The 17-year old was arrested last month for the shooting death of two Wisconsin protesters.
Kyle Rittenhouse, the Illinois teenager accused of fatally shooting protesters in Kenosha, Wis. last month, is just “a little boy” who was “trying to protect his community,” so says former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi (R).
The 17-year old was arrested in late August for the shooting death of two Wisconsin protesters. Rittenhouse, who used a semi-automatic rifle in the attack, has been charged with first-degree murder, theGRIO previously reported.
His case has drawn support from a number of conservative influencers and lawmakers, who have defended the teenager, dubbing him a “patriot.” Political commentator Ann Coulter tweeted that she wanted Rittenhouse as “her president.”
When Bondi appeared on Sean Hannity’s Fox News program on Tuesday to discuss the case, she noted that “People have to understand out there, that was a war zone. You have got a 17-year-old out there trying to protect his state,” Bondi said, The Hill reports.
Rittenhouse is from Antioch, Illinois. His mother reportedly drove him to the anti-police brutality demonstrations in Kenosha, where he decided that it was his duty to protect public property by any means necessary.
He was arrested in his home state a day after he allegedly shot three people — two fatally. Kenosha County Sheriff David Beth said one victim was shot in the head and another was shot in the chest, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.
Many Republicans/conservatives treat Trayvon Martin, 17, and Tamir Rice, 12, with contempt, deeming them to be grown men who got it coming. But accused murderer Kyle Rittenhouse is a “little boy.” https://t.co/NQY2LIYReg
“He is helping people who have been injured. He has paramedic training from being a lifeguard. He is taking graffiti off walls. He is trying to mitigate the chaos out there,” added Bondi, a former special adviser to President Trump.
“There were bullets flying everywhere. Other people were firing, This kid was trying to help people. Were there people killed? Absolutely,” she continued. “You’ve got a little boy out there trying to protect his community.”
Bondi went on to say… “Should he have been out there with a gun? No. But should he have been charged with murder? We just don’t know yet,” she added.
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When South Africa reopens on Oct. 1, travelers can visit private game reserves in KwaZulu-Natal that let tourists help protect the country's rhinos and elephants.
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Viral photos show the 37-year-old standing on the side of a road holding a sign, and the disturbing image has drawn a reaction from the league.
Ex-NBA star Delonte West was recently spotted in Dallas, apparently homeless and begging for money.
Viral photos show the 37-year-old standing on the side of a road holding a sign, and the disturbing image has drawn a reaction from the NBA world.
West’s former coach Doc Rivers and the Players Association have reportedly been trying to him help …ever since he was filmed shirtless on a city curb, shouting expletives with a bloodied and bruised face back in January. At the time, his former college coach took action, enlisting his “basketball network” to come to West’s aid. The NBA also reportedly offered its resources, theGRIO reported.
Multiple insiders tell TMZ that the league, NBPA, Rivers, and West’s former St. Joe’s college teammate, Jameer Nelson, have attempted to get him the much needed assistance that he needs.
Phil Martelli, who coached West and Nelson at Saint Joseph’s before West headed to the NBA, previously took to Twitter to post a compassionate note about watching the former athlete’s downward spiral.
West played eight seasons in the NBA, including several seasons with LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers.
“Over the past several hours I have talked with many who are willing to help – please read and embrace Jameer’s wisdom – we are reaching out to our basketball network to get the professional help Delonte needs. This is so very painful,” Martelli tweeted.
Over the past several hours I have talked with many who are willing to help – please read and embrace Jameer’s wisdom – we are reaching out to our basketball network to get the professional help Delonte needs. This is so very painful. https://t.co/8IAuTdzCc9
The NBA has offered to support West and his family, according to TMZ.
Several years ago, after several bizarre events, West’s brother, Dmitri went public with his brother’s bipolar disorder diagnosis.
“Delonte West is not crazy, he is not on drugs. I don’t know what exactly is going on in his mind but I can tell you that he is safe and he’s doing OK,” Dmitri said at that time. “My family are trying to get him the best professional help that’s out there, the best that they can afford.”
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The actress will tackle police brutality on the NBC cop drama for the upcoming eighth season.
Nicole Air Parker will tackle police brutality in her new recurring role on the upcoming eighth season of NBC’s Chicago P.D.
The actress will play Deputy Superintendent Samatha Miller on the the Dick Wolf drama series. According to Deadline.com, the character hails from Atlanta, Georgia and she’s “a progressive, ardent proponent of police reform” who wants to help a department led by Detective Sergeant Hank Voight “adapt to the new reality but will not tolerate breaches of the new police guidelines and protocols.”
Chicago P.D. is a spinoff of Chicago Fire, and centers on members of the Chicago Police Department run by Voight. Parker’s Miller is expected to rein in Voight’s violent and excessive force when handling suspects and criminals. She will hold him and his team accountable by “imposing high professional standards.”
Cop shows have become increasingly open to scrutiny as racial tensions continue to rise across the country. Critics have noted that police dramas tend to show officers as heroes and Black people as the “bad guys” that they lock up.
A January study by advocacy group Color of Change detailed the effects of this type of fantastical portrayal of American policing. The study said “the crime TV genre – the main way that tens of millions of people learn to think about the criminal justice system – advanced debunked ideas about crime, a false hero narrative about law enforcement, and distorted representations about black people, other people of color and women. These shows rendered racism invisible and dismissed any need for police accountability.”
Police brutality and reform are expected to be explored by most cop shows in their upcoming seasons.
Meanwhile, earlier this year, Chicago Fire, Chicago P.D. and Chicago Med were all renewed for 3 more seasons by NBC.
“Dick Wolf has proven time and time again that he makes shows audiences love,” saidPaul Telegdy, Chairman, NBC Entertainment. “We are delighted, excited and proud that as part of this epic deal with Wolf Entertainment, NBC’s loyal audience will know that their favorite shows have a certain future for the next three years.”
Parker gushed about her new Chicago P.D. gig on Twitter, writing “So excited to join this amazing cast, playing this timely role.” She added that her longtime friend, actor Eriq LaSalle, will direct her on the series.
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Hayes, 51, played the beloved William Dent on the hit show created by Mara Brock Akil starring Golden Brooks, Tracee Ellis Ross, Persia White, and Jill Marie Jones. He recently spoke with The Chicago Tribune and told the outlet not only have acting jobs dried up since the show ended in 2008, he now suffers from congestive heart failure.
“Here in L.A., the sky has been orange with smoke (because of wildfires) and it was just really terrible,” the actor told the Tribune. “So I was in the hospital overnight, they were having trouble getting my blood pressure back down. Seems like the more they look, the more problems they find. The good thing is, I don’t have the coronavirus.”
On Girlfriends which ran first on UPN and then The CW from 200-2008, Hayes was the lovable fifth wheel and sometimes lover to a couple of the women. His character was a funny and vibrant fan favorite, so Hayes was shocked when the show ended and he couldn’t find a job. He said the offers just stopped coming in.
Though the show changed his life, the Chicago native says he wasn’t prepared for his success. By 14, he’d lost both parents, finishing high school at a military academy in Wisconsin.
“God, I wish I knew then what I know now. I wish I’d had more time to ease into it. That you have to save your money. And you need to develop good friendships with people that aren’t going to just go away. Try to find people who aren’t just after you for your money. And maybe pursue other interests.”
Tracee Ellis Ross, Jill Marie Jones, Hayes, Persia White and Golden Brooks of ‘Girlfriends’ (UPN)
The actor says he tried to work as a bouncer but didn’t have the temperament. He also tried moving furniture but said he didn’t have the back for it.
“It was a difficult time, money-wise, I had started a complete rebuild on my house and all of a sudden I didn’t have a job. But the house was on an amazing piece of land and I was able to sell it and break even,” Hayes told the Tribune. “So I moved from a house on the hill down to a little bungalow in a sketchy area and people would come by: “What the hell are you doing here?” Those were pretty awful years. I made it work with my little residual checks for a year and then I ended up moving into my sister’s garage for six years.”
Recently, Girlfriends was picked up by Netflix and Hayes is excited to see himself back on TV.
“Feels like a second birthday,” he said. “Watching it again, I’m surprised at how skinny I was! Because I never really thought of myself as a cool guy who had a lot of luck with the ladies, and now I’m like, ‘Why not, I was gorgeous!’
The actor may have fallen on bad times after his time on the show, but he’s maintained a positive attitude.
“It was such a blessing. It really changed my life,” Hayes said. “Of all the parts I could have played on TV, I think that was the best job I could have gotten.”
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As it turns out, racism is expensive, a new study shows
Ongoing protests sparked by the death of George Floyd have reignited a national discussion around the systemic racial discrimination in the country. To add insult to injury, a major bank has now been able to quantify just how much money the economy has lost as a result of discrimination against Black Americans.
According to a new study by Citigroup, since the year 2000, the United States has lost a whopping $16 trillion in gross domestic product due to discriminatory practices in a plethora of areas from education to access to business loans.
Considering the U.S. GDP totaled $19.5 trillion last year, losing almost the same figure amounts to a massive deficit for everyone. Researchers also found that failing to address these oppressive practices will only lead to continued losses.
Citigroup estimates that if America made a concerted effort to reverse discrimination against Black Americans, in just five years the economy would see a $5 trillion boost.
“We believe we have a responsibility to address current events and to frame them with an economic lens in order to highlight the real costs of longstanding discrimination against minority groups, especially against Black people and particularly in the U.S.,” writes Raymond J. McGuire, a vice chairman at the bank and the chairman of its banking, capital markets, and advisory team.
Discrimination has cost the US economy trillions of dollars (Photo: Stock)
NPR reports that the study came up with the $16 trillion figure by examining four key racial gaps between African Americans and their white counterparts:
$13 trillion lost in potential business revenue because of discriminatory lending to African American entrepreneurs, with an estimated 6.1 million jobs not generated as a result
$2.7 trillion in income lost because of disparities in wages suffered by African Americans
$218 billion lost over the past two decades because of discrimination in providing housing credit
And $90 billion to $113 billion in lifetime income lost from discrimination in accessing higher education
Due to these findings, Citigroup now urges key stakeholders to make it a priority to address discrimination, not just as a social issue but also as a matter of fiscal responsibility.
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Prince Harry and Meghan Markle appeared on the Time 100 special and urged people to vote in November
Members of the British royal family have historically stayed clear of making political statements to maintain a sense of “royal neutrality.” However, this week it’s been alleged that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle upset their family across the pond after making strong statements about the upcoming presidential election.
Tuesday, while speaking in a Time 100 video message in celebrating of National Voter Registration Day, Harry admitted he was not eligible to vote in America and noted that he had never voted in the U.K. due to guidelines that dictate royals avoid taking sides in politics.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle (Photo by Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images)
Harry went on to ask voters to “reject hate speech” while he noted the undeniable significance of the current race.
“Every four years we are told the same thing, that this is the most important election of our lifetime,” said Markle. “But this one is. When we vote, our values are put into action and our voices are heard. Your voice is a reminder that you matter because you do and you deserve to be heard.”
Despite their civic minded message, some viewers thought the video to be an “obvious” indication that the duo was backing Joe Biden over President Donald Trump, even though a source close to Harry reportedly denied this.
"This is the most important election of our lifetime."
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle discuss voting and the importance of combating misinformation #TIME100https://t.co/zcTlwpDWnk
In response to the heated debate in the U.K. about if Harry broke the rules with his statements, when asked for comment a Buckingham Palace spokesman responded: “We would not comment. The Duke is not a working member of the Royal Family and any comments he makes are made in a personal capacity.”
But DailyMailOnline editor-at-large Piers Morgan – a staunch conservative and longtime colleague of Trump – took issue with Harry and Markle’s stance, opining, “Prince Harry poking his woke nose into the US election and effectively telling Americans to vote against President Trump is completely unacceptable behavior for a member of the Royal Family.”
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The president ‘says the most irrational things,’ Biden maintained, campaigning to replace him.
On Wednesday, President Donald Trump would not commit to a peaceful transition of power if he were to lose the 2020 presidential election in November.
“We’re going to have to see what happens, you know, but I’ve been complaining very strongly about the ballots. The ballots are a disaster,” Trump told White House reporters, referring to the increase of absentee and mail-in voting amid the coronavirus pandemic.
“Get rid of the ballots, and you’ll have a very peaceful — there won’t be a transfer, frankly. There will be a continuation,” Trump said. “The ballots are out of control. You know it, and you know who knows it better than anyone else? The Democrats know it better than anyone else.”
Democratic presidential nominee and former Vice President Joe Biden speaks after a recent tour of Jerry Alander Carpenter Training Center in Hermantown, Minnesota. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
His Democratic rival, former Vice President Joe Biden, responded, when questioned by the press: “What country are we in?”
He contended that while he was being “facetious,” asking that question, the president, “says the most irrational things.” Biden added, “I don’t know what to say.”
That Trump will not commit to a conflict-free transfer of power from his presidency to the next is a warning sign for many, even within his own party.
“Fundamental to democracy is the peaceful transition of power; without that, there is Belarus,” wrote Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, a Republican presidential candidate in 2008 and 2012. “Any suggestion that a president might not respect this Constitutional guarantee is both unthinkable and unacceptable.”
Romney’s comment on Twitter got a reply from Maya Harris, sister of Democratic vice-presidential nominee Sen. Kamala Harris, who tweeted, “Yeah, we know that. Looking for someone to do something about it.”
Trump maintains that mail-in voting is akin to voter fraud, despite all evidence to the contrary. All 50 states have seen an increase in absentee ballot applications amid the coronavirus pandemic as people stay home to avoid catching or spreading the highly transmissible disease.
The Brookings Institute has prepared a scorecard of state-by-state mail-in voter readiness. Alabama ranks last with an F, while most western states have an A rating.
Biotech company Oxitec has created a caterpillar with self-destructing eggs in an attempt to curb agricultural damage. But will other pests simply move in?
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Investigators say Brandon Higgs told the victim ‘This is my hood… Black motherf*ckers, go back to Africa.’
Brandon Higgs will spend over 20 years behind bars for charges related to the 2018 shooting of a Black man in Reisterstown, a suburb of Baltimore.
Investigators say 60-year-old Elvis Smith and 48-year-old Robert Peete first encountered the 26-year-old white supremacist as they laid concrete for a driveway at a residential home in December 2019. Higgs’ dog somehow got loose and ran across the wet concrete. The two men exchanged angry words with Higgs over the dog. Higgs became so enraged during the confrontation that he returned home and moments later emerged with a loaded gun, The Huffington Post reports.
Investigators say Higgs told Smith and Peete “This is my hood… Black motherf*ckers, go back to Africa.” That’s when a shoving match ensued between Smith and Higgs.
Peete said Higgs pointed the gun directly in his face but he managed to get out of the line of fire. According to HuffPost, the men struggled and the gun went off, with the bullet ripping through Smith’s leg and obliterating his tibia.
Brandon Higgs, who was active in private neo-Nazi chat groups, said "Go back to Africa!" before the shooting in a Baltimore suburb. https://t.co/lH5593btVW
After the shooting received national attention, private online chat logs surfaced showing Higgs’ activity with white supremacist groups. In some of the messages he made clear his murderous hatred for Black people.
Reportedly Higgs attended the “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, that turned violent and resulted in the death of Heather Hayer, a paralegal and civil rights activist.
The state did not mention Higgs’ connection to anti-Black extremist groups during opening statements. However, on his arm is a visible yellow tattoo of a lambda in a circle. According to the Anti-Defamation League, the tattoo is an Identitarian lambda, a symbol of the Identitarianism and opposed to multiculturalism.
The former Navy cryptologist was found guilty in January of first-degree assault, attempted voluntary manslaughter, hate crimes and firearms charges.
The judge suspended 15 years of the sentence to 25 years in prison, plus five years probation.
“He’s got a long time to think about the shit he did,” Smith told HuffPost after the sentencing hearing in August. “So I’m happy.”
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As a free and open-source operating system, Linux has spawned several distributions over time, spreading its wings to encompass a large community of users. From desktop/home users to Enterprise environments, Linux has ensured that
Memcached is a high performance free and opensource in-memory key-value store used as a caching system. It’s mainly used for speeding up database-driven sites and web applications by caching data in RAM. In so
Are you on social media a lot? When is the last time you checked Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram? Last night? Before breakfast? Five minutes ago?
If so, you are not alone — which is the point, of course. Humans are highly social creatures. Our brains have become wired to process social information, and we usually feel better when we are connected. Social media taps into this tendency.
“Human brains have essentially evolved because of sociality more than any other thing,” says Sinan Aral, an MIT professor and expert in information technology and marketing. “When you develop a population-scale technology that delivers social signals to the tune of trillions per day in real-time, the rise of social media isn’t unexpected. It’s like tossing a lit match into a pool of gasoline.”
The numbers make this clear. In 2005, about 7 percent of American adults used social media. But by 2017, 80 percent of American adults used Facebook alone. About 3.5 billion people on the planet, out of 7.7 billion, are active social media participants. Globally, during a typical day, people post 500 million tweets, share over 10 billion pieces of Facebook content, and watch over a billion hours of YouTube video.
As social media platforms have grown, though, the once-prevalent, gauzy utopian vision of online community has disappeared. Along with the benefits of easy connectivity and increased information, social media has also become a vehicle for disinformation and political attacks from beyond sovereign borders.
“Social media disrupts our elections, our economy, and our health,” says Aral, who is the David Austin Professor of Management at the MIT Sloan School of Management.
Now Aral has written a book about it. In “The Hype Machine,” published this month by Currency, a Random House imprint, Aral details why social media platforms have become so successful yet so problematic, and suggests ways to improve them.
The book covers some of the same territory as “The Social Dilemma,” a popular documentary on Netflix. But Aral’s book, as he puts it, "starts where ‘The Social Dilemma’ leaves off and goes one step further to ask: What can we do to achieve the promise of social media and avoid its peril?”
“This machine exists in every facet of our lives,” Aral says. “And the question in the book is, what do we do? How do we achieve the promise of this machine and avoid the peril? We’re at a crossroads. What we do next is essential, so I want to equip people, policymakers, and platforms to help us achieve the good outcomes and avoid the bad outcomes.”
When “engagement” equals anger
“The Hype Machine” draws on Aral’s own research about social networks, as well as other findings, from the cognitive sciences, computer science, business, politics, and more. Researchers at the University of California at Los Angeles, for instance, have found that people obtain bigger hits of dopamine — the chemical in our brains highly bound up with motivation and reward — when their social media posts receive more likes.
At the same time, consider a 2018 MIT study by Soroush Vosoughi, an MIT PhD student and now an assistant professor of computer science at Dartmouth College; Deb Roy, MIT professor of media arts and sciences and executive director of the MIT Media Lab; and Aral, who has been studying social networking for 20 years. The three researchers found that on Twitter, from 2006 to 2017, false news stories were 70 percent more likely to be retweeted than true ones. Why? Most likely because false news has greater novelty value compared to the truth, and provokes stronger reactions — especially disgust and surprise.
In this light, the essential tension surrounding social media companies is that their platforms gain audiences and revenue when posts provoke strong emotional responses, often based on dubious content.
“This is a well-designed, well-thought-out machine that has objectives it maximizes,” Aral says. “The business models that run the social-media industrial complex have a lot to do with the outcomes we’re seeing — it’s an attention economy, and businesses want you engaged. How do they get engagement? Well, they give you little dopamine hits, and … get you riled up. That’s why I call it the hype machine. We know strong emotions get us engaged, so [that favors] anger and salacious content.”
From Russia to marketing
“The Hype Machine” explores both the political implications and business dimensions of social media in depth. Certainly social media is fertile terrain for misinformation campaigns. During the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Russia spread false information to at least 126 million people on Facebook and another 20 million people on Instagram (which Facebook owns), and was responsible for 10 million tweets. About 44 percent of adult Americans visited a false news source in the final weeks of the campaign.
“I think we need to be a lot more vigilant than we are,” says Aral.
We do not know if Russia’s efforts altered the outcome of the 2016 election, Aral says, though they may have been fairly effective. Curiously, it is not clear if the same is true of most U.S. corporate engagement efforts.
As Aral examines, digital advertising on most big U.S. online platforms is often wildly ineffective, with academic studies showing that the “lift” generated by ad campaigns — the extent to which they affect consumer action — has been overstated by a factor of hundreds, in some cases. Simply counting clicks on ads is not enough. Instead, online engagement tends to be more effective among new consumers, and when it is targeted well; in that sense, there is a parallel between good marketing and guerilla social media campaigns.
“The two questions I get asked the most these days,” Aral says, “are, one, did Russia succeed in intervening in our democracy? And two, how do I measure the ROI [return on investment] from marketing investments? As I was writing this book, I realized the answer to those two questions is the same.”
Ideas for improvement
“The Hype Machine” has received praise from many commentators. Foster Provost, a professor at New York University’s Stern School of Business, says it is a “masterful integration of science, business, law, and policy.” Duncan Watts, a university professor at the University of Pennsylvania, says the book is “essential reading for anyone who wants to understand how we got here and how we can get somewhere better.”
In that vein, “The Hype Machine” has several detailed suggestions for improving social media. Aral favors automated and user-generated labeling of false news, and limiting revenue-collection that is based on false content. He also calls for firms to help scholars better research the issue of election interference.
Aral believes federal privacy measures could be useful, if we learn from the benefits and missteps of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in Europe and a new California law that lets consumers stop some data-sharing and allows people to find out what information companies have stored about them. He does not endorse breaking up Facebook, and suggests instead that the social media economy needs structural reform. He calls for data portability and interoperability, so “consumers would own their identities and could freely switch from one network to another.” Aral believes that without such fundamental changes, new platforms will simply replace the old ones, propelled by the network effects that drive the social-media economy.
“I do not advocate any one silver bullet,” says Aral, who emphasizes that changes in four areas together — money, code, norms, and laws — can alter the trajectory of the social media industry.
But if things continue without change, Aral adds, Facebook and the other social media giants risk substantial civic backlash and user burnout.
“If you get me angry and riled up, I might click more in the short term, but I might also grow really tired and annoyed by how this is making my life miserable, and I might turn you off entirely,” Aral observes. “I mean, that’s why we have a Delete Facebook movement, that’s why we have a Stop Hate for Profit movement. People are pushing back against the short-term vision, and I think we need to embrace this longer-term vision of a healthier communications ecosystem.”
Changing the social media giants can seem like a tall order. Still, Aral says, these firms are not necessarily destined for domination.
“I don’t think this technology or any other technology has some deterministic endpoint,” Aral says. “I want to bring us back to a more practical reality, which is that technology is what we make it, and we are abdicating our responsibility to steer technology toward good and away from bad. That is the path I try to illuminate in this book.”
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KD was out of the league with an injury this year but understands why some players were tempted to break bubble protocol
,” Durant said, “It was like the maids were all men… everybody… it was nothing but men around.”
House departed the bubble as the Houston Rockets continued in the second round of the NBA playoffs against Los Angeles. The Lakers eventually won the best-of-seven series.
“After a couple months, you down 3-1?” Durant expressed. “Nah. He said ‘I don’t give a f— no more man.'”
According to USA Today Sports, Durant’s timeline was slightly off. The Rockets were down 3-1 to the Los Angeles Lakers at the time of the NBA’s discipline, but the second-round series was tied 1-1, when the incident took place.
Budden, the rapper turned podcast host who brought up the topic, told Durant he feels the current restrictions in the NBA might be a little harder for guys who have been in the league for a while.
“You know how I view the league now that you said that,” Budden said “Some of the grown players that’s been around for a lil’ bit… I see them focused on maybe getting some ass… when times get hard.”
Budden when on to say “The younger generation, I just see them locking in on the Fortnite.”
Durant agreed with Budden about the popularity of the video game among younger players but disagreed that it was an adequate substitute for sex.
“Nah bro… they still men at the end of the day… they want some action too,” Durant said. “But they are into Fornite as well.”
House, a Texas native, is reportedly married to Whitney Grant, a former Texas State University volleyball player. The couple has three children together. Their youngest, Brady is named after NFL quarterback Tom Brady.
Grant made her Instagram page private. Her bio now reads: “Never substitute pleasures for principles.”
House has limited comments on his page since his return from Orlando but posted a smiling pic earlier this week.
Earlier this month he expressed gratitude on social media for all the love and support from fans.
Dallas rapper and producer FXXXXY (born Maudell Watkins) died last week from complications following a routine medical procedure.
The 25-year-old artist was signed to Future’s FreeBandz label. He engineered the song “Solitaires” from the rapper’s recent High Off Life album.
Details about what caused Watkins’ death have not been revealed, Billboard reports.
“We are all deeply saddened by the sudden and unexpected passing of FXXXXY and offer our sincerest condolences to his family, his team, friends and thousands of fans,” said IGA executive vice president Joie Manda in a statement. “Everyone who came into FXXXXY’s orbit was moved by his positive energy and spirit. His talent was undeniable. He was an important member of our IGA family and it’s heartbreaking that he was taken from all of us too soon.”
Watkins’ family said in a statement that they are “totally shocked and devastated at his unexpected and unforeseen passing. We would like to express our heartfelt thanks to his many friends and acquaintances who’ve reached out to us in this extremely difficult time. He lived music with every breath he took and his focus and drive were unmatched. May his contributions to the music industry live forever. CC 4 Life!”
The rapper/producer’s rise to fame began after working with Future on his 2019 EP Save Me. He also collaborated with Gunna (“Need U”) and Lil Durk (“Follow Me”) on singles. In 2016, FXXXXY released the album Cartel Shawty and the following year he dropped Flawed Up Shawty. His most recent release is the single “Paranoia/ #1 Stunna.”
“Flawed Up Shawty is me trying to stay sane and avoid the darkness that this type of recognition swallows people in,” Watkins explained to Complex in 2017. “It’s me trying to cope with losing a relationship with somebody that held me down for so long and shooting shots at everybody who’s been sneak dissing as if we don’t see them. It’s a lot more aggressive and less caring—letting the listener hear my flaws and things that’s not attractive. ‘Flawed up’ is slang for having this strong confidence even though you’re not beautiful to the world or maybe looked at as not valuable.”
Baby Shad, who helped manage Watkins, reacted to his death on Twitter, writing “Rest In Peace,” and “Long Live Fxxxxy.”
Anthony Saleh of Watkins’ management team at Emagen Entertainment Group said, “The FBG team and I are extremely crushed by unexpected news about our brother, FXXXXY. He not only was one of us but, he was the most uplifting and positive whenever he was around. And when he wasn’t around, he made sure to share his light with you from afar. We will never be able to make sense of this no matter how hard we try but will do our best to honor his memory. Rip FBG FOX.”
Future noted on his Instagram Stories that his last conversation with Watkins was “Jus yesterday” and that he’s “GONE WAY TOO SOON,” he wrote.
Fans and fellow artists have been expressing condolences online amid news of his death.
Earlier this month, Watkins expressed gratitude on social media for all the love and support from fans.
“Thank u to every single message,” he shared on Instagram. “Every single person that comment CC. Every single person that play my s–t wit they friends. Every single person who get defensive when my name come up. I can’t wait to prove u right n show u that luv back.”
Funeral services are reportedly being planned in Watkins’ hometown of Dallas.
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An Atlanta cop revealed his law enforcement career abruptly ended after he quit the force in protest of gentrification arrests
After he learned the Atlanta Police Department was working with local building developers to arrest and evict Black residents to aid in gentrification, a white police officer resigned.
Published by Mother Jones, in its editorial project created to share the stories of people who “quit,” the three-year police officer told his story. Identified as 49-year-old Tom Gissler, the former officer detailed how he was instructed to heavily police an apartment complex in the city’s Old Fourth Ward section where most residents are Black.
“On my beat, they started telling me, ‘We really want you to start policing this section of Boulevard and Ponce de Leon Avenue — basically the Bedford Pines Apartments,’” Gissler, who started in April 2017 and left the force in July of this year, wrote in the essay. He continued sharing how his superiors informed him to tow cars, run background checks, and take people into custody.
“We think there are dope boys in there. We think there’s a lot of illegal activity happening and we want to really focus there. So we’re gonna put up signs that say you can’t park on the street. I want you to go and write tickets on every single car that’s on the street and I want you to get those cars out of there; if they don’t move, tow ’em. I want you to start running checks on everybody standing on the street; if they have got warrants, I want you to lock ’em up,” Gissler said he was told.
Gissler spoke to residents after receiving the explicit directive. As a resident of the area himself, he hoped to gain insight into community issues. Homeowners informed the former officer that the owners of the complex allegedly wanted to tear down the residence in alignment with gentrification trends in the city. The complex owners were unable to price out residents by raising rents so getting their tenants arrested was plan B.
Bedford PIne apartments, Atlanta (Apartments.com)
“A homeowner in the area was very frank with me. He said the guys who own Bedford Pines got their tax bill last year, and their taxes were assessed based on all the gentrification that’s happening in the area. And so they wanted to move everybody out of these apartments and knock ’em down and rebuild these nice expensive apartments and the government said no. And so then they said, ‘Well, that’s ok, we’ll just increase the rent.’ They tried to increase the rent and the Section 8 guys came back out and said, ‘No, you can’t do that either,’” he wrote in the Mother Jones essay.
Gissler says he was told the only way to evict a person is if they were convicted of a felony, so the building’s owners allegedly enlisted the police for support in their displacement efforts. Gissler claimed upon learning this information, he went to his higher-ups who confirmed the plot.
“I go to my supervisors: Is this what the case is? And they looked at me like, what are you, stupid? Of course, why else would we be doing this?” he remembered.
Gissler, who had already made clear he would not “lock people up for minor drug stuff,” said the experience opened his eyes to realizing law enforcement as a ” shitty Mafia system.”
“I’m not even a political activist. But something about that smacks of institutional racism, right? I mean, there wasn’t a white person in this whole complex. Most of the renters were single Black girls who are just trying to, you know, make their way in the world” he wrote. “There was something about that that made me think now, when I clock into work, I’m not doing any good. I’m actually doing harm.”
According to the Mother Jones report, he relocated shortly after quitting after he alleged retaliation followed his leave departure from the APD. Claims of child abuse and animal abuse were made against him, in what Gissler said was an attempt to get him to stay.
A police officer wearing a body cam is seen during a demonstration on May 31, 2020 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Elijah Nouvelage/Getty Images)
In a statement provided to theGrio, the Atlanta Police Department said the area near Bedford Pine apartments was targeted strictly for its escalating crime.
“The 600 block of Parkway (near the apartment complex) has been an area well known for the sale of narcotics and other crime to include several shootings over the past year. Officers have been able to identify a lot of the vehicles parked in the roadway in front of the complex as a base of operation for the drug sales and other incidents. To combat this, APD in conjunction with the City of Atlanta designated the area a no parking zone. Multiple “No Parking” signs were put into place well in advance of any enforcement, with the date and time the new rules went into effect on each sign.”
The statement continued “Only after this, were any parking tickets issued or any vehicles impounded. Additionally, we did partner with private security at the location to issue criminal trespass orders to non-residents that were suspected to be involved in the aforementioned crime. No orders to stop citizens and perform background checks for anyone standing on the sidewalks were given.”
According to Curbed Atlanta, in 2017, the first phase of an affordable 80-unit senior housing development, City Lights, was built down the street from the Bedford Pine apartments which are still advertising on Apartmentfinder.com. Apartments listed as nearby start at $1,000 and up. A second development next to City Lights, Station 464, a 96-unit affordable income building for families, is under construction.
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Police Sgt. Lamont Washington said in a news release Wednesday night that there would be an update when possible
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Police in Louisville, Kentucky, say an officer has been shot. It’s not clear if the officer was shot during the protests over a grand jury’s decision to bring no charges against police for the killing of Breonna Taylor during a drug raid gone wrong.
Police Sgt. Lamont Washington said in a news release Wednesday night that there would be an update when possible.
Protesters have been marching through the streets, scuffles have broken out between police and protesters, and some demonstrators were arrested.
Officers in riot gear fired flash bangs and a few small fires burned in a square that’s been at the center of protests, but it had largely cleared out ahead of a nighttime curfew and demonstrators marched through other parts of downtown Louisville.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — A Kentucky grand jury brought no charges against Louisville police for the killing of Breonna Taylor during a drug raid gone wrong, with prosecutors saying Wednesday that two officers who fired their weapons at the Black woman were justified in using force to protect themselves after they faced gunfire.
The only charges were three counts of wanton endangerment against fired Officer Brett Hankison for shooting into a home next to Taylor’s that had people in it. The FBI is still investigating potential violations of federal law in connection with the raid at Taylor’s home on the night of March 13.
Ben Crump, a lawyer for Taylor’s family, denounced the decision as “outrageous and offensive,” and protesters shouting, “No justice, no peace!” marched through the streets. Some sat quietly and wept.
Later, scuffles broke out between police and protesters, and some were arrested. Officers in riot gear fired flash bangs and a few small fires burned in a square that’s been at the center of protests, but it had largely cleared out ahead of a nighttime curfew and demonstrators marched through other parts of downtown Louisville.
“I just want to show my support — justice didn’t get done. So what else can we do?” said Leslie Tillis, 75, who cheered on protesters.
Demonstrators also marched in cities like New York, Chicago, Washington, D.C., Atlanta and Philadelphia.
Taylor, an emergency medical worker, was shot multiple times by white officers who entered her home on a no-knock warrant during a narcotics investigation. State Attorney General Daniel Cameron, however, said the investigation showed the officers announced themselves before entering. The warrant used to search her home was connected to a suspect who did not live there, and no drugs were found inside.
Along with the killing of George Floyd in Minnesota, Taylor’s case became a major touchstone for nationwide protests that have drawn attention to entrenched racism and demanded police reform. Taylor’s image has been painted on streets, emblazoned on protest signs and silk-screened on T-shirts worn by celebrities. Several prominent African American celebrities joined those urging that the officers be charged.
Law enforcement push protesters back on September 23, 2020 in Louisville, Kentucky. (Photo by Brandon Bell/Getty Images)
The announcement drew sadness, frustration and anger that the grand jury did not go further. The wanton endangerment charges each carry a sentence of up to five years.
“To not indict the officers for murder is to claim #BreonnaTaylor killed herself. Racist America constantly kills Black people and then tells Black people we killed ourselves,” tweeted Ibram X. Kendi, director of the Center for Antiracist Research at Boston University and the author of “How to Be an Antiracist.”
Morgan Julianna Lee, a high school student in Charlotte, North Carolina, watched the announcement at home.
“It’s almost like a slap in the face,” the 15-year-old said by phone. “If I, as a Black woman, ever need justice, I will never get it.”
Right after the decision, protesters began gathering in Louisville, with some preparing food and others bringing cases of water to “Injustice Square,” the park where people have demanded justice for Taylor.
While the rallies were largely peaceful, police in protective gear carrying batons mobilized in downtown, and some scuffles broke out. Officers could be seen handcuffing some people. Police also ordered a group that broke off from the protests to disperse, warning that chemical agents might be used if they didn’t.
Gov. Andy Beshear, a Democrat, said he authorized a limited deployment of the National Guard. Guard members and armored military vehicles were in downtown Louisville, and streets were blocked off with barricades, fences and large trucks.
Beshear also urged Cameron, the state attorney general, to post online all the evidence that could be released without affecting the charges filed.
“Those that are currently feeling frustration, feeling hurt, they deserve to know more,” he said.
The case exposed the wide gulf between public opinion on justice for those who kill Black Americans and the laws under which those officers are charged, which regularly favor police and do not often result in steep criminal accusations.
Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron speaks during a press conference to announce a grand jury’s decision to indict one of three Louisville Metro Police Department officers involved in the shooting death of Breonna Taylor on September 23, 2020 in Frankfort, Kentucky. (Photo by Jon Cherry/Getty Images)
At a news conference, Cameron spoke to that disconnect: “Criminal law is not meant to respond to every sorrow and grief.”
“But my heart breaks for the loss of Miss Taylor. … My mother, if something was to happen to me, would find it very hard,” he added, choking up.
But Cameron, who is the state’s first Black attorney general, said the officers acted in self-defense after Taylor’s boyfriend fired at them. He added that Hankison and the two other officers who entered Taylor’s apartment announced themselves before entering — and so did not execute the warrant as “no knock,” according to the investigation. The use of no-knock warrants has since been banned.
“According to Kentucky law, the use of force by (Officers Jonathan) Mattingly and (Myles) Cosgrove was justified to protect themselves,” he said. “This justification bars us from pursuing criminal charges in Miss Breonna Taylor’s death.”
Cameron said an FBI crime lab determined that Cosgrove fired the bullet that killed Taylor.
Taylor’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, opened fire when police burst in, hitting Mattingly. Walker was charged with attempted murder of a police officer, but prosecutors later dropped the charge.
Walker told police he heard knocking but didn’t know who was coming into the home and fired in self-defense.
At a news conference, Trump read a statement from Cameron saying “justice is not often easy.” He praised both Cameron’s handling of the case and the governor’s calling up of the National Guard.
Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden told reporters that he didn’t have enough information on the decision to comment fully but warned protesters to keep demonstrations peaceful.
“Do not sully her memory or her mother’s by engaging in any violence,” he said.
Kamala Harris, Biden’s running mate and a former prosecutor, also told reporters she hadn’t fully read the decision.
“But there’s no question that Breonna Taylor and her family deserved justice yesterday, today and tomorrow, so I’ll review it,” she said.
Hankison was fired on June 23. A termination letter sent to him by interim Louisville Police Chief Robert Schroeder said the white officer had violated procedures by showing “extreme indifference to the value of human life” when he “wantonly and blindly” fired his weapon.
Mattingly, Cosgrove and the detective who sought the warrant, Joshua Jaynes, were placed administrative reassignment.
Last week, the city settled a lawsuit against the three officers brought by Taylor’s mother, Tamika Palmer, agreeing to pay her $12 million and enact police reforms.
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Lovan reported from Frankfort, Kentucky. Associated Press writers Bruce Schreiner and Rebecca Reynolds Yonker in Louisville, Kentucky, Kevin Freking in Washington, Aaron Morrison in New York and Haleluya Hadero in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, contributed.
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Hudsbeth Blackburn is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.
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This story has been updated to clarify that, according to the investigation, officers did not execute the warrant as a no-knock warrant, not that they didn’t use a no-knock warrant.
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This story has been edited to clarify that the shots fired by Hankison entered another home with people inside, not several homes.
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