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Black Lives Matter Organizer Oversaw Toppling of a Statue, But Now She's Been Slapped with Serious Charges

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One of the leaders of Black Lives Matter in the United Kingdom, who oversaw the toppling of a statue during a protest, is now facing some very serious charges of fraud.

On Friday, Bristol World reported that Xahra Saleem, a BLM organizer in the U.K. and a co-founder of the organization, All Black Lives Bristol, will appear before a court in January to answer charges of two counts of fraud by abuse of position.

This comes after money raised by the organization via crowdfunding pages went missing and did not reach its supposed beneficiaries, a London-based group BristBLM for Changing Your Mindset.

According to Bristol Live, Avon and Somerset police said in a statement, “A woman is due in court at the start of next year after the Crown Prosecution Service authorized charges following a fraud investigation.”

“Xahra Saleem, 22 and from East London, has been charged with two counts of fraud by abuse of position. She is due before Bristol Magistrates’ Court on Tuesday 3 January 2023.”

Saleem was one of the organizers of a Black Lives Matter protest in Bristol in June 2020 that toppled the statue of 17th-century merchant and slave trader Edward Colston.

During the protests, British monuments were repeatedly attacked and vandalized. The most egregious example was the statue of Winston Churchill in London’s Parliament Square, which was boarded up in anticipation of protesters after being vandalized by an earlier protest.

At this point, no one should really be surprised that another leader of the BLM movement has been accused of fraud. This has frankly become a defining feature of the movement.

Should Black Lives Matter groups face heavier legal scrutiny?

Over the past two years, several leaders of Black Lives Matter have come under fire for their misuse of funds and abuse of their positions.

The most egregious example was that of BLM co-founder Patrisse Colours, who was forced to resign from the group in May 2021, after it was revealed that she had spent millions buying luxury properties in California and Georgia.

But Colours is far from the only BLM organizer to be faced with these accusations. In September 2020, the FBI arrested the Atlanta-based BLM activist Sir Maejor Page, after they accused him of taking money from BLM-linked accounts and using it to buy guns, clothes and a home in Ohio.

In March of this year, the organization’s charity, the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation, had its charity status put at risk after it violated IRS rules by using the charity to solicit political donations for Black Lives Matter PAC.

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Then in September, the charity’s leader, Shalomyah Bowers, was accused of stealing $10 million from the organization.

These are just a few of the many examples that have come to light in recent years of BLM activists and leaders exploiting their position for their own personal gain.

Black Lives Matter does not really care about racial justice or even about the lives of black Americans. It is a fraudulent group that exists to line the pockets of its leaders.

This latest accusation out of Britain shows that corruption is not limited to activists in the United States, but that it is an international phenomenon.

Black Lives Matter is a scam. The money it raises does not go toward fighting for any form of justice but only toward the personal interests of its leaders. It is time for all donors to stop giving money to this fraudulent organization.

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Peter Partoll is a commentary writer for the Western Journal and a Research Assistant for the Catholic Herald. He earned his bachelor's degree at Hillsdale College and recently finished up his masters degree at Royal Holloway University of London. You can follow him on Twitter at @p_partoll.




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