By Kathy Wray Coleman, Editor, Cleveland Urban News. Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com, Ohio's No 1 and No 2 online Black newspapers (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com) and (www.clevelandurbannews.com). Kathy Wray Coleman is a former biology teacher and a 20-year investigative Black journalist who trained for some 15 years at the Call and Post Newspaper, a Black print weekly with distributions in Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati, Ohio. Reach Coleman by phone at 216-659-0473 and by email at editor@clevelandurbannews.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio- Community activists of greater Cleveland will rally for justice for slain Black teen Trayvon Martin on Saturday, July 20, 2013 at a community vigil and rally at noon in front of the Carl B. Stokes U.S. Federal Courthouse in downtown Cleveland at 806 West Superior Ave as part of a 100 Cities national protest sponsored by the Rev. Al Sharpton and the National Action Network (NAN) that he leads. (For more information contact Marcia McCoy at 216-374-0913).

Sharpton called the day a day to rally and pray "for justice for Trayvon." His local chapters leadership team is supporting him across the country.

"We need all of the elected officials and community members that have not rallied for Trayvon Martin since the jury verdict to be there as well as all of those that have, including clergy, and community activists from across greater Cleveland," said Marcia McCoy, president of the Greater Cleveland Chapter of NAN.

Congresswoman Marcia L. Fudge (D-11), Cleveland NAACP President The Rev. Hilton Smith and National NAACP President Ben Jealous

By Kathy Wray Coleman, Editor, Cleveland Urban News. Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com, Ohio's No 1 and No 2 online Black newspapers (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com) and (www.clevelandurbannews.com). Kathy Wray Coleman is a former biology teacher and a 20-year investigative Black journalist who trained for some 15 years at the Call and Post Newspaper, a Black weekly with distributions in Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati Reach Coleman by phone at 216-659-0473 and by email at editor@clevelandurbannews.com

Cleveland, Ohio- In the wake of an acquittal last weekend of night watchman George Zimmerman, who followed, stalked and then gunned down unarmed Black teen Trayvon Martin in a Florida suburb last year, and even after police dispatchers directed him to back off, Ohio 11th Congressional District Congresswoman Marcia L. Fudge and the Congressional Black Caucus of Black members of Congress that she leads are demanding that racial profiling against America's Black community come to an end.

Cleveland Chapter NAACP President The Rev. Hilton Smith, a communications executive for Tuner Construction Company and an associate minister at Greater Abyssinia Baptist Church in Cleveland,  agrees and issued a press statement from the NAACP Convention in Florida saying his organization is "saddened and outraged by the verdict."

Smith, who became chapter president late last year, and the executive committee of the Cleveland NAACP that he leads, have made racial profiling an ongoing organizational goal to tackle, and the congresswoman is standing with them to fight a problem that they say has drawn more credence through the Trayvon Martin tragedy.

"This practice and the presumption of guilt so often associated with people of color must come to an end," said Fudge in a press release on the Zimmerman acquittal. "Racial profiling continues to make communities of innocent individuals fear a justice system designed to protect them."

A licensed attorney, former national president of Delta Sigma Theta Inc, and one of two Blacks in Congress from Ohio, Fudge  said that Trayvon's death and widespread inequities in the country's legal system that target communities of color are  unconstitutional.

"The fight for equality and equal protection under the law in this country is far from over," said the federal lawmaker, a Warrensville Hts. Democrat whose predominantly Black 11th congressional district includes the east side of the largely Black city of Cleveland, and its eastern suburbs,  staggering parts of Summit County, and a pocket of Akron,  a Summit County city 25 miles south of Cleveland.

The congresswoman stressed  that through cohesive action "we can assure Trayvon Martin's death will not be in vain."

National NAACP President Ben Jealous, a former journalist, and a Rhodes Scholar like former President Bill Clinton, wants Zimmerman prosecuted in federal court on charges he killed Martin after he racially profiled him and that he violated a plethora of other Civil Rights of the 17-year-old  teen, now a mortar.

Jealous, 40, told reporters that while the NAACP acknowledges last week's jury verdict,  Zimmerman, who is White, should be prosecuted under the fullest extent of the law, and that just because the over zealous night watchman beat a second degree murder charge brought on behalf of the state of Florida does not automatically exonerate him from criminal Civil Rights charges by a federal venue of jurisdiction.

"The most fundamental of Civil Rights, the right to life, was violated the night George Zimmerman stalked and then took the life of Trayvon Martin," said Jealous in a letter to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder. "We ask that the [U.S.] Department of Justice file civil rights charges against Mr. Zimmerman for this egregious violation."

By Kathy Wray Coleman, Editor, Cleveland Urban News. Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com, Ohio's No 1 and No 2 online Black newspapers (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com) and (www.clevelandurbannews.com). Kathy Wray Coleman is a former biology teacher and a 20-year investigative Black journalist out of the Cleveland, Ohio area. Fifteen of those years were with the Call and Post Newspaper, a weekly print Black newspaper published in the Ohio cities of Cleveland, Columbus and Cincinnati for over 90 years and published since 1998 by renowned boxing promoter Don King. Reach Coleman at 216-659-0473 by phone and by email at editor@clevelandurbannews.com.

CLEVELAND, Ohio-Led by local community activist Art McKoy, about 250 greater Clevelanders across racial lines rallied at the Justice Center in downtown Cleveland at noon on Monday for justice for slain Black teen Trayvon Martin in the wake of a not guilty verdict issued last weekend by a six member all White and all female jury that cleared George Zimmerman of all charges, including second degree murder.

An over anxious neighborhood watchman, Zimmerman, 29 and White, shot the 17-year-old Martin to death last year following a confrontation he initiated even after police dispatchers directed him to back off and to stop following the teen, who was passing through a gated community in the suburb of Sandford, FL on the way to his father's girlfriend's house, trial testimony revealed. He did not take the stand at trial and his lawyers argued that his killing of Martin is protected under the Florida stand your ground law.

Activists groups at the protest include Black on Black Crime Inc, which  McKoy founded, Imperial Women, the Oppressed People's Nation, the Carl Stokes Brifage, the Greater Cleveland Immigrant Support Network, Revolution Books, the People's Forum, Knowledge, and the Underground Railroad.

"They took a young Black life too soon,"  said McKoy, who leads Black on Black Crime Inc, a grassroots group out of E. Cleveland, a neighboring predominantly Black and impoverished suburb of Cleveland, a  largely Black major metropolitan city, a colorful city in fact, and one  with a Black mayor, and some 400,000 people.

Seasoned Activist Dionne Carmichael Thomas, owner and operator of Josephine's in Cleveland's Ward 6 and a member of the Carl Stokes Brigade and the Fairfax Business Association,  had a protest sign in support of Trayvon Martin and against the jury verdict that read "shame, shame,

shame."

Community Activist Ada Averyhart held up a sign at the rally that said "the whole damn system is guilty."

Cleveland Ward 10 city council candidate Donna Walker Brown, also a community activist, said the rally brought Blacks, Whites and others together for a common cause.

"Today was powerful," said  Brown, to Cleveland Urban News.Com, Ohio's most read online Black newspaper. "It brought people from different races together for a common cause of fighting against the injustice against Trayvon Martin, a Black teenager."

Ernest Smith, who leads the Oppressed People's Nation, spoke at the rally and said that the killing  last year of Martin and the gunning down, also last year, by a group of White Cleveland police officers of unarmed Blacks Malissa Williams , 30, and Tim Russell, 43, with 137 bullets both represent unprecedented injustices that cannot go unnoticed. (Williams and Russell are pictured together above in this article)

"What about the 137 shots?,"  asked Smith at Monday's rally, whose grassroots group out of E Cleveland has members in their twenties and thirties that push Civil Rights and youth and Black community empowerment.

By Kathy Wray Coleman, Editor, Cleveland Urban News. Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com, Ohio's No 1 and No 2 online Black newspapers (www.kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com) and (www.clevelandurbannews.com). Kathy Wray Coleman is a former biology teacher and a 20-year investigative Black journalist with more than a decade of those years under current Call and Post Associate Publisher and Editor Constance Harper, with nationally known boxing promoter Don King as the print newspaper's publisher.

Cleveland, Ohio-Cleveland area community activists will rally at noon on Monday, July 15 in front of the Justice Center on Lakeside Ave. in downtown Cleveland for justice for Trayvon Martin, whose killer George Zimmerman was found not guilty of second degree murder on Saturday after stalking and gunning down the unarmed Black teen last year in a  gated community in a Sandford, FL suburb. (For more information on the rally contact Al Porter at 216-704-5036).

"We want justice for Trayvon and we will rally here in Cleveland like other activists in cities across the United States of America," said community activist Al Porter, vice president of Black on Black Crime Inc. "As the late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said, an injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."

Closing arguments in the month long trial ended Friday and an all female jury composed of five White women and a woman deemed half Black and half Hispanic deliberated for 2 days before reaching a verdict Saturday evening that cleared Zimmerman of all charges.

An over anxious neighborhood watchman, Zimmerman, 29 and White, shot the 17-year-old Martin to death following a confrontation he initiated even after police dispatchers directed him to back off and to stop following the teen, who was passing through the neighborhood on the way to his father's girlfriend's house, trial testimony revealed.

The girlfriend resides in the upper middle class, predominantly White neighborhood on the outskirts of Sandford, a city that sits 20 miles northeast of Orlando that is roughly 57 percent White and 30 percent Black.

Zimmerman did not  testified in his own defense  and his lawyers argued at trial that it was self defense under the Florida stand your ground law.

Renowned Civil Rights activists such as the Rev. Al Sharpton and National NAACP President Ben Jealous have spearheaded national protests around the celebrated tragedy, sparking community outcries that forced law enforcement authorities to finally charge Zimmerman with Martin's murder.

Sharpton (pictured) and Jealous said at the time that the failure to initially charge Zimmerman was racially motivated.

After Saturday's verdict Sharpton was outraged.He released a statement calling the jury verdict "a slap in the face."