Summary: This hour stories of black lives caught in the cross hairs of injustice. 695BGK by Phoebe Judge & Lauren Spohrer (Criminal, 2015) Just before 2am on December 31, 2008, police officer John Edwards was patrolling in Bellaire, Texas when he saw an SUV driven by two young African-American men. Edwards followed the SUV and ran the license plate number. His computer indicated that the SUV was stolen, and Edwards drew his gun and told the two men to get down on the ground. By the time Edwards realized he had made a mistake, one of the men had already been shot. Strange Fruit [NOTE: only available at www.ThirdCoastFestival.org until 31 August] by Maggie Ayre (Soul Music, BBC Radio 4, 2014) Billie Holiday's famous song 'Strange Fruit' expresses the horror and anguish of a community subjected to lynching in the American South. In this programe, we hear the stories of people whose relatives were lynched by white racists and of the various forms of grief, anger and reconciliation that have followed. And learn the roots of the song itself. We've Forgotten James Powell by Nate DiMeo (The Memory Palace, 2014) Nate Dimeo looks back to the summer of 1964. It's late afternoon in New York City: a group of kids hangs out on a stoop after a day of summer school, just kicking it, like they always do. Alex Landau and Patsy Hathaway by Jud Etsy Kendall (StoryCorp, 2014) Alex Landau, an African American who was adopted by a white couple, grew up in a largely white, middle-class suburb of Denver, Colorado. After a traffic stop one night, Alex was severely beaten by Denver Police officers. He and his mother, Patsy Hathaway, visited StoryCorps to talk about how Alex’s race has influenced his life and what happened that night the police stopped him. Visit www.ThirdCoastFestival.org for more stories related to this issue. PHOTO Kaitlyn Veto http://bit.ly/1M0C8Gm
