Houston High school brawl involving N.O. evacuees

[ninoslim]

Tensions overflow at Jones High School
5 teens sent to jail after fight erupts between local students and evacuees
By JENNIFER RADCLIFFE
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
HURRICANE KATRINA


Houston school officials will increase police presence at Jesse H. Jones High School and reconsider the number of Hurricane Katrina evacuees at the campus after five students were arrested and three were hospitalized because of an early morning fight Tuesday between Houston and New Orleans teenagers.


The fight, which involved 20 to 25 students, started about 8:15 a.m. — when a Jones student threw a soda can toward a group of New Orleans students, said HISD spokesman Terry Abbott. The incident is the first problem the district has had since enrolling 3,403 evacuated students. In the Greater Houston area, 15,045 displaced students are attending public schools.

A New Orleans student was transported to Memorial Hermann Hospital for facial injuries and two Houston students were taken to the hospital for facial and rib injuries. Two 15- and 16-year-old boys from New Orleans were arrested, as were three local 17- and 18-year-old boys.

All five were charged with disruption of school activities, a Class C misdemeanor, and will be removed from the campus, Abbott said.

"The quickest way to earn a ticket out of Jones High School and into detention is to hurt one of those students from New Orleans," Abbott said. "They've made it very clear to the Jones High School students that the children from New Orleans are our guests. We must treat them with all the dignity and respect we can."

New Orleans students are also being reminded to follow the rules, he said.

About 200 hurricane survivors are bused daily from the Reliant Park shelters to Jones. The school was selected to house evacuated students because of its low enrollment — about 1,100 students, 55 percent of whom are black, according to 2003-04 state figures.

HISD leaders may also discuss reducing the number of evacuated students at Jones, at 7414 St. Lo. The 200 students there are the most evacuees at any HISD high school. There are 103 at Scarborough High, which is taking students from the George R. Brown Convention Center. Sharpstown has 42, Kashmere has 25 and Wheatley has 33, Abbott said.

Jones students said Tuesday that they'd tried to welcome the evacuees to their school, but they changed their tune when New Orleans students started threatening to take over the campus and the city.

Houston students said the tension won't blow over until the evacuees are moved to another campus.

"It's not working," 15-year-old Tracy Williams, a Houston sophomore, said. "We were doing good before they came here — for real."

Teens said they're frustrated that the evacuees are getting extra assistance and special attention.

"Nobody's giving us $2,000. When it floods here, we don't go over there," said Pedro Umana, 14, a freshman from Houston. "They started it, but we finished it. And it's not over yet."

Senior Treyvaun Jones, 18, said, "I'm scared to go back to my own school, and I'm a grown man."

Robert Muhammad, southwest regional minister of the Nation of Islam, said leaders must address the concerns of Houston students. Muhammad, along with other members of the Ministerial Advisory Board to the mayor of Houston, will be on hand to counsel families at Jones today.

"We must address these legitimate complaints of our children. We can't sweep this under the rug," he said. "Those who have always been the least, the lost in this city would feel somewhat neglected."

Still, they must understand and have sympathy for the devastation that their neighbors have experienced, he said.

"The welcome mat in Houston is already being pulled back," he said. "My appeal to our city is that we be in this thing for the long run. It has long-run social, economic and political impact."

After school Tuesday, New Orleans evacuee Thea Daniel, 15, recounted how a Houston boy started the fight by hitting a New Orleans boy in the head with an open can of Sprite. Thea said school officials kept the evacuee students in the auditorium all day, even sending them back to the shelters a little early.

"They talked to us about discipline," Thea said.

Both Thea and her friend Jange Nero, 15, said they weren't surprised by the fight. Students have been talking back and forth since the New Orleans teens started attending classes there last week, they said.

Three HISD officers are already stationed at the school, but extra police, administrators and religious leaders are expected to be on hand today to help quell the tension, officials said.

HISD school board member Arthur Gaines said educators may have been so focused on finding schools for Louisiana students to attend that they didn't spend enough time making sure the children would get along.

"I don't think we should have just assumed these youngsters were going to melt in because they were black," Gaines said. "I think if the staff and teachers had worked with the students to say: 'Look, they've lost their homes. They've lost everything. ... I want you to put your arms around them.' "


While it's typical for teens to have skirmishes, Gaines said he expects Jones students to welcome New Orleans evacuees.

"These young people have had such a traumatic experience. This is like war. I guess you could say we've been in a war against nature," he said. "I don't think there's going to be continuous, ongoing friction."

After returning from their first day of class last week, displaced students living at Reliant Park reported feeling tension. Some Houston students had thrown gang signs and made disparaging remarks, said 17-year-old Raymond Warner, who is from New Orleans.

The evacuated students said last week that they would try to stay out of trouble.

"It's rough where we come from. There's a big chance something will happen," Raymond said Thursday. "Everybody was looking at us strange and everything because we're from New Orleans."

Reliant Park resident Pauline Johnson said Tuesday that she's worried about sending her son and niece back to Jones.

"People are scared for their children. I'm scared that it's going to be a riot," she said. "We didn't ask to come here. I don't know why we're being treated like this."

Chronicle reporters Salatheia Bryant and Becky Bowman contributed to this report.

jennifer.radcliffe@chron.com
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mp ... an/3352946

[Stone]

Send them niggas back!

[Cold Bear]

If somebody comes to your town talking about they're gonna take it over...

Well you know what to do

[tysuave]

if n.o was the murder cap then that means theres alot of guners in diffrent states.

[A Ghost]

Kids from one hood going and temporarily moving into another hood.

Uh-Oh.

This looks like a classic example of "My Hood is harder than yours" syndrome.

How bad is the gang problem in Houston?

And if New Orleans is murder capitol of the country do the kids in Houston really think they are scaring anyone?

[MiChuhSuh]

Kids from one hood going and temporarily moving into another hood.

Uh-Oh.

This looks like a classic example of "My Hood is harder than yours" syndrome.

How bad is the gang problem in Houston?

And if New Orleans is murder capitol of the country do the kids in Houston really think they are scaring anyone?

This disaster just NEVER ENDS!

Houston's 5th Ward has a BAD gang problem, and most of the NO kids got sent to the ghettoest places and high schools in Houston. Something will definitely pop off.

[anonymousman]

i wonder how it would get if they evacuated everyone from southern cali into northern cali

[MiChuhSuh]

i wonder how it would get if they evacuated everyone from southern cali into northern cali

LOL the biggest issue then would be SUR and Aryans vs. NORTE and Northern Structure, THEY ALREADY HAVE BEEF!!!

LOL not to mention all the other craziness, Bloods and Crips would all have to join Northern Structure and BGF, then BGF would get diluted with a harder time being united since most B's and C's fight among themselves already, how would they ally?

That would be interesting, but I wouldn't want to see it happen, alot of people would die.

[wutevr]

i wonder how it would get if they evacuated everyone from southern cali into northern cali

HAHAHA, dats wut Im talking about! I'll kum bak with a couple CIB's

[SWblocks-Veteran]

How bad is the gang problem in Houston?

Coming back hard recently but not as bad and serious as it was in the late 80s and early 90s. Houstons gang problems are just as bad as any other city's who has over a million ppl living in it.

There has been a couple shoot outs between NO and Houston in Houston because the NO kats came here trying to bogard so a couple of them have got whooped or dropped from what I have heard through the grapevine. They tried to jack a slab(lowrider) in 3rd Ward and a dude from NO got killed trying to take the Houston niggas shit. I also have heard about some H-Town niggas gettin jacked too. So its kinda aback and forth thing. Dont know how serious it is now...but when they first got here it was alot of tension.

[A Ghost]

I didn't know Houston had Ward's. That's the projects right?

[SWblocks-Veteran]

I didn't know Houston had Ward's. That's the projects right?

Houston has 6 Wards all of them surround downtown, 4 of them are mostly government living and shotgun houses 2 of them are more like historic neighborhoods...like really old houses and shit like that.

NW of Downtown-1st Ward-historic
E of Downtown-2nd Ward-Mexican
SE of Downtown-3rd Ward-Black
W of Downtown-4th Ward-Black(oldest and smallest ward in Houston, called freedmans town....first place that freed Blacks lived at in Houston)
NE of Downtown-5th Ward-Black
SW of Downtown-6th-historic...the heights and the courthouse is over there

But you have a gang of other hoods that have pj's/government housing. Houston is a crazy city...very diverse...you can find almost every race here. There are 5 million people in the metropolitan area and Houston is the 4th largest city falling right behind Chicago. There is a huge white, black, mexican , asian and middle eastern population here.

You can find ghettos, gangs and dopr dealers out in the surrounding sities of Houston just like how u can if you ride to the outskirts of LA, Chi, NY, Philly. Same big city type of shit, jus we dont get much attention because we way down in the South.

[ninoslim]

Great info SWblocks-Veteran, I been through the 3rd ward on my way to University of Houston and Texas state university. And accidentally exited the 59 too soon and ended up in the 5th ward aka Bloody nickel. Being from Southern California, it was a trip to view the shotgun type houses and the horrid living conditions out there. I also know that the South park area and parts of Southwest Houston are pretty hood. And LOL the parking lot pimpin going on over at sharpstown is like straight out of a rap video cars and all. I agree, Houston is just like any major city dealing with crime. and poverty. They have some great hip hop coming out that city!

[Chase-C]

Kids from one hood going and temporarily moving into another hood.

Uh-Oh.

This looks like a classic example of "My Hood is harder than yours" syndrome.

How bad is the gang problem in Houston?

And if New Orleans is murder capitol of the country do the kids in Houston really think they are scaring anyone?

I do not know how bad is Houston gang proplem but Houston pretty grimy.

Even though New Orleans is murder capital it does not scare teenagers in Houston. In Houston there is alot of cases of Houston vs New Orleans

[ughurdumb]

blame texas

[$outh$ide]

wot area is lil flip from is cloverland(wots it called) real

[Chase-C]

Yeah Cloverland is a neighobrhood.

[MiChuhSuh]

Yeah Cloverland is a neighobrhood.

Do they Claim cloverland, like would it be teh same as claiming a set, or is it just and area, like saying I'm from East Medina, Brooklyn?

[$outh$ide]

where bout is it north.south etc & is it in a ward