Abu-Ali Abdur’Rahman, front left, enters the courtroom for a hearing Wednesday, Aug. 28, 2019, in Nashville, Tenn. Abdur’Rahman, who was convicted of murder and is scheduled to be executed next April, claims that prosecutors’ racially motivated dismissal of potential black jurors resulted in an unfair trial. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) – A condemned Tennessee prisoner was waiting Thursday to hear whether he would be spared the death chamber after he claimed prosecutors illegally excluded African Americans from the jury pool.
Abu-Ali Abdur’Rahman (ah-BOO’-ah-LEE’) (AHB’-dur-RAK’-mahn), who is black, faces an April 16 execution date for the 1986 murder of Patrick Daniels.
Nashville’s district attorney agreed on Wednesday to convert Abdur’Rahman’s sentence to life, but Criminal Court Judge Monte Watkins still has to sign off on the agreement. He said he would decide by Thursday.
Abdur’Rahman, 68, has seen three previous execution dates come and go, once coming within two days of execution, as various legal appeals worked their ways through the courts.
Those appeals were all denied. Although courts more than once found misconduct by the prosecutor, each time they decided the harm done was not enough to justify a new trial.