On a bitter cold December night, 44 years
ago, a police officer was brutally murdered on the icy, dark streets of
Philadelphia. Patrolman Daniel Faulkner, making a routine traffic stop at about
three o'clock on the morning of December 9, 1981, was knocked to the ground and
shot several times in his upper body and face. Four eyewitnesses to the cold-blooded
homicide identified the murderer as, Wesley Cook (AKA Mumia Abu Jamal). Mr.
Cook was convicted of first degree murder the following year and sentenced to
death by execution.
Well, here we are, more than 4
decades later, and instead of an execution, we have something akin to a
coronation. Mr. Cook has received money for the sales of books, written while
in prison, and he has been allowed to write a column in which he regularly
rants about “racial injustice in America.” In addition, his fight against the
death penalty, for which he has had the support of several Hollywood
celebrities, has proved fruitful because several years ago, a judge reduced his
penalty to life in prison.
When I think about the facts of
this case, I have to agree with Mr. Cook, there is racial injustice in this
country. Mr. Cook, a black man, murdered Officer Faulkner, a white man, and to
this date Officer Faulkner has not received justice. Cook, a former member of
the Black Panthers and an avid supporter of anti-government, and anti-police
groups, was observed firing a shot into Faulkner's back as the officer was
struggling with Cook's brother William, the driver of the vehicle. The wounded
officer spun around, drew his revolver, and fired back, hitting Wesley Cook in
the upper torso. At that point, the officer fell to the ground, writhing in
pain from the back wound. Mr. Cook staggered a few feet, then walked up to the
helpless cop and fired at his chest. Faulkner was twisting furiously on the
ground, trying to avoid the bullets. Ultimately, Cook placed the gun barrel
within inches of the cop's face and fired again. Witnesses have stated that a
few quick spasms signaled the end of Faulkner's life.
Before the officer stopped the
vehicle, which was going the wrong way on a one-way street with its lights off,
he had radioed for backup, as police procedure dictates. After Cook fired the
fatal bullet, he attempted to leave the scene, but his wound kept him from
going very far. He was sitting on the curb with the murder weapon in his hand
when the police arrived. When warned to drop the gun, he attempted to take aim
at one of the responding officers, who, rather than shoot him, knocked the gun
to the ground.
At the emergency room of the
hospital, as Cook was violently resisting the police who took him there for
treatment of his wound, witnesses heard Cook shout: “I shot the mother f......
and I hope the mother f..... dies.” The witnesses who were present at the
shooting scene gave signed statements to the police only minutes after the
occurrence. Without deviation, each one stated that they saw Cook murder
Faulkner, and that they never took their eyes off him from the time he fired
the fatal shots, to the time the police arrested him, just minutes later. At
the subsequent trial, the witnesses testified accordingly.
One can scarcely imagine having
more evidence for a trial and conviction than the incontrovertible facts
presented here. During the trial, Mumia Abu Jamal, (He became an African tribal
leader as soon as he found himself in a cell) repeatedly disrupted the
proceedings on a daily basis with loud outbursts and verbal threats. An
extremely patient judge and prosecutor dealt with his desperate attempts to
make the trial about race, even allowing him to run his own defense and
interview potential jurors. In the end, the racially mixed jury convicted Mumia
of First-Degree Murder and recommended the death penalty. Up to that point, the
system was working. If Mumia had been taken from the courtroom, brought to the
place of execution, and been forced to pay with his life, justice would have
been done.
But this is America, the
country where people like Mumia and others are quick to criticize as barbarous
and primitive. In this country, the system of appeals is practically endless,
and the race card has more stopping power than a .44 Magnum. Who cares that
Officer Faulkner has been dead and buried for 44 years? Who cares that the
evidence against his murderer is flawless? Who cares that the jury only needed
3 hours to arrive at a unanimous vote for conviction? Mumia is black, and that
entitles him to proclaim that the only reason for his plight is his color.
Imagine if the situation were
reversed. The white guy stood over the black guy and fired bullets into his
face in front of 4 witnesses. Do you think the judge and the D.A. would be so
patient with his courtroom antics? How many Hollywood celebrities do you think
would be making appeals to save his life? Would he still be alive and able to
spread his racist dogma in newspapers and magazines? Nah! He'd be toast!!
Mumia is right. This is a
racist country.