The first Black Criminal Court judge in Louisiana since Reconstruction, Israel Meyer Augustine Jr. presided over the 1971 trial of 12 Black Panthers accused of shooting at police officers during a standoff on Sept. 15, 1970.

After he was accused of being “part of the white system,” the judge, according to the New York Times, climbed on a courthouse table and raised his clenched fist. 

“Listen to me well,” he said before a crowd. “The purpose of my being here is to ensure that everybody who appears before me gets a fair and impartial trial. And every defendant to appear before me, so help me Jesus Christ, will get a fair and impartial trial.”

A month later, the 12 were found not guilty.

Born in New Orleans, Augustine Jr. graduated from McDonogh No. 35 High School, Southern University and A&M College, Lincoln University School of Law and Union Baptist Theological Seminary.  

Admitted to the Louisiana Bar in 1951, Augustine Jr. was allowed to practice before the Supreme Court in 1962. He was appointed a district judge in 1969 and elected to a 12-year term in 1971. Ten years later, he was elected to Louisiana’s 4th Circuit Court of Appeal. 

He ran for Congress against Rep. Lindy Boggs. “He lost the race but remained a giant on the local civic and political scene,” the Times-Picayune states. 

The first general counsel of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), Augustine Jr. served on numerous boards.

“From his works and the organizations that he was a part of, it was evident that he was centered on doing the right thing, always trying to help the disadvantaged,” Susane Lavallais Boykins wrote in “The Courage of my Ancestors.” He received more than 200 community service awards “for his uncompromising and unselfish devotion to country, family, church and race.”

Augustine Jr. died in 1994 from Lou Gehrig’s disease. The Criminal Court building at Tulane and Broad has borne his name since 1996.

For more tales from New Orleans history, visit the Back in the Day archives.

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Tammy C. Barney is an award-winning columnist who spent most of her career at two major newspapers, The Times-Picayune and The Orlando Sentinel. She served as a bureau chief, assistant city editor, TV...