Wadiya Jamal describes visit with Mumia

Wadiya Jamal and Mumia Abu-Jamal

On April 9, Wadiya Jamal visited her spouse, Mumia Abu-Jamal, at SCI Mahanoy. Here are excerpts from her account of that visit.

I had seen Mumia in the ICU at the hospital, where he was sitting upright, handcuffed to a chair. I saw the photos taken of Mumia during the visit on Monday, April 6, with my sister Pam Africa, I Abdul Jon and Johanna Fernandez. I cried when I saw those photos.  But I still wasn’t prepared for how Mumia looked seeing him in the prison visiting room. He was worse. I felt my husband is about to die.

Later on, after the three-hour visit with Mumia, we were guests on NMEMINDZ Radio with Professor Griff and co-host ZaZa Ali. To you all who love and support Mumia, here are some edited excerpts and an update on Mumia’s medical condition.

Mumia had to bring himself down to the visiting room from the prison infirmary in an old wheelchair, not motorized, had to use his arms that were weak and in pain; his breathing was labored.

I was in shock at how he looked. We embraced and kissed. When I saw him reading legal papers his hands were shaking hard. I put my hands on his hands and tried to steady him so he could read the information. He was shivering so hard, my hands were shaking as well. I put my arms around him and my head to his chest to hear his heart and to bring some warmth to his body because he said he was freezing. And then the guard comes and tells us, “No hugging.” I was just trying to keep him warm.

My husband is innocent. He killed no one. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, his only crime is he survived a severe gunshot to the chest and a serious ass-whipping by “Philly’s finest” and then they attempted to kill him in his hospital bed by stepping on his urine bag and flushing the poison back on him. And now they are trying to do it again.

The way my husband looks today, it looks like they are going to succeed, unless we get some real doctors up there to take care of him. Mumia’s life is at risk. It is execution by medical neglect and mistreatment. The only way I see that Mumia is going to survive this is if he is free, because I can’t trust any of them.

Mumia didn’t have a history of diabetes. Did you see the picture of Mumia, before his illness, how strong he is, how big he is? You see the difference in him now?!! I’ve never seen him so weak like this in my life. You have to understand that I am angry. I’m hurting. I could feel his shoulder blades — that’s how thin he is. I was rubbing his thighs and I could feel the scabs underneath the jump suit. Whatever this stuff is, it is killing Mumia — and it’s on purpose.

Please, please, please, I beg of everybody to help my husband get free, because he is dying in there. He just needs to be home. He should never have been in prison to start off. Not a day.

To demand adequate health care for Mumia, go to iacenter.org/prisoners/mumia/maj2-040615/. Also check Mumia Abu-Jamal on Facebook for more information.