Rebecca Keel Archives

Sending A Highly Visible Message

Carley Welch | August 17, 2020

Topics: billboards, black lives matter, Colette McEachin, DTC RVA, Marcus-David Peters, Marwa Eltaib, Nolef Turns, protests, Rebecca Keel, Richmond Community Bail Fund, RVA26, Sheba Williams, Southerners on new ground

A variety of advocacy groups around Richmond are calling for Commonwealth Attorney Colette McEachin to drop all charges filed against participants in recent Black Lives Matter protests. One group has even posted a billboard.

Driving to the Richmond City Jail, you can hardly miss Commonwealth Attorney Colette McEachin’s face. It’s plastered on a billboard overlooking Oliver Hill Way, and it is not in favor of McEachin’s work as an attorney. Instead, it serves as a demand that she drop all charges against the hundreds of individuals who’ve been arrested and charged with crimes during the recent protests in Richmond. It also asks that she reopen the Marcus-Davis Peters case.

The billboard was paid for by Drop The Charges RVA, a small group of individuals with experience in advertising and communications; it was funded through anonymous donations. DTCRVA leadership said the billboard was made possible by the groundwork done by Nolef Turns, SONG (Southerners On New Ground), the Richmond Community Bail Fund, and other activist groups in the area.

“We are just using our skills to amplify the voices of those doing the groundwork,” a DTCRVA leadership member said in a text message.

Charges facing individuals arrested during the wave of Black Lives Matter protests over the past few months range from misdemeanors that include violating the 8 PM curfew set in the first few days of the protests, to more serious charges such as disturbing the peace and assault of an officer.

Nolef Turns, a local organization dedicated to helping individuals who’ve been charged with a crime get back on their feet, has been working to get charges expunged for those arrested for protest-related offenses since the protests started in late May.

Though Nolef Turns is committed to helping those who have been convicted, the goal where protest-related crimes are concerned is to hopefully avoid a conviction altogether. In Virginia, the state background check includes one’s arrest record, not just their conviction record. This is why getting the charges dropped altogether is vital, according to Nolef Turns Executive Director Sheba Williams, because the process of getting arrest records expunged is a long, drawn-out procedure that someone standing up for social justice shouldn’t have to go through.

“The only people who are eligible for an expungement today are non-convictions. So you go through the process of the court, you pay your bond, you pay for an attorney, you take time off of work to go to court. Then you’re not convicted, but you still have this thing on your background check,” Williams said. “You have to go before the court where you got this charge to request that they expunge it from your record, and that’s the part that we do.”

SONG, a local organization calling for LGBTQ liberation among all races, ethnicities, religions, and backgrounds, has also been fighting to get the charges against protestors dropped, organizing protests of their own and calling on McEachin to drop the charges.

A frustrating part about this particular mission, according to Rebecca Keel, a statewide organizer for SONG, is that McEachin has said numerous times that she will not listen to demands of her constituents. In Keel’s opinion, it’s the responsibility of elected officials to listen to the people they represent.

“I personally voted for Colette McEachin, so I’d like to be listened to by her, but she is refusing to do so,” they said. “I think that that’s a big indicator that a politician is not ready to serve a community, but rather ready to continue to serve laws that do not work. Colette McEachin is serving systems of oppression, rather than her constituents.”

Among those who were arrested and are also calling on McEachin to drop the charges is the group RVA26. RVA26 is a group of individuals of varying races and backgrounds who were part of the 233 people arrested on one of the first nights of protesting, according to group member Marwa Eltaib.

The group name actually originated from the first 26 individuals who were arrested and held on a jail bus that night for “eight or nine hours.” Those 26 people, joined by many others as the night went on, all experienced different outcomes, as some were able to go home after they were released from the bus. while others were kept overnight and into the next day. Eltaib was one of the latter: arrested, crammed into a bus with others in defiance of social distancing guidelines, strip-searched, and left in a jail cell. While there, she says she witnessed what she called “traumatizing” events, including people screaming for medical help or having mental breakdowns.

Eltaib said despite being handcuffed, watching people’s hands turn black and blue from the restraints of handcuffs and zip ties, and not getting a phone call during her booking, she still has gratitude for part of the experience — that the white people who were present were using their privilege for good, and standing by the protesters of color.

“The people that were arrested were more disproportionately Black and brown people, but we still had a good amount of white allies with us that were vocal,” Eltaib said. “It was very traumatizing and horrible, but even still, we were in so much privilege knowing that our community was surrounding us and that we had legal representatives on the outside. And I knew that we had people looking for us and waiting.”

Using their experience to help those who are now getting arrested and facing the same treatment and battles as they once did, members of RVA26 are attempting to build relationships with those currently incarcerated.

“It gets very lonely, and overall mentally,and spiritually draining, being stuck in those jails,” Eltaib said. “So being able to be a level of support for people that are still incarcerated, and then raise funds for that, is what we’re trying to do.”

Richmond Community Bail Fund (RCBF), an organization which supports those who are incarcerated by helping to raise funds for those who can’t afford bail, has focused on protest-related charges in recent months. They too are calling on McEachin to drop the charges against protesters.

RCBF has been around since the spring of 2017, said Luca Connolly, co-director of the organization. Since the protest began, members of the group have passed out flyers at the protests with the organization’s emergency number on them, so individuals who get arrested can call RCBF for help when they get their one phone call.

“There’s usually a hotline volunteer who’s [asking protesters], ‘Do you have the support hotline?’’’ Connolly said. “It’s great now because everybody’s like, ‘Yeah, I have it.’ That feels good. I have met people who have it tattooed on their body, and somebody projected it onto the monument in Marcus-David Peters Circle. You need to be prepared for the worst.”

The organization also builds relationships with those incarcerated, providing support with legal fees, legal advice, child support assistance, clean clothes, and rides home. Connolly said there’s also a hotline number that people can call if they’re calling from outside a jail, which helps provide support for those whose loved ones have been arrested.

RCBF is financed through 100% grassroots fundraising said Connolly, meaning they take no money from foundations or big corporations. She also said they primarily ask for money from white people and people of wealth.

“We kind of understand our work as a reparations-based framework, moving white wealth to liberate black people who are experiencing mass incarceration or police violence,” Connolly said.

Discussing protest-related charges in an interview with RVA Magazine last month, McEachin said she would look at the cases on a case-by-case basis instead of dropping the charges of all protesters as a group, which is what these various organizations are pleading her to do.

“There’s not going to be a general review. It’s a very individualized review, which is what I would think people would want if they were charged,” McEachin said. “Given what I know now, I think there will be some charges left at the end of my review.”

Protesters are facing an array of charges, some of which may sound worse than others. However, Connolly feels that it’s important not to separate the fate of individuals based on what they’re being charged with.

“We are asking Colette McEachin to drop all charges against all protesters,” she said. “No one should experience prosecution for exercising their first amendment right to protest.”

Top Photo via Drop The Charges RVA

Stonewall Rising: Showing Support With Pride

GayRVA Staff | July 2, 2020

Topics: alexsis rodgers, black lives matter, Black Pride RVA, Diversity Richmond, Equality Virginia, health brigade, Jennifer McClellan, Joseph Papa, LGBTQ Pride Month, Marcus-David Peters, Minority Veterans of America, Nationz Foundation, Pride Month, Rebecca Keel, Richmond Lesbian Feminists, Richmond LGBTQ Chamber, Richmond Triangle Players, Southerners on new ground, Stonewall Rising, Stonewall Sports, va pride, Virginia Anti-Violence Project

Last weekend’s Stonewall Rising march was an act of solidarity by Richmond’s LGBTQ community, which took this opportunity during Pride Month to march in support of Black lives.

On Saturday, June 27, Richmond’s LGBTQ community commemorated the last weekend of Pride Month with a march demonstrating solidarity with the Black community of Richmond and beyond. Stonewall Rising: LGBTQ March For Black Lives was organized by a variety of Richmond LGBTQ advocacy and support groups, including Diversity Richmond, the Richmond LGBTQ Chamber, Nationz Foundation, Black Pride RVA, VA Pride, Equality Virginia, Virginia Anti-Violence Project, Southerners On New Ground, Health Brigade, Minority Veterans of America, Richmond Triangle Players, Richmond Lesbian Feminists, and Stonewall Sports.

The march began with a gathering at Diversity Richmond on Sherwood Ave, where local LGBTQ activist Rebecca Keel rallied the crowd with a speech about how the LGBTQ rights movement began 51 years earlier — almost to the day — at Stonewall Inn with a riot against police oppression. After a few other speeches, the crowd formed up and began marching toward the Richmond Police Training Academy on Graham Rd, just over a mile away from Diversity Richmond.

*Jennifer McClellan speaks at Richmond Police Training Academy.*

The crowd, which numbered at least 1000 at the peak of the protest according to local LGBTQ activist Joseph Papa, carried signs featuring slogans like “Black Trans Lives Matter” and “Pride For Black Lives,” as well as posters depicting Breonna Taylor and Marcus-David Peters. The protest was greeted at the Police Training Academy by a line of police in riot gear, but things remained peaceful. Several leaders spoke to the assembled crowd, including Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jennifer McClellan. Alexsis Rodgers, who is currently running for mayor of Richmond, was also in attendance. The evening ended with a march back to Diversity Richmond.

Here are some photos of the evening’s events, captured by Richmond photographer David Kenedy.

Richmond Activists Declare Death of Democratic Party, Hold Funeral Procession

Benjamin West | February 12, 2019

Topics: community activism, Democratic Party, lillie estes, Mark Herring, Ralph Northam, Rebecca Keel, Virginia Capitol

“We have had it with the old Democratic Party. We’re here for a new vision,” declared activist Rebecca Keel during last week’s public funeral vigil, held in front of the Capitol building.

Late last week, at the foot of Virginia’s Capitol building just before dusk, approximately 50 people gathered around a coffin.

Members of the group held their phones or notebooks, brimming with prepared speeches. Local activist Rebecca Keel shook a tambourine to keep time as the group marched and sang. Organizers and community members passed around a microphone. They spoke in the direction of the crowd, but their voices projected further, towards the rolling greens and fat, white columns of the Capitol.

They were there to mourn what they view as the death of the Democratic Party.

“We have had it with the old Democratic Party. We have had it with you,” said Keel to the coffin on the ground. “We are here for a new vision. We are here to see that phoenix rise from the ashes, and for the people to truly be the democracy.”

Largely a response to the recent news of Governor Ralph Northam and Attorney General Mark Herring’s blackface scandals, an issue that has been marinating in the news cycle for the past week and garnering national attention, the vigil was about more than these single reprehensible acts by two of Virginia’s leading politicians.

“We know that racism is alive and well, not only in the city, in the state, but across the nation. And we see it across the world,” said Arthur Burton, founder of Kinfolk, a community outreach organization focused on Richmond’s public housing sector.

A plethora of speakers spoke about the Democratic Party’s hand in past atrocities, from being the cornerstone of slavery in the south to the displacement and murder of indigenous peoples, acts often disregarded by left-leaning people because of the policy changeover and party realignment that took place in the mid-20th century.

But the purpose of the vigil, according to the message of the speakers, was to recognize that these values have not been left behind. Keel spoke, for example, about the Northam Administration’s support of the Mountain Valley and Atlantic Coast Pipelines.

“Environmental degradation is a tool of the Right,” Keel said. “[It] is a tool to push out poor working class people, people of color, black folks, indigenous folks, and we will have that no more from our Democratic leadership.”

Although the event was mourning a failure by politicians whom some in attendance had passionately supported and campaigned for, the group was also looking to the future, questioning what a new progressive political party might look like and how to get there.

“We actually have to build together,” Brooke Taylor said, Richmond Youth Coordinator at Side by Side, a nonprofit supporting LGBTQ youth.

“Come to these strategy meetings, come to these kickbacks where people are talking real politics. Get involved with each other. And most importantly, have hope for the future.”

According to Keel, the vigil was organized in tandem with the full-throttle news cycle, coming together in only 36 hours. The event was also honoring Lillie Estes, a local activist and community strategist who died earlier this month. Keel said Estes had been an invaluable mentor to people in Virginia and throughout the East Coast.

“We’ve been all coming together and so moved,” Keel said. “Moved to do and continue this work.”

As the evening grew darker, electric candles were passed around. The sky became a deep blue, and the tops of the towering Bank Street buildings became less pronounced. The brightest thing in view became the Capitol, its face lit stark white against the night.

After a heartfelt eulogy from Burton, audience and organizers alike formed a silent procession and marched with the coffin on their shoulders. Snaking up a manicured lawn, backdropped by TV Reporters who’d waited just for this moment, the vigil ended in a quiet spot next to the now-looming Capitol building.

One by one, members from the procession came forward to place their candles by the casket. As instructed by Keel, they each whispered or thought an intention of what they wanted from a new Democratic Party.

“We’re just tired of being tired, so we are really calling on our Democratic leaders to step up and take up a people’s platform,” Keel said, just before referencing the quickly-approaching 2019 General Assembly elections.

“We’re going to vote in who we need to vote in.”

Photos by Benjamin West