Oakland Focus News | Oakland News Online Blog

More at Zennie62.com | Follow me on Twitter! | Get my widget! YouTube , Blip.tv and Sclipo For weeks now, BART management and labor have been arguing over who should give up what on the eve of the expiration of contracts with the five unions that represent BART workers. But there's a problem: the matter of the murder of Oscar Grant and the revelation that another BART officer used a racial slur, and this was captured in a new video, raise questions regarding labor's moral standing to strike. While BART's police can't strike, as one officer told me, the unions essentially represent the labor issues for the police. Thus, the use of the racial slur by a BART officer with BART Officer Johannes Mehserle, coupled with the murder by Mehserle, opens the accusation that it was a hate crime. According to the San Francisco Chronicle , it was officer Tony Pirone who yelled "Bitch-ass N__, right?" As he was hitting Grant while Grant was on the ground. Wh...

From The Berkeley Daily Planet - Thursday April 02, 2009 The BART strategy is unfolding and it spells a grim future for the Oscar Grant case and potentially even more unrest. The BDP reports that BART lawyers are saying Oscar Grants own actions contributed to his murder. I find that hard to swallow and it's a terrible message to have released into the public given the existence of the cell phone videos. BART continues to make PR blunders one after the other.

More at Oakland Tribune : “OAKLAND — The family of Oscar Grant, the 22-year-old man shot and killed by a BART police officer early New Year's Day, filed a wrongful-death lawsuit for $50 million against BART in federal court Monday. The shooting prompted massive public outcry and protest in Oakland, and Johannes Mehserle, the BART officer who resigned in January rather than submit to questioning in BART's investigation of the shooting, is charged with murder in the incident. "This is the most egregious police shooting case that I've been involved in," said John Burris, the attorney representing Grant's family who has been involved numerous high-profile police-misconduct cases. Burris filed a $25 million tort claim against BART and Mehserle in January. He said he increased the dollar amount after learning more about what happened before and after the shooting, as well as learning more about the officers who were at the scene and about Grant and his family.” -- A...

This week I posted a vlog on Oscar Grant and what my source claims is an autopsy where crack cocaine was found in his body. Here is an update and what happened when SF Chronicle's Phil Bronstein picked up the story. First my source said the following: 1) The shooting was an accident, and not a racist hit. There are officers who have taken such actions but not like that. They would make it look like a random murder. 2) My source thinks that what happened to Grant was shameful, contrary to what some commenters have written. The vlog was picked up by San Francisco Chronicle Executive Vice President and Editor-At-Large Phil Bronstein on his "Bronstein At Large" blog, and who focused on the idea that drugs may have been planted on Grant. My source insists that was not the case; they were there in Grant already. For some reason, Bronstein's post was removed and when I emailed to learn why got a response from Zoe Stagg , the star of Citizen Sugar, who told m...

A well-placed source reported to me that BART Shooting victim Oscar Grant was found to have Crack Cocaine in his body, and planted through his buttocks. My source also accuses KTVU TV (Oakland, CA) News of delaying video release. My source is a long-time law enforcement official who has seen cases like this more often than not -- but this case given the video evidence, is different.  My source originally tipped me off to the extense of a third KTVU video of the Oscar Grant shooting by BART Police Officer Johannes Mesherle.   He said that  the video showed that another BART officer was clearly on Grant and beating him.  The source said that KTVU was withholding the video because they did not want to start a race-riot. The second tip regards the Crack Cocaine matter.  He claims that the autopsy, which is to be completed by March according, shows that the drugs were stuffed in his body via his buttocks.   My source holds that this is why -- he co...

More at SfGate : “(01-12) 21:36 PST San Francisco -- A raucous crowd protesting the shooting death of a BART passenger marched through downtown San Francisco tonight, overturning trash cans, tossing traffic barriers and lighting small garbage fires. San Francisco police in riot gear quickly moved in and closed off streets as the crowd broke up into smaller groups, scattering in all directions. No arrests were reported.” -- And I'm not sure if this constant drumbeat is going to help. The courts are the best way.

According to the family's lawyer, it sounds like there is a lot of gaps and holes in this story. This is a very sad story, and I can't imagine the frustration and agony that this family is going through trying to piece together exactly how their loved one died in such a public place on one of the busiest nights of the year. VIDEO COMMENTARY: full story on the Oakland Tribune.....