Summary
Three white students were identified as being responsible and the principal recommended they be expelled from school. However, the white superintendent said, "Adolescents play pranks," the superintendent told the Chicago Tribune, "I don't think it was a threat against anybody," and gave them a three day suspension instead.
A few days later, the entire Black student body protested the no-nothing 'punishment' and sat under "the white tree". That day the white District Attorney came to Jena High School for an impromptu assembly, with back-up law enforcement. It has been reported that the DA threatened the silent Black students who were sitting under the tree, saying if they did not stop making a fuss about the "innocent prank...I can be your best friend or your worst enemy. I can take away your lives with a stroke of my pen." The school was then put on lockdown for the remaining week.Seventeen-year-old Robert Bailey Junior -bail was set at $138,000; 17-year-old Theo Shaw - bail was set at $130,000; 18-year-old Carwin Jones - bail was set at $100,000; 17-year-old Bryant Purvis - bail was set at $70,000; 16-year-old Mychal Bell - bail was set at $90,000 (a sophomore in high school, was charged as an adult). There remains another unidentified minor.See the full content of this document
Extract
A Timeline Leading Up to the Jena 6
In the front yard at a high school in Jena, La., with a total population of 4,000, there sits a tree. This is "the white tree", where only white students sit during breaks.
In September of 2006, a Black s...See the full content of this document
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