Thursday, February 19, 2009

Private Oral Exam Guide or Framing of Mumia Abu Jamal

Private Oral Exam Guide: The Comprehensive Guide to Prepare You for the FAA Oral Exam

Author: Michael D Hayes

Updated to reflect vital FAA regulatory, procedural, and training changes, this indispensable tool prepares private pilots for their one-on-one "checkride" with an FAA examiner. It answers the most commonly asked questions, clarifies the requirements of the written and oral portions, and presents study material for the exam. Topics covered include certification and documents, weather, airplane systems, and cross-country flight planning. This newly revised edition also includes a section on aeronautical decision-making and crew resource management.



Book review: Direzione della Fuori-de--Scatola

Framing of Mumia Abu-Jamal

Author: J Patrick OConnor

Sentenced to death in 1982 for allegedly killing a police officer named Daniel Faulkner, Mumia Abu-Jamal is the most famous death row inmate in the United States, if not the world. This book is the first to convincingly show how the Philadelphia Police Department and District Attorney’s Office efficiently and methodically framed him. It takes you step-by-step through what actually transpired on the night Faulkner was shot, including positioning each of the witnesses at the scene and revealing the identity of the killer. It also details the entire trial and fully covers the tortuous appeals process. The author, a seasoned crime reporter, writes in the language of hard facts, without hyperbole or exaggeration, unfounded accusation or finger-pointing, to reveal the truth about one of the most hotly debated cases of the twentieth century.

Publishers Weekly

In this account of the trial of controversial death row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal, O'Connor, editor and publisher of crimemagazine.com, clearly lays out his case that Abu-Jamal should receive at least a new trial, if not complete exoneration. O'Connor asserts that Abu-Jamal was framed for the 1981 murder of police officer Daniel Faulkner because of a vendetta by Philadelphia mayor Frank Rizzo and the police due to Abu-Jamal's defense, as a journalist, of the cultish countercultural group MOVE. Relying heavily on court transcripts and prior books on the case, O'Connor shows what he sees as the judge's bias, troubled relations between Abu-Jamal and his defense lawyer and dubious statements by various witnesses. Abu-Jamal was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death; later overturned, the sentence could still be reinstated pending a decision by the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. In the wake of Faulkner's widow's recent book alleging Abu-Jamal's guilt, it's difficult to be swayed entirely by O'Connor's arguments, but he makes a strong case that the investigation into Faulkner's murder deserves another look. (May)

Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Booklist

A complex and compelling read that rivals established TV hits while tackling real life injustice.

Kirkus Reviews

The title says it all: Longtime investigative reporter and Crime Magazine editor and publisher O'Connor argues that the best-known death-row inmate of our time was set up. An advocacy journalist well regarded in Philadelphia and beyond for his interviewing skills, perhaps destined for fame as a news anchor or writer, Mumia Abu-Jamal "had never been known for violence." Indeed, writes O'Connor, he had been a peace activist while a student at ultraliberal Goddard College and was seemingly on the path to becoming a Rastafarian ascetic when he was charged with the December 9, 1981 murder of police officer Daniel Faulkner. Abu-Jamal admittedly carried a gun; a part-time cab driver since being fired from a public radio station for his unscripted political commentary, Mumia had twice been robbed and was concerned for his safety. Connected by several threads to the "back-to-nature group MOVE," which had drawn the ire and bullets of Philadelphia police during the Frank Rizzo years, Abu-Jamal was framed, perhaps to keep him from looking too deeply into police counterintelligence operations. The police investigation was incomplete, confused and much-revised, and the forensics were improbable: Detained, Abu-Jamal was supposed to have been on the ground below Faulkner, but the first bullet to strike hit the officer in the back. Moreover, writes O'Connor, "It would not come out until trial that the police had not bothered to run any tests of Abu-Jamal's hands or clothing to determine if he had fired a gun or even if [his] .38 had been fired." Such tests being commonplace at shooting scenes, O'Connor advances the view that the results did not fit the setup and were discarded. Compounding all this,O'Connor then enumerates, was flawed physical evidence, a biased judge, perjured testimony and a district attorney known as the " 'Queen of Death' because of her zeal for seeking the death penalty," particularly for black capital offenders. O'Connor sets forth a careful, well-constructed argument. Whether it changes minds one way or the other remains to be seen, but, he urges, it is time for a new trial.

What People Are Saying

Edward Asner
O'Connor's . . .efforts and results are most impressive.




Table of Contents:

Acknowledgments     ix
Preface     xi
Introduction: A Cause Celebre     1
December 9, 1981     7
The Arrest     15
The Original Police Version of the Shooting     21
Frank Rizzo     25
MOVE     29
The Arrest and Trial of John Africa     47
Mumia     49
Pretrial Hearings     57
The Witnesses     61
The Players     65
Jury Selection     73
The Trial Opens     77
Testimony of Robert Chobert     81
Cynthia White's First Day of Testimony     87
White's Testimony, Part II     95
The Alleged Confession     101
Testimony of Michael Scanlan     113
Testimony of Albert Magilton     117
How Faulkner Died     121
Judge Sabo: "I Don't Care About Mr. Jamal"     131
The Defense     141
Witnesses for the Defense     147
"The Negro Male Made No Comments"     157
Jackson's Closing Statement     165
McGill's Summation     171
Guilty!     179
The Sentencing Hearing     181
The FreeMumia Movement     191
The Post-Conviction Relief Act Hearings     201
Arnold Beverly     223
Mumia's Own Account     227
Was Faulkner an FBI Informant?     235
Justice Delayed     239
Oral Arguments     245
Justice at Last     253
Index     261

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