April 8, 2008
Justice in this country is dead.
When Tookie Williams was executed in California, it was to the howls of protest from liberals who viewed as inexcusable the execution of an anti-white former gang member who was sentenced to death for multiple counts of murder (or as the media described him, a nice old man who wrote incredible children’s books).
But I shrugged it off; after all, this was California, and thankfully, a Republican was the governor. Williams died, so justice was served and everyone went home happy.
But the case of Mumia Abu-Jamal is particularly infuriating. Even if we give the people protesting Mumia’s sentence and eventual execution the benefit of the doubt and assume they’re not brain dead, you can’t get much stupider. Here’s a basic outline of the case, as proven in court and affirmed by numerous juries and judges.
Mumia, like most model citizens, was a high school dropout, on his third wife and second child at the time of his conviction. A proud Black Panther, he was suspended from his school for distributing black revolutionary power.
After asking his school, Benjamin Franklin High School, to change its name to Malcolm X High School, Mumia drops out and gets his GED. He worked for a few radio stations and started going to a chapter of the Marijuana Users Association of America.
Like most of his supporters, he was apparently unaware that facts are more important than spin; he was fired from the radio station for not presenting objective news.
Also like his supporters, he was a race baiter who’s sole purpose in life seemed to motivate the black community against the white establishment. Whether in his journalistic rants or in his radio broadcasts, Mumia was a dangerous orator.
And we haven’t even gotten to his crimes yet.
On Dec. 9, 1981, Philadelphia police officer William Faulker was murdered. William Cook, Mumia’s brother, was driving when he was pulled over for a routine traffic stop. After being pulled over, Cook commenced to assault Faulker. Pulling him over was the biggest mistake of Faulkner’s life.
Thanks to Mumia, it was his last. Mumia shot Faulker in the back, and in the scuffle, Faulkner injured Mumia.
When officers arrived at the scene, a .38-caliber revolver was found next to Mumia. It had five spent cartridges. The officers found a critically wounded Mumia unable to flee from the scene and Officer Faulker dead from five shots, one in the face.
And if that’s not enough, Mumia confessed. In the hospital, Mumia screamed “I shot the mother f•••er, and I hope the mother f•••er dies.”
You can’t get clearer than that.
The liberals supporting Mumia have absolutely no evidence. Remember the .38 found near Mumia? It turns out the slugs taken from Faulkner’s body matched Mumia’s gun and the bullet in Mumia matched Faulkner’s gun, confirming the stories told by the witnesses for the prosecution.
In fact, the ballistics expert for the defense didn’t even refute these facts. The best defense Mumia’s supporters have regarding the ballistics is one accidental utterance by the man who performed the autopsy on Faulkner. He mentioned that he also extracted a .44-caliber bullet, leading Mumia’s friends to claim he wasn’t shot by Mumia. Despite this preposterous theory (how do you explain the .38 bullets found in Faulkner?), the doctor who performed the autopsy followed up his statement by clarifying his findings. He said that it was a lay observation, he had absolutely no training in ballistics expertise, and to disregard his statement.
It was disregarded by the court and never admitted as evidence.
In fact, the doctor’s clarification came in 1995, after Mumia was already in jail and his supporters were lying their way toward a goal of acquittal. So apparently the .44-caliber theory went nowhere.
The defense used a witness to tell the court there was a second man, known as the “running man,” who may have committed the crime. This was never proven. One witness, poet Sonia Sanchez, told the court under oath that Mumia was “viewed by the black community as a creative, articulate, peaceful, genial man.”
I’m sure Officer Faulkner appreciated Mumia’s peacefulness when he was shot in the back. I’m almost positive Faulkner’s widow Maureen Faulkner appreciated the creativity of firing a shot at point-blank range into William Faulkner’s face. And how could witnesses not appreciate the articulation of “I hope the mother f•••er dies?”
After three hours of deliberations, Mumia’s original jury delivered a unanimous guilty verdict. Three hours. That’s an incredibly short amount of time for a complex trial, especially one dealing with a capital offense like murder. The district attorney who convicted Mumia described the case as such: It was the “most open-and-shut murder case” ever.
And because our death penalty system is built to protect monsters instead of the William Faulkners of the world, Mumia launched an international appeals campaign to avoid the death penalty.
He appealed to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. Denied.
He appealed to the United States Supreme Court. Denied.
In 1998, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court denied his appeals of not being fried, including any arguments dealing with bad representation.
In December 2001, a judge for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania upheld Mumia’s conviction but overturned his death sentence based on the jury instructions given in the original case.
Apparently Alexander Hamilton was wrong when he said the judicial branch was the least harmful branch. Say anything you want about the legislative branch, but they tend not to favor Black Panthers who shoot cops in the face.
Anyway, Maureen Faulkner and others supporting the dead cop appealed, and the case went further. The U.S. Court of Appeals allowed further consideration of the case to take effect, including whether the jury had a racial bias.
And here’s where we are now: The court upheld his conviction, but ordered a new sentencing trial. The worst thing now is that Mumia is sentenced to life in prison.
But is that enough? A multi-racial jury sentenced this man to die. Unfortunately, the constitution seems to be against shooting a convicted felon in the face, but there’s no question in the minds of the sane that Mumia Abu-Jamal needs to die. The sooner, the better.
Every single pro-Mumia idea ever raised has been shot down by numerous courts. The best things from the defense are: He’s clean and articulate, the jury was racist, the media was racist, Faulkner deserved it, Faulker was killed by fellow cops, Mumia was a nice guy, and the French don’t want him to die.
His supporters name streets after him. They stage marches in his honor (let’s hope they wear protective head gear; I’ve heard lead is hard to extract from the skull). These people are either in need of a practical hobby or are brain dead.
So here’s hoping that the judicial system finally allows this monster’s euthanasia to happen. Even if the execution doesn’t hurt, at least it’ll shut his supporters up.
