CULTURE AS A WEAPON!

A BOOK PARTY FOR BLACK PANTHER/BLACK LIBERATION ARMY PRISONER OF WAR, BRO. JALIL ABDUL MUNTAQIM    


Who Is Jalil Abdul Muntaqim?
Jalil was 19 years old when he was arrested. He is a former member of the Black Panther Party and a Veteran of the Black Liberation Army. For the past 42 years, Jalil has been a political prisoner, and one of the New York Three (NY3), in retaliation for his activism in the 1960s and early 1970s.

Jalil was born October 18, 1951, in Oakland, CA. His early years were spent in San Francisco. Jalil attended high school in San Jose, CA, where he earned a scholarship to an advanced high school math and science program. He also received a summer scholarship for a San Jose State College math and engineering course. Jalil participated in NAACP youth organizing during the civil rights movement. In high school, he became a leading member of the Black Student Union, often touring in "speak-outs" with the BSU Chairman of San Jose State and City College.

After the assassination of Dr. King, Jalil began to believe a more militant response to racism and injustice was necessary. He began to look towards the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense for leadership. After moving back to San Francisco from San Jose, he was recruited into the BPP by old elementary school friends who had since become Panthers.

Two months shy of his 20th birthday, Jalil was captured along with Albert “Nuh” Washington in a midnight shoot-out with San Francisco police. When Jalil was arrested, he was a high school graduate and employed as a social worker.

While in San Quentin prison in California in 1976 before being moved to New York, Jalil launched the National Prisoners Campaign to Petition the United Nations to recognize the existence of political prisoners in the United States. Progressives nationwide joined this effort, and the petition was submitted in Geneva, Switzerland. This led to Lennox Hinds and the National Conference of Black Lawyers having the UN International Commission of Jurists tour U.S. prisons and speak with specific political prisoners. The International Commission of Jurists then reported that political prisoners did in fact exist in the United States.

Jalil put out the call for the Jericho March on Washington in Spring 1998, which was answered by over 6,000 supporters demanding recognition of and amnesty for U.S. political prisoners. The Jericho Amnesty Movement (JAM) aims to gain the recognition by the U.S. government and the United Nations that political prisoners exist in this country, and that on the basis of international law, they should be granted amnesty because of the political nature of their cases.

Since in New York prisons, Jalil wrote and submitted a legislative bill for prisoners with life sentences to receive good time off their minimum sentences. This bill was introduced to the NYS Assembly Committee on Corrections. Jalil has filed numerous lawsuits on behalf of prisoners.

Jalil has received awards of appreciation from Jaycee's, NAACP, and Project Build for his active participation and leadership. After many years of being denied the opportunity to attend college, Jalil graduated from SUNY-New Paltz with a BS in Psychology and a BA in Sociology in 1994. He would like to pursue his Masters degree, but has not been allowed by DOCS.

During his imprisonment, Jalil has become a father, a grandfather and a great-grandfather. He states, "I came to prison an expectant father and will leave prison a great-grandfather."

Jalil has worked as an educator of other inmates and practices organizing and advocacy whenever possible to ensure the most adequate, humane treatment for all people. He has been repeatedly punished for these activities, through physical abuse, formal discipline, and numerous prison transfers. Jalil is presently working to develop a National Prisoners Afrikan Studies Project (NPASP), a new non-profit organization dedicated to educating prisoners.

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