Monday, March 31, 2008

Mumia Abu-Jamal’s Lead Attorney Maintains Hope for Overturning Conviction.

And here is another person fighting for his freedom.

Democracynow.org:


A federal appeals court Thursday refused to overturn the conviction of imprisoned journalist and former Black Panther Mumia Abu-Jamal and rejected his call for a new trial. However, the long-awaited ruling said Abu-Jamal, who has been on death row for twenty-six years, deserves a new sentencing hearing because of flawed jury instructions. If he is re-sentenced, he will face either death or life in prison without parole. We speak to Abu-Jamal’s lead attorney, Robert Bryan. [includes rush transcript]

Guest:

Robert Bryan, Lead counsel for Mumia Abu-Jamal.

JUAN GONZALEZ: A federal appeals court Thursday refused to overturn the conviction of imprisoned journalist and former Black Panther, Mumia Abu-Jamal, and rejected his call for a new trial. However, the long-awaited ruling said that Abu-Jamal, who has been on death row for twenty-six years, deserves a new sentencing hearing because of flawed jury instructions. That’s if he is not sentenced purely just to life in prison without parole. If he is re-sentenced, he will face either death or life in prison without parole.

Abu-Jamal was convicted for killing a white police officer in 1982 following a controversial trial before a predominantly white jury.

JUAN GONZALEZ: So now, with this, since this was a decision, a split decision, of a panel of the Third Circuit, is it possible then to appeal to the entire Third Circuit on this decision?

ROBERT BRYAN: Well, Juan, you’ve actually—you’ve certainly been doing your homework. That’s exactly what we will be doing within the next few weeks. And that is, this was a decision by three judges, two-to-one; now we will be going before the entire court, all the judges, asking them to review this issue.

And, of course, the biggie, the big—the gorilla in the room, the elephant in the room, is the racism in jury selection. The District Attorney’s office in Pennsylvania—in Philadelphia, back during—particularly during that period in the early ’80s, late ’70s and mid- to late ’80s, engaged in a pattern—this is judicially recognized—of removing people from sitting on juries because of race, because of the color of their skin. And when we argued this case before the three-judge panel last May 17, I completed the argument by asking the rhetorical question: are we to believe that the District Attorney did not engage in racism in jury selection in this case, when it’s judicially recognized it did in case after case, both before and after the trial of Mumia Abu-Jamal?

And, of course, the trial of Mumia Abu-Jamal was the biggest trial in the history of the city of Pennsylvania. And Mumia Abu-Jamal, as people certainly know, is a very activist writer, journalist—he’s written five books on death row—and he’s the person who’s always bringing the authorities, the establishment, to task. He’s very critical of abuse of government, people abusing power, of racism, that type of thing. And so, racism was certainly at work in this case. More on the story.


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