Inquirer Editorial: Dredging up Abu-Jamal case

The demagoguery of politicians exploiting the 1981 murder of Philadelphia Police Officer Daniel Faulkner to score points toward their next election is blatant and sickening. Among them is Sen. Pat Toomey, who has joined those vigorously opposing the nomination of civil rights attorney Debo Adegbile to head the U.S. Justice Department's Civil Rights Division.

It would be hard to find a better candidate for the position than Adegbile. But Toomey (R., Pa.), Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams, and others say he should be disqualified because he was the NAACP Legal Defense Fund's director of litigation when the organization advocated on behalf of Faulkner's killer, Mumia Abu-Jamal, during appeals of his conviction.

The NAACP Legal Defense Fund is no fly-by-night group. It is held in high esteem for the historic work that led to the Supreme Court's 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, which struck down segregation. That case was argued by NAACP lawyer Thurgood Marshall, who later became the high court's first black justice. Over the years, the Legal Defense Fund has added to its mission the pursuit of justice in criminal cases that may involve racial bias.

Sometimes the organization is right; sometimes it is wrong. But its goal is commendable.

To argue that Adegbile, one of the country's foremost legal scholars - especially when it comes to civil rights law - should be disqualified from the Justice post because he participated in Abu-Jamal's appeals is an affront to what it means to live in America. This country allows every convict to exhaustively appeal a verdict, even when all the prior evidence appears to have assured his guilt.

In a commentary in The Inquirer on Monday, Toomey argued that the NAACP shouldn't have joined Abu-Jamal's appeal. "This was not a case of every defendant deserving a lawyer," Toomey wrote. "Abu-Jamal already had multiple attorneys." Would the senator want limits placed on his right to counsel if he were charged with a crime?

And does Toomey truly believe the three-judge panel that heard the NAACP appeal - including Reagan appointees Anthony Scirica and Robert Cowen - was swayed by anything other than the law to order the hearing that led to Abu-Jamal's death sentence being reduced to life imprisonment?

The family of Officer Faulkner should be treated with great respect. He did not deserve to die at the hands of a murderer. But the appointment of Adegbile is not about what happened to the policeman. For politicians who know better to cause further grief for the family by reviving the tragedy to smear Adegbile is atrocious.

The NAACP Legal Defense Fund decided to join Abu-Jamal's appeals, but that doesn't mean Adegbile has no respect for slain police officers. It means he worked for an organization that believes in leaving no stone unturned in seeking justice for all.

Unfortunately, Sen. Bob Casey (D., Pa.) announced Friday that because of "open wounds for Maureen Faulkner and her family as well as the city of Philadelphia," he would not vote for Adegbile's appointment either. Frankly, though, that noble sentiment should not be the basis of his vote.