Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, August 8, 1995 TAG: 9508080054
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
PHILADELPHIA - Ten days before he was to be put to death for the murder of a police officer, black activist and radio reporter Mumia Abu-Jamal won a reprieve Monday while he pursues an appeal that could take years.
Dozens of supporters, joined by the Rev. Jesse Jackson, cheered the ruling by Judge Albert F. Sabo. The decision came on the ninth day of a hearing on Abu-Jamal's request for a new trial. He had been scheduled to die by injection Aug. 17.
``There's reasonable doubt, so there should be a new trial,'' Jackson said outside the courtroom.
The case has generated international attention, especially since publication this year of ``Live from Death Row,'' a collection of prison essays by Abu-Jamal..
- Associated Press
Ex-worker testifies of sex with legislator
CHICAGO - Breaking her silence after 11 days in jail, a former campaign worker for Rep. Mel Reynolds testified Monday that she and the congressman began having sex when she was 16 and once took part in a menage a trois in his office.
She said she usually was paid, as much as $100 a time.
Beverly Heard, 19, had been jailed for refusing to confirm either her original accusations in June 1994 or her recantation in January. She said their relationship became sexual almost from the moment the two-term Democratic congressman drove up to her as she walked outside a high school in 1992.
Reynolds, 43, is charged with sexual assault, sexual abuse and obstruction, for allegedly trying to engineer Heard's withdrawal from the case.
- Associated Press
Senate votes down automatic pay raise
WASHINGTON - The Senate has voted to block members of Congress from receiving automatic 2.4 percent pay raises at a time when they are trimming spending for hundreds of federal programs.
By voice vote, senators voted to prevent the increase from taking effect Oct. 1, the start of fiscal 1996. By law, all federal civilian workers automatically receive annual cost-of-living increases set by the president unless Congress intervenes.
- Associated Press
NBC wins rights to show Olympics
NEW YORK - NBC won American TV rights to both the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, and the 2002 Winter Games at Salt Lake City, surprising its competitors Monday with a record bid of $1.25 billion.
NBC bid $705 million for the Sydney Games and $545 million for the Games at Salt Lake City, said Dick Pound, chairman of the International Olympic Committee's television panel.
- Associated Press
Movie director found buried under house
LOS ANGELES - Al Adamson, a B-movie director whose films included ``Five Bloody Graves'' and ``Satan's Sadists,'' was found killed and buried under his house.
The body of Adamson, 66, was found in Indio, about 150 miles southeast of Los Angeles, police said Monday.
Police issued a homicide arrest warrant for a contractor who had been living at Adamson's home while remodeling it. Fred Fulford, 46, traveled to Florida about a week before Adamson was reported missing, police said.
- Associated Press
Keywords:
FATALITY
by CNB