N DEATHROW, in a 6-feet-by-10-feet cell ofa maximum secu- he was old enough to drive. His lawyers credit the international political pressure rity prison nearly lost in southwest Pennsylvania, sits Mumia with a major role in winning a stay of the Abu- Jamal, a 41-year-old journalist and convicted cop killer . original execution date, Aug. 17, 1995, Incarcerated since the 1981 shooting of Daniel Faulkner, a as they seek a new trial. Those lawyers, led by Leonard I. Philadelphia police officer, Abu-Jamal has become an interna- Weinglass, whose many famous cases tional cause celebre. Thousands of grass-roots folks from New include the Chicago Seven and the pen- tagon Papers defense, have raised a York to London and from England to South Africa have staged spirited rallies series of serious issues concerning the and passed out literature in his defense. Among his marquee supporters are first trial. Taken together, they raise sig- Maya Angelou, Paul Newman, Johnnie Cochran, Danny Glover, JesseJack- nificant problems with the adequacy and fairness of his trial. son, Alec Baldwin, Cornel West, Oliver Stone, Ed Asner, Norman Mailer, E.L. Many of the issues that have fueled Doctorow, Ossie Davis, Naomi Campbell, Gloria Steinem, Henry Louis Gates the swell of support for Abu-Jamal involve witnesses, specifically the exclu- Jr., Norman Lear, bell hooks, Spike Lee porters -said the trial "was full of gross sion from his trial in 1982 of testimony and Salman Rushdie. procedural errors and judicial miscon- from an eyewitness who fingered anoth- Nelson Mandela wrote Pennsylvania duct. There is strong reason to er man as Faulkner's killer. There also Gov. Thomas Ridge asking that Abu- believe...," the ad continues, "Mumia are questions about the credibility of Jamal's life be spared "on humanitarian Abu-Jamal has been sentenced to death and conflicts of interest among three grounds. " The president of France and because of his political beliefs." star witnesses for the prosecution. Also, the foreign minister of Germany have Abu-Jamal is a former Black Panther much has been made of the f~ct that one made public appeals on his behalf. Even who came under FBI surveillance before of the first police officers on the scene, the National Black Police Association has called the celebrated prisoner "a vic- tim of the criminal justice system." .Abu-Jamal has become the first self-described "political prisoner" to be launched into cyberspace on a slick $29.95 CD-ROM produced by Voy- ager Co. His book, Live from Death Row, has gone through four printings for a total of 65,000 copies, according to a spokesman for his publishing com- pany, Addison-Wesley. And it's hard to visit any major city in the United States without seeing his smiling face and waist- length dreadlocks adorning posters. A full page New York Times adver- tisement -which ran on standby for $19,800 (but normally would run for $62,000) and was paid for by his sup- Supporters protested as Abu-Jamal, next page, was taken back and forth to court.
36 EMERGE. NOVEMBER 1995
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who gave contradictory statements to enough to have avoided a conviction. published a book of Abu-Jamal com- officials, was conveniently "on vaca- As it was, jurors in a Philadelphia mentaries, pulling a banner that said the tion"during the trial. Discrepancies in courtroo~ apparently had little doubt firm supports convicted cop killers. reports about the weapon used in the to overcome. They returned a guilty ver- Philadelphia Mayor Ed Rendell, who killing and the failure of police to con- dict in five hours. was district attorney when Abu-Jamal duct routine tests immediately after- Those who believe Abu-Jamal was was prosecuted, told CBS Evening ward, have also given some pause. fairly tried, convicted and should be exe- News, "If I were picking a poster child If fully explored in the original trial by cuted have not been silent during the for the death penalty, I wouldn't pick a skilled and sufficiently funded defense, incredible public debate about his case. someone who the evidence says over- these concerns could have produced rea- Maureen Faulkner, the officer's widow, whelmingly came up behind another sonable doubt about Abu-Jamal's guilt hired a plane to fly over the Massachu- human being who happens to be a police in the mind of at least one juror - setts headquarters of the company that officer, shot him in the back and then
NOVEMBER 1995. EMERGE 37 Wakshul, who had Abu-Jamal in cus- trial because "there were always two (2) gletary testified at the hearing that he tody immediately after the shooting until plainclothes men near where she worked saw someone else shoot Faulkner. The doctors began working on him at the hos- her corner on Locust; I waited in vain for shooter, according to Singletary, was a pital, filed a report that said, "during this them to leave, but they never did." passenger with dreadlocks in the car dri- time, the negro male made no state- Joey Grant, former chief of the dis- ven by Cook, Abu-Jamal's brother. Sin- ments," according to documents filed by trict attorney's homicide unit, said gletary told his story to police after the Abu-Jamal's lawyers. The trial lawyer White "wasn't protected by the police shooting, but his statements were re- while she was prostituting herself. " Fur- wanted to call Wakshul but was told he peatedly discarded until he signed one was on vacation and unavailable. Trial thermore, he added, Greer testified that dictated by a detective. This one denied Judge Albert Sabo refused to delay the the two people in the car never prevent- that he had seen the shooting. trial until Wakshul could testify. ed him from talking to White and he After Singletary's testimony this sum-
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Large rallies, like this one in Philadelphia, were held across the nation, as well as in England, Italy, South Africa and Brazil.
In addition to their attack on the never saw them talking to her. mer, an assistant district attorney was alleged confession, Abu-Jamal's new Another witness who said Abu- quoted as saying the cabdriver "has cre- defense lawyers have sought to discredit Jamal shot Faulkner was cabdriver ated a fantasy version " of the truth. The other prosecution witnesses. One wit- Robert Chobert. Chobert, argues the 1982 jury, however, never had an oppor- ness, Cynthia White, was a prostitute defense petition, "was clearly suscepti- tunity to evaluate Singletary's testimony with three open cases when she testified ble to police pressure" because he was -testimony that might have led to a rea- that Abu-Jamal was the killer. "With- on probation after being convicted of sonable doubt about Abu-Jamal's guilt. out explanation, bench warrants against throwing a molotov cocktail at a school His chances of acquittal also were her were not prosecuted," says Abu- for pay. At a recent hearing, however, heavily damaged by an impoverished, Jamal's petition for a new trial. "Police Chobert again fingered Abu-Jamal. deficient and chaotic defense effort. told another prostitute, Veronica Jones, Sabo did not allow the 1982 jury to hear Abu-Jamal acted as his own lawyer dur- that Ms. Jones would be allowed to about Chobert's firebomb conviction, ing some of his trial, which he regarded as work the street with impunity like Ms. nor Jones' full description of the deal she a political tool of an oppressor state. He White if Ms. Jones would testify against" said had been offered by the police. lashed out at jurors, only two of whom Abu-Jamal. At a hearing this past August, the were Black -a low number that was a Robert Greer, a private investigator defense produced a witness who said he result of what his current defense team who worked for the defense in 1982, was so intimidated by police after calls "the prosecution's use of racially said in an affidavit this year, that he was Faulkner's murder that he left town biased preemptory challenges. " As is his unable to interview White before the before Abu-Jamal's trial. William Sin- constitutional right, Abu-Jamal never
NOVEMBER 1995 .EMERGE 39
~ told what occurred when A prosecution ballistics after her tiring duties as a housekeeper Faulkner was killed. He has expert did testify that the fatal in a West Mount Airy home. On arrival, proclaimed his innocence, bullet was a "Plus-P" .38 caliber she was stopped by police, who told her but still refuses to tell inter- consistent with those fired from she could not enter her home of twen- viewers what happened. Abu-Jamal's gun. Because the ty-three years, and that it would be torn Also strangely silent is Abu- bullet's condition prevented a down as part of a city program against Jamal's brother, who had direct match, no connection drug dens. "My house ain't no drug den! " the fifty-nine-year-old-grand- dropped out of sight until between Abu-Jamal's gun and recently. the fatal bullet ever was estab- mother argued. "This is my home!" The But no matter how strict- lished. Also, no test was done to cops, strangers to this part of town, ly Abu-Jamal might have determine if Abu-Jamal had could care less. conformed to standard courtroom proce- recently fired a gun. Even the simple test Mrs. Helen Anthony left the scene, to dures, he still faced a judge with a clear of smelling Abu-Jamal's gun barrel to contact her grown children. Two hours bent for the prosecution. Sabo has been determine the presence of spent gun- later, she returned to an eerie scene dubbed "the king of death row" by the powder was not done. straight out of The Twilight Zone. Her Philadelphia Inquirer. Though he hasn't Through his work as a radio journal- home was no more. presided over a capital case since 1991, ist, Abu-Jamal has demonstrated a clear A pile of bricks stood amid hi/Is bf "Sabo still has sentenced more than twice bent for those ignored by the powerful red dust and twisted debris; a lone wa/1 as many people to death than any other and well-heeled. His writing is vivid. He was standing jagged, a man's suit flap- judge in the country," according to the carries the listener/reader to the scene to ping on a hook, flapping like a flag of NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. Juries presided over by Sabo have "sentenced 32 people to death -all but ECAUSE OF THE BULLET'S CONDI. two of whom are people of color." Sabo refused defense requests during the trial for funding to hire experts. He TION, NO CONNECTION BETWEEN approved just $150 each for an investiga- tor, a photographer, a pathologist and a ballistician. In an affidavit published ABU-JAMAL'S GUN AND THE FATAL along with other defense documents in Race for Justice, a Common Courage Press book compiled by Leonard I. Wein- BULLET EVER WAS ESTABLISHED. glass, Anthony Jackson, his 1982 court- appointed lawyer, said Abu-Jamal's case "could not be defended with the limited feel thejoy or pain of the occasion: surrender, after a war waged by bulldoz-- resources that were available. I presented She sits in utter stillness. Her cof- ers and ambitious politicians. Mrs. no expert testimony on ballistics or fee-brown features as if set in obsidian; Anthony received no warning before the pathology since no funds were available as if a mask. Barely perceptible, the tears jaws of the baleful backhoe bit into the to retain such experts." threaten to overflow that dark, proud, bricks of her life, tearing asunder the Abu-Jamal's current lawyers argue maternal face, a face held still by rage. gatherings and memories of a life well his trial defense was inadequate for rea- A warm spring day in North lived. She was served no notice that the sons beyond the lack of resources. Stern- Philadelphia saw her on her way home, City of Brotherly Love intended to grind Iy, the petition for a new trial says he "received the death penalty as a direct result of defense counsel's wholesale fail- ure to prepare for the penalty phase." Another area the defense has attacked is the lack of conclusive physical evidence directly linking Abu-Jamal's gun to Faulkner's murder. A report by Paul Hoyer, the assistant medical examiner who did the autopsy on the officer, indi- cated the murder weapon was a .44-cal- iber handgun, not a .38. He later said that notation is not something he would defend. Nonetheless, his report, done within hours of the incident, could have produced significant doubt in Abu- Jamal's jurors had they known about it, but the document was not produced dur- ing the trial. Attorney Leonard I. Weinglass, no stranger to controversy, leads the new defense team.
40 EMERGE. NOVEMBER 1995 her home of twenty-three years into UBLISHING A BOOK GOT ABU-JAMAL dust because they didn't like her neigh- bors... Another chapter in the tragicom- edy called "The Drug War." IN TROUBLE. AUTHORITIES SAID HE
This April 1992 commentary, entitled "A house is not a home," by Abu-Jamal, VIOLATED REGULATIONS BY CONDUCT. is among those in Live from Death Row. National Public Radio (NPR) had planned to broadcast a series of his com- ING A BUSINESS WHILE INCARCERATED. mentaries until, Abu-Jamal supporters contend, political pressure organized by as co-founder and minister of ship in the Black Panther Party the Fraternal Order of Police forced NPR information of the philadel- in a way the defense says violat- to change its plans. NPR says the decision phia chapter of the Black Pan- ed Abu-Jamal's constitutional was not influenced by outsiders. ther Party (BPP) when he was rights. Prosecutor Joseph Mc- Publishing the book did get Abu- 15. It was then that the FBI Gill asked Abu-::-Jamal about an Jamal in trouble with prison authorities. began collecting data on him. article he wrote as a Panther They said he violated prison regulations An October 1969 report in his which used the Mao Tse-tung by conduCting a business while incarcer- FBI file says: "In spite of the quote: "Political power grows ated. He was put in disciplinary custody subject's age (15 years), out of the barrel of a gun." The and suffered a loss of privileges because Philadelphia feels that his Pennsylvania Supreme Court, he practiced journalism. The book, how- continued participation in Judge Albert Sabo however, ruled the Panther evi- ever, apparently has helped its author BPP activits [sic] in the dence admissible. provide for his new defense effort. The Philadelphia Division, his position in the Whatever the impact of the Panther Sunday Patriot-News in Harrisburg, Pa., Philadelphia Branch of BPP, and his past disclosure on the jury's decision to execute estimated Abu-Jamal netted at least inclination to appear and speak at pub- Abu-Jamal, his Panther membership had $425,000 from the book. Overall, the lic gatherings, the subject should be a significant impact on his craft. Writing newspaper said, more than $800,000 included on the Security Index." for the party's newspaper, he later re- has been raised since 1990. Mumia sup- During the phase of the trial when the called, "charged my pen with a distinctive porters dispute that amount. jury decided Abu-Jamal's sentence, the anti-authoritarian, and anti-establishment Abu-Jamal got his start as a journalist prosecution used his former member- character that survives to this day." .