Sharpton Jailed for Vieques Protest
N E W Y O R K, May 23,, 2001 -- One day after the Rev. Al Sharpton said he might run for the White House in 2004, the civil rights leader was behind bars in Puerto Rico.
It's hardly a traditional stop for a presidential hopeful, but Sharpton's career as agitator and activist has rarely followed the usual path. A federal judge sentenced Sharpton to 90 days in jail today.for trespassing on U.S. Navy property as part of a May 1 protestagainst bombing exercises on the Puerto Rican island of Vieques.
Political analysts say the jail time will broaden his supportamong New York City's vast Puerto Rican community — and furtherraise the national profile Sharpton has carefully cultivated inrecent months.
"He will get a lot of attention and that's something he'salways coveted as a community activist," said Lee Miringoff, apollster at the Marist Institute for Public Opinion inPoughkeepsie, N.Y.
"His actions are not necessarily calculated to appeal to all ofthe electorate." This protest, Miringoff said, "is one hecalculated, or understood, would be intensely supported by some ofthe electorate."
Nine other Vieques protesters were sentenced to 40 days inprison and given $500 fines. They included city councilman AdolfoCarrion, state Assemblyman Jose Rivera and Roberto Ramirez,chairman of the Bronx County Democratic Party.
Judge Jose Fuste sentenced Sharpton as a repeat offender becausehe had prior arrests for civil disobedience in New York. He alsowas fined $500.
"If Martin Luther King were alive, he would have come toVieques and raised these issues," Sharpton said during hisappearance in court.
Sharpton was taken to a federal prison in Puerto Rico. Hisspokeswoman, Rachel Noerdlinger, said Johnnie Cochran is assemblinga team of lawyers who plan to file an appeal with the First CircuitCourt of Appeals in Boston.
Sharpton Said to Feel 'Victimized'
Noerdlinger said Sharpton appeared in court this morningafter he was subpoenaed on Tuesday. She said Sharpton was notprepared for the sentence, which he thinks is unfair.
"He strongly feels that he's been victimized by the justicesystem," Noerdlinger said.
Hank Sheinkopf, a New York Democratic strategist, saidSharpton's sentence will be seen as significant among Puerto Ricanactivists in New York and nationwide. New York City's Puerto Ricanpopulation tops 789,000, according to the 2000 census, the largestsuch concentration in the nation.
"Sharpton has positioned himself as a civil rights leader, andcivil rights leaders in our history go to jail. This is consistentwith that and it makes him a kind of martyr," Sheinkopf said."What better position to be in if you want to be a martyr for agroup that is growing as a community?"
Sharpton has built a career out of speaking his mind — inspiringboth devotion and loathing.
He has toned down in recent years, distancing himself from acontroversial past that included falsely accusing a stateprosecutor of taking part in the alleged rape of a black girl.
Sharpton was ordered to pay civil damages in the ensuing slanderlawsuit, but he allowed the debt to go largely unpaid for years. Ten years ago, during the infamous Crown Heights riots inBrooklyn, Sharpton was seen by many as a polarizing figure.
Yet he has remained a political force in New York, seekingDemocratic nominations for U.S. Senate in 1994 and mayor in 1997.Though unsuccessful, he proved to analysts that he commands thesolid support of a quarter to a third of Democratic voters here.
Most of Sharpton's activism, until recently, has revolved aroundlocal cases involving racial violence or police brutality.
But in the last few months he has traveled to Florida for thepresidential recount, to Cincinnati to protest a police shooting,and to Sudan to investigate reports of slavery.
Jesse Jackson Supports Sharpton
Many observers suggest Sharpton is seeking to become a newleader of the national civil rights movement. The man who has longheld that mantle, the Rev. Jesse Jackson, immediately came toSharpton's support today.
"We have to first determine what the legal options are, but westand in support of two things: one, his early release, and two,stop the bombing of Vieques and respect the territorial integrityof the people of Puerto Rico," Jackson said in a telephoneinterview with The Associated Press.
Former New York Civil Liberties Union director Norman Siegel,called the sentence "excessive."
"It seems very inappropriate," Siegel said. "Civildisobedience is a long and honored tradition in American politicaldiscourse and I think that it's a mistake to increase the sentencebecause someone has been involved in peaceful nonviolence before."
Other high-profile protesters arrested during the demonstrationsincluded environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. A spokesman forKennedy, who was traveling in Japan today, said the judge handling Kennedy's case had not yet set a court date.