MikeDunnAuthorToday in Labor History May 12, 1971: The Panther 21 were acquitted in New York on charges of conspiring to bomb buildings after it was revealed that the undercover police had infiltrated the Black Panther Party, created the plans for the violence, and framed innocent Panthers. Among those charged were Afeni Shakur who was, at the time, pregnant with Tupac Shakur. Another defendant was Sundiata Acoli, who would later join the Black Liberation Army (BLA) and get convicted (1974), along with Assata Shakur, of murdering a New Jersey state trooper. Another defendant in the Panther 21 case was Kuwasi Balagoon who became an anarchist while in prison and who also joined the BLA. In 1979, while on the lam from his second prison escape, he helped to free Assata Shakur, who fled to Cuba and who died there in 2025. In 1986, Balagoon, who was bisexual, died in prison from AIDS. The prison abolitionist group, Black and Pink, which supports LGBTQ and HIV-positive prisoners, has, since 2020, run a "Kuwasi Balagoon award" for prisoners living with HIV/AIDS.
#workingclass #LaborHistory #blackpanthers #bpp #tupac #assata #aids #lgbtq #racism #homophobia #kuwasibalagoon #anarchism #socialism #communism #sundiataacoli #police #BlackMastodon
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