Civil rights attorney to receive NC NAACP award

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — The North Carolina chapter of the NAACP is giving its 2013 humanitarian of the year award to a civil rights attorney who's a visiting research fellow at Duke University.

In a ceremony Saturday in Raleigh, the NAACP is giving the award to Anita Earls, executive director of the Southern Coalition for Social Justice. Earls is a former deputy assistant attorney in the U.S. Justice Department and previously taught at law schools at the University of North Carolina and the University of Maryland.

Previous recipients include historian John Hope Franklin, former Gov. Jim Hunt and poet Maya Angelou.

The banquet will be held at Abundant Life Christian Center.