Michigan Black Activist in Solitary Confinement

Michigan Black Activist In Solitary Confinement
by JoNina M. Abron

(Battle Creek, Mich.) -- Black anti-police brutality activist Robert C. Mitchell is in solitary confinement at the Calhoun County Jail here after protesting the confiscation of his legal papers by jail officials.

In another development, Mitchell's trial, scheduled to begin Jan. 25, was delayed until Feb. 19 due to a scheduling conflict of his attorney, Toby White.

According to a prisoner, White, a Lansing-based attorney, was at the jail on Jan. 22 waiting to meet with Mitchell when the dispute over the black activist's legal papers occurred. A white sheriff's deputy, known for using racial epithets against black and Hispanic prisoners, went to Mitchell's cell and began to read the legal papers Mitchell was carrying to his meeting with White, the prisoner said. When Mitchell objected, he was placed in solitary confinement, known as the "hole."

Mitchell, founder of the National Police Misconduct Project, is charged with assaulting and kidnapping Deborah Sparks Gordon at her apartment on July 12, 2000. According to police, Mitchell and Gordon, 46, argued after she threatened to tell the black woman with whom Mitchell was living that he and Gordon, who is white, were having an affair.

Mitchell served a prior prison sentence for practicing law without a license. If convicted of assaulting Gordon, he faces life in prison.

An outspoken critic of the Battle Creek Police Department, Mitchell was instrumental in bringing public attention to several cases of brutality and other misconduct by police when he was legal redress chairman of the local NAACP chapter. He organized a march against police brutal and racial profiling less than a month before he was charged with assaulting Gordon.

Mitchell was a fugitive from justice for over seven months before he was arrested by state police in Lansing on March 18, 2001. He said he feared for his life if arrested by police. Since August, Mitchell has suffered a series of heart attacks and strokes.

Mitchell is a trained paralegal and did the primary research for a federal lawsuit now pending by several black and white Battle Creek firefighters. They allege that the fire department discriminates against black and female fire fighters.

His supporters say Mitchell is being framed for assaulting Gordon because of his work organizing against police brutality and racism.