Crime

NAACP Demands Answers in Hanging Death of Son of BLM Activist

THE AFRO — National and local chapters of the NAACP continue to call out the St. Louis Medical Examiner’s office over the issue of whether the office will be destroying evidence in the investigation of the death of Danye Jones.

Published

6 years ago

January 7, 2019

Oakland Post

By AFRO Staff

National and local chapters of the NAACP continue to call out the St. Louis Medical Examiner’s office over the issue of whether the office will be destroying evidence in the investigation of the death of Danye Jones.

Jones, the son Black Lives Matter activist Melissa McKinnes, was found dead, hanging from a tree, nine weeks ago at the McKinnes home.

McKinnes believes that her son was murdered, but has not yet received the promised Medical Examiner’s report, a document expected eight weeks ago.

Police report the death as a suicide, whereas McKinnes says her son died in a “lynching.”

Jones’s death falls within a series of murders and suspicious deaths of prominent Ferguson activists that took to the streets in protest of the killing of Michael Brown.

McKinnes claims that she and other activists across the country are being targeted by multiple law enforcement agencies and White supremacist groups who find her work dangerous. Many Federal agencies have already been found to be surveilling other such activists.

“We are calling for justice and transparency,” said John Gaskin III, St. Louis County NAACP President.”

A lawsuit, filed last year by Color of Change and the Center for Constitutional Rights, remains ongoing. It asks for answers regarding the full extent of law enforcements targeting of agitating within the movement for Black lives.

This article originally appeared in The Afro.

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Oakland Post: Week of June 4 – 10, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of June 4-10, 2025

Published

4 days ago

June 7, 2025

Oakland Post

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Remembering George Floyd

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — Minnesota State Attorney General Keith Ellison acknowledges that the Floyd case five years ago involved a situation in which due process was denied, and five years later, the president is currently dismissing “due process. “The Minnesota Atty General also says, “Trump is trying to attack constitutional rule, attacking congressional authority and judicial decision-making.” George Floyd was an African American man killed by police who knocked on his neck and on his back, preventing him from breathing.

Published

1 week ago

June 2, 2025

Oakland Post

Mural showing the portrait of George Floyd in Mauerpark in Berlin. To the left of the portrait the lettering "I can't Breathe" was added, on the right side the three hashtags #GeorgeFloyd, #Icantbreathe and #Sayhisname. The mural was completed by Eme Street Art (facebook name) / Eme Free Thinker (signature) on 29 May 2020. (Wikimedia Commons)

By April Ryan
BlackPressUSA Newswire

“The president’s been very clear he has no intentions of pardoning Derek Chauvin, and it’s not a request that we’re looking at,” confirms a senior staffer at the Trump White House. That White House response results from public hope, including from a close Trump ally, Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. The timing of Greene’s hopes coincides with the Justice Department’s recent decision to end oversight of local police accused of abuse. It also falls on the fifth anniversary of the police-involved death of George Floyd on May 25th. The death sparked national and worldwide outrage and became a transitional moment politically and culturally, although the outcry for laws on police accountability failed.

The death forced then-Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden to focus on deadly police force and accountability. His efforts while president to pass the George Floyd Justice in policing act failed. The death of George Floyd also put a spotlight on the Black community, forcing then-candidate Biden to choose a Black woman running mate. Kamala Harris ultimately became vice president of the United States alongside Joe Biden. Minnesota State Attorney General Keith Ellison prosecuted the cases against the officers involved in the death of Floyd. He remembers,” Trump was in office when George Floyd was killed, and I would blame Trump for creating a negative environment for police-community relations. Remember, it was him who said when the looting starts, the shooting starts, it was him who got rid of all the consent decrees that were in place by the Obama administration.”

In 2025, Police-involved civilian deaths are up by “about 100 to about 11 hundred,” according to Ellison. Ellison acknowledges that the Floyd case five years ago involved a situation in which due process was denied, and five years later, the president is currently dismissing “due process. “The Minnesota Atty General also says, “Trump is trying to attack constitutional rule, attacking congressional authority and judicial decision-making.” George Floyd was an African-American man killed by police who knocked on his neck and on his back, preventing him from breathing. During those minutes on the ground, Floyd cried out for his late mother several times. Police subdued Floyd for an alleged counterfeit $20 bill.