The government carefully shields its citizens from glimpsing any human qualities in the condemned and from learning of the glaring inequities as the justice system grinds forward with the most premeditated of serial murders. In my scores of book reviews over the years, I've never used the following phrase, so I don't use it lightly: this book is a must read. The invaluable heart is the raw power of Mumia's description and analysis. In addition, the book includes an insightful introduction by the acclaimed novelist, John Edgar Wideman, and an informative afterward by Mumia's attorney, Leonard Weinglass. Live From Death Row is comprised of those commentaries along with several of Mumia's previously published essays. Last year National Public Radio (NPR) contracted Mumia to do a series of recorded commentaries about life on death row and then, after intense political pressure, canceled them for 'editorial reasons.' Now, thanks to the publishing house Addison-Wesley, you can read for yourself what NPR censored. Meanwhile the death penalty is exceedingly rare for anyone with money and resources no matter how heinous the crime. And the disparity based on the race of the victims which lives are or are not deemed valuable is even starker.

Some 40 percent are African Americans, who constitute only 11 percent of the U.S. Pennsylvania's Governor Tom Ridge signed Mumia's death warrant on June 2nd, setting an execution date of August 17th, at 10:00 P.M.Īs of October, 1994 there were 2,948 people locked in death rows in the U.S. Despite a plethora of injustices and legal irregularities in his case, Mumia is now stalked more closely than ever by execution. By 1981, Mumia Abu-Jamal was an award-winning journalist and an outspoken critic of police brutality in Philadelphia, when he was framed and railroaded to the death penalty for the murder of Police Officer Daniel Faulkner. The author had been a member of the Black Panther Party as a youth, and later became a supporter of the radical M.O.V.E. Setting the tone for the immediacy and hard-hitting reality of Live From Death Row. From death row, this is Mumia Abu-Jamal.'

Even if I must do so from the valley of the shadow of death, I will.

Don't expect the media networks to tell you, for they can't, because of the incestuousness. They're not rights - they're privileges of the powerful and rich. 'Perhaps we can shrug off and shred some of the dangerous myths laid on our minds like a second skin-such as. Share: Share on Twitter Share on Facebook Share on G+ Share with email

Live from Death Row by Mumia Abu-Jamal