Third Chardon High School shooting victim that dies is Black student named Demetrius Hewlin, 16

Demetrius Hewlin

By Kathy Wray Coleman, Editor, Cleveland Urban News.Com(www.clevelandurbannews.com)

CHARDON, Ohio-In spite of a Black population of roughly a half of a percent in the once obscure city of Chardon, Oh., a small town in Geauga County of some 5, 000 people that lies 35 miles east of the largely Black major metropolitan city of Cleveland, a Black teen is the third of three students to die among five students shot during a shooting rampage by gunman Thomas "TJ" Lane, 16, who let loose in the school cafeteria Mon. morning.

Demetrius Hewlin, 17, died at Metro-Health Hospital in Cleveland Tues. afternoon, police said.

His family donated his organs to Lifebanc, saying that that was what he wanted.

The other two fatally injured victims, Daniel Parmertor, 16, and Russell King, 17, died Mon.

A fourth and fifth student remain hospitalized.

Meanwhile, Lane, who was also a student at the school, and a kid that his classmates say was bullied and deemed an outcast, remains in police custody. He was charged on Thurs. with three juvenile counts of aggravated murder, two counts of attempted aggravated murder and one count of felonious assault.

His friends reportedly told police that to their knowledge he just suddenly went off, allegedly out of anger at Parmertor for dating a former girlfriend that had jilted him.

The Black community was saddened to hear about Hewlin especially, with some chanting by land line telephones and cell phones, primarily to each other, that "the third student was Black," and a few worrying if race is playing any part in the media's interests in his unprecedented death.

Some yielded a sigh of relief that the shooter is White, saying the Black community cannot stand another unwarranted stigma, and others said they were proud that the profile of these teen serial killers are traditionally not Black teens and, instead, are disgruntled and emotionally malnourished White males.

And national cable network personalities like CNN's the Rev. Al. Sharpton have motivated discussion around the racial politics of rampant school shootings with guests forcing questions on why White kids that kill are routinely analyzed by media pundits as having problems coping with life while similarly situated Black males are too frequently branded merely thugs.

But in the end, most are simply brokenhearted at the loss of lives so young in the city of Chardon , and some of them are reminded once again that "But there for the grace of God go I," be I White, Black or other.

State Rep. Bill Patmon (D-10), a Cleveland Democrat on a mission with community activists behind him for a state law that makes it illegal for school districts not to have metal detectors, said that teen violence in America's schools transcends racial and ethic lines.

"School violence impacts all of us," said Patmon.

Reach Kathy Wray Coleman by email at kathy@kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, and by telephone at 216-932-3114.

Rep. Patmon wants law for metal detectors like Cleveland has in aftermath of Chardon school shooting that left 2 dead, Kasich calls for prayer

Ohio State Rep. Bill Patmon (D-Cleveland)

Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R-OH)

Suspected Chardon High School Gunman Thomas "TJ" Lane

From the Metro Desk of The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com and Cleveland Urban News.Com(www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com) and (www.clevelandurbannews.com)

CLEVELAND, Ohio-Following the aftermath of a shooting Mon. morning by a craze student in the cafeteria of Chardon High School that left two students dead, three others hospitalized, and a town in grief, a state legislator is calling for metal detectors in all of Ohio's public schools.

"What happen is horrendous and you have to wonder what is going on in and out of our schools for this type of hate and destructive behavior to occur, " said state Rep. Bill Patmon (D-10), a Cleveland Democrat. "I would support a state law for a requirement for all Ohio schools districts to install metal detectors in all of its schools."

Community activist groups such as The Imperial Women have asked Patmon to lead the charge for Ohio to put children first by introducing a bill that makes it illegal for public school districts to not have metal detectors in its schools, given the educational climate in Ohio, and nationally.

They say that it is time for educational priorities to change, while reminding Ohio legislators that the Ohio Constitution gives the state legislature the responsibility of ensuring access to a thorough and efficient education to all of Ohio's children, inclusive of school safety policies void of negligent criteria that might not pass constitutional muster.

A city of some 5,000 people that lies 35 miles east of Cleveland that is roughly 98 percent White with families with a median income of $46 thousand annually, the quiet town and tight-nit community of Chardon has become Ohio's Columbine, and in an overnight fashion.

The 17- year old suspect, later identified as Thomas "TJ" Lane, targeted a table of five boys, witnesses told police, and in particular the teen that was allegedly dating a former girlfriend that had reportedly jilted the loner.

He remains in police custody and has not yet been charged.

Lane lived with his grandparents and was from a broken home.

His father has a felony rap sheet including a plea deal that got him four years in prison on a reduced charge from original charges of murder and kidnapping.

After the shooting two students were taken by ambulance to Hillcrest Hospital in Mayfield Hts. and three were taken by helicopter to Cleveland's Metro-Health Hospital.

Dead are 16-year-old Daniel Parmertor, the teen that his classmates said was the target for allegedly dating Lane's former girlfriend, and 17-year-old Russell King, Jr, whom doctors declared brain dead. Both were shot in the head.

The other three victims remain hospitalized.

Gov. John Kasich (R-OH) on Tues. ordered that the Statehouse flags be flown at half-staff in memory of the two fallen students as he prepared for a evening vigil and memorial.

"Please join me in praying for the students who've been injured in this horrible crime," the governor said in a press release shortly after Monday's terrible shooting."Praise goes to the Chardon police and Geauga County sheriff's office for quickly getting this situation under control. I've pledged Ohio's full support to them, the school and the local community in this difficult time."

Witnesses said that Lane, who has no criminal record, was chased out of the school by brave and determined assistant football coach Frank Hall, now a hero who is believed to have save lies.

He surrendered to police hours later.

Unlike the Cleveland Municipal School District that now has metal detectors in all of its schools, the Chardon schools did not have that luxury.

"Yes mam," said Cleveland schools spokesperson Brenda Morris," We have metal detectors in every one of Cleveland's public schools.

Cleveland schools met tragedy with a school shooting three and half years ago that brought national attention, but it in no way compared to this week's Chardon fiasco, by some standards.

That shooting occurred in Oct. 2007 at the district's Success Tech High School where.

then 14-year-old freshman Asa H. Coon shot two students and two teachers before committing suicide on the fourth floor of the building.

Coon fit a profile similar to that of Lane. He was White, male, and an outcast.

Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson, who controls the city schools via state law, ordered the metal detectors after the Success Tech incident, a project that schools officials said began in the high schools and was completed district-wide two years ago. He had no comment on the Chardon tragedy.

"No comment," said Jackson's press secretary Andrea Taylor.

The East Cleveland City School District, a majority Black impoverished school district like Cleveland that borders Cleveland, has metal detectors in Shaw High School, its only high school, and at Heritage Middle School.

Warrensville Hts. High School, which serves the majority Black city of Warrensville, also a Cleveland suburb, has metal detectors too.

But the nearby Shaker School District and the bordering Cleveland Hts-University Hts schools do not have them, something typical of middle class and upper middle class largely White school districts, until tragedy strikes.

Reach Kathy Wray Coleman by email at kathy@kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, and by telephone at 216-932-3114.

Activists to picket Cleveland NAACP President George Forbes March 2 for supporting Tim McGinty as county prosecutor, his mistreatment of Blacks, women

Cleveland NAACP President George Forbes, whom community activists will picket on Fri., March 2 for his support of Tim McGinty for county prosecutor and what they say is Forbes harassment of Blacks and women to accommodate racist Whites like McGinty that have infringed upon their constitutional and statutory rights


From the Metro Desk of The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com and Cleveland Urban News.Com(www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com) and (www.clevelandurbannews.com)

CLEVELAND, Ohio-Grassroots activists will picket Cleveland NAACP President George Forbes at the organization's headquarters at 2131 Stokes Blvd. in Cleveland on Fri., March 2 at 4:30 pm.

They say that Forbes will not stand up for Blacks and women on crucial matters and that he is supporting Tim McGinty for Cuyahoga County prosecutor in spite of McGinty's record as a former assistant county prosecutor and prior common pleas judge who had Black men maliciously prosecuted on rape charges relative to White women and whose judicial orders to illegally imprison Black men and harass women and community activists were repeatedly overturned on appeal.

"George Forbes has not represented the interests of the Black community as president of the local chapter of the nation's most renowned Civil Rights organization and he has gone too far many times, including endorsing higher Shell gas station prices on the majority Black east side of Cleveland than on the majority White west side, but this time he has gone overboard in supporting or endorsing Tim McGinty for county prosecutor," said Community Activist Ada Averyhart, a member of The Imperial Women and The Carl Stokes Brigade who is organizing the protest with other grassroots people. "We urge others to join us to call attention to Mr. Forbes hatred of his own people and his selfishness in selling us out for money and other favors."

Contacts for the rally are Ada Averyhart at 216-938-7891, Marva Patterson at 216-334-7013 and Imperial Women Leader Kathy Wray Coleman at 216-932-3114.

Averyhart said that Forbes does more than nothing, he helps do in Blacks.

Patterson, also a community activist, said that instead of protecting the constitutional and statutory rights of Blacks, Forbes is allegedly "perpetuating discrimination against them."

At the protest, she will read the list of concerns the activist groups have about Forbes and Cleveland NAACP officials from his silence regarding negligence around the Imperial Ave Murders, to allowing the theft by illegal foreclosure activity on Black people's homes, to malicious prosecutions and illegal jailing of Blacks, and now McGinty.

Another concern, they say, is his silence while Black babies are stolen from Black families by the Cuyahoga County Department of Child and Family Services to sell or hand to affluent Whites with popular surnames.

Forbes was allegedly promised to be assigned as bond counsel on lucrative county projects if McGinty wins and a couple of the Cleveland Black elected officials that are behind him have said publicly that McGinty offered them something in exchange for their endorsements, quid pro quo maneuvers that activists say reveal that the county prosecutor's office is for sale to the detriment of the Black community.

They also say that McGinty is being pushed by the Cleveland Police Patrolmen's Association and that as a judge he harassed Blacks at the request of police, in addition to harassment from the bench for what they say also was simply his own deranged self.

His campaign commercials don't' say that if elected county prosecutor he will be fair, and instead he openly brags that he will be hard on crime, which many Blacks say translates to Whites and others that he will get Blacks as he did when he was judge before resigning last year to try to steal the county prosecutor's office with the money of his rich daddy.

Data compiled by research orchestrated by the Cleveland NAACP reveal that in Cuyahoga County Blacks are disproportionately prosecuted and given harsher sentences than their similarly situated White counterparts by the majority White judges of the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas where felony cases, civil cases that seek damages in excess of $15 thousand, and other matters are heard.

"They listen to the police and the prosecutors," said county prosecutor candidate Subodh Chandra during a county prosecutor's debate earlier this year at Lil Africa in Cleveland when explaining to Blacks and others that attended why Blacks are often maliciously indicted on felony charges by Cuyahoga County grand juries, something even more stinging against McGinty who in 2010 appointed former Cleveland NAACP Executive Director Stanley Miller to the Cuyahoga County Grand Jury.

As grand jury foreman, data show that Miller then pushed for indictments of bogus felony criminal charges against Blacks that complained of police brutality by Cleveland police that other grand juries would not indict, including then college student Rebecca Whitby, who is now 24 .

Activists say that Whitby was maliciously prosecuted and harassed after being beat up and called nigger by police by common pleas judge Daniel Gaul, who was suspended for six months by the Ohio Supreme Court for harassing Blacks that come before him.

During a community meeting held last year after activists complained of Forbes and he sent Miller and a female NAACP affiliate to try to temper them, Miller admitted that he was the grand jury foreman that pushed the indictment against Whitby. He resigned seven months later.

Roz McAllister, a White woman and member of The Imperial Women who leads Ohio Family Rights and lives on Cleveland's predominantly Blacks east side, says the protest and rally are long overdue and that she had had enough of Forbes, who has led the organization since 1992, when he did not speak out when police admitted that since convicted serial killer Anthony Sowell was released from police custody on a rape complaint in 2008 to murder the last six of the 11 Black women who were raped and strangled at his Imperial Ave home on Cleveland's east side.

"He did not say a word about the negligence around The Imperial Ave. Murders," said McAllister. "He and the Cleveland NAACP have not stood up for Black people for more than a decade."

Chandra and McGinty are among five candidates vying for the county prosecutor's job as to the March 6 Democratic primary.

No Republican or Independent is in the race .

The other candidates are Stephanie Hall, James McDonnell and Robert Triozzi.

Activists said that if any of the women are arrested in retaliation via intimidation at Friday's protest or in connection with illegal arrest warrants from the friends and associates of Forbes and McGinty that want to down play McGinty's record of harassing Blacks and others, they will picket outside of their homes next.

Obama campaign announces 35 national campaign co-chairs such as actress Eva Longoria, Black Congressional Caucus Chair Emanuel Cleaver, Strickland

Former Ohio Democratic Gov. Ted Strickland (center) with President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama

Congressional Black Caucus Chairperson Emanuel Cleaver III (D-MO)

President Barack Obama (lt) with Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick

Desperate Housewives Actress Eva Longoria

From the Metro Desk of The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com and Cleveland Urban News.Com (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com and www.clevelandurbannews.com)

CLEVELAND, Ohio-The Obama for America campaign announced on Wed. the names of 35 co-chairs for the president's 2012 reelection campaign that include a host of Democratic mayors, governors and U. S. senators, as well as union leaders, former Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland, Congressional Black Caucus Chairperson Emanuel Cleaver III (D-MO), and famous people such as Caroline Kennedy and desperate housewives actress Eva Longoria.

Also among the group are Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, who campaigned for the president in 2008 during a heated Democratic primary against now Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, former White House chief of staff Bill Daley, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who was also a former chief of staff, and San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro.

“The president’s national co-chairs will be tremendous assets on the ground as we build the biggest grassroots campaign in history,” said Obama for America Campaign Manager Jim Messina in a press release to Cleveland Urban New.Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com. “They each share the president’s vision for a future where every American can have a fair shot at success, where hard work pays off, and where responsibility is rewarded.”

Blacks leaders that were selected were enthusiastic about the challenge.

"I am committed to working tirelessly as a national co-chair for Obama for America to ensure the president can continue to carry out his vision for an economy built to last and continue to bring positive change to our great country, " said Cleaver III, who has led the Congressional Black Caucus of 43 members of the U.S. House of Representatives since 2010.

"We need this president’s continued leadership to help us leave our country better than we found it," added Patrick, the first Black governor of Massachusetts .

The president is clever enough to include people representing pivotal states such as Strickland in Ohio, former Wisconsin senator Russ Feingold, Florida Obama for America affiliate Annette Acosta, and Sai lyer, a student at Virginia Commonwealth University.

No Republican has won the White House without first winning Ohio and the last Democrat to jump that hurdle was the late former president John F. Kennedy, Caroline Kennedy's father.

Strickland is a former congressman that represented Ohio's 6th Congressional District.

He served a single four-year term as Ohio governor before his defeat in 2010 by John Kasich, a Republican, and also a former U.S. representative to Congress.

Reach Kathy Wray Coleman by email at kathy@kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, and by telephone at 216-932-3114.

Updated: Cordi Stokes, the oldest daughter of the late and former Cleveland Mayor Carl B. Stokes and a niece of retired U.S. Rep. Louis Stokes, dies

Cordi Stokes

The late Carl B. Stokes, who became the first Black mayor of a major metropolitan city when he was elected mayor of the City of Cleveland in 1967

Retired U.S. Rep. Louis Stokes, Carl Stokes' only sibling and the first Black congressman representing Ohio

Cleveland Municipal Court Judge Angela Stokes, a daughter of retired U.S. Rep. Louis Stokes and Cordi Stokes' first cousin

Cordi Stokes (far rt.), with her older brother Carl Stokes Jr., her mother Shirley, and her father Carl B. Stokes in earlier years

By Kathy Wray Coleman, Editor of Cleveland Urban News.Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com) and (www.clevelandurbannews.com)

CUYAHOGA FALLS, Ohio-Cordi Stokes, the second child and oldest daughter of the late Carl B. Stokes, the former mayor of the city of Cleveland and the first Black mayor of a major metropolitan city, and a niece of retired U.S. Congressman Louis Stokes, was found dead in her Cuyahoga Falls apartment Mon. morning. She was 50.

The cause of death was from natural causes, the medical examiner's report said. She had battled heart disease and breast cancer for 10 years.

A divorcee, she leaves behind a daughter, Quinn McBee, from a previous marriage, her mother Shirley Sacks, three siblings (Carl Stokes Jr., Cordell Stokes and Cynthia Stokes) , a stepbrother (Sasha Kostadinov), and a host of other relatives, including Cleveland Municipal Court Judge Angela Stokes, a first cousin and one of Louis Stokes' four children.

Cordi worked in various capacities and more recently as an insurance agent.

Friends said that she had planned to move back to Cleveland in the coming months after her apartment lease was up.

She was active in politics and once ran unsuccessfully for a seat on the Cleveland Board of Education.

She attended the State of the Union watch party on Jan 24 at the Obama campaign headquarters at Shaker Square in Cleveland.

Her father Carl, who died in 1996 of cancer of the esophagus, grew up in a Cleveland housing project.

His father died when he was three years old and he and his brother Louis were reared by their mother, who worked multiple jobs to make ends meet.

Carl Stokes was a state representative for three terms before his election to mayor in 1967. After serving one term as mayor and deciding against seeking reelection, he moved his family to New York so that he could become a New York anchorman, the first Black anchorman in New York history. He and Cordi Stokes' mother Shirley later divorced, and both later remarried.

After a successful media career he returned home and served as a Cleveland Municipal Court judge from 1983-1994. In 1994, former president Bill Clinton appointed him as Ambassador to the Republic of Seychelles.

His journey to become the first Black mayor of a major American city is outlined in his book titled "Promises of Power."

Community activists said that Cordi will be missed.

"I just talked to her last month about buying insurance," said Community Activist Ada Averhart. "Cordie was loved in the grassroots community and we will miss her."

Funeral arrangements are by Lucas Memorial Funeral Home in Garfield Hts., with a private funeral service Sat. afternoon at 4:00 pm and a repast at Touch of Italy restaurant in Shaker Hts. at 6:30 pm.

Reach Kathy Wray Coleman by email at kathy@kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, and by telephone at 216-932-3114.