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An Injury to One Is an Injury to All!
The 8 class-war prisoners described below
receive monthly stipends from the PDC.
[Up to date as of November 2024]
Mumia Abu-Jamal is a former
Black Panther Party spokesman, a well-known
supporter of the MOVE organization and an
award-winning journalist known as "the voice of
the voiceless." Framed up for the 1981 killing
of a Philadelphia police officer, Mumia was
sentenced to death explicitly for his political
views. Federal and state courts have repeatedly
refused to consider evidence proving Mumia's
innocence, including the sworn confession of
Arnold Beverly that he, not Mumia, shot and
killed the policeman. In 2011, the Philadelphia
district attorney's office dropped its
longstanding effort to legally lynch Mumia,
condemning him to life in prison with no chance
of parole. In 2016, attorneys for Mumia filed a
petition under Pennsylvania's Post Conviction
Relief Act (PCRA) seeking to overturn the denial
of his four prior PCRA claims by the
Pennsylvania Supreme Court. On 27 December 2018,
Judge Leon Tucker of the Philadelphia Court of
Common Pleas granted Mumia's petition, allowing
him to argue before an appellate court for
reversal of his frame-up conviction. Mumia's
appeal is now back in the Pennsylvania Supreme
Court, where the Philly DA Larry Krasner is
fighting tooth and nail to get the appeal
dismissed and keep Mumia buried in prison for
life.
Georges Ibrahim Abdallah is a
fighter for Palestinian rights and determined
opponent of imperialism. Held in French prison
since 1984, Abdallah has spent more time behind
bars than any other class-war prisoner in France
and most likely all Europe. A leading member of
the Lebanese Revolutionary Armed Factions, he
was convicted on trumped-up charges of
complicity in two murders of a CIA agent and a
Mossad agent, as well as the attempted murder of
an American consul. From 2004 to 2020, nine
parole applications have been denied under
direct pressure from the U.S. State Department.
A new application filed last year is pending.
Abdallah has always denied any involvement in
these killings and should have never spent a day
in prison.
The Merrimack 4 are pro-Palestine activists—Paige Belanger, Sophie Ross, Bridget Shergalis, and Calla Walsh. They were witchhunted for participating in a November 2023 Palestine Action US protest aiming to disrupt production by Israeli arms maker Elbit in Merrimack, New Hampshire. The four were hit with serious felony charges and possibly decades in prison, as well as a "no contact" order preventing them from communicating with each other. They defeated the felony charges, but are sentenced to 60 days jail in Manchester NH, starting November 14, 2024.
Leonard Peltier is an
internationally renowned class-war prisoner.
Peltier's incarceration for his activism in the
American Indian Movement has come to symbolize
this country's racist repression of its Native
peoples, the survivors of centuries of genocidal
oppression. Peltier was framed up for the 1975
deaths of two FBI agents marauding in what had
become a war zone on the South Dakota Pine Ridge
Reservation. The lead government attorney has
admitted, "We can't prove who shot those
agents," and the courts have repeatedly denied
Peltier's appeals while acknowledging blatant
prosecutorial misconduct. Before leaving office,
Barack Obama rejected Peltier's request for
clemency. In 2024 Peltier was denied parole again. Peltier suffers from multiple serious
medical conditions, including a heart condition
which led to triple bypass surgery in 2017. He
is incarcerated far from his people and family.
Alvaro Luna Hernandez (Xinachtli)
is a Mexican American initially framed up in the
1970s for a murder he did not commit. He was
politicized in prison where he helped lead a
movement for prison reform and became an
effective jailhouse lawyer. Xinachtli spent
nearly a decade in solitary confinement. After
the frame-up was exposed by the
Houston Post, Xinachtli was freed in
1991, but the state continued to target him for
his activism on behalf of Mexican Americans. He
founded the National Movement of La Raza and led
a successful campaign to free Ricardo Aldape
Guerra, a Mexican national framed for killing a
Houston cop, from Texas' death row. In 1996, the
Brewster County Sheriff attempted to arrest him.
When Xinachtli challenged the legality of the
warrantless arrest, the sheriff pulled a gun
compelling him to disarm the sheriff in
self-defense. Xinachtli was railroaded for
"aggravated assault" and outrageously sentenced
to 50 years. He has now been
continually confined in solitary for more than
19 years in Texas dungeons.
Contribute now! This is
not charity but an elementary act of
solidarity with those imprisoned for their
opposition to racist capitalism and
imperialist depredation. Send your
contributions to: PDC, P.O. Box 99, Canal
Street Station, New York, NY 10013; (212)
406-4252.
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