Bronx legend Clive Campbell, who as DJ Kool Herc is widely credited as one of hip-hop’s founding fathers, is not suing Jay-Z, developer Bruce Ratner and Barclays bank, as previously reported by the Observer online. The $5 billion lawsuit is being brought by a much less famous Brooklyn activist also named Clive Campbell, and the mix-up is probably a big publicity boon for his lawsuit, as it echoed far and wide across the internets before the Observer corrected it. Campbell is demanding the money as slavery reparations because of Barclays’ history with the slave trade; the bank has secured the naming rights for the controversial Nets stadium Ratner is trying to build at Brooklyn’s Atlantic Yards, which would be part of a bigger residential development.
Jay-Z is part-owner of the New Jersey Nets and has been an enthusiastic supporter of the project, which some local residents have been fighting to stop. Campbell’s suit is being brought in conjunction with Da Black Defense League, which is headquartered on Fulton Street in Brooklyn, and has a MySpace page that identifies the group as “a patriotic organization within the confines of the United States Constitution and have yet to draft a Black Defense League Constitution.” The suit, which was to be officially filed in court today, asserts:
Barclays has vehemently deniedBarclays profited from the African Slave Trade and continue to profit from these gains, through a conspiracy dating back hundreds of years and continue to date to oppress Black people, enslave them, unlawfully deport them to all corners of the Earth.
the widespread allegations of slave trade profiteering and Forest City Ratner, the development group behind the Atlantic Yards project, insists the suit has no legal merit.
Photo: Ryan Dombal.
