[icffmaj] MUMIA Rallies; New article; Interview
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*11/9 - 12pm, Philadelphia, PA
Third Circuit Court, 6th and Market
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*11/9 - 12pm, Oakland, CA
14th and Broadway, 510-763-2347
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*11/9 - 7pm, SF, CA
Centro del Pueblo, 474 Valencia Street, SF, CA, 510-268-9429 - please see below
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*Article by Jeff Mackler - Mumia: Life in Prison or Execution? - Please see below
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*Copenhagen, Denmark interview video with Mumia's attorney:
http://www.youtube.com/user/KPnetTV#p/a/u/0/5xmuIxWRftw
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Please post widely - Mobilize for Mumia!
San Francisco: Protest meeting/premier film showing, "Justice on Trial: The Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal." Tuesday, Nov. 9, 7 pm, Centro del Pueblo, 474 Valencia Street (between 15th and 16th Streets). 510-268-9429
Philadelphia: RALLY AT 12 NOON AT 6TH AND MARKET STS. MUMIA'S HEARING IS AT 2PM AT 601 N. MARKET ST.
THE STREETS MUST BE PACKED WITH SUPPORTERS!!
U.S. Court of Appeals Nov. 9 hearing -
Mumia Abu-Jamal: Life in prison or execution?
By JEFF MACKLER
Supporters of death-row inmate and innocent political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal will mobilize outside the courthouse in Philadelphia on Nov. 9 at 12 p.m., as the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit meets, for a second time, to decide whether Mumia is to be executed post haste or granted a new trial.
The Third Circuit announced its decision to hear the case almost immediately following the circus-like spectacle orchestrated by Philadelphia's Fraternal Order of Police, its district attorney and mayor, and a host of other blood-thirsty would-be Mumia executioners. They and their associates rallied last month to the premier showing of Tigre Hill's twisted new film, "The Barrel of a Gun," which promised to reveal critical evidence proving that Mumia was the killer of Police Officer Daniel Faulkner on Dec. 9, 1981.
While Hill's film showing made the front page of the Philadelphia Inquirer, neither that paper nor any other in the country could bring itself to affirm Hill's unsubstantiated conclusions. Indeed, Hill's thesis that Mumia had participated in an ambush of Faulkner was never offered by the prosecution itself during Mumia's trial.
This did not deter Philadelphia's DA, Seth Williams, from declaring to the media that he would seek the death penalty. Nor was it a coincidence, in this writer's view, that the Third Circuit followed Hill's film premier with an announcement that it would hear the case on Nov. 9.
The last time that the Third Circuit heard Mumia's appeal, in 2008, it affirmed the decision of Federal District Court Judge William H. Yohn, that the instructions given to the jury by "hanging judge" Albert Sabo in Mumia's discredited 1982 trial were fundamentally flawed and in violation of the famous 1988 U.S. Supreme Court decision in the case of Mills v. Maryland. The Mills decision made it more difficult for juries to execute people found guilty of murder by making it clear that a majority, as opposed to unanimity, was sufficient to consider the weight of each and every mitigating circumstance sufficient to negate a death sentence. Citing Mills, both District Court judge Yohn and the Third Circuit voided Mumia's death sentence and ordered a new sentencing trial.
But last year's decision of the U.S. Supreme Court vacated the Third Circuit's Mills ruling and instructed it to reconsider in light of its January 2010 new interpretation of Mills rendered by the case of Smith v. Spisak.
Spisak was a U.S. Nazi Party member who confessed to the killing of three people. Spisak's death sentence, like Mumia's, had been voided due to a Mills violation.
Pennsylvania officials filed a friend-of-the-court brief in support of the Ohio prosecutors' appeal, realizing that a Supreme Court reversal or new interpretation of Mills could be used to re-instate Mumia's death sentence. That is precisely what happened, and that is what they are now seeking on Nov. 9. Rather than being compelled to organize a new sentencing trial in which new and old evidence demonstrating the racist frame-up of Mumia during his 1992 trial can be presented, they would much prefer an immediate order by the Third Circuit to reverse its previous decision and replace it with a new sentence of execution. If this turns out to be the case, Pennsylvania's Governor Edward Rendell has pledged to sign yet a third warrant for Mumia's execution.
Should the Third Circuit order a new sentencing trial, however, the jury is not permitted to find Mumia "Not Guilty!" While the proceeding itself must include Mumia's right to introduce evidence of innocence, the jury will nevertheless be limited to determining Mumia's sentence only, that is, life in prison or execution.
Even if the jury should believe that Mumia is indeed innocent and that he has proven his innocence "beyond a reasonable doubt," the peculiarities of the "law" in corporate America preclude a reversal of the guilty verdict of the previous jury. In this instance as well as others decreed by the Supreme Court in recent decades, "innocence is no defense." In its "wisdom," and to limit endless appeals by the innocent, the courts today operate on the thesis that "innocence is trumped by timeliness." If an innocent person does not submit evidence of innocence within whatever statutory guidelines are set by each state, the evidence is worthless!
Further, the Anti-terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA), signed by President Clinton, also designed to hasten the murder of the innocent, declares that federal courts today must grant a "presumption of correctness" to the findings of fact of state courts. Previously, the criteria employed in federal court appeals, habeus corpus, was based on the presumption of innocence. That is, defendants had the right to challenge the "findings of fact" of state courts.
The AEDPA was passed by Congress and signed by Clinton because a full 40 percent of all state court convictions in murder cases were reversed on appeal to the federal judiciary. Why? Authoritative studies demonstrated that the state court convictions were often based on ineffective assistance of counsel, police falsification and planting of evidence, intimidation of witnesses, withholding of evidence of innocence, etc. AEDPA was designed to affirm racist state court decisions and to make them "effective," that is, carried out swiftly without serious recourse to federal courts. Scapegoated Blacks and Latinos were the major victims.
Mumia's case was riddled with all of the above inherent racist and classist practices, yet the vast majority of the points raised in his federal appeals were rejected, with Judge Yohn citing the AEDPA. The findings of fact of the racist Judge Albert Sabo, the same Sabo who stated in his antechambers before entering the courtroom to judge Mumia's case stated, "Yeah, and I'm going to help 'em fry the nigger," had to be presumed correct.
To expect that the Third Circuit will on Nov. 9 uphold its previous ruling that voided Mumia's death sentence is to be naïve at best. This is the same Third Circuit that in 2008 violated its own precedents and the U.S. Supreme Court decision in the famous case of Batson v. Kentucky. The Batson decision voided murder convictions in which Blacks were excluded from juries. In Mumia's case, 11 of 14 Black jurors were excluded by racist preemptory challenges of the prosecution.
Mumia asked for a re-hearing on his Batson claim, this time before the whole panel, or nine judges of the Third Circuit, as opposed to the original three-judge panel. Maybe, some thought, the whole court would remember that one of their own, Justice Alito, now sitting on the U.S. Supreme Court, had written the decision and had sharply noted that the exclusion of even one juror on account of race, voided the trial result. But the Third Circuit, with nine judges participating, rejected Mumia's request for a re-hearing, without comment.
To be fair, one judge, Donetta Ambrose, did dissent, stating that the "core guarantee of equal protection, ensuring citizens that their State will not discriminate on account of race, would be meaningless were we to approve the exclusion of jurors on the basis of Š race. Š I respectfully dissent."
With the Supreme Court's Nazi Spisak decision in hand and with the same court's having vacated the Third Circuit's ruling that had previously voided Mumia's death sentence, it's not unreasonable to expect these "prestigious" jurists to bend once again to carry out the decisions of those in power who seek to justify their corrupt criminal "justice" system and silence one of its most prominent critics.
But this may not be the end of the "legal" struggle. There may be still be some extra innings left in this 30-year game, innings that allow Mumia's supporters to strengthen a movement that makes the political price of the execution and incarceration of the innocent Mumia Abu-Jamal too high to pay and to win Mumia's freedom.
A recent CounterPunch article by David Lindorff, author of the book, "Killing Time: An Investigation into the Death Row Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal," points to the fact that when in 2001 Judge Yohn, citing the AEDPA, ruled against Mumia on most of the 29 points in Mumia's federal appeal, he did, citing Mills, rule in favor of Mumia on one point. He voided the death penalty. In so doing, Yohn declined to rule on four other points in Mumia's brief, declaring them essentially moot because they dealt with the sentencing aspect of Mumia's trial and he had already voided Mumia's death sentence.
Should the Third Circuit now reverse itself and Yohn, these previously mooted (set aside as no longer relevant) points could be expected to once again come into play. Mumia's attorneys would, of course, appeal any negative Third Circuit decision back to the Supreme Court for yet another ruling. If Mumia lost there once again, Yohn's mooted points might still see the light of day.
Here's a summary of Lindorff's account of the four points that might allow further litigation and therefore delay any effort to execute Mumia: "The first unresolved appeal claim goes to the heart of a defendant's right to representation and a fair trial. Abu-Jamal's attorney, Anthony Jackson, testified under oath at a Post-Conviction Relief Act hearing in 1995 to the obvious truth that he did absolutely nothing to prepare for the sentencing portion of the trial. He called no witnesses to testify to Abu-Jamal's character, an astonishing lapse which left the prosecutor free and unchallenged in portraying Abu-Jamal as a cop-hating terrorist.
"A second line of appeal, also mooted, Š was a claim that Abu-Jamal's first, fourth, fifth and fourteenth amendment rights were violated when Prosecutor Joseph McGill improperly used Abu-Jamal's membership, as a 15-year-old boy, in the Black Panther organization, in trying to portray him as a vicious cop-hater.
"Third, McGill told the jury: 'Ladies and gentlemen, you are not asked to kill anybody. You are asked to follow the law. The same law that I keep on throwing at you, saying those words, law and order. I should point out to you it's the same law that has for six months provided safeguards for this defendant. The same law, ladies and gentlemen, the same law that will provide him appeal after appeal after appeal. ... The same law, ladies and gentlemen, that has made it so because of the constant appeals ... nobody at all has died in Pennsylvania since 1962 for an incident that occurred in 1959.'
"Again, the courts at all levels-in Pennsylvania, in the Third Circuit, and the U.S. Supreme Court itself-have all overturned death penalty sentences based upon just such statements having been made to juries at trials.
"Finally, there is a fourth avenue of appeal Š the claim that the prosecutor knowingly withheld evidence in police files which showed that Abu-Jamal had no criminal record and no propensity for violence."
The "appearance" of justice is important in "democratic" America but the state power is finding it increasingly difficult to maintain this illusion or appearance, hence the passage in 1996 of the AEDPA, the Patriot Act of 2001, the frame-up, absurd and abhorrent 10-year re-sentencing of Lynne Stewart, the massive persecution of Arabs and people of Islamic faith, the recent FBI raids and Grand Jury subpoenas and the associated and daily infringements of civil and democratic rights that are justified in the name of pursuing the government's "war on terrorism."
Mumia's ongoing persecution represents the tip of the iceberg in regard to the legal atrocities that have been committed to keep this innocent man, on death row. His is a case study in the use of lying witnesses, falsification of evidence, manipulation of the crime scene, witness intimidation, police lying, exclusion of evidence proving innocence, and a myriad of constitutional violations including rejection of the right to act as one's own counsel, Mumia's physical exclusion from a majority of the trial proceedings against him, the racist exclusion of Black jurors, a racist judge who ruled against more than 100 motions presented by Mumia's defense team, and more.
Mumia's freedom would represent a victory for all people struggling for freedom and equality. All out to Philadelphia, Nov. 9! Stop the execution! Free Mumia now!
Jeff Mackler is the director of the Northern California-based Mobilization to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal. For further information contact: International Concerned Family and Friends of Mumia Abu-Jamal, (215) 476-8812 or The Mobilization to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal, (510) 268-9429, freemumia.org.
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PLEASE CIRCULATE WIDELY!
View/Download the Flyer Here: http://www.abu-jamal-news.com/docs/nov9.pdf
and/or scroll down.
Stop The Execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal!
--Emergency Protest Rally & Film Screening of "Justice On Trial: The Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal"
Tuesday, November 9, 7:00 PM
Centro del Pueblo, 474 Valencia Street, San Francisco
(Between 15th and 16 Streets - near 16th St. BART)
FEATURED SPEAKERS:
Hans Bennett, Co-founder, Journalists for Mumia
Rebecca Doran, Committee to Free Kevin Cooper
Jeff Mackler, West Coast Coordinator, Lynne Stewart Defense Committee
Laura Herrera, Co-Coordinator, Mobilization to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
Alicia Jrapko, International Committee for the Freedom of the Cuban Five
Tom Lacey, State Committee, California Peace & Freedom Party
Cristina Gutierrez, Barrio Unido
Merle Woo, SF poet
$5 to $20 sliding scale. No one turned away for lack of funds. This is a benefit for Journalists for Mumia. For more information contact: The Mobilization to Free Mumia Abu-Jamal, 510-268-9428, www.freemumia.org,
[email protected]
Wheelchair accessible. Labor donated.
November 9 Oral Arguments in Philadelphia
In Philadelphia, on Nov. 9, the US Third Circuit Court will hear oral arguments concerning whether or not Mumia will be executed without a new sentencing trial, as the District Attorney is seeking to do. The court ruling can be issued anytime after oral arguments. If the ruling is against Mumia, he could then be executed very quickly.
Mumia's lead attorney, Robert R. Bryan, says that Mumia is now "in the greatest danger since his 1981 arrest."
In 2001, US District Court Judge William Yohn somewhat overturned the death penalty (Mumia has never left death row) and ruled that if the DA still wants to execute, there must first be a new sentencing-phase jury trial where evidence of innocence can be presented, but the jury can only decide between execution or life in prison without parole. This 2001 ruling by Judge Yohn was affirmed by the US 3rd Circuit in 2008, but in January, 2010, the US Supreme Court vacated the ruling and sent the case back down to the 3rd Circuit for reconsideration.
"Justice on Trial" Film
The new film, "Justice on Trial: The Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal," directed by Kouross Esmaeli and produced by Johanna Fernandez (co-coordinator of Educators for Mumia) premiered in Philadelphia at the National Constitution Center on Sept. 21, the same day as the right-wing anti-Mumia film, called "The Barrel of a Gun."
"Barrel" ignores the frame-up nature of Mumia's trial and the "evidence" used to convict him. "Justice," in contrast, fairly presents the arguments made by Mumia's supporters alongside the prosecution's alleged shooting scenario and interviews with others advocating Mumia's execution. Justice's featured interviews include press photographer Pedro Polakoff (whose newly discovered crime scene photos expose police manipulation of evidence) and author J. Patrick O'Connor (whose 2008 book argues that the actual shooter of Officer Daniel Faulkner was a man named Kenneth Freeman). For more about the film, visit: www.emajonline.com, www.abu-jamal-news.com and watch the trailer here: http://bignoisefilms.org/films/tactical-media/114-justice-on-trial