Shalomyah Bowers, one of the three board members of the BLM Global Network Foundation, was sued in court by California-based BLM Grassroots. The non-profit organization accused Bowers of using the foundation as his "personal piggy bank," collecting money from donors for his own personal use. BLM Grassroots denounced Bowers as a "rogue administrator" and "middleman turned usurper."
"While BLM leaders and movement workers were on the streets risking their lives, Bowers remained in his cushy office devising a scheme of fraud and misrepresentation to break the implied-in-fact contract between donors and [the group]," stated the lawsuit by BLM Grassroots.
Walter Mosley, an attorney handling the case, said Bowers engaged in self-dealing by giving grants to his own consulting firm and charging exorbitant fees – in some instances reaching eight figures. Bowers was originally hired to help collect and distribute donations for expenditures within the foundation. However, his actions prompted various state attorney generals to lead "multiple investigations" into BLM's financial accounts, "blazing a path of irreparable harm" to the movement in less than 18 months.
California State University Los Angeles professor and BLM Los Angeles chapter co-founder Melina Abdullah announced the lawsuit during a Sept. 1 press conference. During the briefing, she claimed that Bowers shut her and other leaders out of the movement's social media accounts in March 2022. The defendant changed the passwords of shared social media accounts, email groups, website portals and other tools the movement had built over the years after being confronted over the allegation.
According to Abdullah, Bowers changed the passwords of BLM's social media accounts in order to continue "fraudulently raising money from unsuspecting donors passing himself off as the organization." Meanwhile, Mosley said the lawsuit "demands that the [foundation] return the people's funds and stop impersonating BLM."
Foundation board: Abdullah, BLM Grassroots attempting to overthrow leadership
On the same day as the press conference, the foundation's board members released a statement calling the lawsuit against Bowers as "harmful, divisive and false."
According to the board, it requested to meet with BLM Grassroots to discuss the allegations against Bowers – which Abdullah and her group "ignored or refused." The board also accused the plaintiffs of wanting "to control the entirety of BLM" by taking "the same steps of our white oppressors" by utilizing "the criminal legal system" through the lawsuit, instead of resolving internal issues through conflict mediation.
Bowers was hired in 2020 by BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors, who stepped down from the foundation's board in June 2021 amid criticism over her purchase of real estate in the U.S. worth $3.2 million. (Related: BLM co-founder Patrisse Khan-Cullors has purchased four lavish estates in wealthy white neighborhoods with her "social justice" reparations.)
"[BLM Grassroots] and Abdullah take issue with not being given control of all financial assets and the social media accounts of [the foundation] after Cullors stepped down," it said in a statement. "Since [Cullors'] departure, Abdullah and BLM Grassroots have sent threatening letters and attacked the livelihood of board members directly. Not only have they demanded the resignation of current leadership in efforts to seize the financial resources of BLMGNF via intimidation tactics, but they have quite literally forced the firing of a board member from her job, threatening her livelihood and removed her from her activist community."
The board also responded to accusations that the plaintiffs were locked out of the BLM foundation's social media accounts. According to the board, Abdullah "has been personally invited to continue sending content … for sharing" and had even posted to the foundation's Facebook page four days before it issued the statement.
"Abdullah has attempted to bully the board into submission to her will," the foundation's board of directors concluded, adding that the Sept. 1 press conference is her "latest attempt to assert a false version of events and create enemies out of fellow movement leaders and impacted family members."
Head over to BlackLiesMatter.news for more stories about embezzlement within the BLM movement.
Watch this video about the real estate properties purchased by BLM co-founder Patrisse Cullors.
This video is from the Recharge Freedom channel on Brighteon.com.
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