If an all-white gang of teenagers, all members of a “popular football team” as reported by the Associated Press, in the tiny blue-collar town of Shenandoah PA, were charged for attacking a Mexican man who ultimately died, what are the chances of an all-white jury rendering a guilty verdict against them?

Almost a year before the teenage perpetrators were even tried, Ms. Dillman, a young white woman and mother of Mr. Ramirez’s two young children was not sure justice would prevail; “I think they might get off… because Luis was an illegal Mexican and these are ‘all-American boys’ on the football team…they’ll find some way to let them go,” she told the New York Times back in August of 2008.

“In my mind it was the lack of evidence to tie these kids to the serious charges that they brought” said defense lawyer Frederick Fanelli pointing to his defense strategy as well as to the weaknesses of the prosecution.The fact was that a Mexican man was murdered but the circumstances of the crime were blurred by means of  “a cast of witnesses provided conflicting accounts regarding who initiated the encounter and who exactly did what, complicating prosecutor’s efforts to assign blame” according to CNN

Even though the use of ethnic slurs used by at least one of the attackers was admitted into evidence –defendant Mr. Scully admitted to shouting ethnic slurs- the jury also found the teenagers not guilty of having committed a hate crime.

Not only were the teenagers found not guilty of all serious charges, the victim Mexican Luis Ramirez -25-year-old, was actually portrayed as the aggressor by the defense attorney Fred Fanelli who asked the jurors: “Does Mr. Ramirez fit the description of an innocent soul who just happened to get picked on by a group of kids?”

The Role of Shenandoah’s Police

The difficulties in producing sufficient evidence were ascribed not only to a deficiency of the prosecution to a seeming collusion by police officers:

“It was very clear that at least a couple of officers colluded with the conspiracy to conceal the crime,” declared Gladys Limon a lawyer of the advocacy group MALDEF. 

The prosecution direct made the accusation  saying “the two police officers who testified…were not telling the truth.”

The prosecution indicated one of the defendants -17-year-old Piekarsky- returned to the scene with Shenandoah police officer Jason Hayes – his mother’s boyfriend.

A Biased Jury?

“The foreman of the jury that acquitted two teens of all serious charges in the beating death of an illegal immigrant believes some of the jurors were racist.  He said he thinks they had their mind made up from the start,” reported WNEP-TV in May 2, 2009.

“I believe strongly that some of the people on the jury were racist.  I believe strongly that some of the people on the jury had their minds made up maybe before the first day of trial.. and I believe the four boys that were involved the most are racist.  I absolutely do.  Derrick Donchak wore a US Border Patrol t-shirt to a Halloween party after Luis died.  That is racist.  That is beyond in bad taste.  That is horrible.”

“Justice was not done for Luis Ramirez but as I said, we gave the verdict that we had to give based on the testimony and the evidence that we had to go on,” Eric Maclin WNEP-TV

Even if the jury was not biased, the evidence offered in the case and the high standard of proof for criminal cases where responsibility must be established beyond reasonable doubt still limited them.

“I do believe that our verdict was a fair verdict given the evidence and the testimony that we had to work with.  But I do believe that the four boys, and especially the two that were on trial, are guilty of those crimes, but there was not enough evidence to convict them beyond a reasonable doubt,” Eric Maclin, jury foreman.

An Isolated Case?

Hate Crimes statistics tell a story of widespread attacks throughout the United States.  “Crimes of hatred and prejudice –from lynching to cross burnings to vandalism of synagogues- are a sad fact of American History” states the FBI in the front page of its website’s special section on Hate Crime. 

Mandated by law, the FBI provides annual statistics of hate crimes since 1995.  While an average of 24 incidents a day of hate crime were reported to the police in 2007, another 150 incidents per day were reported by the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) in the period between 2000 and 2003.  

The difference stems from the fact that the “FBI counts only crimes that are reported to the police… BJS collects information from victims, who are asked if they think hate played a role in the crime” according to the study “Hate Crime in America” published by the National Institute of Justice in 2007.

When Local Justice Fails, Federal Justice Prevails?

Given the seeming lack of evidence, and possible tampering with evidence involving police officers federal justice might have a chance to step in and prosecute the teenagers.

Federal officials are investigating whether to prosecute two teenagers convicted of simple assault in connection with the fatal beating of an illegal Mexican immigrant, per a U. S. Department of Justice spokesman.

“There is an investigation ongoing…The Civil Rights Division is examining the evidence and will determine if there is a prosecutable violation of federal civil rights statutes” stated the spokesman to CitizensVoice.com

“The federal government can still try Piekarsky and Donchak on the basis of alleged violations of Ramirez’s civil rights.  Because of the principle of dual sovereignty – the country and the states are separate entities, except where the states have voluntarily surrendered their powers – such a prosecution does not violate the constitutional guarantee against double jeopardy under U. S. law” indicated CitizensVoice.com in its article.

The Immigration Showdown

In 2005 Congress moved to promote the Sensenbrenner bill to combat illegal immigration, which triggered a series of marches nationwide by Hispanics pleading for a fair immigration reform instead of the criminalization of immigrants.

During 2006 it was in Pennsylvania that a series of city ordinances were discussed or enacted to combat illegal immigration.  The lead was taken by Hazleton a small city 20 miles from Shenandoah enacting an ordinance to discourage hiring or renting to illegal immigrants.

Various radical supremacist groups experienced a renewed impetus in its discourse of hatred this time against Hispanic immigrants as reported by the Anti Defamation League.

As if preparing for Luis Ramirez’s death, Shenandoah’s Mexican community, given the growing racial tensions pulled out of the little town’s Heritage Days in 2006.

After the rendering of a not guilty verdict for murder and hate crime, the celebratory mood of a white-majority Shenandoah was evident. The joy of the family and friend of the perpetrators in the courtroom was followed by “several cars… driving through Shenandoah blowing their horns” reported the Republican Herald.