A US federal judge overturned the death sentence of former Black Panther and radio journalist Mumia Abu-Jamal today, ordering a new sentencing hearing for the convicted killer of a Philadelphia police officer whose case has been championed by death-penalty opponents worldwide.
Ruling on a defence petition for a new trial in the 20-year-old case, US District Judge William Yohn let stand Abu-Jamal's first-degree murder conviction for the 1981 slaying of white Philadelphia police officer Mr Daniel Faulkner.
But in a 272-page opinion that stunned legal experts and stirred emotions on both sides of the case, Judge Yohn gave state prosecutors 180 days to conduct a new sentencing hearing, citing errors in the death-penalty phase of the 1982 trial.
The judge said proceedings in the original penalty hearing created a reasonable likelihood that the jury believed it was precluded from considering any mitigating circumstance that had not been found unanimously to exist.