What Is Currently Going On In Baltimore?

It has been about a week since the worst of the riots in Baltimore.  What has been recently going on?

Protests have been largely celebratory since State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby announced charges against the six police officers involved in Freddie Gray’s arrest, states The Baltimore Sun.

The announcement by the city’s top prosecutor came as a shock to many in the Baltimore Police Department.

The police department officially handed over the case to Mosby’s office last week but will continue to investigate Gray’s death, Commissioner Anthony Batts said.

Gray died April 19, a week after his arrest.

Hundreds rejoiced and sang outside City Hall on Sunday, and many residents attended special worship services across the city, writes The Baltimore Sun.

Crime unrelated to the protests spiked last week, despite the additional police on duty and heavy National Guard presence.

Eight homicides and 12 shootings have been reported across the city since Tuesday.

Outside of the city, observers are looking at how the events in Baltimore will play into presidential campaigns. Former Baltimore mayor and Maryland governor Martin O’Malley said the tensions that erupted into riots last week would be central to his presidential campaign, should he decide to run for office.

The New Republice writes that members of the city’s rival gangs—the Bloods, Crips, Black Guerrilla Family (BGF)—say they’ve declared a truce and vowed to bring peace to their communities.

Many people in the city wonder what might be the long term economic impact to Baltimore after the riots destroyed some businesses, and left many outside the city with a negative image.

Baltimore Curfew Lifted

Baltimore has lifted its overnight curfew that was imposed after riots sparked by the death of a Freddie Gray while in police custody, states The BBC.

National Guard troops are now pulling out of the city, writes the BBC.

The curfew was put in place on Tuesday, after protests over Freddie Gray’s death turned into rioting.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-32573694

Baltimore Police Officers Charged In Freddie Gray’s Murder

Six Baltimore Police officers who were charged Friday in the death of Freddie Gray: Officer Caesar Goodson; Lt. Brian Rice; Sgt. Alicia White; Officer Garrett Miller; Officer William Porter; and Officer Edward Nero.

According to The New York Times, the officers who were arrested, three white and three black, include a lieutenant with 17 years on the force, several near-rookies and a woman who had just been promoted to sergeant.

The most serious charges were brought against Officer Caesar R. Goodson Jr., who was driving the van that carried Mr. Gray to a police station after his April 12 arrest. Along with involuntary manslaughter, Officer Goodson, 45, was charged with “second-degree depraved heart murder,” which means indifference to human life.

According to The Baltimore Sun, the other officers were charged with offenses that included involuntary manslaughter, vehicular manslaughter, second-degree assault, false imprisonment and misconduct in office. The officers were taken into custody Friday and released on bail.

Is There Hope In Baltimore?

Sam Seder

Is there hope in Baltimore? And if there’s no hope, what do we do about it?

Recent Wal-Mart Developments

The United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) International Union said it planned to seek an injunction from the National Labor Relations Board on Monday to get retailer Wal-Mart to rehire 2,200 employees at five recently closed stores, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

The UFCW claims that Wal-Mart Stores closed its Pico Rivera, CA location in retaliation for protests by workers there in recent years seeking higher pay and benefits, states the Post-Dispatch.  Other closed locations are in Florida, Texas, and Oklahoma.

Walmart’s spokesperson, Delia Garcia, claimed “these are not layoffs” just before clarifying that “everyone will have to reapply as if new employees” once the stores reopen, states Jobs With Justice.

Wal-Mart has argued it closed the stores because of “major plumbing issues.” They had said the stores would remain closed to up to six months, according to the Associated Press.

However, Jobs With Justice states that according to city officials in the city of Pico Rivera, Walmart has not applied for permits to engage in plumbing work.

The group OUR Walmart filed the charge with the National Labor Relations Board on Monday, and argues the closings were a “retaliatory” measure against employees.

The store in Pico Rivera, California, was reportedly a hotbed for worker protesting.

The group wants the board to seek a court injunction, which can be quicker than typical NLRB proceedings.

In other related news, Wal-Mart is increasing the pressure on suppliers to cut the cost of their products in an effort to regain the image of low-price leader and turn around its sluggish U.S. sales, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Wal-Mart says it has been telling suppliers to forgo investments in joint marketing with the retailer and to put the savings into lower prices instead. Makers of branded consumer products from diapers to yogurt typically set aside a part of their budgets for marketing with Wal-Mart, spending on things like product displays and online advertisements.

Wal-Mart has long had a reputation for pressing its suppliers to cut costs to help lower prices, but the retailer’s new leadership has embraced the concept with “fresh vigor,” states the Wall Street Journal.

With the growth of dollar stores and other discounters, Wal-Mart is facing more competition on price, which for many customers is the most important point.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the new order to lower prices “is creating tension with companies that supply the hundreds of thousands of products on Wal-Mart’s shelves.”

More here

David Cross and Sam Seder Discuss Horses In New York

Comedian David Cross and Majority Report and discuss the coming NYC horse carriage ban, which leads them talking about horses and protests.  Sam Seder and David Cross reminisce about an anti-war protest.

Sam Seder

Oops: German Anti-Islam Protest Leader Seen Dressed Like Hitler

The leader of the anti-Islamisation PEGIDA movement in Germany has stepped down after a photo of him posing as Hitler was published in the Bild newspaper.

Lutz Bachmann also made comments on Facebook where he apparently called refugees ‘animals’ and ‘scumbags’ but made no reference to the photo.

He now finds himself under investigation for incitement to racial hatred.

Prosecutors opened preliminary proceedings after the publication of the Bild report.

euronews

Up To 100,000 Protesters Expected To March In Leipzig, Germany

NPR states that according to organizers, as many as 60,000 people could attend an anti-Islamization rally in the eastern German city of Leipzig today. It could be one of the biggest protests there since pro-democracy marches a quarter-century ago.

NPR’s Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson states, “Organizers of the anti-Islam protest say they have two goals: One is to show the German government they won’t be silenced, just like the protesters who brought down the East German government 25 years ago.

“They also say they are snubbing Muslim extremists who are accused of threatening one of the Dresden leaders of the anti-Islam movement earlier this week.”

Deutsche Welle writes: “‘There is no concrete [terror] threat, such as the one in Dresden,’ Saxony’s Interior Ministry said. On Monday, PEGIDA’s Dresden march was called off following a death threat against the movement’s leader Lutz Bachmann.

According to NPR, German prosecutors opened an investigation into one of the PEGIDA’s leaders.  Bild, a mass-circulation newspaper, printed a photograph of a man it said was Lutz Bachmann, 41, posing as Adolf Hitler,

Counterprotests in Dresden were also cancelled.

Soraya says about 4,000 police officers from around the region have arrived in downtown Leipzig to prevent expected clashes between the demonstrators and their opponents. Nineteen counterdemonstrations are registered with authorities for this evening.

Deutsche Welle states: “‘LEGIDA,’ the Leipzig offshoot of anti-Islamization movement PEGIDA expects some 30,0000 to 40,000 protesters to march through the eastern German city on Wednesday. Organizers of the demonstration, however, have said the goal is ‘at least 60,000.’ Unlike in Saxony’s capital, Dresden, on Monday, no ban on public assembly has been enforced.

In response to the LEGIDA / PEGIDA rally, some 19 counter-demonstrations, such as sit-ins, have been organized, which could bring the numbers of people on the streets up to 100,000.

German PEGIDA Protest Cancelled Due To Terrorist Threat

euronews

Euronews claims that the weekly march in the German city of Dresden organized by the organisation PEGIDA – Patriotic Europeans against the “Islamization” of the West has been called off because of a security threat.

PEGIDA is an “anti-Islamization” movement in Germany.

Also, Several thousand people took to the streets of Berlin and other German cities on Monday night to protest their opposition to PEGIDA.

PEGIDA, which drew a record 25,000 to its march last week denies claims the group is racist and says it tries to distinguish between Islamists and most of Germany’s four million Muslims.

Who Was Hrant Dink?

euronews

Hrant Dink was a highly-esteemed Turkish-Armenian editor-in-chief of weekly Agos. According to Wikipedia, Agos is an Armenian bilingual weekly newspaper published in Istanbul, Turkey.

Dink was murdered in broad daylight in front of his newspaper’s building on January 19th, 2007, by a 17-year-old Turkish nationalist. The triggerman, Ogün Samast, was convicted of premeditated murder and sentenced to 22 years and 10 months of prison after a two-year trial.

The trial into the murder resumed Sept. 17, 2013, after the Supreme Court of Appeals ruled that all suspects in the case had acted as part of a criminal organization, rather than individually.

Istanbul’s 5th High Criminal Court, which is overseeing the case, announced on Oct. 30, 2014, that it will focus on the “criminal organization” allegations against suspects, a move that lawyers representing the victim’s family have demanded since the start of the retrial.

Yusuf Hayal and Erhan Tuncel are accused of convincing Samast in Trabzon to shoot Dink.

Turkey’s Constitutional Court stated that civil servants and institutions allegedly implicated in the murder of Dink should be investigated. Its detailed ruling on the case was on Nov. 12, 2014.

Thousands of people recently have taken to the streets of Istanbul to commemorate the death Dink, who was shot eight years ago on January 19th, 2007.