Mumia-"the priest and the police"

[Guest Frank Zappa Mask]

THE PRIEST AND THE POLICE

[Col. Writ. 1/29/02] Copyright '02 Mumia Abu-Jamal

 

  What happens when a deeply committed, religious person,

a priest, comes into direct contact with a cynical cabal of

cops?

 

  This question is far from rhetorical.

 

  A middle-aged man named Kobutsu Malone knows it's

not rhetorical, for he is an American-born Zen Buddhist

priest, and he came in direct contact with some cops

recently.

 

  It wasn't pretty.

 

  As leader of the Engaged Zen Foundation (based in N.J.)

Rev. Malone has put his Zen humanistic faith into practice

in the darkest corners of the real world, by going into

American prisons, some as notorious as the infamous Sing

Sing prison in upstate New York, to promote and sustain

Zen practice and meditation.

 

  In 1996, he served as Spiritual Advisor to a prisoner on

Death Row in Arkansas, named Jusan Frankie Parker.

Indeed, he waged a 6-month campaign on Parker's behalf,

begging two successive Arkansan governors to commute

his death sentence to life in prison.  Rev. Kobutsu Malone's

efforts did not succeed, and he shared the last day of Parker

as the state committed a legalized lynching on August 8th,

1996, in Varner, Arkansas.

 

  The experience left him deeply committed to the abolition

of the death penalty, and led him to the frigid, rain-swept

streets of Philadelphia, on December 8th, 2001, on behalf

of this writer.  As a religious person and as an American

citizen, he felt safe to come to a city that takes its name

from the Bible, meaning "City of Brotherly Love," and the

place where the Constitution was written several

centuries ago.  It was at 13th and Walnut Street, that he

would learn about today's Philadelphia, and that the

Constitution, nor his faith, meant nothing, at least to

the armed men who claim their sworn duty is to serve

and protect people.

 

  After he heard some commotion behind him, at the

rear of a march, he turned back when he heard people

hollering about arrests, and then it happened:

 

     I was standing there for less than a minute on

     the edge of the crowd when suddenly, without

     any announcement or warning, a policeman

     rushed at me from my left side holding a

     nightstick diagonally in front of him.  I clearly

     saw his black gloved right hand and part of

     the wooden shaft of the nightstick as it came

     at me and hit me across the chest pushing

     me backwards.  I fell backwards onto the

     pavement and remember seeing stars and

     hearing a rushing sound as my head hit

     the pavement.  I lost consciousness.

 

  When he came to, the 50-something priest would

find himself struggling to breathe, his face mashed

into the wet concrete, a cop's meaty knee boring into

his back, while his arms were being wrenched behind

him, only to be lashed together tightly by plastic bonds.

Rev. Kobutsu Malone, who suffers from heart trouble,

would be violently rushed to a van, hoisted into it, and

when he found the breath to tell a cop that he was a

priest, and could his bonds be loosened, one cop

sneered at his request, while another announced

Malone should be ashamed of himself, if he really

was a priest.

 

  Meanwhile, Rev. Kobutsu, his arms numb from

the tightened tourniquet which stopped circulation

to his hands, tossed to and fro by the moving van,

fell again into unconsciousness.

 

  When he came to this time, cops were tugging

at his vestments, and pulling him out of the van

onto a stretcher.  

 

  The Rev. Kobutsu Malone was on his way to a

nearby hospital where he was given some

rudimentary heart medication.

 

  He saw several cops during his time in the

hospital, and whenever he spoke to them they

informed him that he was indeed under arrest,

but when he inquired as to the charges, he was

told repeatedly, that they didn't know what charges:

 

     I was not informed of my Miranda rights,

     nor told of any consequences of answering

     any questions.  [The detective] asked me  

     why I was there and I told him about my

     heart condition.  He then rephrased the

     question asking me why I was arrested.

     I was taken aback with this question and

     asked if I was indeed under arrest and what

     I was charged with.  He responded that

     they didn't know what I was arrested for,

     did not know what I was charged with and

     did not even know who placed me under

     arrest.

 

  Hours later, when the charges were finally dropped,

he took his bruised and battered body and pysche and,

along with family and friends, put distance between

himself and Philadelphia.  He learned firsthand, what

Philadelphia freedom was about.

 

  He must have wondered to himself, in the early morning

hours, if this can happen to me, a priest, an American, a

white guy (who happens to believe in Zen Buddhism) what

of other people, who are younger, darker, or poorer?  And

surely, a shudder must have moved through him.

 

 

[Note: Ven. Rev. Kobutsu may be reached at

www.engaged-zen.org]

 

Copyright 2002 MAJ

 

==================================

 

 

CHECK www.mumia.org AND ITS LINKS FOR IMPORTANT ACTION ALERTS!

 

PLEASE CONTACT:

International Concerned Family &Friends of MAJ

P.O. Box 19709

Philadelphia, PA 19143

Phone - 215-476-8812/ Fax - 215-476-6180/ E-mail - [email protected]

AND OFFER YOUR SERVICES!

 

Send our brotha some LOVE and LIGHT at:

Mumia Abu-Jamal

AM 8335

SCI-Greene

175 Progress Drive

Waynesburg, PA 15370

 

WE SHALL NOT BE MOVED!!

 

******************************************************

This column may be reprinted and/or distributed by

electronic means, but only for non-commercial use, and

only with the inclusion of the following copyright

information:

 

Text © copyright 2001 by Mumia Abu-Jamal. All rights

reserved. Reprinted by permission of the author.

******************************************************

 

Mumia Abu-Jamal is the author of three books: 'Live

from Death Row', 'Death Blossoms', and 'All Things

Censored'.

 

Write to Mumia directly at:

Mumia Abu-Jamal AM 8335

SCI-Greene

175 Progress Drive

Waynesburg, PA 15370

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