Al Sharpton used his Twitter account to blast New York cops for the “unfair treatment” of his daughter and ex-wife during a traffic dispute.

Kathy Jordan (Sharpton’s ex) and Dominique Sharpton were arrested in New York after the daughter allegedly ran through a stoplight and was pulled over by police.

Dominique called her mother who came to the scene. The pair were arrested after having a heated exchange with the officers, according to the New York Daily News. Both were issued tickets and released later that evening.

On Sunday, exactly 20 years after a 16-year-old Black boy was shot to death in the mostly White Brooklyn neighborhood of Bensonhurst, the Rev. Al Sharpton led a small procession of the victim’s family and friends in a memory march to the cemetery. Once in front of the tomb of the slain youth, Yusef Hawkins, Sharpton began to pray as the others closed their eyes and quietly sang the Negro national anthem, “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing.” While the key goal was to ensure that the racism and indifference that led to her son’s death never be forgotten, Diane Hawkins also saw it as a chance to evaluate the current status of race relations in America. “Every day I hear on the news about young men, police officers under cover being shot down,” she said, referring to an incident in New York in late May when a White officer shot and killed a Black off-duty officer he mistook for a criminal. “That’s not good. It’s not right.” Hawkins was shot twice in the chest on Aug. 23. He and three friends, all Black, had arrived in Bensonhurst to look at a used car that was for sale. About 30 Whites, armed with at least one gun, bats and golf clubs, chased the four and surrounded them. Eight people were tried for the attack; five were convicted; but only three were sentenced to prison time. Attention centered on Joseph Fama, then 18, and Keith Mondello, then 19, who were said to have been the leaders of the mob. Mondello was released in 1998 after spending eight years in prison. Upon his release, he met with Hawkins’ father, the late Moses Stewart, and also sent a three-page letter to the family asking for forgiveness. Fama, the gunman, remains jailed, convicted of second-degree murder. He is not scheduled for parole until 2022.  “So much has changed but much has stayed the same,” Sharpton said. Still, “the case of Yusuf Hawkins showed us that we can win.”

The Rev. Al Sharpton descended upon Phoenix Friday, taking the bombastic Mayor Joe Arpaio up on his challenge for a throw-down over immigration in the Valley of the Sun. Several months ago, the civil rights leader threatened to shine the spotlight on Arpaio, the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Department and the racial-profiling of Mexican Americans, which Sharpton said is both racist and un-American. Calling Sharpton a publicity-seeking, outside interloper, Arpaio dared Sharpton to “bring his circus to town.” Said Sharpton on Friday, “We didn’t come to start trouble; we came to stop trouble.” “Let me make this clear – we are not here about Sheriff Joe as much as we’re here about citizen Jose,” Sharpton told a crowd at Pilgrim Rest Baptist Church in Phoenix. Read more.

The shooting death of a 73-year-old Black husband and father of five by a northern Louisiana police officer has ignited outrage among a Black community that’s demanding an external investigation into the circumstances surrounding the killing. The shooting of Bernard Monroe in front of his home in February is drawing attention from way beyond the tiny town of Homer, which is about 45 miles north or Shreveport, La. On Friday, the Rev. Al Sharpton, who led some 20,000 demonstrators through the town of Jena, La., in 2007 to protest the seemingly harsh prosecution of six Black youths accused of beating a White classmate, was back in the state. Read the rest.

Revs. Jesse and Al say their activist  work will continue. The two highest profile civil rights leaders in the nation, the Revs. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, say their roles will not change as America ushers in its first Black president. ”The issues haven’t gone away,” Sharpton told the Wilmington Journal. ”Barack Obama said this is the beginning of change. This is not change itself. It’s almost insulting to act like Blacks should now shut up just because we have a Black president.” Read the rest here.

Rev. Al owes taxpayers $500,000, says government. Federal auditors say the Rev. Al Sharpton’s 2004 campaign accepted illegal donations and other financial illegalities totally $500,000 and must pay that amount back to the government. Sharpton has been feuding with the Federal Elections Commission for years over the funding of his failed presidential run, for which he received $100,000 in so-called government matching funds that authorities later concluded he did not deserve because he hadn’t followed campaign laws. Now federal auditors say that Sharpton owes $486,803 to the U.S. Treasury because his campaign took improper donations, mostly from the National Action Network, a not-for-profit corporation that Sharpton leads but kept separate from his campaign committee. Continuing the longstanding battle with the government, Sharpton will appeal the finding, aides said Friday.

Rev. Al and seven protesters convicted.

The Rev. AL Sharpton and seven others who disrupted traffic in protest over the Sean Bell verdict were found guilty of disorderly conduct Wednesday. “I am sympathetic to the underlying issues that gave rise to the protest,” Criminal Court Judge Larry Stephen said. But, he said, the police warned the protesters to get on the sidewalk during the May demonstration or face arrest, and they chose to disobey the orders, The New York Daily News reported. “If you decide to take a bullet for the team, you should not complain about the consequences,” Stephen said as he sentenced each protester to time served and $95 to cover court costs. Sharpton, pulling a $50 bill from his pocket, said his National Action Network would pay the fines “with $50 bills representing the 50 shots” fired by the cops who killed Bell and wounded two others. Bell was shot by police as he left his engagement party two years ago. Trent Benefield, Joseph Guzman and Bell’s fiancée, Nicole Paultre Bell, were present for the verdict. 

L.A. man kills his family of five and then himself? A Los Angeles man took his life today after taking the lives of his 39-year-old wife, 70-year-old mother-in-law and three young children. Police say Karthik Rajaram, of Porter Ranch, Calif., had become unhappy about his financial situation. Read more here.

Sharpton’s on trial.

The Rev. Al Sharpton, on trial for an old-school act of civil disobedience last spring, is still making it clear that he’s outraged over the acquittal last spring of three cops acquitted in the killing of an unarmed young Black man on his wedding day. “We wanted to stop violence, not cause violence,” the head of the Harlem-based National Action Network testified Monday. Sharpton could have taken the easy way out – had the charges tossed in exchange for 5½ hours of community service and been home chilling yesterday. But the civil rights leader has said that pleading guilty would have undermined the point of the May 7 protest – that he is guilty of nothing, except drawing attention to the real crime, which was the acquittal of the officers and the low regard they afforded the victim, 23-year-old Sean Bell. Sharpton had promised to continue orchestrating nonviolent demonstrations like the May action that choked traffic in several New York City thoroughfares during rush hour. Some 200 demonstrators were arrested at the time, but their cases since have been dismissed. On Monday, Sharpton testified on behalf of Anthony Estes, a construction worker who was arrested in May on charges of disorderly conduct at the Queens Midtown Tunnel.