DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA - SATURDAY, JANUARY 9, 2016
VOLUME 95 - NUMBER 1
TELEPHONE (919) 682-2913
Tamir Rice protesters want Cleveland
prosecutor to step down
PRICE: 50 CENTS
CLEVELAND (AP) -
Protesters upset by a deci
sion not to indict two white
police officers in the shoot
ing death of Tamir Rice, a
12-year-old black boy who
had a pellet gun, marched
to the home of the prosecu
tor Jan. 1 and repeated calls
for him to resign.
More than 100 people
stood outside the home of
Cuyahoga County Prose
cutor Tim McGinty during
the peaceful protest, which
also included demands for
a federal investigation into
the shooting.
A march leader told pro
testers not to vandalize Mc
Ginty’s home, which is in a
neighborhood on the west
side of Cleveland. Police
officers accompanied the
marchers and stood in Mc
Ginty’s driveway but did
not intervene.
The protesters chanted,
“New year, no more!” and
“McGinty has got to go!”
Through a spokesman,
McGinty declined to com
ment.
Protesters have called
for McGinty’s resignation
since he announced that
the officers would not face
criminal charges in Tamir’s
death. But criticism of him
SINGER NATALIE COLE
Natalie Cole, master of past and pres
ent styles
Abortion-rights
group wants ultra-
sound documentation
stopped
By Gary D. Robertson
RALEIGH (AP) - A po
litical arm of Planned Par
enthood says Gov. Pat Mc
Crory should block a law
taking effect with the new
year requiring physicians
who perform certain later-
term abortions in North
Carolina send ultrasound
images to state officials.
Starting Jan. 1, doctors
must fill out a form for
abortions performed af
ter a woman’s 16th week
of pregnancy and provide
the ultrasound. More in
formation is needed after
20 weeks. The records are
confidential and the wom
an’s name is removed.
Law supporters say it’s
designed to ensure doctors
comply with the exception
to banning abortion after
20 weeks when the life
and health of the pregnant
woman is at stake. Planned
Parenthood Votes! South
Atlantic calls the ultra-
sound requirement medi-
By Sandy Cohen and Hillel Italie
LOS ANGELES (AP) - She began as a 1970s soul singer hyped
as the next Aretha Franklin and peaked in the 1990s as an old-fash
ioned stylist and time-defying duet partner to her late father, Nat
“King” Cole.
Natalie Cole, who died Jan. 1 in Los Angeles at age 65, was a
Grammy winning superstar honored and haunted by comparisons to
others.
“Natalie fought a fierce, courageous battle, dying how she lived
... with dignity, strength and honor. Our beloved Mother and sister
will be greatly missed and remain UNFORGETTABLE in our hearts
forever,” read a statement from her son, Robert Yancy, and sisters
Timolin and Casey Cole.
According to her family, Cole died of complications from ongo
ing health issues. She had battled drug problems and hepatitis that
forced her to undergo a kidney transplant in May 2009. Cole’s older
sister, Carol “Cookie” Cole, died the day she received the transplant.
Their brother, Nat Kelly Cole, died ih 1995.
“I had to hold back the tears,” Franklin, who had feuded with
Cole early in Cole’s career, said in a statement. “She fought for so
long. She was one of the greatest singers of our time. She repre
sented the Cole legend of excellence and class quite well.”
A mezzo-soprano with striking range and power, Cole was des
tined to be a singer, the only question being what kind. She was
inspired by her dad at an early age and auditioned to sing with him
when she was just 11 years old. She was 15 when he died of lung
cancer, in 1965, and would reunite with him decades later in a way
only possible through modern technology.
All along, she was moved by and sometimes torn between past
and present sounds. As a young woman, she had listened to Franklin
and Janis Joplin and for years was reluctant to perform her father’s
material. She sang on stage with Frank Sinatra, but also covered
Bruce Springsteen’s “Pink Cadillac.”
“I was determined to create my own identity,” she wrote in her
2010 memoir “Love Brought Me Back.”
The public loved her either way.
She made her recording debut in 1975 with “Inseparable,” and
the music industry welcomed her with two Grammy Awards - one
’ for best new artist and one for best female R&B vocal performance
for her buoyant hit “This Will Be (An Everlasting Love).” Her quick
success and the similarities to Franklin, another mezzo-soprano, did
i not please the “Queen of Soul,” who at the time called Cole “just a
dates back months as frus
tration grew over the length
of time it took to reach a
decision concerning the
November 2014 shooting.
Dozens of marchers lay
down on the sidewalk run
ning past McGinty’s house
for four minutes, the time
they say it took medical-
responders to reach Tamir
after he was shot outside a
recreation center.
In announcing that
charges would not be
brought, McGinty said it
was “indisputable” that
Tamir was drawing the
pistol from his waistband
when he was gunned down.
The prosecutor said
Tamir was trying to either,
hand the pellet gun over to
police or show them it was
not real, but the officer who
shot him, Timothy Loehm-
ann, and his partner, Frank
Garmback, had no way of
knowing that.
Tamir was shot by
Loehmann within two sec
onds of the officers’ police
cruiser skidding to a stop
near the boy.
McGinty said police ra
dio personnel contributed
to the tragedy by failing to
pass along the “all-impor
tant fact” that a 911 caller
said the gunman was prob
ably a juvenile and the gun
probably was not real.
Mayor Frank Jackson
and Police Chief Calvin
Williams said that as pro
tests continue, they plan to
balance public safety with
protesters’ First Amend
ment rights.
Abortion-rights group
wants ultrasound
documentation stopped
BILL COSBY
Cosby’s sexual assault
charge leaves blacks
feeling betrayed
cally unnecessary and says
it wrongly intrudes into a
woman’s medical history.
McCrory signed the law
in June.
In North Carolina
544,950 People Are En
rolled In Marketplace
Coverage
As of December 19, the
number of consumers signed
up for Marketplace cover
age surged to more than 8.2
million nationally, including
544,950 in North Carolina.
Those who selected a plan
by December 17 or were auto
reenrolled will have cover
age effective January 1, 2016.
High consumer demand as we
neared the enrollment dead
line for January 1 coverage, as
well as the automatic renewal
process, contributed to this
overall total.
beginner.”
“The first time I saw Aretha was at an industry banquet,” Cole
later told Franklin biographer David Ritz. “She gave me an icy stare
and turned her back on me. It took me weeks to recover.”
Backed by the writing-producing team of Chuck Jackson and
Marvin Yancy, she followed with such hits as “Our Love” and “I’ve
Got Love on My Mind,” and by 1979 had a star on the Hollywood
Walk of Fame. But her career faded in the early 1980s and she bat
tled heroin, crack cocaine and alcohol addiction for many years. She
spent six months in rehab in 1983.
Her recovery began later in the decade with the album “Everlast
ing” and reached multiplatinum heights with her 1991 album, “Un
forgettable ... With Love.” No longer trying to keep up with current
sounds, Cole paid tribute to her father with reworked versions of
some of his best-known songs, including “That Sunday That Sum
mer,” '’Too Young” and “Mona Lisa.”
Her voice was overlaid with her dad’s in the title cut, offering a
delicate duet a quarter-century after his death.
Although criticized by some as morbid, the album sold some 14
million copies and won six Grammys, including album of the year as
well record and song of the year for the title track duet.
While making the album, Cole told The Associated Press in 1991,
she had to “throw out every R&B lick that I had ever learned and
every pop trick I had ever learned. With him, the music was in the
background and the voice was in the front.”
“I didn’t shed really any real tears until the album was over,” Cole
said. “Then I cried a whole lot. When we started the project it was a
way of reconnecting with my dad. Then when we did the last song, I
had to say goodbye again.”
She was nominated for an Emmy award in 1992 for a televised
perfonnance of her father’s songs.
“That was really my thank you,” she told People magazine in
2006. “I owed that to him.”
By Gary D. Robertson
RALEIGH (AP) - A po
litical arm of Planned Par
enthood says Gov. Pat Mc
Crory should block a law
taking effect with the new
year requiring physicians
who perform certain later-
term abortions in North
Carolina send ultrasound
images to state officials.
Starting Jan. 1, doctors
must fill out a form for
abortions performed af
ter a woman’s 16th week
of pregnancy and provide
the ultrasound. More in
formation is needed after
20 weeks. The records are
confidential and the wom
an’s name is removed.
Law supporters say it’s
designed to ensure doctors
comply with the exception
to banning abortion after
20 weeks when the life
and health of the pregnant
woman is at stake. Planned
Parenthood Votes! South
Atlantic calls the ultra-
sound requirement medi
cally unnecessary and says
it wrongly intrudes into a
woman’s medical history.
McCrory signed the law in
June.
By Errin Haines Whack
PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Bill Cosby, a cultural icon who once
stood among America’s most beloved figures, suffered the latest and
most serious blow to his forever mixed legacy, as he walked slow
ly into a Pennsylvania courthouse holding a cane and answered to
charges that he drugged and sexually assaulted a woman.
It was a moment Dec. 30 in stark contrast to a reputation built
over half a century, merging the personal and professional into one
potent, visceral brand. The allegations have left many - especially in
the black community - feeling betrayed.
“This is an entire edifice of iconic and symbolic blackness shat
tered by this charge,” said author and Georgetown University profes
sor Michael Eric Dyson, noting that “millions of people looked up
to him.”
At times, Cosby has lashed out against the African-American com
munity that long embraced him. Late in his career, Cosby famously
and publicly excoriated poor blacks in a 2004 speech - comments that
angered many. Dyson, who wrote a book on Cosby a decade ago in
response to the incident, said his admonitions sting more now in light
of the comedian’s own moral failings.
“He lashed out, ultimately, only at himself, even as he indicted
millions along the way,” Dyson said.
Though Cosby had been previously accused of sexual miscon
duct by dozens of women and several civil claims against him are
still pending, he has never been criminally charged until now. His
public persona began to rapidly unravel last year, when black come
dian Hannibal Buress called Cosby out as a rapist and a hypocrite.
Burress’ comments unleashed the allegations anew - and forced a
reckoning among many African-Americans.
Cosby had been, in many ways, a pioneer. The 78-year-old be
came the first black actor in a television drama when “I Spy” debuted
in 1965. Two decades later, he starred as Cliff Huxtable in “The Cos
by Show” - based on his own marriage and family - endearing him to
the country as “America’s Dad.”
The NBC show aired from 1984 to 1992 and was the highest-
rated sitcom for five consecutive years. The 90s spinoff “A Differ
ent World,” set at Huxtable’s fictitious alma mater, Hillman College,
inspired thousands of African-American youth to attend historically
black colleges, or HBCUs.
Cosby is one of only a few popular figures who can be credited
with promoting HBCUs nationally, said Jarrett Carter Sr., publisher
of HBCU Digest.
“(The show) came about at a time where we were slowly transi
tioning into having more access to predominantly white (colleges),”
Carter said. “Then you had this show, which just ushered in the next
level of explosion of HBCUs. It just came at a critical time. I don’t
think it’s a coincidence that since the show’s gone off, you don’t have
the same level of enrollment for HBCUs.”
Following the parade of allegations against him in the past year,
the all-women Spelman College - one of the crowned jewels of the
HBCU community - ended its Cosby-endowed professorship. Cosby
and his wife, Camille, donated $20 million to the school in the 1980s.
At the time, the gift was the largest personal gift to an HBCU.
Cosby has long enjoyed the loyalty given to breakthrough cultural
figures by the black community that can sometimes supersede their
transgressions, said James Peterson, director of Africana Studies at
Lehigh University.
“This contradicts our sense of who Bill Cosby was,” Peterson said
of the Dec. 30 criminal charge. “People really felt that Mr. Cosby
would never be arraigned. He wasn’t Cliff Huxtable.”
Though his groundbreaking work cannot be erased, it has been
tarnished by the allegations of the past year, and likely will be further
soiled by his ongoing legal battles.
“There is a fatal difference now between Cliff Huxtable and Bill
Cosby that can never be overcome, because Cosby depended as a
figure and an icon on the goodwill he established through his charac
ters,” Dyson said. “It does add a creepy subtext and a shadow of tre
mendous moral weight that will inevitably be brought up each time
his name is evoked.”
Hill