A-Infos (en) Mumia Abu-Jamal: The Nichols Verdict

[Tom Burghardt <tburghardt@igc.apc.org>]

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                       THE NICHOLS VERDICT
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                        By Mumia Abu-Jamal
                      Column Written 1/14/98
                   Source: Mumia, Mumia@aol.com
                   - Thursday, 22 January 1998 -
 
                                *
 
     When Oklahoma bombing suspect, Terry Nichols, was convicted
of manslaughter and conspiracy charges in Denver, yet was
acquitted of the more serious murder charges, the jury was
signaling its unease with the governments case. Legal scholars
and jailhouse lawyers alike rightly predicted it was highly
unlikely that such a jury would, days later, sentence the
defendant to death.
 
     On Wednesday, Jan. 7, 1998, the jury hung on the death
sentence, and Federal judge Richard Matsch dismissed them. Under
existing federal death penalty law, only a jury can impose a
death sentence.
 
     There is something quite remarkable when a man charged in
the usage of a truck bomb to unleash the deadliest terrorist
attack in US history, not only escapes murder convictions
(Nichols was charged federally in the deaths of federal
employees) but also eludes a death sentence.
 
     These remarkable occurrences turn on the strategy and
tactics of Nichols' counsel, Michael Tigar and Co. Tigar, who
fought quite a few cases in the death penalty trenches of Texas,
worked, from the start, at humanizing his client, both from the
witness stand and from the defense table.
 
     This is no small task for a defendant even linked to the
planned and premeditated bombing of a building where 168 people,
including children, died.
 
     Tigar spent considerable time bringing Nichols' family
members to the stand, thereby establishing his alternate personas
of father, husband, son and relative. At trial's end and at
sentencing, Tigar stood behind Nichols, placed his hands on his
shoulders, and told jurors, "this man is my brother."
 
     Jury foreperson, Nike Deutchman, speaking to reporters after
the hung jury, said, "the sentencing phase obviously was
excruciating. It was agonizing." The quality of legal
representation accorded Nichols was light years ahead of the
usual defendant. Tigar, if memory serves, was not only an able,
experienced capital defender, but a law professor. Few of the
3,200 on American death rows have ever had the skills of a legal
scholar utilized at trial.
 
     In most cases, they are dehumanized, the obvious ire of all
of the personnel in the courthouse, cops, bailiffs, prosecutors,
the judge and their reluctant court-appointed counsel.
 
     They are but a means to an end: a political stepping stone
to the prosecutor, a notch on the gavel to the judge, and a
distant paycheck to the defense lawyer.
 
     To the jury, they are a silent cipher, a caricature for
crime, a presence of menace.
 
     Not quite human.
 
     Tigar showed what a difference good lawyering makes, and by
contrast, how poorly the thousands on death row, mostly charged
with one killing, (not to mention over a hundred!) were truly
misrepresented.
 
     Copyright 1998 Mumia Abu-Jamal. All Rights Reserved.
 
                              * * *
 
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        to subscribe e-mail Tom Burghardt <tburghardt@igc.org>
 
          ++++ stop the execution of Mumia Abu-Jamal ++++
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