Her brother, Jawanza Brown, bolted from the defendant's seat, nearly knocking over the chair. The 17-year-old burst out of the room. As TV news cameras watched, he danced defiantly.
His father, Keith Brown, put a finger to his lips, warning his family and friends not to celebrate in front of the families of the slain kids.
Jawanza's friend DuJuan looked up, confused. "What happened?" Someone told him that Jawanza was free. "He beat it?" he asked.
Jawanza had been charged with killing two teenagers in 2005 near a basketball court in a housing project. Three people claimed that they saw him do it.
He beat the accusations in part because of the work of Brown, a minister and community activist. Brown did his own detective work and made one of the witnesses, Jaronn Harris, sound more like a suspect.
Both the defense and the prosecution called children to the stand as their main witnesses. The teens, from some of KC's roughest inner city neighborhoods, got their first glimpse of how the justice system works. But they had a lesson for everyone else about what it's like to grow up poor and black on the city's East Side.
In March 28, 2007, the first day of Jawanza's trial, in a courtroom on the eighth floor of the Jackson County Courthouse, 16-year-old Jaronn Harris described the double homicide he says he witnessed on the evening of August 17, 2005. He wore a striped shirt. He answered each question slowly, after much prodding from prosecutors Kevin Harrell and Teresa Moore.
Jaronn had been labeled a snitch for talking to the cops. Judge Williamson received word that Jaronn's life had been threatened. The judge banned camera phones in the gallery for fear that someone would sneak a picture of the witnesses.
Jaronn said he met up with his friend Jawanza that summer night because the pair planned to go talk to the girls at drill team practice inside the Clymer Center, a gymnasium at the heart of the T.B. Watkins public housing project near 12th Street and Woodland. But the Clymer Center was too full, and the security guard told Jaronn and Jawanza to leave. As they walked away, Jaronn said, he noticed a 9 mm handgun in Jawanza's pocket.
Jaronn, according to police, is the son of Jai Scott, who was convicted of cocaine trafficking in 1992 and has spent much of the past 15 years behind bars. Meanwhile, Jawanza's father is an ordained minister and a community outreach specialist for an alternative school called Genesis. Brown and his wife, Barbara, named their second son after Jawanza Kunjufu, author of a book called Countering the Conspiracy to Destroy Black Boys.
Near the basketball court, with the Clymer Center still in sight, they ran into two boys whom they didn't know well. Chris "Hits" Jackson was 17, and his family had just moved from Kansas City, Kansas, into one of the three-story brick buildings with matching green banisters that make up T.B. Watkins. His friend, 18-year-old Antonio Hall, was visiting from the old neighborhood.
Jaronn said he noticed an intense look on Jawanza's face. "What did you say about my boy?" Jawanza asked, according to Jaronn.
Chris grabbed his denim shorts at the waist, tugging them higher on his hips. Jaronn testified that Jawanza then took the gun out of his pocket and shot Chris several times.
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BITCH ASS NIGGA SHOULD OFF HAVE BEEN GUILTY NOW LOOK TWO MORE LIFES WAS TAKEN STUPID BITCHIES... I SWEAR THAT'S SUM BULL SHIT... BUT IT'S KOOL LORD GONE GET U. I WON THIS ONE BUT JUDGEMENT DAY WILL COME FOR U..
its getting closer an closer baby cant wait to see yo sexy ass again keep your head up an stay strong i love you
missing you my love cant wait tell you get out mr harris i'll be waiting for you
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