Justice for DeeDee Jones! More Anger in the Streets of Oakland

Just days after Johannes Mehserle was given a slap on the wrist sentence for murdering Oscar Grant – an execution caught on cell phones and video cameras, Oakland police shot and killed Derrick "DeeDee" Jones an unarmed Black man. Dee was well known in the community. He owned a local barbershop where he held neighborhood BBQ's every week. Once again we hear the police justifications – "he was reaching for his belt" or we "thought we say something metallic" as if uttering these makes it OK to shoot an unarmed man. Once again a young daughter will grow up without a father. Once again a hole in the heart of a community. Once again a life full of potential stolen by this system's enforcers. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!

The days when this system can just keep on doing what it does to people, here and all over the world…when people are not inspired and organized to stand up against these outrages and to build up the strength to put an end to this madness…those days must be GONE. And they CAN be. We need a revolution to put an end to this rotten system.

On November 11 people in DeeDee's neighborhood, members of Oscar Grant's family and people who have been fighting for justice in that case, revolutionaries, community organizers, religious leaders gathered at DeeDee's barber shop and marched more than 30 blocks to the Fruitvale BART station where Oscar Grant was murdered. I hope that these pictures tell something about the anger and determination of people.