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This man's only connection with "rap" is a rap sheet as long as your arm for
various criminal indictments, plus six years in jail from 1970 to 1976 as the
result of a bungled robbery and, guess what, a shoot-out with New York
police. In prison, H. "Rap" Brown became a Muslim and took the name Jamil
Abdullah Al-Amin. He continued to have run-ins with law enforcement. He did,
however, become an imam for an Atlanta mosque and leader of what the
Associated Press describes as "one of the nation's largest Black Muslim
groups, the National Ummah."
Al-Amin is on trial for the killing of Fulton County Sheriff's Deputy, Ricky
Kinchen and the wounding of his partner, Deputy Aldranon English. They were
both shot in March 2000 while attempting to serve Al-Amin with an arrest
warrant. Both police officers are Afro-Americans. He fled to Alabama where,
for the second time in his life, he made the FBI's Most Wanted list. Arrested
there within days, police found the guns whose ballistic tests reportedly
linked him to the shooting and a car with a telltale bullet hole in it.
According to Al-Amin, though, it's all part of "a government conspiracy."
Now, you might think the American Muslim Council, the Council on
American-Islamic Relations, the Islamic Society of North America, and the
Muslim American Society would issue a statement decrying such behavior, but
no. Instead, their statement said "First, we wish to remind everyone of Imam
Jamil Al-Amin's longstanding role as a community leader who had a positive
impact on the lives of so many people. The charges against Imam Jamil are
especially troubling because they are inconsistent with what is known of his
moral character and past behavior as a Muslim." It does appear that, as a
spiritual leader, he worked against drugs and prostitution, and for community
betterment.
His behavior is best known, however, as that of a career criminal, an inciter
to arson, thief, and, following his conversion, as head of a mosque whose
members received paramilitary training. And that's just the short version of
his various misdemeanors and felonious history. With one dead, Black cop and
another seriously wounded, there is more than a little irony in the title of
his autobiography, "Die, Nigger, Die."
"This trial is of great concern to Muslims and the Muslim community," said
Ibrahim Hooper, the spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations,
a Washington, DC advocacy group. "We see this trial as a barometer on whether
a Muslim can get a fair trial, free of bias, and whether a jury will make
decision based on external factors or look at the facts of the case." If they
look at the facts, Al-Amin is in big trouble. And, yes, a Muslim or anyone
else in American can reasonably expect a fair trial. It goes on every day in
America.
Daniel Pipes, one of the most knowledgeable and outspoken experts on Islam in
America and around the world, calls Al-Amin "a Muslim O.J." We all remember
how it took a largely Black jury in Los Angeles only a few hours to spring
O.J. Simpson. Some Blacks thought it was justice. Most people thought it was a
travesty of justice. A later civil trial found him guilty of killing his
ex-wife and a friend of hers.
Apparently, if you're a Muslim in America, you're supposed to believe you
can't get a fair trial. That, at the very least, is the clear intent of the
Islamic groups that have lined up to defend Al-Amin. They could, as Dr. Pipes
points out, have shown their concern for the dead police officer by raising
money for the family he left behind in the line of duty. Instead, they raised
money to insure a lawyer's circus for a man who believes that "the main
essence" of the US Constitution "is diametrically opposed to what Allah has
commanded." America's Muslim's should thank Allah that Al-Amin will receive
the full benefit of the US Constitution and its protection.
Be watchful now as Muslim organizations seek to make this trial a litmus test
of "fairness." Al-Amin does not face trial because he is a Muslim. He does
not face trial because he's Black. He faces trial because he is a suspected
cop killer.
Alan Caruba is the author of "The Pocket Guide to
Militant Islam", for sale from the Internet site of The National Anxiety
Center, a clearinghouse for information about scare campaigns at
www.anxietycenter.com.
Copyright, Alan Caruba, 2002
Published by permission.
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