Herman Wallace, one of the longest held political prisoners in the world, and a member of the Angola 3, is on the streets today after a federal court granted his habeas corpus and vacated his bogus conviction.
Herman, 72 years old, now becomes the second of the Angola 3 to have their wrongful convictions reversed, paving the way for Albert Woodfox, who remains under the claws of the State.
The Angola 3 have spent more time in solitary confinement than almost any men in America – over 41 years, after the 3, then young men, were charged with murder to cover up the real reason for their draconian banishment to this hole for life: what Louisiana officials termed “Black Pantherism”.
Despite the fact that no reliable evidence exists to support the murder charge, there is abundant evidence to prove that the Angola 3 – Robert King, Herman Wallace and Albert Woodfox – were targeted by Louisiana for being revolutionaries; for being members of the Black Panther Party – and for being bold enough, courageous enough, to organize a branch of the Black Panther Party in the very bowels of Angola State Penitentiary, back in the 1970s!
The late L.A. BPP Deputy Minister of Defense, Geronimo Ji-Jaga [Pratt] once called them the most courageous Panthers of them all, for daring to organize in the heart of Angola, a former slave plantation.
For their political beliefs and affiliations, they were consigned to a living death in Angola’s hole – for over 40 years.
Herman’s win is bittersweet, as it comes the very year that the 72-year old was diagnosed with liver cancer.
Terminal liver cancer.
What kind of system damns 3 innocent men to decades in dungeons?
The kind we live in.
Herman’s on his way home. Albert remains behind, waiting.
