SCLC internal battle continues

By Rhonda Cook

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

A Fulton County judge has signed an order cutting off the access the Southern Christian Leadership Conference's national treasurer has to SCLC funds.

In his place, two of three people – board members Curtis Harris, Rita Samuel or Jewel Devereaux – are now required to sign any checks drawn on the organization's bank accounts, according to the order Fulton Superior Court Judge Alford Dempsey signed Monday.

The "consent" order, agreed to by warring factions of the national SCLC, is the latest chapter in an ongoing struggle for control of the Atlanta-based civil rights organization.

In recent weeks, one faction tried to remove treasurer Spiver Gordon of Eutaw, Ala., and chairman Raleigh Trammell of Dayton, Ohio, for allegedly writing checks to themselves or moving SCLC funds into accounts only they could access. The money involved totaled about $569,000, according to documents obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constituti0n.

Another group backs Gordon and Trammell. Those supporters successfully asked the judge to restore Trammell and Gordon to their positions because the two were removed during a December board meeting that violated SCLC rules; the meeting was conducted over the telephone.

According to the order, SCLC president Byron Clay and vice chairwoman Sylvia Tucker must  turn over “books, records, bank accounts, keys, seals and other materials of SCLC” to Harris, who will oversee day-to-day operations, or to the Rev. Wilburt Shanklin, a longtime SCLC  board member who was among those bringing the court action to restore Trammell and Gordon.

“The SCLC treasurer will voluntarily disinvolve himself with any financial matters … until further action by the Board of Directors of SCLC,” the order said.

The order also said SCLC general counsel Dexter Wimbish and staff member Ron Woods can have no contact with the organization’s staff or board, though they will continue to be paid, “strictly subject to the SCLC’s ability to pay,” until the board meets later this year. It is not known why the two men were placed on administrative leave.

Board member Art Rocker -- a visible member of  the anti-Trammell, anti-Gordon group -- complained that while the national treasurer could no longer sign checks on SCLC   bank accounts, others aligned with him still had control over the funds.

Trammell has declined to comment and Gordon has not returned telephone calls.

But their backers have been advocating for them while opponents push for criminal investigations in at least two states – Georgia, where the SCLC is based, and Alabama, where Gordon operates.

Rocker, head of the Florida state SCLC chapter, has met with Alabama’s attorney general and with Fulton District Attorney Paul Howard in recent weeks. The Alabama AG declined to say if that office was investigating, while Howard’s office confirmed investigators were looking into complaints Rocker and others had made.

“The Fulton County District Attorney’s Office has opened a criminal investigation into charges of fraud, conversion and embezzlement since the internal financial investigation has been stopped by those 12 people who met illegally,” vice chairwoman Tucker wrote the other board members, referring to a board meeting called by Trammell and his supporters last month.

Shanklin, one of the SCLC members who filed in court to have Trammell and Gordon re-instated, wrote Rocker that he was no longer head of the Florida chapter, a position elected by local chapters in that state.

Shanklin, SCLC national parliamentarian and "compliance" chairman, also wrote Rocker that he would be removed “from the records of the SCLC forever” and his name “forever stricken from the annals of SCLC.”

“Your unfounded and incorrect statements about SCLC board members have done nothing but exacerbate a bad situation to people who have no knowledge of the real inner workings of the SCLC,” Shanklin wrote in a letter obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

The national SCLC board was to meet Wednesday to resolve the differences over the organization's leadership, but the meeting has been postponed until April.

Shanklin, who is in Dayton, declined to comment Tuesday, saying members “are supposed to be quiet” until meeting in the spring.