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THE PANELISTS |
HUGH M. "BUCK" DAVIS co-founded Constitutional Litigation Associates, P.C., in Detroit in 1995. He was one of the trial counsel on one of the first multimillion-dollar police misconduct verdicts in Michigan (Jennings v. Detroit 1979). He wrote the Annual Survey of Civil Rights Law in the Sixth Circuit for the DCL at MSU Law Review (1997), "So You Want To Be A Civil Rights Lawyer?" Mr. Davis served on the executive boards of the Michigan Trial Lawyers Association and the National Lawyer's Guild. He attended Hampden-Sydney College in Prince Edward County, Virginia, and taught at the Freedom School while the public schools were closed to avoid integration. He graduated from Harvard Law School in 1968 and joined VISTA, assigned to Detroit Community Legal Counsel, a law reform group representation office. Mr. Davis received a national law reform community lawyer fellowship to the Wayne County Neighborhood Legal Services Research Office. He helped establish and staff the Detroit National Lawyers' Guild Defense Office and has been involved in civil rights and progressive litigation in private practice since 1972. |
KING DOWNING is the director of the Human Rights-Racial Justice Center, which researches and advocates on race and political issues. He is an advocate with the Sean Bell Justice Project, created by the family of the police shooting victim. Mr. Downing is also the former national coordinator of the ACLU’s Campaign Against Racial Profiling and a current member of the National Police Accountability Project. On October, 16, 2003 Mr. Downing was stopped for questioning by Massachusetts state police troopers after simply using a phone on his way out of Logan Airport. Police demanded to see Downing's identification and travel documents, which he was under no obligation to provide. After initially being told that he must leave the airport, which he intended to do anyway, Downing was surrounded by five state troopers and told he was under arrest. Although the police had no reason to stop him, Downing was detained for 40 minutes until he finally acceded to police demands for his identification and travel papers. Downing, a Harvard-educated lawyer, sued the Massachusetts State Police for racial profiling and won. The jury found that the police had unlawfully detained Mr. Downing without reasonable suspicion to believe he had committed any crime. |
SANDRA HINES joined the Detroit Coalition Against Police Brutalilty in 2000 to assist in the efforts aimed at abolishing police misconduct, the excessive use of force and racially motivated injustice carried by the Detroit Police Department. She has worked for years to develop a co-operative relationship between the Police Department and the larger community. Ms. Hines is uncompromising in her fight for equality and unwavering in her dedication to social justice. A noted violence prevention specialist and social worker, she has designed, developed and implemented cultural arts programming for the Detroit Public Schools as well as several non-profit organizations. Ms. Hines is a member of the Michigan Emergency Committee Against War & Injustice (MECAWI), the Moratorium NOW! Coalition to Stop Foreclosures, Evictions and Utility Shut-offs and the Coalition to Restore Hope to the Detroit Public Schools. A noted 21st Century militant and freedom fighter, she has spoken over the last several months at various conferences and rallies in Detroit, Chicago, New York and Pittsburgh. |
DICK LEHR a reporter at the Boston Globe for nearly two decades, is now a professor of journalism at Boston University. He is the co-author of the New York Times bestseller Black Mass: The Irish Mob, the FBI, and a Devil's Deal and most recently co-author of Judgment Ridge: The True Story of the Dartmouth Murders. Lehr also wrote, THE FENCE: A Police Cover-up Along Boston's Racial Divide, the true story about Michael Cox, an African American plainclothes officer, who was brutally beaten by his fellow police officers when he was mistaken for a murder suspect. While he was being attacked, Kenny Conley, an Irish American officer from South Boston, was chasing down the actual murder suspect. Weeks later, Cox was in the hospital waiting for an apology from the Boston Police Department. Instead, he came up against the infamous blue wall of silence. |
RON SCOTT has nearly 40 years of experience in politics as well as radio, television, and video production. He is an Emmy Award-winning producer who has completed significant documentary projects on various topics. He is a board member of the National Lawyers Guild; and is active in numerous other progressive causes nationally and internationally, including a long-term involvement in the Detroit Coalition Against Police Brutality. Ron Scott has served a leadership role in promoting the election campaigns of such notables as Governor Jennifer Granholm, Congressman John Conyers and H. Ross Perot in his presidential bid. Currently, Ron Scott co-hosts and co-produces CW50’s For My People, watched by many political actives and activists; and WDTW-1310 AM’s Fighting for Justice, a radio program that focuses on politics and community affairs. |
TIJUANA MORRIS is a Retired Detroit Police Officer with over 35 years of public service, including 20 years of Law Enforcement focusing on Homicide Investigations and Police Misconduct. Tijuana is a member of the Detroit Coalition Against Police Brutality and sits on the Executive Board of the National Lawyers Guild. She is now a Private Investigator with expertise in vindicating the wrongly accused, police misconduct and sexual harassment cases. Tijuana has many times over, assisted indigent citizens who would have served unjustified time in prison for crimes they did not commit. |