Prostitute Cynthia White's version of events evolved as well, each time becoming more helpful for the prosecution even as her version failed to gibe with others' significant details. White, though, would seem to have received little in return for what Jamal supporters claim was her deal with the police; because she was arrested several more times. However, Abu-Jamal claims White was arrested because she recanted or was about to. The prosecution denies that White ever recanted or would have. White is now dead.

There are more witnesses, with similarly conflicting memories and statements.

The Judge

"Nobody tried before Judge [Albert] Sabo got a fair trial," Stephen Bright of the Southern Center for Human Rights says. "He's the country's leading hanging judge."

Prosecutor Burns disagrees: "Judge Albert Sabo is a jurist of impeccable credentials who conducted a scrupulously fair trial in the midst of terrible conditions created by Jamal himself."

It's true that Abu-Jamal's behavior during the trial bordered on the psychotic. He insisted on representing himself and on having John Africa, a local activist and non-lawyer, sit at counsel table with him. He indulged in outbursts and insults and treated his court appointed attorney, Anthony Jackson, with outright contempt.

Abu-Jamal was ejected from his own trial numerous times. During jury selection, part of which Abu-Jamal conducted himself, some prospective jurors confided to Judge Sabo that the defendant "scared them to death" by his manner.

Abu-Jamal's supporters charge that Judge Sabo allowed the prosecutors to inflame the jury's fears by repeating Abu-Jamal's youthful pro-Black Panther pronouncements from 12 years before (when he was 15). It is a well-settled issue in the law, however, that a defendant's abstract beliefs cannot be used unless they are directly relevant to the crime at hand.

So, should Abu-Jamal get a new trial?

Tucker Carlson, a conservative journalist who has written about Abu-Jamal's case, probably speaks for most people when he says, "Look, I'm horrified by the thought of innocent people in jail. But you can't just poke holes at what happened. You have to tell us why this guy is innocent."

For the majority, it all comes down to that, of course. Those who want to see Abu-Jamal denied a retrial harp on the fact that neither he, nor his brother, have ever explained what happened that morning. (Defense attorney Williams counters that Abu-Jamal will tell his story in court if and when he is granted a new trial.)

But Abu-Jamal is under no legal obligation to tell his story. And the real point here is not in fact Abu-Jamal's guilt or innocence. The point is whether or not he got a fair trial. Under our judicial system, fairness of process is the only way civilized people can have confidence that guilt and innocence have been determined, since we can't read minds.

If Abu-Jamal was not fairly tried, then he should be retried. Fairly, the way any one of us would want to be tried were the power of the state to haul us into court, and especially were the state poised to take our lives. You cannot believe in the rule of law, or our constitutional system of democracy and disagree with that proposition. So, was his original trial fair? No. It was certainly typical in many ways, however. Poor and minority defendants often face rushed trials defended by outgunned public defenders in our criminal justice system. They often face prosecutorial "irregularities" as well.

For their part, police and prosecutors are confronted with an overflow of perpetrators who are guilty at the least of something, if not the specific crime as charged. And jurors of all races routinely send people to prison on the basis of scanty or contradictory evidence and/or conflicting testimony. The difference in Abu-Jamal's case is that a poor black defendant has somehow become a celebrity.

In the end, Abu-Jamal is probably going to use his celebrity status to do what O.J. did -- buy himself some reasonable doubt. He's probably going to get a retrial where the prosecution will have to put up a real fight -- and he probably deserves one.

Did Abu-Jamal shoot Officer Faulkner? He probably did.

Premeditatedly? Probably not.

Before or after Faulkner shot him? This is a very important question and one the federal court should focus on. Faulkner likely was in legitimate fear for his life and fired on Abu-Jamal, who was running toward him, and who then returned the fire.

What about the unidentified man who some witnesses said fled the scene? That needs to be thoroughly investigated, as was not done in the first trial.

Stuart Taylor believes that the best hope for a retrial lies in a judgment of ineffective assistance of counsel. "That's the best way to sugar-coat a reversal. Judge Sabo is shockingly biased but courts don't like to have to say that about other judges."

If the federal court grapples directly with Judge Sabo's handling of the trial, we can have faith in their ultimate decision. If they do not, there will certainly be more Mumia Abu-Jamals to come, and poor and minority communities perhaps be forgiven if their faith in the system continues to crumble.

In the end, justice for dead policeman Daniel Faulkner, cut down in the prime of his life and leaving a young widow whose life is forever scarred, will not be served by executing a framed man.

Not even if he is guilty.

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