment of conception, so if you kill off a small collection of cells that could potentiallly become a human being, yeah, I can see their anger.

However, if two guys or two gals marry each other, nobody gets hurt or killed. So we're good, right?

Wrong, apparently.

Atkins writes:

"An array of obviously specious slippery slope arguments notwithstanding, even under the Christianist worldview marriage equality hurts no one but the supposed sinners in question, who will either repent and be saved or not - but their souls are subject to their own God-given free will. 

It's not as if LGBT people haven't heard the 'good news' from evangelicals before; what they do with the 'information is their business and their potential salvation is entirely in their own hands."

So why can't evangelicals just keep giving their, ugh, 'good news' to us and if we don't take the bait, fughettaboutit.

Well, Atkins explains this in is Washington Monthly article, too:

"Some of the more unhinged on the religious right believe that God is actively protecting the United States because of America's religiosity, and God's grace will be removed by cultural coarsening. But again, so what? The United States is not Jerusalem. It's existence is obviously not part of any scripture or prophecy. 

In the supposed end times, the entire world is supposed to come under the spell of the Anti-Christ, which means that the U.S. will either exist or fall under Satan's dominion. In either case, the removal of divine protection isn't much to be feared, as it seemingly must happen sooner or later."

Atkins points out the radical right is not railing under other sins, like divorce, selfishness and hypocracy. Maybe because these yellers and screamers are hypocrites themselves?

I can only come to exactly the same conclusion Atkins did in his article. The right wingers are are using religion as, as Atkins puts it the "most socially acceptable veneer for exercising that bigotry. Which is really what it's all about."

Debbie Harry Turns 70; Still Coolest Woman Out There

The ever-awesome Debby Harry turns 70 today.  

Yeah, it makes me feel old to realize that Debbie Harry, most famous for her role as lead singer for Blondie, turns 70 today.

Harry has always been so sexy and awesome that she comes the closest to turning this gay man straight. Not really, but still.

Love the spread of Debbie Harry photos in today's The Guardian. 

Debbie Harry  has always been the epitome of cool.

One song that sticks in my head today on her birthday is Blondie's "Atomic" Lyrically, the song is lame, but the tune is so atmospheric that you can't help but love it.

"Atomic" came out around 1980. Most of the time, when you see videos and images from 1980s, the fashion and look of everybody is laughably dated.

In the video, though, the people, including Harry, seem strangely fashion forward, if a little wonderfully odd. And those soaring vocals! Not to mention the cheekbones on her face!

Judge for yourself: (To watch, you'll probably have to click "Watch on YouTube to actually see it. )

No You Can't Give Your Low Wage Workers' Salaries To Big Banks

A McDonald's franchise insisted on paying this women
only with a fee-laden debit card. So she sued.  

There's been some good U.S. Supreme Court rulings in the past week, but another ruling, from a lower court in Pennsylvania about a month ago, gave me another reason to be happy.

The court said that a McDonald's franchise owner could not pay the employees there in the form of Chase Bank debit cards.

As we well know, McDonald's employees tend not to be super rich 1 percenters. So they need every penny of their paychecks.

According to Consumerist, the debit card pay violated a Pennsylvania laws that says "wages shall be paid in lawful money of the United States or check."

The legal question was whether a debit card is lawful money. It kinda is, but.....

Anyway, a woman named Natalie Gunshannon worked briefly at one of these debit card McDonald's. Briefly, because she objected to being forced to use the fee-laden debit card. Her employer said she had no choice.

Oh, but she did. She quit and went straight to a lawyer. Gunshannon is sort of a Norma Rae of McDonald's, at least in Pennsylvania.

Here's how Consumerist described it:

"The 2013 complaint alleges that the McDonald's franchisee violate this law by requiring that employees accept the Chase debit card, which charged fees like $1.50 for using an ATM, $5 for over-the-countery cash withdrawals, $1 per balance inquiry and $0.75 for online bill payment."

In other words, if these McDonald's employees actually wanted to get access to their wages, they had to give some of it to Chase Bank, which, as I noted, is probably not about to run out of cash anytime soon.

Consumerist goes on, "At the same time, managers at these McDonald's were being paid through direct deposit, meaning that the were not stuck with any of these fees."

Yep, the lower wage workers had to give some of their money to the poor suffering bank, while the somewhat better paid managers got to keep all of their wages.

The judge said the debit cards violated the law because the cards are neither cash nor check.

The judge in the case also said this new technology makes for evolving case law, and state legislators are grappling with this.

Consumerist notes that Federal Reserve Regulations say that "no financial institutions or other person may require a consumer to establish an account for receipt of electronic fund transfers with a particular institution as a condition of employment or receipt of a government benefit."

In other words, an employee can choose to get a paycheck, cash, direct deposit or debit card arrangement with the bank of his or her choice, but the employer can't choose for the employee.

More than that, though, the McDonald's franchise owners were awfully scummy. Did they get some nice arrangement from Chase Bank for forcing employees to use the debit cards.

Worse than that, this is totally a reverse Robin Hood. The debit cards are classic steal from the poor and give to the rich.  (Hmm, I bet Bernie Sanders wouldn't approve of this!)