21.10.1999

Act to save Mumia

Death warrant signed

On October 13 the governor of Pennsylvania signed a death warrant for Mumia Abu-Jamal, currently languishing on death row after an imprisonment of 17 years. The execution is due on December 2.

Born Wesley Cook in 1954, Mumia became politically active as a teenager, at 15 helping to found the Philadelphia chapter of the Black Panthers. After its collapse, Mumia found work as a radio journalist, where he quickly gained a reputation as an articulate opponent of capitalism and an outspoken critic of police brutality, defending the Rasta-inspired MOVE collective against police brutality.

In the early hours of December 9 1981, Mumia witnessed a police officer attacking his brother. The events that followed are somewhat confused, partly due to the state’s willingness to tamper with the evidence. What did clearly emerge was that a police officer - Daniel Faulkner - was shot dead and Mumia was critically wounded by a bullet from Faulkner’s gun.

The events surrounding the trial clearly indicate that political motives took absolute precedence for the police and courts. The nature of the evidence and the subsequent means by which Mumia was to be convicted of murder were secondary matters. Thus the police failed to perform ballistic tests to determine whether Mumia’s licensed handgun had even been fired. Suspects picked up in the immediate vicinity were forced to undergo tests for gunshot residue on their hands. Mumia was not. The medical examiner adjudged the fatal bullet to be .44 calibre. Mumia’s handgun fired .38. Part of the bullet shard extracted from Faulkner’s corpse wasn conveniently ‘lost’. Put quite simply, Mumia Abu-Jamal is the victim of a frame-up.

The prosecutor at Mumia’s original trial was blatant about the motives of the state, committing a procedural violation by citing membership of the Black Panther Party as ‘evidence’ of Mumia’s guilt. By attempting to liquidate its critics in this manner, the state attempts to give an unequivocal message to any potential rebels - fighting back is not permissible. This is so-called ‘justice’ in modern-day capitalist society.

The fact that Mumia has been incarcerated for 17 years is in itself a damning indictment of the US system. Yet this “cruel and unusual punishment” is almost the norm in a country whose jails are overflowing with two million prisoners, overwhelmingly poor, black or working class.

British workers have their own examples of a ‘fair play’ legal system. The conviction of Winston Silcott, the so-called ‘Birmingham bombers’ and many others give us a graphic picture of the manner in which the state is willing to frame those it feels are a threat. Workers must organise, on an international scale, in opposition to such abuses.

Save Mumia Abu-Jamal! Free all political prisoners!

Will Parker