Mumia Abu-Jamal Trial: 1982

Witnesses introduced by defense attorney Jackson painted a different picture. A second prostitute who had worked that same corner that night said she, like White, had been offered immunity from arrest in exchange for testimony against Abu-Jamal. A neighborhood resident said he had seen a man run away in the direction cabdriver Chobert described. Altogether, four witnesses, none of whom were acquainted, testified as seeing the shooter flee in the same direction. Was Mumia Abu-Jamal framed, the defense asked, by police who resented his on-air reporting and public insinuations about police brutality?

Meanwhile, court pundits wondered why the suspect's hands had not been checked for residue upon his arrest; why he had not claimed to have shot the officer in self-defense; why the court had allotted only $14,000 for the defense of someone accused of first-degree murder; why Abu-Jamal had been so disruptive that the judge had no choice but to throw him out of the courtroom; and why the defense had not called a ballistics expert or a pathologist to testify.

The defense, however, did call 16 character witnesses to avow that Abu-Jamal, a decent, professional good guy, was not the type to commit such a crime.