Madame Noire | Black Women's Lifestyle Guide | Black Hair | Black Love

Robert Champion and family - Source: wsbtv.com

Not really sure when those with positions of authority in these organizations and bands will get the memo that hazing is wrong on so many levels and needs to stop. But maybe, just maybe, after the death of Robert Champion and the charges brought against 13 members of FAMU’s legendary band, people will learn.

Champion, a 26-year-old drum major at FAMU, was beaten to death aboard a chartered bus after a performance last fall. Band members beat Champion severely, leaving large bruises on his chest, arms, shoulders and back, according to the AP. Witnesses to the beating say Champion might have been targeted not only because he was against members partaking in hazing, but also because he was gay, and was a candidate for the role of chief drum major.

The 13 individuals had the charges brought against them today, five months after the incident happened, and 11 out of the 13 people will face a hazing resulting in death charge, which can carry up to six years. The other two individuals will face misdemeanor charges for their role in Champion’s death. While the parents of the young man were pleased that charges were being filed, they were disappointed that the charges were not more severe. The mother of Champion, Pam, told the AP, “I thought there would be more serious charges. I thought it should send a harsher message.” It seems the possibility of manslaughter and second-degree murder charges were shut down. But State Attorney Lawson Lamar said these charges weren’t sought because murder didn’t seem to be the motive, plus, there’s no evidence to support that thought:

“The testimony obtained to date does not support a charge of murder, in that it does not contain the elements of murder. We can prove participation in hazing and a death. We do not have a blow or a shot or a knife thrust that killed Mr. Champion. It is an aggregation of things which exactly fit the Florida statute as written by the Legislature.”

Because of the incident, the school has suspended the band, and Champion’s parents are even trying to sue the bus company for standing by and allowing the beating to happen–on the bus. But representatives of the company said the driver was not near the bus during the beating, and if he was, he wouldn’t have let it happen.

This is definitely a sad situation, and I hope the family can get some justice for Robert. Unfortunately, this has become far too common of a thing on college campuses. People hoping to get the shine of being a member of a prestigious band or having the chance to wear certain letters have been getting beat, run like mules, forced to drink to the point of alcohol poisoning and more for years now, and sometimes death is the result. Well a lot of the time actually. Look up names like Carson Starkey, Michael Starks, Kenitha Saafir and Kristin High, Vann L. Watts, Michael Davis, Joseph Green–just to name a few names. While this might change the way FAMU and their band happen to do things, what’s it really going to take for students in these organizations and groups elsewhere to get the memo? If the death of someone innocent isn’t the glaring sign these students need, then what’s really left to get them to wake up?

How can schools step in more to stop hazing? Is it possible?

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From EurWeb.com

E! News has obtained the graphic autopsy results on “Soul Train” founder Don Cornelius, who died in February at the age of 75.

The documents reaffirm the coroner’s ruling issued then: the cause of death was a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head which entered through the right temple.

The autopsy report states that Cornelius had suffered an aneurysm about 15 years ago which caused him to develop seizures and “as time went on the decedent’s health continued to decline regardless of his medication.”

It notes that on Feb. 1 at approximately 3 a.m., the 75-year-old “Soul Train” host phoned his son and said, “I don’t know how long I can take this.” Moments later, Cornelius apparently shot himself.

His son later told investigators, “[I] found the back door open and detected the odor of smoke … then found him unresponsive on a chair. 911 was dialed.”

The report, which includes vivid depictions of Don Cornelius’ wounds, reveals that he had been “very depressed about his failing health” for the past six months.

For the complete story as well as a link to the Coroner’s report, visit EurWeb.com.

From TheGrio.com

zap2it.com

Who could forget Kevin Costner’s moving personal statement during Whitney Houston’s funeral this February? Houston’s co-star from The Bodyguard, portrayed the late R&B icon as a shy, insecure young lady, with enormous talent.

Costner said, ‘Whitney was nervous and scared that she wasn’t good enough for the role. But I told her I would be with her every step of the way.”

One of the most emotionally moving parts of the service was Costner’s final message to the Grammy Award winning songstress, “Off you go Whitney, off you go. Escorted by an army of angels to your heavenly father. When you sing before him. Don’t you worry. You will be good enough.”

For the complete story, visit TheGrio.com

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People.zap2it.com

The details of Whitney Houston’s death as noted in the LA County Department of Coroner Final Report are quite different from initial information that was shared about the singer’s passing. Yesterday, E! News obtained the official report, and it reveals the sad circumstances of how Whitney was found.

The report states that she was discovered face-down in “extremely hot water,” and there was a scald burn on her back. A small spoon with a “white crystal like substance,” as well as a “white powdery substance” on the counter and a portable mirror with traces of the same powder on it were also found in the bathroom.

“possibly overdosed on a narcotic substance, prescription medications, over the counter medications and alcohol.”

Toxicology testing turned up cocaine, Benadril, the muscle relaxer Flexeril, marijuana, Xanax, cocaethylene (produced when cocaine mixes with alcohol) and benzoylecgonin (a primary metabolite of cocaine).

Brande Victorian is a blogger and culture writer in New York City. Follower her on Twitter at @be_vic.

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Source: thespreadit.com

“I miss her. I’m very proud of my daughter. She accomplished a great deal in the short time she was here. She was very special to me. My only daughter.”

Those were the things Cissy Houston had to say about her late daughter, Whitney Houston. Last night on New Jersey station My 9 TV (WWOR-TV), Cissy Houston  opened up publicly for the first time about the tragic loss of her daughter, her thoughts on the media’s portrayal of “Nippy,” and who she would place blame on for Whitney’s death.  I was very surprised to find that her first interview on her loss would be with a local news station in Jersey, but in a way, it was also pretty fitting–they’re ride or die New Jersey folks, and it’s also fitting since Cissy is calling out big mainstream media for trying to throw dirt on her daughter’s reputation after her death.

“The media is awful. People I haven’t seen in 20 years coming and speaking out and don’t know what they’re talking about,” she says.  “But God has a way of dealing with all of it. These people don’t know anything about her. She’s had her good times and bad times. They really chopped on her and chopped on her. I’m going to let them say what they want to say, but I’m just going to hope they never come and say it to me.”

For the most part, Cissy kept her words pretty short about everything (except for her issues with the media). When asked if she felt she could have done anything differently to help Whitney as a mother, she said, “I don’t blame me for anything because I know I did the best I could.” And when it comes to trying to place blame on others, as many tried to do with Bobby Brown, she also said, “She had her ups and downs. There’s nothing I can do about it, and nothing nobody else can do about it.” And just so you know, Cissy says don’t believe the hype about her daughter being broke. That’s all a lie: “She’s not broke, she’s not anything, not none of that crap.”

At the end of the short interview, she wanted to send her thanks and love to all of Whitney’s fans, who reached out to the family, sent cards, and even sent money. She says she’s more grateful for all those things than people will ever know:

“Everybody’s been so wonderful, I must say that. I would love to thank all the people who sent cards and checks–we got so many things from so many people around the world. I want to thank them with all my heart.”

Cissy’s appearance on the show was also to let people know that she has a new song in the works called “Walk on By Faith,” (also fitting) and that the whole entire family, allegedly even Bobbi Kristina (by the way, she didn’t want to touch on the rumors about her granddaughter and Nick Gordon), will be in Jersey for the McDonald’s Gospel Fest in May . If you’re in New Jersey on May 12, you can check the family out at the Prudential Center in Newark for the Fest, where they will be honoring Whitney with a tribute.  I’m happy to see that Cissy is doing pretty good despite the circumstances, but I hope she continues to do what she needs to do to find peace.  Oh yeah, her voice sounds amazing still…if you were wondering. So keep an eye out for her new music!

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Source: MSNBC

Officials at St. Mary’s Health Center in St. Louis are claiming the treatment they gave a 29-year-old homeless woman who went to the hospital for a sprained ankle and later died in police custody after refusing to leave the ER, appropriate.

Anna Brown’s September death inside a St. Louis jail cell was determined to be caused by blood clots that formed in her legs and migrated to her lungs. Brown reportedly went to three hospitals complaining of leg pain in the days prior to her death, including the visit to St. Mary’s that led to her arrest for trespassing. Brown was wheeled out of the facility in handcuffs after a doctor said she was healthy enough to be locked up and  officers say they had no reason to think otherwise.

“A lot of times people don’t want to stay in jail and will claim to be sick,” Acting Police Chief Maj. Roy Wright said. “We depend on medical officials to tell us they’re OK.”

According to an official statement from St. Mary’s, to the best of their knowledge she was.

“Unfortunately, even with appropriate testing using sophisticated technology, blood clots can still be undetected in a small number of cases,” they said. “The sad reality is that emergency departments across the country are often a place of last resort for many people in our society who suffer from complex social problems that become medical issues when they are not addressed. It is unfortunate that it takes a tragic event like this to call attention to a crisis in our midst.”

Brown’s life had been on a downward spiral since a tornado destroyed her home in 2010. The mother moved to a St. Louis suburb with her children following the tragedy, but shortly after she lost her job in a sandwich shop. Because Brown couldn’t pay her bills, her utilities were shut off and when a child welfare agent visited her home in April, the toilet was found filled with feces and there were burn marks on the floor where she had lit fires to keep warm. Brown was arrested for parental neglect and her mother, Dorothy Davis, received custody of her children on the condition that their mother couldn’t also live with them. With her home condemned, Brown lived in four homeless shelters from May until September. She also joined the St. Louis Empowerment Center, a drop-in center for the mentally ill.

Davis says her daughter called everyday to check on her children, and now she has a responsibility to tell them what happened to their mother.

“If the police killed my daughter, I want to know. If the hospital is at fault, I want to know,” she told the Post-Dispatch. “I want to be able to tell her children why their mother isn’t here.”

The family believes Brown was treated unfairly and they’ve hired a lawyer to help them prove it. According to Brown’s sister Krystle:

“My sister is not here today because people passed judgment.”

What do you think about this case? Is anyone at fault for Anna Brown’s death?

Brande Victorian is a blogger and culture writer in New York City. Follower her on Twitter at @be_vic.

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Anyone out there know who Leolah Brown is? Yeah me neither, besides the fact that she’s Bobby Brown’s sister. In true come-out-the-woodworks-when-somebody-dies fashion, Leolah went on Dr. Drew with a couple of Bobby Brown’s nephews yesterday to start some stuff, and essentially blame Ray J for Whitney Houston’s death.

Leolah said that Ray J was far from Whitney’s lover or friend, claiming that Whitney told her he was her “runner boy,” and she’s adamant that Ray J must have given her a “bad bag” the night she died. Here’s a bit of what she said:

“When I first saw the news, I saw Ray J coming out of the hotel hiding his head being pushed into the car. I looked and I said why is he hiding? Why is he hiding his face? He’s always trying to show his face when he’s around Whitney. Why now? Why are you trying to hide now Ray J? I put it all together; when I first heard she passed away I said, ‘My God, somebody gave her a bad bag.’ [Cocaine?] Yes, that was the first thing that came out of my mouth and then I saw Ray J and it all added up. So I am going to believe that Ray J who Whitney told me she had no relationship with….. Now this is a young boy who’s running around telling people that he is a boyfriend of Whitney’s. I know clearly that he wasn’t. He was like she said, a runner boy. For some reason, he knows somebody that sells drugs and he was buying them for Whitney for what I know and giving her drugs.

I want to know why this boy was allowed to do that around Pat and around Gary. Around Pat mainly because you were with her all the time. For you to say that you don’t know what happened to her, I’m really disturbed by that.”

Leolah admitted that she doesn’t know Ray J personally, but from what Whitney told her about him, he was nothing more than her drug dealer.

“No I did not know Ray J but I can tell you this… I asked Whitney. I said, ‘Whitney, what is Ray J to you?’ She laughed. She laughed so hard she almost fell out the chair. She said, ‘Nothing.’ She said, ‘Nothing at all.’ She said Ray J was a runner boy. I said a runner boy? She said that they were never together so this stuff about Ray J…there’s a lot of games being played here with Ray J using Whitney’s name to say that he’s with Whitney Houston. That is — I doubt it very, very much.”

Leolah added that she had no knowledge of Whitney being on pain killers and that she never got into hotel bathtubs which is why she knows there was foul play involved in her death. She also said she’s sick of people expressing condolences for Whitney when they didn’t do anything to help her while she was alive, but I wonder if she should be saying the same thing to herself about Whitney and her own brother. It seems like this whole set of Whitney’s ex-in-laws is just out for attention, or trying to deflect blame that some have placed on Bobby.

Check out a couple of the interview segments here. Do you think there’s any truth to what she’s saying?

Brande Victorian is a blogger and culture writer in New York City. Follower her on Twitter at @be_vic.

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Dionne Warwick met with Robin Roberts on ABC’s “Good Morning America” to discuss her late cousin, Whitney Houston. During the interview, Dionne said Whitney was the little girl she never had.

Warwick also spoke about the grief she and Cissy feel and the fact that the reality of Whitney’s death hasn’t hit her completely yet.

You can watch a snippet of the interview below.

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It has been less than a week since Whitney Houston unexpectedly passed away in her hotel room at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in Beverly Hills, and ever since that day, it has been a frenzy. A wealth of media coverage, Internet trolls talking crazy about the singer for attention, interviews done with people who claimed to know her best and other interviews done by people who act like they know her but didn’t (sit down Dr. Drew). On top of that though, there has been a great outpouring of love for Whitney–for what she did in the past, a grief over what she could have done in the future, and just for the wonderful person she seemed to be, no matter what her trials were.

Everyday on the local news here in NYC, they show a crowd of people outside the New Hope Baptist Church in Newark, New Jersey, signing cards, playing her music, leaving flowers and notes to commemorate the life of the Jersey-born songstress they idolized. They’ve been there since news broke of Houston’s death, and they keep coming back, more and more people. So when news broke earlier in the week that the family would not be holding Houston’s funeral at the massive Prudential Center where her face is currently emblazoned outside, some were mad, and some were sad, but understood the fact that the family didn’t want a huge “parade” as Pastor Marvin L. Winans called it.

But only a few days later, it was announced that to help Whitney’s fans get the closure they need, the funeral on Saturday would be streamed online, and could possibly even be available on television. As a fan, I can appreciate that the family would want to let the people, folks all over the world who loved her, share in the celebration of Whitney’s life. In Jersey, she was obviously a major figure, what with schools named after her and the fact that she used to rep Newark like no other. The sadness you hear in the voices and see in the eyes of those who wait outside the church (NOT those who peddle memorabilia outside of it…smh) is real, and they’re mourning too. I respect that the family recognizes how much Whitney loved her fans and how much they loved her back and want to share her in the end.

But I’d also like to say, as someone who lost someone very close to me unexpectedly as a young adult, I’m also a bit worried for Bobbi Kristina. Funerals in general are heart wrenching, but there’s something about a funeral for a sudden loss that occurs soon after that loss that are even more emotional. You never truly know how you will act on that day and during that ceremony until you step in the church and the reality of your loss sinks in. And when you’re younger and not used to such hits, it can be more difficult to hold it together. So while you might go in there with the hopes of holding it together, you never know how you’ll feel until it hits you. I was one year younger than Bobbi Kristina (she’s 18 now) when one of my siblings unexpectedly passed away. During the funeral, I think I held it together pretty well in front of the hundreds of friends and our family. However, I totally fell apart when they closed the casket. I yelped and literally could have fallen out right there in the funeral home. Emotions like that, which I’m thinking Bobbi might have seeing as she and her mother were more like sisters, in my mind, doesn’t really need to be seen or critiqued by the whole world, including the folks at CNN, Fox News, MSNBC and others.

I just think the grief of the family and those close to Whitney should remain amongst them. If Bobbi Kristina is all for it, then let it go on, but during it or when it’s all over, I’d rather not have the news or anyone else analyze, do a play by play, or make a mockery of how these people say their last goodbyes and how they pay their respects, because they’ve found every way possible to analyze how Whitney spent her last days (from analyzing old scratches on her to making accusations because her hair was messed up…smh again). Whether the family grieves quietly, or they find themselves rolling around on the floor in an inconsolable state, it happens, and if it does, that should be for them only if you ask me. But that’s just my opinion and something that was on my heart that I needed to say…

Photos courtesy of Topnews.in and People.com.

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During her show today, Wendy Williams tearfully expressed her love for Whitney Houston and how painful her death over the weekend has been. Williams stated that after finding out, she shut down: turned off the TV, didn’t watch the Grammys, didn’t answer phone calls and tried to separate herself from all the coverage. For those who tuned into The Wendy Williams Show early on, you probably know that she was a huge Whitney fan and wanted her to appear on the show many times. But she pointed out that even though she knew Whitney would never show up, it was her own way of sending the troubled singer some love. That’s why her death has been so hard–and also why she doesn’t plan on talking about it again on the show.

In addition to expressing her love for Whitney as a fan and a fellow Jersey girl, Williams also opened up about the fact that they both have more than that in common. Wendy said she also struggled with drugs in the past and broke down while revealing the details: “It’s been almost 15 years since I last smoked from a crack pipe. It’s been almost 15 years since I waited on Jerome Avenue in the Bronx for my drugs. I’m not proud of the girl that I was, but without being that girl I wouldn’t be the woman I am today.”

That’s true folks! You can’t go back and change the mistakes you may have made in the past, but you can definitely use them to grow as a person and to help others do the same. While I have had my issues with her show from time to time, Williams’ admission is very commendable in the wake of Houston’s death, and I’m sure it will help others in their struggles. Check out what else Williams had to say about Whitney below and the hopes she had for the singer that were never fulfilled.

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