Hundreds of people rallied in downtown Los Angeles on Thursday to protest the treatment of six African-American teenagers accused of assaulting a white classmate.

 

Meanwhile, about 200 students walked out of a high school in the city to show support for the so-called "Jena 6."

 

The march in downtown was peaceful and there were no problems, police officer Karen Smith said.

 

Other marches and rallies in the Los Angeles area are scheduled for Thursday afternoon and night.

 

The marchers condemned what happened in Jena, Louisiana as symptomatic of a racist justice system.

 

"There is still an undercurrent of racism in this nation," said march organizer Steven Webb. "Jena 6 could be the Jena 100 or the Jena 1,000. What about the thousands of African Americans who are jailed and who are not given a voice?"

 

"This kind of injustice happens too many times to black youth," said march organizer Tony Muhammad of the Nation of Islam. "You never read about white teenagers tried as adults."

 

Last year, six black high school students in Jena were initially charged with attempted murder for allegedly beating a white classmate. The white student was knocked unconscious but able to attend a school function later that night.

 

The charges were later reduced to battery for five of the students and the sixth was charged as a juvenile.

 

One of the students, Mychal Bell, was convicted of aggravated second-degree battery, which carries a sentence of up to 15 years in prison, but the conviction was overturned last week by a state appeals court that ruled he should have been tried as an adult.

 

The six teens were charged months after prosecutors declined to charge three white high school students who hung nooses from a tree.

 

The school's principal recommended the students be expelled, but the school's superintendent overruled the recommendation and the punishment was reduced to three days of in-school suspension.

 

District Attorney Reed Walters Wednesday denied that racism was involved in the prosecution of either case.

 

He said the noose incident was a "villainous act," but that he could find no Louisiana law under which to charge them criminally.

 

As for the beating case, he said four of the teens were adults under Louisiana law and that the sixth named Bell had a prior criminal record.

 

"This case has been portrayed by the news media as being about race," he said. "And the fact that it takes place in a small southern town lends itself to that portrayal. But it is not and never has been about race. It is about finding justice for an innocent victim and holding people accountable for their actions."

 

The Revs. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, along with thousands of mostly black college students, descended on the Louisiana town of 3,500 on what was supposed to be sentencing day for Bell.

 

Although the conviction was overturned, organizers decided to go ahead with the rally.

 

Protesters have been calling the furor over the case the start of a 21st century version of the civil rights movement of the 1960s.

 

In other local reaction to the Louisiana case, community activist Eddie Jones is calling on the Los Angeles and national media to end what he calls a "news blackout" of the Jena 6 case and "give the case the same intense coverage that it gave and gives the (O.J.) Simpson case."

 

Later Thursday afternoon, Earl Ofari Hutchinson of the Los Angeles Urban Police Roundtable will hold a news conference and rally to announce a donation to the Jena 6 Legal Defense Fund and challenge other civil rights organizations to match the donation.

 

On Thursday evening, Community Coalition and Project Islamic Hope will host a teach-in and candlelight vigil for the Jena 6 with African American and Latino youth and community members.

 

(Xinhua News Agency September 21, 2007)