Vallejo Peace Project

5 years ago ~ we started

Stopping someone from getting remarried is an act of violence #OpenVallejoStopping someone from getting remarried is an act of violence #OpenVallejo

NEW ON THE PODCAST Revelations about Councilmember Hakeem Brown's history of domestic violence have wracked Vallejo, resulting in rescinded endorsements of hi...s mayoral campaign and an effort to have him recalled from city council. Featuring exclusive interviews with Brown's wife Joanna Cullom, as well as the family of former wife Chana Brown, this episode contains graphic descriptions of domestic violence and death. Listen on: Apple Podcasts https://podcasts.apple.com//pod/open-vallejo/id1522409000 Spotify https://open.spotify.com/episode/5y3HCrOTlhlyIgjvrNJ7in SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/openvallejo/the-rules-of-marriage

Posted on NextDoor: Vallejo City Manager Greg Nyhoff Activates Emergency Operations Center. City Manager Greg Nyhoff just issued a bizarre press release s...tating that he is activating the Emergency Operations Center and will have the Vallejo Police Department riot squad on standby to prepare for "civil unrest directly associated with the 2020 election" - even though he states - "there is no immediate threat of unrest, nor do we have reason to believe there will be a threat in the City of Vallejo or surrounding areas": https://myemail.constantcontact.com/City-of-Vallejo-Prepare This is extremely alarming considering the recent declaration by Nyhoff of a "local state of emergency" that grants him sweeping unchecked power, as well as his deployment of a highly controversial military grade Stingray surveillance system: https://www.eff.org//2020/10/judge-upends-vallejos-use-sti

REAL QUICK ........ The brother in law of Chana Brown feels the need to clarify some of the lies and false statements made by Councilman Hakee...m Brown over the last two weeks. Lie #1: This was a one-time incident 20 years ago just a ‘domestic scuffle’: According to court records, Hakeem Brown physically abused Joanna Cullom throughout their relationship, not just one time. He was twice convicted of domestic violence offenses against her culminating in a 4-year prison sentence after punching her repeatedly in the stomach when she was pregnant according to her testimony. Ms. Cullom believes she miscarried her baby because of Mr. Brown’s abuse. This wasn’t Mr. Brown’s first time abusing a woman, as prosecutors have alleged and was reported in the Open Vallejo article: June 1994: Mr. Brown pushed a woman to the floor and kicked her in the chest. January 1995: Mr. Brown punched a woman in the mouth and threatened to get a gun January 2001: Mr. Brown punched through a window of a woman’s house March 2001: Mr. Brown punched a girlfriend in the face and torso Lie #2: This is my past; I am a changed man: Hakeem Brown’s aggression and intimidation against women continue to this very day. Voices of Vallejo posted testimony from 8 additional women that had run-ins with Mr. Brown from 2016 to the present on their website. Mr. Brown has documented domestic violence cases through 2012, which is just 8 years ago, when Hakeem was 37 years old, not a young man as he keeps claiming. According to court records, Mr. Brown has failed to pay child support and rear his own 4 children, while claiming to be extremely wealthy and a mentor to Vallejo’s youth. In 2018, he had a public spectacle of a wedding; however, Mr. Brown was knowingly married to 2 other women at that time. A wedding I am sure some of you reading this attended. Mr. Brown’s second wife asked for an annulment on the grounds of bigamy in the mid-2000s. How can this man speak about empowering women and advocate for our youth? Mr. Brown’s silence on these misdeeds is deafening. You must ask yourself if Mr. Brown’s recent altruism was done out of the goodness of his heart or rather was it to gain political capital or to provide cover if his violent history was ever revealed to the public. Lie #3 The 2012 allegations against me are false and unsubstantiated, that’s why the case was dismissed. To the contrary, Chana Brown’s claims of emotional, physical, and sexual violence are very much substantiated by overwhelming evidence, which can be found In the documentation Open Vallejo carefully curated. Under oath, a police deputy called Mr. Brown’s crimes against Chana as domestic violence bordering on torture. Chana said Mr. Brown: Choked her unconscious multiple times Punched her so hard in the head, she said had some permanent hearing loss Forced her to have sex against her will Abused her while she was both pregnant and while holding his baby. The violence was so extensive and so frequent, there isn’t enough space to include all the horrific acts from her sworn statements to two different police departments. The case, a total of 12 charges, was dismissed because Chana Brown stopped cooperating and coincidently, Mr. Brown pled guilty to violating a restraining order. I think we can all connect the dots. According to Chana, she dropped the case because Mr. Brown threatened to kill her and her family. Mr. Brown wants you to believe everyone else is lying, Chana, her family, cops in both California and New Jersey, other victims, and only he is telling the truth. However, how does Mr. Brown have any credibility left considering he recently held a sham wedding and called punching a woman 5 times in the stomach a domestic scuffle? Mr. Brown has said on the campaign trail that we need to trust black women, however now he says you can’t trust any of the black women he had relationships with. Lie #4 I hold myself fully accountable for my actions. On October 11th, October 15th, October 20th and October 21st, 2020, Mr. Brown both insinuated and explicitly stated that his victims were either exaggerating or lying - a baffling position based on the court recorded evidence. That is a far cry from being accountable if anything that is the exact opposite of accepting responsibility. Those are the actions of someone doing damage control. These are the actions of someone who is only remorseful that his darkness came to light, as Mr. Brown stated to the San Francisco Chronicle If [the people of Vallejo] were aware of my record, do you think I would have won? Mr. Brown has never asked his victims what justice means to them; he has never reached out to us, never apologized. Rather, he tells us, his victims, what justice means to him. Mr. Brown only cares about himself and all his current actions are evidence of that he continually tries to play the victim. On Tuesday (10/20), he had the audacity to compare himself to Maya Angelou on Facebook; an odd choice, considering she was a domestic violence survivor. On Wednesday (10/21), he told the NAACP he wants to put this behind him. That’s nice that he wants to put this all in the past, but what about the victims who still lay awake crying and have depression and PTSD to this very day because of his abuse. Mr. Brown, his supporters, and his enablers keep asking for compassion for Mr. Brown, which is insulting, hurtful, and tone deaf, while also simultaneously minimizing the pain of his victims. Where is their compassion for the women he abused? The trauma of domestic violence, especially the horrific acts that Mr. Brown committed, don’t end the day these women escape. However, Mr. Brown keeps telling everyone to move on and move forward because that is best for Hakeem Brown. Conclusion: Hakeem Brown has 9 arrests 3 convictions for violence against a total of 5 women Spanning over 3 decades; he isn’t asking for a second chance; he is asking for a 10th. I believe in restorative justice and turning over a new leaf, but Mr. Brown has not even taken the first step to repair the harm caused by his crimes. He keeps saying he has, but those are just empty words, as his actions say otherwise. If Mr. Brown wants to make a positive impact on the great city of Vallejo; he can spend his future days volunteering to make the community a better place, he doesn’t need to be a mayor or a council member to do that. It’s honestly disheartening that I have to write this letter, that I have to justify my family’s pain; and frankly I don’t understand why it’s a tough choice for certain organizations to end their association with an unrepentant abuser of women. Endorsing and supporting, Mr. Brown is condoning and normalizing domestic violence make no mistake about that. Carefully crafted statements can be released saying otherwise, but that’s exactly what is being done. You can either support Hakeem Brown or support Joanna, Chana, Mr. Brown’s other victims and domestic violence survivors across the world; you can’t do both. Enough is enough. --Christopher , the brother in law of Chana Brown (New Jersey)

Do you know how and why the little black boy, Franklin, came to join the Peanuts comic strip? I didn't know until a few minutes ago. Shultz had to buck the sy...stem to do it. On July 31, 1968, a young, black man was reading the newspaper when he saw something that he had never seen before. With tears in his eyes, he started running and screaming throughout the house, calling for his mom. He would show his mom, and, she would gasp, seeing something she thought she would never see in her lifetime. Throughout the nation, there were similar reactions. What they saw was Franklin Armstrong's first appearance on the iconic comic strip "Peanuts." Franklin would be 50 years old this year. (2018) Franklin was "born" after a school teacher, Harriet Glickman, had written a letter to creator Charles M. Schulz after Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was shot to death outside his Memphis hotel room. Glickman, who had kids of her own and having worked with kids, was especially aware of the power of comics among the young. And my feeling at the time was that I realized that black kids and white kids never saw themselves [depicted] together in the classroom, she would say. She would write, Since the death of Martin Luther King, 'I’ve been asking myself what I can do to help change those conditions in our society which led to the assassination and which contribute to the vast sea of misunderstanding, hate, fear and violence.' Glickman asked Schulz if he could consider adding a black character to his popular comic strip, which she hoped would bring the country together and show people of color that they are not excluded from American society. She had written to others as well, but the others feared it was too soon, that it may be costly to their careers, that the syndicate would drop them if they dared do something like that. Charles Schulz did not have to respond to her letter, he could have just completely ignored it, and everyone would have forgotten about it. But, Schulz did take the time to respond, saying he was intrigued with the idea, but wasn't sure whether it would be right, coming from him, he didn't want to make matters worse, he felt that it may sound condescending to people of color. Glickman did not give up, and continued communicating with Schulz, with Schulz surprisingly responding each time. She would even have black friends write to Schulz and explain to him what it would mean to them and gave him some suggestions on how to introduce such a character without offending anyone. This conversation would continue until one day, Schulz would tell Glickman to check her newspaper on July 31, 1968. On that date, the cartoon, as created by Schulz, shows Charlie Brown meeting a new character, named Franklin. Other than his color, Franklin was just an ordinary kid who befriends and helps Charlie Brown. Franklin also mentions that his father was "over at Vietnam." At the end of the series, which lasted three strips, Charlie invites Franklin to spend the night one day so they can continue their friendship. I just thought this was a good re-introduction of Franklin to the rest of the world - "I'm very glad to know you." There was no big announcement, there was no big deal, it was just a natural conversation between two kids, whose obvious differences did not matter to them. And, the fact that Franklin's father was fighting for this country was also a very strong statement by Schulz. Although Schulz never made a big deal over the inclusion of Franklin, there were many fans, especially in the South, who were very upset by it and that made national news. One Southern editor even said, I don’t mind you having a black character, but please don’t show them in school together. It would eventually lead to a conversation between Schulz and the president of the comic's distribution company, who was concerned about the introduction of Franklin and how it might affect Schulz' popularity. Many newspapers during that time had threatened to cut the strip. Schulz' response: "I remember telling Larry at the time about Franklin -- he wanted me to change it, and we talked about it for a long while on the phone, and I finally sighed and said, "Well, Larry, let's put it this way: Either you print it just the way I draw it or I quit. How's that?" Eventually, Franklin became a regular character in the comic strips, and, despite complaints, Franklin would be shown sitting in front of Peppermint Patty at school and playing center field on her baseball team. More recently, Franklin is brought up on social media around Thanksgiving time, when the animated 1973 special "A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving" appears. Some people have blamed Schulz for showing Franklin sitting alone on the Thanksgiving table, while the other characters sit across him. But, Schulz did not have the same control over the animated cartoon on a television network that he did on his own comic strip in the newspapers. But, he did have control over his own comic strip, and, he courageously decided to make a statement because of one brave school teacher who decided to ask a simple question. Glickman would explain later that her parents were "concerned about others, and the values that they instilled in us about caring for and appreciating everyone of all colors and backgrounds this is what we knew when we were growing up, that you cared about other people . . . And so, during the years, we were very aware of the issues of racism and civil rights in this country [when] black people had to sit at the back of the bus, black people couldn’t sit in the same seats in the restaurants that you could sit . . . Every day I would see, or read, about black children trying to get into school and seeing crowds of white people standing around spitting at them or yelling at them . . . and the beatings and the dogs and the hosings and the courage of so many people in that time." Because of Glickman, because of Schulz, people around the world were introduced to a little boy named Franklin. From The Jon S. Randal Peace Page Learn more about the experiences of people of color at https://www.netflix.com/title/80091741 or free on YouTube https://youtu.be/krfcq5pF8u8

Let us refocus our energy back to where our fight started. #fuckvpd #vallejostrong

In response to Open Vallejo's reporting, the Napa/Solano Central Labor Council has rescinded its endorsement of Hakeem Brown for Mayor of Vallejo.

Please... we can’t let this happen....