Week In Review

State District Judge Larry Mitchell, in Dallas, rescheduled Kimberly McCarthy’s punishment for April 3 so lawyers for the former nursing home therapist could have more time to pursue an appeal focused on whether her predominantly white jury was improperly selected on the basis of race. McCarthy is black.

Read More

Frank Washington, 91, a Germantown native who played with the Harlem Globetrotters when the world-famous team actually competed (and beat nearly all comers), died Thursday, Jan. 24, at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital.

Read More

A bipartisan group of leading senators has reached agreement on the principles for a sweeping overhaul of the nation’s immigration laws, including a path to citizenship for the 11 million illegal immigrants already in this country.

Read More

Anna Deavere Smith has won one of the largest and most prestigious awards in the arts. The committee that awards the Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize announced Friday that the actress and playwright known for pioneering a form of theatrical journalism is this year’s winner.

Read More

Hans Massaquoi, a former managing editor of Ebony magazine who wrote a memoir about his unusual childhood growing up black in Nazi Germany, has died. He was 87. His son said Massaquoi died Saturday, on his birthday, in Florida. He had been hospitalized over the Christmas holidays.

Read More

President Barack Obama is set to use the Bibles of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Abraham Lincoln for his second swearing in January 21, no doubt symbolizing his pride as the nation’s first Black president. The symbolic move also aligns his principles with the principles of the two most transformative leaders…

Read More

Former residents of Revilletown—an African-American community torn down 25 years ago in Iberville Parish—are trying to preserve a cemetery founded by ancestors there in 1874. The cemetery, started by ex-slaves, is now within the grounds of a vinyl-resin plant owned by Georgia Gulf Corp., based in Atlanta.

Read More

Experiencing life while a loved one is imprisoned can strain your emotions and relationships, but it shouldn’t strain your pocketbook. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) found that the cost of phone calls from incarcerated friends and family members is at an all-time high…

Read More

Myrlie Evers-Williams, the widow of civil rights activist Medgar Evers, will deliver the invocation at President Barack Obama’s inauguration later this month, organizers announced last Tuesday.

Read More

The evangelical pastor chosen to give the benediction at President Barack Obama’s inauguration withdrew from the ceremony Thursday after remarks he made two decades ago condemning the gay rights movement surfaced.

Read More