For Immediate Release

        Contact Rev Edward Pinkney
269-925-0001
      banco9342@sbcglobal.net

Mass Demonstration to protest
The Benton Harbor Police Department        

March 1, 2014           March: Starts at 11am

Start at Benton Harbor

City Hall to the Courthouse

Press Conference starts at            

10:30 am

Karrington Penny must have 

             Justice                

A NUMBER OF Black groups, Churches and Community activist along with the Black

Autonomy Network Community Organization (BANCO) will be protesting the Benton Harbor Police Department to represent the best interest of the community. The issues range from poor police service, destruction of the black family and extraordinary high incarceration rate of black residents in Benton Harbor. The Benton Harbor Police Department is out of touch with the black community.

The Benton Harbor Police Department has targeted the black community amd must quit endorsing destructive and unfair behavior by the police department.

The only words that can define the gross negligence of the Benton Harbor Police Department are betrayal.

The Benton Harbor Police Department is corrupt from the top to the bottom. We do not believe the police department has ever been concern with serving and protecting black people in the community.

• We are demanding Justice for Karrington Penny;
• We are demanding a complete investigation of the murder of Karrington Penny;
• We are demanding the removal of Det. Wes Smigielski from Benton Harbor Police Department;
• We are demanding an investigation into Timothy (Bulldog) Allen, Toby Williams, Williams Edward Hurse, Dewayne Flowers, Eric McGinnis, and many others;
• We are demanding the Benton Harbor Police Department be dissolved, because they do not serve the black community.   

Rev Edward Pinkney

www.bhbanco.org

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The tough guys strike again in Benton Harbor

Yesterday was another bad day for Benton Harbor residents.  Law enforcement took five $10 bags of marijuana from five houses.  As per usual, these opportunities to imprison more BH residents happened courtesy of BHPD collaborating with the Berrien county sheriff.  

The tough guys are at it again. 

And, as per usual, the radio immediately began reporting it as some big deal drug bust.  Keeps BH residents in the state of fear.

They would find a lot more "street drugs" in St. Joe, but US representative Fred Upton's town will continue to operate how ever it wants to without scrutiny of any kind.  The Whirlpool heir and his surroundings are untouchable.  He and his law enforcement tough guys will continue to ruin lives in Benton Harbor until people figure out a way to stop them.

How do we show our playground bullies a humane way to behave in the world before they grow up and cause serious life tragedies?

ANOTHER African-American male found dead in Benton Harbor

Benton Harbor police dept. - most corrupt in US?

A Benton Harbor, Michigan man was found dead in the snow on Wednesday, January 15. Friends and family asked city commissioners to help them find answers to how and why their son died.

Benton Harbor police said they do not believe foul play was involved in the death of 18 year old Karrington Penny Morrow.  He was found unresponsive in the front yard of 420 Empire Ave, Benton Harbor on January 1.  His parents, Kimberly Penny Word and Robert Morrow, want someone to be held accountable for their son's death. 

The family wants a thorough and independent investigation.

"There is more to this than what we're being told," said Penny Word, who spoke to the Benton Harbor commissioners during the city Legislative Committee meeting, "and the very manner that we were told was wrong in itself.  Detective Smigielski kept saying there was no foul play."  Yet, serious questions remain unanswered.

The parents gave a copy of a Facebook message to the commissioners. It shows that something else was going on, and that the Benton Harbor police department may be part of the cover-up.  Police told Ms. Word not to share this message until the investigation is over.

Penny Word said persons who were with her son that night said someone slipped a "molly" (illegal street drug) into her son's drink, a drink served by the mother in the home Karrington was visiting.  Penny Word wants that person held accountable, further stating that he would have been at Lansing Community College in two weeks. 

Ms. Word said when she got the phone call at her Mississippi home, she was told that her son had died and no foul play was suspected. Despite the fact that three Black bodies have been found floating in the river, the police amazingly continue to say there was and is no foul play.  In all the cases.

Penny Word said, "I can't fathom there not being foul play, or even making that statement within two minutes of talking to me.  My child is dead."

Moreover, in a blatant display of racist insensitivity, Det. Smigielski wanted to know why she (Ms. Word) was "so upset." 

                                                       

The parents of the deceased 18 year old said they were told their son was drinking alcohol though he was underage, and that the alcohol was furnished by an adult woman at the house.

The obvious question is, who was Karrington with?  Ms. Word said, "If this adult served my child alcohol, why can't she be charged with murder or wrongful death?  If this person would have been black she would be in jail and charged with murder.  Apparently, someone at her home slipped a molly into my son Karrington's drink."

Ms. Word said Berrien county prosecutor Mike Septic told her that if the

woman is charged with anything, it be would be a "misdemeanor."

"He's deceased!" Ms. Word said, "and I can't see that being a misdemeanor."

The parent said that Det. Wes Smigielski is trying to cover up any foul play, because he has a relationship with the white woman who served the drinks.  Det. Smigielski is known for covering up crimes in against blacks in Benton Harbor by white people.

Smigielski said the case is "closed."  It's apparent to Benton Harbor residents, familiar with police dept. activities, Smigielski is again protecting his white friends.

Deputy Chief Dan McGinnis said Karrington was identified by his wallet. However, the wallet was not found in his pocket.  It was found in his car 2 days after the media announced his death.  (Another lie by BHPD.)

McGinnis also said Karrington's father has asked the public safety dept. at least twice not to press charges against the adult woman who was serving drinks to a minor. However, Karrington's father said he never said anything

like that.  Another BHPD lie.

Benton Harbor, Michigan has the worst police department in the nation. A city with a 94% black population and yet the police department is 95% white and does not support the community.

As corruption rolls on in the city of Benton Harbor, we should be thinking about dissolving the BHPD. They continue to support the likes of Wes Smigielski and Dan McGinnis.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Benton Harbor has possibly the most corrupt police department in the nation.

Former police officer Andrew Collins planted drugs on more than 200 citizens of Benton Harbor.  Presently, we no longer have Andrew Collins, but now have Wes Smigielski who is known for his open practices of racism in Benton Harbor. 

Three bodies have been found floating in the river, and we believe that the police have something to do with these apparent murders.  Benton Harbor citizens are constantly harassed by the police. Thus, when we speak of a police state, we are describing the horrible daily reality in Benton Harbor.

Rev. Edward Pinkney

ANOTHER African-American male found dead in Benton Harbor, just in time for MLK day

Karrington Penny Morrow, RIP  

 The Public Safety Department of Benton Harbor, Michigan is in need of citizen input, an independent evaluation of the services, and of employee practices.  Numerous questions have been voiced by citizens regarding racial profiling, unsolved murders and numbers of citizens feel they have not been treated fairly, at best.  Recent history revealed officers planting drugs, getting benefits for arresting citizens, and an obvious police oppression that leaves Benton Harbor residents living in an unusual and unreasonable state of fear. 

   Peaceful citizen protests have historically been surrounded with police in riot gear video taping, and police taking pictures of participants as a means of intimidation. 

   Fear tactics have been the norm in an unprecedented fashion in Benton Harbor. Even the mostly white neighboring community across the river has public safety signs that read, "Video Surveillance," as another means of intimidating residents of Benton Harbor. White visitors in St. Joe will be cautioned about going over the bridge. Nothing in Michigan quite compares with the police-like state, the racial divide, and the use of tax dollars, to that of Benton Harbor.

Karrington Penney Morrow

   One only has to spend time in Benton Harbor to realize the effect that public safety has on the residents. More recently, individuals of African-American descent were found floating in the river in Benton Harbor.  A young man of 18 years old, Karrington Penny Morrow, was found dead in a snow bank this week under suspicious circumstances.  The publicity and investigation of these deaths leave many residents wondering why. Where is the thorough investigation, and where is the publicity to expose and understand these horrors?  

   Another odd and apparent scare tactic was the acquisition of a vehicle with extraordinary military power by Berrien County.  This 20-ton armored vehicle can be used for terrorist-type attacks and is not something even large metropolitan areas would have.  Odd that Berrien County, an unlikely place for a national terrorist attack, would seek such a monolithic machine. 

   Public works of Benton Harbor seem limited:  poor snow removal, limited parks, limited civic activities, limited public services such as recreational areas hospitable to typical Benton Harbor residents. Gentrification continues to be the apparent goal as the city sits on Lake Michigan. The actual residents who have been born and raised in Benton Harbor, with their entire family connection, continue to pay a price by the funds being used in citizen intimidation, limited services for the people, oppressive tactics, and ultimately creating many questions as related to democracy and use of tax dollars. This is a different Benton Harbor, the real Benton Harbor; not the small enclaves of white gentrification that has infiltrated the shoreline in upscale gated-like communities.

   It is time for an impartial, non-political, and highly ethical service to evaluate the use of tax dollars, the level of satisfaction of Benton Harbor residents, the need for public parks that serve the community (not the up-scale developments along the beach or the visiting golfing community), the police department, the use of racial profiling, the recreational facilities, and all the amenities needed to increase residential satisfaction and quality of life in Benton Harbor.  Make it comparable to St. Joe and any other lake shore community. Perhaps a university, a citizen driven group, and a survey of the citizens via confidential poling would be a place to start. Kalamazoo and other communities have hired evaluators of their police departments. It's time Benton Harbor be given this opportunity to begin developing the great community it can be (and once was). 

Benton Harbor mayor purposely leaves city streets unplowed for one week

Benton Harbor Mayor James Hightower is a great supporter of the blood-sucking corporation Whirlpool. The Mayor instructed the snow cleaning team not to clean the streets in Benton Harbor.

A snow emergency is still in place in Benton Harbor to keep people from parking on city streets so plows can get through. Many residents are wondering when their streets will be plowed.

The city is impassible almost everywhere.  Not driveable, and not walkable.  The snow is knee deep.  Ms. Jefferson finally make it out of her home on Benton Ave.  "It's hard to get out of the house.  After a lot of effort, I was able to push snow away from the door and get outside."

She said her street hasn't been plowed since last Sunday's storm and she's stuck at home with no food.  After a week of being inside without food, Ms. Jefferson doesn't feel well.

"It's so cold inside my house, I have ice on the inside of my windows," said Ms. Jefferson.

"No one can come pick you up or bring you anything, because the roads are so bad."  

Mayor James Hightower has a strong bias against the black population in Benton Harbor.  His goal is to protect the Whirlpool Corporation. 

Rev Edward Pinkney

 

Hightower recall signatures turned in

The recall of Benton Harbor mayor James Hightower will be going forward.  The signatures were turned in Wenesday, January 8, 2014, 9am.

The recall action is taking place because the mayor voted no to allowing the city income tax to be placed on the November 15, 2013 ballot.

Mayor Hightower said the commissioners need to think of the city debt as bills needing to be paid by the people, not by non-residents.

What he did not say was that non-residents are more than 90% of the working people in Benton Harbor.

If the residents would have known about the $2.3 million dollar loan, they would have passed the income tax.

The recall signatures we worked hard to collect are more signatures than mayor Hightower got votes in the election.  

Rev Edward Pinkney

Benton Harbor mayor Hightower wants residents to pay the bills - not Whirlpool

Mayor James Hightower of Benton Harbor, Michigan says the

Whirlpool Corporation should not pay taxes - only the

residents of the city of Benton Harbor should foot the bills.

Whirlpool Corporation's profit last year was more than ten billion 

dollars, and it paid no taxes to the city of Benton Harbor where 

the headquarters resides.

Mayor James Hightower and the Whirlpool Corporation fought

extremely hard to defeat the city income tax which would

have provided $3.5 million dollars the very first year and

every year after.  Residents and those who work in the city 

would pay the income tax. Corporations would, too.

Mayor Hightower wanted a debt consolidation loan. He

said the loan would not add to the debt, but eliminate it. How

stupid does the mayor and Whirlpool Corporation believe the

residents of Benton Harbor are?

Commissioner Marcus Muhammad, who supports the residents

and fights for the all of us, said he remains unconvinced that 

the loan is a good idea.

Commissioner Muhammad remarked, "You cannot cut your way 

out of debt, or borrow your way out of debt. These are just two 

basic principle of finance.

Commissioner Bowen said, "Without the loan the city will still pay 

off it's debt, it will just take longer.  I don't see what's the rush."

The commissioners question why Mayor Hightower didn't mention 

the need for a loan in his State of the City address on October 15,2013 - 

before the November 5, 2013 election when the city income tax 

was defeated.  It would have provided $3.5 million every year. 

There would be no need for a loan. He said the city was in the black, 

and now he wanted to take out a $2.3 million dollar loan 

(on the backs of the people.)

If the people had known about the loan they would have approved 

the city income tax, which called for residents and businesses to pay 

1% income tax and non-residents 0.5% city income tax.  Non-residents 

are over 90% of the people who work inside Benton Harbor. 

Hightower is being recalled for voting "no" on the city income tax.  

Because of him the residents are forced to take out a loan for $2.3 

million dollars. We must remove the Mayor from office.         

 

Rev Edward Pinkney

 

Burned to Death by a Refrigerator

ASHEBORO, N.C. (CN) - A man burned to death when his Whirlpool refrigerator overheated to more than 1,000 degrees and fire-balled him in the face as he opened it, his family claims 

in court.     

Jane Walker Payne sued Whirlpool Corp. on behalf of Ashley Alvin Walker, in Randolph County Superior Court.
     In March 2002, Walker bought a Whirlpool refrigerator which had a defective heating element pin in its icemaker, according to the complaint.
     The family claims that despite warranty repairs a short occurred in the heating element in January 2012, causing the fridge to overheat to more than 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit.
     The appliance began to smoke and activated the smoke alarm in Walker's home.
     When Walker saw smoke coming out of the fridge he opened the freezer door, unaware of the high temperature inside.
     The rush of oxygen generated a fireball that burned Walker's face and body, and damaged his lungs.
     "In what must have been extreme agony, decedent managed to pull himself from his kitchen to the front door," the complaint states. "Eventually, he was rushed to the hospital by emergency personnel, but unfortunately, it was too late. He died later that day from his injuries. His death certificate lists the cause of death as 'acute thermal injury.'"
     The family says the fire destroyed much of Walker's home and belongings.
     They claim that Whirlpool, like other major appliance manufacturers, cuts corners to save money and sacrifices product quality.
     Major appliances cause about 150,000 house fires each year, resulting in 3,500 injuries, 150 deaths and more than $540 million in property damage. Major manufacturers recalled 1.6 million refrigerators from 2007 to 2011, according to the lawsuit.
     The family seeks compensatory and punitive damages for negligence, failure to warn, breach of warranty and negligent repair.
     They are represented by John Ormand III with Brooks, Pierce, McLendon, Humphrey & Leonard, of Greensboro.
     Whirlpool did not respond to a request for comment.  

www.courthousenews.com/2014/01/08/64331.htm

Why Detroit blacks are presently being degraded in the media

Received from Tom Barrow, Detroit.

Dear Friend:

I wanted to share with you the crux of a post I received from one of my Facebook friends,  Troy Tisdale.  I took the liberty to edit some of it, but am sending it to you and encourage you to take a few minutes to read it.  While the post discusses race, it is not a racial assault but rather is given to explain precisely what you and I see that is occurring in Detroit.  Personally, I believe it explains why many Detroiters participate in what so many others see so clearly as injustice.  Mr friend, read the post for its information and then think deliberately about what you are seeing with your own eyes...

 

     The attached is a JPEG of the 1928 picture of  Dr. Edward Bernays, the man ultimately responsible for why Detroit blacks are presently being degraded within the majority controlled media. He reveals that it is a mortifying psycho-social method of control which is being used in urban centers all across America and will gain even greater popularity because it is now shown to have worked in the city of Detroit. 

 

     Bear in mind that Dr Bernays’s uncle was psychiatrist Sigmund Freud.  Bernays was a mass manipulation expert hired as an advisor to several U.S corporations and presidents. It was he that impressed upon the majority ruling elite of how they could control the minds of the masses and targeted populations by using mass media propaganda.   Dr. Bernays coined the terms "group mind" and "engineering consent", both are important concepts in practical mind manipulation. 

 

     Bernays is quoted as saying that "The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.” 

 

     What we have just experienced in Detroit, with the planned help of the influx of massive unprecedented corporate money, is the direct outgrowth of Dr. Bernays' work.   To quote Dr. Bernays “If we understand the mechanism and motives of a group mind [long-time Detroit residents], it is now possible to control and regiment the masses [long-time Detroit residents] according to our will without them knowing it”.  

 

     Sigmund Freud taught Bernays how to use the human psyche to make people feel they needed whatever product was being advertised.  He also invented the public relations profession in the 1920s and was the first person to take Freud’s ideas to manipulate the masses.   In the process, he invented the modern technique for mass-consumer persuasion.

 

     Bernays showed American corporations how they could make people want things they didn’t need by systematically linking their products to their unconscious desires.   “You’ve Come a Long Way Baby!”  His most notorious feat was breaking the taboo on women smoking by persuading them that cigarettes were a symbol of independence and freedom.  Bernays was convinced that this mass method of manipulation was more than just a way of selling consumer goods. For him it was a NEW POLITICAL tool which could allow one to control the masses [long-time Detroit residents].   By satisfying the inner irrational desires that his uncle, Sigmund Freud, had identified, people could be made happy, docile, angry, self hating or even confused.  

 

     One of Bernays biggest fans was Adolph Hitler’s propaganda chief, Joseph Goebbels, a fact about which Bernays bragged proudly. A common pattern used repeatedly by Goebbels was to turn a harmless entity into a fearsome enemy through lies and manufactured news items. Then use that “threat” to justify attacking the entity.  To do that, Bernays coined the terms “group mind” and “engineering consent”, important concepts in practical propaganda work. 

 

     The present despairing state of Detroit’s majority community is neither a baffling phenomenon nor the result of some innate deficient capacity among its residents, but rather the result of the elites innate proclivity to reinvent devious methods of suppressing the city’s majority population – thus now using these same psychological programs against the city’s majority population as a means of maintaining dominance and control. 

 

     Using the travails of Kwame Kilpatrick against the city’s entire African American population, the local media constantly but racially put forth devaluing depictions and distorted portrayal of Detroit’s Black population, amplified the negative to the point that it distorted reality.  This, my friends, was really a carefully crafted, deliberately designed debasing management perception program—a media driven mass manipulation wherein which the city’s Black population was made to see themselves through mortifyingly lens secretly assigned to them by the few newly arrived Detroit corporate executive’s mass manipulation experts.

 

     This contemporary bigoted system used the trusted local media’s proven mass manipulating capabilities to adversely shape the collective perceptions of the city’s own black population as a means of maintaining a minority white dominance and control. Within the doctrines of Bernays, this method of Psychological manipulation states that in order to maintain dominance and control over a targeted group that the groups aggressions must be turned inward AGAINST themselves. Simply stated, “they must be made to hate themselves.”   And to accomplish this goal the targeted group must be made to believe that their problem is an internalized one. This is precisely what is being done to long time Detroit residents of color by the majority controlled media. Its daily assault of deplorable minority debasing images upon the Black psyche is purposefully designed to adversely manipulate and shape the minds and collective consciousness of the targeted Black population.

 

     This media driven program from trusted media sources falsely devalued anything of color and effectively marginalized the Black brand while exemplifying the white brand. It circulates Black demeaning TV stroies on crime, Kwame Kilpatrick and other fake news reports designed to frame the myth of Whites’ racial, moral, and intellectual superiority over the Black population. This mass manipulation produced internalized feelings of self-contemptuous responses within the targeted Black population that hinders the black community’s own unity, upward mobility and manipulates them to accept white dominance over their lives.

 

     The assault reinforced seemingly pre-conditioned responses of resentment and prejudicial images of Black people in the city’s majority population, thereby creating a false impression of wanton Black criminality and violence. This created conditioned responses in its population for eventualities to unfold against the targeted Black populous without opposition or resentment. The local media controllers will never come out and admit that they are intentionally doing this to Black populations–for they are actually accountable to no one and are free to target and therefore destroy any group they choose. Nonetheless, this mass manipulation scheme is deemed a necessity by the city’s media because although they profess upon the surface equality for all of the citizens, they are in fact unrelentingly committed towards the preservation of White dominance over its minority population.

 

     My friends,  do not lose hope.  Facebook alone will not save us, rather we must organize formally and excise the Bernays operative within.  Those of us who saw Dr. Bernays’s methods while they were being applied were vilified because we saw them and had to be diminished.  Inform your friends.  the unwarranted Detroit bankruptcy, the devaluing of anything controlled by black or long-time Detroit residents, the deliberate reducing and restoration of city services, the selling off of city assets and transferring of the city’s wealth from democrats to conservatives and the unjust enrichment of conservative law firms during the bankruptcy is all the practical application of Bernays’s work.

 

     The current public relations behemoth on Detroit is a direct outgrowth of Bernays’ work and his method of mass psychological manipulation is being currently used by a few Detroit businessmen who seek to control all of Detroit by conducting planned campaigns of extensive strategic psychological operations [based upon the works of Benays] through the local media to influence and direct the perception and climate of the city towards their own objectives.  Today, these corporate few are openly carrying out their social-engineering agendas via planned campaigns of extensive strategic psychological operations through the media to influence and direct the perception and climate of the city towards their objectives of maintaining a white dominance and control resulted in Detroit using these same proven methods of strategic psychological manipulation of the city’s Black population.

 

     I will close with this last quote from Bernays  “The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who can manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.  If we understand the mechanism and motives of the group mind, it is possible to control and regiment those masses [long-time Detroit residents] according

 

Regards,

TOM BARROW

Pinkney To Pinkney End of 2013 Episode

Whirlpool paid money to destroy the city of Benton Harbor. Whirlpool provided money under table to control the election.

Benton Harbor Emergency Manager is now seeking a 2.3 million dollar loan that must be paid back by the residents.

Lynn Stewart political prisoner must come home!

Targeted individual by our government

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Wes Smigielski must be terminated from the Benton Harbor police department

Outrage, disgust, and sadness were the emotions I felt as a court-observer when Benton Harbor police officer Wes Smigielski gave his testimony in December.  He said he called Child Protective Services "on a victim."  The young mother is not a victim and is not a bad parent;  Smigielski just wasn't getting the answers he wanted from her.  (see blog post below)

Because of Smigielski, this innocent Benton Harbor woman now has a felony record.  She was charged with perjury.

Surprise, shock, and disbelief were the emotions felt by black and white Americans who learned about this miscarriage of justice.  By calling Child Protective Services, Smigielski violated the woman's civil and human rights.

For white people who are bigots, their world is one of white privilege which confers not only power and opportunity, but also a presumption of innocence and the right to protection.

It is a world in which the police are, if not exactly friends, certainly not enemies.  More often than not, if the player is black and the police officer is white, the officer receives benefit of the doubt.

Police misconduct, whether described as brutality, harassment, discourtesy, dishonesty, or calling Child Protective Services to ruin lives, it cannot be tolerated.  It is inconsistent with the ethical functioning of a police department in a democracy.

A police department must have rules prohibiting such misconduct and enforce them vigorously.  Police chiefs should be aware of what takes place in the field and take firm steps to correct abuses.

We demand the immediate termination of Wes Smigielski from the Benton Harbor police department.

Power concedes nothing without a demand.  It never did and it never will.

Rev Edward Pinkney
BlogTalkRadio.com/rev-pinkney

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