The Third Circuit issued an order stating Abu-Jamal will receive a life-sentence unless Philadelphia prosecutors hold a new penalty phase hearing seeking to reinstate his death sentence within six months.
This mini-trial style hearing would allow Abu-Jamal to present evidence, including new evidence of innocence that has emerged like a flood since his first trial.
But it is unclear if prosecutors will pursue this route that could create evidence and procedure that could secure a new round of federal appeals for Abu-Jamal.
OVERLOOKED CRUX OF CASE
Sadly, the federal judges at the trial and appellate court levels, like judges in Pa state courts, have refused to uphold the most fundamental issue in the contentious Abu-Jamal case: the right to a fair trial.
Critics of Abu-Jamal’s conviction from Philadelphia’s Francisville section to France all feel he was denied a fair trial.
Police and prosecutors blatantly engaging in misconduct to secure a conviction destroys fair trial rights. A trial judge openly biased towards police and prosecutors destroys fair trial rights. Court applying the law in the Abu-Jamal case differently from applied in other cases destroys equal justice rights.
The Pa Supreme Court declared in a 1959 ruling involving a Philadelphia murder case that every defendant is entitled “to all the safeguards of a fair trial…even if evidence of guilt piles as high a Mt Everest…”
Abu-Jamal was four-years-old when the Pa Supreme Court issued that 1959 ruling against judges and prosecutors cutting-corners during a trial.
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