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Leon Jenkins at a LA NAACP breakfast in 2013.
Disgraced former Detroit 36th District Court Leon Jenkins has resigned as the head of the Los Angeles NAACP amid questions linked to LA Clippers' owner Donald Sterling.
Angel Jennings of the Los Angeles Times reports that Jenkins resignation Thursday evening came amid scrutiny surrounding the NAACP's decision to give awards to disgraced Clippers owner Donald Sterling. Jenkins was indicted in Detroit in the late 1980s for bribery, but was eventually acquitted.
In LA, in his letter of resignation, Jenkins stated that the “legacy, history and reputation of the NAACP is more important to me than the presidency. In order to separate the Los Angeles NAACP and the NAACP from the negative exposure I have caused … I respectfully resign my position as president of the Los Angeles NAACP.”
The LA Times reported that the NAACP granted Sterling an award in 2009, the very same year he paid $2.73 million to settle a claim by the federal government that he refused to rent apartments in Koreatown to Latinos and blacks.
The Times reported that the chapter was about to give Sterling a second award this month.
The New York TImes reported that officials from the California state conference of the NAACP. are looking into why the LA branch planned this month to give one of its highest awards to Sterling who has been accused of making racially offensive comments and discriminating against blacks and Hispanics.
Jenkins announced earlier this week that the NAACP was withdrawing that award because of Sterling's racial remarks. He was also returning money Sterling had donated to the organization. The fact he has donated money to the organzation has raised questions as to whether Sterling essentially bought goodwill with the organization instead of earning it.
Up until now, Detroiters had long forgotten the judge that had been nicknamed "Neon Leon" because of his flash. He was indicted in 1988 with a group of judges in an FBI sting involving bribery. The others pleaded guilty. Jenkins, who was accused of fixing traffic tickets in exchange for money and gifts, decided to fight the feds in court.
The jury acquitted on four of five counts in the first trial even though there were FBI videotapes of party store owner Sam Dickow, a government informant, paying off Jenkins to fix traffic tickets. The jury deadlocked on the fifth count.
Fed prosecutors went after him one more time, but lost in the retrial on the one outstanding count.
He did, however, lose his law license in Michigan.
Jenkins got married after the trial and interestingly sent out invitations with a notation that cash gifts were appreciated. It was second marriage and it ended in divorce. His first wife died.
He also eventually went west to California to start anew, though he lost his law license in the state because of the serious Michigan allegations.
