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Still Black Still Strong STIll BLACK,STIll SfRONG l STILL BLACK, STILL STRONG SURVIVORS Of THE U.S. WAR AGAINST BLACK REVOlUTIONARIES DHORUBA BIN WAHAD MUMIA ABU-JAMAL ASSATA SHAKUR Ediled by lim f1elcher, Tonoquillones, & Sylverelolringer SbIII01EXT(E) Sentiotext(e) Offices: P.O. Box 629, South Pasadena, CA 91031 Copyright ©1993 Semiotext(e) and individual contributors. Printed in the United States of America. ISBN 978-0-936756-74-5 1098765 ~_.......-.;,;,,~---------:.;- Contents DHORUDA BIN W"AHAD WARWITIllN 9 TOWARD RE'rHINKING SEIl'-DEFENSE 57 THE CuTnNG EDGE OF PRISONTECHNOLOGY 77 ON RACISM. RAp AND REBElliON 103 MUM<A ABU-JAMAL !NrERVIEW FROM DEATH Row 117 THE PRIsON-HOUSE OF NATIONS 151 COURT TRANSCRIPT 169 THE MAN MALCOLM 187 P ANIllER DAZE REMEMBERED 193 ASSATA SHAKUR PRISONER IN THE UNITED STATES 205 CHRONOLOGY OF THE BLACK PANTHER PARTY 221 FROM THE FBI PANTHER FILES 243 NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS 272 THE CAMPAIGN TO FREE BLACK POLITICALPRISONERS 272 Contents DHORUBA BIN "W AHAD WAKWITIllN 9 TOWARD REnnNKINO SELF-DEFENSE 57 THE CurnNG EOOE OF PRISON TECHNOLOGY 77 ON RACISM, RAp AND REBEWON 103 MUMIA ABU-JAMAL !NrERVIEW FROM DEATH Row 117 THE PRIsoN-HOUSE OF NATIONS 151 COURT TRANSCRIPT 169 THE MAN MALCOLM 187 PANTHER DAZE REMEMBERED 193 ASSATA SHAKUR PJusONER IN THE UNITED STATES 205 CHRONOLOGY OF THE BLACK PANTHER PARTY 221 FROM THE FBI PANTHER FILES 243 NOTES ON CONTRmUTORS 272 THE CAMPAIGN TO FREE BUCK POLITICAL PRISONERS 272 • ... Ahmad Abdur·Rahmon (reIeo,ed) Mumio Abu·lomol (deoth row) lundiolo Acoli Alberlo '/lick" Africa (releosed) Ohoruba Bin Wahad Carlos Perez Africa Chorl.. lim' Africa Can,uella Dotson Africa Debbi lim' Africo Delberl Orr Africa Edward Goodman Africa lonet Halloway Africa lanine Phillip. Africa MOlle Auslin Africo Michael Davi' Africa Ramona lahnlQn Africa (releosed) lue lean Africa (.. leased) William Phillips Africa William AlI,n ... War Within Prison Interview Dhoruba Bin Wahad: My name is Dhoruba Al Mujahid Bin Wahad. Formerly Dhoruba Moore. I'm a political prison- er. I've been incarcerated in New York State for nearly nine- teen years. which I guess makes me one of the longest held political prisoners in the world. a notoriety I do not seek, but there it is. My imprisonment was a result of my activities in the Black community as a member and leader of the Black Panther Party. My case has been recently argued in an appel- late court in New York State after a judge ruled on a motion filed by myself that evidence was withheld in my case that would have overturned my conviction on direct appeal. And because the government withheld its evidence for eighteen years. my direct appeal has been exhausted. So essentially I remain in prison on a legal technicality. That's the legal status This interview was conducted by Chris Bratton and Annie Goldson in the fall of 1989 at Eastern Prison in Napanoch. New York. approximately seven months before Dhoruba Bin Wahad was released on his own recognizance after his conviction was vacated. The interview also appears in Branon and Goldson's documentary film. Framing the Panthers. 9 War Within Prison Interview Dhoruba Bin Wahad: My name is Dhoruba Al Mujahid Bin Wahad. Formerly Dhoruba Moore. I'm a political prison- er. I've been incarcerated in New York State for nearly nine- teen years, which I guess makes me one of the longest held political prisoners in the world, a notoriety I do not seek, but there it is. My imprisonment was a result of my activities in the Black community as a member and leader of the Black Panther Party. My case has been recently argued in an appel- late court in New York State after a judge ruled on a motion filed by myself that evidence was withheld in my case that would have overtumed my conviction on direct appeal. And because the government withheld its evidence for eighteen years, my direct appeal has been exhausted. So essentially I remain in prison on a legal technicality. That's the legal status This interview was conducted by Chris Bratton and Annie Goldson in the fall of 1989 at Eastern Prison in Napanoch, New York. approximately seven months before Dhoruba Bin Wahad was released on his own recognizance after his conviction was vacated. The interview also appears in Bratton and Go/dson's documentary film. Framing the Panthers. 9 1 SJIlL BLICK, SIILL SIRONG of my case. Right now there are over a hundred political pris- oners and prisoners of war incarcerated in the United States and serving exceptionally long sentences, and most of them are Black militants and former members of the Black Panther Party. My case has received a considerable amount of notori- ety in that I was one of the original defendants in the New York Panther 21 conspiracy case which involved an indict- ment against the leadership of the New York Chapter of the Black Panther Party in April of 1969. Q: And you were part of that original indictment? DBW: Yes. At that particular time the Black Panther Party was under full-force attack from the United States gov- ernment, which subsequently destroyed tbe Black Panther Party. I used to travel around the country speaking about that case and other political cases so I always had to go through a lot of changes with the FBI at the airports, State Troopers pulling us over on the highway, the whole nine yards. It became really crazy. I felt I was in a war. I would walk down a street and if kids threw firecrackers, man, I would duck. The only reason we wouldn't shoot back was that we had a policy to see who it was first, It stayed that way until I was arrested. You could see by some of the photos how I looked. I looked like one of those POW's in the early stages of the battle out- side Laos-you know, Vietnam. I was completely shell- shocked. I had a combat mentality. It was a question of sur- vival. It was them or me. I was targeted as a "Black extrem- ist" and put into the United States government's "Agitator Index" and "Black Extremists" files. These files were meant to identify and target certain leaders and spokespersons of the Black struggle for human rights so that they could be neutral- ized and otherwise taken out of circulation. 10 DHDRUBA BIN WAHAD Q: The sentence you're serving now, was that on charges unrelated to the 21 trial? DBW: It's unrelated to the 21 case hut it's a continuation of the political repression that was aimed at myself and at the Black Panther Party at that time. You see, when I was acquit- ted in absentia in the 21 case I was a fugitive, forced under- ground hy the FBI's Counterintelligence Program (COIN- TELPRO). COINTELPRO had devised a plot to incite the national leadership of the Black Panther Party to assassinate me and some of my comrades. Q: How did you hecome aware of that? DBW: During my civil suit against the government, around 1980, I eventually got them to release a hunch of doc- uments under the heading "Travel of BPP National Leadership." And one of these documents indicated that there was, in fact, a counterintelligence program aimed at creating a split between the New York Black Panther Party and the BPP National Headquarters. The FBI wanted to sow suspicion in the minds of national leadership, specifically Huey P. Newton, David Hilliard and the Central Committee in Oakland, California, that the New York Black Panther Party members were out to kill them They would go about this very systematically. They would send leiters to Huey P. Newton purporting to come from New York Panthers who were dis- gruntled because they didn't adhere to the instructions of the Central Committee. They would also capitalize on individual differences, on the sexism and on the regionalism within the Black Panther Party. You should remember that the BPP was a national organization, and when you travel across the coun- 11 STIlL BLACK, STIlL STRONG try you see that each city has a different rhythm, and style. The FBI would try to use these differences to divide the Black Panther Party. One operation specifically mentioned that I was opposed to representatives of the Central COmmittee who were stationed in New York to administer the everyday affairs of the Black Panther Party after the Panther 21 arrests. The Panther 21 were the leadership of the NY Chapter of the Black Panther Party, and for a number of years they were in prison, so the office of the Black Panther Party sent cadres and other field workers to New York to help run the party. So when I was released on bail the FBI started a program to sow dissension between myself and the individuals who were left in prison and between myself and the individuals who were put in leadership positions from the West Coast. And this resulted in my being demoted in rank, this resulted in friction between myself and the leadership which was already under stress. and culminated in threats on my life during the time of the Panther 21 trial. It was a result of these threats on my life that I bad to flee underground, during a crucial point in my trial, and the government tried to portray my disappearance as an admission of guilt. Of course it was all designed to preju- dice the jury because the evidence in the case was very weak. I imagine the State thought that if the Panthers who were on bail fled right before the deliberation, that would sort of sway the jury into believing that they were guilty.
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