Documentary Recounts the Story of the Tulsa Race Riot Survivors' Fight for Reparations

On October 2nd and 3rd, a premier showing of "Before They Die" will take place in Buffalo (more details to come). Lead attorney, Charles J. Ogletree, film maker, Reggie Turner, and race riot survivors, Otis Clark, 105, Dr. Olivia Hooker, 94 and Wess Young, 93 will join us in a forum to discuss the survivors' fight for reparations in the Tulsa Race Riot case.

In 2003, a distinguished team of legal experts volunteered to work, pro bono, on the behalf of Tulsa Race Riot survivors and their descendants seeking reparations. Prof. Charles Ogletree was among lawyers who sued the Oklahoma Governor and Tulsa Mayor and chief of police in federal court on behalf of plaintiffs including more than 125 survivors, who ranged in age from 89 to 105 years. Lower courts denied the claim, saying that the statute of limitations had expired, and in December 2004, a federal appeals court voted not to grant a rehearing of the case. The legal team's petition to the United States Supreme Court, submitted on March 9, 2005 was dismissed, without comment, by the Court on May 16, 2005. Next, the legal team and its cadre of survivors appealed to the U.S. Congressional Black Caucus, requesting legislative action to correct the injustice. They also took their case to the World Court (The Organization of American States' Inter-American Commission on Human Rights) in 2007. At every turn, the survivors, their descendants and their legal team have faced dismissals of their argument for reparations. Throughout most of this historic legal battle, film maker, Reggie Turner has been documenting its course, "focused on telling the story of the survivors of the 1921 Tulsa Race Riot in their quest for justice and to let the world know about their story. The documentary follows the survivors, and their legal team headed by Professor Charles Ogletree, through the court system all the way to the Supreme Court and on to the US Congress." "Before They Die" not only follows the journey of the survivors as they seek reparations for their losses, but it also allows the audience to hear the first-person stories of the horror and destructive outrages of the May 31-June 1, 1921 "riot". Through the medium of the film and the accompanying educational forums, the Lead Attorneys on the Tulsa Reparations Case and the Film Producers have several goals that they want to accomplish:

• To create and generate the Tulsa Fund, Inc. which will provide direct compensation of up to $50,000 per surviving victim; a total fund of $5 Million dollars
• To be the conduit to achieving justice and compensation for the living survivors of the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921
• To exhume and give a proper burial to those victims killed and buried in the Mass Grave found in Tulsa
• To create educational components to ensure that future generations of Americans learn all of our history and that this dark day in our history is never forgotten...Again

(See a preview of this historic documentary: http://www.beforetheydiemovie.com/)