Attorneys for a New Black Panther Party leader say he is being illegally held against his will and unfairly being denied a probable cause hearing after his arrest while trying to do the right thing.
But legal scholars and attorneys say the circumstances surrounding Hashim Nzinga’s arrest for gun possession charges leave him little option but to wait to go to trial.
Nzinga, 49, was arrested March 26 after he pawned a semi-automatic handgun, authorities said. At the time, he was a convicted felon; in February, he pleaded guilty in Gwinnett County to writing a bad check for $3,000, a felony because the amount exceeded $500.
It is unlawful in Georgia for a convicted felon to have a gun.
Days earlier, the Stone Mountain father of six and chief of staff of the New Black Panther Party told the news media the organization was offering a $10,000 bounty for the “citizen’s arrest” of George Zimmerman, who admitted to killing an unarmed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in self-defense last month in Sanford, Fla.
Asked upon his own arrest if he wanted a preliminary, or probable cause, hearing on the gun charge, Nzinga – who had no legal representation at the time – declined, his attorney Mawuli Mel Davis said.
Davis said his client thought he was only waiving his right to the hearing at his first appearance before a DeKalb County Magistrate Court judge. “Since he didn’t have an attorney present, he wasn’t comfortable with having the hearing,” Davis said.
Davis was hired on March 30 and has twice been denied a preliminary hearing for his client by Magistrate Judge William D. Strickland.
“The defendant knowingly and voluntarily waived his right to a preliminary hearing,” Strickland said Monday in a second brief denying Davis’ request.
Defense attorney Jackie Patterson said Nzinga shouldn’t have passed on the hearing, regardless of whether a lawyer was with him.
“Anytime you get arrested, you certainly don’t want to waive anything,” Patterson said. “When a defendant waives a preliminary hearing, that’s equivalent to saying there is sufficient evidence for you to stand trial.”
Nzinga’s supporters say he is being singled out because of statements he made to the media in the Trayvon Martin case.
“I say Hashim Nzinga is a political prisoner based on what he said and what he believes,” radio personality and former Atlanta City Councilman Derrick Boazman said.
David Jenks, criminology department chairman at the University of West Georgia, said Nzinga did himself no favors by becoming a public figure before his arrest.
“Anytime you’re on probation, being the front man for anything having to do with a bounty is not a good idea,” Jenks said. “Being a member of the Black Panthers is so politically charged, it’s only going to increase police scrutiny.”
The New Black Panther organization is fashioned after the 1960s-era group founded in Oakland, Calif., on the principles of African-American self-defense and black nationalism, but often associated with racism and violence to further its political goals.
The Rev. Derrick Rice, pastor of Sankofa United Church of Christ, complained that Nzinga wasn’t afforded the same benefit of the doubt given to Zimmerman, who was free for more than a month after shooting Martin.
Attorneys say Nzinga was arrested by plainclothes DeKalb County Sheriff’s deputies as he went to meet his probation officer for the first time.
“It’s interesting that a person can murder someone and be provided all the loopholes of the law,” Rice said of Zimmerman. “And here, a man was very clearly trying to follow the law and is in jail.”
Indeed, Nzinga tried to adhere to the law, seeking to relinquish his handgun after the Gwinnett conviction, Davis said.
Georgia Department of Corrections spokeswoman Gwendolyn Hogan said a convicted felon should be served with a firearms form to sign either during sentencing or on the first visit to a probation officer, informing the court of the weapon.
It’s unclear if Nzinga received signed such documentation when he made his plea in February, but he never got a chance to do so on his initial probation visit.
Davis said his client’s actions when pawning the gun were careful and deliberate, however.
“He never touched the gun when he turned it in to the pawn shop,” Davis said. “He had his [26-year-old] son place in the trunk of the car, take it to the pawn shop and take it in, where Mr. Nzinga only signed the paperwork and was fingerprinted.”
University of Georgia law professor Ronald Carlson said those details could prevent a gun conviction if they are proven in court.
“He’ll have an arguable claim of defense if he’s got good witnesses – maybe the son – who will swear that he never touched the gun,” Carlson said. “If the [pawn shop] video shows he didn’t touch it, that helps the case measurably if everything that the defense says is borne out by the visuals.”
In the meantime, Davis has filed a writ of Habeas Corpus in court against DeKalb Sheriff Thomas Brown, claiming Nzinga is being unlawfully held in the DeKalb jail on a $10,000 bond.
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