Muncie Times, Muncie, Delaware County, 7 November 2002 — Page 11

Page 10 • The Muncie Times • November 7, 2002

NEWS BRIEFS from pg. 7 to continue to fight for justice." "I'm glad that the investigation is proceeding," said gubernatorial candidate H. Carl McCall, who was in City Hall Park to pick up an endorsement from a group of nurses. "Their situation appears to be a terrible miscarriage of justice." The Black and Hispanic Council voiced its support for the faith-based initiative, citing in a statement that "the new evidence would, at a minimum, provide reasonable juries with a reasonable doubt." Activists are calling for a massive turnout at the Manhattan Criminal Court, 100 Centre St., Part 58, on Oct. 21. "A crime has been committed against these young men," declared a flier from the Millions for Reparation Criminal Justice Committee, "and the convictions must be overturned!" York Pa Ex-Mayor Found "Not Guilty" of The Murder Of Lillie Belle Allen in 1969 PA. A day after his acquittal on charges of being involved in the killing of a young black woman in this city's 1969 race riots, former Mayor Charlie Robertson stood outside his clapboard house and waved to a passing driver who honked his car horn. "I'm still- the mayor to a lot of people," Mr. Robertson said this afternoon. But to some in York, he is guilty despite being acquitted of first- and second-degree murder charges by an all-white jury

NEWS BRIEFS after a three-week trial. despite fears that the could not work the new

Brian Barbour, who is black and lives in view of where Lillie Belle Allen, 27, was shot on July 21, 1969, said he believed witnesses who testified that Mr. Robertson, then a police officer, handed out ammunition to whites and exhorted them to kill blacks. "Nobody should be in jail, except for the mayor," Mr. Barbour, 42, said. After acquitting Mr. Robertson on Saturday night, jurors convicted two men who prosecutors say were leaders of the white gangs that ambushed Ms. Allen, of Aiken, S.C., and several family members in a predominantly white neighborhood. Prosecutors reopened the case in December 1999, saying witnesses were coming forward with new information. Last year, nine white men were arrested. Six pleaded guilty in August, a month after prosecutors arrested a 10th man, who is to be tried separately. Mr. Robertson said this was his first normal day since his arrest. He said he slept soundly in the house where he was born, went to church, and then stopped by his favorite cafe, Norma's. On the way home, he picked up two bottles of diet soda and a newspaper with his photograph on the front and said he was ready to watch a football game on television. "I feel like a new man, a free man," Mr. Robertson said, adding that he planned to retire, probably in York, and quit politics. The cky also appeared normal today, even placid.

prosecution and trial would re-ignite racial friction. "I was worried that if Charlie didn't get what was coming to him, there was going to be a big riot," said Betty Roach, 62, who lived through the 1969 upheaval. "Bigger than the last." Ms. Roach, who is white, agreed with Margaret Hoff. 43, also white, that political enemies had driven Mr. Robertson's prosecution. While lawyers for the two men convicted of seconddegree murder say they will appeal, prosecution of the 33-year-old crime is, perhaps, coming to a close. York County prosecutors would not say whether they planned to pursue charges against others, and the United States attorney's office has said federal authorities do not have jurisdiction. Voting Cliches Continue To Plague African-American Communities In Miami-Dade New York Black voters were disenfranchised more than others by snafus when Florida's Miami-Dade County introduced electronic voting equipment for the Sept. 10 primary, the American Civil Liberties Union said on Monday. The primary, which gave Bill McBride a narrow victory over former U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination, was marred by glitches at many polling stations in Miami-Dade and neighboring Broward County when stations opened late or poll workers

machines. The two counties had installed touch-screen voting equipment to replace punch-card systems after the 2000 presidential election, which turned into a fiveweek legal battle over vote recounts. Republican George W. Bush eventually defeated Democrat A1 Gore in the state to win the White House. The ACLU released a report on Monday about polling problems in MiamiDade, which was also one of several counties hit by controversy in 2000. It. said that as in 2000, September's voting problems hit blacks worse than other voters. The organization said an examination of 31 problem precincts revealed at least 1,544 "lost" votes, about half of which were from blacks. "Not only are there a significant number of missing votes, but there's also an alarming racial disparity in the errors that occurred during the last election," said JoNel Newman, an ACLU attorney leading the ACLU's voting probe. "That the AfricanAmerican community was disproportionately affected on September 10th is particularly egregious after the well-documented disparities of November 2000." The ACLU obtained a list of 198 precincts reported to have experienced machine malfunctions on Sept. 10. It said those 198 precincts had an average black voter registration of 27 percent, higher than the countywide 19 percent average. Of those 198 precincts.

the legal team focused on 31 for which they had received the most complaints, and where there is an average black voter registration rate of 51 percent. It said that in the 31 precincts, 18,752 voters signed the rolls to vote, but only 17,208 votes were recorded. "That is, 1,544 votes were lost due to electionday errors that included the failure of poll workers to press the red vote button for voters as required by state law or voters not being able to vote because no working machines were available," the ACLU said in a statement. It added the lost votes did not account for voters who were unable to sign in because of polling place closings. The ACLU said that racial disparities shown by its report echoed those of the presidential election of 2000, which were examined by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. The commission's report last year said that statewide, black voters were nearly 10 times more likely than white voters to have their ballots NEWS BRIEFS cont. pg.l 1 Seeking to get things right before the Nov. 5 gubernatorial election, in which the president's younger brother, Republican Gov. Jeb Bush, will be trying to fend off McBride, Miami-Dade authorities have stepped up training of poll workers. The county is also hiring a monitoring group, the Washington-based Center for Democracy, to observe polling.