http://www.comcast.net/news/articles/national/2008/03/27/Mumia.Abu.Jamal/
I’m so not sure how I feel about this; at one time they were arguing over whether he even did it, now it appears that they’ve agreed he did it, but the argument is over whether or not he should die for it.
As a firm non-believer in the death sentence, I agree that he should not get it, but my reasons definitely are not because of some supposed "flaw in the jury instructions". (Which IMO, is another way of saying "loophole".)
Former Black Panther Mumia Abu-Jamal (why do they always call him that, like ‘Former Black Panther’ is part of his name? But that’s another story, for another day!) has been granted a new penalty hearing because a federal appeals court has said that he cannot be executed; their reason is that the instructions given the jury during the penalty phase of his trial were not clear. Okay, this man was sentenced to the death penalty 25 years ago; he has spent a quarter of a century of his life in prison, fighting the sentence. You mean to tell me it took all this time for someone to realize that? Did the jurors never tell anyone "Well, we were told that we had to unanimously agree on mitigating circumstances, and we couldn’t." Did no one ever ASK if they thought of mitigating circumstances? Come on people! As much as I am against the death penalty, I am also against people finding loopholes and attempting to use them in a last ditch effort to circumvent whatever decision has been made, or penalty they’ve been given. It’s become almost the norm for people appealing convictions and/or sentences to look for loopholes in the law, rather than look for new evidence, or look for something that was actually wrong with the trial, the way they were treated, SOMETHING. Going through a warrant and looking for a wrong date, or checking juror’s backgrounds to see if one of them ever said anything to anyone against the defendant, these are the kinds of things lawyers base their client’s appeals on, rather than looking for evidence that wasn’t brought out at trial, or NEW evidence, or finding out if any of the jurors or the judge had been bribed, or the judge didn’t allow something crucial to the defense that he had no legal right to bar. What’s happened to our justice system, when instead of seeking true justice you’re busy seeking a way around the system?
How do we teach our children to be upright and honest, and tell them that our justice system is so great and how well it works, when you have people like Michael Vicks shortening the time he serves by going into a drug rehabilitation program that he doesn’t need, and taking a slot that someone with a REAL drug problem and a family at home he needs to get back to could use? (http://hamptonroads.com/2008/01/michael-vick-serve-his-time-leavenworth,-kan.) Or when you have drunk drivers getting away with driving drunk and admitting that they were driving drunk, just because the police officer didn’t see them behind the wheel of the car? (http://www.newsherald.com/headlines/article.display.php?id=1014) How can you tell your children they shouldn’t use drugs, and marijuana is illegal, when you’ve got people lying and taking advantage of a law which is supposed to benefit legitimately ill people? (http://cannabisnews.com/news/22/thread22569.shtml)
I am not against Mumia getting a new penalty hearing; if there was something that should have been done (or not done) or heard (or not heard) at the first one, then fine, give him another one. But to go through all this again because you think maybe the jury didn’t understand, and now after all these years you can’t think of any other reason? I just can’t see it. I think we’ve invested enough time and money into this and other cases, and unless they’ve got something better, his sentence should stand.
And that’s Live From Bikini Bottom...
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