Imprisoned writer Mumia Abu-Jamal seeks UN intervention after 44 years behind bars

Former Black Panther Mumia Abu-Jamal, seen in this undated file photo. Photograph: April Saul/April Saul / Philadelphia Inquirer View image in fullscreen Former Black Panther Mumia Abu-Jamal, seen in this undated file photo. Photograph: April Saul/April Saul / Philadelphia Inquirer Imprisoned writer Mumia Abu-Jamal seeks UN intervention after 44 years behind bars The former Black Panther’s lawyers ask a UN panel to review his detention after US legal avenues were exhausted As he approaches the 45th anniversary of his incarceration in December, the Black radical writer and prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal is taking his claim that he has been subjected to arbitrary imprisonment for a crime that he did not commit to a new tribunal: the United Nations in Geneva. On Tuesday Abu-Jamal, 72, lodged a petition with the UN’s working group on arbitrary detention, a body within the Human Rights Council. It marks the latest attempt by the internationally-renowned prisoner and prolific author of 15 books to seek relief, having exhausted all domestic channels through state and federal courts. In a telephone interview with the Guardian from Mahanoy correctional institution in Pennsylvania, where he is being held on a life sentence with no chance of parole, he said the appeal to the UN was part of his personal and legal efforts to keep hope alive. “Hope is an element of struggle, is it not,” he said. “As we used to say in the old days, ‘La luta continua’.” ‘Intoxicating freedom, gripping fear’: Mumia Abu-Jamal on life as a Black Panther Read more The hope that this former Black Panther might one day walk free from Mahanoy is slim. He is serving a life sentence without any possibility of parole. In Pennsylvania, life without parole means just that: there is no accounting for rehabilitation, age or health, and any prisoner serving it will die behind bars no matter his or her circumstances. Abu-Jamal was convicted in 1982 of a crime for which he has always protested his innocence – the first degree murder of a police officer, Daniel Faulkner, in Philadelphia. Since then, he has become a lightning rod for both left and right. For progressives, he is arguably the most celebrated political prisoner in America today. For the law and order crowd, led by the Fraternal Order of Police that has pushed relentlessly for his maximum punishment, he is nothing other than a cop killer. Despite the long odds, Abu-Jamal is doing all he can to stay upbeat. “I’ve rarely, if ever, placed my hope in courts of law,” he said. “But I do trust in people, as people are the ones who build movements and make change.” Tuesday’s newly-lodged petition calls on the UN to take a stance over what it says are the many injustices against Abu-Jamal during his original trial and in the decades of unsuccessful appeals that have followed. His legal team – led by Bret Grote of the Abolitionist Law Center, joined by the ACLU and the Center for Constitutional Rights – argues that he has endured multiple violations