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Amnesty International is renewing its call to the Louisiana authorities for a pardon to be granted to Gary Tyler, a 49 year-old African-American man who has been in prison in Louisiana since the age of 17, and whose 1975 trial was infected with racial prejudice.
Tyler was convicted in 1975 of the murder of Timothy Weber, a white 13 year-old schoolboy who was shot outside Destrehan High School, St Charles Parish, during racial disturbances. Tyler had been one of many black students on a bus carrying black students back to their homes which was being attacked by white people throwing stones and bottles, and from which the shot had allegedly come.
More...
 Background Website: FreeGaryTyler.com
At 2:30 am on January 31, NOPD SWAT members team raided the St. Bernard housing complex in an effort to flush out individuals occupying the community center as part of an ongoing campaign to reopen public housing in New Orleans. Two individuals were taken from the site and arrested.
Legal observers were denied access to the scene by SWAT team members wielding automatic weapons, and there are reports that supporters of the public housing advocates were turned away at gunpoint when they attempted to approach the housing complex. More...
Judge Hunter ordered their release
update 1:30 PM: both activists have been released from central lockup.
Democracy now story (includes interview of Bork from jail)
 Yesterday, attorney Bill Quigley, a distinguished professor of law, human rights and public housing rights defender, received a threatening "cease and desist" letter from the law firm representing the Housing Authority of New Orleans(HANO) and the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
The firm Stone Pigman Walther Wittmann claims Quigley's comments to the press on the housing situation in New Orleans--specifically mentioned is an interview posted on New Orleans IndyMedia--constitute "improper conduct." "We came across many reported statements by you to the press that prejudice HANO's position in this litigation, including but not limited to an audio recording of an interview you gave that is posted on the New Orleans Indy Media website," read the letter signed by Rachel Wisdom.
More... Read the letter  Listen to the targeted interview Take Action
 HUD has initiated a lawsuit against public housing residents and their allies for reopening and cleaning their homes in the St. Bernard development. Residents point to their legal, civil and human rights as justification for their confidence that HANO’s retaliatory lawsuit will be dismissed. As legal lease-holders of apartments largely undamaged by hurricane Katrina who are merely seeking to expedite their return by cleaning up the complex themselves, residents and their allies hold faith that the court and public opinion will find in their favor. “The residents who are cleaning their apartments have current leases and therefore have a legal right to enter their homes,” said Endesha Juakali of Survivor’s Village. HUD’s legal action at this point appears to be a rearguard effort to undercut the forward momentum of the Right of Return Movement.
 Volunteers clean out returning residents' apartments
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