From NBC Philadelphia More than 60 campers from Northeast Philadelphia were turned away from a private swim club and left to wonder if their race was the reason. “I heard this lady, she was like, ‘Uh, what are all these black kids doing here?’ She’s like, ‘I’m scared they might do something to my child,’” said camper Dymire Baylor. The Creative Steps Day Camp paid more than $1900 to The Valley Swim Club. The Valley Swim Club is a private club that advertises open membership. But the campers’ first visit to the pool suggested otherwise. “When the minority children got in the pool all of the Caucasian children immediately exited the pool,” Horace Gibson, parent of a day camp child, wrote in an email. “The pool attendants came and told the black children that they did not allow minorities in the club and needed the children to leave immediately.” The next day the club told the camp director that the camp’s membership was being suspended and their money would be refunded. “I said, ‘The parents don’t want the refund. They want a place for their children to swim,’” camp director Aetha Wright said.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Judge Orders Release of Guantanamo Prisoner After Seven Years, Saying Government Position “Defies Common Sense”
A federal judge has ordered the release of another prisoner held at Guantanamo Bay, thirty-year-old Syrian national Abdul Rahim Abdul Razak al-Janko. In the year 2000, al-Janko was tortured by al-Qaeda, who accused him of being a Western spy, and he was imprisoned by the Taliban for eighteen months. He was then captured by the United States in 2002 and spent the next seven years in Guantanamo. On Monday, District Court Judge Richard Leon rejected the government’s position that al-Janko had once been a part of al-Qaeda, saying it “defies common sense.” We speak with British journalist Andy Worthington,
Brisenia, who was nine at the time, was murdered in her home by armed members of a right-wing paramilitary group. Right-wing militias, deaths squads and other such paramilitary organizations were relatively common in Latin America during the tumultuous 1980s, and their horrendous crimes and history of cruel human rights abuses are well known and have been extensively documented by human rights groups. What makes Brisenia's murder different isn't just that it ocurred more recently, but rather that it ocurred on American soil, and that the violent paramilitary organization that murdered her while she recoiled and wept, pleading for her life, was an American terrorist organization known as the Minutemen American Defense organization, a group whose founder, Shawna Forde, has well established ties to larger and better known anti-immigrant groups such as the Minutemen and FAIR, the Federation For American Immigration Reform (Forde once served as a spokesperson for FAIR).
It was no random act of violence. Shawna Forde, the suspected mastermind of the home invasion robbery in which Brisenia and her father Raul were killed, is the leader of the vigilante group Minutemen American Defense and has been tied to the national Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). Both groups have been labeled by the Southern Poverty Law Center as “hate groups” and have a long record of routinely dehumanizing immigrants and vilifying Latinos.
The problem is bigger than FAIR or any other group. Some members of Congress have been legitimizing these organizations for years—inviting them to testify as “experts”—while the rhetoric coming from these groups has given rise to violence against Latinos, like the killing of Brisenia and Raul Flores. That needs to end now.
I’ve joined Presente.org in demanding that Congress renounce FAIR, the Minutemen, and other anti-immigrant hate groups. Please click below to join me, and ask your friends and family to do the same:
http://presente.org/ref/20856/campaigns/flores
FAIR and the Minutemen groups are regularly quoted in the mainstream media—FAIR more than 500 times in 2008—giving them a megaphone to broadcast their hateful rhetoric: like FAIR executive director Dan Stein’s claim that “illegal aliens are more prone to criminal activity than the rest of the population,” or Minutemen co-founder Jim Gilchrist’s assertion that it is “okay to say ‘rapist,’ ‘robber’ and ‘murderer’” when describing “illegal aliens.”
As vile as their rhetoric is, even more disturbing is when our elected representatives applaud their efforts and parrot their messages. Take Ranking Republican Congressman on the House Immigration Sub-Committee, Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), a long-time friend of extremist groups, who wrote that a day without immigrants in America would mean “the lives of 12 U.S. citizens would be saved who otherwise die a violent death at the hands of murderous illegal aliens each day.” Those debunked claims were then repeated hundreds of times by FAIR and others, creating an echo chamber of racism and hate.
Or take Senator Jeff Sessions (R-Alabama), the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, who has likened immigrants to terrorists and child molesters, as well as taking money from a group with white-supremacist ties.
Elected leaders like these, together with their allies in extremist anti-immigrant groups, create a climate of hatred that leads to violence – as evidenced by a recent string of hate-motivated killings across the country .
Enough is enough. Please join me in holding members of Congress accountable by demanding they stop legitimizing FAIR and the Minutemen. It takes only a moment:
http://presente.org/ref/20856/campaigns/flores
The American political scene has recently been dominated by a dark and dangerous undercurrent of nativist, anti-immigrant demagoguery served up by irresposible propagandists such as CNN's Lou Dobbs and Fox New's Bill O'Reilly and race-baiting politicians such as U.S. Congressman Tom Tancredo among many, many others.
President Obama hit a home run with his nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court -- and not just because she's the "woman who saved baseball" by ending the strike in 1995, nor simply because she would be the first Latina ever to serve on the high court.
It was a home run because in her three-decade career as a prosecutor, judge, private litigator and law professor, she has time and again earned bipartisan praise as one of America's finest legal minds. And it was the right choice because Judge Sotomayor -- herself born and raised in a South Bronx housing project -- has summed up the American dream in her own incredible story and never once forgotten how the law affects our daily lives.
Now her historic nomination goes to the Senate. I know that process well, and I can tell you that the debate of the coming weeks and months will be shaped by the public response in the next few hours and days. It's critical that the Senate and the public clearly see where the American people stand.
I've followed Judge Sotomayor's remarkable journey for years. I voted for her when President George H.W. Bush nominated her for the District Court in 1992, and I was proud to vote for her again when President Bill Clinton nominated her for the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in 1998.
Born to a Puerto Rican family, Sotomayor grew up in a public housing project in the South Bronx. She was an avid reader from an early age, and was first inspired to pursue a legal career by the Nancy Drew mystery novels. Driven by her mother's belief in the power of education and her own relentless work ethic, she excelled in school. She won a scholarship to Princeton University, graduated summa cum laude, and then went on to attend Yale Law School where she served as an editor of the prestigious Yale Law Journal.
Like President Obama, Sotomayor passed up many more lucrative opportunities after law school to put her degree to work for the public good. She served as an Assistant District Attorney in New York, tackling some of the hardest cases facing the city, including robberies, assaults, murders, police brutality, and child pornography. Her growing reputation for fearlessness and legal brilliance prompted her first nomination to the federal bench, and she's only continued to soar.
If confirmed, she would start with more federal judicial experience than any Justice in a century, more overall judicial experience than any Justice in 70 years, and replace David Souter as the only Justice with firsthand experience as a trial judge. She has participated in over 3,000 panel decisions and authored roughly 400 opinions, expertly handling difficult issues of constitutional law, complicated procedural matters, and lawsuits involving complex business organizations.
In her years on the bench, Judge Sotomayor has earned acclaim from legal scholars and experts from both sides of the aisle for her intellectual toughness, her probing oral questioning, and her ability to issue decisions that hold both factual details and legal doctrines in equal measure. And she's never failed to apply a steady, common-sense analysis of how the law touches our daily lives.
Her story is incredible. Her qualifications are undeniable. And her judgment will serve us all well on the highest court in the land.
By JESS BRAVIN and EVAN PEREZ WASHINGTON -- Supreme Court Justice David Souter has disclosed plans to retire, two congressional aides briefed on the decision said, a move that would create the first vacancy on the high court for President Barack Obama to fill. Justice Souter, 69 years old, has been a reliable member of the court's liberal wing. President Obama likely to select a candidate young enough to serve for decades, bolstering the court's aging liberal faction.
Justice Souter was a little-known New Hampshire jurist when Republican President George H.W. Bush elevated him to the Supreme Court in 1990. Influential New Hampshire Republicans vouched for his credentials, but he soon proved a disappointment to conservatives hungry for a reversal of precedents they opposed.
Joining with Justices Sandra Day O'Connor and Anthony Kennedy -- moderates appointed by President Ronald Reagan -- Justice Souter voted to limit, rather than overturn, Roe v. Wade, the 1973 opinion that recognized abortion rights. Justice Souter was no liberal trailblazer, like the jurist he succeeded, William Brennan. But as the court's center shifted to the right after Justice Thurgood Marshall's 1991 retirement, Justice Souter increasingly found himself on the court's left wing.
In 1992, just two years into his term, Justice Souter provided the fifth vote in a key abortion case, Planned Parenthood v. Casey, that served notice the court wasn't ready to overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision upholding a woman's right to have an abortion.
Justice Souter was again in the majority in a 5-4 decision in 2003 when the high court endorsed the use of race in choosing students for America's top universities and the concept of racial diversity as a compelling national interest.
In recent years, he has almost invariably aligned with Justices John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer on the defining issues, including the executive powers asserted by former President George W. Bush, the constitutionality of executing criminals for crimes short of murder, and the extent government can consider race when seeking to promote diversity.
A Souter retirement comes as little surprise. While justices Stevens, 89, and Ginsburg, 76, are older, both have said they enjoy the work and have more to contribute to the bench. Justice Ginsburg had an operation earlier this year to remove a cancerous tumor from her pancreas, but the court has said the disease was caught early and the surgery was successful.
Justice Souter has complained about life in Washington and even about aspects of the court's work, such as the numbingly technical cases involving applications of pension or benefits law. Earlier this year, he told friends he planned to retire at the end of the present term if Justices Stevens and Ginsburg decided to remain on the court for at least another term. Unlike his fellow justices, he didn't hire law clerks for the term that begins in October, and some members of his staff were inquiring about finding other jobs.
"I don't think it is a big surprise," said Bill Glahn, who once worked for Justice Souter in the New Hampshire attorney general's office and has remained friends with him since. "He's almost 70 years old. At some point, you make a choice as whether you're going to be there forever or whether you want to retire and do some of the other things you want to do, whether it's taking a walk in the morning or reading some books." To have a new justice in place by the beginning of the court's term in October would mean conducting a Senate confirmation process. Democrats -- along with two independents -- have 59 votes in the Senate and a 60th possibly on the way. They are in a good position to push through any nomination.
The Obama administration hasn't publicly named any choices to fill a high-court vacancy. But possible candidates could include Kathleen Sullivan, 53, a professor and former dean of Stanford Law School; Georgia Chief Justice Leah
THE FOLLOWING ARE THE ONES MOST LIKELY TO BE CHOSEN..., ACCORDING TO RUMORS! WHO DO THINK BE THE NEXT CANDIDATE FOR U.S. SUPREME COURT? I ONLY HAVE THE TOP THREE FEATURED IN VIDEO:
Who will it be? U.S.Circuit Judge Sonia Sotomayor?(2nd on bottom row)
Will it be Judge Leah Ward Sears? (4th on bottom row)
Posted by Denver Louis Filed under: BlackSpin, News
Note: The video stated a teen girl..., but the lady was 42 years old in the write up..., never the less.., it was still abuse!
There's a tender balance between being a law enforcement officer and a thug with a badge. The problem is that too often that balance tends to tip toward the latter. Every day it seems there's a new video out there of police abusing their power. This video from Millville, Pa., was just released and is at the center of a civil lawsuit.
Sheila Stevenson, 42, was pulled over on Feb. 3 for illegally riding her bike on the sidewalk. The arresting officer attempts to mace her and inadvertently hits himself. So what does he do while she's already restrained on the ground? Take a look at this unbelievable video.
Seriously, when are police going to learn? Where in the job description does it say you're at liberty to assault or even murder people? The disturbing trend of an out-of-control national police force seems more endemic of countries where people have less-pronounced civil rights. This is why we must be vigilant in keeping police honest, because the day we stop being outraged about things like this is the day we stop caring about our civil rights.
The George County Sheriff’s Department claims that on that fateful morning, Billey Joe attempted to break into the home of an on-again, off-again girlfriend in the nearby city of Lucedale. According to the sheriff’s department, he left the scene and ran a red light at 5:34 a.m. After a 1½-mile pursuit, Billey Joe got out of his truck, met sheriff’s deputy Joe Sullivan and handed over his license. Then Billey Joe returned to his truck, put a 12-gauge shotgun he used to target deer to his head and committed suicide. It was 5:40 a.m.
Sullivan’s patrol car was not equipped with a camera, and his is the only account of the event. Billey Joe’s friends and family don’t believe the story.
Billey Joe was black. Sullivan is white. The case, as such, is shrouded by race in this small community in the Deep South. Everyone wants answers. No one is getting them. The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation and the local district attorney – the two bodies in charge of the case – have issued neither a ruling nor many pertinent details.
Annette and Billey Joe Johnson Sr. want to know how their son, Billey Joe Johnson Jr., 17, died.
Johnson, a talented running back at George County (Lucedale, Miss.) High School, was remembered during a funeral service at his high school. He died of a gunshot wound Dec. 8 during a traffic stop by a George County deputy in Lucedale after the officer witnessed Johnson run a red light and a four-way stop.
The state and the Johnsons' lawyer are conducting investigations into his death. "The investigation is going to be an exhaustive search for the truth," District Attorney Tony Lawrence said.
Here is what the police say about Billey Joe’s death: During a routine traffic stop, Billey Joe Johnson Jr. shot himself in the head.
He woke at 4:30 a.m. that day, a school day, at his parents’ trailer and took a shower. His dad thought he was going hunting. Instead, he drove 15 miles to Lucedale, the 2,700-person county seat and location of both his high school and a girlfriend. Billey Joe’s truck had notes from multiple female admirers, and his friends said he enjoyed the attention offered to a star athlete. He’d already run for 4,000 yards in his high school career and helped make George County a state powerhouse. Everyone knew him. Many wanted to be with him.
One girl, whom Yahoo! Sports will not name since she is a minor, had been around the longest. It was a typical high school relationship – “they’d break up every day and then get back together,” said one of his friends, Drew Bradley. The fact that she was white bothered some people.
“It’s George County, it’s a little Southern town,” said Bradley, who is white. “You’ve got a bunch of racist people down here. You have people who hated on them because it was black and white.”
After two months of questions and very few answers, a George County grand jury rendered a unanimous decision ,12-gauge shotgun accidentally discharged as Billey Joe Johnson Jr. was attempting to move the shotgun in the cab portion of this truck,"
The family isn’t buying it.
"I ain't buying that," said his mother, Annette Johnson, after the 16-member grand jury ruled Thursday. "We are going further and we are going higher."
Her pursuit is joined by her attorney, who plans to continue his own investigation, and the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, which said it would submit evidence to the U.S. Justice Department and ask for a federal probe.
Drop the Rock': Repeal Unfair Drug Laws By Brett Story March 30, 2009
Hundreds of New Yorkers rallied in front of Gov. David Paterson's office March 25 to urge the repeal of Rockefeller Drug Laws. Instituted in the 1970s, the laws dole out mandatory sentences for minor infractions and disproportionately affect communities of color, 90 percent of those jailed under its auspices are black or Latino. As a state senator Governor Paterson vocally criticized the laws and The Nation reported early in his term his administration's focus on overturning them. The New York Times reports that along with the Democratic state assembly and senate, Governor Paterson has reached an agreement to dismantle the drug laws.
Yesterday there was an outpouring of love and support for the TJMS through e-mails, texts and phone calls letting us know how much we will be missed on Chicago radio. Many of you were looking for a call to action, and to you, I say this:
One, thank you for caring enough to take time out of your busy life to let us know how you feel. Two, the most immediate call to action for people in Chicago and anywhere else where we aren’t heard is to listen on BlackAmericaWeb.com - which, by the way, had a record number of people tuning in to hear our show yesterday. And three, support the advertisers you hear on our stations, and let them know you’re supporting them because you heard them advertising on our show.
Without boring you, I’d like to give you a quick lesson in black radio and what we are up against in this ever-changing world. We face a system that has never worked in the favor of black media and other factors, such as a new ratings system, and the country’s horrible economic state stacks even more odds against us. The bottom line is black radio will never be what it once was, and there’s absolutely nothing we can do about that.
There are and will continue to be radio stations playing urban music, and of those few, the only way they will survive is if they are making money. They make money from the commercials they sell, and that’s based on them being able to prove that the people listening are good candidates for buying their products. It isn’t personal; it’s business. And as much as I appreciate the emotions expressed in the letters, texts and e-mail I’ve gotten, we can only move forward if we recognize the business we’re dealing with.
Like all businesses, the success of black radio is based on supply and demand - not just for the station owners and the advertisers but for the audience too. You know what you want, and you know whether the radio stations you tune in to are providing it. As much as you love to hear R&B music, if that is all you wanted, you could load your iPod with your favorite songs and never tune in to black radio again. But you obviously want more than that, and you have fewer places to get it than ever before. So, the issue is much bigger than which urban D.J. you like better in the morning. The issue is whether the urban format is worth saving.
The old saying “Give a man fish; you feed him for a day but teach a man to fish; you feed him for a lifetime” has never rung truer. If it had not been for the urban format, many of us would not have ever known the importance of radio advocacy and how a wrong can be righted with the power of our phone calls, pens, voices and votes. It has helped us to do everything from saving a sitcom from cancellation to electing the first African-American president. It has made us more accountable, more self reliant and more empowered.
In the end, whether there are 50 black radio stations or two, you will have been victorious because you stood tall and lifted your voice. We have black radio to thank for that, and that’s something no man, no format, and no conglomerate can take away. So we move forward stronger, wiser and looking for a better way to do - and that’s a lot more than play music.
Police Kill 73 Year Old Man, Family Claims Cover-Up
This 73 year old cancer survivor, Bernard Monroe was enjoying a barbecue and some family time when the police arrived to question his son Shawn Monroe. At the time of this incident Monroe had no standing arrest warrants pending. The media of course make a point of letting the public know that Shawn has a lengthy record. Monroe was shot by Louisiana Police and his family is alleging racism and a police cover-up.
Here is a quote from the town’s police chief “If I see three or four young black men walking down the street, I have to stop them and check their names,” said [Homer, Louisiana Police Chief Russell] Mills, who is white. “I want them to be afraid every time they see the police that they might get arrested. We’re not out there trying to abuse and harass people—we’re trying to protect the law-abiding citizens locked behind their doors in fear.”
Whatever you think you know about our election systems or Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, this film will make you question further why the news media fails to accurately inform the public. Directed by GNN's Ian Inaba, creator of Eminem's "Mosh" music video, American Blackout critically examines the contemporary tactics used to control our democratic process and silence voices of political dissent.
Many have heard of the alleged voting irregularities that occurred during the presidential elections of 2000 and 2004. Until now, these incidents have gone under- reported and are commonly written-off as insignificant rumors or unintentional mishaps resulting from an overburdened election system.
American Blackout chronicles the recurring patterns of voter disenfranchisement from Florida 2000 to Ohio 2004 while following the story of Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney. Mckinney not only took an active role investigating these election debacles, but has found herself in the middle of her own after publicly questioning the Bush Administration about the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Featuring: Congressional members John Conyers, John Lewis, Stephanie Tubbs-Jones, Bernie Sanders and jounalists Greg Palast and Bob Fitrakis.
Florida's Disappeared Voters' Disfranchised by the GOP " The Nation" In Latin America they might have called them votantes desaparecidos, "disappeared voters." On November 7 tens of thousands of eligible Florida voters were wrongly prevented from casting their ballots--some purged from the voter registries and others blocked from registering in the first instance. Nearly all were Democrats, nearly half of them African-American. The systematic program that disfranchised these legal voters, directed by the offices of Florida Governor Jeb Bush and Secretary of State Katherine Harris, was so quiet, subtle and intricate that if not for George W. Bush's 500-vote eyelash margin of victory, certified by Harris, the chance of the purge's discovery would have been vanishingly small.
American Blackout - Cynthia Mckinney confronts Choicepoint
American Blackout - Ohio trailer
Disenfranchised Felons Unfairly Punished Twice Sonata Lee
The United States has the highest rate of incarceration in the world. More than 2.3 million people are incarcerated in the U.S. -- or roughly one in 100 adults -- according to a report released earlier this year by the Pew Center on the States. Even China, the most populous nation in the world, incarcerates fewer people than we do.
While we laud the historic nature of this election and speculate over how the various voting blocks -- women, Latinos, evangelicals -- will cast their ballots in November, we've forgotten about a group that may have the most at stake in local and national elections: our felons. Overly punitive legislation and a devastating war on drugs have resulted in the disenfranchisement of 5.3 million people who are unable to vote in this country because of a felony conviction.
The most egregious and notorious case may be in Florida during the 2000 election. In an interview with the Christian Science Monitor, Marc Mauer, executive director of the non-profit Sentencing Project, stated that, "On the day of the 2000 [presidential] election, there were an estimated 600,000 former felons who had completed their sentence yet because of Florida's restrictive laws were unable to vote." It's widely believed that the 2000 election would have gone to Al Gore had Florida allowed former felons to cast ballots.
Rhode Island has the nation’s 13th highest percentage of African-American disfranchisement, higher than Mississippi, Texas, Louisiana, Georgia, North and South Carolina and 31 other states
12 percent of African- Americans are barred from voting in Rhode Island
20 percent of African-American men cannot vote statewide
1 in 4 African-American men in Providence cannot vote
40 percent of 18-34 year old African-American men on the Southside of Providence cannot vote Read the rest of the story here
STEALING AMERICA: Vote by Vote
Selected Scenes from STEALING AMERICA: Vote by Vote
Princeton University Exposes Diebold Flaws
The Official Count vs. Exit Polls - 2004 Election
Stolen Election 2004
The Right to Vote Continues to Elude Millions By Ryan Paul Haygood The tragic, history-making events of "Bloody Sunday," on March 7, 1965, in Selma, Alabama, ultimately freed the vote for millions of African Americans. Forty years later, as we reflect on the march that led to passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, we are also reminded that more than two million African Americans continue to be denied the right to vote by felon disfranchisement laws. Black voter registration in Selma in 1965 was made virtually impossible by Alabama's relentless efforts to block the Black vote, which included requiring Blacks to interpret entire sections of Alabama's constitution, an impossible feat for even the most learned. On one occasion, even a Black man who had earned a Ph.D. was unable to pass Alabama's literacy test. On Bloody Sunday, John Lewis and Reverend Hosea Williams led almost 600 unarmed men, women and children in a peaceful march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge from Selma to Montgomery to dramatize to the nation their desire as Black people to participate in the political process. As they crossed the highest part of the bridge, Alabama state troopers, who ridiculed, tear-gassed, clubbed, spat on, whipped and trampled them with their horses, viciously attacked the marchers. In the end, Lewis's skull was fractured by a state trooper's nightstick, and 17 other marchers were hospitalized. In direct response to Bloody Sunday, President Lyndon Johnson, five months later, signed the Voting Rights Act of 1965 into law. Considered by many to be the greatest victory of the civil-rights movement, the Voting Rights Act removed barriers, such as literacy tests, that had long kept Blacks from voting. Despite the promise of increased political participation by Blacks and other racial minorities created by the Voting Rights Act, its full potential has not been realized by one of the last excluded segments of our society: Americans with felony convictions. Today, nearly 5 million Americans are literally locked out of the political process by state felon disfranchisement laws that disqualify people with felony convictions from voting.
For the past five years, the Bush Administration has used the Justice Department, Civil Rights Division - the institutional guarantor of the Voting Rights Act - to legitimize a series of Republican power grabs in the South. Central to these power grabs has been violations of the Voting Rights Act - i.e. the suppression or dilution of African American votes. For instance, in a series of recent preclearance (Section 5) cases, Bush appointees in the Civil Rights Division have overruled career lawyers when their decisions stood in the way of white Republican political objectives. Although a majority of career lawyers rejected Republican backed redistricting plans in Mississippi and Texas, political appointees overruled them and precleared the plans. The Texas and Mississippi redistricting plans have since been implemented, to the tremendous benefit of the GOP. (The Supreme Court has recently agreed to hear a series of cases in which Democrats, blacks, and Latinos argue that the Texas redistricting plan and the manner in which it was implemented violate the Voting Rights Act.) Political appointees also overruled career attorneys when they rejected the 2005 Georgia Voter ID law - passed by the Republican majority in the state legislature - as retrogressive. A federal appeals court later struck down the law, arguing that it would reduce blacks' access to the franchise. African Americans in Texas, Mississippi, and Georgia vote overwhelmingly for the Democratic Party.
The Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal: An Innocent Man on Death Row
Who is Mumia Abu-Jamal? Mumia Abu-Jamal is a renowned journalist from Philadelphia who has been in prison since 1981 and on death row since 1983 for allegedly shooting Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner. He is known as the “Voice of the Voiceless” for his award- winning reporting on police brutality and other social and racial epidemics that plague communities of color in Philadelphia and throughout the world. Mumia has received international support over the years in his efforts to overturn his unjust conviction.
Mumia Abu-Jamal was serving as the President of the Association of Black Journalists at the time of his arrest. He was a founding member of the Philadelphia Chapter of the Black Panther Party as a teenager. Years later he began reporting professionally on radio stations such as NPR, and was the news director of Philadelphia station WHAT. Much of his journalism called attention to the blatant injustice and brutality he watched happen on a daily basis to MOVE, a revolutionary organization that works to protect all forms of life--human, animal, plant--and the Earth as a whole.
The Scene In 1981, Mumia worked as a cab driver at night to supplement his income. On December 9th he was driving his cab through the red light district of downtown Philadelphia at around 4 a.m. Mumia testifies that he let off a fare and parked near the corner of 13th and Locust Streets. Upon hearing gunshots, he turned and saw his brother, William Cook, staggering in the street. Mumia exited the cab and ran to the scene, where he was shot by a uniformed police officer and fell to the ground, fading in and out of consciousness. Within minutes, police arrived on the scene to find Officer Faulkner and Mumia shot; Faulkner died. Mumia was arrested, savagely beaten, thrown into a paddy wagon and driven to a hospital a few blocks away (suspiciously, it took over 30 minutes to arrive at the hospital). Mumia somehow survived.
From NBC Philadelphia
