tagged w/ Shawna Forde
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TUCSON (KGUN9-TV) - A Pima County Superior Court jury has decided Shawna Forde will get the death penalty in a double-murder case.
The jury earlier convicted Forde of killing an Arivaca man and his daughter during a search for drugs and money at his home.
The jury was to decide whether or not Forde would be put to death for her crimes or serve a life sentence. The death penalty case went to the jury Friday. Deliberations resumed Tuesday morning. There were no deliberations on Monday because of the holiday.
Forde and two men were charged in the killings of Raul Flores and his nine-year-old daughter Brisenia in 2009.
Prosecutors told the jury Forde staged the break-in at the Arivaca home and intended to rob the family of drugs and money she intended to use to bankroll her own border vigilante splinter group.
Although Flores' wife, who survived the shooting, could not pick Forde out of a photo lineup, she said Forde looked like the woman who entered her home with two men who shot her, her husband and her daughter.
The jury decided Forde should face the possibility of the death penalty. And then it began to consider whether she would die for the killings.
The jury stopped deliberations at 4:30 Friday and resumed on Tuesday morning. There was no court on Monday because of the President's Day holiday.
Forde's attorneys said there was no clear evidence linking her to the killings. They also had experts testify she had a troubled childhood and suffered a stroke. They said she had a personality disorder and a low average IQ.
Forde will be sentenced on six other burglary and assault charges in the case on April 25 in Pima County Superior Court.
http://www.kgun9.com/Global/story.asp?S=14077065TUCSON (KGUN9-TV) - A Pima County Superior Court jury has decided Shawna Forde will... more
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An Arizona jury could soon decide the fate of an anti-illegal immigration activist convicted of killing a Latino man and his 9-year-old daughter during a May 2009 vigilante raid.An Arizona jury could soon decide the fate of an anti-illegal immigration activist... more
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By Catherine A. Traywick, Media Consortium blogger
Days after Arizona Governor Jan Brewer and Attorney General Tom Horne filed suit against the federal government for allegedly failing to protect the state from a Mexican “invasion,” the high-profile murder conviction of a Minutemen border vigilante underscores the state’s misguided border priorities.
Earlier this week, a jury found Shawna Forde—leader of the Minutemen American Defense (MAD)—guilty of murdering 8-year-old Brisenia Flores and her father, Raul Flores, Jr. during a racially motivated home invasion in 2009. Forde faces the death penalty for orchestrating the robbery and murders.
ColorLines’ Julianne Hing reports that Forde had planned a number of elaborate home invasions to raise funds for her border patrol activities—targeting individuals whom she (erroneously) believed to be drug dealers. Though no drugs were found in the Flores home, Forde—who, incidentally, has close ties to both the Tea Party and the conservative think tank Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR)—nevertheless justified Brisenia’s murder on the grounds that “people shouldn’t deal drugs if they have kids.” After watching Forde’s accomplices shoot her mother and kill her father, Brisenia was shot twice in the face.
While Latino advocacy groups have characterized the Flores murders as hate crimes provoked—at least in part—by state leaders’ incendiary anti-immigrant rhetoric, many regard Forde’s conviction as one of many indicators that the tables are turning on anti-immigrant politicos like Brewer who have curried political support through fear-mongering and misinformation.
Less tolerance for border vigilantes
As Valeria Fernandez reports at New America Media, the verdict comes just weeks after another Arizona court upheld a decision against rancher Roger Barnett who, in an act of unwarranted border vigilantism, assaulted a group of migrants traveling across his property. Barnett was fined $80,000. While the Forde and Barnett cases are only two incidents of a nationwide rash of anti-Latino crime, their convictions are particularly significant in Arizona, where state leaders have long tolerated and even encouraged border vigilantism as a necessary response to purported border-related violence.
A year ago, state politicians—including Brewer—fomented a national anti-immigrant mania (which handily ushered in SB 1070) by promoting false reports of border violence. As Valeria Fernandez reported at Feet in 2 Worlds last March, lawmakers were quick to attribute the shooting of Arizona rancher Robert Krentz to an unidentified, undocumented Mexican immigrant—though the sheriff in charge of the case later told the press that the prime suspect was not actually Mexican.
Brewer, for her part, gained national notoriety after fabricating tales of beheadings in the Arizona desert—which, as I wrote for Campus Progress at the time—generated support for her anti-immigrant political agenda while diverting public attention away from the reality that most of Arizona’s border violence is directed at immigrants, rather than perpetrated by them.
Arizona’s countersuit against the federal government
Brewer’s recent countersuit against the federal government—which alleges that Arizona is under invasion from the south and that the feds have failed to protect the state accordingly—similarly conjures nativist fantasies of immigrant-fueled border violence. But, as Scott Lemieux posits at TAPPED, the suit idly and transparently villainizes immigrants:
It is (to put it mildly) a stretch to argue that Arizona is undergoing an “invasion.” Illegal immigration does not constitute a military threat or an attempt to overthrow the state government; anti-immigration metaphors are not a sound basis for constitutional interpretation.
Like those propagated by state lawmakers during Arizona’s nativist heyday last spring, this new offensive belies the reality that, while anti-Latino hate crimes have risen by 52 percent nationally in recent years, border crime has been on the decline for quite some time—a fact noted by Alternet’s Julianne Escobedo Shepherd in her coverage of the countersuit.
Yet, in an effort to further their extreme, anti-immigrant agenda, Arizona’s nativist lawmakers determinedly maintain the myth that Latin American immigration somehow generates a groundswell of violent crime—even when doing so requires the hasty revision of a rancher’s death, and the callous disregard of an innocent child’s murder.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about immigration by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Diaspora for a complete list of articles on immigration issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, and health care issues, check out The Audit, The Mulch, and The Pulse. This is a project of The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent media outlets.By Catherine A. Traywick, Media Consortium blogger
Days after Arizona Governor Jan... more
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The leader of an anti-illegal-immigrant group was convicted Monday in a home invasion robbery that left a 9-year-old girl and her father dead in what prosecutors said was an attempt to steal drug money to fund the group’s operations.The leader of an anti-illegal-immigrant group was convicted Monday in a home invasion... more
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WASHINGTON -- An Arizona anti-illegal immigration activist was convicted on Monday of killing two Latinos during a 2009 raid: nine-year-old Brisenia Flores and her father, Raul Flores. The killer, Shawna Forde, is a member of the Minutemen, which patrols the southern border vigilante-style to detect illegal entry into the country.
Although the shootings were never classified as a hate crime, Latino groups argue the murders reflect growing anti-immigrant sentiment within the United States. The details are chilling: Forde and two others entered the Flores home, allegedly looking for a million-dollar drug stash that never materialized, and shot both of Brisenia Flores' parents before turning the gun on the child.
As her mother played dead, Brisenia Flores said, "Please don't shoot me," before being shot twice in the head.
A jury convicted Forde of planning and executing the raid that led to the deaths of Raul and Brisenia Flores, and of the attempted murder of Gina Gonzales, the child's mother (she survived the attack). Forde was also convicted on two counts of aggravated assault and counts of burglary, armed robbery and aggravated robbery.
The jury will announce Forde's sentence on Thursday; her alleged accomplices, Albert Robert Gaxiola and Jason Eugene Bush, still await trial.
Joaquin Guerra, campaign director for Latino activism group Presente.org, told HuffPost the conviction is "justice for a little girl whose death was ignored by the mainstream media." The case largely escaped the notice of major news outlets until a few weeks ago, when a number of national news sources covered Forde's trial.
Few politicians spoke out against the murders, which occurred in a state that later passed the hotly-contested SB1070 immigration law and is now considering a bill that would deny citizenship to children born to undocumented immigrants.
Latinos organized to bring attention to the Flores killings, including a campaign by Presente.org to shed light on the case.
"What we have shown is that Latinos are watching, and if people and parties want the Latino vote, they will have to speak out against things like this," Guerra said. "We hope her death wasn't in vain and that it serves as an example of what can happen when the types of conditions that are in Arizona are allowed to go unchecked and are legitimated as serious policy issues."WASHINGTON -- An Arizona anti-illegal immigration activist was convicted on Monday of... more
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by Catherine A. Traywick, Media Consortium blogger
This week, two high-profile trials involving the racially motivated murders of Latinos in Pennsylvania and Arizona are exposing the unsettling implications of growing anti-immigrant sentiment. But while antagonistic political discourse and incendiary policy are shown to provoke ethnic violence—correlating with a 52 percent increase in hate crimes—they also indirectly drive sexual violence against immigrant women. The combination of stricter enforcement and increased cultural animosity toward immigrants renders undocumented women workers more susceptible to workplace rape and sexual exploitation—violent crimes that don’t generally register as hate crimes but that nevertheless bespeak of racially charged motives.
Two murder cases highlight senseless violence against Latinos
The trial of Minuteman border vigilante Shawna Forde, and two other individuals charged with the 2009 murder of a nine-year-old Latina girl and her father, began this week in Arivaca, Arizona. Julianne Hing at ColorLines reports that Brisenia Flores was shot twice in the head by home invaders allegedly enlisted by Forde, who is accused of sanctioning racially motivated home invasions to finance (via robbery) her border patrol activities. Flores’ parents were also shot, but her mother, Gina Gonzales, survived.
As Hing notes, Forde had strong ties with both the Tea Party movement and prominent anti-immigrant groups, including the influential conservative think-tank Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR):
Forde had a habit of ending her emails with the sign off, “Lock and Load” and had close ties with tea party groups. She was involved with the Minutemen American Defense—her supporters claim she was once a Minuteman National Director—a loose affiliation of anti-immigration border activists who took to policing the border on their own with guns and surveillance equipment. Forde has also had ties with the anti-immigrant Federation for American Immigration Reform. These groups have all been labeled hate groups by the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Immigrant rights groups and Latino community advocates alike have characterized the grisly crime as part of a growing anti-immigrant hate crime epidemic plaguing many divided communities across the country.
One such community, Shenandoah, Pennsylvania, recently saw the close of another hate crime case, in which three police officers were accused of covering up the racially motivated murder of 25-year-old immigrant Luis Ramirez. As New America Media reports, a Shenandoah jury issued a split verdict against the officers who were charged with obstruction of justice, falsifying records and conspiracy for their alleged attempt to protect Ramirez’s teenage murderers. Former police Chief Matthew Nestor was found guilty on the first two counts, but found not guilty of conspiracy. Former police Lt. William Moyer was similarly found guilty of making false statements, but acquitted of all other charges, as was former police Officer Jason R. Hayes. Latino advocacy groups have characterized the officers’ actions as a stark example of politicized community leaders privileging white criminals over their Latino victims.
Death of 17-year-old farmworker brings to light workplace exploitation
As antagonistic immigration discourse and prejudicial policies foster violence, immigrant workers are increasingly susceptible to workplace exploitation. In the case of 17-year-old Maria Isabel Vasquez Jimenez, that exploitation proved deadly.
Change.org’s Antonio Ramirez reports that Jimenez, who was two months pregnant, died of exposure while pruning grapes on a field owned by California’s Merced Farm Labor. The company had been fined previously for violating heat regulations, but still failed to ensure that its workers received legally mandated access shade, water and breaks. Now, Merced’s owner, Maria De Los Angeles Colung, as well as its former safety coordinator, Elias Armenta, are charged with involuntary manslaughter in Jimenez’s death but, as Ramirez notes, they’ve accepted a plea bargain which would only mandate community service.
Jimenez’s preventable death highlights rampant exploitation of immigrant workers in the U.S. food industry—particularly of women. As Alternet’s Jill Richardson reports, immigrant workers are increasingly the victims of wage theft and are routinely exposed to toxic pesticides and other hazardous conditions while women workers regularly contend with a variety of workplace sexual abuse and harassment. Richardson summarizes the phenomenon thusly:
In addition to the fondling and groping the women endured on the job, women also engaged in consensual relationships with supervisors to gain “a secure place in American society, a green card, a husband — or at the very least a transfer to an easier job at the plant.” […]
And then there’s the nonconsensual stuff: A 2008 piece in High Country News revealed that farmworkers refer to one company’s field as the “field of panties” because so many women workers are raped by supervisors. And as far back as 1993, the Southern Poverty Law Center found in its own study that 90 percent of female farm workers cite sexual harassment as a serious problem.
While the sexual abuse of (largely undocumented) women farmworkers doesn’t register as a hate crime in the same way that the racially motivated murders of Luiz Ramirez and the Flores family do, the nature of their exploitation is clearly gendered and racialized. As immigration enforcement tightens, effectively pushing undocumented workers further underground while discouraging undocumented victims of violent crimes from coming forward, farmworkers will continue to be targeted for exploitation based on their gender, race and nationality—the same criteria upon which Ramirez and the Flores family were targeted for deadly violence.
This post features links to the best independent, progressive reporting about immigration by members of The Media Consortium. It is free to reprint. Visit the Diaspora for a complete list of articles on immigration issues, or follow us on Twitter. And for the best progressive reporting on critical economy, environment, and health care issues, check out The Audit, The Mulch, and The Pulseby Catherine A. Traywick, Media Consortium blogger
This week, two high-profile... more
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There's another infamous shooting of a nine-year-old girl that is making headlines this week in Tucson. This time, we wonder if the rest of the media will bother to cover it.
The little girl's name was Brisenia Flores. She lived near the border with her parents and sister outside the town of Arivaca, Arizona. On May 30 of 2009, a woman named Shawna Forde, who led an offshoot unit of Minutemen who ran armed border patrols for patriotic "fun". Forde's gang had decided to go "operational," which meant they concocted a scheme to raid drug smugglers and take their money and drugs and use it to finance a border race war and "start a revolution against the government". They targeted the Flores home, which had neither money nor drugs, based on dubious information. They convinced Flores to let them in by claiming to be law-enforcement officers seeking fugitives, then shot him point-blank in the head when he questioned them and wounded his wife, Gina Gonzalez. And then, while she pleaded for her life, they shot Brisenia in cold blood in the head. (Her sister, fortunately, was sleeping over at a friend's.)
You can listen to the wounded mother's 911 call here:
As Terry Greene Sterling at the Daily Beast reports, Shawna Forde's trial finally opens this week, having been briefly delayed by the Giffords shooting.
Already, we're getting some fascinating details about that riveting 911 call:
http://azstarnet.com/news/blogs/courthouse/article_e7adbd8e-1919-11e0-82ac-001cc4c002e0.html
> Gonzalez testified Tuesday she recognized Forde for several reasons. It was the first
> time she'd seen her in person since the incident, she wasn't wearing makeup (the
> women in the photo lineup were wearing makeup), she had the same smile and her
> hair was styled the same way.
> As for the smile, Gonzalez said that after the shootings, the home invaders
> ransacked her house and then left. However, when she was on the phone with 911,
> she looked up and saw the woman standing on the threshold, smiling.
> "She saw me standing there and her face dropped and she said 'Oh, (expletive),"
> Gonzalez said.
> The woman went back outside and a few seconds later Gonzalez said she and the
> tall man exchanged shots. (Prosecutors think the tall guy was Jason Bush.)
We've been following the Forde case closely from the day it was first reported, in large part because it tells us so much about the mindset and behind-the-scenes operations of would-be border vigilantes.
Indeed, one of the things we look forward most to learning from this trial is the extent to which Minutemen cofounder Jim Gilchrist was involved: there is a considerable likelihood it will turn out he tipped off Forde that federal authorities were looking for her in connection with the murders.
We're also looking forward to perhaps finally seeing some coverage of the case in the mainstream media -- perhaps even Fox News, which has been assiduous in refusing to do so. I have to admit I'm baffled that, in a cable-TV business that prizes riveting audio snippets, it's gotten so little attention elsewhere.
But then, this case always cut against everyone's favorite "neighborhood watch" narrative. It's about time we laid that one to rest for good.There's another infamous shooting of a nine-year-old girl that is making... more
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