Recently, the U.S. government has been executing people “legally” at an alarming rate. The first woman to be executed in Texas, Frances Newton, was murdered by the state last summer; Tookie Williams was murdered in California in December at San Quentin; and Clarence Ray Allen was killed in mid-January, he too at San Quentin.
               
On Jan. 17, the same day that California murdered Allen, New Jersey’s governor gave in to the people’s demand for a moratorium on the death penalty. This comes three years after the Illinois governor was forced to issue a moratorium.
               
Ra’shida and JR had a rare chance to speak with political prisoner and Pennsylvania state death row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal to talk about some of the new developments in his case, among other issues regarding death row prisoners, and the overall war against Black life in America.

Ra’shida: Describe what death row is like, how the police treat you, your access to the outside world and loved ones and the physical area that you are being held captive in.

Mumia: Death row is like a prison within a prison within a prison. All death rows, at least in Pennsylvania, and perhaps all across the country, are in the maximum-security prisons, and they’re isolated from even other prisoners. They’re even isolated from
people in the hole, and that’s why I say it’s a prison within a prison within a prison. In terms of how people are treated, it differs from man to man, person to person, but it ain’t no such thing as a good death row. I don’t even think that such a thing is possible, because people are so isolated … because they’re so isolated from the world.
There are many people, here in Pennsylvania and certainly, I’m sure in other places all across the country, who never hear from or see their loved ones, their families. Many prisons, like for example this place, is situated about as far as you could get from the city of Philadelphia [but] still stay in the state of Pennsylvania. It’s hundreds of miles away. I’m sure for many people in Texas, it’s the same thing. And for many people in parts of California, depending on whether you’re in Northern or Southern California, it’s the same thing. It’s about as isolated as you could get and still stay on the planet, in many ways.

JR: Can you give us an update about the new developments in your case?

Mumia: The court of appeals agreed to hear what is called the Batson issue, among other issues, but the Batson issue deals with jury selection. Under the Batson case, it is a violation of the Constitution to wrongfully, or racially remove Black people from jury service. If one Black juror is illegally and improperly removed, that constitutes such a violation. In our case, it was over 14, so you know … but that’s the big part of that. There are other issues, but Batson is the biggest one.

Ra’shida: In the case of Tookie Williams, there was a lot of evidence in his legal case that points to innocence, and he also maintained his innocence throughout the 24 years that he was being held captive. In light of that, what do you think about the position of so-called supporters that were calling for people to “save Tookie” or simply “don’t kill Tookie” but not “Free Tookie”?

Mumia: Well, you’re always going to have supporters from different political perspectives. You’re going to have some that are radical, some that are straight up warriors, and some people that are not … some people that are liberals. When you really think about people calling to “save Tookie,” what they were really saying was, “Lock him up for the rest of his life,” because they were not talking about freeing him. And that’s the real tragedy, even when you talk about the clemency hearings and the proceedings and so forth. I think that there is no question that his trial was unfair. He may have been innocent, but it’s also true that political pressure determined whether he lived or died. If you read the statement of the governor, he essentially used his (Tookie’s) politicization and his consciousness being raised as a basis for saying that you should kill the man. He (Gov. Schwarzenegger) said to name Dhoruba Bin Wahad, Malcolm X, Angela Davis or Nelson Mandela – and me – was reason to kill the man, you know? And the truth of the matter is if he had said Buddha or Jesus Christ, it wouldn’t have mattered, you know what I mean? But he used his Black consciousness as an additional aggravating circumstance to determine that he was not worthy of life. That’s politics. That’s racism. That’s white supremacy and white nationalism.

JR: Since Tookie’s execution and the denial of clemency to Clarence Ray Allen, what has been the response of other death row captives?

Mumia: Well, the truth of the matter is I would say that most people in this country, certainly over here, didn’t know about the last brother that you named. There were a lot of people that were speaking in the yard, and they believed that Tookie had a shot, that things would go his way. And there were other people looking at the politics of the situation, understanding that Schwarzenegger was a politician first, who was trying to appease the right wing after losing all of those referendums (and) wasn’t about to do something humane in that case. So you know some guys were really … because they knew about Crip-life and so forth or read about him in the papers or saw him on TV, they were really messed up about that.

JR: With the Patriot Act in the news along with Bush’s mandate to go even further than that and Cynthia McKinney working to get the intelligence files on Tupac Shakur released, what do you think about the government’s war against [particular] people and organizations in America?

Mumia: Well, the truth of the matter is that it has never stopped. I mean anyone who has consciously and honestly researched and questioned government war against the people … it didn’t begin with COINTELPRO, and – guess what? – It didn’t end in 1972 or ‘73, when COINTELPRO was discovered. There is a book put out by Tyrone Powers of the FBI … While he was in the academy, he stayed in the library, he read the files.
He read books and he studied what the FBI was doing, and he was saying, “If it worked so well” – and it did work in destroying these Black organizations – “why would they ever stop?” And he said that one of the supervisors, one of his teachers, told him that.

Ra’shida: Can you talk about why the people should support political prisoner Aaron Patterson, as well as other political prisoners?

Mumia: Because specifically with Aaron Patterson, this was a brother who as soon as he got, not out of jail but off of death row, he hit the ground running and he began working with Chairman Fred Hampton Jr. He began working in Chicago and all across Black America to try to wake young people up to the war against Black
life in America. This brother has proven through his work in the street, not just in prison, that he is working for the interests of Black people, and I think that it is for that reason he was targeted and he was taken off of the streets the second time. Certainly, the first time
is because he was a young Black man in the clutches of the state.

Ra’shida: What is the role of the revolutionary journalist in this movement of people’s
self-determination?

Mumia: To wake people up … to speak truth to power … to do what Fredrick Douglass did so many years ago with his newspaper, the North Star: to speak the truth about the conditions that our people and all oppressed people are facing, no matter what. The job of a revolutionary journalist is to turn people on to revolutionary possibilities, to show them that it is possible to speak truth about this oppressive system that continues with its boot on our collective necks.

JR is an Oakland based contributing journalist, activist, radio host and the Minister of Information for the Prisoners of Conscience Committee (POCC), an organization founded by Fred Hampton Jr. (Son of assassinated Chicago Black Panther Chairman Fred Hampton), and Ra’shida is the POCC West Coast Chairwoman. You can hear the “Block Report” by logging onto sfbayview.com under the “Block Report” section. Email JR at blockreportradio@yahoo.com.