Mumia

JUST BEFORE 4 a.m. on Dec. 9, 1981, in a rough downtown neighborhood of Philadelphia, Police Officer Daniel Faulkner stopped a Volkswagen Beetle and arrested its driver, William Cook, for driving the wrong way down a one-way street.Expecting or experiencing trouble, Daniel Faulkner radioed for assistance.When fellow police officers arrived, they found him lying in the street, shot in the back and the face.A few feet away, slumped in his own pool of blood, was William Cook's brother, a free-lance journalist and black activist named Mumia Abu-Jamal -- born Wesley Cook.

PHILADELPHIA -- Do a Google search for "Mumia Abu-Jamal" and you'll get more than 1 million hits for sites containing his name. For "Police Officer Daniel Faulkner," it's only 25,000. Twenty-five years ago, an exchange of gunfire that left Faulkner dead and Abu-Jamal wounded linked the names of the two men inextricably in Philadelphia's history. The survivor was transformed into a revolutionary folk hero, an international cause celebre; the dead man became a memory whose cause has been taken up by supporters determined to ensure that his is more than a bit part in a death penalty drama still without a final act. Both sides - those who are determined that Abu-Jamal is innocent and those who are equally determined that he is not - will gather again in Philadelphia this week.

What is one to make of the case of Mumia Abu-Jamal, the former Black Panther and radio journalist who has been on Pennsylvania's death row for the last 13 years awaiting execution for the 1981 murder of a white Philadelphia police officer?Quite aside from the issue of his guilt or innocence, the case raises troubling questions for Abu-Jamal's fellow black journalists, who held their annual meeting last month in Philadelphia. The case drew a well-attended panel discussion in which both the prosecutor in Abu-Jamal's original trial and the lawyer handling his appeal participated.

THE FBI IS supposedly the nation's top law enforcement agency. The truth is, it's overrated, ineffective and incompetent. How else could we explain why that dangerous, dreaded and elusive criminal, Someone Else, is not at the top of the FBI's 10 Most Wanted List? We have no firm description of Else. We know he's male. But his address, whereabouts and even his origins are unknown. What we do know is that on the night of Dec. 9, 1981, Else was in Philadelphia, where he gunned down and killed Officer Daniel Faulkner.

Mumia Abu-Jamal was sentenced to death in connection with the Dec. 9, 1981, slaying of a Philadelphia police officer. The date was incorrectly reported in an article and photo caption in Sunday's Perspective section.The Sun regrets the error.

PHILADELPHIA -- Do a Google search for "Mumia Abu-Jamal" and you'll get more than 1 million hits for sites containing his name. For "Police Officer Daniel Faulkner," it's only 25,000. Twenty-five years ago, an exchange of gunfire that left Faulkner dead and Abu-Jamal wounded linked the names of the two men inextricably in Philadelphia's history. The survivor was transformed into a revolutionary folk hero, an international cause celebre; the dead man became a memory whose cause has been taken up by supporters determined to ensure that his is more than a bit part in a death penalty drama still without a final act. Both sides - those who are determined that Abu-Jamal is innocent and those who are equally determined that he is not - will gather again in Philadelphia this week.

Here is some career advice for anyone who plans on becoming a murderer: Develop your writing skills.This could prove to be far more significant than your choice of weapons or lawyers, especially if you land on Death Row.That's because big names in literary, intellectual and show business circles tend to be far more sympathetic to an articulate killer than some lowbrow fiend who drools and grunts.We're seeing a classic example of this in the case of a convict named Mumia Abu-Jamal, 41, who awaits execution in Pennsylvania for the murder of a Philadelphia cop.Abu-Jamal has won the loyalty and affection of prominent authors, actors, academics and other deep thinkers not only in this country but across Europe.

THE RECENT decision by a South Carolina jury to spare the life of confessed murderer Susan Smith and the continued refusal of a Philadelphia judge to reconsider the scheduled execution of black political activist and journalist Mumia Abu-Jamal demonstrate that the American criminal justice system is not color blind and does not value all human life equally.Susan Smith, a white woman, was convicted of killing her two sons. She originally had concocted a story that a black male carjacker kidnapped her two children.

PHILADELPHIA -- The protests and passions of the 1960s made a comeback here yesterday as more than 3,500 people rallied against the death penalty and demanded a new trial for a condemned radio journalist and former Black Panther, Mumia Abu-Jamal.In the 13 years since he was sent to death row for the 1981 murder of a police officer here, Abu-Jamal has become an international symbol for the movement against the death penalty, and several other demonstrations on his behalf were scheduled yesterday in cities across the country and in Europe.

WASHINGTON -- Ten days before he was scheduled to die, journalist and death row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal received yesterday an indefinite delay of his execution for the 1981 murder of a Philadelphia police officer.Judge Albert F. Sabo, who presided over the 1982 trial that sent Abu-Jamal to Pennsylvania's death row, said there isn't enough time to complete a hearing into whether the journalist deserves a new trial before the Saturday execution date.Moreover, Judge Sabo said defense attorneys would need time to exhaust all possible appeals before Abu-Jamal can be put to death by lethal injection.

PHILADELPHIA - Tiana Duvall and a platoon of allies carried signs that read "Stop Police Brutality" and marched across Benjamin Franklin Parkway yesterday with determination. The crew - decked in ripped T-shirts, nose rings and pink hair - joined 7,000 protesters, creating a makeshift village on Philadelphia's widest street while denouncing everything from abortion to the death penalty. But the 24-year-old State University of New York student and her friends had more modest goals for the moment.

Let's take first things first. I believe that one December night in 1981 Mumia Abu-Jamal shot and killed Philadelphia police Officer Daniel Faulkner. The official story says that Abu-Jamal came across Faulkner beating his brother and shot the officer.Abu-Jamal was tried for the crime. Friends either from or living in Philadelphia tell me that, during the trial, Abu-Jamal insulted and questioned the integrity of his black attorney and insulted jurors. In other words, Abu-Jamal acted as biliously and truculently as any member of MOVE - a militant, "back-to-nature organization."

What is one to make of the case of Mumia Abu-Jamal, the former Black Panther and radio journalist who has been on Pennsylvania's death row for the last 13 years awaiting execution for the 1981 murder of a white Philadelphia police officer?Quite aside from the issue of his guilt or innocence, the case raises troubling questions for Abu-Jamal's fellow black journalists, who held their annual meeting last month in Philadelphia. The case drew a well-attended panel discussion in which both the prosecutor in Abu-Jamal's original trial and the lawyer handling his appeal participated.

Miami -- I was 13 years old. The police car drew abreast of me as I rounded the corner. ''Where you headed?'' demanded the officer inside.Startled, I nodded my head toward the building next to me. ''Inside the church,'' I said. The deacons paid me $2 a week to clean it up after choir rehearsal.The officer was skeptical. ''On a Saturday?'' he asked. ''What's that in your pocket?''I pulled out a large comb. He drove off and I exhaled.* * *We are all prisoners of our own experiences, hostage to the way it is where we come from.

PHILADELPHIA -- The protests and passions of the 1960s made a comeback here yesterday as more than 3,500 people rallied against the death penalty and demanded a new trial for a condemned radio journalist and former Black Panther, Mumia Abu-Jamal.In the 13 years since he was sent to death row for the 1981 murder of a police officer here, Abu-Jamal has become an international symbol for the movement against the death penalty, and several other demonstrations on his behalf were scheduled yesterday in cities across the country and in Europe.

Here is some career advice for anyone who plans on becoming a murderer: Develop your writing skills.This could prove to be far more significant than your choice of weapons or lawyers, especially if you land on Death Row.That's because big names in literary, intellectual and show business circles tend to be far more sympathetic to an articulate killer than some lowbrow fiend who drools and grunts.We're seeing a classic example of this in the case of a convict named Mumia Abu-Jamal, 41, who awaits execution in Pennsylvania for the murder of a Philadelphia cop.Abu-Jamal has won the loyalty and affection of prominent authors, actors, academics and other deep thinkers not only in this country but across Europe.

New York -- Writers from around the world gathered here and in Paris this past Tuesday to denounce the pending execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal as an evil, racist act and to call for a new trial for a man they consider a fellow author.Meanwhile, in Italy, deputies in that country's lower house called on the government to press the United States to lift the death sentence on the former radio journalist, who has become the subject of an international campaign backed by politicians, movie celebrities and writers.

Miami -- I was 13 years old. The police car drew abreast of me as I rounded the corner. ''Where you headed?'' demanded the officer inside.Startled, I nodded my head toward the building next to me. ''Inside the church,'' I said. The deacons paid me $2 a week to clean it up after choir rehearsal.The officer was skeptical. ''On a Saturday?'' he asked. ''What's that in your pocket?''I pulled out a large comb. He drove off and I exhaled.* * *We are all prisoners of our own experiences, hostage to the way it is where we come from.

WASHINGTON -- Ten days before he was scheduled to die, journalist and death row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal received yesterday an indefinite delay of his execution for the 1981 murder of a Philadelphia police officer.Judge Albert F. Sabo, who presided over the 1982 trial that sent Abu-Jamal to Pennsylvania's death row, said there isn't enough time to complete a hearing into whether the journalist deserves a new trial before the Saturday execution date.Moreover, Judge Sabo said defense attorneys would need time to exhaust all possible appeals before Abu-Jamal can be put to death by lethal injection.

THE RECENT decision by a South Carolina jury to spare the life of confessed murderer Susan Smith and the continued refusal of a Philadelphia judge to reconsider the scheduled execution of black political activist and journalist Mumia Abu-Jamal demonstrate that the American criminal justice system is not color blind and does not value all human life equally.Susan Smith, a white woman, was convicted of killing her two sons. She originally had concocted a story that a black male carjacker kidnapped her two children.