ACT NOW

TO SAVE MUMIA ABU-JAMAL

Mumia Abu-Jamal, author of Live From Death Row, Death Blossoms, and award winning journalist is currently awaiting state sanctioned execution at the State Correctional Institute in Huntingdon, Pennsylvania. Mumia Abu-Jamal, the former president of the Philadelphia chapter of the Association of Black Journalists was named "one of the people to watch in 1981" by Philadelphia magazine. Referred to by many as "the voice of the voiceless", Mumia Abu-Jamal was convicted of slaying a Philadelphia police officer in 1982 and sentenced to death after a trial that was profoundly biased and politically motivated.

Over time Mumia Abu-Jamal's attorneys have shown that:

police reports show that four witnesses said they saw the man who shot the officer flee the scene, who could not have been Jamal since he himself was shot and remained at the scene. But no police inquiries into the possibility of another gunman were ever made.

the government then suppressed the evidence that exonerates Jamal by intimidating and coaxing witnesses.

the prosecution ignored ballistic and forensic evidence showing that Mumia could not have fired the shot that killed the police officer.

the jury was unfairly selected to minimize the number of African-Americans - and one juror was removed in Jamal's absence.

a group of white jurors, headed by the jury's foreman, met and deliberated throughout the trial, separate from the two black jurors, in violation of due process.

Jamal, when he was acting as his own attorney, was banished from the courtroom during key portions of his trial - leaving him without adequate defense counsel.

the prosecution used evidence of Jamal's former political affiliations to urge the jury to impose the death penalty, violating his rights under the first and fourteenth amendments.

After police arrived on the scene Mumia was severely beaten by authorities and denied medical treatment for a prolonged period of time. He was arbitrarily stripped of his right to represent himself in the middle of a voir dire and was expelled from the courtroom after protesting this outrage. Mumia was able to select only one juror during his defense and that juror was later discharged for transient reasons. During the sentencing phase of his trial the prosecution told the jury that it was okay to sentence Jamal to death because he had an infinite number of appeals and wouldn't be executed for many years. He went further to stipulate that appelate courts usually overturn death sentences anyhow. All of this in clear violation of Supreme Court case Eddings v. Oklahoma, 455 U.S. 104 (1982). The prosecution also stated that Mr. Jamal's silence on the circumstances of the shooting bespoke a lack of emotion. This being a definitive violation of Jamal's fifth amendment right to silence.

In October the United States Supreme Court refused to hear Mumia's case once again. On October 13 Governor Ridge signed Mumia's death warrant. He was scheduled to be murdered on December 2. Later that month Judge Yohn of a federal appeals court granted Mumia a stay of execution in response to overwhelming public pressure. Now is the time to act to ensure that this railroading doesn't reach its established conclusion. Help organize your family and friends to fight this judicial miscarriage by passing the in formation contained herein to as many people as possible. Mumia will need solid support to get a new trial so be prepared.

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