Walker felt the aftermath of that racial tension and experienced pushback at every turn. The murder of Matthew Johnson led to the Hunter Point riots. Additionally, racial tension was at a high after SFPD officer Alvin Johnson shot and killed Matthew Johnson, a teenager running away from the scene of a stolen car. During that time, there were protests happening throughout San Francisco opposing the Vietnam War.
Baldwin makes it a point to acknowledge the illusion that racism was somehow diluted in San Francisco compared to racism Black people experienced in the south - which was not true. “There is no moral distance between the facts of life in San Francisco and the facts of life in Birmingham,” Baldwin said in his quote. “I’m Charlie Walker” opens with a quote from James Baldwin, followed by a quote from Charlie Walker. It stars Mike Colter (Charlie Walker), Dylan Baker, Safiya Fredericks, Mark Leslie Ford, Steven Wiig, Greg Cipes, Travis Johns, Emma Caulfield Ford, Monica Barbaro, and Carl Lumbly. Shout! Studios in partnership with FAMM Films Production presents the film “I’m Charlie Walker.” Written and directed by Patrick Gilles, the film tells the true story of Charlie Walker’s experiences in trucking before and after the oil spill. That oil spill changed everything for Walker.
On January 19, 1971, two oil trucks collided in the San Francisco Bay spilling 800,000 gallons of crude oil into the water. Walker experienced racism in every facet of his life. Boldness was evident in every fiber of Walker’s being - a characteristic rejected when it was presented in a Black body. With a desire to be his own boss, he eventually set up his own small trucking company, Charlie Walker Trucking.
Born in the south, Walker moved to San Francisco when he was a teen. "I still believed Chavez’s primary motivation was a desire to help the poor majority with his own power simply because he was the only politician capable of leading the coalition government at the moment.“Never, ever be afraid to make some noise and get in good trouble - necessary trouble.”Ĭharlie Walker, a trucking, and construction entrepreneur, lives his life by these words. "It was hard to overlook Chavez’s efforts to entrench his own hold on power," he wrote. While he expressed some trepidation, Boudin was still largely supportive of Chavez. "I had found one of the few places on the planet where having parents in prison in the United States for politically motivated crimes actually opened doors rather than closed them." - Chesa Boudin, "Gringo: A Coming of Age in Latin America" By this time, poverty under the country's socialist government had led to shortages and Boudin wrote that he couldn't find milk or sugar at the grocery store - an ominous preview of the chaos that has engulfed the country in recent years. He will be eligible for parole in 2056.īoudin returned to Venezuela again in 2007, according to his book, as the nation was voting on a package of constitutional changes that would have concentrated power in Chavez's hands and allowed him to remain president indefinitely. Gilbert was convicted of three counts of felony murder and one count of robbery and sentenced to 75 years to life in prison. Kathy Boudin pleaded guilty to one count of felony murder and robbery and was sentenced to 20-years-to-life. Two police officers and one guard were killed when they tried to stop the getaway.
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In 1981, when Boudin was 1, his parents were getaway drivers for a group of radical black nationalists as they robbed a Brinks truck of $1.6 million. "I took to signing my e-mails to friends and family ‘in the belly of the revolution.'" - Chesa Boudin, "Gringo: A Coming of Age in Latin America"īut Boudin's past has gotten as much attention as his present-day policies. His biological parents, David Gilbert and Kathy Boudin, were also long-time Weather Underground members. It's just further making the problem worse as people sit there and suffer on our streets, the residents and visitors suffer too by having to live in these types of situations." "To just take on the approach that you're not going to even acknowledge it, as if the problem doesn't exist, is not a solution.