J.Mackler: Fall von Th.Miller-El versus Dretke eröffnete Möglichkeiten für neuen Mumia-Prozess …

Von: „MUMIA ABU-JAMAL“ <……..>

Datum: Dienstag, 23. August 2005

  

The June 13 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in the case of Thomas

Miller-El v. Dretke, Director, Texas Department of Criminal Justice

opens the door wide for a new trial for journalist, and innocent

political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal. Jamal has been on Pennsylvania’s

death row for 23 years as a result of a 1982 Philadelphia racist

frame-up trial.

 

The Supreme Court ruled that the preemptive striking by Texas

prosecutors of 10 of 11 Black jurors violated Miller-El’s constitutional

right of equal protection. Miller-El was convicted of murder in a 1985

Dallas County, Texas, trial. At the time Texas prosecutors used

state-produced training manuals with explicit instructions as to how to

exclude Blacks and Jews from capital juries.

 

In an earlier and related case, Miller-El v. Cockrell, the U.S. Supreme

Court overturned a provision of the reactionary 1996 Anti-terrorism and

Effective Death Penalty Act (AEDPA) that essentially eliminated appeal

rights or habeas corpus by applying a standard of proof of innocence

that was virtually impossible to meet. This Clinton-era legislation was

designed to limit federal appeals in capital cases.

 

The AEDPA was employed by Judge William H. Yohn Jr. in Mumia’s Federal

District Court appeal to deny virtually all of the 29 constitutional and

factual issues that Mumia raised in his defense.

 

The two Miller-El decisions bode well for Mumia’s current appeal,

currently pending before the U.S. Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.

Mumia’s 1982

 

Philadelphia trial, conducted by the „hanging judge“ Albert Sabo,

included the prosecution’s use of preemptive challenges to eliminate 11

of 14 potential Black jurors.

 

As with Thomas Miller-El’s trial in Texas, the state of Pennsylvania had

employed an overtly racist training manual, in video form, instructing

prosecutors on how to remove Black jurors.

 

The U.S. Supreme Court overturned Miller-El’s death sentence and ordered

the state of Texas to either immediately release him or to conduct a new

trial.

 

Mumia’s lead counsel, Robert R. Bryan, told Socialist Action that the

Supreme Court’s June 13 decision applied directly to Mumia.

 

Also, the Miller-El v. Cockrell decision may lead to the reversal of

Judge Yohn’s refusal to grant „certificates of appealability“ to Mumia

in regard to several of the 29 points in Mumia’s original federal

appeal, where the impossible AEDPA standards, now defunct, were applied

with impunity.

 

 

*City judge rules against Mumia*

 

 

In a separate development, Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas Judge

Pamela Dembe on June 16 finalized her decision to exclude evidence of

Mumia’s innocence from the record. Dembe refused to consider the

affidavits submitted on behalf of Mumia by Yvette William and Kenneth Pate.

 

Williams had affirmed that the prosecution’s chief eyewitness against

Mumia, Cynthia White, lied on the witness stand. While both were

incarcerated in the same prison, White admitted to Williams that

Philadelphia police had forced her to testify that she saw Mumia shoot

and kill Police Officer Daniel Faulkner, when in fact White had not been

on the murder scene.

 

White, who had some 26 outstanding charges of prostitution and check

fraud against her, was threatened with indefinite imprisonment unless

she cooperated with the prosecution.

 

Kenneth Pate’s step-sister, Priscilla Durham, a hospital security guard,

testified at Mumia’s trial that she had heard Mumia confess to

Faulkner’s murder while Mumia was in Jefferson Hospital. Pate states

that Durham told him that she lied under police pressure.

 

Judge Dembe, appointed as Sabo’s successor upon his death in 2001, has

consistently rejected defense evidence exposing Mumia’s frame-up.

 

 

*Mayor Street reverses himself again*

 

 

In a June 20 meeting with Pam Africa, leader of the International

Concerned Family and Friends of Mumia Abu-Jamal, Philadelphia Mayor John

Street denied having stated on Feb. 16 in a phone conversation with the

slain policeman’s wife, Maureen Faulkner, that „Mumia murdered Daniel

Faulkner and he was in prison where he belonged.“

 

Several Mumia supporters accompanied Africa at this meeting, including

MOVE leader Ramona Africa and Ossining, N.Y., NAACP leader Sadiq

Sundiata. Despite Street’s denial, however, he rejected Africa’s request

to publicly reaffirm his position supporting a new trial for Mumia.

 

Street’s alleged Feb. 16 statement was originally reported in the

Philadelphia Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News, based on

information obtained from Maureen Faulkner.

 

When Street served as a Philadelphia city councilman he often stated

that Mumia had not received a fair trial. During last summer’s NAACP

national convention in Philadelphia, Street’s administrative assistant,

Connie Little, helped draft a strong resolution supporting Mumia’s fight

for a new trial. The resolution was approved by a near-unanimous vote of

the delegates.

 

Street’s reversal came following the Feb. 10 visit to Philadelphia of a

French delegation representing the cities of Paris and St. Denis.

 

The Paris city government had previously granted Mumia honorary

citizenship. Neighboring St. Denis announced that the street leading to

France’s largest sports stadium, named after Nelson Mandela and set to

host the 2008 Olympics, was to be renamed Mumia Abu-Jamal Street. The

joint delegation had come to Philadelphia to protest the cancellation of

a hearing ordered by Judge Dembe, where the Terri Maurer Carter evidence

was to be considered.

Philadelphia officials welcomed the French delegation and presented them

with a miniature replica of the Liberty Bell. Their effort evoked rage

from the city’s dailies, which attacked the delegation as „communists“

and demanded that the mayor repudiate the gift. Street ran for cover,

apparently capitulating to the media pressure, while the media played up

Faulkner’s report that Street had said Mumia was justly sentenced.

 

Street, a preeminent equivocator and political opportunist, may well

shift again with the prevailing winds. In the meantime, Mumia’s

defenders have held his feet to the fire, demanding that he make good on

his original pledge to support a new trial.

 

While Mumia’s appeals, in various stages, slowly move through the state

and federal courts, the state of Pennsylvania continues to seek his

execution.

 

Should the U.S. Court of Appeals rule in favor of the state appeal of an

earlier decision ordering Mumia to be sentenced to life imprisonment as

opposed to execution, Mumia’s life will again be in immediate danger, as

a third order for his execution will likely be drawn up by Gov. Ed Rendell.

 

While all legal avenues are being exhausted to win Mumia’s freedom, his

supporters have always believed that his life rests in the movement’s

capacity to make the political price of his execution and continued

incarceration too high to pay. Mumia has remained alive only due to the

international movement that has stayed the hand of his would-be

executioners.

  

*To support Mumia on the East Coast, call (215) 476-8812.*

 

*On the West Coast, call (415) 255-1085 or click on www.freemumia.org

< mip://0693fec8/ www.freemumia.org >.*