The Philadelphia District
Attorney’s Office announced today that they would cease to pursue a death
penalty conviction for Mumia Abu-Jamal. As a result, Mumia’s sentence has been
commuted to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. In 2001, Judge
William Yohn, a federal district judge, threw out Mumia’s death penalty
conviction because of improper jury instruction during the original trial.
Today’s ruling ends the process that began with that case and passed through a
number of appeals and desperate attempts by the Philly DA to reinstate the death
penalty and murder Mumia.
Both the Third Circuit Court of
Appeals and the Supreme Court agreed that Mumia must either be given a new sentencing
hearing if the death penalty was to be reinstated, or have his sentence
commuted to life imprisonment. A new sentencing hearing was a dangerous gamble
for the DA, as it would give Mumia’s lawyers a chance to expose other flawed
elements of the original trial. Unable to kill Mumia, Philadelphia
“authorities” are now content to keep him locked in prison for the rest of his
natural life. While this decision saves Mumia from death row, it still leaves
him trapped in prison for a crime he did not commit.
Mumia was convicted of the 1981
murder of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner, but since the original
1982 trial a large amount of evidence has accumulated pointing directly to
Mumia’s innocence. The district attorney still maintains there was eyewitness
testimony that Mumia killed Faulkner. In truth, none of the eyewitnesses
claimed to have seen Mumia kill Faulkner; instead, they gave inconsistent,
confused accounts of the events.
Further, the key prosecution
witness, Cynthia White, was revealed to have not even been at the scene by
further witness testimony. Veronica Jones, another witness in the original
trial, courageously came forward in later years to reveal intimidation in the
original trial by the police and judge. The prosecution claims that Mumia
confessed in the hospital; however, the two supposed witnesses to the
confession were not present at the time they claim the confession took place.
Also contrary to prosecution claims, there was never any sort of exact match
between Mumia’s gun and the bullets that killed Faulkner.
If all that wasn’t enough, the
original trial was presided over by a judge who made the statement “I’m going
to help them fry the n*****.”
Mumia is innocent! Known as the
“Voice of the Voiceless,” Mumia was a long-time Philadelphia activist and by that
time was an award-winning journalist known for taking the side of those
attacked by the capitalist elites. By pinning the murder of Officer Faulkner on
Mumia, Philadelphia’s notoriously corrupt police and political establishment
thought they could silence his voice.
However, since that original
trial, hundreds of thousands of people have flocked to Mumia’s cause. His case
became the center of the struggle against the racist, anti-worker death
penalty. The massive amounts of attention generated by this mass movement, and
the dedicated legal work of many, has frustrated the attempts to murder Mumia.
It has made his name, writings and speeches well known, amplifying a voice the
powerful hoped to never hear again.
We must continue to fight the
lies and slanders against Mumia and assert his innocence. Whatever the
situation in the legal arena, we need to raise the struggle to free Mumia, along
with all political prisoners, as a crucial element in the struggle against the
capitalist elites. Frame-ups and sham executions are a weapon used against mass
movements of the people that challenge the powerful. The entire “law-and-order”
police establishment that tramples on rights, frames up activists and imprisons
millions of working-class people of color is a scourge facing the struggle
against the powerful few dominating and oppression society, and it must be
fought viciously. We must intensify the struggle to free Mumia Abu-Jamal.
Free Mumia!
