https://socialistaction.org/2017/05/29/a-day-of-action-for-mumia-abu-jamal/
A DAY OF ACTION FOR MUMIA ABU-JAMAL!
/ 2 days ago
June 2017 Mumia posterPressure DA’s office to release documents
pertaining to former DA Ron Castille’s handling of Mumia Abu-Jamal’s
appeals!
PHILADELPHIA—On Tuesday, May 30, The Mobilization For Mumia, a coalition
of human rights groups in support of political prisoner Mumia Abu Jamal,
will host a 2 p.m. press conference and rally at the Philadelphia DA’s
office to demand that the office comply with a recent court order in the
Abu-Jamal case: the release, by May 30, of all files that cite the
involvement in this case of former DA Ronald Castille. The press
conference will be followed by a march to key media outlets, demanding
balanced coverage of the recent Supreme Court precedent that re-opened
this world famous case as well as the cases of at least 16 other
Philadelphia defendants. The coalition is also asking the public to call
the DA’s office to demand the release of all files in the Abu-Jamal
case, as well as the files of these 16 other cases, all of which were
heard on April 24, 2017.
Baruch College historian Dr. Johanna Fernández explains, “The current
battle for accountability in the Philly DA’s office is bound up in what
happened in the Court of Common Pleas when seventeen defendants,
including Mumia Abu-Jamal, presented the same claim to Judge Leon
Tucker. Each defendant argued separately that one man, the former DA
turned PA Supreme Court judge, Ronald Castille, played the role of
prosecutor and judge in each of their cases—a conflict of interest and
violation of the constitution. These cases were eclipsed in recent
mainstream debates because they threaten to deepen the crisis of
legitimacy in the Philly DA’s office. It’s far more expedient to focus
on Seth Williams’ petty corruption, than to open a Pandora’s box: in
addition to the specific legal violation that brought these defendants
to court, their cases are rife with suppression of evidence by Philly
prosecutors.”
These hearings and dozens of others were granted on the basis of a
recent landmark U.S. Supreme Court case, Williams v. Pennsylvania, which
ruled that it is a violation of due process for a judge to rule on a
case in which he/she had prior personal involvement as prosecutor.
Many of the cases heard by Judge Leon Tucker on the Williams claim
received favorable rulings. In the Abu-Jamal case, Judge Tucker ordered
“Discovery” within 30 days of his April 28, 2017 ruling—that the DA’s
office find and turn over to Abu-Jamal’s attorneys a broad category of
internal documents they need to prove their claims. Abu-Jamal’s
attorneys contend that Castille played a role in the case, that
Abu-Jamal’s initial appeals coincided with Castille’s tenure as DA and
that as top prosecutor, Ronald Eisenberg held, among other arguments,
that if Judge Leon Tucker ruled in favor of Abu-Jamal, this case alone
would overburden his office and the higher courts. Eisenberg failed to
say that should Abu-Jamal’s appeal proceed it would open the door to
hundreds of similar claims and create a firestorm for former prosecutors
who went on to review the same cases when they became judges.
Even before Judge Tucker’s ruling, the Philadelphia DA’s office was
under increasing scrutiny for its climate of racism and collusion with
the Fraternal Order of Police. In addition to Castille’s direct role in
these cases during his tenure in the DA’s office, his election campaign
to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court was heavily backed and financed by the
FOP. In addition, it was under DA Ron Castille’s reign that the
infamous “Jack McMahon training tape” was produced to train Philly
prosecutors to ignore a U.S. Supreme Court ban on racial discrimination
in jury selection. In the tape, McMahon instructs prosecutors: “Blacks
from low-income areas are less likely to convict … you don’t want these
people on your jury.”
According to Pam Africa, “If we are not vigilant, the long history of
corruption and suppression of evidence in the Philadelphia D.A.’s office
could stand in the way of Mumia’s files from seeing the light of day.”
Mumia activist Joe Piette explains, “The potential to re-open Mumia’s
conviction case is dangerous to certain people in high places. The case
is rife with suppression of evidence of innocence, evidence tampering by
the police, and coercion of witnesses to finger Mumia. The PA
establishment has consistently lied about the facts of this case and
demonized Mumia and politicians have consistently used this case to win
votes through racially divisive law and order politics.”
According to Tiffany Robbins, “This opening in the case follows on the
heels of Mumia’s major victory around humane healthcare for prisoners.”
In January, a court order guaranteed Mumia’s right to be treated with
the Hep C cure. Robbins continues, “this court order was the result of a
two-year legal and political battle that could not have been won without
grassroots organizing. The attention garnered by Mumia’s near-death,
medical crisis, and the subsequent public campaign we launched on the
Hep C epidemic in the prisons and communities across PA, may be partly
responsible for a recent decision by Governor Tom Wolf to extend the Hep
C anti-viral drugs to Medicaid recipients.”
The importance of Judge Tucker’s decision lies in its challenge to the
numerous legal roadblocks, especially in the federal courts, to habeas
corpus and petitioners’ rights to appeal their convictions. In 1989, the
US Supreme Court established such a limit in Teague v. Lane, which ruled
that petitioners in the final stages of appeal would not be granted
relief on violations of criminal procedure, barring the emergence of a
new “watershed rule of criminal procedure.” In identifying, for the
first time in U.S. history, an “objective” definition of judicial bias,
the Williams v. Pennsylvania ruling appears to meet the guidelines of
this exception.
More information can be found through Mobilization4Mumia on facebook or
by contacting mobilization4Mumia@xxxxxxxxx.
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May 29, 2017 in Black Liberation, Prisons. Tags: Mumia Abu-Jamal
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