Defense Files New Legal Papers in Mumia Abu-Jamal Case

Government Witness Against Police Corruption in 39th District Provides New Evidence of Jamal's Innocence

March 10 - Attorneys for Mumia Abu-Jamal filed new legal papers today, centered on testimony from former Philadelphia police informant Pamela Jenkins, that give further proof that police manipulated and pressured witnesses to give false testimony against death row political prisoner and MOVE supporter Mumia Abu-Jamal.

Jenkins was the central government informant and witness in the federal investigation which recently led to the conviction of six 39th District officers for gross police corruption including framing up innocent people. In a signed statement to Jamal's attorneys in January, Jenkins testified that police officer Tom Ryan, one of the convicted police from the 39th District, had pressured her to give false testimony against Jamal in the shooting of police officer Daniel Faulkner.

In her affidavit Jenkins, a former prostitute and girlfriend of Ryan's, states: "Tom Ryan, Richard Ryan and other police officers pressured me and asked me if I had seen the shooting of the police officer and whether I had been in the area of the shooting that night. When I said 'no' they pressured some more and asked me was I really sure that I hadn't been on the street that night and seen the shooting. It was clear to me that Tom Ryan and Richard Ryan wanted me to perjure myself and say that I had seen Jamal shoot the police officer."

Jenkins' affidavit further testifies that Cynthia White, the star witness for the prosecution in Jamal's 1982 trial and the only one to claim to have seen Jamal, with a gun in his hand, shoot Faulkner, was also subject to police coercion to make her give false testimony against Jamal. Jenkins states, "I know that Cynthia White worked as a prostitute in the center city area, specifically at Locust and 13th Street, during 1980 and 1981 and that she was a prostitute, police informant and turned tricks for police officers in the district. . . . During the same period of time, Cynthia White told me that she was afraid of the police and that the police were trying to get her to say something about the shooting. Lucky [Cynthia White] also told me that she had been threatened with her life by a police officer because of the Jamal case."

The legal brief filed with the Pennsylvania Supreme Court discloses, "In the days after the shooting, [White] was arrested at least twice for prostitution. Her picture was posted in the 6th District with instructions for arresting officers to 'Contact Homicide.' Each time police picked White up and took her statement, she revised her story [on Faulkner's shooting]. Without explanation, bench warrants against her were not prosecuted."

The papers go on to expose that police attention to White did not cease even after Jamal's 1982 conviction: "White claimed at the 1982 trial that she had received no special treatment in return for her testimony, other than lodging and security during her testimony. However, White plainly continued to receive special treatment as late as 1987, when _a Homicide detective came to court to ask the judge to let White out of jail because of her role in the Jamal case._ On June 29, 1987, after a preliminary hearing, White was held for arraignment on serious felony charges including robbery, assault, and weapons charges. Jamal has now obtained the transcript of this hearing, attached as Exhibit 2, which shows an extraordinary proceeding. The court was prepared to impose a bail requirement on Ms. White, based on 'seventeen failures to appear.' Ms. White's attorney then sought to go to a sidebar to permit Homicide detective Douglas Culbreth to address the court. Det. Culbreth, who was one of the detectives involved in the Jamal investigation, told the court that Ms. White 'was a Commonwealth witness in a very high profile case.' The District Attorney's office then agreed that Ms. White would be allowed to sign for her own bail. After that Homicide detective's intervention, White signed herself out, skipped bail, and has never been arrested in Philadelphia since."

At a press conference today in Philadelphia following the filing of the new defense papers, Jamal's lead attorney, Leonard Weinglass, argued that Jenkins' testimony "adds to the testimony already given by Veronica Jones about police intimidation and by witness William Singletary, calls for a new trial without further hearing, and in accordance with the doctrine of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania even mandates an absolute dismissal of the case against Mumia." At Jamal's 1995 PCRA hearing, Singletary testified that he had been threatened by police to withdraw his original true statement that he saw the shooter and it wasn't Jamal. Jones, another key witness in the 1982 trial of Jamal, came forward last October to testify that Philadelphia police had threatened her with arrest and worse if she did not change her original true statement that she had seen two men run from the scene of Faulkner's shooting as Jamal lay wounded on the ground.

At today's press conference, Veronica Jones made a public plea for Cynthia White to surface and to tell the truth: "We know we can bring this down to a nutshell if you just come forward. We've all lost a lot by coming forward; I've lost somebody I love dearly. . . . Just do it this one time, one favor, that's not asking a lot. Then maybe you can clean up your past, like the rest of us are doing."

Rachel Wolkenstein, one of Jamal's attorneys and staff counsel for the Partisan Defense Committee, noted: "The coercion, alternately combined with favors to witnesses, to provide false testimony in the Jamal case parallels revelations of the police frame-up machine in the 39th District which falsely convicted and jailed countless innocent men and women. For 15 years, Mumia has proclaimed his innocence and accused his accusers of a politically motivated frame-up. Since he joined the Black Panther Party at age 15, Mumia was targeted by the Philly police and the FBI's notorious COINTELPRO operation. Now they want to silence forever this powerful voice who exposed racism and police brutality in his radio broadcasts and as a supporter of the MOVE organization."

As PDC spokesman Richard Genova stated, "From the time the Partisan Defense Committee took up Jamal's case ten years ago, we have emphasized that the fight for his freedom must rely on mass mobilizations centered on the social power of the labor movement. Trade unions representing millions of workers--in the U.S., Britain, France, Germany, South Africa and elsewhere--have spoken out for Mumia. Thousands took to the streets following the signing of a death warrant against Jamal in 1995. Thousands must be turned into tens of thousands, bringing to bear the weight of the working class in the urgent fight for Jamal's freedom. Join us in the fight to abolish the racist death penalty! Free Mumia Abu-Jamal!"

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