July, 2006

Suburban drug epidemic becomes racial persecution

By Cole Dorsey

Eugene Atkins PHOTO/CONTRIBUTED TO THE PEOPLE’S TRIBUNE

Grandville, an affluent white suburb of Grand Rapids, Mich., is dealing with an epidemic. The epidemic is heroin abuse amongst it's young people. After a couple of deaths involving people in their early twenties due to heroin overdoses, drug enforcement agencies, both local and federal, had to find a scapegoat. They found it in a 21-year old Black man named Eugene Atkins.

Eugene's case seemed doomed from the outset. A 17-year-old white kid from Grandville overdosed from heroin and his buddy Christopher Perrin, who let him die, claimed they got the drugs from Eugene. This revelation came after Perrin lied to a Grand Jury about his involvement in the case. Finally, he admitted to giving the drugs to his friend, throwing blankets on him after he passed out, and leaving him in his car until the morning where he was found dead. Perrin then began working with the police on investigations to better his position when it came time for him to get sentenced, which is when Eugene Atkins' name was introduced.

The prosecution gathered over a dozen young people to testify against Eugene Atkins. They were all white, from Grandville, addicted to drugs, and facing their own criminal charges. In what appeared to be carefully rehearsed recantations, the witnesses each gave nearly identical testimony. All those who testified for the prosecution got drastically reduced sentences. Eugene Atkins was convicted.

The Grand Rapids Press coverage of this story included sinister portraits of Eugene as an evil drug-dealer preying on young people. Any story during this period having to do with heroin included Eugene's case -- and many times his picture. When a City Council member's son from a Grand Rapids suburb was charged with multiple armed robberies to secure money to feed his drug habit, the Press made a point to include that Eugene was on trial for selling drugs to suburban youth even though he had no connection with that case. Eugene wrote in a letter to his Aunt, "They lock us hood kids up and let the suburban ones run back home to Mom and Dad. It makes me mad."

Cole Dorsey (right) and Robert S, host of the “Pulse of the City” radio talk show in Grand Rapids, Mich., at a march in downtown Grand Rapids March 18 protesting the Iraq war. The march and rally represented a broad cross section of people from all different communities and was designed to link various causes so the participants “realize it’s one fight,” said Dorsey. PHOTO/CONTRIBUTED TO THE PEOPLE’S TRIBUNE

After constant pressure by the prosecution and his own court-appointed defense lawyer, Eugene pleaded guilty. They told his mother, Felicia Simms, that he needed to take the 20 to life plea deal because he would definitely be found guilty by a white jury (there was one Black juror). That coerced decision felt so wrong that Eugene wrote a letter to the Judge after the trial saying, "My counsel spent the past year pressuring me into pleading out. My lawyer and the prosecutor feared that Judge Bell would not accept my plea of not guilty because of how messed up I was."

"It makes you wanna cry and makes you so angry because why can't they just be fair?" said his Aunt Glenda Williams after the trial. "I have no faith in the justice system because of this," said his mother. "Black people … your standing in a court of law is not the same as a white person," said Kenneth Muhammad, a local leader for the national Millions More Movement who observed the week-long trial. He pointed out that Christopher Perrin was immediately offered a deal in exchange for his testimony against Atkins. He pled guilty to lying and was then used as a star witness against Atkins.

The Eugene Atkins case is a clear example of the racism and injustice that is inherent in the American judicial system. When justice is meted out by the color of your skin, as is so evident in this case, it becomes clear that Jim Crow hasn't gone anywhere. There is legal lynching going on and Eugene Atkins happens to be the latest victim. They are also using the media to foment racial tension by continually referring to Atkins as the supplier and the white kids as victims.

However, this issue cuts across racial boundaries. When the courts are used to suppress or oppress working class and/or an ethnic group in society, it wreaks of fascism. It is not enough to just recognize injustice. We must continue to organize our working class brothers and sisters, expose this system of all its inequity, and fight for something better. Justice for Eugene Atkins.

Sentencing is scheduled for July 11. Coincidentally, the presiding Judge, Robert Holmes Bell, has a son who is the pastor of Mars Hill church which is in Grandville and happens to be popular among white youth in that area.

Cole Dorsey is a member of the cable access TV program, "Oh say can you S.E.E." (Society for Economic Equality,) one of the founders of Sabo's Infoshop in Grand Rapids, an IWW delegate, and involved in social justice issues. While serving time in state prison, he and others started a community development program to assist inmates upon their release.