Boot-camp case stirs students
FAMU, FSU
students call for justice at
forum
By Daniela
Velazquez
DEMOCRAT STAFF WRITER
April 13, 2006
 College
students from throughout
Tallahassee remembered Martin
Lee Anderson during a forum
Wednesday and renewed calls for
justice in the case of the
14-year-old's death after an
incident involving guards at the
Bay County boot camp.
"I began to imagine about
slavery. I almost shed a tear. I
began to imagine I was bitten by
dogs, and I almost shed a tear.
I began to imagine I was Martin
Lee Anderson beaten to death,"
said Florida State University
senior Jesce Horton to a crowd
of students and community
members at FSU's Moore
Auditorium.
The forum, hosted as part of
FSU's Chi Theta chapter of the
fraternity Omega Psi Phi's
"Omega Week," aimed to educate
and provide discussion about
Martin's death. He died in
January, one day after being
kicked and punched by guards.
Bay County Medical Examiner Dr.
Charles Siebert ruled his death
was caused by sickle-cell trait.
The body was exhumed, and final
results of a second autopsy have
not been released, but an expert
who viewed the second autopsy on
behalf of Martin's family said
the boy likely died from
asphyxiation caused by the
incident.
Gov. Jeb Bush has appointed
Hillsborough County State
Attorney Mark Ober to
investigate. Ober brought in his
local sheriff, replacing the
Florida Department of Law
Enforcement, after the Miami
Herald disclosed e-mails
FDLE Commissioner Guy Tunnell
sent to Bay County officials,
promising that a videotape of
the incident would not be
released. Tunnell, a former Bay
County sheriff, apologized for
the e-mail exchange.
The fraternity is a
participating organization in
the Coalition for Justice for
Martin Lee Anderson, the group
that is organizing a rally April
21, when students from FSU,
Florida A&M University and
Tallahassee Community College
will march from their campuses,
converge at the Civic Center and
then walk to the Capitol. The
coalition demands that Bush and
FDLE employees publicly
apologize to Martin's family for
their "uncooperative nature,"
that the results from the second
autopsy be released, for Tunnell
to be officially reprimanded,
for all seven guards seen in the
video to be arrested, the
license of the camp's nurse to
be suspended and the medical
examiner who performed the first
autopsy to be removed from his
job.
Some students previewed the
black T-shirts to be worn at the
march. In bold, white writing
across the chest, the shirts
read: "The next Emmett Till?"
Till was a 14-year-old black boy
from Chicago who was killed in
1955, three days after he
whistled at a white woman in a
grocery store in Money, Miss.
"It's remembrance of such
injustices that happened prior
to this one," Cendino Teme, 24,
an FSU graduate student, said.
The forum featured Rep.
Curtis Richardson,
D-Tallahassee; Sen. Tony Hill,
D-Jacksonville; Benjamin Crump,
attorney for Martin Lee
Anderson's family; Dale Landry,
chair of the Florida State
Conference Criminal and Juvenile
Justice Committee of the NAACP;
and other community members. A
video montage played in the
auditorium of television news
excerpts about Martin's death
and his mother's appearance on
MSNBC's "Scarborough Country."
The video showing Martin's
beating at the boot camp was
also shown.
"I'm very proud of the
students," Crump said. "Young
people have the courage to say
what is right and what is wrong,
whereas the adults are afraid to
say what is right and what is
wrong."
Crump is an FSU alumnus and
member of Omega Psi Phi.
Richardson, a member of the
black caucus, helped introduce
"The Martin Lee Anderson Act of
2006" last week. The
House-passed bill requires the
Department of Juvenile Justice
to set uniform standards for use
of force and restraint.
Contact reporter Daniela
Velazquez at (850) 599-2161 or
dvelazquez@tallahassee.com.
Originally published April 13,
2006
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