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Rap star Jay Z has quietly sent thousands of dollars to help bail out protesters from Baltimore’s jail system, a writer who worked with him on his 2010 memoir said. Dream Hampton, who helped Jay Z author “Decoded,” revealed the rapper’s cash infusions via Twitter. The messages were shortly after deleted – but not before the hip-hop magazine Complex picked them up and reported them, Agence France-Presse said. Among the tweets: “When we needed money for bail for Baltimore protesters, I … hit Jay up, as I had for Ferguson [and he] wired tens of thousands [of dollars].”

BREAKING:Charges will not be filed against MPD Officer Matt Kenny in the shooting death of Tony Robinson Updated: Tue 3:17 PM, May 12, 2015 MADISON, Wis.---BREAKING: DA Ozanne: Charges will not be filed against MPD Officer Matt Kenny in the shooting death of Tony Robinson. UPDATED: Tuesday, May 12, 2015 ---3:17 p.m. MADISON, Wis.---BREAKING: DA Ozanne: Charges will not be filed against MPD Officer Matt Kenny in the shooting death of Tony Robinson. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It’s a dignity thing — democracy is threatened by racism and poverty. The two seminal pieces of Legislation in the 20th century happened just before the tumult of 1968–the Civil Rights Act in 1964 and the Voting Rights Act in 1965. Fifty years later, we ought to be in a season of celebration. Instead, we find ourselves in an American catastrophe. Trayvon Martin. Eric Garner. Freddie Gray. On April 4, 1967, Martin Luther King Jr. gave the most controversial speech of his life, “Beyond Vietnam.” A year later to the day, almost to the hour, he was assassinated. In that...

As Baltimore burns, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake is turning the flip-flop into a high art form, to the point where she is now apologizing to the rioters for calling them “thugs.” She stated early Monday that police were instructed to allow “those who wished to destroy space to do that.” By Monday evening, facing heavy criticism from residents and business owners, she walked back from those comments. As the city was in flames Monday night, Rawlings-Blake spoke freely on CNN about “thugs” and “criminals” who were destroying what so many had worked so hard to build, even as Marxist professor Marc...

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Where are the black fathers in Baltimore? They don‘t exist. I saw black mothers in the streets. I saw black male teens. But no black fathers trying to keep their kids off the streets and away from violence. Where is Barack Obama? Our nation’s first black president has been silent as blacks tear apart a major America city. He’s quick to weigh in and assign blame every time one black kid gets shot by a white cop. But not a word on the day thousands of blacks rampage and terrorize a city? Not a word ever about black-on-black crime? As...

A 12-year-old boy swept up glass in front of his family’s cornerstore early Tuesday morning. Among the detritus that littered the sidewalk were a few Butterfingers, pieces of gum, and a single roll of pennies. That seems to be the value of what’s left in this store run by a family of Chinese immigrants after the looting. “They just stole everything,” the boy said. The family had been in New York, celebrating the wedding of a family member. They returned to a Baltimore that in places is unrecognizable thanks to the chaos following Freddie Gray’s funeral. They weren’t the only...

In a list that included Pope Francis and tech billionaires, two Ferguson protesters were lauded as among the 50 “greatest leaders,” by Fortune magazine. Fortune described the people who made the list as “extraordinary men and women” who are “transforming business, government, philanthropy, and so much more.” If by transforming businesses, Fortune means looting and burning them, no argument here. Deray McKesson and Johnetta Elzie helped whip up the Ferguson mobs that terrorized the city in service of a lie. Not that Fortune would tell readers that

A St. Louis community activist told a civil rights commission that he is worried that rising temperatures will bring more violence in a region that saw widespread riots last year after Michael Brown’s death and is becoming more “volatile.”

Black rioting and looting are not caused by any conflicts between US cops and black criminals, although these can be used as a pretext. Events in South Africa show that it is in fact a far more widespread, global phenomenon. And in this case blacks form the country's majority, targeting a powerless minority: so, who's racist and xenophobic now? For a week, at the end of January, a mob in South Africa lynched Ethiopians, Somalis and immigrants of other nationalities living in Nelson Mandela's country, and raided and looted their stores. At least 4 people were killed and over...

FERGUSON, MO (KTVI) – For the past five weeks, FOX 2 has worked with St. Louis County police to show surveillance footage of hundreds of criminals looting businesses in the Ferguson aftermath. The goal is to identify these looters, but these videos also provide a unique opportunity for law enforcement and criminologists to take a closer look at their behavior. On August 10th, the day after Michael Brown was shot; several people broke through the security gate outside prime sole shoe store on West Florissant. Throughout the 14-minute surveillance video, people casually walk in, grab Jordans, then other Nikes, and...

It was an overcast Saturday in August, eight days after Michael Brown's death, when Juanita Morris rushed barefoot out the front door of Fashions R Boutique to watch hundreds of protesters surging north on West Florrisant Avenue. She was too excited to remember her shoes. "I was working and I saw my people out here, I'm for it, I'm supporting it, so I came out," said Morris, who moved her boutique to this spot in Dellwood ten years ago. She said she wasn't afraid of the looters and vandals that struck other business the previous night. She refused to board...

While things have obviously not returned entirely to normal in and around Ferguson, Missouri, people have to eventually get back to the normal business of day to day life. This includes the police, apparently, who had a lot of loose ends to tie up following all of the lawlessness and mayhem. Rod Kackley at PJ Media caught wind of some recent efforts by the St. Louis County PD to catch up with some of the looters via social media. But while the drama between legal minds plays out, St. Louis County, Mo., police officers enlisted the aid of the department’s...

Oprah Winfrey has been watching the protests in Ferguson and New York like everyone else. "I think it's wonderful to march and to protest and it's wonderful to see all across the country, people doing it," she tells PEOPLE exclusively. But it's not enough to march, says Winfrey. "What I'm looking for is some kind of leadership to come out of this to say, 'This is what we want. This is what has to change, and these are the steps that we need to take to make these changes, and this is what we're willing to do to get it.'"...

Three people are facing charges after allegedly looting a beauty supply store in Ferguson Tuesday night. 25-year-old Lysha Merritt, 23-year-old Farraad Rogers-Bolden (pictured above), and 20-year-old Ronda Atkins-Rogers (pictured above) have formally been charged in connection to the robbery. Police said the three were among the six people caught looting a burned out beauty supply store. Police say Rogers-Bolden was sentenced to five years probation in 2013 for theft, however the court suspended that sentence. The other two suspects, Atkins-Rogers and Merritt, have no prior records. Both women are facing possible burglary and theft charges. Shots were fired after officers...

What to say about “activists” pushing the “Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” “movement,” even as police shootings of blacks are actually down 75 percent over the last 45 years? Some protesters, many old enough to know better, say ridiculous things about race relations, like “things have gone backward.” Time for perspective.

FERGUSON, Missouri – A federal judge ruled Thursday that police can no longer use tear gas on protesters without declaring an illegal assembly, giving them fair warning and time to vacate the area.

Charles Barkley of NBA fame said he’s not backtracking on his earlier characterization of Ferguson violent rioters and looters as “scumbags” — and moreover, the grand jury was quite right in not indicting policeman Darren Wilson. ... “We, as black people, we have a lot of crooks,” he said, CNN reported. “We can’t just wait until something like [the Brown shooting] happens. We have to look at ourselves in the mirror. There is a reason that they racially profile us in the way they do. Sometimes it is wrong. and sometimes it is right.” ... “To be burning peoples’ property,...

Earlier this semester, the UNC-Wilmington African American Center hosted a panel discussion on the Ferguson race riots. A student of mine noticed that none of the panel participants actually visited Ferguson. Given that I interviewed protestors on site in Ferguson in August, the student wanted to know why I was excluded from the panel. It would only make sense to assume that I had some unique insights into the Ferguson situation relative to those who had never actually been there. Of course, the problem with my student is that he is a man of principle and thus fails to comprehend...

A crowdfunding campaign advertising itself as the Ferguson Legal Defense Fund has been running a campaign since October that boasts a goal of raising $250,000 for protesters in Ferguson, Missouri, seeking “money for jail, bail & life.” Protesters have been voicing outrage over the shooting death of Michael Brown, ratcheting up demonstrations in the days surrounding a grand jury decision over whether to indict the officer who shot Brown....