Posted on 10/21/2014 3:23:02 PM PDT by smoothsailing
October 21, 2014
By Sky News US Team
Pennsylvania's governor has signed into law a measure aimed at curbing the "obscene celebrity" cultivated by convicts at the expense of victims.
Governor Tom Corbett signed the bill on Tuesday near the spot where Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner was shot dead by Mumia Abu-Jamal in 1981.
The measure passed with unanimous approval after Abu-Jamal delivered a pre-recorded commencement address earlier this month to graduates of Goddard College in Vermont.
It allows prosecutors or crime victims to seek an injunction when an offender's conduct "perpetuates the continuing effect of the crime", including causing "mental anguish".
Abu-Jamal, 60, has drawn international support in the decades since his conviction with claims that he is the victim of racial injustice.
His assertions were broadcast in weekly radio commentaries and he authored books that brought further attention to his cause.
"This unrepentant cop killer has tested the limits of decency," Gov Corbett said, flanked by uniformed officers and Officer Faulkner's widow.
"Gullible activists and celebrities have continued to feed this killer's ego." ....
(Excerpt) Read more at news.sky.com ...
Well-intentioned law, but any injunction against letting someone (even a convicted murderer) speak is a clear violation of the First Amendment.
A number of years ago somebody wrote “Free Mumia” in the dirt on the back window of my suburban. I didn’t know what a mumia was until I googled it.
Nope, it isn’t. People are deprived of life, liberty, and property every day by due process. He isn’t entitled to unrestricted use of the First Amendment anymore than he is the Second, or the Fourth, ...
Racial injustice my rear, the bastard is a cold blooded killer and should have executed as sentenced.
If you want real justice, execute the POS in accordance with his sentence. That’ll shut him up.
There is no write to have your speech covered or broadcast or otherwise made public. Prison officials do not have to provide access to have your speech heard by anyone.
Someone brought a case in the 90s that their rights were violated because the prison would not let the media in to talk to him. The inmate lost the case.
There is no right
[ Well-intentioned law, but any injunction against letting someone (even a convicted murderer) speak is a clear violation of the First Amendment. ]
I didn’t know they had 2nd Amendment rights in prisons...
You know all those prisons shootings that happen becasue all the prisoners have guns and such...
The whole idea of prison is that YOU LOSE YOUR RIGHTS because you have deprived someone else of THEIR RIGHTS...
Mumia is still in Prison, ergo no 1st Amendment for him, except his appeals lawyer...
I would agree if he had served his sentence and was free. But not while he is still in prison. Heck, even my kids in high school give up some of their First Amendment rights (and their second, fourth and many others I imagine).
It's just a da** shame he wasn't executed. Makes me angry that in this state while technically we do have the death penalty, heinous murderers like Mumia are allowed to continue breathing.
Sounds very anti-first amendmenty.
Once those door slam shut you no longer get to prosper from the freedoms granted to free men. In fact I’ll go one further...the liberal spines claiming constitutional protection and due process to ILLEGAL ALIENS is also a farse. As far as I can read it they too are granted no constitutional protections as many liberal judges infamously do.
What other parts of the First Amendment did he lose? Can he be forced to convert to Episcopalianism?
Rendell Lied.
In the 38 years since the Supreme Court re-instituted the death penalty, only three convicted murderers [all of them white, by the way] have been executed. The last was in 1999. Pennsylvania has no death penalty for all practical purposes.
So it’s on to the Federal courts for Wesley Cook.
[ Mumia is still in Prison, ergo no 1st Amendment for him, except his appeals lawyer...
What other parts of the First Amendment did he lose? Can he be forced to convert to Episcopalianism? ]
Maybe this explains all the muslim conversions in prisons....
The law, as written, is not limited to people who still are (or ever were) in prison; it applies to anyone who was convicted of a crime.
There's got to be at least a few "white supremacist" scumbags serving where Wesley is.Just release him into general population and the punks with swastikas on their foreheads will take care of things.
Study the case law, and find out. Incarcerated prisoners are held essentially to have lost all of their rights until and unless a State or Federal Supreme Court decides otherwise.
Unfortunately for you, your attempt at a clever, snarky answer betrays some ignorance on the question. What other First Amendment rights did he lose? Well, we know he lost nearly all of his rights to free association, don't we? We know he cannot join a union, and we know that his religious liberty is severely circumscribed. We know that he is not as free to petition government officials for redress of grievances as you and I. The list of what rights he's lost is a lot longer than you think.
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