{"id":218057,"date":"2019-06-09T02:57:31","date_gmt":"2019-06-09T06:57:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=218057"},"modified":"2019-06-09T02:57:31","modified_gmt":"2019-06-09T06:57:31","slug":"michael-b-jordan-presents-central-park-5-with-courage-award","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2019\/06\/09\/michael-b-jordan-presents-central-park-5-with-courage-award\/","title":{"rendered":"Michael B. Jordan presents Central Park 5 with courage award"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Jordan praised the men \u2014 Yusef Salaam, Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana, and Korey Wise \u2014 for their perseverance and courage during a luncheon in which the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California honoured Netflix’s series about their case. (File Photo<\/a>: @michaelbjordan\/Instagram<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

LOS ANGELES \u2014 Michael B. Jordan told the men known as the Central Park Five Friday that he cannot watch footage of the new series \u201cWhen They See Us\u201d without getting emotional and feeling like as a young black man he too could have faced a similar ordeal.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s dangerous in America when you’re living in a black body,\u201d Jordan said.<\/p>\n

Jordan praised the men \u2014 Yusef Salaam, Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana, and Korey Wise \u2014 for their perseverance and courage during a luncheon in which the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California honoured Netflix’s series about their case.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe whole time that these men were incarcerated, they never changed their story,\u201d he said. \u201cThey insisted of their innocence even as they did their time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Salaam cried as he accepted an award on behalf of series creator Ava DuVernay.<\/p>\n

\u201cI’m not ashamed to cry in front of you,\u201d Salaam said after a moment of silence as he reflected on how he and the other men were \u201cjust boys\u201d between the ages of 13 and 16 years old when they were wrongfully convicted.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur story is a story of an egregious miscarriage of justice,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Jordan hugged Salaam, who also spoke on behalf of the five men.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat’s courage,\u201d said Jordan, whose performances have ranged from his acclaimed portrayal of a young black man killed by a police officer in \u201cFruitvale Station\u201d to the vengeful Erik Killmonger in \u201cBlack Panther.\u201d<\/p>\n

Salaam and the rest of the Central Park Five were exonerated in 2002 after being charged with the 1989 rape of a white woman in New York’s Central Park. They received a standing ovation while accepting the ACLU chapter’s inaugural Roger Baldwin Courage Award. Baldwin was one of the ACLU’s founders and its first executive director.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen They See Us\u201d isn’t Hollywood’s first attempt to recount the story of the Central Park Five’s wrongful conviction, but it has sparked a renewed interest in the details of the case.<\/p>\n

Hector Villagra, executive director of the ACLU of Southern California, said DuVernay refocused the narrative on the humanity of the five men and it has shone a new light on a widely known case 30 years later.<\/p>\n

The series has re-ignited outcry about how the case was handled.
\nLinda Fairstein, the Manhattan sex crimes prosecutor who observed
\nthe teenagers’ interrogation, has faced backlash for her role in
\ntheir conviction. Fairstein has already resigned from at least two
\nnon-profit boards as backlash intensified and a
\n#CancelLindaFairstein movement spread on social media.<\/p>\n

Shortly before the men accepted their award, Fairstein was dropped by her book publisher in the face of the increasing criticism. Villagra said that he thinks it’s fair that Fairstein be judged for her actions, even decades later.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s in many ways justice delayed,\u201d Villagra said.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

LOS ANGELES \u2014 Michael B. Jordan told the men known as the Central Park Five Friday that he cannot watch …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":218059,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-218057","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","category-hollywood","mauthors-katie-campione","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218057","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218057"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218057\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":218060,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218057\/revisions\/218060"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/218059"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}