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Snipes Replays Race Card in Tax Trial

Thu., Nov. 8, 2007 2:08 PM PST by Sarah Hall

Wesley Snipes has a new gripe.

The Blade star has filed court documents claiming central Florida's Marion County—where he is due to stand trial on tax evasion charges—is too racist for him to get a fair deal.

Snipes stands accused of fraudulently claiming close to $12 million in refunds in 1996 and 1997 for income taxes already paid. He is also charged with failing to file tax returns from 1999 to 2004. His trial is due to commence in Ocala in January.

Snipes' attorney filed a motion Monday in U.S. District Court, arguing the U.S. Attorney's Office purposefully selected Ocala after prosecutors sniffed out "the most racially discriminatory venue available to the government with the best possibility of an all-white southern jury where Snipes has never resided."

The locale was ostensibly chosen because the actor's codefendant, Eddie Ray Kahn, operated his Guiding Light of God Ministries, which prosecutors claim provided tax evasion information, from neighboring Lake County.

Snipes' motion calls the area "a hotbed of Klan activity where the Klan adopted highways to commemorate the Klan and the Confederate flag flies over government property."

He is seeking to have his trial relocated to New York City, or alternately, to have the charges against him dismissed.

A spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Middle District of Florida in Tampa said prosecutors would have no comment, noting that any response would be made in court.

Loretta Pompey Jenkins, president of the Ocala chapter of the NAACP, told the Ocala Star-Banner she thought Snipes could "possibly" receive a fair trial in the area.

"Marion County does have its problems with the justice system as it pertains to African-American people," she said. "Sometimes justice has not prevailed."

However, Jenkins said she believed Snipes' celebrity would aid him in his quest for impartiality.

"I think that a person's status does play a part in it. If you are able to retain good attorneys, that is in your favor," she said. "I think both of those are in the equation."