A Carbondale Community High School graduate spoke at a forum Tuesday night about the internationally known Mumia Abu-Jamal death penalty case he is involved in.

Jonathan Piper, a CCHS and Yale University Law School graduate, told an audience at the Lesar Law Building of the injustices he sees in the death penalty, and used his client Abu-Jamal’s case as an example.

Fundamentally, the problem with the death penalty is that it gives the government the right to decide who should live and who should die, Piper said. And it’s the single fact in America, that means that it’s the blacks and the poor whose lives are considered to be less valuable.

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Piper is part of the Chicago-based law firm of Sonnenschein, Nath & Rosenthal, and has been working as one of Abu-Jamal appellate defense attorneys.

Abu-Jamal, a talented journalist, was convicted and sentenced to death in 1982 for killing Daniel Faulkner a Philadelphia police officer.

Mumia was found shot bleeding to death on the ground… near lye a shot police officer. The police officer died and Jamal did not and Jamal was charged with the murder of the police officer, Piper said.

Piper said Abu-Jamal was the target of Philadelphia Police Department and the FBI even before his conviction, because he was the founder of the Philadelphia chapter of Black Panthers.

Piper said Abu-Jamal was framed by police and prosecutors. He also said the notoriously biased Philadelphia Judge Albert Sabo, gave Abu-Jamal an unfair trial.

There are many injustices in the American criminal justice system particularly if you are poor and black, Piper said.

Abu-Jamal’s current defense team has uncovered evidence supporting Abu-Jamal’s innocence, however, Abu-Jamal’s federal and state appeals have been rejected, Piper said.

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Abu-Jamal was granted a stay of execution last month and his lawyers are preparing to ask the Pennsylvania Supreme Court for a new trial.

Piper said Abu-Jamal was given the death penalty in part because he was a black panther. He said the death penalty has a history of black oppression and has been used as a tool against radicals.

Piper said he hopes a new trial would not only save Mumia’s life, but abolish the racist death penalty.

SIUC law professor Richard Whitney said he also opposes the death penalty, in part because it’s use is non-proportional in regards to race.

The Carbondale chapter of the National Lawyers Guild sponsored the forum, and Whitney said the Guild has been opposed to the death penalty since its formation in the 1930’s.

Whitney said the justice system is capable of error, but capitol punishment is irrevocable.

We do have an imperfect justice system, Whitney said.