Town braces for civil-rights rally

Up to 50,000 could visit
the town, police say.

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

JENA, La. — The promised arrival of 50,000 demonstrators to this rural town is unnerving locals who fear the protest over the treatment of six black teens will spark chaos.

Most shop owners won’t even open today during the march, noting that demonstrators will outnumber residents by roughly a 20-to-1 margin.

The rally is being organized to condemn the town’s treatment of the so-called Jena 6, black teens who were hit with severe charges after beating up a white student last year.

The white teen was punched and kicked at Jena High School on Dec. 4, one of a series of racial clashes that began when white students hung nooses in a school tree.

“You’ve got 40,000 people or so coming into this small town who know nothing about Jena except they’ve been told white people are bad and black people are good,” said Nora Bradford, 51, the owner of a dress shop. “Are we concerned? Of course we are.”

Police said they were gearing up for the rally that they estimated could bring up to 50,000 people to this town, about 140 miles northwest of Baton Rouge.

Col. Stanley Griffin, chief of the Louisiana State Police, insisted the protest “will be secure and it will be uneventful,” regardless of the number of people who show up.

Residents of this mostly white town aren’t so sure.

Gary Moser, 70, the owner of a two-story brick building that houses two boutiques, plans to board up his property, fearing the protest led by the Rev. Al Sharpton and other prominent civil-rights activists could spin out of control.

“We’re only 2,300 people and there are supposed to be 10 times that many [protesters] here,” he said. “We’ve never had to deal with anything as momentous as that.”

“You get so many people here on both sides and something’s bound to happen.”

Rumors even floated around town that members of the Ku Klux Klan may show up today.

A town divided

The case of the Jena 6 has divided this town since Mychal Bell, then 16, and five other black teens, all members of the high school football team, were charged with attempted murder in the assault of Justin Barker, 17.

The charges brought widespread criticism that blacks were being treated more harshly than whites. Critics noted that the white students who hung the nooses around the tree were punished with three days of in-school suspension.

The charges against the Jena 6 were reduced, but Bell has been jailed since January, unable to meet a $90,000 bond. On Friday, the state appeals court threw out his conviction of aggravated battery, saying he shouldn’t have been tried as an adult.

Bell’s lawyer wants him released or his bail reduced while the prosecutor mulls whether to appeal. Still, Bell has remained behind bars because the judge and prosecutor didn’t come to a bail hearing Monday.

“I’m ready to get his life back on track,” Bell’s mother, Melissa, said yesterday, “getting him back to being a teenager again.”