Despite Appeals Court’s Ruling, Bell Remains In Jena Jail

Leonard E. Colvin
Chief Reporter
New Journal & Guide
 
       A day after thousands  of people marched  to demonstrate the injustice imposed on Mychal Bell, the only member of the Jena 6 to be tried for  his participation in a brawl earlier this year, Bell was denied bail and remains in jail.

       Bell  and his fellow students were charged originally as adults with second degree aggravated battery. But a Louisiana Appeals Court struck down Bell’s conviction on September 14 because he  was 16 at the time of the trial, citing he should not have been tried as an adult.
       Last Friday January 21, in a closed session, with only his family on hand, a judge refused to grant Bell bail. There was no reason given for his decision.  The other five black youths will be tried in the coming weeks.

        
       Bell’s family, Civil Rights leaders who organized and led the thousands who marched in Jena a day earlier on Thursday, September 20 said they were disappointed at the judge’s decision. but were not surprised.
       “The judge  in this case knowingly tried Bell as an adult,” said Rev. Jesse Jackson, President of the Rainbow-Push Coalition, which was among the groups which helped stage the September 20 March.  “Not only is this child abuse but this is prosecutorial misconduct. They need to walk across (in that courthouse) the hall and indict themselves.”
       Bell has spent the last nine months in an adult jail with an excessively high bail of $130,000 and is now in a juvenile holding facility.

Mychal Bell

       Clarence Anthony Lee, of Yorktown, was the organizer of a busload of Virginians who traveled  to Jena last week from Hampton Roads. When he heard of the judge’s decision. he said he was disappointed  but vowed to  continue his effort support the cause of the young black men.
       “This was an act of revenge against those young men,” said Bell, 46. “They (court and political officials in Jena) are telling us that we cannot come down there and tell them how to run their town and their courts.  Something is wrong in Jena when this young man is still sitting in jail.”

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