Mark Clark (activist)


Mark Clark was an American activist and member of the Black Panther Party. He was murdered with Fred Hampton during a Chicago police predawn raid on December 4, 1969.
In January 1970, a coroner's jury held an inquest and ruled the deaths of Clark and Hampton to be justifiable homicide. A lawsuit filed on behalf of the survivors and the relatives of Clark and Hampton was eventually settled in 1982 with the City of Chicago, Cook County, and the federal government each paying $616,333 to a group of nine plaintiffs. The allegation that Hampton was assassinated has been debated since the day he and Clark were killed in the police raid.

Youth

Clark was born on June 28, 1947, in Peoria, Illinois, to Elder William Clark and Fannie Bardley Clark. He became active in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People at an early age and joined in demonstrating against discrimination in employment, housing, and education. According to John Gwynn, former President of state and local chapters of the NAACP, Clark and his brothers played a role in helping keep other teenagers in line. "He could call for order when older persons or adults could not," Gwynn said of Clark in a December 1969 interview with the Chicago Tribune. In that same Chicago Tribune article, family members are quoted as saying Clark enjoyed reading and art, and was good at drawing portraits. He attended Manual High School and Illinois Central College in Peoria.

Black Panther Party

After reading their literature and the Ten Point Program, Clark joined the Black Panther Party and later decided to organize a local Peoria chapter. He went from church to church in an effort to find a building to house a free breakfast program. He was eventually successful when Pastor Blaine Ramsey agreed to allow a free breakfast program. Church members later voted against continuing the breakfast program because of concerns of government monitoring of the Black Panther Party.

Death

Some family members and friends say Mark Clark knew he would be murdered in Chicago. In the predawn hours of December 4, 1969, Chicago Police stormed into the apartment of BPP State Chairman Fred Hampton at 2337 West Monroe Street, killing both Mark Clark and Fred Hampton, and causing serious bodily harm to Verlina Brewer, Ronald "Doc" Satchel, Blair Anderson, and Brenda Harris.
Hampton and Deborah Johnson, who was eight-and-a-half months pregnant with their child, were sleeping in the south bedroom. Satchel, Anderson, and Brewer were asleep in the north bedroom. Harris and Louis Truelock were sleeping on a bed by the south wall of the living room, and Harold Bell slept on a mattress on the floor in the middle of the room. Clark, sitting in the front room of the apartment with a shotgun in his lap, was on security duty.
The first shot hit Clark in the heart. He died instantly, and his gun went off as he fell, according to Harris, who watched from the bed in the corner.
The single round was later determined to be caused by a reflexive death convulsion after the raiding team shot him. This was the only shot the Panthers fired. A federal grand jury determined that the police fired between 82 and 99 shots, including into bedrooms, while most of the occupants lay sleeping.

Inquest

Shortly afterwards, Cook County coroner Andrew Toman began forming a special six-member coroner's jury to hold an inquest into the deaths of Clark and Hampton. On December 23, Toman announced four additions to the jury which included two African-American men: physician Theodore K. Lawless and attorney Julian B. Wilkins, the son of J. Ernest Wilkins Sr. He stated the four were selected from a group of candidates submitted to his office by groups and individuals representing both Chicago's black and white communities. Civil rights leaders and spokesmen for the black community were reported to have been disappointed with the selection. An official with the Chicago Urban League said: "I would have had more confidence in the jury if one of them had been a black man who has a rapport with the young and the grass roots in the community." Gus Savage said that such a man to whom the community could relate need not be black. The jury eventually included a third black man who was a member of the first coroner's jury sworn in on December 4.
The blue-ribbon panel convened for the inquest on January 6, 1970 and on January 21 ruled the deaths of Clark and Hampton to be justifiable homicide. The jury qualified their verdict on the death of Hampton as "based solely and exclusively on the evidence presented to this inquisition"; police and expert witness provided the only testimony during the inquest. Jury foreman James T. Hicks stated that they could not consider the charges of the Black Panthers in the apartment who stated that the police entered the apartment shooting; those who survived the raid were reported to have refused to testify during the inquest because they faced criminal charges of attempted murder and aggravated assault during the raid. Attorney's for the Clark and Hampton families did not introduce any witnesses during the proceedings, but described the inquest as "a well-rehearsed theatrical performance designed to vindicate the police officers". State's Attorney Edward Hanrahan said the verdict was recognition "of the truthfulness of our police officers' account of the events".

Civil rights lawsuit

In 1970, a $47.7 million lawsuit as filed on behalf of the survivors and the relatives of Clark and Hampton stating that the civil rights of the Black Panther members were violated. Twenty-eight defendants were named, including Hanrahan as well as the City of Chicago, Cook County, and federal governments. The following trial lasted 18 months and was reported to have been the longest federal trial up to that time. After its conclusion in 1977, Judge Joseph Sam Perry of United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois dismissed the suit against 21 of the defendants prior to jury deliberations. Perry dismissed the suit against the remaining defendants after jurors deadlocked. In 1979, the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago stated that the government had withheld relevant documents thereby obstructing the judicial process. Reinstating the case against 24 of the defendants, the Court of Appeals ordered a new trial. The Supreme Court of the United States heard an appeal but voted 5-3 in 1980 to return the case to the District Court for a new trial.
In 1982, the City of Chicago, Cook County, and the federal government agreed to a settlement in which each would pay $616,333 to a group of nine plaintiffs, including the mothers of Clark and Hampton. The $1.85 million settlement was believed to be the largest ever in a civil rights case.

Controversy

The allegation that Hampton was assassinated has been debated since the day he and Clark were killed in the police raid. Ten days afterward, Bobby Rush, then the "minister of defense" for the Illinois Black Panther party, called the raiding party an "execution squad". Despite the settlements, controversy remained as to whether the men died in an exchange of gunfire with police or were intentionally slain.

Weather Underground reaction

In response to the killing of Black Panther members Fred Hampton and Mark Clark during the December 1969 police raid, on May 21, 1970, the Weather Underground issued a "" against the United States government, using for the first time its new name, the "Weather Underground Organization", adopting fake identities, and pursuing covert activities only. These initially included preparations for a bombing of a U.S. military non-commissioned officers' dance at Fort Dix, New Jersey, in what Brian Flanagan said had been intended to be "the most horrific hit the United States government had ever suffered on its territory".
Although two months earlier, Hampton had criticized the predominantly white Weather Underground for being "adventuristic, masochistic and Custeristic", Bernardine Dohrn of the Weathermen, which had a close relationship with the Black Panthers in Chicago at the time of Hampton's death, said in the documentary The Weather Underground that the killing of Fred Hampton caused them to "be more grave, more serious, more determined to raise the stakes, and not just be the white people who wrung their hands when black people were being murdered."