Jayson Williams gave oral to White girls, says wife. An ex-NBA star and former commentator who escaped a murder conviction has new troubles. Former Nets player Jayson Williams’ wife has filed for divorce, accusing him of physical and emotional abuse, family abandonment and bragging that he performed oral sex “on White girls.” Tanya Young Williams claims that her husband has threatened to kill her, faked a suicide and falsely claimed to have stomach cancer. Among the other allegations she makes is that the ex-baller once urinated in their home’s kitchen sink. Among other things, she wants sole custody of their children. Williams was charged with the 2002 shooting death of a limo driver, but he was not convicted. He reportedly killed the man accidentally, while playing with a shotgun. Williams could face trial again on reckless manslaughter charges.

Police respond to report of racist murders in New Orleans. New Orleans Police have launched an investigation into reports that White vigilantes hunted down and killed Black people in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and were never prosecuted for their actions. An article published by The Nation magazine, “Katrina’s Hidden Race War,” has sparked a national outcry about the way racism manifested itself in one of the worst national disasters in U.S. history. In a statement released Wednesday, the New Orleans Police Department said that Superintendent Warren J. Riley “is currently looking into the allegations, and asked if anyone has substantial information relative to any incidents of this type call to the New Orleans Police Department Bureau of Investigations.” Riley said the department was unaware of allegations before the article was published. He police did not receive “any complaints or information to substantiate any of the allegations of racial conflicts or vigilante type crimes in the City of New Orleans including the Algiers Point on the west bank of the City.” In the Nation article, two Black shooting survivors – Donnell Herrington and Marcel Alexander – relayed how they had been blasted with shotguns by White vigilantes in the mostly White Algiers Point neighborhood of New Orleans in the wake of the killer storm. The article also quotes several White vigilantes who admit targeting Blacks, even shooting them as if they were “pheasants.” One of the Whites in the story says, proudly, “Three people got shot in just one day!” Eleven Blacks were killed during the shooting spree, according to the report.

Here are the top five child-friendly African countries. As media reports show, children often end up being the biggest victims in many of Africa’s conflict-ridden nations. But in some African nations, TV news reports are the closest kids will get to war and fighting. A report released by the African Child Policy Forum Thursday ranked the top African countries for “child friendliness” reports CNN. The top five were Mauritius, Namibia, Tunisia, Libya and Morocco; the bottom five were Sao Tome and Principe, Gambia, Central African Republic, Eritrea and Guinea Bissau. Health care and education were among the 40 indicators the group used in the ranking. “Governments that have come out well on this index did so because they have done two things – they have put in place the relevant laws to protect children from abuse and exploitation, and they have targeted resources at the basic needs of children,” an adviser to the Ethiopia-based group said. Policies to protect children, not the nation’s wealth, were considered in the ranking. Some of the poorest nations ranked high because of their laws protecting children.

South African killer will be sentenced. The White South African teen who admitted earlier this week to killing four Black people (including two children) during a horrific shooting spree in January, will now face sentencing, reports the BBC. Johan Nel, 18, shouted racist slurs while he fired on the Black settlement killing two adults, a 10-year-old boy and a three-month-old baby, say witnesses. Thousands participated in fiery protests demanding Nel get life in prison for the murders. Nel was upset by the attacks by criminals, he told the court. A psychologist, Kobus Truter, found that Nel is mentally fit to stand trial and that he should be sentenced to between 20 and 25 years in prison. Nel thought Whites were being targeted for attack, when his family and friends were victimized by violent criminals, Truter said. Nel was charged with 11 counts of attempted murder, and with the four murders as a result of the spree.

White S. African pleads guilty of shooting Black kids. A White South African teen pleaded guilty Monday to shooting and killing four Blacks during a shocking shooting spree earlier this year, reports The Associated Press. Johan Nel, 18, appeared for the start of his trial in a court in Mmabatho, which is 185 miles away from Johannesburg. The courtroom was full of the victims’ family members. Prosecutors were set to present their case this week. Nel fired on children in deprived Black neighborhood back in January, according to witnesses.  After shooting relentlessly, he even stopped at one point to ask a farmer for more ammunition. When the farmer refused to provide him with any, he shot and killed his ostrich. A 3-month-old baby (who was being carried on his mom’s back), a 10-year-old boy, a 31-year-old mother and a 35-year-old man died from the attack.  

Black teens are less likely to smoke than Whites. During their teen years, Blacks are much less likely to smoke than Whites, a new study says. However, most of this advantage disappears by mid-adulthood, researchers say. There is a puzzle here in that usually the health disadvantages in African Americans show up early in life and get worse as they get older,” says Fred Pampel, Ph.D., a sociology professor at the University of Colorado at Boulder. “For cigarette-smoking, African Americans tend to act in a more healthy way during their teens, but that advantage goes away by middle age.” The study appears in the December issue of the Journal of Health and Social Behavior. Pampel used data from two surveys to look at groups of White and Black teens to see how their cigarette-smoking patterns changed as they aged. “Resources, such as higher income, more education, better access to medical care and greater use of nicotine replacement products, help Whites quit at a faster rate,” Pampel said. But C. Tracy Orleans, Ph.D., of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, said the study did not factor in possible socio-demographic differences in exposure to higher tobacco prices and taxes, which “deter youth onset and promote quitting, especially among low-income smokers, and protection by worksite and comprehensive smoke-free airs laws, which affect adult cessation more than youth initiation.”

 Celebrities stand up to diabetes. Several celebrities are talking about their battles with diabetes during National Diabetes Month. To see what they have to say, go to BET.com/Body & Soul.

Trying youths as adults causes mental stress. Young people who are tried as adults, which continues to be a growing trend, suffer stress that results in mental disease, new research shows. Juveniles who are transferred to adult court, known as “transferred youths,” are a growing population. Between 1983 and 1998, the number of transferred youths in the United States almost quadrupled. But as much as two-thirds(68 percent) of the transferred youths were found to have psychiatric problems, and nearly half had one or more types of disorders, says the study in Septembers issue of Psychiatric Services. For the study, Jason J. Washburn of Chicago’s Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and colleagues examined the cases of 1,715 youths, aged 13 to 18, who were processed in the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center in Chicago. Of the youths, 275 were transferred to adult court. Another finding was that Black and Hispanic males were more likely than non-Hispanic Whites to be transferred, even when the researchers controlled for violent crime. What’s more, there is also evidence that males from minority groups are among the least likely to receive mental health treatment, either in the community or in prison.

Black students are more likely to get HIV test. When it comes to HIV testing, Black college students make the grade. Blacks in college are much more likely to get tested for HIV than are White students, according to a cross-sectional survey. The survey also found that college students are less knowledgeable about HIV testing than about the disease itself. Overall, 61 percent of Blacks and 18 percent of Whites said they had been tested for the virus , according to the study by the University of Georgia researchers.  Even at that, Black students were nearly seven times more likely to have been tested than non-minority students. And although the students were generally knowledgeable about HIV/AIDS, both races scored lower on questions specific to testing. “Misconceptions regarding testing results could lead to students underestimating their risk or the importance of testing and retesting, or having false assurance from the negative test result,” said Su-I Hou, the study’s lead researcher. The studies authors suggest that HIV prevention messages to heterosexual and White students should be strengthened to encourage them to get tested.

Many youths tried as adults suffer from mental disorders.
Trying youths as adults causes mental stress. Young people who are tried as adults, which continues to be a growing trend, suffer stress that results in mental disease, new research shows. Juveniles who are transferred to adult court, known as “transferred youths,” are a growing population. Between 1983 and 1998, the number of transferred youths in the United States almost quadrupled. But as much as two-thirds(68 percent) of the transferred youths were found to have psychiatric problems, and nearly half had one or more types of disorders, says the study in Septembers issue of Psychiatric Services. For the study, Jason J. Washburn of Chicago’s Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and colleagues examined the cases of 1,715 youths, aged 13 to 18, who were processed in the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center in Chicago. Of the youths, 275 were transferred to adult court. Another finding was that Black and Hispanic males were more likely than non-Hispanic Whites to be transferred, even when the researchers controlled for violent crime. What’s more, there is also evidence that males from minority groups are among the least likely to receive mental health treatment, either in the community or in prison.

Most of the students needed more information about testing.
Black students are more likely to get HIV test. When it comes to HIV testing, Black college students make the grade. Blacks in college are much more likely to get tested for HIV than are White students, according to a cross-sectional survey. The survey also found that college students are less knowledgeable about HIV testing than about the disease itself. Overall, 61 percent of Blacks and 18 percent of Whites said they had been tested for the virus , according to the study by the University of Georgia researchers.  Even at that, Black students were nearly seven times more likely to have been tested than non-minority students. And although the students were generally knowledgeable about HIV/AIDS, both races scored lower on questions specific to testing. “Misconceptions regarding testing results could lead to students underestimating their risk or the importance of testing and retesting, or having false assurance from the negative test result,” said Su-I Hou, the study’s lead researcher. The studies authors suggest that HIV prevention messages to heterosexual and White students should be strengthened to encourage them to get tested.

Many youths tried as adults suffer from mental disorders.
Trying youths as adults causes mental stress. Young people who are tried as adults, which continues to be a growing trend, suffer stress that results in mental disease, new research shows. Juveniles who are transferred to adult court, known as “transferred youths,” are a growing population. Between 1983 and 1998, the number of transferred youths in the United States almost quadrupled. But as much as two-thirds(68 percent) of the transferred youths were found to have psychiatric problems, and nearly half had one or more types of disorders, says the study in Septembers issue of Psychiatric Services. For the study, Jason J. Washburn of Chicago’s Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and colleagues examined the cases of 1,715 youths, aged 13 to 18, who were processed in the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center in Chicago, reports HealthDay. Of the youths, 275 were transferred to adult court. Another finding was that Black and Hispanic males were more likely than non-Hispanic Whites to be transferred, even when the researchers controlled for violent crime. What’s more, there is also evidence that males from minority groups are among the least likely to receive mental health treatment, either in the community or in prison.

Most of the students needed more information about testing.
Black students are more likely to get HIV test. When it comes to HIV testing, Black college students make the grade. Blacks in college are much more likely to get tested for HIV than are White students, according to a cross-sectional survey. The survey also found that college students are less knowledgeable about HIV testing than about the disease itself. Overall, 61 percent of Blacks and 18 percent of Whites said they had been tested for the virus , according to the study by the University of Georgia researchers.  Even at that, Black students were nearly seven times more likely to have been tested than non-minority students. And although the students were generally knowledgeable about HIV/AIDS, both races scored lower on questions specific to testing. “Misconceptions regarding testing results could lead to students underestimating their risk or the importance of testing and retesting, or having false assurance from the negative test result,” said Su-I Hou, the study’s lead researcher. The studies authors suggest that HIV prevention messages to heterosexual and White students should be strengthened to encourage them to get tested.

The neighbors say they were shocked by the discovery.
Historic D.C.-area church is defaced. Members of the First Baptist Church of Chesterbrook got the word last Sunday – the “N”-word, spray-painted in bold, block letters right next to the front door. “It was a very upsetting time,” Andre Johnson, a longtime member of the historic African-American church, told The Washington Post, adding that many of the congregants are concerned. “It was very disturbing to the membership” and “to me,” said James R. King, chairman of the board of deacons at the church, which traces its history to the Civil War era, when the neighborhood was known as Lincolnville. “That you would deface a house of worship . . . shocked us more than anything,” King said. It was the first racist incident he could recall in about 30 years – when somebody burned a cross on the front lawn of the edifice. The community has been very supportive, he said. “It’s a sick person who did that, [and] not an indication of what the community around us is like.”

White man files $6 million discrimination suit. Kevin Stevens, a 46-year-old air-conditioning maintenance worker, is suing the school board in Annapolis for $6 million, saying he’s been getting passed over for manager posts because he’s White. Stevens, who has been with the county school system for the past 28 years, says that he has been trying to move up for the past year and a half. “The hiring authority won’t allow me to advance,” Stevens told The Capital newspaper. “You work so hard, and you attain all these licenses and advanced education, and when no one will allow you to move, it’s very frustrating.” Stevens fixes heating and air-conditioning systems in county schools, but a year ago, he sought a post as night quality-control manager, according to his lawsuit. In that capacity, he would have been in charge of supervising night housekeeping crews in the schools. The Black man promoted instead worked under him for the past several years, says Stevens, noting that he has received high ratings on his evaluations and “has more letters of recommendation and more experience than the man who got the job,” the Capital reports. The supervisor of the operations division is also African American, which Stevens says is the reason he was not promoted.

Black weekly ceases printing amid money woes. After 16 years, The Bay View has bottled up the ink. From now on, according to founder Mary Ratcliff, the Oakland-based African-American weekly will be available online only. “This is not a goodbye to you, our beloved readers, though,” she promised her readers. “As the headline suggests, the Bay View’s not dead; we’ll see you on the Web! We’re pouring all our energy into improving our Web site, www.sfbayview.com, which has already recovered from a bad hacking enough to draw over a million hits a month.” She said that the printed version of the newspaper has been “a labor of love and the love,” but she and husband Willie Ratcliff were never able to make it profitable – or even sustainable. “Now we’ve had to face the reality that we’re flat out of funds or any source to tap.”

The Maryland teen was found dead in his cell in Prince George’s County, Md.

A month and a half has passed since a 19-year-old Black suspect was found murdered in his cell at a southern Maryland jail, and NAACP officials are angry over the pace of the investigation. On June 29, Ronnie L. White, was found strangled in his cell, less than two days after he was charged with killing a veteran Prince George’s County, Md., police officer by hitting him with his car. Go to BET.com/News to find out what the NAACP says should be done in the case.

There are about a quarter-million hate-group members nationwide.

Conventional wisdom suggests that racists are tossing and turning at night over the prospect of a Black man in the White house. But, word is, White supremacists are looking forward to a Barack Obama presidency, The Associated Press reports. Take Louisiana Klansman David Duke, who came within inches of being a U.S. senator in 1990. He describes Obama as a “visual aid” that other White supremacists can rally around. And the brands of White supremacists are many. In addition to a number of KKK subspecies (the United White Knights, Church of the American Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, Imperial Klans of America Knights of the White Kamelia, Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, etc.), there’s the Aryan Nation, the Nazi Party, the Skinheads, the Nationalist Movement and the average, run-of-the-mill racist who believes that Blacks are inferior. Organizations like the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League, which make a living keeping their eye on White supremacy activity, estimate that there are roughly a quarter-million active hate-group members nationwide. One of those haters, 65-year-old Richard Barrett, a member of the Nationalist Movement, believes that Obama is just the catalyst needed to get White folks to unite. “Instead of this so-called civil rights bill, for example, that says you have to give preferences to minorities, I think the American people are going — once they see the ‘Obamanation’ — they’re going to demand a tweaking of that and say, ‘You have to put the majority into office,’” Barrett told The Associated Press. Duke, in a recent essay posted on his Web site, titled, “Obama Wins Demo Nomination: A Black Flag for White America,” wrote that “Obama is a visual aid for White Americans who just don’t get it yet that we have lost control of our country, and unless we get it back we are heading for complete annihilation as a people.”

Latinos, Blacks squeezed hard in tight job market.

As the nation’s job market grows tighter, Latinos and Black workers are suffering disproportionately, according to employment specialists and figures from the Department of Labor. While employment shrank by 51,000 jobs in July and nationwide joblessness rose to a four-year high of 5.7 percent, Latino unemployment was 7.4 percent last month, according to the Labor Department. Black joblessness was 9.7 percent in July. It was 9.2 percent in June. The overall teen jobless rate was 20.3 percent in July. It was 27.3 percent for Latino teens and 32 percent for Black teens. Analysts attribute much of the Latino job loss to ongoing contraction in the construction industry. A Labor Department report said the construction industry “has shed 557,000 jobs since its September 2006 employment peak, with nearly three-quarters of the decline occurring since October 2007.” A Pew report and other studies have found that for Black workers and their families, the picture is especially bleak. An Aug. 1 report by the Joint Economic Committee of Congress said that one in four Blacks lived in poverty in 2006. Black lost 55,000 jobs since December and wage growth continued its stall. “During the 2000s’ economic recovery, African American workers’ inflation-adjusted wages grew at an annual rate of only 0.2 percent, after having grown four times as much (0.8 percent) per year during the 1990s recovery,” the congressional committee reported. Between 2000 and 2006, median Black family income fell by 2.9 percent to $39,367, according to federal statistics.

Widow of slain Atlanta judge gets $5 million settlement. The widow of the Atlanta judge who was allegedly shot to death by a defendant during a daring escape from a courtroom three years ago will be paid more than $5.2 million by Fulton County. Under a settlement made public Thursday, Claudia Barnes, the wife of slain judge Rowland Barnes, the county will $5 million to settle lawsuits against itself and Sheriff Myron Freeman. The county will also pay a one-time annuity of $246,000 in a separate benefits case filed by Barnes, a former Fulton County employee. “I miss my husband every day, and this won’t take that away,” Barnes said Thursday. “I’ve had so many irons in the fire. This just closes another chapter of things I have to do.” Rowland Barnes was shot in March 2005 as he presided over a hearing involving convicted rapist Brian Nichols. The defendant allegedly wrested a sidearm from a deputy and shot to death the judge, a court reporter, a sheriff’s sergeant and, later, a federal agent. Nichols’ capital trial for the three deaths has been delayed several times. “Now I can focus all my attention on the criminal trial,” Barnes said.

Even the Klan ads didn’t help the Black challenger win. A nasty Democratic primary came to a close in Tennessee Thursday as the White incumbent congressman had a runaway win against his African-American challenger in a majority-Black district. Rep. Steve Cohen took an astounding 79 percent of the vote, compared with 19 percent for Nikki Turner, a Black lawyer, who throughout the campaign tried to convince voters that they should stick with their own race. In a particularly controversial campaign moment, Tinker ran an ad linking Cohen, a Jew, to the Ku Klux Klan. Sen. Barack Obama even entered the mix on that one, condemning the ad, which juxtaposed Cohen’s picture with that of a hooded Klansman. Cohen has long civil rights record. Just last month, he introduced a resolution to get Congress to issue an apology to African Americans for this nation’s imposition of slavery and Jim Crow.