When not to kill

In an endemically racist society, the criminality of law enforcers is underpinned by a code of race solidarity among the supposed protectors of society and upholders of its laws, fostering a culture of impunity that covers their conduct toward those they believe to be either inferior or, worse still, appear to act against their "natural" social status - talking back, insisting on rights, responding to authority from the confidence of dignified humanity. Let us merely recall the image of Rodney King under the battering of police officers and the cynicism of justice in the outcome of the trial of his torturers. Or the sheer overflow of adrenalin in the overkill of the Senegalese trader, Amadou Diallo, an image that reminds one of the senseless pumping of bullets into the body of a dangling black in an era that is not so distant. It is unfortunate that United States society, in the main, still fails to relate such conduct to a historic lynch culture. The demise of the once popular lynch party may mean no more than that it has merely been driven underground, where it is channeled into new undertows of surrogate gratification.

Could the police of such a society prove to be such an accessible, legalized channel? This very possibility should give American

society pause. If it all sounds preposterous, we have to ask ourselves why again and again we are confronted by evidence of abuse wherein the police doctor, even fabricate evidence, and why the minority racial sectors are mostly to be found at the receiving end of such ministrations, including extra-judicial killings. The notorious revelations that have swept American society this past year alone-LAPD, NYPD, Chicago Police, etc.-can only be viewed as exceptions by the incurably naive or complacent. What bothers us, outsiders to such a society, goes to the very basis of our valuation of human life.

American society is in full knowledge of the fact that new scientific (mostly DNA) evidence has freed a number of individuals already pronounced guilty It is impossible to argue against the assertion that a large number of innocent victims have actually been executed, over and above even the handful that have been tacitly acknowledged. In Illinois alone, according to the Los Angeles Times, 13 inmates on Death Row have been set free, but not before 12 had been executed-within the last 23 years! Now, this is where the problem arises.

How comes it that when evidence erupts of the clear corruption of the judicial process, a severe questioning of the infallibility of the judicial process-how comes it that the corrective response to this has been merely piecemeal? Such indictments do not lack for public notoriety-the real-life epic of Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, now made into a film, is no more than the icing on a festering cake. How is it possible then that executions still continue despite such overwhelming evidence that some, even ONE of the present inmates on Death Row may be headed for extinction in the promotion of a proven imperfect-we shall not even say "unjust," no, simply imperfect-system?

When a plane crashes-and even when it does not, but a pilot has merely reported a mechanical failure, or a chance inspection reveals a crack in the fuselage-all planes of that manufacture are instantly grounded until the problem is fixed. Drugs are constantly recalled from the shelves-not always quickly enough, admittedly-whenever an unforeseen side effect is reported. Society accepts responsibility when the manufacturer fails to do so and orders the vendors of potential death to withdraw their wares from the market. Why should justice, where life is the price of a flaw or imperfection, be any different?

The problem, I think, lies in the fact that society fails to take on itself the basic manufacturer's responsibility; it is incapable of, or has not been goaded into, the actuality of collective guilt. What we would expect from such a guilt-ridden society is an immediate withdrawal of this corrupted pill-judicial murder!-a national moratorium on all pending executions, following the example of Governor George Ryan of Illinois, and the organization of an investigative citizens' board that is empowered to look into every single

case of capital conviction in the nation-no matter how many years the process takes. Until that is done, how is it possible, in all concience, to sanction the taking of yet another life?

Mumia Abu-Jamal, now in his 19th year on Death Row, is not alone. His case may, however, prove the pivot on which the American conscience will be considered to have turned for decades to come. Rubin Carter visited him recently on Death Row in his Waynesburg, Pa., prison. At a press conference that Carter held afterward, exculpatory testimony that was never exposed at trial or publicized was presented. This sworn testimony by a key prosecution witness, from the transcript of the trial of Munia's brother Billy Cook, corroborates defense testimony in Mumia's trial that a fourth person was present at the scene, thus destroying the entire foundation of the prosecution's case against Mumia. The fact that this evidence was hidden at Mumia's trial proves that officers of the law, of the American judicial system, acted contrary to fundamental requirements of truth and justice, and actually suppressed exculpatory evidence that would have required an acquittal. In Rubin "Hurricane" Carter's own words, the prosecution " ... suborned perjury. And that, if nothing else, is enough reason to free Mumia Abu-Jamal."

We do not have to be theologians to urge that, in any doctrine of guilt, reparations and redemption, the blood of the innocent, the wasted years of those who have walked the valley of the shadow of death, have reprieved the lives of others. Let America learn to pay her debts to a violated humanity. After a Rubin Carter, there should never have been an Abu-Jamal. Let America settle her blood debts in this millennium.

This article first appeared in Africana, an online magazine at www.africana.com.

In 1986 Wole Soyinka was the first African writer to receive the Nobel Prize for Literature. He is the recipient of numerous other prestigious awards, including several honorary doctorates from universities all over the world. Apart from his stature as a pioneer in African drama written in English, Soyinka has produced a vast body of work as a poet, dramatist, theater director, novelist, essayist, autobiographer, political commentator, critic, and theorist of art and culture. In addition to his Yoruba-Christian upbringing, Soyinka received a Western academic education. Born Akinwande Oluwole Soyinka in Abeokuta, Nigeria, he studied at the University College in Ibadan, Nigeria, and earned a BA. degree from the University of Leeds in Great Britain.

Soyinka's column, Olumo Eyrie, takes its name from the rock bill in Abeokuta, his hometown, which served both as a refuge in times of war, and as an observation post for the township's sentinel

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