U.S.

“He was selling untaxed cigarettes on the street in small volumes, trying to make a little extra money."

Former President Bill Clinton is set to address the Eric Garner case in a Tuesday interview with cable TV channel Fusion, saying that the unarmed black man from Staten Island, N.Y. did not deserve to die for allegedly selling cigarettes on the street.

“He was doing something he should not have been doing. That was illegal,” Clinton said during the interview. “ He was selling untaxed cigarettes on the street in small volumes, trying to make a little extra money. But he didn’t deserve to die because of that.”

Clinton spoke to Fusion during the Clinton Foundation’s “Future of the Americas” summit in Miami last week. Protests have continued in the days since a New York City grand jury opted not to indict a white police officer who subdued Garner in what appeared to be a chokehold, leading to his eventual death. The officer, Daniel Pantaleo, has denied using a chokehold.

Over the weekend, thousands of protestors took to the streets in Washington, D.C. and New York to show their discontent with the way police often treat brown and black people.

Clinton added there are “preconceptions wired into us and we have got to get beyond them,” when talking about race relations in America.

The full interview is set to air on Tuesday at 10p.m.

[Fusion]

The objects for sale included religious masks, dozens of Hopi kachina dolls and several striking Pueblo masks embellished with horse hair, bone and feathers

(PARIS)— When diplomacy and a plea to return sacred ceremonial masks to an American Indian tribe in the United States failed, officials from the Navajo Nation traveled to the Paris auction house selling the items and started bidding for them.

They fended off a French art collector Monday, winning seven masks for more than $9,000. Navajo Vice President Rex Lee Jim said the Navajo delegation was unable to determine the exact provenance of the artifacts but said they had to face the reality of the auction and buy them.

“They are sacred masks … and unfortunately they end up here. Whether that is legal or illegal … we don’t know,” said Jim, a medicine man who offered prayers to the masks that embody Navajo deities. “What we do know is that they are for sale.”

The Navajo Nation took a different approach than its Hopi neighbor in northeastern Arizona, which has seen losses of ceremonial items at auctions in France that were deemed legal to private collectors.

The objects for sale at the Drouot auction house included religious masks, colored in pigment, that are believed to be used in Navajo wintertime healing ceremonies. It also included dozens of Hopi kachina dolls and several striking Pueblo masks embellished with horse hair, bone and feathers, thought to be from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The U.S. Embassy in Paris asked Drouot to suspend the sale to allow Navajo and Hopi representatives to determine if they were stolen from the tribes. But Drouot refused, arguing that the auction was in accordance with the law — and that a French tribunal had previously ruled that a similar sale was legal.

Sales from the auction totaled 929,000 euros ($1.12 million).

The Hopi saw the sale as sacrilege and did not travel to Paris for the auction, said Pierre Schreiber, a lawyer representing the tribe. Only a member of the tribe has the right to possess the items that represent the spirits of their ancestors, tribal officials have argued.

“Hopis were opposed to buying back their artifacts as they did not want to engage in the auction,” Servan-Schreiber said.

Hopi Chairman Herman Honanie said he was appalled by the latest sale.

The Navajo Nation delegation was authorized to spend up to $20,000 to retrieve the masks that typically are disassembled after a nine-day ceremony and returned to the earth, said Deswood Tome, a spokesman for the tribe.

Jim said the objects were not art but “living and breathing beings” that should not be traded commercially. He was set to return to the United States on Tuesday, with the masks to be shipped later to the tribe.

French art collector Armand Hui bid for several masks at the auction but told The Associated Press hebacked down when he saw that tribal members had come in person to buy them.

“I wanted to respect that,” he said.

Tome said it would incumbent upon the leaders of the Navajo and Hopi tribes to discuss how to approach any future sales of sacred items in foreign countries.

“If there are religious items that are sacred in the future, the leadership will have to determine what steps they will take,” said Tome. “Buying these masks here today is a precedent that we’ve set.”

The Associated Press is not transmitting images of the objects because both the Navajo and Hopi have strict rules against recording and photographing ceremonies featuring the items that otherwise are kept entirely out of public view. The Navajo Nation initially included a photo of the masks in a news release but later replaced the photo with one of Jim, saying it was a mistake. The Hopi tribe considers it sacrilegious for any of the images of the objects to appear.

Wife of Bill Cosby addresses sexual assault allegations against him

The wife of Bill Cosby fiercely defended her husband in a statement Monday as outrage continues to mount over accusations that he drugged and raped multiple women throughout his career.

Camille Cosby, who has largely remained silent on the allegations, released a letter that compared the accusations against the actor and comedian to Rolling Stone‘s explosive story of an alleged rape at the University of Virginia. Discrepancies that emerged after publication of that story cast doubt on the accuracy of the piece.

“The story was devastating, but ultimately appears to be proved to be untrue,” she writes in the comparison. “None of us will ever want to be in the position of attacking a victim,” she adds. “But the question should be asked — who is the victim?”

The entertainer has faced accusations of sexual assault from more than a dozen women and has largely declined to address the claims. In a recent interview with the New York Post, he praised his wife and admitted that his public relations representatives “don’t want me talking to the media.”

Samaria Rice said her son, Tamir, was shot before he could comply with police

(NEW YORK) — The mother of a 12-year-old Ohio boy fatally shot by police who believed he was carrying a gun said Monday he was never given a chance to follow officers’ orders.

Samaria Rice said in an interview at The Associated Press offices in New York that her son, Tamir Rice, was shot before he could comply with police who pulled up next to him on a Cleveland playground. A rookie officer fired within 2 seconds.

Tamir had an airsoft gun, which shoots nonlethal plastic pellets.

Rice said she wants the officer charged with murder and she called on authorities to make sure young officers don’t “ignore the training.”

Police say officers were responding to a call Nov. 22 about someone possibly carrying a gun. They say Tamir didn’t respond to commands to raise his hands before Officer Timothy Loehmann fired his weapon. The officers also meant to stop the patrol car farther from Tamir but the vehicle slid on the grass, the Cleveland police union has said.

Rice said she found out later that Tamir was handed the fake weapon by a girl at the playground. She said police put Tamir’s 14-year-old sister in handcuffs as she rushed to help her mortally wounded brother that day.

Rice’s attorney, Benjamin Crump, said in the AP interview that the two officers could have defused the situation — by talking to the boy from a distance instead of pulling up next to him on the grass and firing.

An internal Cleveland police investigation is underway and the results will be turned over to the local prosecutor, who will present them to a grand jury. The fatal encounter was caught on surveillance video.

Clutching Crump’s hand, the teary-eyed mother said Monday she knew exactly where her son had gone before the shooting. After she made lunch for him, he went to a recreation center across the street from their home then to the playground that is steps away from his school. His 14-year-old sister was with him, their mother said, “and I told them to stick together and be safe.”

The sister had gone to the bathroom when she heard a shot. Meanwhile, just after 3 p.m. that day, the mother heard a knock on her door.

“Two little boys came and knocked on my door and said, ‘The police just shot your son twice in the stomach,'” she recalled Monday.

When she got to the scene, following her 16-year-old son, she saw him being held against the police car, with officers surrounding him while Tamir lay on the ground, she said. Tamir’s sister was in the back of the cruiser, their mother said.

Rice said that when she tried to get close to her bleeding son, officers “pushed me back, telling me to chill out or they were going to put me in the police car.”

Rice, who is black, said she long ago had “The Talk” with her children — as black parents call warnings to their children to comply with police or risk danger.

“My kids already know that they are supposed to cooperate with authority, period,” she said.

She said her son was talented in sports and the arts and was loved in their community as someone who helped others.

“All lives matter, I don’t see any color. I see boys,” she said.