Biography
Malik Rahim, born Donald Guyton on December 17, 1947 in Algiers, Louisiana, was the defense minister of the New Orleans chapter of the Black Panther Party (the National Committee to Combat Fascism) during the 1970 standoffs around the Desire housing project. He was among the twelve New Orleans Panthers charged with attempted murder over the confrontations with police, and all twelve were acquitted by a jury in a landmark August 1971 trial — the first Black Panther trial in the country before a Black judge and a majority-Black jury. Decades later he became a nationally known housing- and prisoner-rights activist, co-founding the Common Ground Collective after Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and running for office as a Green Party candidate.
After the August 6, 1971 acquittal — he had been held about eleven months — a later account says he was released during 1971 and arrested again five days later on an unrelated kidnapping allegation; the exact date of his first discharge is not supplied, so his release is entered at year precision.
The August 21, 1971 Black Panther names this defendant among the twelve New Orleans Panthers tried after the September 15, 1970 raid. It identifies prosecutors Numa Bertel and William Ary and says the jury acquitted all twelve. The article also reports that the FBI placed holds on all defendants before the verdict and that only seven had posted the new federal bail by publication; it does not identify those seven or document their individual physical release dates.
The Black Panther, August 21, 1971, PDF page 5; The Black Panther, August 21, 1971, PDF page 14.
