Jalil Abdul Muntaqim (born Anthony Jalil Bottom; October 18, 1951) is a political activist and former member of the Black Panther Party (BPP) and the
Black Liberation Army
The Black Liberation Army (BLA) was a far-left, black nationalist, underground Black Power revolutionary paramilitary organization that operated in the United States from 1970 to 1981. Composed of former Black Panthers (BPP) and Republic ...
(BLA) who served 49 years in prison for two counts of first-degree murder. In August 1971, he was arrested in California along with Albert “Nuh” Washington and Herman Bell and charged with the killing of two
NYPD
The New York City Police Department (NYPD), officially the City of New York Police Department, established on May 23, 1845, is the primary municipal law enforcement agency within the City of New York, the largest and one of the oldest in ...
police officers, Waverly Jones and Joseph A. Piagentini, in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
on May 21. In 1975, he was convicted on two counts of first-degree murder and sentenced to life imprisonment with possible parole after 22 years. Muntaqim had been the subject of attention for being repeatedly denied parole despite having been eligible since 1993. In June 2020, Muntaqim was reportedly sick with
COVID-19
Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickly ...
. He was released from prison on October 7, 2020, after more than 49 years of incarceration and 11 parole denials.
He was portrayed by actor
Richard Brooks
Richard Brooks (May 18, 1912 – March 11, 1992) was an American screenwriter, film director, novelist and film producer. Nominated for eight Academy Awards, Oscars in his career, he was best known for ''Blackboard Jungle'' (1955), ''Cat on a ...
in the 1985 TV movie ''
Badge of the Assassin
''Badge of the Assassin'' is a 1985 television film starring James Woods, Yaphet Kotto and Alex Rocco. It was directed by Mel Damski. The film first aired on the Columbia Broadcasting System network on November 2, 1985. The film's production comp ...
.''
Early life and political development
Jalil Abdul Muntaqim was born Anthony Jalil Bottom in
Oakland, California
Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast of the United States, West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third ...
and grew up in
San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...
. Drawn to the civil rights activism during the 1960s, Muntaqim joined and began organizing for the
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is a civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E. ...
(NAACP) during his teenage years. In high school he played an active role in the
Black Student Union
In higher education in the United States, a Black Student Union (BSU) is an organization of Black students, generally with a focus on protest. Historically functioning as a Black counterpart to the largely white organization Students for a Democrat ...
and was often recruited to play the voice of and engage in “speak outs” on behalf of the organization. He was also involved in street protests against police brutality.
At the age of 18, he joined the Black Panther Party after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. solidified Muntaqim's beliefs that armed resistance was necessary to combat racism and the oppression of Black individuals in society. While a member of the Black Panther Party, Muntaqim held beliefs which paralleled those of the underground organization the
Black Liberation Army
The Black Liberation Army (BLA) was a far-left, black nationalist, underground Black Power revolutionary paramilitary organization that operated in the United States from 1970 to 1981. Composed of former Black Panthers (BPP) and Republic ...
, which focused on militant means of obtaining Black national self-determination. Its members served as experts in military strategy and were “the essential armed wing of the above-ground political apparatus.”James, Joy, ed. ''Imprisoned Intellectuals: America’s Political Prisoners Write on Life, Liberation and Rebellion''. 1st edn. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield. 2003.
Arrest and imprisonment
Muntaqim and Albert “Nuh” Washington were arrested and charged with the May 21, 1971 killings of two NYPD officers, P.O. Joseph Piagentini and P.O. Waverly Jones. Muntaqim and Washington were arrested in San Francisco, reportedly with Jones' revolver in their possession. Police alleged that Muntaqim and Washington had committed the act in retaliation for the killing of George Jackson despite Jackson's death taking place 3 months after the NYPD officers were killed. Brothers Francisco and Gabriel Torres were arrested after police were tipped that they had been in contact with Muntaqim and Washington soon after the murders. A few years later in 1973, Herman Bell was arrested for unrelated robberies, but NYPD linked him to a fingerprint reportedly found at the scene. The first trial of the men ended in a hung jury, with the second in 1975 resulting his conviction on two counts of first-degree murder and sentenced to life imprisonment with possible parole after 22 years. The charges against the Torres brothers were thrown out due to lack of evidence, while Muntaqim, Washington and Bell were convicted and sentenced to 25-to-life based on new testimony by Ruben Scott, a
police informant
An informant (also called an informer or, as a slang term, a “snitch”) is a person who provides privileged information about a person or organization to an agency. The term is usually used within the law-enforcement world, where informant ...
in the Black Panther Party. These convictions were part of a larger FBI program known as Operation NEWKILL, which aimed at casting a nationwide dragnet to track down and imprison members of the Black Liberation Army through total cooperation and sharing of information between the FBI and local police departments.
Muntaqim remained politically active throughout his incarceration, writing theoretical texts as well as organizing with activists both inside and outside prison. While incarcerated, he met fellow Black revolutionaries Jamil Al-Amin and
Muhammad Ahmad
Muhammad Ahmad ( ar, محمد أحمد ابن عبد الله; 12 August 1844 – 22 June 1885) was a Nubian Sufi religious leader of the Samaniyya order in Sudan who, as a youth, studied Sunni Islam. In 1881, he claimed to be the Mahdi, ...
, who inspired him to convert to Islam and take on the name Jalil Abdul Muntaqim. The English translation of Muntaqim is "avenger." He never made a legal name change. He was involved in the National Prisoners Afrikan Studies Project, an organization that educates inmates on their rights.
In 1976, he founded the National Prisoners Campaign to petition the
United Nations
The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmoniz ...
to recognize the existence of
political prisoner
A political prisoner is someone imprisoned for their political activity. The political offense is not always the official reason for the prisoner's detention.
There is no internationally recognized legal definition of the concept, although n ...
s in the United States. During his 49 years of incarceration, Muntaqim and other Black Panthers imprisoned as part of Operation NEWKILL were widely described as political prisoners, including by the National Conference of Black Lawyers, the
National Lawyers Guild
The National Lawyers Guild (NLG) is a progressive public interest association of lawyers, law students, paralegals, jailhouse lawyers, law collective members, and other activist legal workers, in the United States. The group was founded in 19 ...
In 1994, Muntaqim (representing himself) challenged the disenfranchisement of felons in New York in '' Muntaqim v. Coombe'', arguing that it disproportionately impacted African Americans and therefore violated Section 2 of the
Voting Rights Act
The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is a landmark piece of federal legislation in the United States that prohibits racial discrimination in voting. It was signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson during the height of the civil rights movement ...
. The case was first dismissed by the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York on the grounds that applying Section 2 (a federal law) to state felon-disenfranchisement law "would upset the sensitive relation between federal and state criminal jurisdiction." They cited then-recent Court precedent which required that laws which sought to change any balance between state and federal governments must explicitly say so in writing. In 2005 the case was argued again in front of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, which agreed to rehear the case alongside '' Hayden v. Pataki'' via internal poll. The Second Circuit ruled that due to Muntaqim being initially incarcerated in California under different charges, and only later transferred to New York where he has never voted nor had the right to vote at any time, they lacked the jurisdiction to hear the case and must dismiss.
Second conviction
In 1999 the investigation into the death of San Francisco police officer John V. Young was re-opened, costing the city over $2 million but eventually leading to charges being filed against eight former BLA members in 2007, including Muntaqim. Members of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, who needed to approve the $2 million appropriation for the investigation and legal fees, requested that the charges be dropped against the remaining defendants, citing the use of torture and denial of
right to counsel
In criminal law, the right to counsel means a defendant has a legal right to have the assistance of counsel (i.e., lawyers) and, if the defendant cannot afford a lawyer, requires that the government appoint one or pay the defendant's legal exp ...
in order to obtain confessions. The SF Police Officer Association president at the time, Gary P. Delagnes, responded by stating “Regardless of how this confession was obtained, these seven people murdered a police officer in 1971.” Charges were dropped against six of the eight accused between 2008 and 2011. Muntaqim and Bell offered pleas in return for greatly reduced sentences (time served plus probation).
Parole and release
While
abolitionists
Abolitionism, or the abolitionist movement, is the movement to end slavery. In Western Europe and the Americas, abolitionism was a historic movement that sought to end the Atlantic slave trade and liberate the enslaved people.
The Britis ...
and other left-wing organizations believed he should be paroled, others, mainly law enforcement, opposed his release. In 2002, former New York City mayor
Mike Bloomberg
Michael Rubens Bloomberg (born February 14, 1942) is an American businessman, politician, philanthropist, and author. He is the majority owner, co-founder and CEO of Bloomberg L.P. He was Mayor of New York City from 2002 to 2013, and was a ca ...
publicized his opposition to granting Muntaqim parole, stating, “Anthony Bottom's crime is unforgivable, and its consequences will remain forever with the families of the police officers, as well as the men and women of the New York City Police Department.” Councilman Charles Barron, a self-described Black revolutionary, is one of Muntaqim's active advocates.
Muntaqim had a hearing with the parole board on November 17, 2009, and was again denied parole and remained incarcerated. He was transferred from
Attica Correctional Facility
Attica Correctional Facility is a maximum security campus New York State prison in the Town of Attica, New York, operated by the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision. It was constructed in the 1930s in response ...
to
Southport Correctional Facility
The Southport Correctional Facility was an ultra-maximum-security, or " supermax", prison, run by the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision. It was located in the town of Southport, in the Southern Tier of New York ...
near Elmira, New York, in early January, 2017. In June 2020, Muntaqim was reported to be under treatment in a prison hospital for
Coronavirus disease
Coronavirus diseases are caused by viruses in the coronavirus subfamily, a group of related RNA viruses that cause diseases in mammals and birds. In humans and birds, the group of viruses cause respiratory tract infections that can range from ...
. He attempted to gain release based on public health guidance advising the release of medically vulnerable people, but New York state attorney general Letitia James challenged the appeal, and the courts struck down a judge's order mandating his release. Within a few months, however, the
parole board A parole board is a panel of people who decide whether an offender should be released from prison on parole after serving at least a minimum portion of their sentence as prescribed by the sentencing judge. Parole boards are used in many jurisdiction ...
finally approved him for release, and his supporters confirmed that he left prison on October 7, 2020. Muntaqim was the last of the "New York Three" to leave prison. Herman Bell had already been paroled in 2018 and Albert “Nuh” Washington died of liver cancer in April 2000 in New York State's
Coxsackie Correctional Facility
Coxsackie Correctional Facility is a maximum security state prison in Coxsackie, Greene County, New York. It currently houses approximately 900 inmates. It is classified as a maximum security general confinement facility and detention center f ...
.
The day after his release, Muntaqim filled out a voting registration form despite not being eligible to vote due to his felony conviction. This registration form had been provided alongside other documents given to Muntaqim as part of his release from prison and re-integration into society. Then-county GOP Chair
Bill Napier
William M. Napier (born 29 June 1940 in Perth, Scotland) is the author of five high tech thriller novels and a number of nonfiction science books.
Career
He received his Bachelor of Science degree in 1963 and his Doctor of Philosophy degree in ...
alerted the Monroe County DA on the matter, deeming Muntaqim a "danger to society". He was charged with two felony counts and the lesser offense of providing a false affidavit, but the grand jury in the case refused to indict him.