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ACLU Files Lawsuit Against City of Denver for Outrageous Bail Bond Fees
In a righteous blow to the prison industrial complex’s enduring grab for funds from already cash-strapped communities, the American Civil Liberties Union has brought a lawsuit against the city of Denver for what it terms illegal jail bond fees. The lawsuit reportedly began when a Denver man committed a petty crime by breaking a city…
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Cop Who Shot and Killed 12-Year-Old Tamir Rice Withdraws New Police Job Offer
Timothy Loehmann is the man who shot 12-year-old Tamir Rice less than two seconds after arriving on the scene of a Cleveland playground (the police cruiser was still moving). Loehmann is the guy who’d been on the job in the Cleveland PD only eight months before killing Tamir, and who had to leave his previous…
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Former Students at Pittsburgh-Area High School Settle Lawsuit Alleging Physical Abuse and Tasing by School Resource Officers
Five black students and their parents who filed a civil rights lawsuit alleging that a Pittsburgh-area school allowed them to be physically assaulted, cursed, and shocked with stun guns, have settled the case, pending a judge’s approval. The federal suit filed in August 2017, by five former black students at Woodlawn Hills and their families,…
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Dark Times: Trump and Sessions Seek to Halt Mandated Reform of Chicago Police Department
As Donald Trump and his abused Keebler elf in the Justice Department, Jeff Sessions, work double time to pander to shore up Trump’s support among law enforcement officials, the administration is now actively blocking fundamental, hard-fought reform of police departments found to have engaged in violent, abusive and unconstitutional behavior against citizens in their jurisdictions,…
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Cardi Reveals What Really Set Off Her Fisticuffs With Nicki Minaj (Hint: It Was for the Kulture)
You can call Cardi B lots of things—stripper, ghetto bird, reality TV heaux—but what you’re not gonna do is question her mama credentials. Just ask Nicki Minaj. In a new cover interview with W magazine, Bartier Cardi (born Belcalis Almanzar) said that thing that brought her beef with Nicki Minaj to its boiling point (again)…
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‘A Love Supreme’: John and Alice Coltrane’s NY Home Named a National Treasure
For those of us still reeling from the closure of Harlem’s iconic Lenox Lounge, coincidentally, a place where the legendary saxophonist John Coltrane once played, there is good news today. We can take heart in the fact that John Coltrane’s Long Island, N.Y., home, the same home where he recorded his seminal, transcendent work, “A…
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Kenan Thompson Has Three Words About Voting This Election: ‘Figure It Out’
We here at The Root always come with receipts, as hard as they may be to bear. Last week, writer Michael Harriot asked, “Why Is It So Damn Hard to Vote?” Tonight, The Root writer Monique Judge answered, but regardless of the obstacles, one of our favorite big men on late-night has some sage advice:…
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Gov. of Mississippi Has the Nerve to Talk About Being ‘Civilized’ After Black Teens Stage Controversial Halftime Show
Gov. Phil Bryant, head of the state which ranks second to last in education in all 50 of these United States; a man who runs the government of a place with an actual Confederate flag in its state flag and where the poverty rate stands at an abysmal 20 percent, has the nerve, the unmitigated…
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A Hero Lives in Chitown: Chance The Rapper Pledges $1 Million to City Mental Health Services
In the words of that sage of Hollywood, Robert Downey Jr., a hero is not a noun it’s a verb. Truer words have never spoken as our most favorite philanthropist, Chance the Rapper, aka Lil Chano, who has already given millions to Chicago public schools, announced on Thursday that he’d be donating $1 million dollars…
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Black Genius Recognized: Meet Our 2018 MacArthur Foundation Fellows
Although we know that genius drips from our very pores—from the magic of hip-hop to the delicacies of soul food—it’s nice to be acknowledged. And, as per usual, the MacArthur Foundation gets it right, choosing the best, the brightest, the most creative, and, dare we say, the wokest from our communities. This year, five black…
