Friday, April 22, 2011

The case of Mumia Abu-Jamal

By Dolores Cox , Workers World, April 21, 2011

Mumia Abu-Jamal
It has been almost 30 years since the case of the internationally renowned political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal officially opened in December 1981. In April 2009 the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear Abu-Jamal’s appeal and returned it to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals.

Mumia Abu-Jamal now has a new legal team led by Christina Swarns, director of the Criminal Justice Project of the NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund; and Judith Ritter, professor and director of the Criminal Defense Clinic at Widener University Law School in Wilmington, Del. They will be directing their defense strategy to not only fight reinstatement of Mumia’s death penalty but also overturn his conviction.

On April 3 in New York City supporters and human rights activists gathered at the historic Riverside Church to meet and honor the new lawyers. The event was moderated by Suzanne Ross of the Free Mumia Abu-Jamal Coalition (NYC), with the room filled to capacity. The gathering was also video-streamed live worldwide.

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