STORY UPDATE: A 7-Year-Old’s truthful Black Poem Scares Schools & White People

Peekskill police investigate hate literature
By TERRY CORCORAN
THE JOURNAL NEWS
(Original Publication: March 15, 2006)

PEEKSKILL — Postcards containing a message of hate were found strewn on city streets yesterday morning, but police said they do not believe they are related to a controversy over a poem a 7-year-old girl wrote for Black History Month.

"The cards were found in various locations (Monday) night and early (yesterday) morning," Detective Sgt. Mark O'Buck said. "They were found on the south and eastern sides of the city and in the area of Peekskill High School. It was basically hate material — anti-black, anti-Semitic, anti-Hispanic — in postcard size. We only got a couple of calls (yesterday) morning because the officers went out right away and started picking them up. They got around 60 to 70."

O'Buck said the postcards did not target any particular neighborhood and seemed to be thrown from the window of a passing car.

"We had a conversation with the District Attorney's Office and they indicated that similar items were distributed recently in lower Westchester," he said.

Lucian Chalfen, spokesman for District Attorney Janet DiFiore, said the office's Bias Crimes Unit is aware of the situation.

"From time to time, we get reports of incidents like this. The Bias Crimes Unit was advised of the matter and are working with Peekskill police," Chalfen said.

When asked if police thought the action was in response to the controversy over the poem that Autum Ashante wrote, Chief Eugene Tumolo said, "I don't think so."

"It's very offensive and representative of a debased way of thinking, but I think we need to remember the kinds of people who distribute this type of material and keep things in perspective," Tumolo said. "Hopefully, something like this will make us all aware of the fact that a majority of the people embrace diversity as a positive part of what our culture is about."

The postcards were found one day after published reports on a poem that Ashante, 7, of Mount Vernon wrote and recently recited during a Black History Month event at Peekskill's middle and high schools. In her poem, "White Nationalism Put U In Bondage," Ashante described Christopher Columbus and Charles Darwin as "pirates" and "vampires" and accused them of stealing identity, wealth and culture from black people. Some people at the event were offended.

The Rev. Jan Nunley, an Episcopal priest who serves as deputy director of the Episcopal News Service in Manhattan, said her partner was walking their dog around 7 a.m. yesterday when she came across some of the postcards on Maple Street and brought them home.

Nunley, a former radio reporter who covered racist groups in Texas, said her initial fear was that their neighborhood was singled out. "Our street is pretty diverse, and I was afraid that people were being targeted," she said. "We called the police and they told us they had reports of them all over town. It makes you sad because I feel sorry for anybody who has to look at this literature directed at them. But I also feel sorry for the people who distribute it because they need help — although it does make you mad."