Of course it may be hard to predict prosecutorial competence or jury bias, but on the surface, it looks like the additional charges should stick.

I think there actually is evidence of bias. On the most literal level, at least one of the defendants has confessed that racial epithets were used by the perpetrators.

Bobby Brewster’s statement also said that Karen Burton cut and pulled out Megan’s hair, choked her, cut her ankle and forced her to perform oral sex on Frankie Brewster. His statement noted repeated instances when the N-word was used during the alleged attack.

Furthermore forensic evaluations for the sequelae of physical and psychological torture can provide further evidence for the prosecution.

If bias can be proven based on the confessions of some of the defendants, then I would say that the abuse can be judged as racially motivated.

It is also my opinion—though perhaps less likely to fly in court—that these acts of physical and psychological torture are themselves demonstrations of bias. Without a doubt, threats of hanging are no different than nooses. They cannot be separated from their historical meaning.

But I want to say even further that the reason why I am talking about whites going ape shit and white bloodlust for Blacks is that we have to recognize that racial violence has this dimension. I make this assertion from my perspective, as someone who studies the history of mid-twentieth century racial violence in the South. This kind of mind boggling violence against a Black person is eerily familiar to me.

Of course, in Megan’s case, the brutal physical assaults add another major dimension. It obviously can’t be the motive of all 6 as retaliation, since the police were called on just one. So her attorney has to raise the question: if this was not bias, what other possible motivation exists?

Gang violence by whites against Blacks has often been extra-judicial punishment for perceived affronts to segregationist decorum: registering to vote, buying property, Black men’s interest (or perceived interest) in white women, a lack of adequate deference to whites, pressing charges against whites for their crimes against Blacks, etc. When extra-judicial mob violence rises to the level of execution, it is called lynching. Arguably, Megan Williams has survived a lynching.

Perceived violations, real or imagined, of segregationist decorum make some whites go ape shit. I am not talking about a literal motive (Bobby Brewster was angry at Megan Williams for filing charges against him) so much as I am talking about the psychology of the white torturers. While I think it is unlikely that the psychology of white-on-Black racist violence would be considered in a court of law, it is the best way I can explain why those six whites behaved with such blood thirsty abandon.

Unless I missed details elsewhere, the only evident bias - besides the race of each (which proves nada) is Megan’s words. If six defendants deny it, it comes down to hearsay.

And I don’t say this from anything but an observation of a different gangrape case. Because three guys said it was consensual, and she’d previously had a relationship with one of the men, the prosecutor ultimately decided to charge her with filing a false police report.

In that case, the gender bias was obvious in the initial outcome. The judge indicated inconsistencies existed in the stories of BOTH sides…. then ruled against the woman. Had it not been for the prior relationship, it would have been harder to make such a judgment, skewed as it was.

Of course, in Megan’s case, the brutal physical assaults add another major dimension. It obviously can’t be the motive of all 6 as retaliation, since the police were called on just one. So her attorney has to raise the question: if this was not bias, what other possible motivation exists?

People may back up their friends to bully someone, but how many cases can a jury think of where that bullying includes multiple rapes and stabbings?

I believe her, but would a jury or judge find it proven beyond a reasonable doubt?

Even if they don’t, with all the other charges, I should think convictions and maximum sentences are in order. It’s hard to see how the perps can avoid that, unless the bias of the judge and jury adds to her injuries.

Initially I felt very strongly that this was a hate crime, then I started second guessing myself as more details trickled out. At this point, with everything I know now, I’m back to thinking that this was definitely a hate crime. I do still think that even though these people are already facing life in prison, hate crime charges should be filed (for all the reasons I’ve already discussed on my blog).

Thanks for this post and the discussion of the real aims of racial segregation. It has given me a lot to think about.

I just noticed you’ve done some first-hand writing about the Gulf Coast, including the MS Gulf Coast. I am going to check it out!

You can see that same crap that I already buried here: http://www.blackperspective.net/index.php/megan-williams-invisible-black-women-pt2/#comments

Good synthesis on your part all the way around. Blair refuses to answer for how mere domestic violence or rataliation applies to the other 5 that she wasn’t in a relationship with.

I can’t really tell what point you are trying to make by bringing up these other terrible stories of sexual violence, torture and murder.

Are you familiar with the details of the Megan Williams case? There were 6 perpetrators and the torture, stabbing, rape, threats of hanging, burning and more occurred over at least a one week, possibly more than 5 week, period.

My point was that what might have started out as retaliation by a lover escalated into something more or other than that.

I am making an argument about how recognizable misogynistic violence intersects with racist violence. The southern context is significant because of the power dynamics in interracial relationships that have always been a feature of southern society.

What are you trying to say is more or less clear cut about any of these cases??

There are other controvrsial cases that have attracted little attention that seem more clear cut than the Megan Williams case.

Last January, two Knoxville Tennessee residents, college student Channon Christian 21, set to graduate this year and her boyfriend Chris Newsom 23 were minding their own business and going about their own lives when they were carjacked by two black males, Devall Davidson[5] and Letalvis Darnell Cobbins. Just taking Christian’s Toyota 4-Runner wasn’t all these two had in mind, they kidnapped the boyfriend/girlfriend pair and forced Christian and Newsom to accompany them back to their ‘seedy rental house,’ where they then enlisted the help of two others, including a black female named Vanessa Coleman and proceeded to sodomize Chris Newsom in front of Channon before they emasculated him and shot him in the head. He was then “bound and his body wrapped up in bedding and set afire,” prior to being “discarded like trash along nearby railroad tracks.”

A most horrific and unimaginable fate awaited Channon, after being traumatized by seeing her boyfriend raped and executed before her eyes, the three males, Davidson, Cobbins and George Thomas with the assistance of the female Coleman proceeded to subject Channon to a brutal and continuous series of rapes, including sodomy and God knows what else over a period of two days inside that house – they literally tortured her in ways that defy even the most jaded imagination for two days! Later her “battered body was found stuffed in a trash can.”

“Battered” in this case means that she was dismembered so that her corpse would fit neatly into several plastic bags. According to Vanessa Coleman, after they tired of torturing and raping Channon, the men urinated on her, and poured “cleaning chemicals” into her mouth and down her throat in an effort to destroy the physical evidence they had left behind. They then inexplicably cut off her breasts, dismembered her body and threw it in a trash can at the residence.

On September 21, 2007, to cite another case, a 12-year old white girl named Emily Haddock was home sick from school. Four black males broke into her home and shot her in the head numerous times. Her body was found later that same day by her grandfather. Initially the police described the murder scene as “brutal,” but didn’t elaborate. Almost immediately a shroud enveloped the case and any further details have been carefully suppressed.