Blacks Tear Down "Racist" Halloween Display

LAUREN BAYNE ANDERSON and LEANORA MINAI
Published October 20, 2004




It had the face of Frankenstein and the hands of a werewolf.

Outfitted in jeans and flannel shirt, the creature - stuffed with crumpled newspaper - hung by the neck on a homemade gallows outside a home in the Allendale neighborhood.

To its owner, "Bob" was a Halloween decoration. But to Omali Yeshitela, it was a racially charged symbol of hate.

On Tuesday, as police officers on the scene scrambled to contact the homeowner at work, Yeshitela and others from the International People's Democratic Uhuru Movement tore the dummy down.

"There is no history of hanging ghouls in this country but there is a history of hanging African people," said Yeshitela, leader of the St. Petersburg-based group.

Colleen Watson was surprised and upset when police called her at work to say the display her 15-year-old son had spent two days creating had been torn down. She said it had never occurred to her it would offend anyone.

"We are not those kind of people, we are not like that," Watson said. "This really opened my eyes, I just didn't see it this way."

Last year for Halloween, the family beheaded "Bob," replicating a guillotine. The year before, "Bob" lay in a casket. But on Tuesday, "Bob's" latest incarnation sparked anger.

Yeshitela said he got a call from a local high school student, who saw the hanging dummy from her school bus window on her morning commute. Post-slavery, lynchings were used to terrorize African-Americans and remain a painful memory for many today, Yeshitela said.

"She called because she couldn't believe what she had seen," he said.

Yeshitela, who tore down a mural in St. Petersburg City Hall that he found racially offensive in the 1960s, went to see the display.

Despite the Halloween decor - a synthetic spider web that spanned half the width of the gray house and an arrangement of plastic skulls and bones - Yeshitela said he saw something more sinister: a black man hanging from a noose.

Some passers-by agreed.

Sandra Albanese stopped and called police after she spotted the hanging monster. "I drove by, saw it and came back around again," said Albanese, a real estate agent. "It looked like a black man hanging."

As a small crowd of passers-by and Uhuru members gathered Tuesday afternoon, Patty Melnick also drove by with her 9-year-old daughter, Lindsay.

"My daughter told me this morning there was someone hanging out here and right away I said, I bet you it's black," Melnick said. "I think it's horrendous, it's a hate crime."

As the crowd looked on, Yeshitela said he wouldn't wait any longer for the gallows and hanging dummy to be removed.

"It's coming down," he said and opened the chain-link gate around the yard. Yeshitela walked up to the dummy and ripped it down. Uhuru supporters followed, dismantling the gallows and tearing apart the dummy's head and limbs and leaving the newspaper stuffing strewn across the yard.

As the Uhuru members left the property, St. Petersburg police Sgt. Glenn Stofer approached them and took their names, but did not arrest anyone.

Stofer said he arrived shortly before Yeshitela tore down the dummy and was trying to contact Watson, who was at work.

"They were rightfully upset," Stofer said of the Uhuru members. "I was in the car trying to get information and while I was doing that, they decided to tear it down themselves."

In some misdemeanor incidents - in this case, criminal mischief - police usually interview alleged victims before making an arrest to determine whether they want to prosecute, said Lt. Joe Jesiolkiewic.

"Without a victim, we don't have a crime," he said. "How do we know that they don't know the people, that this isn't some kind of set up? There's an infinite number of things that could play into it, and the prudent thing to do is make sure you've got a victim."

Yeshitela said he would do it all again, even if it meant going onto private property. "The issue of private property holds no special mystique," he said. "We have been private property as a people."

Watson told police she did not want to prosecute anyone. On Tuesday, she called Yeshitela and apologized. He accepted.

"If we hurt someone's feelings, let's take it down now," Watson said from her garage as she cleared up "Bob's" remains.

Florence Whipple, who lives with the Watsons agreed, "Bob is officially retired."

[Grimmy]

We either learn to grow a pair and stand up to these radicals or learn to survive in the hate filled horror show that these radicals will create for us because of our cowardice in confronting them.

[Ram0528]

You know if i was the home owner i would have considered taking it down if they came up to me in a formal & pleasant manner, but since they trespassed & made a mess on my lawn & tore it down themselves, i would press charges & put "bob" right back up

[SR-25]

Thats lame. Come on, a racial display? Its a Halloween display for Christ sakes. Ya know what, white women were hung in Salem for being "witches". Someone hanging from a tree doesnt mean shit. If it was black and had a shirt on that said down with black people or something like that. Then ya im all for tarering it down, because thats VERY FUCKED UP and not right. But it didnt, and its a HALLOWEEN DISPLAY!

[Field_Sailor]

I think the article is extremely stupid. If it had been my house and I was approached I would have taken it down. If they would have came on my property and startled me I'd have shot their asses. Otherwise I would have pressed charges.

Next...

Don't try to compare the Salem witch trials to the slavery days, That is pass absurd.

Nineteen people were hanged, one person was pressed to death, and as many as thirteen people may have died in prison.

[Grimmy]

Lynching has alot more to it in our history other than simply racial oppression.
But this has nothing to do with any of that. It's all about grandstanding.

The radical left count of the rest of us to be too afraid to stand up to their onslaughts and irrationalities. So far, they got most of us pegged right on the money.

[0311Marine]

I might get some flak off this, but it seems to me that black people right now are the most racist people in America. You can find racism if you really want to find it anywhere. Just like a Drill Instructor can find dirt if hes really looking for it. And just to head the shit off, im not racist some of the finest people i had the honor to serve with are black.

Semper Fi

[SR-25]

I agree with that. And Field, im not comparing anything. Im just saying that more than one race of people have been lynched.