Assata Olugbala Shakur aka JoAnne Deborah Byron, married name Chesimard is a activist and escaped citizen who was a member of the Black Panther Party (BPP) and Black Liberation Army (BLA). Between 1971 and 1973, Shakur was accused of several crimes and made the subject of a multi-state manhunt.
In May 1973, Shakur was involved in a shootout on the New Jersey Turnpike, during which New Jersey State Trooper Werner Foerster and BLA member Zayd Malik Shakur were killed and Shakur and Trooper James Harper were wounded. Between 1973 and 1977, Shakur was indicted in relation to six other alleged criminal incidents—charged with murder, attempted murder, armed robbery, bank robbery, and kidnapping—resulting in three acquittals and three dismissals. In 1977, she was convicted of the first-degree murder of Foerster and of seven other felonies related to the shootout.
In 2013, the FBI announced it had made Shakur the 1st woman on its list of most wanted terrorists. Shakur was incarcerated in several prisons in the 70s. She escaped from prison in 1979 and has been living in Cuba inpolitical asylum since 1984. Since May 2, 2005, the FBI has classified her as a domestic terrorist and offered a $1 million reward for assistance in her capture. On May 2, 2013, the FBI added her to the Most Wanted Terrorist list and increased the reward for her capture to $2 million.
Attempts to extradite her have resulted in letters to the Pope and a Congressional resolution. On Sept 14, 1998: Senator and Former 2016 Presidential candidate, Bernie Sanders VOTED YES on H.Con.Res. 254 (105th). Which called on the Government of Cuba to extradite to the United States convicted felon Joanne Chesimard (Assata Shakur) and all other individuals who have fled the United States to avoid prosecution or confinement for criminal offenses and who are currently living freely in Cuba.
Shakur is the step-aunt of the deceased hip-hop icon Tupac Shakur, the stepson of her brother Mutulu Shakur. Her life has been portrayed in literature, film and song.
CULTURAL IMPACT:
A documentary film about Shakur, Eyes of the Rainbow, written and directed by Cuban filmmaker Gloria Rolando, appeared in 1997. The official premier of the film in Havana in 2004 was promoted by Casa de las Américas, the main cultural forum of the Cuban government.
The National Conference of Black Lawyers and Mos Def are among the professional organizations and entertainers to support Assata Shakur; The "Hands Off Assata" campaign is organized by Dream Hampton.
Due to her support in the hip-hop culture, Shakur has been alternately termed a "rap music legend" or a "minorcause celebre.":
Hip-hop artist Common recorded a tribute to Shakur, "A Song for Assata," on his album Like Water for Chocolate, 2000, after traveling to Havana to meet with Shakur personally.
Paris ("Assata's Song", in Sleeping with the Enemy, 1992)
Public Enemy ("Rebel Without A Pause" in It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, 1988)
2Pac ("Words of Wisdom" in 2Pacalypse Now, 1991)
Digital Underground ("Heartbeat Props" in Sons of the P, 1991)
The Roots ("The Adventures in Wonderland" in Illadelph Halflife, 1996)
Saul Williams ("Black Stacey" in Saul Williams, 2004)
Rebel Diaz ("Which Side Are You On?" in Otro Guerrillero Mixtape Vol. 2, 2008)
Lowkey ("Something Wonderful" in Soundtrack to the Struggle, 2011)
Jay Z ("Open Letter Part II" in 2013)
Digable Planets and X-Clan have recorded similar songs about Shakur.
On December 12, 2006 the Chancellor of the City University of New York, Matthew Goldstein, directed City College's president, Gregory H. Williams, to remove the "unauthorized and inappropriate" designation of the "Guillermo Morales/Assata Shakur Community and Student Center," which was named by students in 1989, when a student group won the right to use the lounge after a campus shutdown over proposed tuition increases. The decision resulted in a lawsuit from student and alumni groups. As of April 7, 2010, the presiding judge has ruled that the issues of students' free speech and administrators' immunity from suit "deserve a trial."
In 1995 Manhattan Community College renamed a scholarship which had previously been named for Shakur, following controversy.
In 2008, Shakur was featured in a course on "African-American heroes"—along with figures such as Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, John Henry, Malcolm X, and Angela Davis—at Bucknell University.
Rutgers University professor H. Bruce Franklin, who excerpts Shakur's book in a class on Crime and Punishment in American Literature, calls her a "revolutionary fighter against imperialism."
Shakur is still a notorious figure among New Jersey law enforcement officials. For example, black (now ex-)Trooper Anthony Reed sued the force, among other things, over posters of Shakur, altered to include Reed's badge number, being hung in Newark barracks, an incident that Reed considered "racist in nature."In contrast, according to Dylan Rodriguez, to many "U.S. radicals and revolutionaries" Shakur represents a "venerated (if sometimes fetishized) signification of liberatory desire and possibility.
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