Supreme Court Setback for Cop Killer
NEW AIA MONOGRAPH REVEALS TRUTH ABOUT RADIO JOURNALIST TURNED DEATH ROW INMATE MUMIA ABU-JAMAL
by Dan Flynn
The ’20s had Sacco and Vanzetti. Committed disciples of Alger Hiss trumpeted his innocence in the ’40s. Angela Davis, the Chicago Seven, and “Hurricane” Carter would gain cult followings in the ’60s and ’70s. Now the 1990s has its very own cause celebre: Mumia Abu-Jamal. In 1981, Abu-Jamal brutally murdered Philadelphia Policeman Daniel Faulkner, shooting him in the back and then in the face. Eighteen years later, scores of rock stars, actors, campus activists, and even world leaders demand his release and put forward various conspiracy theories purporting to prove Abu-Jamal’s innocence.
Cop Killer: How Mumia Abu-Jamal Conned Millions Into Believing He Was Framed is an Accuracy in Academia monograph that I’ve just published. The release of the monograph coincides with Monday’s ruling against Abu-Jamal by the U.S. Supreme Court that makes the signing of his death warrant imminent (although a separate appeal in federal court is expected). Accuracy in Academia will be distributing tens-of-thousands of copies of Cop Killer to students on campuses where the case has become “the issue.” Although the 38-page booklet contains more than 100 citations, don’t look for it to be used in any of the many campus “teach-ins” devoted to the subject or to be required reading in classes devoted to promoting Mr. Abu-Jamal. This is because it dares to suggest that the police got the right man. The booklet debunks claims that Abu-Jamal is a political prisoner like Nelson Mandela, painting the death row inmate as a wannabe O.J. Simpson—one who seeks to avoid punishment for a crime he did commit. A wealth of evidence points to his guilt:
* Five eyewitnesses implicated
Abu-Jamal as the killer. His legally-registered gun was found at
the scene with five spent shells in the chamber—shells that
matched the bullet retrieved from the slain officer’s brain.
Abu-Jamal was found wearing a holster. A return round from the
policeman’s revolver was embedded in Abu-Jamal’s chest.
When police arrived Abu-Jamal lunged for his gun. To this day
Abu-Jamal and his brother, both witnesses to the crime, remain
curiously silent on what happened.
* Numerous people report that they heard him confess—including an anti-death penalty activist sympathetic to his cause. “I shot the mother-f***** and I hope the mother-f***** dies,” three witnesses say he bragged. “I’m glad. If you let me go, I’ll kill all of you cops,” he screamed at a local hospital.
Despite the evidence, Abu-Jamal counts scores of VIPs among supporters. Paul Newman, Susan Sarandon, Whoopi Goldberg, and Oliver Stone have fought for his conviction to be thrown out. Multi-platinum music acts The Beastie Boys, Rage Against the Machine, and Public Enemy raise money for his defense. France’s Jacques Chirac and South Africa’s Nelson Mandela demand his release. Abu-Jamal’s books can be read in at least eight languages. His radio commentaries air nationally. He’s even delivered a college commencement address via a videotaped jailhouse monologue.
Since Abu-Jamal’s conviction, his defense team has put forth evidence and witnesses that, despite fueling the fervor of gullible supporters, have brought further discredit upon their cause in the eyes of mainstream observers.
NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD On appeal, two defense witnesses testified to the dead acting in supernatural ways. William Singletary, who initially denied seeing anything, and said a different man shot the police man twice and when Abu-Jamal later tried to help the incapacitated officer, the officer raised his gun and shot him—a medical impossibility given that the cop was for all intents and purposes already dead. He also claimed that a Philadelphia Police helicopter circled overhead (none existed), that Abu-Jamal wore “a safari suit like the Arabs wear” that escaped everyone else’s notice, and that the policeman spoke after having been shot between the eyes. In 1997, Pamela Jenkins took the stand, claiming that a key prosecution eyewitness, Cynthia White, had recanted her entire testimony to her and outlined a police plot to frame Abu-Jamal. White, however, had died more than four years prior to the time when these conversations were supposed to have taken place. This inconvenient fact hasn’t stopped activists from claiming that prosecution witness White is still alive and that the states of New Jersey and Pennsylvania worked together to fake her death!
IN PURSUIT OF THE REAL KILLERS A core tenet of the conspiracy theory is that several eyewitnesses saw “the real killers” flee the scene. Unfortunately for the defense, the accounts of these witnesses do not mesh with their story. One testified that Mumia Abu-Jamal was the killer and that he was the only person who attempted to escape the area. Another was angered by the defense’s efforts to intimate that she saw the “killers” flee when she told police that she saw people running about the scene long after the shooting had taken place. “No, I think the runner was part of the whole flow of the situation. There was a man killed. There’s panic. Someone was running, maybe two people are running, maybe three people are running, you know. There’s police, there’s news crews, etc.” Another of these defense “witnesses” failed a lie detector test
DID MUMIA’S GUN FIRE THE BULLETS? An article of faith among “Mumiacs” is the idea that the bullet that killed Officer Faulkner was a .44 caliber round, not matching Abu-Jamal’s .38 caliber revolver. Spent shells found in Abu-Jamal’s gun were all .38 Caliber “Plus P” ammunition, the same type of special high-pressure bullet that blew apart the officer’s face and was discovered in his brain. Ballistics tests on this retrieved bullet reported rifling groves that were consistent with the chamber of the gun found beside the suspect, a gun purchased by and registered to Mumia Abu-Jamal. Even Abu-Jamal’s own ballistics analyst conceded under oath that the bullet was not a .44 caliber round.
To believe the story of innocence one has to buy into a conspiracy involving hundreds of people. One has to accept that the states of Pennsylvania and New Jersey acted in collusion to fake the death of a woman to keep her from testifying in favor of Abu-Jamal. Believing the story of a frame-up is to think that the police planted crucial evidence at the scene, including a murder weapon registered to Abu-Jamal. Accepting the defense’s version means that Officer Faulkner shot Abu-Jamal for no reason, that numerous eyewitnesses were coerced into lying, that blacks on the jury were tricked by the racist scheme, and that Abu-Jamal’s silence on this case—but apparently on nothing else—is just noble stoicism.
Such a wild scenario might make for an entertaining fantasy. For those grounded in reality, there is no escaping the fact that Mumia Abu-Jamal, an intelligent and articulate man, is also a guilty man.
(To order a copy of Dan Flynn’s Cop Killer: How Mumia Abu-Jamal Conned Millions Into Believing He Was Framed, send $5 to Accuracy in Academia, 4455 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 330, Washington, DC 20008.)
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