DARC to fete olympian, poet, exonerated Central Park jogger
Internationally, nationally
and locally acclaimed individuals
will be feted on Nov. 3 during
the annual Ethiophile Banquet
and Rastafari Meritorious
Awards hosted by Diaspora
African Rastafari Congress
(DARC).
The annual event commemmorates
the coronation of Ethiopian
Emperor Haile Selassie I
and his bride Empress Menen
Asfaw as well as honor distinguished
individuals throughout
the diaspora.
Slated for Antun’s in Queens,
the black-tie gala will pay tribute
to Yusef Salaam, one of
five Harlem youths that was
unlawfully arrested in 1989
and gained national notoriety
with four others to be known
as the Central Park Five.
It is now wide knowledge
that Salaam was railroaded by
a network of collaborators representing
the New York Police
Department, the Manhattan
District Attorney’s office and a
media pool that inveigled negative
public opinion resulting
with conviction and prison sentencing
extending past his adolescence
and into manhood.
Wrongfully convicted,
Salaam was maligned as a
rapist and publicly humiliated
when Donald Trump paid
for full advertising in several
daily newspapers to execute the
youths.
The court case ended with
Salaam a disgraced and convicted
“ We got the
flu vaccine
…not the FLU ‘‘
Caribbean L 14 ife, NOVEMBER 1-7, 2019
youth indelibly stained
by unproven evidence that
he had raped Patricia Miele,
an investment banker whose
association was that she was
the innocent jogger victimized
by the crime. Ultimately,
after serving years in prison,
Salaam was reprieved when
the brutal attacker — incarcerated
for another crime at
the same facility — boasted
he had violated the jogger and
with DNA evidence was proven
the demon.
Since his release, Salaam
has dedicated time and energy
to preventing similar travesties.
Relentless in his attempts
to save innocent Black youths
from a similar fate, he has been
on a mission that DARC recognizes
to be worthy.
“When They See Us” an
enlightening documentary
about the miscarriage of justice
amplified the travesty and perhaps
further vindicated recently
by receiving accolades and
Emmy awards for the research
director Ava Duvernay applied
to the television project.
Her detailing retrospect
forced successful book publisher
Linda Fairstein, the chief
prosecutor of the case and the
alleged principal perpetrator of
coercive interrogation tactics
to resign a position she maintained
since leaving the DA’s
office.
Salaam is neither a Rastafarian
nor a Caribbean national,
however as the lyrics of a
popular reggae song declares,
“You Don’t Haffi Dread To Be
Rasta.”
Olympian John Wesley Carlos
was a champion in Mexico
in 1968. He won a bronze
medal for his third place run in
Yusef Salaam, right, addresses the audience as presenter
Michael B. Jordan looks on during the ACLU SoCal’s 25th
Annual Luncheon at the JW Marriott at LA Live, Friday,
June 7, 2019, in Los Angeles.
Chris Pizzello / Invision / Associated Press, File
the 200 metres race.
His colleague Tommie Smith
took the gold.
History documents that
when the winning pair stood
on the podium to collect their
medals, as the world’s biggest
television viewing audiences
watched, during the playing of
the Star Spangled banner, both
American athletes raised their
fists to dramatize American
racism and the hypocrisy they
believed the world audience of
nations should be informed.
Catch You On The Inside!
Inside Life
By Vinette K. Pryce
Getting vaccinated not only protects you, it also keeps you from spreading the
flu to others who can get seriously ill — including pregnant women, young children,
adults 65 years and older, and people with chronic health conditions.
For more information, call 311 or visit nyc.gov/flu.
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