Mumia Abu-Jamal Case: DA Dropping Death Penalty

gimmesometruth27

interesting turn of events in this case. i feel sorry for the cop's wife and family, but they would most likely be waiting another decade before all of this is settled in the legal system. they can't re-try him, as witnesses have died in the last 30 years, and the circumstances in his trial were reported to be fishy.

i remember hearing about this case as a kid in middle and high school. and even moreso in college...

Mumia Abu-Jamal Case: DA Dropping Death Penalty Against Former Black Panther Convicted Of Shooting Philadelphia Cop

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/0 ... 33949.html

PHILADELPHIA -- Prosecutors on Wednesday abandoned their 30-year push to execute convicted cop-killer Mumia Abu-Jamal, the former Black Panther whose claim that he was the victim of a racist legal system made him an international cause celebre.

Abu-Jamal, 58, will instead spend the rest of his life in prison.

Flanked by police Officer Daniel Faulkner's widow, Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams announced his decision two days short of the 30th anniversary of the white patrolman's killing.

He said that continuing to seek the death penalty could lead to "an unknowable number of years" of appeals, and that some witnesses have died or are unavailable after nearly three decades.

"There's never been any doubt in my mind that Mumia Abu-Jamal shot and killed Officer Faulkner. I believe that the appropriate sentence was handed down by a jury of his peers in 1982," said Williams, the city's first black district attorney. "While Abu-Jamal will no longer be facing the death penalty, he will remain behind bars for the rest of his life, and that is where he belongs."

Abu-Jamal was originally sentenced to death. His murder conviction was upheld through years of appeals. But in 2008, a federal appeals court ordered a new sentencing hearing on the grounds that the instructions given to the jury were potentially misleading.

After the U.S. Supreme Court declined to weigh in two months ago, prosecutors were forced to decide whether to pursue the death penalty again or accept a life sentence without parole.

Williams said he reached the decision with the blessing of Faulkner's widow, Maureen.

"Another penalty proceeding would open the case to the repetition of the state appeals process and an unknowable number of years of federal review again, even if we were successful," the district attorney said.

Widener University law professor Judith Ritter, who represented Abu-Jamal in recent appeals, welcomed the move.

"There is no question that justice is served when a death sentence from a misinformed jury is overturned," Ritter said. "Thirty years later, the district attorney's decision not to seek a new death sentence also furthers the interests of justice."

According to trial testimony, Abu-Jamal saw his brother scuffle with the patrolman during a 4 a.m. traffic stop in 1981 and ran toward the scene. Police found Abu-Jamal wounded by a round from Faulkner's gun. Faulkner, shot several times, was killed. A .38-caliber revolver registered to Abu-Jamal was found at the scene with five spent shell casings.

Over the years, Abu-Jamal challenged the predominantly white makeup of the jury, the instructions given to the jurors and the accounts of eyewitnesses. He also complained that his lawyer was ineffective, that the judge was racist and that another man confessed to the crime.

His writings and radio broadcasts from death row put him at the center of an international debate over capital punishment and made him the subject of books and movies. The one-time journalist's own 1995 book, "Live From Death Row," depicts prison life and calls the justice system racist.

He garnered worldwide support from the "Free Mumia" movement, with hundreds of vocal supporters and death-penalty opponents regularly turning out for court hearings in his case.

His message resonated on college campuses and in Hollywood. Actors Mike Farrell and Tim Robbins were among dozens of luminaries who used a New York Times ad to call for a new trial, and the Beastie Boys played a concert to raise money for Abu-Jamal's defense.

Faulkner's widow labored to ensure her husband was not forgotten.

"My family and I have endured a three-decade ordeal at the hands of Mumia Abu-Jamal, his attorneys and his supporters, who in many cases never even took the time to educate themselves about the case before lending their names, giving their support and advocating for his freedom," she said Wednesday. "All of this has taken an unimaginable physical, emotional and financial toll on each of us."

Amnesty International, which maintains that Abu-Jamal's trial was "manifestly unfair and failed to meet international fair trial standards," said the district attorney's decision does not go far enough. Abu-Jamal still has an appeal pending before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court over the validity of ballistics evidence.

"Amnesty International continues to believe that justice would best be served by granting Mumia Abu-Jamal a new trial," said Laura Moye, director of the human rights group's Campaign to Abolish the Death Penalty.

Members of Philadelphia's police community stood with Williams and Maureen Faulkner as the decision was announced. Former police union president Rich Costello blasted the courts for ordering a new sentencing hearing.

"Where do Maureen and the Faulkner family go for a reduction in their sentence?" Costello said. "For 30 years now, they have been forced to suffer grief, anguish, abuse, insults, intimidation, threats and every other sort of indignity that can be visited on a family already in grief."

Faulkner lashed out at the judges who overturned the death sentence, calling them "dishonest cowards" who, she said, oppose the death penalty. The widow also vowed to fight any special treatment for Abu-Jamal behind bars, saying he should be moved to the general population after being taken off death row.

"I will not stand by and see him coddled, as he has been in the past," Faulkner said. "And I am heartened that he will be taken from the protective cloister he has been living in all these years and begin living among his own kind – the thugs and common criminals that infest our prisons."

marcos

There was nothing fishy about the case; I've read almost everything about it. This was more about people being against the death penalty than anything. It's ashame the issues got confused and overlapped. I would imagine that many of his supporters will drop which may ultimately be the motive of the District Atorney's move.

gimmesometruth27

so should the state continue to pay for more legal maneuvering? the man has been on death row for 30 years. it could take another 20 years to settle it. with witnesses dying off i don't think they would come to a satisfactory conclusion.

marcos

I think the DA did the right thing; as I said many of his supporters, money & such, will be gone as I believe many of them objected to the death penalty and not really an issue of his innocence.

This case was a poor model for real issues against the death penalty. But money is money no matter the source, so I don't think it mattered to him or his attorneys the real issue.

gimmesometruth27

i think he did the right thing too.

in some states life with possibility of parole is 40 years, in some it is 35, and life without parole is life in jail. he is not getting out.

just close the case and stop wasting money and man hours on it.

maybe the wife can come to some sort of peace that the man is not going to be murdered by the state, but he is not going to ever see the outside of the prison either.

marcos

That's my hope as well for the widow and her family. This even became a racial issue as well for the city; which again clouded things as well. I was really impressed that she was at the press conference today despite the position that she was often painted into. She has been a very strong person throughout the years and can now hopefully get some much deserved rest.

_

I haven't studied this case since college & don't have time to do it again now, but what I remember is that the people I knew who supported him did so because they thought he was innocent, not because they were just against the death penalty. And I think I think anyone who believes in someone's innocence should continue to fight for his release whether or not he has been removed from death row. This is big news though. Thanks for posting.

marcos

_ wrote:

I haven't studied this case since college & don't have time to do it again now, but what I remember is that the people I knew who supported him did so because they thought he was innocent, not because they were just against the death penalty. And I think I think anyone who believes in someone's innocence should continue to fight for his release whether or not he has been removed from death row. This is big news though. Thanks for posting.

Well, Mumia supporters gathered last night here in Philly at the Constitution center to demonstrate their continued support of his innocence. And protesters gathered outside to show their support for the sentence which may have comprised of some police organizations and believe or not, bikers, loud bikers. It was very disturbing as they reved their loud engines and helicopters circled the area for coverage. I had a nasty sinus headache last night and it aggravated the hell out of me. So I'm angered at both sides of the issue now

I too read about the case in the early 90's and believed it was a solid case at the time, perhaps I will have to review some of their issues. But I know this was no West Memphis 3 thing. I think that many of his celebrity supporters like Tim Robbins were involved because of the death penalty issue. It was a large amount of support last night so I suppose we will see more. I just hope it's more toward Center City or that I don't have a sinus headache next time

Idris

http://www.freemumia.com/

pjhawks

he is 100% guilty. anyone who doesn't think so is just flat out ignoring the evidence.

read below debunking the bs rhetoric of the moron mumia supporters.

http://justice.danielfaulkner.com/myths-about-mumia/

Byrnzie

marcos wrote:

There was nothing fishy about the case

Nah, nothing fishy about it at all:

http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset ... 2000en.pdf
A Life in the Balance
The Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal
Amnesty International February 2000
In 1995, defence lawyers obtained approximately 700 pages of files on Mumia Abu-Jamal maintained by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), via the Freedom of Information Act. These documents represented only a portion of the total files and were heavily censored.
The FBI began monitoring Abu-Jamal in 1969 when he was 15 years old, because of his activities at High
School and later with the Black Panther Party (BPP). According to a sworn affidavit by the attorney who
examined the files, Abu-Jamal was under surveillance as part of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Program,
COINTELPRO (see footnote 7), which operated with the cooperation and assistance of the Philadelphia police.
According to the affidavit: “Mr. Jamal was subjected to surveillance, harassment, disruption, politically
motivated arrests and attempted frame-ups by the FBI, who worked in conjunction with the Philadelphia Police Department.” Although the FBI classified Abu-Jamal as “armed and dangerous”, he was not convicted of any crime during this period. The documents reveal that the FBI was continuing to monitor Abu-Jamal as late as 1990, recording the details of one of his visitors while he was incarcerated in Huntingdon Prison.

http://blog.amnestyusa.org/deathpenalty ... abu-jamal/
Among other things, Amnesty’s report highlighted the prosecution’s use of peremptory strikes to dismiss African American jurors during trial; inadequate defense representation at trial and during the sentencing phase; the prosecution’s use of Abu-Jamal’s political statements to argue for a death sentence; overt hostility of the trial judge and the appearance of judicial bias during appellate review; the close political relationship between the Fraternal Order of Police and the (elected) Pennsylvania judiciary; and law enforcement’s unseemly agitation for execution throughout the process


http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset ... 000en.html

The three prosecution eyewitnesses substantively altered their description of what they saw between their original statements to police and their trial testimony.

The witnesses were confused and unclear about the height of the shooter, what clothes he was wearing, in which hand he held the gun, and whether he ran away from the scene.

The alleged confession, reportedly crucial to the jury's decision and sentencing, was first reported more than two months after the shooting.

It directly contradicted the contemporaneous notes of one of the alleged witnesses to the confession (a police officer) that "the negro male made no comments." This evidence was not put before the jury.

There is also evidence that witnesses were offered inducements to alter their testimony in favour of the prosecution's version of events. This evidence was not put before the jury.

Lack of adequate ballistic tests to determine whether Abu-Jamal's gun had recently been fired. It was not determined, for instance, whether there was residue on his hands from firing a gun.

marcos

pjhawks wrote:

he is 100% guilty. anyone who doesn't think so is just flat out ignoring the evidence.

read below debunking the bs rhetoric of the moron mumia supporters.

http://justice.danielfaulkner.com/myths-about-mumia/

Some people just don't get it with this case and at this point, after years of appeals and arguments never will. The questions have been asked and answered in this case. I believe that corruption and conspiracies can exist; just not this one.

pjhawks

marcos wrote:

pjhawks wrote:

he is 100% guilty. anyone who doesn't think so is just flat out ignoring the evidence.

read below debunking the bs rhetoric of the moron mumia supporters.

http://justice.danielfaulkner.com/myths-about-mumia/

Some people just don't get it with this case and at this point, after years of appeals and arguments never will. The questions have been asked and answered in this case. I believe that corruption and conspiracies can exist; just not this one.

sad that some clowns just spew the bs rhetoric without knowing the true facts of the case. whether the fbi had one or one millions files on the dude is irrelevant to whether he fired the gun - a gun registered to him with a caliber of bullet he purchased.

Byrnzie

pjhawks wrote:

sad that some clowns just spew the bs rhetoric without knowing the true facts of the case. whether the fbi had one or one millions files on the dude is irrelevant to whether he fired the gun - a gun registered to him with a caliber of bullet he purchased.

Sad that some clowns try and pretend that all of the discrepancies with this case simply amount to the fact that the FBI kept over 700 files on him and that “Mr. Jamal was subjected to surveillance, harassment, disruption, politically motivated arrests and attempted frame-ups by the FBI, who worked in conjunction with the Philadelphia Police Department", while ignoring all of the other points raised, including Amnesty's full report: http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset ... 2000en.pdf

pjhawks

Byrnzie wrote:

pjhawks wrote:

sad that some clowns just spew the bs rhetoric without knowing the true facts of the case. whether the fbi had one or one millions files on the dude is irrelevant to whether he fired the gun - a gun registered to him with a caliber of bullet he purchased.

Sad that some clowns try and pretend that all of the discrepancies with this case simply amount to the fact that the FBI kept over 700 files on him and that “Mr. Jamal was subjected to surveillance, harassment, disruption, politically motivated arrests and attempted frame-ups by the FBI, who worked in conjunction with the Philadelphia Police Department", while ignoring all of the other points raised.

2 questions for you

1) what does the fbi having files have to do with whether he fired the gun or not???

2) and have you actually read the trial transcripts?

Byrnzie

pjhawks wrote:

1) what does the fbi having files have to do with whether he fired the gun or not???

The FBI having over 700 files on him along with years of him having been 'subjected to surveillance, harassment, disruption, politically motivated arrests and attempted frame-ups by the FBI' has nothing to do with whether he fired the gun or not. But that's not the point, as you know.

What does your question have to do with the following:


The ballistics evidence
Although all five bullets in Abu-Jamal’s gun were spent, the police failed to conduct tests to ascertain whether the weapon had been fired in the immediate past. The test is relatively simple: smell the gun for the odour of gun powder, which should be detectable for approximately five hours after the gun was fired. Compounding this error, the police also failed to conduct chemical tests on Abu-Jamal’s hands to find out if he had fired a gun recently.
The police appeared to be aware of the value of basic forensic testing. According to the testimony of Arnold Howard during the 1995 hearings, after he was arrested on suspicion of involvement in the Faulkner shooting, the police tested his hands to ascertain if he had fired a gun in the recent past. Howard was arrested because his driver’s license application form was in Faulkner’s possession.
As noted on page 12, the court refused to grant the defence funding sufficient to obtain expert witnesses. As a consequence, the jury was presented with no expert testimony to counter the prosecution’s assertion that Abu-Jamal had fired at Officer Faulkner and that the policeman was killed with Abu-Jamal’s weapon.
The prosecution maintained that Officer Faulkner turned and fired at Abu-Jamal as he fell to the ground after being shot. Therefore, the entry of the bullet into Abu-Jamal should have been on a level or upward trajectory. However, according to the medical records, the overall pathway of the bullet was downwards. During trial, the doctor who removed the bullet from Abu-Jamal (who admitted his lack of forensic expertise) was asked why the bullet would be "unnecessarily lowered in its trajectory" and speculated that "ricochet" and "tumble" were the explanation.
In 1992, an expert forensic pathologist employed by Abu-Jamal’s defence team examined the medical records and concluded:
“...For these reasons, there appears to be no reasons to postulate a ricochet to explain a downward course through the body. Rather, it is likely that the bullet had a downward course through the body because of the relative positions of Mr. Jamal and the shooter. Consistent relative positions include a standing shooter firing down on a prone Mr. Jamal, or a standing shooter firing horizontally at Mr. Jamal while Mr. Jamal was bent
over at the waist.”
Neither of these postures is consistent with the prosecution’s theory. The forensic pathologist also concluded that “since I disagree with both the Medical Examiner’s findings with respect to the cause of death and Dr. Coletta’s postulation of a possible ‘ricochet’...Mr. Jamal’s defense required, and would have been well served by, the testimony of a qualified forensic pathologist.”
There were also inconsistencies in the original findings concerning the bullet removed from Faulkner’s body. The Medical Examiner first wrote in his notes that the bullet was “.44 cal.” (Abu-Jamal’s gun was a .38 calibre weapon and could not possibly have fired such a bullet). This discrepancy, which was never made known to the jury, was later explained by the Medical Examiner as “part of the paper work but not an official finding.” At trial, the Medical Examiner testified that the bullet was consistent with those fired by Abu-Jamal’s gun but that those tests were inconclusive as to whether it actually came from his firearm. The court accepted the medical examiner as a ballistics expert. However, during the 1995 hearing, Judge Sabo contended that the medical examiner was “not a ballistics expert”" and that his original findings that the bullet was a .44 calibre were a “mere lay guess.”
In a case where the prosecution’s theory of the crime rests on a specific sequence of events involving an exchange of gunfire, the gathering of ballistics evidence is crucial--as is the ability of the defence to present its own expert testimony on the significance of that evidence.
The failure of the police to test Abu-Jamal’s gun, hands and clothing for evidence of recent firing is deeply troubling. Without the ability to hear and assess that missing evidence, the jury was required to reach a verdict based largely on the contradictory and variable testimony of a limited list of eye witnesses.

pjhawks wrote:

2) and have you actually read the trial transcripts?

Yes.

Byrnzie

Yep, nothing at all fishy about this case at all. A cut and dry case if ever there was one:



http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset ... 2000en.pdf

A Life in the Balance
The Case of Mumia Abu-Jamal
Amnesty International February 2000

Witnesses to the crime: conflicting and confusing

During the trial, three witnesses testified that Abu-Jamal had run up to Officer Faulkner, shot him in the back and then stood over him and fired another bullet into his head, killing him instantly (although only one witness, White, claimed to have seen the events as described above in their entirety). None of the witnesses testified that Faulkner fired at Abu-Jamal as he fell to the ground - even when specifically asked - as the prosecution maintained. The prosecution also maintained that only Abu-Jamal, his brother William Cook and Officer Faulkner were present in the immediate vicinity of the crime scene.
In the years since the trial, defence lawyers have thrown into doubt the reliability of much of this trial testimony.
The complicated nature of the numerous accusations, counter accusations and withdrawing of statements and testimony make it impossible, based on the existing record, to reach definitive conclusions regarding the reliability of any witness. The prosecutors and police contend that the testimony presented at the trial was truthful and uncoerced, and that other witnesses to the crime were not called to testify as they had nothing relevant to add.
However, Abu-Jamal’s attorneys contend that a number of witnesses changed their original statements regarding what they saw on the night of the crime after being coerced, threatened or offered inducements by the police. Based on a comparison of their statements given to the police immediately after the shooting, their testimony during pretrial hearings and their testimony at the trial, the key witnesses did substantively alter their descriptions of what they saw, in ways that supported the prosecution’s version of events.
Cynthia White and Veronica Jones Cynthia White was a prostitute working in the area on the night in question. At the trial she testified that she had seen Mumia Abu-Jamal run up to Officer Faulkner, shoot him in the back, and then stand over him firing at his head.
Prior to the trial, White had given four written statements and one tape-recorded statement to the police. In one interview she estimated the height of the person who shot Faulkner to be shorter than five feet eight inches. Abu-Jamal is six feet one inch tall. In her first court appearance at a pretrial hearing, she testified that Abu-Jamal held the gun in his left hand. Three days later she testified that she was unsure which hand he held the gun in. At trial she denied knowing which hand the gun was in. During her trial testimony, she claimed that the diagram she originally drew of the incident was incorrect and that her placement of the actors
prior to Abu-Jamal’s appearance was inaccurate.

There is evidence to show that Cynthia White received preferential treatment from the prosecution and police. At the time of the trial, she was serving an 18-month prison sentence for prostitution in Massachusetts. She had 38 previous arrests for prostitution in Philadelphia; three of those charges were still pending at the time of trial. She was arrested twice within days of the shooting incident (12 and 17 December). According to Abu-Jamal’s current defence attorneys, there are no records of White ever being prosecuted for those arrests.
In 1987, a detective involved in the prosecution of Abu-Jamal testified in support of bail for White at a court hearing concerning charges of robbery, aggravated assault and possession of illegal weapons. Despite the judge pointing out that White had failed to appear in court on 17 different occasions and that she had "page after page" of arrests and convictions, the prosecution consented to the request that she be allowed to sign her own bail and the judge released her. According to information received by Amnesty International, White failed to appear in court on the charges and the authorities have since been unable to locate her. At an appeal hearings in 1997, the prosecution claimed Cynthia White was deceased and produced a 1992 death certificate in the name of Cynthia Williams, claiming that the fingerprints of the dead woman and White matched. However, an examination of the fingerprint records of White and Williams showed no match and the evidence that White is now dead is far from conclusive.
A second prostitute, Veronica Jones, witnessed the killing and testified for the defence. She claimed she had been offered inducements by the police to testify that she saw Abu-Jamal kill Faulkner, stating that "they [the police] were trying to get me to say something the other girl [White] said. I couldn’t do that." Jones went on to testify that "they [the police] told us we could work the area [as prostitutes] if we tell them [that Abu-Jamal was the shooter]."
However, Judge Sabo had the jury removed for this testimony and then ruled that Jones’ statements were inadmissible evidence. The jury were thus left unaware of the allegations that police officers were offering inducements in return for testimony against Abu-Jamal. In her testimony before the jury, Jones retracted her original statement to police that she saw two unidentified men leave the scene of the crime. Remarkably, Jackson had never interviewed his own witness (a standard practice) but Jones was interviewed by the prosecution prior to the trial.
In 1996, Veronica Jones testified at an appeal hearing that she changed her version of events after being visited by two police officers in prison, where she was being held on charges of robbery and assault. While cross-examining Jones, the prosecution announced to the court that there was an outstanding arrest warrant for Jones on charges of passing bad cheques and indicated that she would be arrested at the conclusion of her testimony.
In a sworn affidavit, Jones described her meeting with the plain clothes police officers:
“They told me that if I would testify against Jamal and identify Jamal as the shooter I wouldn’t have to worry about my pending felony charges...The detectives threatened me by reminding me that I faced a long prison sentence - fifteen years...I knew that if I did anything to help the Jamal defense I would face years in prison.”
After Abu-Jamal’s trial, Veronica Jones received a sentence of two years’ probation on the charges she was facing.
In January 1997, another former prostitute who worked in the area of the crime scene in 1981, came forward. In a sworn affidavit, Pamela Jenkins stated that she knew Cynthia White, who had told her she was afraid of the police and that the police were trying to get her to say something about the shooting of Faulkner and had threatened her life. Jenkins was the lover and informant of Philadelphia police officer Tom Ryan. In her statement, Jenkins claimed that Ryan "wanted me to perjure myself and say that I had seen Jamal shoot the police officer."
In 1996, Tom Ryan and five other officers from the same district went to prison after being convicted of charges of planting evidence, stealing money from suspects and making false reports. Their convictions resulted in the release of numerous prisoners implicated by the officers. Jenkins was a principal prosecution witness at the trials of the officers.

Robert Chobert

Robert Chobert had just let a passenger out of his cab and was parked when he viewed the incident. It is undisputed that he was closest to the scene of the prosecution eyewitnesses, parked in his cab a car's length behind Faulkner’s police car and approximately 50 feet from the shooting. According to his testimony and statements, he was writing in his logbook when he heard the first shot and looked up. He had to look over or past Faulkner's car, with its flashing red dome light, to see the incident and saw the shooter only in profile. Chobert testified at trial that when he looked up, he saw Faulkner fall and then saw Abu-Jamal "standing over him and firing some more shots into him. “Under cross-examination by Jackson, he stated: "I know who
shot the cop, and I ain't going to forget it.”
But Chobert's first recorded statement to police -- about which the jury was not told -- was that the shooter “apparently ran away”, according to a report written on 10 December 1981 by Inspector Giordano. Giordano encountered Chobert upon reaching the scene about five minutes after the shooting. Giordano wrote: “[A] white male from the crowd stated that he saw the shooting and that a black MOVE member had done it and appearently [sic] ran away. When asked what he ment [sic] bby [sic] a MOVE member, the white male stated, 'His hair, his hair,' apparently [sic] referring to dreadlocks.”
There are also discrepancies between Chobert’s description of the shooter’s clothes and weight and that of Abu-Jamal.
During the trial, Jackson attempted to introduce into evidence Chobert’s previous convictions for driving while intoxicated (twice) and the arson of a school, for which he was on probation. Jackson sought to introduce the convictions to challenge Chobert’s credibility, but Judge Sabo refused to allow the defence the opportunity to make the jury aware of Chobert’s convictions.
The jury were also left unaware that Chobert had been driving his cab with a suspended drivers’ license on the night of the killing; that it was still suspended at the time of the trial and that the police had never sought to charge him for this offence. According to Chobert’s testimony at the 1995 hearing, he had asked the prosecutor during the trial “if he could help me find out how I could get my license back”, which was “important” to him because “that's how I earned my living.” According to Chobert, the prosecutor told him that he would “look into it.”
During this final summation to the jury, the prosecutor emphasized Chobert’s testimony, telling the jury they could “trust” Chobert because “he knows what he saw”. The prosecutor suggested that Chobert’s testimony was given without anyone having influenced him, telling the jury: “do you think that anybody could get him to say anything that wasn’t the truth? I would not criticize that man one bit...What motivation would Robert Chobert have to make up a story...”.
However, subsequent revelations suggest that Chobert had substantial reasons to ingratiate himself with the authorities by corroborating their version of events.

Mark Scanlan

In one of his original statements to the police, Scanlan stated several times that he did not know whether Abu-Jamal or his brother shot Faulkner: “I don’t know who had the gun. I don’t know who fired it.” He also misidentified Abu-Jamal as the driver of the vehicle stopped by Officer Faulkner and was approximately 120 feet from the scene. A diagram that Scanlan drew for police indicated that Abu-Jamal and Faulkner were facing each other when the first shot was fired, contrary to the prosecution’s theory that the police officer was initially shot in the back.
At trial, Scanlan admitted that he had been drinking on the night in question and that “There was confusion when all three of them were in front of the car.”

The missing witnesses

Abu-Jamal’s attorneys also allege that a number of eye witnesses were not investigated by the defence because of a lack of resources and that the witnesses’ whereabouts were withheld from them by the prosecution. According to subsequent investigations by the current defence team, numerous witnesses have been located who claim to have seen other unidentified men fleeing the scene of the killing. Since this report is primarily concerned with the fairness of Abu Jamal’s original trial, Amnesty International has not analysed the statements of these potential witnesses. The defence filed an appellate brief in Federal court in October 1999 which summarizes these claims.
William Cook, Abu-Jamal’s brother and an obvious eyewitness to the killing, did not testify for either side at trial. He was convicted in separate proceedings of assaulting Faulkner. Cook made a statement to the police on the night of the shooting, and another to Abu-Jamal’s legal team in 1995. However, neither of these statements have been seen by Amnesty International. Abu-Jamal’s supporters have alleged that in 1982, Cook was being intimidated by the police and feared being charged in connection with the killing and was therefore too frightened to testify. Cook was scheduled to testify during the 1995 hearing but failed to appear.
Again it was alleged that this was due to fear of the police and of being arrested on unrelated charges in court. In his written denial of the 1995 appeal, Judge Sabo made negative assumptions regarding Cook’s unwillingness to testify. Since 1995, the defence team have been unable to locate Cook despite numerous attempts.

pjhawks

Byrnzie wrote:

pjhawks wrote:

1) what does the fbi having files have to do with whether he fired the gun or not???

The FBI having over 700 files on him along with years of him having been 'subjected to surveillance, harassment, disruption, politically motivated arrests and attempted frame-ups by the FBI' has nothing to do with whether he fired the gun or not. But that's not the point, as you know.

What does your question have to do with the following:


The ballistics evidence
Although all five bullets in Abu-Jamal’s gun were spent, the police failed to conduct tests to ascertain whether the weapon had been fired in the immediate past. The test is relatively simple: smell the gun for the odour of gun powder, which should be detectable for approximately five hours after the gun was fired. Compounding this error, the police also failed to conduct chemical tests on Abu-Jamal’s hands to find out if he had fired a gun recently.
The police appeared to be aware of the value of basic forensic testing. According to the testimony of Arnold Howard during the 1995 hearings, after he was arrested on suspicion of involvement in the Faulkner shooting, the police tested his hands to ascertain if he had fired a gun in the recent past. Howard was arrested because his driver’s license application form was in Faulkner’s possession.
As noted on page 12, the court refused to grant the defence funding sufficient to obtain expert witnesses. As a consequence, the jury was presented with no expert testimony to counter the prosecution’s assertion that Abu-Jamal had fired at Officer Faulkner and that the policeman was killed with Abu-Jamal’s weapon.
The prosecution maintained that Officer Faulkner turned and fired at Abu-Jamal as he fell to the ground after being shot. Therefore, the entry of the bullet into Abu-Jamal should have been on a level or upward trajectory. However, according to the medical records, the overall pathway of the bullet was downwards. During trial, the doctor who removed the bullet from Abu-Jamal (who admitted his lack of forensic expertise) was asked why the bullet would be "unnecessarily lowered in its trajectory" and speculated that "ricochet" and "tumble" were the explanation.
In 1992, an expert forensic pathologist employed by Abu-Jamal’s defence team examined the medical records and concluded:
“...For these reasons, there appears to be no reasons to postulate a ricochet to explain a downward course through the body. Rather, it is likely that the bullet had a downward course through the body because of the relative positions of Mr. Jamal and the shooter. Consistent relative positions include a standing shooter firing down on a prone Mr. Jamal, or a standing shooter firing horizontally at Mr. Jamal while Mr. Jamal was bent
over at the waist.”
Neither of these postures is consistent with the prosecution’s theory. The forensic pathologist also concluded that “since I disagree with both the Medical Examiner’s findings with respect to the cause of death and Dr. Coletta’s postulation of a possible ‘ricochet’...Mr. Jamal’s defense required, and would have been well served by, the testimony of a qualified forensic pathologist.”
There were also inconsistencies in the original findings concerning the bullet removed from Faulkner’s body. The Medical Examiner first wrote in his notes that the bullet was “.44 cal.” (Abu-Jamal’s gun was a .38 calibre weapon and could not possibly have fired such a bullet). This discrepancy, which was never made known to the jury, was later explained by the Medical Examiner as “part of the paper work but not an official finding.” At trial, the Medical Examiner testified that the bullet was consistent with those fired by Abu-Jamal’s gun but that those tests were inconclusive as to whether it actually came from his firearm. The court accepted the medical examiner as a ballistics expert. However, during the 1995 hearing, Judge Sabo contended that the medical examiner was “not a ballistics expert”" and that his original findings that the bullet was a .44 calibre were a “mere lay guess.”
In a case where the prosecution’s theory of the crime rests on a specific sequence of events involving an exchange of gunfire, the gathering of ballistics evidence is crucial--as is the ability of the defence to present its own expert testimony on the significance of that evidence.
The failure of the police to test Abu-Jamal’s gun, hands and clothing for evidence of recent firing is deeply troubling. Without the ability to hear and assess that missing evidence, the jury was required to reach a verdict based largely on the contradictory and variable testimony of a limited list of eye witnesses.

pjhawks wrote:

2) and have you actually read the trial transcripts?

Yes.

http://justice.danielfaulkner.com/myths ... ia/myth-1/

debunking that myth about the ballistics.

and don't you love that almost no one in the city Mumia was from, expect a radical anti-government group, supports Mumia? becuase the facts have been presented here. the facts apparantly don't translate overseas.

Byrnzie

pjhawks wrote:

http://justice.danielfaulkner.com/myths-about-mumia/myth-1/

debunking that myth about the ballistics.

and don't you love that almost no one in the city Mumia was from, expect a radical anti-government group, supports Mumia? becuase the facts have been presented here. the facts apparantly don't translate overseas.

Daniel Faulkner.com? Are you kidding me? How about presenting an unbiased source?

pjhawks

Byrnzie wrote:

pjhawks wrote:

http://justice.danielfaulkner.com/myths-about-mumia/myth-1/

debunking that myth about the ballistics.

and don't you love that almost no one in the city Mumia was from, expect a radical anti-government group, supports Mumia? becuase the facts have been presented here. the facts apparantly don't translate overseas.

Daniel Faulkner.com? Are you kidding me? How about presenting an unbiased source?

well you don't believe trial transcripts so not sure how any reference you would consider unbiased.

Byrnzie

pjhawks wrote:

well you don't believe trial transcripts so not sure how any reference you would consider unbiased.

We're not talking about trial transcripts. We're talking about Danielfaulkner.com

What trial transcripts are you pretending that I don't 'believe'?