--Please sign our Color of Change petition to Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner: Stop Defending Mumia Abu-Jamal's Unjust Conviction
The first 3 photos displayed below are taken from the Dec. 8, 2007 slide show by Journalists for Mumia, shown in the embedded video above.
The original photos being displayed by the slide show are taken by Pedro Polakoff, who retains the copyright for the original photos. However, permission is granted to reprint these 3 photos taken at the 2007 slide show, as long as they are not cropped and www.Abu-Jamal-News.com is credited as the source--so, please help spread the word.
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(PHOTO: Officer James Forbes holds both Abu-Jamal's and Faulkner's guns in his bare hand and touches the metal parts. This contradicts his later court testimony that he had preserved the ballistics evidence.) |
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(PHOTO: The parking spot immediately past Officer Faulkner's car is empty, all the way to the end of the curb. This empty space is where prosecution witness Robert Chobert testified that he was parked.) |
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(PHOTO: As also shown in the first photo, of Officer Forbes holding two guns, Billy Cook's hat is on the roof of his car, not on the sidewalk, where it would later appear for the official police photo, as shown directly below) |
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(PHOTO: On the sidewalk, where Faulkner was found, there are no large bullet divots, or destroyed chunks of cement, which should be visible in the pavement if the prosecution scenario was accurate, according to which Abu-Jamal shot down at Faulkner - and allegedly missed several times - while Faulkner was on his back. Dr. Michael Schiffmann writes: "It is thus no question any more whether the scenario presented by the prosecution at Abu-Jamal's trial is true. It is clearly not, because it is physically and ballistically impossible." This observation is supported by the new photos, the official police photo shown above and by a recent ballistics test by investigative journalists Linn Washington Jr. and Dave Lindorff in the embedded video directly below.) |
The Newly Discovered Polakoff Crime Scene Photos: 20 FAQs
--Co-written by Educators for Mumia Abu-Jamal and Journalists for Mumia Abu-Jamal (2007)
Mumia Abu-Jamal has been on Pennsylvania's death row for over a quarter of a century. His 1982 conviction for the shooting death of Philadelphia Police Officer Daniel Faulkner, has been contested by jurists, human rights organizations, and peoples of conscience the world over.Even
though he is arguably the most famous political prisoner in the United
States, his case and struggle for justice distill many of the issues
that racially stigmatized groups and others have faced in the United
States for decades: police brutality and violence, racist applications
of the death penalty, prosecutorial misconduct, suborning of witnesses,
and the use of wealth and political privilege in criminal justice
systems to service the ideological interests of groups and classes in
power.
Within the last year, some 26 photos have been discovered by researcher Dr. Michael Schiffmann of the University of Heidelberg , showing the crime scene where Officer Faulkner was killed.
Within the last year, some 26 photos have been discovered by researcher Dr. Michael Schiffmann of the University of Heidelberg , showing the crime scene where Officer Faulkner was killed.
These photos were offered
to police and prosecutors from the beginning, but were never considered
at Abu-Jamal's 1982 trial, or in any judicial phase of his struggle for
justice thereafter. Indeed, they were unknown even to Abu-Jamal's
defense team, until very recently.
To widen public knowledge about these
photos and to answer many of the basic questions about them, Educators
for Mumia Abu-Jamal and Journalists for Mumia Abu-Jamal have
collaborated to produce this document of "21 FAQs about the Polakoff
Photos."
