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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThree Tennessee Men Sentenced for Launching Mortar-Style Fireworks at African-Americans
Thursday, April 12, 2012
Colton L. Partin, 22, of Apison, Tenn., Kyle C. Montgomery, 23, and James Smiley, 27, both of Chattanooga, Tenn., were sentenced today by Chief U.S. District Court Judge Curtis L. Collier. Smiley and Montgomery were sentenced to 12 months in prison and three years of supervised release for conspiring to intimidate African-Americans in the free exercise and enjoyment of housing rights secured to them by the laws of the United States. Partin was sentenced to 18 months probation, including six months home confinement. All three men will also serve 300 hours of community service. The men pleaded guilty on Jan. 6, 2012.
In the early morning hours of July 9, 2011, at least four African-American residents of East Lake Courts Public Housing Authority in Chattanooga were on the porch of one of the units. As they conversed, defendants Smiley, Partin and Montgomery drove by several times yelling racial slurs and launched mortar-type fireworks, from a cylinder, directly toward these individuals. The individuals on the porch avoided the explosions, one of which was captured on video by the Chattanooga Housing Authority. Another explosion shattered a window pane in an apartment of an African-American resident of the East Lake Courts. This individual was asleep inside with her infant child and her boyfriend's adolescent siblings.
Based on a 911 call, the Chattanooga Police Department swiftly apprehended and arrested Smiley, Partin and Montgomery. Fireworks, like the ones fired at the individuals on the porch, were photographed and observed in the bed of the truck. Smiley, Partin and Montgomery admitted their involvement to the officers. They further admitted that the explosives were fired toward the individuals in order to intimidate them because they were African-American.
Todays sentence sends the clear message that every person in our country has the right to live peacefully in their communities free from hate-fueled acts of violence, said Thomas E. Perez, Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division. The department is committed to vigorously enforcing our nations civil rights laws.
This is an example to others that the exhibition of actions based upon racial or any other kind of prejudice will result in federal convictions and confinement, said Bill Killian, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Tennessee. Acts of violence based upon prejudice, regardless of the nature of the prejudice, will be actively prosecuted.
read: http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2012/April/12-crt-470.html
CurtEastPoint
(18,638 posts)bigtree
(85,986 posts). . . all young men with most of their lives ahead of them.
BlueToTheBone
(3,747 posts)And the smiler. Wow.
Fawke Em
(11,366 posts)I hate my short neck, but I'm not a dimwit.
MineralMan
(146,286 posts)I wonder if their 12 months will teach them anything. I hope so, but I'm not optimistic.
hifiguy
(33,688 posts)"Goobers" hits the mark exactly.
southernyankeebelle
(11,304 posts)he'll have a new home at the jailhouse. He doesn't seem like it bothers him much. What rednecks. I'm glad they don't live in my neck of the woods in Tn.
dembotoz
(16,799 posts)exboyfil
(17,862 posts)We had a 30 year sentence for arson here in Iowa (later commuted to about 2 years I think). Would an arson charge have yielded a higher conviction? This is terrorism plain and simple.
bigtree
(85,986 posts). . . this is a relatively light sentence, given the harm those fireworks could have caused.
I'm not sure what the criteria was under the law, or the mitigating factors; such as the nature of the group targeted vs. an individual. and actual physical damage done. I'd guess that the crime and punishment of arson has a longer history of determined legislative efforts and prosecutions behind it. I really don't know why the sentences aren't compatible, but perhaps they should be.
bongbong
(5,436 posts)One can only imagine how harsh the sentence, and charges, would have been if they were Arab-American.