Christian-Newsom Murder Trials Rocks Knoxville

by Lewis Loflin

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Martin Luther King Jr.

Race is a touchy subject in America. In fact it's an obsession. When I ended up with this picture (click here) via an e-mail chat group, I was skeptical. After all, I live in Bristol Virginia/Tennessee only 90 miles from Knoxville. This horror story never made it into the local press that I know of. Anna Nicole Smith, the Duke Rape Case fraud, and Imus drowned us out.



If it had been reported, it was certain we would never know the race of the felons, or that at least one of the five was a released felon. Because of the explosive issue of race, accusations of media bias, and lack of information from Knoxville authorities, we have far more than just two wonderful young people slaughtered by some savages. It's a political correctness freak show.

Like it or note Christian-Newsom murders had became a racial flashpoint. The leftwing press has run a relentless propaganda blitz attacking whites savagely for the smallest violation of political correctness, while playing down minority violence, crime and anti-white racism. Since this case first exploded onto the scene via the internet America has elected a black president - yet race relations are worse than ever. Liberals have exploited race at every opportunity for political gain.

The internet has changed everything. Stories from local press reports, small city-town news sources, and bloggers doing their own reporting has taken at curbed the power of big media setting the political agenda and silencing dissent. That is what this is about.

I have compiled via many sources to counter what I and thousands of other believe is media bias. One will not find political correctness censorship and I will challenge anyone to disprove what I present. Equally I want nothing to do with blatant racists on the right or left. I revile race hustlers be they David Duke as much as Al Sharpton. The left is simply racists and because of censorship and slanting the news create even more racial tension. So let's explore the following.

But to quote Dr. Walter Williams:

What have we heard from the NAACP, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton and others who rushed to judgment and outrage as they condemned whites in the cases of the "Jena 6" and Don Imus when he referred to the Rutgers ladies basketball team as "nappy-headed ho's"? Where were the national news media and public officials? You can bet the rent money that were the victims black and the perpetrators white, Knoxville would have been inundated with TV crews, with Jackson, Sharpton and other civil rights spokesmen and politicians from both parties condemning racism, possibly blaming it all on George Bush...

Now the Associated Press (August 17, 2009) plays the race card. To quote,

A jury was brought in for the case from Davidson County, 150 miles away, in an unusual move to ensure jurors weren't tainted by pretrial publicity. They are sequestered in a hotel and barred by the judge from following news coverage of the trial. The victims were white and middle class, and the defendants are poor and black. Some conservative Internet commentators and white supremacist agitators accused the national media of reverse discrimination by failing to give the case the same attention paid to white-on-black hate crimes.

Conservative commentators and Internet bloggers latched onto the Christian-Newsom killings soon after the crimes occurred. They demonized the national media for ignoring what they considered a black-on-white hate crime and contrasted it to the heavily reported white-on-black Duke lacrosse rape case. But two rallies in Knoxville in 2007 led by white supremacist sympathizers were met with significant anti-protester response and failed to gain traction. No demonstrations are expected now.

Knoxville's black community has had problems with selective enforcement by police, but that is in the past, said Knoxville NAACP president Sheryl Rollins, an attorney. "In no way does the NAACP condone or support anybody - black, white, Chinese, greenies, whatever - that would do what those people (allegedly) did to those children," she said.

First the social class of the victims doesn't have a damn thing to do with this. The usual liberal racist' nonsense is to imply all minority criminals because they are "poor" or "down trodden" or whatever somehow excuses their behavior. On the other hand the victims being better off somehow and white had it coming to them or as the liberal racists always imply, the criminal actions of a "coward" like Cobbins is rooted in a racist' white society.Then statements such as "conservative Internet commentators and white supremacist agitators" suggests everyone into the racist category.The same press went into a feeding frenzy at the time over Imus' comments about the Rutgers girls basketball team, a total non-crime, and participated in the press lynching of three white members of the Duke lacrosse team over the non-rape of a black prostitute. The press, Jackson, Sharpton , etc. never even offered an apology.In another biased news report:

The "white supremacists" were a whopping total of three people. Everyone else protesting this news bias got lumped in with these three. The reason the three got no traction is they represented nobody because they were just idiots trying to take advantage of the situation. As for Sheryl Rollins, that was the same racist' NAACP that lynched the Duke lacrosse players in the press and never apologized for it.



Channon Christian and Chris Newsom

Quoting Nicholas Stix, AR News, May 14, 2007, he claimed the Knoxville police won't give him the cause of death either. (I tried find too at the time.)

Police and reporters have promoted the view that this crime was a simple carjacking that got out of hand, and that the rapists poured cleaning fluid down Miss Christian's throat to destroy DNA evidence. This appears to be wrong on both counts. The killers ditched Miss Christian's SUV just a few hours after they stole it, which suggests they had no great interest in it. Also, according to court documents, they had already planned on killing Miss Christian, so they could have used the cleaning fluid after she was dead. They did not bother to "clean" her vagina and anus, which were stuffed with DNA evidence. It appears to this reporter that the carjacking was just a way to kidnap, gang rape, torture, and murder whites, and that the killers used the cleaning fluid for the sole purpose of further torturing Miss Christian.

Quoting an article by James H. Lilley, also stated in other blogs, etc:

On Saturday January 6, 2007 Hugh Christopher Newsom, age 23 and Channon Gail Christian, age 21, both students at the University of Tennessee went out on a date. They were driving in Channon's Toyota 4-Runner when they were carjacked at gunpoint. Suddenly the crime turned far more savage than an armed car theft. Chris and Channon were kidnapped and driven to 2316 Chipman Street where they were forced into the home at gunpoint. While Channon was forced to watch, her boyfriend was raped prison style and then his penis was cut off. He was later driven to nearby railroad tracks where he was shot and set afire.



But Channon's hell was just beginning. She was beaten; gang raped repeatedly in many ways, had one of her breasts cut off and bleach poured down her throat to destroy DNA evidence-all while she was still alive. To add to Channon's degradation the suspects took turns urinating on her. They too set her body afire, apparently inside the residence, but for some reason left her body there-in five separate trash bags...

No wonder the police were not releasing this information if it's true. (Turns out part of it wasn't.) There are endless conflicting news reports on this story at the time. Also, it has been reported by some this was a crack house where people came and went that nobody tried to help them or call police. For the whole article from Mr. Lilly see click here.

This comment at www.vdare.com from a reader in Knoxville, Tennessee:

Here we go again, the depths of depravity are pushed deeper by black hooligans in sleepy Knoxville, TN. First they were just going to carjack, then they decided to abduct and take the couple back to the criminal's house. So they tied them up, beat the boyfriend in front of his girl, shoot him, pour gasoline on him and lit him on fire. They disposed of his body near some railroad tracks. Next, it is her turn as they rape and sodomize her for several days, maybe as many as four black men took part! They pour drain cleaner into her throat to clean up the evidence, wrap her in plastic and throw her into their garbage can outside their house. Except that they didn't know she was alive! She later died from the cold. No mention of the perpetrator's or victim's ancestry is mentioned. Although in Knoxville, their faces are all on the news channels...

As of this news article, even with trial dates set, to quote: "Groups wondering why prosecutors haven't demanded the death penalty yet. "We've had some discussions of course, we're still putting evidence together," says Knox County District Attorney General Randy Nichols." I'm wondering the same.

More Accusations of biased press coverage

A blogger had this to say, "Is race a factor?" in regards to the Knoxville horror:

Still others see a more sinister hand at work. The suspects who have been apprehended for the horrific crime against those two young people are black; the victims were white. Many seem to think that the race of the alleged perpetrators is the issue. Had the perpetrators been white, and the victims black, they say, the case would be all over the television and newspapers. Many cite the much-publicized dragging death of James Byrd, Jr. as an example. Also troubling, according to some, is the contrast between the national media coverage of the alleged Duke rape case and this one. Visitors to the blogs I viewed also cited similarities between this case and the Wichita Massacre, a black-on-white rape/torture/murder in 2000, and other little-known cases as proof of a recent history of "blacking out" certain news stories.

See The Wichita Massacre by Stephen Webster, American Renaissance, July 16, 2002.

In addition, to quote from the West Virginia case where they can't press hate crime charges because the "victim" knew her captor, "She was not a random target, prosecutor Brian Abraham said Wednesday. She had a "social relationship" with one of the suspects, he said... The victim had a previous relationship with Bobby Brewster, one of the six in custody, Abraham said. He was charged in July with domestic battery and assault after a domestic dispute involving the same woman." This couple didn't know these people, so why doesn't hate crime charges not apply here?

Now they play the race card, trying to make anyone protesting this lack of media coverage as racist: "The Reverend Maize maintains, the NAACP trusts city leaders and police to handle what ever the trials or the case itself, might bring. "We don't have any counter marches or counter protests lined up. We don't want to ad fuel, to the fire, if they choose to come to town. We'll allow them to do what they're going to do...Nevertheless, at least one group, white supremacist or racially focused, depending on your prospective has vowed to rally here in several weeks. Later this month, though Knox County Mayor Mike Ragsdale will ask commissioners to pass a resolution requesting that group not come.

They came, and the national press covered that because they could make it out to be white racism. The end result of this is a growing backlash against all black people because many feel there's a double standard.

Those indicted and later convicted were:

George Geovonni "Detroit" Thomas, 24, (b. January 23, 1983) faced a total of 46 charges. Thomas was indicted on 16 counts of felony murder growing out of the rape, robbery, kidnapping, and theft of Christian and Newsom, 2 counts of premeditated murder, 2 counts of especially aggravated robbery, 4 counts of especially aggravated kidnapping, 20 counts of aggravated rape, and 2 counts of theft. See Thomas Convicted.

Letalvis "Rome" Cobbins, 28, (b. December 20, 1982) faced the same 46 charges as Thomas. He has also been charged with assaulting a correctional officer while incarcerated pending trial. In 2003, Cobbins was convicted of third-degree attempted robbery in New York state. He and Davidson are brothers. Cobbins was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Letalvis "Rome" Cobbins Found Guilty

Lemaricus Devall "Slim" Davidson, 30, (b. June 13, 1981) faced the same 46 charges as Thomas. Previously Davidson had just completed a five-year sentence in Tennessee on a previous felony conviction for carjacking and aggravated robbery on August 5, 2006. Lemaricus Davidson Goes on Trial, Found Guilty.

Vanessa Coleman, 18, (b. June 29, 1988) was arrested by the Lebanon Police Department in Lebanon, Kentucky. She faces 40 Tennessee state charges. Coleman was indicted on 12 counts of felony murder growing out of the rape, robbery, kidnapping, and theft of Christian and Newsom, 1 count of premeditated murder (of Christian only), 1 count of especially aggravated robbery (of Newsom only), 4 counts of especially aggravated kidnapping, 20 counts of aggravated rape, and 2 counts of theft. She was convicted and sentenced to 53 years in prison on July 30, 2010. She described her time in Knoxville as "an adventure."

Coleman's case is complicated by the fact that, while she was granted immunity by federal authorities for testimony in the federal case on the car-jacking, the state courts have ruled that the federal grant of immunity does not extend to the state charges on murder and rape. On May 13, 2010, Coleman was acquitted of first degree murder but found guilty on lesser charges. On July 30, 2010, she was sentenced to 53 years behind bars. See Vanessa Coleman.

In each indictment, the large number of rape counts were included to provide a range of options for prosecutors, not to reflect the number of rapes which actually occurred.

Eric DeWayne "E" Boyd, 34, was arrested in connection with the fatal carjacking, though not indicted by the Knox County grand jury. Boyd faced federal charges in United States district court as an accessory after the fact for helping the suspects evade the police. Later, Boyd was also accused by Thomas and Cobbins of rape and murder, and a search warrant was obtained for his DNA.[10] The accusations by Thomas and Cobbins did not result in state charges against Boyd,[11] but he is serving 18 years in federal prison on his conviction as an accessory to the carjacking.

On April 16, 2008, Eric Boyd was found guilty in Federal court of being an accessory to a fatal carjacking and for failing to report the location of a known fugitive.[21] Boyd's was the first case to go to trial, and he was the only suspect not charged with murder.[22] He was sentenced to the maximum of 18 years in Federal prison. He is currently incarcerated at Beckley FCI. See Eric Boyd Found Guilty.