RFK Jr. heavily criticized for continuing to accuse black men of murder

While presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. starts the race for… platform advocating for criminal justice reform in his efforts to bring black voters to justice, critics indicate that the independent candidate spent years accusing two black and brown men of committing the murder for which his white cousin was convicted, despite the lawsuits being dismissed by court.

“He is very much like many other racist white people who have decided it is more convenient to choose defenseless people as a scapegoat for their crimes,” said activist Tamika Mallory, founder of the nonprofit Until Freedom. “The easiest targets are black and brown men because in most cases the system will automatically assume these people are guilty until proven innocent.”

In 2016, Kennedy published a book titled “Framed” during which he explains why he believed his cousin Michael Skakel was innocent after being convicted of the October 30, 1975 murder of 15-year-old Martha Moxley in Greenwich. Connecticut. Moxley was bludgeoned to death with a golf club that traced back to the house of Skakel, then a neighbor who was also an adolescent. Skakel was convicted of murder in 2002 and released from prison in 2013 after a Connecticut judge ruled he didn’t receive an adequate defense from his original lawyer.

In his book, Kennedy repeats the accusations of Skakel’s friend Gitano “Tony” Bryant, the cousin of NBA star Kobe Bryant, who taken over two of his friends from the Bronx, Adolph Hasbrouck and Burton Tinsley, were responsible for Moxley’s murder. Hasbrouck is black and Tinsley is described in news reports as mixed race and of Asian descent.

“I’m sure they did it” – Kennedy he said New York Times in 2016 Despite the claims in his book, there are holes in Kennedy’s theory that Hasbrouck and Tinsley were responsible for Moxley’s murder.

Kennedy claimed to know “facts that were not part of the trial and … were not part of the public debate,” based on conversations he had with neighbors of the Moxley family. He used his roles as a contributor at publications similar to the Atlantic Monthly to push his claims, and later within the 2000s he launched a media onslaught in an attempt to clear his cousin’s name.

In 2007, a Stamford Superior Court judge found Bryant’s claims about Hasbrouck and Tinsley to have little credibility and said they’d not have produced a unique end in the case. Meanwhile, no evidence or other eyewitnesses placed Hasbrouck or Tinsley in the world on the night of Moxley’s murder.

“No one saw anyone black in this all-white neighborhood,” said Schoenbach, who noted that the private, gated community had “extra security” on the night of the murder since it was the night before Halloween.

According to a court document containing his 2007 testimony, Kennedy stated that Hasbrouck and Tinsley would “probably have short lives” and find yourself in prison.

Schoenbach said Hasbrouck was “not at all the typical kid from the South Bronx that Kennedy thought he was,” declaring that he earned a bachelor’s degree, joined the military, was honorably discharged and worked for ABC for 30 years. He also emphasized that Bryant, the person on whose claims Kennedy relied to accuse Hasbrouck and Tinsley of Moxley’s murder, was convicted fraud and sentenced to federal prison.

While promoting his book “Framed,” Kennedy, who earned his law degree from the University of Virginia School of Law, dismissed concerns that Hasbrouck or Tinsley might sue him for defamation. He emboldened them eloquent radio station: “I hope they file a lawsuit… if they’re innocent, they’ll file a lawsuit against me.”

Schoenbach said Kennedy “desperately wanted” Hasbrouck, referred to as Al, “to say something so that Al would be forced to testify.” He advised Hasbrouck to exercise his Fifth Amendment right to avoid being subpoenaed.

He also falsely claimed that Skakel was “released from prison as a result of this investigation,” when the truth is he was released on a separate appeal during which he claimed that his defense attorney in the primary trial was “incompetent”

Until Freedom’s Mallory stated that Kennedy’s continued accusations should “disqualify” him from gaining support from the Black community.

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“It’s not an ideological difference. “This is a false accusation of a Black man and a mixed-race gentleman of a very serious crime that they did not commit,” she said. “I do not know what’s worse than someone running for president trying to appeal to the frustrations of our community, and on this case actually directly hurting Black people. It could be very dangerous.”

“When we talk about the criminal justice system, when we talk about black Americans, when we talk about Trump and black men, we must continue to remind people who Trump has always been,” she maintained.

Williams said Trump similarly falsely accused five black teenagers, referred to as the Central Park Five, of a brutal crime against a white woman.

She added: “They were innocent Black men and now they are the Exonerated Five. And yet he said they should be shot, and people act as if they forgot about it.”