How about some justice for Antonio West?

Len received a slightly longer version of this message today. I'll append a couple of notes, but, since we're hearing a lot about justice for someone who was (supposedly) shot for no other reason than "being black in a white neighbourhood", I ask you to read this plea for justice for a small white victim of black crime.

Hello. Don’t recognize me? That’s OK; I understand. My name was Antonio West. I was the 13-month old child who was shot in the face at point blank range by two black teens, who were attempting to rob my mother [Sherry], who was also shot.

I think my murder and my mommy’s wounding made the news for maybe a day, and then disappeared.

The black teens who murdered me will not face the death penalty. Too bad it was me who got the death sentence from my killers instead, because Mommy didn’t have the money they demanded.

See, my family made the mistake of being white in a 73% non-white neighborhood, but my murder wasn’t ruled a "hate crime". And President Obama didn’t take a single moment to acknowledge my murder. He couldn’t have any children who could possibly look like me, so why should he care?

I’m one of the youngest murder victims in our great nation's history, but the media didn’t care to cover the story of my being killed in cold blood.

There isn’t a white equivalent of Al Sharpton, because if there was he would be branded a "racist". So no one’s rushing to Brunswick, Georgia to demonstrate and demand "justice" for me. There’s no "White Panther" party, either, to put a bounty on the lives of the two black teens who murdered me.

I have no voice, I have no representation, and -- unlike those who shot me in the face while I sat innocently in my stroller -- I no longer have my life.

Isn’t this a great country?

So while you’re out seeking "justice for Trayvon", please remember to seek justice for me. Tell your friends about me, tell you families, get t-shirts with my face on them, and make the world pay attention, just like you did for Trayvon.

I won’t hold my breath. I don’t have to anymore.

The version I received suggested that a Georgia grand jury had decided that Antonio's killers won't face the death penalty. That's not quite correct. The reason De'Marquise Elkins and Dominique Lang won't get what they richly deserve is that they were 17 and 15, respectively, at the time of their wanton attack on Antonio and his mother.

Nor does it matter that Elkins is under indictment for a similar attempted robbery and shooting which happened 10 days before. The perps were minors so they get to escape with their lives... unlike little Antonio. Is that justice? What a pity George Zimmerman didn't live in Brunswick!

It's also not strictly true to say that the media paid no attention. The story got some coverage, but no more than you'd expect in a country where 100s or 1000s of violent muggings happen every day. The only unusual feature of this one was the age of the victim. Unfortunately there was nothing unusual about the perps, not even their ages. "Young black guy wearing a hoodie" is set in cold type in every newsroom in America.

One final thought. When I wrote "Walmart responsible for social injustice" last week, I was under the impression that Walt had written before about the Tawana Brawley hoax, in which the "Rev" Al Sharpton was one of the main actors -- and I use the word advisedly. Wherever there is "hate crime", you'll find the Rev there denouncing it, as long as it's a black "victim" being unjustly oppressed by a honky. You won't be findin' Sharpton in Sherry Elkins's corner.

For more about Al Sharpton, Tawan Brawley and the knee-jerk demonization of whites by vote-seeking politicians and the lamestream media, Walt recommends Outrage: the Story Behind the Tawana Brawley Hoax, by Robert D. McFadden, Ralph Blumenthal and their colleagues at the New York Times. It was published by Bantam Books in 1990.