http://www.finalcall.com/artman/publish/article_5416.shtml
By Saeed Shabazz
Staff Writer
Updated Nov 21, 2008
A week after the Jericho Amnesty Movement held October rallies and
workshops here to commemorate their 10th anniversary as a coalition
dedicated to freeing political dissidents in U.S. prisons, there were
charges that repression continues.
"More activism and support is needed in the campaign to free Mumia
Abu-Jamal," wrote lead defense attorney Robert R. Ryan, in an
internet message to supporters of the former Black Panther and
journalist. "There are new developments in the case that are the most
significant and deadly since his 1981 arrest. The prosecution has
advised the U.S. Supreme Court that they (will) seek reversal of the
federal court decision, which granted a new jury trial on the
question of the death penalty," Mr. Ryan wrote. Mr. Abu-Jamal was
convicted of killing a White police officer in 1981. Supporters said
he was targeted because of his activism and was not given a fair trial.
"If the U.S. Supreme Court rules for the DA and overturns the federal
court ruling, Mumia can be executed without having a new penalty
phase jury trial, which would allow us to introduce new evidence
which could free Mumia," said Mr. Ryan.
The Leonard Peltier Defense/Offense Committee sent out an alert
informing supporters that the Federal Bureau of Prisons was planning
to move the Native American freedom fighter to another facility.
"There seems to be a strategy by the federal government to disrupt
Leonard's defense committee through these transfers," according to
Betty Ann Peltier-Solana, executive coordinator of the defense committee.
Ms. Solana said attorneys asked that Mr. Peltier be transferred to a
facility closer to his home reservation, either a prison in
Sandstone, Minn., or Oxford, Wis. He is currently held at the federal
prison in Lewisburg, Penn. Mr. Peltier was convicted of murder in
connection with a shootout between FBI agents and members of the
American Indian Movement in 1975.
The governors of New York and California are refusing to allow Herman
Bell and Jalil Muntaqim, members of the San Francisco 8, to be
transferred from their San Francisco County jail cells to New York
for parole hearings, supporters complain. "Judge Philip Moscone
signed an order in May allowing both men to return to New York state
for their parole hearings. All parties agreed at the time that the
move would be temporary; Herman and Jalil waived their rights to
fight extradition back to Calif.," wrote Claude Marks of the
California-based Committee for the Defense of Human Rights. According
to Mr. Marks, both men have served over 35 years in prison and have
been called model inmates.
The San Francisco 8 are awaiting trial on charges they were involved
in the 1971 killing of a police officer. "The 'SF8' is another
example of how the government seeks to crush self-determination and
any challenges to the status quo," Mr. Marks told The Final Call.
Harold Taylor, another SF8 member, was convicted on what supporters
called "bogus" drug charges in Panama City, Fla. He will be sentenced
Dec. 9. Supporters contend he was simply in the wrong place at the
wrong time. Mr. Taylor was already out on bail in the SF8 case.
Karimah Al-Amin, attorney and wife of Imam Jamil Al-Amin, formerly
known as Black Panther leader H. Rap Brown, told The Final Call the
only thing her husband is guilty of "is fighting for the rights of
African Americans and fighting for the rights of Muslims." Her
husband spends 23 hours a day in a cell. He is allowed five social
visits a month and two phone calls a week. Imam Al-Amin, who led an
Islamic community in Atlanta, is serving life without parole plus 35
years at the Supermax facility in Florence, Colo., for the fatal
shooting of one Atlanta deputy and wounding of a second deputy in March 2000.
The imam served five and a half years in administrative segregation
in the state prison at Reidsville, Ga.
Mrs. Al-Amin said on Oct. 6, the Supreme Court agreed with the
Georgia Circuit Court of Appeals that the prison administration at
Reidsville violated the imam's first amendment rights by opening his
legal mail and denying visits from his attorney, who is also his wife.
"The state of Georgia must settle financially with my husband, but
they are hiding behind the Prison Litigation Reform Act, which
prevents inmates from getting a large settlement," Mrs. Al-Amin said.
"We consider Imam Jamil to be a prisoner of war," she said.
"When I look at the names of those in Florence with my husband, you
would have to say it is a place for political prisoners," Mrs.
Al-Amin added. Also incarcerated at the federal facility are Dr.
Mutulu Shakur of the Black Liberation Army and the Republic of New
Africa; Sekou Odinga of the Black Liberation Army; Dr. Malachi Z.
York of the Nuwaubian Nation; Imam Malik Khaba (formerly Jeff Fort),
founder of the Blackstone Rangers street gang in Chicago; Larry
Hoover of Growth and Development, formerly the Gangster Disciple
street gang in Chicago. "They refer to the prison as the 'stateside
Guantanamo,'" she said.
Lance Tapley, a journalist who has written extensively on prisons in
the U.S., has made critical observations on the use of solitary
confinement. "Supermax confinement is repulsive, immoral mass torture
that is historically unprecedented. I would also suggest it is
illegal under international law," he told the National Lawyers Guild
at its 70th anniversary convention last October.
Solitary disrupts "profoundly the sense of personality," meeting the
Senate standard for one mark of mental torture and the Senate
recognizes mental torture to be a companion of physical suffering,
Mr. Tapley said.
Over the years political prisoners in the U.S. have been represented
by a battery of politically astute lawyers, including Chokwe Lumumba,
Lynn Stewart, Roger Wareham, Adjoa Aiyetoro, Ashanti Chimurenga and
Michael Tarif Warren.
"People don't know about the issue of political prisoners and
prisoners of war in the United States," Mr. Warren told The Final
Call. "People must be educated on how the system is violating their
eighth amendment rights. Take for instance, we fought to have Bashir
Hameed moved to a facility with a hospital that would help with his
cancer, but they let him die," Atty. Warren said.
Mr. Hameed was the New Jersey deputy chairman of the Black Panther
Party and a member of the Black Liberation Army. He was convicted in
the 1981 murder of a New York policeman and attempted murder of his
partner. He was given a 25-year sentence after three trials and died Aug. 30.
"This is a mean spirited system that is only concerned with
retribution, because they perceive that these people are a threat to
the system," Atty. Warren said.
Mr. Hameed was the fifth political prisoner to die behind bars in
this era, advocates said.
"Imam Jamil talks all the time about the need to get the issue of
political prisoners back on the front burner," said Mrs. Al-Amin.
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