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USPS091-380 tUME 71 - NUMBER 43 DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA —SATURDAY, OCTOBER 30,1993 TELEPHONE (919) 682-2913 PRICE:30 CENTS After Being Set Afire Bum Victim Taiks of Heaiing, Not Vengeance LLSIDE high students have lunch with COLOMBIAN BALLET COMPANY See Story on Page 7, \fter Firing First Biack Poiice )hief, Town Seeks Quiet By James Martinez WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) - Instead ol vengeance, Christopher Wilson spoke softly of healing after the two attackers who set him afire were sentjenced to life behind bars. "I just want to get on with my life,” Wilson told a crush of reporters after Friday’s sentencing. "Justice was done." Mark Kohut, 27, and Charles Rourk, 33. both white, each received life terms for the racially motivated attempted murder that left the black New York City stock brokerage clerk with bums over nearly 40 percent of his body. Circuit Judge Donald Evans called the torching one of the most "senseless and atrocious" crimes he had ever seen and sentenced Kohut to an additional 27 years and Rourk, who carried the gun, to 40 more years for kidnapping and robbery. He also granted a defense request to keep both men isolated in prison because of the nature of their crimes. "We’re going to prison as convicted racists,” Kohut told a Florida News Network reporter for broadcast late Friday. "The prison population is 85 percent black. Now, I don’t want to die, 1 sure don’t want to be hurt for something I didn’t do." Wilson had asked lABOR CITY (AP) - For the lime since tlic organized Ku I Klan was driven from tabus County in the early i, tensions divide Tabor City igracial lines. lension has heightened since August firing of the city’s black ice chief. Fhis has 'caught us all off shid Sterling Hinson, a ie downtown shoe store owner, len I was a boy, one of my ly’s best friends was a black He’d come and eat dinner us. His wife and my mother led and carried on in the ien. He and my father sat in the watching TV. We don’t kistand what's going on now." fourth Saturday in October lly means crowds, of 12,000 (Ic streaming into Tabor City to tate yams. But some beauty MS have canceled plans to id this weekend’s North ilina Yam Festival as have ivrformers. Many worry ids will be thin. try Saturday for six weeks, an lack group called Concerned ns for Justice has marched on Street, calling for the statement of Tabor City native it Gore. Gore was police chief til years and a member of tlic *departmeni for 22. was tired Aug. 9 by Town ijcr A1 Leonard, with the iiiiioiis backing of the city lil. Ill a letter to Gore, Leonard lie ignored procedure by *g employees’ names on time land sick-leave request.s. It believe w hat was done to Willie Gore was unjust," iityne Williams, a retired Diteachcr who heads Observer. "Wc want the chief reinstated, or given early retirement with pay." Gore has declined to talk to reporters, but has said lie did nothing wrong. The town kist week hired Rol-ci t "Bert" Crooin, who is white, from the. Carolina Beach Police Department to become Tabor City’s new police chief. Croom’s hiring came after a tense night Oct. 12. Gore’s supporters grew angry after the council adjourned before taking their questions. Several members refused to leave. Acting Chief Thomas Dicker, who is black, and several officers used pepper spray to force them out. A short time later, bullets started flying. Dicker said. Most of the estimated 100 rounds were shot in the air. The shots also punctured the windows of three passing cars. Some officers heard bullets whiz past. Four pcojile were arrested’. "This tiling didn’t start out as a racial issue," Dicker said. "It should slay that way. If Willie Gore has a grievance, he should take it to the courts." On Sunday, fire gutted a discount furniture store owned by Winston Gore, who is white. The day before. Gore’s son, Eddie, told marchers they were disrupting downtown business. Two members of the concerned citizens group have been charged with setting die fire. Dicker said.” George Bryant, the city council’s lone black member, said die unrest was triggered by Gore’s firing, not by an underlying problem. "This was just one isolated incident," he said. "It troubles me tremendously. We’ve had good relations among all people. Now we’re in a mess. Things are happening that don’t normally happen. And it’s not something we can be awfully proud of." the judge to give his attackers "what the law allows" and testified about the constant pain that keeps him fiom working, the nightmares that keep him from sleeping and the painful memories that keep him from trusting. "Doctors say one day I will get back to normal. I don’t know," Wilson testified Friday. "I just have to keep t^ing and forget what happened to me. "I wish it just never happened. It happened for no reason at all." The two day-laborers from Lakeland wore convicted last month of abducting Wilson on Now Year’s Day outside a suburban Tampa shopping plaza and forcing him to drive to a remote field. There they sloshed him with gasoline from a plastic jug, insulted him with racial slurs and laughed as they set him on fire. Emotional testimony from the soft-spoken 32-ycar- old was credited with winning the convictions despite a prosecution hampered by the mid-trial walkout of Us lead prosecutor and a lack of any physical evidence tying the men to the crime. Kohut and Rourk showed no emotion Friday as they listened to the sentence, but Kohut had burst into (Continued On Page 2) ~ ELECTION- VOTE! TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 2,1993 6:30 A.M. TO 7:30 P.M. VOTE FOR CANDIDATES FOR MAYOR- WARDS 1-3-5 - AT-LARGE POSITIONS - BOND REFERENDUMS! COME ONE! COME ALL! "GET-OUT-THE-VOTE" MASS RALLY 5:00 RM. - SUNDAY, OCTOBER 31,1993 GREATER ST. PAUL BAPTIST CHURCH 1102 JUNIPER STREET NEED A RIDE? CALL 682-9690 - 683-3006 - 683-1047 DURHAM COMMITTEE ON THE AFFAIRS OF BLACK PEOPLE Camerawoliian Who Filmed Denny Beating Avoids Limelight Dapper Defense Lawyer In Denny Case Took All-Or-Nothing Gamble the group, lold The Charlotlc LOS ANGELES (AP) - George Holliday was thrust into the spotliglit when he videotaped the 1991 police beating of motorist Rodney King. Marika Tur taped Reginald Denny’s beating but shuns publicity. Ms. Tur’s footage of die April 29. 1992, beating during die Los Angeles riots, shot from a helicopter, won a local Emmy for spot news coverage, but her name doesn’t appear on the award.-Instead, the trophy went to her husband. Bob, a broadcast journalist and pilot of die helicopter. "Mtirika’s name should be on it," Tur said. "It’s her trophy." But Ms. Tur, 38, prefers to keep it that way. I 111 proud of the video I shot and the people who I care about know that I shot iL I don’t miss the notoriety," she said. The Turs run Los Angeles News Service. She was subpoenaed by prosecutors in the just-concluded trial of two men accused of trying to kill Denny. By James Anderson LOS ANGELES (AP) - With the country watching, Edi M.O. Faal took an all-or-nothing gamble as he defended Damian Williams on charges of trying to kill Reginald Denny. Faal, confident that prosecutors had failed to prove Williams meant to kill Denny, increased the risk of a life sentence for his client in an attempt to get him acquitted of all serious charges in a move associates say is typical of his bold style. Faal allowed the judge to tell jurors to convict or acquit Williams of attempted murder, not the lesser charge of assault The move denied jurors the chance to compromise by acquitting Williams of attempted murder but convicting him of assault, a much less serious charge. "This is it,” Faal told the jury in his closing argument. "The stakes arc high.” Associates say the move is typical of the 38- ycur-old attorney whose spirited defense of Williams thrust him into the national spotlight. "I would expect it of him," said Ann Ruth Grant, a criminal defense attorney who used to share an office with Faal in suburban Downey. "He’s very dedicated. He’s not tifraid." Faal inherited a defense in disarray. Williams’ first ^attorney, Dennis Palmicri, was *' Fired during a preliminary hearing ast year. His boss turned out to be a felon vho claimed he was a government gent ordered to sabotage the case. Faal quickly restored order and set about trying to avoid conviction on attempted murder and aggravated mayhem counts, which carry life terms. Assault; in contrast, carries a six- month sentence; assault with: a. deadly weapon, up to four years. - . The jury on Monday acquitted Williams of aggravated ma\liein and found him guilty of the lesser charge of mayhem, with a maximum sentence of eight years. They continued to deliberate on the attempted murder count. Amid die suspense, Faal exuded confidence. "There is no question that we won this case," he declared Monday, speaking in his richly textured British empire accent "With ' respect to attempted' (Continued On Page 2) ivil Rights Fighter Leon >uilivan Sees Dream Realized WlLESTON, W.Va. (AP) - The Rev. Leon Sullivan learned about ® when he was 8 years old and a Charleston drugstore refused to let sit down to drink his soda. man said. Stand on your feet, boy. You can’t sit here,"’ recalls ", 70. "And his face, I can still see it now. It was red, very red. I MI would stand up to that kind of thing my entire life." The retired * of Zion Baptist Church in North Philadelphia spent his career in and in the church fighting for equal rights. 'W7 he wrote the "Sullivan Principles," guidelines used as a code of for companies doing business in South Africa. 'principles said American companies should be integrated, use fair ‘i anti employment practices and train non-whiles to be managers. later said his principles were not enough to dismande apartheid. *, ho says, things are looking better. * oould announce that the Sullivan principles had been realized, *te will be fiw elections, that was a great accomplishment Gandhi couldn’t do," Sullivan said Saturday in Charleston, *ne came to give a speech to the Opportunities Industrial Council, nlso planned to see relatives in the town where his mother was a janitor. Sullivan left Charleston after attending West Virginia State College, where he had basketball and football scholarships, and went to New York when he was 20. By then, he had become a minister and had two years experience as a pastor. He became involved in the civil rights movement in the 1950s and helped organize black boycotts of uncooperative businesses. He led marches on Washington and persuaded major American corporations to hire and promote blacks and to invest in black communities. Sullivan founded the national job training program in Philadelphia in the 1950s with private funds. The agency now relies heavily on federal grants. Sullivan believes government should play a role in such programs, but the private sector must do more than it does. In the 1970s, he turned his energies to South Africa. As the first black board member of General Motors, Sullivan used his influence to persuade American companies there to work to end apartheid Many did. He stepped up the effort in 1985, setting a two-year deadUne for blacks to vote. "When the deadline failed, he called for multinational companies to pull out. Others argued the noose on the South African economy would hurt Wacks. But Sullivan persevered. In 198'7,1 took a risk. What would happen if the companies left? But I thought, it was cither things would get worse and change, or things would get worse and not change," he said. His risk paid off. A multiracial vote is sot for April 27,1994. Many blacks and white have been killed as the country moves away from white rule. Sullivan expected violence. countries emerge anywhere, they run into violence," he said. "I’m a minister, and I’m part of the non-violent tradition. I think things can he achieved without violence." But Sullivan said he also is a realist and a pragmatist As with the embargo, the end may justify the means, he said. During the summer, Sullivan met with African National Congress leader Nelson Mandela in Philadelphia. Mandela asked him to encourage countries to return to South Africa. The companies will be returning to factories they closed or sold, and will have to compete with companies from around the wodi which ignored the boycott, Sullivan said. The region is rich in mineral deposits, including gold, silver and plutonium.
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