Professor Gates, Harvard's Pride

[richlevy]

Well this takes the whole affair to a new level.

Officer Justin Barrett was suspended Tuesday after allegedly sending a copy of the racially charged e-mail about Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. to The Boston Globe and colleagues at the National Guard, referring to Gates as a "jungle monkey."

Of Gates, the e-mail said, "His first priority of effort should be to get off the phone and comply with police, for if I was the officer he verbally assaulted like a banana-eating jungle monkey, I would have sprayed him in the face with OC [pepper spray] deserving of his belligerent non-compliance." The e-mail also used the phrase "jungle monkey" two other times.

And of course, trust a lawyer to put a really bizarre spin on it.

Barrett's lawyer, Peter Marano, said his client, who did a tour of duty in Iraq in 2005, would not be speaking publicly.
"He's facing military criminal charges for this," said Marano. He said Barrett's letter could be construed as "conduct unbecoming in the military" and that could lead to time in the stockade -- or even the death penalty.
A National Guard spokesman said late this afternoon that Barrett was not facing criminal charges and there was no way that he would face the death penalty.
Barrett will fight the department if he is fired, Marano said.
"I think the department has taken such an outwardly over-proportional response," he said. "We have police officers who do heroin, cocaine and keep their job, beat their wives, keep their jobs. The mayor isn't out on TV saying they're g-o-n-e ... The issue is that it's a private e-mail from a private computer at home."

Death Penalty? Is Marano Italian for moron?

I'm trying to figure out from the last paragraph if it is Barrett or Marano who speaks so well of the drug using, wife beating members of the Boston Police.

A copy of Barrett's e-mail, which was addressed to Globe columnist Yvonne Abraham and criticized her July 21 column on the Gates incident, was released by police today. The long, rambling, angry screed against Abraham criticized her writing, her views, and Gates. Abraham writes today that Barrett's email was one of many that she deleted.

BTW, it's not a private e-mail if you send it to a newspaper columnist.