By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief,  Cleveland Urban News.Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com, Ohio's No 1 and No 2 online Black news venues

Reach Cleveland Urban News.Com by email at editor@clevelandurbannews.com and by phone at 216-659-0473

Pictured are Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson (in beard), Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Tim McGinty (the Caucasian in red tie), and Cleveland NAACP President The Rev. Hilton Smith (the African-American in red tie)

CLEVELAND,Ohio- Cleveland area community activists groups have voted to picket Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Tim McGinty, Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson and Cleveland NAACP President The Rev. Hilton Smith, though Smith and Jackson can get a reprieve, activists said, if a meeting date is scheduled at an inner city forum to address their community-related concerns that is void of the typical police harassment and intimidation they sometimes bring with them. Those concerns include the deadly Cleveland police shootings of Malissa Williams,Tim Russell, Daniel Ficker and Kenneth Smith (AKA Rapper Kenn Ball), all of whom were unarmed, foreclosure fraud, judicial impropriety, orchestrated unemployment of Black people and Black contractors,  and police negligence around the abduction, rape and murder of women and children across racial lines. (For more information contact Black on Black Crime Inc. at 216-253-4070, The Task Force for Community Mobilization at 216-538-4043 and The Imperial Women at 216-659-0473).

McGinty is under fire for refusing to recuse himself and inturn seek a special prosecutor after taking campaign monies and an endorsement last year from the Cleveland police union relative to his successful bid for Cuyahoga County prosecutor and then refusing to push a county grand jury indictment of a group of Cleveland police officers, 12 White and 1 Hispanic, that gunned down Williams and Russell with an unprecedented 137 bullets on Nov. 29 following a car chase from downtown Cleveland that ended in neighboring East Cleveland. Also, employees of his office like Lily Miller are accused of calling Blacks nigger and then defaming community activists that complain with McGinty's blessing with lies on the Internet and through emails sent on company time in alleged violation of state law. (Editor's Note: The vote to picket McGinty was taken two weeks ago at a Black on Black Crime meeting that included activists groups of Imperial Women, The Carl Stokes Brigade, The Oppressed People's Nation, The Cleveland Chapter of the New Black Panther Party, The People's Forum, People for The Imperial Act, Survivors/Victims of Tragedy, and The Greater Cleveland Immigrant Support Network. Also there were members of The Task Force for Community Mobilization, a grassroots group led by Community Activist Khalid Samad that has a petition of over 1,300 signatures to date for McGinty's recusal in the  Williams-Russell case).

Activists voted at a meeting on Thursday to ask Jackson to meet with them to explain why police have not been charged relative to the Williams-Russell shooting and other shootings of unarmed people like Kenneth Smith and Daniel Ficker They are also upset about alleged impropriety around the rape and murder in March of Christine Malone, and  police harassment of Imperial Women members at peaceful protests. Activists say they also will discuss the failure of police and the Jackson administration to implement the 27 recommendations issued by the mayor's three-member commission. That commission, that does not include community activists, was formed in 2009 around the Imperial Avenue Murders of 11 Black women on Imperial Ave by convicted serial killer Anthony Sowell.

Two other pickets by Imperial Women .at the mayor's home in the city's Central Neighborhood, both held in the last four years, dealt with the Imperial Avenue Murders.

Rev Smith took the helm as Cleveland NAACP president this year and according to activists is doing what White folks and some sellout greater Cleveland Black elected officials are telling him to do , and allegedly to the detriment of the Black community. Activists, many of whom are dues paying members of the organization, want a meeting with Smith as repeatedly promised, regular committee meetings, and for the group to stand for jobs, and against the gunning down of unarmed innocent people by Cleveland police, documented Cuyahoga County foreclosure fraud, judicial impropriety and the abduction, rape and murders of women and children. (Editors Note: The latter include Amanda Berry, Gina DeJesus, Michelle Knight, the 11 Imperial Ave. murdered women and Malone).

By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief,  Cleveland Urban News.Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com, Ohio's No 1 and No 2 online Black news venues (www.clevelandurbannews.com) Reach Cleveland Urban News.Com by email at editor@clevelandurbannews.com and by phone at 216-659-0473

LAS VEGAS, Nevada-Legendary former pro football player O.J. Simpson (pictured) testified this week against the lawyer that got him a prejudicial nine to 33 year prison sentence nearly five years ago on kidnapping and armed robbery charges, hoping to get a new trial.

Simpson, 65, took the stand in a Nevada courtroom on Wednesday after not doing so by his former attorney's advice during his trial in 2008 and said that Miami attorney Yale Galanter knew that he did not  know that two companions had guns in a 2007 confrontation with memorabilia dealers that he says were scamming him. He testified that Galanter advised him to "go get his stuff" and that the attorney did not tell him of a plea deal.

And Simpson, who is Black, reminded a prejudicial public that 33 years in the slammer is a bit much since he did not have a gun and "nobody got hurt."

Galanter contradicted much of Simpson's allegations during his testimony Thursday afternoon but could not produce anything in writing confirming that he told his client of a plea deal.  As legal pundits predicted, he told the judge that Simpson got a raw deal but that Simpson allegedly knew guns would be involved.

Simpson's current attorneys have accused Galanter of ineffective assistance of counsel at trial, and on appeal, and argued that all he wanted was O.J.'s money in exchange for selling him out.

The Black community is divided on the issue, some admitting that O.J. is still a target by the White establishment for beating criminal charges in 1995 that he murdered ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman, both White. Other Blacks say that even after standing behind him in that case, O.J. continued to run around with White women and thumbed his nose at being Black.

From The Metro Desk of Cleveland Urban News.Com

COLUMBUS, Ohio- On Sunday, Democratic Cuyahoga County Executive and former FBI agent and prior Lakewood mayor Ed FitzGerald (pictured) received the official endorsement from the Ohio State Council of Machinists that represents 30,000 workers and retirees in Ohio in his bid to unseat Republican Gov John Kasich in the 2014 gubernatorial race.

But can he generate enough love and support needed from rural and Appalachia voters and from Ohio Democratic Black elected officials in greater Cleveland and his own county to perpetuate his dream into a reality?

"The Ohio State Council of Machinists is proud to announce its endorsement for Ed FitzGerald running to be Ohio's next governor," said  Ohio State Council of Machinists President T. Dean Wright, Jr. in a press release to

Cleveland Urban News.Com, Ohio's most read online Black newspaper. "Since

announcing our support for him  years ago, Ed FitzGerald has proven us right by making government work for middle class families. Ed is clearly the right choice forworkers in Ohio, and we look forward to supporting him."

In response, FitzGerald said that he is pleased with the endorsement.

"I'm honored to have such strong and early support from the Ohio State Council of Machinists. This historic organization has represented Ohio workers with the highest honor, and I hope to do the same as their governor," said FitzGerald. "In the coming months I look forward to working with them to find the best ways to help to protect workers in Ohio. I am deeply appreciative of their longstanding support throughout my years in public service."

From serving as an FBI agent on the Organized Crime Task Force, assistant

Cuyahoga County prosecutor, Lakewood mayor, the county executive of Ohio's largest county, a county that is roughly 29 percent Black, includes Cleveland and is a Democratic stronghold FitzGerald, 43, brags that he has "brought down corrupt public officials, cleaned up government, and fought to make government work for the middle class."

The moderately young Democrat that his party hopes will bring a fresh perspective to next year's statewide office races has announced and not yet announced endorsements from practically every powerful Democratic elected official in Ohio, though Kasich has his ear in Cleveland's Black political community and has a relationship with some powerful Black leaders.

Some Black elected officials of the majority Black city like him, and he has partnered with Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson, up for a third term this year,  on educational reform issues and the successful passage last year of the Cleveland schools tax levy.

By Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief,  Cleveland Urban News.Com and The Kathy Wray Coleman Online News Blog.Com, Ohio's No 1 and No 2 online Black news venues

Reach Cleveland Urban News.Com by email at editor@clevelandurbannews.com and by phone at 216-659-0473

CLEVELAND,Ohio- The Imperial Women and other community activists groups will vote on Thursday, May 16, 2013 on whether to picket the home of Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson in response to harassment of Black women and community activists by his predominantly White police force as to free speech rallies on issues of public concern and because police and the Jackson administration have failed to implement the 27 recommendations issued by the mayor's three-member commission formed around the murders of 11 Black women on Imperial Avenue in Cleveland.

The meeting is open to community activists only and will be held at 7504 Cedar Ave in Cleveland. For more information contact The Imperial Women at 216-659-0473.

Two other pickets at the mayor's home in the city's Central Neighborhood, both held in the last four years, dealt with the Imperial Avenue Murders, murders undertaken at the home of convicted serial killer Anthony Sowell on the city's largely Black east side.

Activists are upset also because the mayor sent blond, blue-eyed Seventh District Police Station cops to harass and intimidate Black women and community activists at a rally scheduled for Monday, May 11 to seek help from the Cleveland NAACP. Activists want the Civil Rights organization to stand for jobs, and against the gunning down of unarmed Blacks Malissa Williams, and Timothy Russell, foreclosure fraud, judicial impropriety and the abduction, rape and murders of women across racial lines.

At the  rally on Cleveland's east side on Monday cops from the Seventh District Police Station threatened activists and the children of Black women raped and murdered in Cleveland that were there to rally. Specifically, they pulled their cars over without reasonable suspension as required by law, ran licence plates and harassed them, including a daughter of Christine Malone.

Malone, 45, was found raped and murdered in an open field on Cleveland's east side in late March after Fourth District police allegedly told family members to find her on their own and to call after they located her. Her killer is still at large and police have arrested no suspects in the case.