Twenty-three students graduate from Goddard College this Sunday. The school will hand out diplomas in a small, intimate ceremony — one of 20 held each year — at the Haybarn Theatre on its Plainfield campus. The graduates chose for a speaker a 1996 alumnus who has written six books and has been an outspoken advocate for racial justice and prisoners’ rights.
Yesterday, Vermont cops requested that Goddard rescind its invitation.
The commencement speaker, Mumia Abu-Jamal, is a convicted murderer who is sending his speech, prerecorded, from the Mahanoy State Correctional Institution in Frackville, Penn. That’s causing a stir — in Vermont and beyond.
Jamal was originally sentenced to death for killing a police officer in Philadelphia in 1981. The sentence was later amended to life in prison without parole. While behind bars, Abu-Jamal, 60, who claims to be innocent, has been speaking and writing extensively about his experience on death row and the criminal justice system in general. While in prison, he earned his bachelor of arts from Goddard in 1996.
The officer’s widow has condemned Goddard’s decision. Fox News ran a story yesterday with the headline “Decision to let cop killer Abu-Jamal give commencement speech ‘despicable,’ widow says.” John Wetzel, the Pennsylvania corrections secretary, was quoted calling the decision “very troubling.”
Vermont cops are upset, too. Michael O’Neil, president of the 280-member Vermont Troopers’ Association, penned a strongly-worded letter requesting that the college’s interim president, Bob Kenny, rescind its offer. “Your invitation to this convicted murderer demonstrates an absolute disregard for the family of Danny Faulkner and the families of other police officers who have been killed while serving their communities,” O’Neil wrote on Tuesday, referring to the police officer Abu-Jamal is convicted of killing.
In a written statement, Kenny commended the students’ choice. “Choosing Mumia as their commencement speaker, to me, shows how this newest group of Goddard graduates expresses their freedom to engage and think radically and critically in a world that often sets up barriers to do just that.”
Goddard isn’t the first college to ask Jamal to speak at graduation — Evergreen State College in Washington invited him in 1999, which created a similar backlash, and Antioch College in Ohio invited him the following year.
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How can he speak if he’s in prison???
“How can he speak if he’s in prison???”
Via prerecorded video.
As it says in the story “The commencement speaker, Mumia Abu-Jamal, is a convicted murderer who is sending his speech, prerecorded, from the Mahanoy State Correctional Institution in Frackville, Penn. “
Commend the courage of theses students and the cooperation of the university in granting them their desire!
Curls to all; I am sure Mumia will deliver an impactful engaging message, B Great!
http://youtu.be/V4A0Qya23y0
The word courage is used in many circumstances where it doesn’t belong.
Mumia will deliver a powerful message as he has done many,many times before. He should be a free man and I am proud to be a Vermonter tonight as I hear this news. Kudos to Goddard and to the graduates for believing in themselves and in Mumia. Thousands and thousands of people sit behind bars at this very moment in American prisons who should be FREE. This is a fact. Our legal system had,has and will continue to have in perfections. We are humans and mistakes will be made. Putting Mumia behind bars was one of those mistakes our legal system made. Proud of you tonight Goddard College!!
I see 7 Days has simply followed the same path as WCAX with this article. I used to ignore the idea that Vermont has an insidious “racism” issue with blacks and other minorities. I say incidious, because Vermont speaks all-nice and left-wingy about life, but notoriously turns nasty, without looking up the facts, when it comes to these types of stories. Very sad, this is.
Interesting it is that WCAX (in Vermont) would immediately paste Mumia Abu Jamal as a `cop killer,` instead of an `accused`cop-killer, without bothering to actually research several sources about his case and the unjustified and brutal (and consistent) actions of the Philadelphia Police department’s treatment toward black Americans, not just in the 1960s, but straight through the 1990s and early 2000s. However, I live in America. This does not surprise me.
Any other person would be marked as “accused cop-killer.” No one is justifying murder; yet, a cabie comes across the scene of his own brother being beaten by a cop (yes, allegedly–though extraordinarily common and considered the cultural norm for white cops to act toward blacks in that time and more recent times), and he cannot defend his family? He is shot and the cop is shot. Where those shots came from was never proven beyond a shadow of a doubt. Numerous witnesses (themselves black) stated that another black man shot both people (but let’s be fair: some folks think we all look the same, and are all guilty). Several witnesses were taken in by the cops and seriously intimidated into signing retractions. Oh no. This does not get out. Mumia’s black. He must have killed the cop. The cop was white; he must have been all good, and not doing the very thing the Philadelphia Police department was consistently accused of in that time period–relentlessly abusing, harassing and beating black and Hispanic citizens. Where the bullets came from was simply never clear. Yet, Jamal is black. He must be guilty.
This may not be “nice” and “politically correct.” I am actually in support of most of what law enforcement stands for; tampering with evidence and false accusations is not any of them, though. World outrage over this did not happen in a vacuum. I am not in favor of labeling someone for any kind of crime, much less murder, without knowing the deepest, most hidden particulars of the case. Though I do love WCAX reporting most of the time, I am shaken by your lack of fairness with this subject. I simply am; but I am black, so who cares, right? There really aren’t enough of us around for my voice to matter.
Most of you will simply say that I am just “playing the race card,” a quick way for certain folks to write this off. I have to accept that I live in a world where “shooting an unarmed black man” is a running sport with police and other certain citizens. I have to be careful, and just accept that this is the way it has always been in America. I support Goddard College`s students in their decision. They have the First Amendment right and the Liberty to hear the voices chosen by their students. We do not have to all agree; but the decision was not made in a vacuum, once again. It will be interesting to see if I am taken out of context. Be Well and Go Carefully.
http://www.bostonreview.net/us/loren-goldner-campaign-save-mumia-abu-jamal
The Campaign to Save Mumia Abu-Jamal | Boston Review
Loren GoldnerFebruary 01, 1999 Loren GoldnerUnless he is saved in the coming weeks and months by an international campaign of protest, or by an unlikely Supreme Court decision in his favor,…
bostonreview.net
[laughter]
“Accused” cop killer? How about *convicted* cop killer?
Why is he serving a life sentence if he is not guilty? I’m not for crime-black or white. When does the killing end if we don’t uphold the law? Who kills who next? Is that the freedom you want to enjoy? Why glorify evil?
Congratulations to Goddard College, an institution of thoughtful and critical education, for doing something radical and unprecedented as respecting the wishes of its students, and for keeping to its tradition of unconventional education where students are NOT taught to be sheep like the rest of society who fail to question authority and give them a blank check to do so many criminal things in the name of justice!
Congrats to the graduating class, and may Goddard and its students always continue to speak their truth to power! In this time post -Ferguson a time of ongoing criminality by the police everywhere in this country who continue to devalue African American lives by beating and shooting to kill, because of their underlying racism that shows its ugly face under pressure, that no white person has to live through because of their white skin privilege…but we are getting tired of this two tiered system, and its time to end this vicious cycle…racial profiling must end, as must fearing black and brown people, and they must be seen as humans too, until then the civil rights, equality and democracy that this country upholds is a sham. Ya Basta! Enough is Enough…here’s a step in the direction of social change, a tradition that Vermont should continue to venerate and celebrate, not fall victim to the same old racist and authoritarian rhetoric of a corrupt justice system. Be proud Vermont, when have you ever not done the correct thing? “Never doubt that a small group of concerned citizens can change the world, indeed it’s the only thing that ever has”–Margaret Mead.
Before commenting on Mumia Abu Jamal, ask yourself the following questions:
1. Who is Mumia Abu Jamal?
2. Why is his conviction and continued imprisonment controversial?
3. Why don’t I know the facts of his prosecution and conviction?
4. Why am I commenting about something I know nothing about?
Then, google search Mumia Abu Jamal innocent.
Then google search Knee jerk reaction.
Very good.
I myself have often fantasize about taking the law into my own hands. At the same time I’m thankful I don’t live in a lawful vigitantee system.
This is McCarthy-style orchestrated outrage
operating without intellectual integrity:
http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/27…
Mumia was convicted, but his trial was a sham.
Facts:
Daniel Faulkner was executed while making what seemed to be a routine traffic stop.
He pulled over the brother of Mumia Abu-Jamaul, William Cook, who was driving his Volkswagen the wrong way on a one way street.
Abu-Jamal was then an out of work journalist who was driving a cab. His revolutionary ideas were well documented.
He saw the police stop from across the street.
Four, I repeat FOUR eyewitnesses testified at trial as to what happened next. Their testimony portrayed a horrific sequence:
Abu-Jamal ran across the street, shot Faulkner in the back, and finally between the eyes. Before that final fatal shot, Faulkner has discharged his gun, hitting Abu-Jamal in the stomach. With that bullet, you could say he confirmed the identity of his executioner.
When police arrived quickly on the scene, Abu-Jamal was still wearing his holster.
The murder weapon was registered to Abu-Jamal. He’d purchased it at a local sporting goods store. The five -shot Charter Arms revolver contained five spent shells. Ballistic tests verified that the shells found in Abu-Jamals gun were the same caliber, brand, and type as the fatal bullet removed from Faulkners brain.
Both men were taken to a local ER, Faulkner was pronounced dead. Abu-Jamal was heard by witnesses to say, “I shot the motherf-and I hope the motherf-dies.”
So the case had eyewitnesses, a ballistics match, and a confession.
Abu-Jamals own brother, William Cook, saw it all. It was his car stop that set in motion the chain of events. His words to police upon their arrival were, “I ain’t got nothing to do with it,” and he has NEVER testified on his brother’s behalf. Let me say that again-the BROTHER of the man convicted of killing Daniel has never taken the stand to tell a different story, and he was there.
In 1982 a multi racial jury heard the case. It convicted Abu_jamal and then sentenced him to death.
In 2011, he death sentence was overturned on a technicality-whether the jury was properly instructed on aggravating vs. mitigating circumstances-but not his conviction. The district attorney, in consultation with Faulkner’s widow, decided not to appeal that ruling. Doing so might have begun another three decades of appeal.
Know your facts. The pos shot a police officer and killed him. There is evidence that proves this and yet there are still those that protest in behalf of this murderer.
And yet, despite the fears & vitriol of the police unions and the murdered officer’s wife, the speech was in no way an invective against police, hate-filled, or a rant. Seemed like a thoughtful speech of a radical to radicals. That someone was convicted of murder doesn’t mean he was actually a murderer. Admitting you shot someone and admitting it’s *murder* are two different things. Has a police officer never been guilty of harassing someone? Has a white police officer never been guilty of racial motivation? His successful sentencing appeal showed prejudice on the part of the court that tried him.
Imagine if all the families and supporters of all the outraged, incorrectly incarcerated, shot-and-killed, improperly arrested, improperly beaten, or improperly tazed people who suffer these injustices at the hands of police, as happens thousands of times per year in the U.S., and disproportionately to blacks and Hispanics (and organized anti-government groups)showed up at the State Police commencement to protest, or wrote letters of “disappointment” to the commanding officer for every one of its commencements that glorifies the every-growing police state in the U.S. It would be chaos.
This is just another attempt by social conservatives to limit freedom of speech. And of course to tell people what’s “right” and “wrong”.