Harlem street meeting says, ‘Free Mumia’

The struggle to free death-row political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal is heating up in New York City. On May 8, an emergency, militant street meeting took place in front of Harlem’s Adam Clayton Powell Jr. State Office Building to demand that elected officials call upon U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and the Justice Department to conduct a civil rights investigation into constitutional rights violations against Mumia. Congressperson Charles Rangel, who represents the Harlem community, has come out in support of the call for the investigation.

Larry Hales WW photos: Lal Roohk

Mumia, a former Black Panther and an award-winning journalist, was arrested in December 1981 for the shooting death of a white police officer, Daniel Faulkner, in Philadelphia. Mumia has maintained his innocence for almost 27 years following a sham of a trial in which he was convicted. He is facing the possibility of lethal injection or life in prison without parole. The U.S. Supreme Court recently refused to review one of Mumia’s legal petitions that exposed the racist exclusion of Black jurors during the original trial.

Orrie Lumumba, a MOVE supporter, chaired the street meeting called by the New York Free Mumia Abu-Jamal Coalition. Speaker after speaker linked the campaign to free Mumia with broader political and economic issues, such as the prison industrial complex, gentrification, police brutality, foreclosures, health care, racism, Palestine and Somalia. A number of talks raised the case of Troy Davis, another Black man being threatened with execution in Georgia.

Pam Africa

Speakers included City Councilperson Charles Barron; Rev. Luis Barrios, who was recently released from a New York prison following his arrest at a protest of the repressive Western Hemisphere Institute for Security Cooperation in Georgia; Esperanza Martell, long-time fighter for the freedom of Puerto Rican political prisoners; Nellie Bailey, Harlem Tenants Council; Laura Whitehorn and Lawrence Hayes, former political prisoners; Larry Hales, Fight Imperialism, Stand Together and the International Action Center; Omowale Clay, December 12th Movement; Suzanne Ross and Sundiata Sadiq, N.Y. Free Mumia Coalition; Nada Khader, Westchester Peace Action Coalition; and Pam Africa, International Concerned Family and Friends of Mumia Abu-Jamal.

Rev. Luis Barrios

The street meeting attracted many Harlem residents. Copies of Mumia’s new book, “Jailhouse Lawyers,” were sold during the talks. Visit www.iacenter.org to sign the petition in support of the civil rights investigation.