(upbeat music)
- Written by an Nykiera Chaney.
The chairman explores The
Life and Assassinations
of Black Panther Party
Chairman Fred Hampton
for this reading narrated by Kizra Deon.
Ki-Jana Garmon as Fred Hampton,
Michelle Lamb as Iberia Hampton,
Marita McKee as Maime Till,
Tajira S. Hawkins as Bobby Rush,
Joe Quimby as Roy Mitchell,
Jonathan Patton as Francis Hampton,
Tereva Crum as Deborah Johnson,
Jeremy Crawford as William O'Neal,
Steven Hamilton as police
and William Preacherman Fesperman,
Jasmine Jett as Student,
Jeffrey Haas, and songstress.
- We open in the village of Maywood.
A "Welcome to Maywood" marker
proudly stands downstage,
right welcoming visitors to
a village of eternal light.
Upstage, stretching across the stage,
is a mural depicting buildings
of Chicago in the distance.
At Rise: Maime Till-Mobley, 55,
hesitantly enters upstage left.
She pauses to smooth her dress
and straighten her glasses.
Nervously, she takes a
deep breath before walking
to the center of the stage.
- I was born in Webb,
Mississippi but we moved to Argo,
a small town right outside of Chicago,
after my father found work
at the Argo Corn Products
Refining Company.
I don't have much to say about myself.
I was always into my studies,
I was the first black student
to make the honor roll
at Argo Community High School.
Actually, I was only
the fourth black student
to graduate from the school.
I met Louis when I was 18 and
not long after we married.
Our first and only child was
born later that same year.
Louis wasn't too faithful
and he was violent at times
so eventually I was forced
to obtain a restraining order against him.
He kept violating it
so finally the judge made
him choose between enlistment
in the army or jail time.
He enlisted.
- Iberia Hampton, 54, enters upstage left,
her eyes are vacant as a woman haunted.
Iberia walks over and rests
her hand on Maime's shoulder.
Maime pats Iberia's hand with recognition.
- Francis, my husband, and I
grew up in a small town outside
of Haynesville, Louisiana.
We'd farmed the land, our
grandparents worked as slaves.
Francis needed a real job
and it weren't none to be had
in the rural South so we
made our way North to Argo.
- Emmett was born the 25th of July, 1941,
and it was a very difficult birth
because he was a breech baby.
But he was the happiest baby in the world,
nothing phased him.
You didn't have to hold or rock him.
As long as he had the bottle and was dry,
he would lie in bed and entertain himself.
I named Emmett after my favorite uncle,
Emmett and his father.
He was a beautiful bouncing baby,
always filled with joy and the
sight of him brought a smile
to my face.
- Louis and Francis both
worked at the Corn Factory.
Maime and I were mutual
acquaintances of Fannie Wesley.
Fannie was Emmett's regular babysitter
but I was sitting at home
raising Fred, Bill, and Dee Dee
so I would babysit Emmett often.
- They both had speech
challenges, Emmett and Fred.
Emmett caught polio when he was six
and that caused him to stutter.
I took him to speech therapy
and they said he'd eventually outgrow it.
- When Fred was really young,
he fell and landed on his face.
He knocked his teeth out and
caused him to talk with a lisp.
He began practicing speaking
speeches until he overcame it.
- When Emmett turned 14
my uncle, Mose Wright,
visited Chicago for a funeral.
- He told Emmett stories about living
in the Mississippi Delta,
and Emmett wanted to see for himself.
Maime didn't wanna let him go.
I faced the same decision
each time I sent my children
to my parents farm outside
of Haynesville, Louisiana.
I was always nervous about
allowing them to go back South.
- But he begged to visit so I relented.
That day will live in
infamy within my mind.
For some reason, that
morning we couldn't seem
to get out the house.
- They were to meet Mose
at the 12th street station
and the train whistle was
blowing as they arrived.
- As Maime is speaking
she advances down stage
as if she can still see the
train sitting at the station.
The sound of an old train
whistle can be heard
throughout the room.
- He took off up the steps
and I called him back.
I told him, "You didn't kiss me goodbye,
how you know I'll ever see you again."
So he turned around and gave me a kiss.
He also gave me his watch
but he kept his daddy's ring.
- Maime runs downstage
right after the train,
waving and blowing kisses.
She stops just short of exiting the stage.
- The South was a very
different world from the North.
You had to know how to
behave in front of whites.
Times were so different then.
- In 1950s Mississippi,
lynching was a real risk for black men,
especially if they were
accused of associating
with white women.
- I remember it was 1955
because Fred had just turned 6.
- Emmett was only 14.
- Enter FBI agent, Roy Mitchell.
- It shall be unlawful for
a Negro and white person
to play together or in
company with each other
in any game of cards or
dice, dominoes, or checkers.
- It shall be unlawful
for any white prisoner
to be handcuffed or
otherwise chained or tied
to a Negro prisoner.
- No colored barber
shall serve as a barber
to white women or girls.
Marriages are void when
one party is a white person
and the other is possessed
with one-eighth or more Negro,
Japanese, or Chinese blood.
- The schools for white
children and the schools
for Negro children shall
be conducted separately.
- Baths and lockers for the Negroes,
shall be separate from the white race.
Negroes shall not show
affection towards one another
in public, especially
kissing, as it is offensive.
- Colored men do not look at white women.
- Colored men do not touch white women.
- If you see a white woman,
it's best for colored men
to cross to the other side
of the street.
- Colored men do not whistle
at white women in Mississippi.
- From the Federal Bureau
of Investigation's narrative
of the offense.
- On August 24, 1955, Emmett Louis Till,
a fourteen-year-old male
from Chicago, Illinois,
visiting relatives in
Leflore County, Mississippi,
entered the Bryant's Grocery & Meat Market
in the town of Money, Mississippi.
Till exit the store and shortly
thereafter, Carolyn Bryant,
the store's owner wife, exited as well.
Upon Carolyn Bryant's exit, Till whistled.
The relatives accompanying him,
knew his whistle would cause trouble
and they left in haste,
taking Till with them.
- On August 28, 1955, at
approximately 2:30 a.m.,
Roy Bryant, Carolyn Bryant's husband,
J.W. Milan, and at least
one other person appeared
at the home of Mose Wright,
looking for the boy who had
done the talking in Money
and abducted Till from the home.
Following the abduction,
Roy and J.W. were arrested
and charged with kidnapping.
- [Narrator] Roy Mitchell exits.
- One day after Fred's 7th
birthday, August 31, 1955,
a naked body presumed to be
Till's was found floating
in a section of the Tallahatchie River.
A 75 pound cotton gin fan was tied
with barbed wire to the
neck of the floating body.
There was extensive trauma to the head.
- It was Emmett.
- Down in Mississippi,
the sheriff told everyone
to meet at the church, there
was going to be a burial.
When everyone got there
Emmett was in a pine box
and a grave had been dug for him.
They tried to cover up what
happened and bury Emmett
but Maime refused.
She got the Chicago officials
to demand the return
of his body.
- When I first saw that
box, I just collapsed.
That box seemed to be bigger
than anything I'd seen before.
Mr. Rayner, the funeral director,
was prohibited from opening the box
but he told me to go home
and he'd take care of it.
On my way back to the funeral home,
I was about 3 blocks
away when an odor met me
that nearly knocked me out.
I said what in the world is that!
It was Emmett's body.
When it was time to see the body,
they tried to hold me up
but I shrugged them off.
I had a job to do and I didn't
have time to be fainting.
I saw his tongue had been chopped out,
and it was lying down on his chin.
I saw that this eye was out,
and was lying about midway the cheek.
I looked at this eye and it was gone.
I looked at the bridge of his nose
and it looked like someone
had taken a meat chopper
and chopped it.
I looked at his teeth because
I'd taken so much pride
in his teeth,
they were the prettiest
I'd seen in my life,
and I only saw two.
Well, where were the rest of them?
They'd just been knocked out.
And, I was looking at his ears.
They were like mine,
they're not attached, they curl up.
I didn't see the ear.
Where's the ear?
That's when I discovered
a hole in his head
and I could see daylight
on the other side.
Was it necessary to shoot
him if that's a bullet hole?
Was that necessary?
I also discovered they'd taken an ax
and gone straight down
across his head and the face
and back of his head were separated.
Well, I looked at Mr. Rayner
and he wanted to know.
- Maime, do you think you
wanna keep the casket open?
You know we can keep it closed.
- I told him, "Oh yes,
we're gonna keep it open."
He said-
- I'll do the best I
can to fix up the face,
you know, to make him
somewhat presentable.
- Iberia exits as Maime speaks.
- I said, "No!"
Let the people see what I see.
There was no way I could tell this story
and give people the visual picture
of what my son looked like.
I wanted the world to see
what they'd done to my baby.
- [Narrator] As Maime sings,
Emmett enters as an angel
dressed in flowing white garments
with wings widely spread behind him.
He encircles his mother,
before wrapping his wings around her
and leading her offstage.
♪ Precious Lord ♪
♪ Take my hand ♪
♪ Lead me on ♪
♪ Help me to stand ♪
♪ I am tired ♪
♪ I am weak ♪
♪ I am worn ♪
♪ Through the storms ♪
♪ And through the night ♪
♪ Guide me to ♪
♪ Guide me to the light ♪
♪ Precious Lord ♪
♪ Take my hand ♪
♪ Lead me on ♪
At Rise: Roy Mitchell
is standing center stage
with an urgent briefing
from the FBI Director.
- FBI Director dated August 25, 1967.
Counterintelligence
Program Black Nationalist,
Hate Groups, Internal Security.
The purpose of this new
counterintelligence endeavor is
to expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit,
or otherwise neutralize the activities
of black nationalist, hate-type
organizations and groupings,
their leadership, spokesmen,
membership, and supporters.
Long range goals are:
Prevent the coalition of black
militant nationalist groups.
In unity there is strength, a
truism that is no less valid
for all its triteness.
An effective coalition of
black nationalist groups,
might be the first step toward
a true black revolution.
Prevent the rise of a
Messiah who could unify
and electrify the militant
black nationalist movement.
Prevent militant black nationalists groups
and leaders from gaining respectability
by discrediting them to
three separate segments
of the community.
Discredit them first to the
responsible Negro community,
second, the white community,
and last, their followers
must be discredited
in the eyes of Negro radicals,
the followers of the movement.
You are urged to take an enthusiastic
and inevitable approach
to this new counterintelligence endeavor,
and the Bureau will be pleased
to entertain any suggestions
or techniques you may recommend.
- Roy Mitchell exits stage right
as crowd of students enter stage left,
carrying various posters for
equal treatment and recreation.
The group is lead by a young Fred Hampton.
- Now see, we have to go down there
and make our voices heard.
Here in Maywood,
there isn't any public pools
or recreational centers.
- Whites can go to the pool
at the private Veteran Industrial Park
but we ain't allowed there.
- Now they say,
"They don't want no,
integrated facility
causing no racial strife."
- It's hot and sticky out here.
If it weren't for you carpooling
us to the pool in Lyons
we wouldn't have anywhere to go.
- And I see racial strife
to me is when we're obedient
in the face of the
blatant racism displayed
by the teachers their Proviso East.
They call us all types
of niggers and Negroes,
and don't care much for teaching us.
There's no type of remedial
or tutoring programs
to make sure that we graduate
along with our peers.
It can't be that the only
time we matter is when
we're on the football field.
- They want us to represent them
but we can't even get a
black homecoming queen
or more black teachers.
- That's because without education,
well, people accept anything.
Without education, what you'll
have is a neocolonialism
instead of the colonialism
like you have now.
They won't know why they're
doing what they're doing.
- They don't wanna spend the money on us.
They want to keep us stupid and silent.
- Listen, in the words of Dr. King,
"By being here today, you are proving
that the youth of
America is freeing itself
of the prejudices of an
older and darker time
in our history.
Proving that the so-called
silent generation,
is not so silent.
And the so-called beat
generation have been hit hard,
but it is definitely not beat!"
- Fred, you really memorize
all of those speeches
of Dr. King and Malcolm?
- Sure, right I did.
Like Malcolm X said, "America
has a very serious problem.
Not only does America have
a very serious problem,
but our people have a
very serious problem.
America's problem is us.
We're her problem.
The only reason she has a problem,
is she doesn't want us here.
And every time you look at yourself,
be you black, brown, red, or
yellow, a so-called Negro,
you represent a person who
possesses such a serious problem
for America because you're not wanted.
Once you face this as a fact,
then you can start plotting a course
that will make you appear intelligent,
instead of unintelligent.
So we show them that we're intelligent."
So what's going to happen
is Maywood Town Hall,
is having a meeting this evening.
And we're gonna go down there peacefully,
and we gonna make sure
our voices are heard.
- Fred, did you see those
brothers and sisters
in California that took
over the capital with guns?
- Excitement echoes through the crowd.
- That's right, they told them
that they we're not gonna put up
with California being racist
and making laws to discriminate
against black people.
- And I see those were some
bad brothers and sisters!
- Come on y'all, follow me.
♪ Ain't gonna let nobody turn us around, ♪
♪ Turn us around, turn us around ♪
♪ Ain't gonna let nobody turn us around ♪
♪ We're gonna march to Maywood Town Hall ♪
♪ Ain't gonna let nobody turn us around ♪
♪ Turn us around, turn us around ♪
♪ Ain't gonna let nobody turn us around ♪
♪ We're gonna march to Maywood Town Hall ♪
- Students break out into
dance as they sing along.
Students are met
at the other end of stage by police.
Fred and Jim Ivory are let in.
The police stop the others.
- They're with me.
- Oh you're the one that came here, huh?
I said, "No more seats."
- Come on man, ain't no room,
or you just don't wanna let us in.
- Like I said, "No more seats."
- Fred and officers freeze
in place and are illuminated
as the rest of the stage dims.
Crowd increasingly becomes more rowdy,
before the off glass shattering is heard.
The youth exit in a state of panic.
- Both of you are under arrest.
- Under arrest, for what?
To be arrested,
you must first do something
warranting an arrest.
I've been here inside
with you this entire time.
What trouble have I caused?
- You're under arrest
for inciting mob action.
The knowing or reckless use of force
or violence disturbing the public peace
by two or more persons acting together
and without authority of law.
- Officers place Fred
and Jim in handcuffs.
- If you're gonna arrest
me, you gonna have
to read me my rights.
- Your what?
- Miranda vs. Arizona 1966 says,
"If you're gonna arrest me,
then you got to read me my legal rights."
- Stunned, the officers look
at one another before one
reaches into their pockets
and pulls out a sheet of paper,
which he reads directly from.
- You have the right to remain silent.
Anything you say can and
will be used against you
in a court of law.
You have the right to an attorney.
If you cannot afford an attorney,
one will be provided for you.
- Police officers exit with
Jim and Fred in handcuffs.
Telephone rings.
- Hanrahan, we have a
problem out in Maywood.
- Who we talking about?
- Young punk by the name of Fred Hampton.
He's talking big talk,
got them thinking they can
organize and disrupt the peace.
- [Hanrahan] My men
will take care of that.
- He's been added to the Agitator Index
as a key militant leader.
- [Hanrahan] What about his family?
- We've put a tap on his mother's phone.
- [Narrator] William O'Neal
and Roy Mitchell enters.
- You remember a few months back when you
and your friend decided to steal that car
and then wreck it?
You know you should be in jail now
but I'll let you go on that.
Told you that we could work it out.
- I appreciate what you did.
- It's payback time.
I want you to see if you can
join the Black Panther Party,
and if you can, give me a call.
- You want me to become a Black Panther?
- Just go see if you can
join the Black Panther Party.
I understand they're recruiting
new Panther recruits.
So why don't you see
if you can go down to the office and join.
You're going to be an informant.
If you get in, give me a call.
- [Fred] So like I'm working for the FBI?
- But you're working for me.
- Will do.
- Roy and William exit.
At Rise: Group of Black
Panther Party recruits led
by Fred enter while chanting
in two uniformed lines.
Informant William O'Neal is
in the front of the line.
They are dressed in all
black sporting black berets.
Bobby Rush enters behind the recruits.
♪ No more brothers in jail ♪
♪ Off the pigs ♪
♪ The pigs are gonna catch hell ♪
♪ Off the pigs ♪
♪ No more pigs in our Community ♪
♪ Off the pigs ♪
♪ No more pigs in our Community ♪
♪ Off the pigs ♪
♪ No more pigs in our Community ♪
♪ Off the pigs ♪
♪ The revolution has come ♪
♪ Off the pigs ♪
♪ Time to pick up our guns ♪
♪ Off the pigs ♪
- If you listen to the black, to the pigs,
they're gonna tell you to
fear the Black Panther Party.
They want you to hate the party
because they know that
if you respect the party,
you support the party.
And if you support the
party, you join the party.
And then you got a whole bunch
of us united against them
and they can't continue oppressing us.
This is why they got Brother Huey in jail.
- Power is the ability to define phenomena
and make it act in a desired manner.
When the pigs is wrong,
you whip out your guns.
We have the ability and the organization
to make that pig act in a desired manner.
- Yeah, we got guns too.
We got guns 'cause pigs is violent,
and we gotta protect ourselves.
We do defend our offices and our homes.
This is a constitutional right
that everybody has and there's
nothing funny about that.
The only reason they get mad
at the Black Panther
Party when we do it is
because we're political.
And we understand that
the politics is nothing
but war without bloodshed
and that war is nothing
but politics with bloodshed.
- Our brother, Martin Luther
King, exhausted a means
of non-violence with his life
being taken by some racist.
What is being done to
us is what has been done
to Martin Luther King.
It's the same.
Yes, we support non-violence
but we cannot sit and allow those things
to continue happening.
So in the words of Malcolm
X, "By any means necessary."
- The Black Panther Party
is simply the vanguard
of the revolution,
and we plan to teach
the people the strategy
and the necessary tools
to liberate themselves.
- Beginning here with
the Ten-Point Program.
- We want freedom.
We want the power to determine the destiny
of our black community.
We believe that Black
people will not be free,
until we are able to
determine our own destiny.
- We want full employment for our people.
- We want an end to the
robbery by the capitalists
of our black community.
40 acres and two mules were
promised 100 years back,
and as the restitution for slave labor
and mass murder of Black people.
We will accept the payment in currency,
which will be distributed to
our many, many communities.
- We want education that
teaches us our true history
and our role in the present-day society.
- [Fred] Right on.
- We want all black men to be
exempt from military service.
We believe that Black people
should not be forced to fight
in the military service to
defend the racist government
that does not protect us.
- [Fred] Right on.
- [All] We want an immediate
end to police brutality
and murder of black people.
- We want freedom from all black
men held in federal, state,
county, and city prisons and jails.
We believe that all Black people,
should be released from
the many jails and prisons
because they have not received
a fair and impartial trial.
- The Fourteenth Amendment
of the U.S. Constitution,
gives a man a right to be
tried by his peer group.
Now, see a peer,
is a person or from a
similar economic, social,
religious, and
geographical, environmental,
historical and racial background.
To do this the court will be forced
to select a jury from
the Black community from
which the Black defendant came.
We have been, and are being tried
by an all-white jury,
that have no understanding
of the average reasoning man
of the Black community.
- No party member can
have narcotics or weed
in his possession while doing party work.
Any party member found shooting narcotics,
will be expelled from this party.
No party member will violate
rules relating to office work,
general meetings of the
Black Panther Party,
and meetings of the Black
Panther Party anywhere.
No party member will use
point or fire a weapon
of any kind unnecessarily
or accidentally at anyone.
- No party member will commit any crimes,
against other party members
or black people at all,
and cannot steal or take from the people,
not even a needle or a piece of thread.
- Bread, housing, education-
- [Fred] Right on.
- Clothing, justice, and peace.
This is our Ten-Point Program.
The Ten-Point Program and platform
of the Black Panther Party
must be known and understood
by each Party member.
- All Panthers must learn to operate
and service weapons correctly.
Everyone in a leadership position,
must read no less than two hours per day
to keep abreast of the
changing political situation.
- Our Eight Points of
Attention are, speak politely,
pay fairly for what you buy,
return everything you borrow,
pay for anything you damage,
do not hit or swear at people,
do not damage property
or crops of the poor, oppressed masses,
do not take liberties with women.
If we ever have to take
captives, do not ill-treat them.
- And last but not least,
of our three main rules of discipline are,
obey orders in all your actions.
Do not take a single needle
or a piece of thread from the
poor and oppressed masses.
And turn in everything captured
from the attacking enemy.
♪ People get ready,
revolution's has come ♪
♪ You don't need no
ticket, just a loaded gun ♪
♪ All you need is a creed and
the love for your people ♪
♪ You don't need no
ticket, just a loaded gun ♪
- Power to the people!
- [All] Power to the people!
- INT. Wright College
At Rise: Stage is bare except
for a speaking podium
that stands centerstage.
Crowd enters and sits on the
first row of the theater,
among the audience.
Crowd is chattering about their excitement
that Chairman Fred has come to speak.
Fred enters with William O'Neal
and armed Black Panthers,
male and female, on each side.
They stand to the sides of
the podium as he speaks.
- I'm the Deputy Chairman
of the State of Illinois Black
Panther Party, Fred Hampton.
Now see, a lot of people get
that word revolution mixed up
and they think revolution's a bad word.
Listen, we're going to
organize and dedicate ourselves
to revolutionary political power,
and we're gonna teach
ourselves the specific needs
of resisting the power structure.
Yes, we're gonna arm ourselves,
and we're gonna fight
those reactionary pigs
with international proletarian revolution.
Now see, the people
have to have the power,
it belongs to the people.
- [Female] That's right.
- Unless the people show us
through their social practice
that they relate to the
struggle in Babylon,
then that means that they're
not internationalists,
and that very well means
that they're in fact not revolutionaries.
Right on?
- [All] Right on!
- We have to understand very clearly
that there's a man in our
community called a capitalist.
Sometimes he's Black,
sometimes he's White.
But that man has to be
driven out of our community
because anybody who
comes into the community
to make profit off the people
by exploiting them can be
defined as a capitalist.
- [William] Right on, brother, right on.
(clapping)
- Any program that's brought
into our community should be analyzed
by the people of that community to see
if it meets the needs of the community.
Now, that's what the Breakfast
for Children Program is.
A lot of people think that it's a charity.
But any program that's revolutionary
is an advancing program
because revolution is change.
- [William] Right on.
- We say that the Breakfast program,
is a socialistic program.
It teaches people by practice.
Now, we never negated the fact
that there was racism in America,
but we said that,
"The byproduct of capitalism
just so happens to be racism."
- [Female] Right on.
- Now see, capitalism comes
first and the next is racism.
- [William] Right on, right on, brother.
- Now see, that's when they
brought slaves over here.
- [Female] That's right.
- It was to make money.
So first the idea came that
we need want to make money,
and then the slaves came in
order to make that money.
That means, that through historical facts,
that racism had to come from capitalism.
Now, we may be the minority,
but this minority is gonna keep
on shouting loud and clear.
- [All] Right on!
- And we're not going
to fight fire with fire,
we're gonna fight fire with water.
- [Female] That's right.
- We're not gonna fight
racism with racism,
we're gonna fight racism with solidarity.
- [William] Right on!
- We're not gonna fight
capitalism with Black capitalism,
'cause we're gonna fight
capitalism with socialism.
- Right on, brother, right on,
right on, brother.
(feet stomping)
(fingers snapping)
♪ Paul and Silas in jail ♪
♪ Had no money to go their bail ♪
♪ Keep your eyes on the prize ♪
♪ And hold on, hold on ♪
♪ Hold on, hold on ♪
♪ Keep your eyes on the prize ♪
♪ And hold on, hold on. ♪
- Now, say it with me, I am.
- [All] I am!
- A Revolutionary!
- [All] A Revolutionary!
- I said, "I am!"
- [All] I am.
- A revolutionary!
- [All] A revolutionary!
- And you're gonna have
to keep on saying that.
You're gonna have to say
that I am a Proletarian.
I am the people!
You gotta stay focused.
You gotta keep your eyes on the prize.
- [William] Amen, brother!
- Crowd breaks off talking as song ends.
Deborah Johnson walks up
to Fred holding a book.
- Excuse me Chairman Fred.
Brother, do you like poetry.
- Sister, if the poetry is
not reflective of the struggle
of the people, it means nothing.
I'm not just with poetry
for the sake of poetry.
- For as Countee Cullen said,
"So in the dark we hide
the heart that bleeds,
and wait, tends our agonizing seeds."
Better yet, in the words of Ralph Ellison,
"I am not ashamed of my
grandparents for having been slaves.
I am only ashamed of myself
for having at one time been ashamed."
It is through the history of my roots
that I have found love,
love of my kinky hair with
coiled and untamed roots.
Proud of my larger nose and fuller lips,
more of me to give unto you.
It is through my roots
that I have learned that
black is beautiful and royal.
As it's been said of the color purple,
it's hard to walk by black and not smile
So if you should walk by
and see my lips turned towards the sky,
head back and a glaze in my eyes,
know that it's simply
because I'm tickled that the color
of my skin holds secrets
you may never know,
or maybe some seldom known
fact has crossed my mind.
When you see me smiling of all things,
please know, it's because I'm black,
and I'm proud.
- [All] Yes.
(finger snapping)
- Something like that.
- Right on, sister.
I can certainly dig it.
What's your name?
- I'm Deborah Johnson.
- Seems nice to meet you Debbie.
Maybe you wanna stick
around and come with us
to get a bite to eat after the meeting.
- I sure would.
- Fred thanks members
for coming as they exit.
Deborah fans her face
to hold back her excitement
and anticipation.
Fred returns to Deborah
once everyone has exited.
He pulls out a chair
for her to have a seat.
- So what do you know
about the Panthers, sister?
- I have first heard about
the Black Panther Party,
and my brother brought a flier home
with a Black Panther on it.
Seems like it was walking across the page.
I'd heard about you all,
trying to organize the
free breakfast programs
in the community and whatnot.
- That's right, that's right.
Got a lot of hungry children out there.
Matter of fact, they ain't
hungry, they starving,
and what good can you do
when your belly screaming?
I so can't think when
my belly talking to me.
What about you?
- Deborah blushes with the attention.
- No, I can't do much when I'm hungry.
- So you came to learn
more about the party?
- I am, I saw you on TV,
on Ronnie Barrett's Chicago Show.
Ronnie was trying to take
over the conversation
but you wouldn't have none of that.
He tried to go to break
but even then you kept
talking about the Party
and the programs you had.
- So you came to see me?
- You're a very beautiful speaker.
- Now it's Fred's turn to blush.
- And I've been called a number of things
but I don't think that's one of them.
♪ Hypnotized, you've got me hypnotized ♪
♪ All it took was just one
little look into your eyes ♪
♪ I'll do whatever you say ♪
♪ Command me and I'll obey ♪
♪ Because I la la la ♪
- INT. Fred's Monroe St. apartment.
The small living room
is sparsely decorated
and dimly lit by a floor light stage left.
A second hand chair much too
large for the cramped space,
is next to a mattress upstage center.
News clippings and Black
Panther newspaper covers,
are scattered throughout the room.
At Rise: Deborah Johnson dressed
in black panther attire is sitting
at a table stage right with Fred Hampton.
Bobby Rush sits in the chair
across the room from them.
- Black people have been demonstrating
and going on for I
don't know for how long.
We been getting our
heads beat and whatnot.
We've seen the pigs on the scene.
We know what he's like.
We know what he's capable of.
Just being a damn pig,
oinking and beating and
walking the streets.
I'm sick of these damn
pigs walking our streets.
People get upset,
when a few white people
get their heads beat.
What did they do when we
were getting our heads beat?
Them pigs been beating and
killing black and brown folks
for target practice.
How many more of us got to die?
When is it going to end?
- Who's going to police the pigs?
That's the question
America needs answering?
White man get killed, the
neighborhood is turned upside down
to find out how it happened.
- A black man gets beat
and killed by the pigs
on national TV and
nobody don't see nothing.
Calm down they tell us.
Don't riot, don't speak,
don't raise no noise.
- No, no, they don't
want us raising no noise.
Not even two years ago,
you got the Watts riots of '65.
They damn near beat
Marquette Frye to death.
Matter of fact, we can go
back further than that.
Let's talk about Bloody Christmas 1951,
when the filthy pigs of
the LAPD left several men
with broken bones and
ruptured organs, that's right.
They dragged six men from they jail cells
and over 50 officers beat them down
for more than 95 minutes.
- They leave our bodies
bloodied and bruised,
under the shield of the blue,
disrupting the peace
they're supposed to keep.
- Come on, Sister Deborah.
Talk about Bloody Sunday
in 1965 down in Selma.
Pigs and possemen turn water
hoses, dogs, and tear gas,
and guns on peaceful marches,
or you wanna talk about
Bloody Monday June 10th 1963,
over in Danville, Virginia.
Pigs attacked a group at a
prayer vigil with fire hoses
and billy cubs.
It's been a long hot summer.
- 159 race riots the summer of 1967.
You got Atlanta, Boston,
Cincinnati, Buffalo,
Tampa, New York, Milwaukee, Minneapolis,
Rochester, Plainfield,
and right here in Chicago.
- Don't forget Rebecca
Brown, mother of 11 children.
Police killed her,
while she was looking
out her apartment window.
Said they thought she was a sniper.
You can't tell a bottle
and a diaper from the barrel of a gun?
- Historically, the most dangerous person
to America is not the Black Panther Party.
It is not Bobby Seale, Huey
P. Newton, Stokely Carmichael,
and it certainly not Fred Hampton.
The most dangerous
person to America is far
and near, is white men.
- And We ain't here to cause trouble.
We here to keep the peace,
to fight for our right
to be free from disproportionate
police brutality
and the use of deadly force.
And King said it best,
"We can never be satisfied
as long as the Negro is the victim
of the unspeakable horrors
of police brutality."
- That's the thing they
don't wanna talk about.
Over the course of history,
our government has found it difficult
to regulate police behavior.
Not to say they ain't tried very hard.
28 Black Panthers have been killed
by the policy since January 1968.
- Right on, Bobby.
We got Huey P. Newton in jail,
Eldridge Cleaver underground,
Bunchy Carter has been murdered,
Bobby Hutton and John
Huggins been murdered.
You've got Bobby Seale
being chained and gagged
at the federal building.
You've got John and Michael Soto,
who were both murdered
in a matter of two days.
We need some guns, we need some guns,
and we need some force.
Now, they brutalize without
even arresting them.
They shoot somebody with no
intention of arresting them.
We gonna keep fighting and busting,
and exposing them pigs.
- [Bobby] Yes.
- We're gonna keep enlightening our youth
and joining hands together
when they tell us that
we should be fighting.
- Right on.
- [Bobby] Right on, yes.
- Matter of fact, I'm
gonna tell you right now.
We not talking about protesting.
Protest is when I say, "I don't like this
and I don't like that."
Resistance is when I see to it
that the things I don't
like will no longer occur.
- Right on.
- Protest is when I say,
"I will no longer go along with this."
But resistance is when I see to it
that no one else goes along
with it anymore either.
See, we're going to resist,
until ain't no more black
and brown bodies being slain
by racist pigs.
- [All] Right on!
- [Bobby] What we gone do
about them landlords pushing,
trying to push us out?
Pigs been putting pressure
on them left and then right.
- I'll tell you what we're gonna do.
We're gonna get up the money
and buy our own building.
- Where we gonna get that type of money?
- Listen, we're gonna
take it to the people
and rally from them.
We're created by us and for us.
The money is the last thing
we got to worry about.
We gonna get our own building and then
we ain't got to worry about
nobody moving every few months,
people telling us what
we can and can't do.
No, no, no, we will own our own building.
- Let's keep thinking and talking on this
but I have to got to get home for now.
Mess around and be here all night
and I'll never hear the end of it.
- You be easy in those
streets Brother Rush.
- Bobby kisses Deborah's cheek and exits.
Fred checks his watch just
as the doorbell rings.
- You ready?
- Bout as ready as I'm not gonna be.
- Fred opens door.
Enter Francis and Iberia Hampton.
Iberia hugs and kisses on her son
as if she hasn't seen him in some time.
- Look what we have hear,
I've heard so much about you.
- Deborah rushes to greet Fred's parents.
- You didn't do too bad there, Fred.
- Quite the catch if I do say so myself.
- Fred's the real catch.
- Iberia silently surveys the apartment
as Francis takes a seat at the table.
- You have it nice and cozy in here.
- We're working on it.
Most of the time it's
full of Party members
so we don't have much time for decorating.
- Fred pulls out a chair so
his mother can have a seat.
- No, we're slowly
making it feel like home.
- And you know you always
have a home with us.
I keep your room just like you left it.
The beds always waiting for you.
- He does but he's growing into a man.
Can't stay a boy all his life.
- That's right, that's right.
I don't need all this
ending up on your doorstep.
- I know.
I always work to be down for the people.
- Fred is so dynamic and charismatic.
He's just personable.
You can tell he believes
in what he's doing.
He's not the type of leader that says,
"Listen brother, go out
there and sell 200 papers."
No, he gets right out there
in the middle of the street,
"Hey, sis, you wanna buy
a Black Panther newspaper?
This is the people's party!"
I see him do it all the time.
- That's right.
I can walk the streets just
as good as anybody else.
What kind of leader
sits back giving orders?
That's not a leader, why won't
you call that a dictator?
- He's always been a people person.
Growing up, he would bring
home school kids to tutor them.
- I wonder where he
gets it from, his mama.
- But he kept my house full
and refrigerator empty.
- Tell me about it.
These fellas sure can eat.
- Oh when you got a mother
that can cook like mine,
what would you expect?
And she loves cooking too.
One time she cooked
for 700 people everyday
for a two month strike at the Union Hall.
- 700?
- And she sure did.
- I was the Union Steward.
I did what I had to.
- And she going to help us cook
for the Children's Breakfast Program too.
You got to try mama's peach
cobbler or no, no, no,
you got to try that banana pudding.
- Oh collard greens,
fried fish, you name it,
she can cook it.
- Mrs. Hampton, that's wonderful.
We can use every bit of help we can get.
- I'd do anything for Fred.
I was so nervous when he said,
"He was gonna join a Party."
It's a mean cruel world
and you want to do anything
to protect your children.
And I got three.
Bill, Dee Dee, and Fred.
I'd lay down my life for all of them.
- For a while there I thought
you were going to have to.
They used to pick on
Fred when he was little.
They called him peanut
head and watermelon head.
He was upset for a while
but he learned to defend
himself with words.
- And that he did!
He had the ability to signify
that would put others to shame.
They quickly stopped picking on him.
We haven't had to worry about him since.
- Only way I'm going somewhere
is kicking and screaming.
I said, "I am, a revolutionary!"
- A rebel you are!
- And, a soon to be father.
- Iberia and Francis quickly looks at Fred
and then to Deborah and back to Fred.
Deborah touches her stomach.
♪ I never knew a man, quite like Fred ♪
♪ He's doing all he can
to help his fellow men ♪
♪ He's strong and he's smart ♪
♪ He's taking my heart ♪
♪ I even gave him my body too ♪
♪ He's the perfect man for me ♪
♪ And a father soon ♪
- God willing he is.
- Iberia crosses to Deborah
and softly touches her stomach.
- That's my boy!
- In there?
My grandbaby?
- She looks back at Fred
who is beaming with joy.
- I'm gonna be a father.
- Iberia pulls Deborah into a hug
as Francis rushes to hug Fred.
At Rise: A ringing phone
sounds through the darkness.
Very faintly, a voice whispers,
Fred is in jail.
A collection of phones can be
heard ringing all over town.
Voices collectively pass
that Fred is in jail.
The volume increases
as the story is told from
one person to the next,
Fred has been arrested, the pigs got Fred.
The stage washes in blue.
Enter male and female dancer.
Choreographed dance to the song.
Enter white uniformed
police officer as dancer.
In sync, the three dance as
he beats from one to the next.
As the two attempt to run from him,
they are met on the
other side of the stage
by uniformed Klansman.
Caught in between the two,
the male drags and shields
the woman as he is beaten.
♪ I was born by the
river in a little tent ♪
♪ And old just like this river,
I've been running ever since ♪
♪ It's been a long, long time coming ♪
♪ But I know change gonna come ♪
♪ Oh yes it is ♪
At Rise: Fred Hampton and William O'Neal,
are reviewing Panther documents.
Door bell is rung, William answers.
- How can I help you?
- This is Jeff from the
People's Law Office.
I have a meeting with Chairman Fred.
- Come on in, Jeff.
Don't mind William, he's
just our head of security.
- Fred rises and shakes hand with Jeff.
William sits and observes the interaction,
from across the room.
Fred and Jeff have a seat.
- Glad to see that you're home.
- And I learned a lot
down when I was in prison.
I had an educational
process, learning process.
I was there asking myself
why wasn't I afraid.
- They sent you way down
in Menard, Illinois?
- When I got down to Menard,
I myself even being the vanguard,
had to get down on my knees
and learn from the people.
I had to put my ear to the ground.
And when I put my ear to the
ground, I heard the people.
And now I'm free and I'm
gonna do and make some changes
in this system.
I got the person who's giving
us the money ready to go.
Can we close on the property tomorrow?
We ready to be in our
own building, you know?
- I have to file our proposal
with the Department of Urban
Renewal on Thursday morning.
It really looks good.
If the city follows its guidelines,
we should get the money to build,
but that's a big if, given who we are.
How about if I meet you and the owner
at the building Thursday afternoon?
- That work good.
- How's the boiler at the place?
Have you checked it out?
- We got plenty of heat,
except when the police bullets come,
given us too much ventilation.
- We put some cement in our walls when
we opened the People's
Law Office last August.
Maybe you should try that.
- Now see, it's the
windows that they shoot at,
not the walls.
But I'll check it out.
- You can take a look at these.
- Jeffrey passes Fred a stack of papers.
Small group of Panthers and
students enter with Deborah.
She walks over to Fred
and kisses him on the
cheek before joining group.
Preparing for a meeting,
they arrange chairs into a semicircle.
- I've listed you as the
Chairman of the Panthers
to make it legal.
- Yes, I do.
Let's go and make this quick.
- Fred signs the papers.
- I'll do what I can.
- I'll see you Thursday.
Power to the people.
- Power to the people.
- William locks door behind Jeff.
Fred greets group and weaves
throughout them as he speaks.
- If you think about me
and you ain't gonna do
no revolutionary act,
then forget about me.
I don't want myself on your mind
if you're not gonna do
work for the people.
It's like I always say,
"If you're asked to make a
commitment at the age of 20,
and you say I don't wanna
make no commitment only
because of the simple reason
that I'm too young to die,
I wanna live a little bit longer."
Look at what you said
is, you're already dead.
You have to understand
that the people have to
pay the price for peace.
You dare to struggle, you dare to win.
If you dare not struggle, then goddammit,
you don't deserve to win.
- [All] Right on!
- Let me say to you peace if
you're willing to fight for it.
I been gone for a little while
but I'm back now and I
believe I'm back to stay.
[All] Right on, brother, right on!
- And I believe I'm gonna do my job.
I don't believe I'm gonna
to die in a car wreck.
I don't believe I'm gonna die
slipping on a piece of ice.
- [All] No!
- I don't believe I'm gonna
die because I had a bad heart.
I don't believe I'm gonna
die because I have cancer.
- [All] No!
- I believe I'm gonna be able to die,
doing the things that I was born for.
I believe I'm gonna die
high off the people.
- [William] That's right,
turn them on, turn them.
Right on Chairman Fred!
- Listen, I believe I'm
gonna die a revolutionary
in the international revolutionary
proletarian struggle.
I hope each of you will be able to die
in the international revolutionary
proletarian struggle,
or you'll be able to live in it.
And I think that
struggle's gonna come, yes,
but why don't you live for the people?
- [Deborah] Right on.
- Why don't you struggle for the people?
And why don't you die for the people?
- Right on.
- Fred is interrupted
by knocks on the door.
- Pigs vamping?
- Man, there ain't no
pigs vamping that softly.
They like to come in shooting.
- Deborah Johnson goes to the door.
- Who is it?
- Oh Preacherman.
- Preacherman who?
- The one and only Preacherman.
- Deborah opens the door
and stands back in shock.
William Preacherman Fesperman
of the Young Patriots Organization enters,
carrying a large Confederate flag.
Black Panther members
immediately cock their guns.
Crowd reacts with
disgust to the intrusion.
- No, no, no, wait a minute, everybody.
Everybody calm down, calm down.
This here is our guests whom I invited.
This is, go on and let everybody know you.
- Hey, I don't mean no harm.
I'm William Fesperman but
everybody call me Preacherman.
I'm with the Young Patriot Organization.
- You got some balls coming down here
with that racist flag all by yourself.
- Brother, I don't mean no harm.
Where I go, my flag go.
If I stay, it stays.
- I invited Preacherman
down here to talk us about
how our organizations can join.
- Chairman, what we got in common
with a group of white racists?
- Man, for what I know and what I've seen,
we should already know this.
We come from a monster.
And the jaws of the monster in Chicago,
are grinding up the flesh
and spitting out the blood
of the poor and oppressed people.
And yes, that includes
white oppressed people.
- I see, the Young Patriots
face the same discrimination
we do because it's not about
racism, it's about capitalism.
- Talking about the
blacks in the Southside,
the Westside, the browns in the Northside,
and the reds and the yellows,
and yes, the whites,
white oppressed people.
You talk about have any white
people before ever known
what oppression is?
Come to uptown Chicago.
Five pig cars on a square block.
White pigs murdering,
brutalizing white brothers.
- White people discriminating
against white people.
- Correct.
We talk to people a lot, and they say,
"You hillbillies ain't planning
on picking up a gun or anything, are you?
I mean, that one you
brought from Kentucky,
or North Carolina."
And we say to 'em, "Listen here,
a gun on the side of a
pig means two things.
It means racism and it means capitalism.
And the gun on the side
of a revolutionary,
on the side of the people,
means solidarity and socialism."
Right on?
- Right on.
No matter what color you are,
there's only two classes of people.
There's a class over
here and one over there.
One is lower, and the other is upper.
One is exploited, and the
other is the exploiter.
The oppressor wants you to think
that you're each other's
enemy but see, we know better.
It's not I'm black and I hate white people
nor as I'm white and I hate black people.
We're not each other's enemy.
- [Preacherman] That's right.
- The real enemy is the capitalism
that separates the two classes.
Together, we're uniting our
calls for economic justice.
- We see you're the vanguard
of the revolution against
the pig power structure
of American capitalism,
racism, and imperialism.
Therefore we claim a position
of white revolutionary solidarity
with oppressed people of
color around the world.
- This is about poor
people, it's not about race.
You fight fire with water.
You fight racism with solidarity,
and you fight capitalism with socialism.
- That's right.
We're not gonna fight reactionary
pigs and states attorneys,
like hand-in-hand with
reactions of our own part.
We're gonna fight them
by having an international
proletarian revolution.
- That's right, right on.
They want us to think
that we're so different
because our skin is different colors.
My people are poor.
My people being beaten and ostracized.
We hungry just like yours.
- They tell us that the
gangs wanna kill us.
And they tell us
that the whites don't
wanna be bothered with us.
- That's right.
- It's all rhetoric.
We beat them by joining forces.
- Yeah.
- And this right here is the beginning
of the Rainbow Coalition.
- At Rise: Offstage, William
nervously looks around himself.
Checking both to see if his party is near
or anyone can bear witness
to what's taking place.
Roy Mitchell enters.
- Took you long enough.
You couldn't find nowhere
better for us to meet?
- You got what I asked you for?
- William pulls folded
paper from his back pocket.
- Everything is right there.
- Roy unfolds and looks over the paper.
- We need details.
- It's drawn exactly as it is.
- Don't you lie to me boy.
- Everything is right there.
- We're gonna pay you good for this.
- I don't want my name
associated with any of this.
- Roy retrieves a bottle of pills
and pressing them into William's hand.
- This will keep him good and quiet.
- What is it?
- You don't need to worry about that.
- Enter Fred, William, Mark Clark,
Ronald Satchel and others.
Fred kisses Deborah on the cheek.
- Baby, go back in to the bed.
I'll be there in a few.
- Deborah sleepily exits.
- Don't take too long.
- Bobby, I had to go home.
Mark, can you stay here and
watch the door with William?
- I need to make a run
and I'll be right back.
- Okay, Mark can hold things
down till you get back.
Ron, you gonna make yourself comfortable.
- William exits to the door.
Fred exits to the back room.
Loud knock on door.
- Who is it?
- Tommy Gun.
- In the darkness,
rapid machine gunfire can be
heard throughout the theater.
- He's barely alive.
- Two gunshots can be heard.
- He's good and dead now.
- Lights return to heavily
pregnant Deborah Johnson,
is sitting shot in a chair center stage.
Her robe is covered in blood.
Image of the 2337 West Monroe bedroom,
after the shooting is
displayed in the background.
The room is in a state of disarray,
sheets are removed from the bed
and a large pool of blood
stains the mattress.
- Someone came into the room
and started shaking the Chairman.
Said, "Chairman, Chairman,
wake up, the pigs are vamping."
Still half asleep, I looked up
and I saw sparks of light
coming from the doorway
into the bedroom.
The person in the bedroom with us said,
"Stop shooting, we have a
pregnant woman in here."
The pigs were just shooting.
About this time I jumped
on top of the Chairman.
He's looked up, it looked
like all the pigs had verged
to the back bedroom area.
The mattress was just,
you could feel the bullets going into it.
I just knew we'd be
dead, everybody in there.
When he looked up, he just looked up,
he didn't say a word,
he didn't move except
for moving his head.
He laid his head back down,
he never said a word and he
never got up outta that bed.
Finally, they stopped and
they pulled me by my hair.
They opened my robe and saw I'm pregnant.
He said, "What do you know?
We got a broad here."
He pulled me by the hair and
pushed me and the other brother
by the kitchen door and
told us to face the wall.
I heard a pig say,
"He's barely alive, he'll barely make it."
Then they started shooting again.
They stopped shooting.
The Pig said, "He's good and dead now."
- Deborah slowly rises and
exits carrying the weight
of the world.
Francis and Iberia enters stage left.
They both become increasingly
emotional as they speak.
- It was freezing
and snow was piled up
all along the streets.
- Fred was supposed to
come over last night
but when we woke, his bed was still made
and the chitterlings he'd asked me
to make were still on the stove.
- I drove Iberia and myself
to the Corn Products plant.
I dropped Iberia off at the entrance
so that I could park the
car and make some coffee
in the paint shop before my shift started.
This time the gate didn't open.
Marley told me he's heard on the radio,
there was a police raid
and Fred had been shot.
I asked him to call Iberia's workstation
and tell her to come outside to meet me.
- Before I could punch the
clock to the assembly line,
I saw a slip of paper for me
to call my daughter Dee Dee.
- I was sitting in the
car waiting for Iberia,
trying to convince myself,
everything would be alright.
Yeah, Fred was the target of police raids.
I told him when he joined the Party,
I didn't want him to be violent.
But he told me, "I will
defend myself if I have to."
A few weeks ago he spoke
at Reverend McNelty's Baptist Church.
He told them, "The next time you see me,
I may be in a collar and tie."
Fred don't wear dress shirts or ties
so what was he talking about.
- I called Dee Dee and she
told me they'd killed my boy.
My baby, my Fred.
- This is All News Radio with
an important announcement.
Black Panther leader, Fred Hampton
and another unknown Panther
were killed at 4:30 this morning
in a shootout at 2337 West Monroe street.
The police entered the Panther apartment
with a search warrant looking for guns.
The Panthers opened fire on the police
at which time a gunfight ensued.
Two police officers were injured,
along with four Black Panthers
who were taken to Cook County Hospital.
- Francis is overcome with emotion.
- They killed my son, my baby boy.
Fred ain't try to hurt nobody.
He out here teaching people
how to do for themselves.
Teaching the community
how to get up and fight.
You don't bury your children.
You don't shoot up people
sleeping in their bed.
- At Rise: Roy Mitchell enters exterior
of apartment off stage.
- The immediate violent criminal reaction
of the occupants shooting
at announced police officers,
emphasizes the extreme viciousness
of the Black Panther Party.
- The pigs went into
the Chairman's apartment
with one thing in mind.
They went there to kill and destroy
and that's what they did.
- Inflammatory statements
and false charges,
against our office has been made
by the Black Panther Party and others.
The Black Panthers preach
everyday, hate, hate, hate.
That's all you hear from them.
They expect us to walk in
there with peace shooters?
- Bobby Rush invites people
to walk through the apartment.
The group begins to walk
through examining the damage.
- Don't touch nothing, don't move nothing
because we want to keep
everything just the way it is.
This here is the room where
Mark Clark was first at.
- Walks through the apartment.
- This here is where they
blew Chairman's brains out.
- I stepped over with the
machine gun still on single fire
and I started from the
left side of the wall,
coming across watching where
the rounds were hitting,
and I went over the girls head,
down on the other side of her
and continued fire on the wall.
- One strange thing about this wall is,
they say they fired
numerous fires up and down
to avoid hitting people
in the apartment here.
You'll notice that all these
plugs are in a straight line
on one level, bed level.
- I was very careful and watched
where each one was hitting.
- It was unlawful and disorderly.
There was a trial, conviction,
and execution right here.
It was nothing but a northern lynching.
- We called for a cease fire three times
and told the occupants to
come out with their hands up.
Each time, one of the occupants
replied, "Shoot it out"
and continued shooting.
The account we gave of
the events is the truth.
- They fired for over 12
minutes into the apartment.
Only one shot came out and
that was from Mark Clark
as he fell to the ground.
They've lied before and
they're going to lie again.
- Many years and appeals later,
a box of documents were
discovered in a raided FBI office.
These documents exposed
the FBI's super secret
and profoundly illegal COINTELPRO program.
The direction abhorrent to expose,
disrupt, misdirect, discredit,
and otherwise neutralize
African American organizations
and the rise of a Black Messiah.
In 1983, Jeffrey Haas and
the People's Law Firm,
reached a $1.85 million settlement,
paid out in equal part by federal,
state and local law enforcement agencies.
A win?
Yes.
Justice?
Not at all.
(upbeat music)
