Mumia Abu-Jamal (born Wesley Cook April 24, 1954) was convicted and sentenced to death on July 3, 1982, for the December 1981 murder of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner. His sentence was commuted to life imprisonment without parole in December 2011. Activists, celebrities, and political organizations have criticized the fairness of his trial or opposed his death penalty. The Faulkner family, public authorities, and police organizations maintain that he was properly convicted and appropriately sentenced to death. Once described as "perhaps the world's best known death-row inmate" by The New York Times, during his imprisonment he has published books and commentaries on social and political issues, including Live from Death Row (1995).

Abu-Jamal became involved in black nationalism in his youth and was a member of the Black Panther Party until October 1970. While a self described "lieutenant of Information" for the party, he quoted Mao Zedong during one of his interviews, saying that "political power grows out of the barrel of a gun". He was closely involved with the leftist organization MOVE that protested police brutality and was involved in several incidents that included conflict with the police, violence, and homicide. After leaving the party, he became a radio journalist – eventually becoming president of the Philadelphia Association of Black Journalists.