HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Lynne Marsha Abraham (born January 31, 1941) is an American attorney who served as the
district attorney In the United States, a district attorney (DA), county attorney, county prosecutor, state attorney, state's attorney, prosecuting attorney, commonwealth's attorney, or solicitor is the chief prosecutor or chief law enforcement officer represen ...
of the
City of Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...
from May 1991 to January 2010. She was the first woman to serve as Philadelphia's district attorney. Abraham won election to that position four times. Abraham is sometimes regarded as having been among the United States' "deadliest" prosecutors because she sought and obtained the
death penalty Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty and formerly called judicial homicide, is the state-sanctioned killing of a person as punishment for actual or supposed misconduct. The sentence ordering that an offender be punished in s ...
more frequently than most district attorneys. She ran for
Mayor In many countries, a mayor is the highest-ranking official in a Municipal corporation, municipal government such as that of a city or a town. Worldwide, there is a wide variance in local laws and customs regarding the powers and responsibilitie ...
of
Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...
in the 2015 election, but lost the Democratic primary.


Early life and education

Abraham was born in 1941 and raised in
Philadelphia Philadelphia ( ), colloquially referred to as Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, most populous city in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania and the List of United States cities by population, sixth-most populous city in the Unit ...
, where she was educated in
Philadelphia public schools The School District of Philadelphia (SDP) is the school district that includes all school district-operated public schools in Philadelphia. Established in 1818, it is the largest school district in Pennsylvania and the eighth-largest school di ...
. The daughter of first-generation Americans, she grew up on the margins of poverty. Her grandparents were a tailor and a butcher from Europe. She studied at
Temple University Temple University (Temple or TU) is a public university, public Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related research university in Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. It was founded in 1884 by the Baptist ministe ...
for her undergraduate degree and received her
Juris Doctor A Juris Doctor, Doctor of Jurisprudence, or Doctor of Law (JD) is a graduate-entry professional degree that primarily prepares individuals to practice law. In the United States and the Philippines, it is the only qualifying law degree. Other j ...
from
Temple University Beasley School of Law The James E. Beasley School of Law (known as Temple Law) is the law school of Temple University, a public research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was founded in 1895 and enrolls about 650 students. Student body Admission for the ...
.


Career

Abraham served as a legislative consultant for the city council of Philadelphia. She served as the head of the
Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority The Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority (PRA) was created by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's Urban Redevelopment Law of 1945. Until the Fall of 2011 it was known as the Redevelopment Authority of the City of Philadelphia (RDA). Function The ...
during the administration of Mayor
Frank Rizzo Francis Lazarro Rizzo (October 23, 1920 – July 16, 1991) was an American police officer and politician. He served as commissioner of the Philadelphia Police Department (PPD) from 1967 to 1971 and mayor of Philadelphia from 1972 to 1980. He wa ...
. She was elected Judge of the
Philadelphia Municipal Court The Philadelphia Municipal Court is a trial court of limited jurisdiction seated in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It has 27 judges elected by the voters of Philadelphia. The Municipal Court has three divisions: the Criminal Division, the Civil Div ...
in 1977, then was elected to the Court of Common Pleas in 1980, where she presided over criminal trials until she became district attorney in 1991.


District Attorney

Abraham was elected by Philadelphia judges to take over as District Attorney in 1991 when then-District Attorney Ronald D. Castille, later Chief Justice of the
Pennsylvania Supreme Court The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania is the highest court in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania's Unified Judicial System. It began in 1684 as the Provincial Court, and casual references to it as the "Supreme Court" of Pennsylvania were made offici ...
, stepped down from the District Attorney post in order to run for mayor. The Board of Judges elected Abraham by a thin 39-37 margin. As an incumbent, Abraham was elected to a four-year term in 1993. She was re-elected three more times; in 1997 (defeating challengers Jack McMahon and Leon Williams), 2001 (defeating challengers Alexander Talmadge and Leon Williams) and 2005 (defeating challenger Seth Williams, who would succeed her as District Attorney five years later). Abraham held the office of district attorney longer than anyone else in Philadelphia history, during which time she saw 108 capital sentences returned. She earned the nicknames "Deadliest DA" and "Queen of Death" for the high rate at which her office, especially prosecutor Roger King, sought the death penalty in past decades. In 2007, Abraham charged William J. Barnes for the murder of a police officer, whom Barnes shot forty-one years earlier during a failed burglary. The officer survived, but died in 2007 from a urinary tract infection. Barnes had served twenty years for the incident, but Abraham believed she could prove causation between Barnes' shot and the urinary tract infection. Despite Barnes having reformed his life, he was incarcerated until he was acquitted of the homicide in 2010.


Post-District Attorney career

In the 2004 presidential election, Abraham served as one of Pennsylvania's electors, casting her ballot for
John Kerry John Forbes Kerry (born December 11, 1943) is an American attorney, politician, and diplomat who served as the 68th United States secretary of state from 2013 to 2017 in the Presidency of Barack Obama#Administration, administration of Barac ...
. In the 2008 election, she cast her electoral ballot for
Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...
. Abraham retired in 2009, and was replaced by Seth Williams. In 2015, Abraham ran for
Mayor of Philadelphia The mayor of Philadelphia is the chief executive of the government of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as stipulated by the Charter of the City of Philadelphia. The current mayor of Philadelphia is Cherelle Parker, who is the first woman to hold the ...
in
2015 2015 was designated by the United Nations as: * International Year of Light * International Year of Soil __TOC__ Events January * January 1 – Lithuania officially adopts the euro as its currency, replacing the litas, and becomes ...
and finished third among six candidates in the Democratic primary. In 2017, Abraham applied to serve as interim district attorney following the resignation of Seth Williams, who had pleaded guilty in a federal corruption case. The Philadelphia
NAACP The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is an American civil rights organization formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E. B. Du&nbs ...
publicly opposed her appointment. Abraham is co-founder of I-LEAD Charter School in
Reading, Pennsylvania Reading ( ; ) is a city in Berks County, Pennsylvania, United States, and its county seat. The city had a population of 95,112 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census and is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania, fourth-most populous ...
.


Personal life

Abraham was married to Frank Ford until his death in March 2009.


References


External links


Lynne Abraham records
{{DEFAULTSORT:Abraham, Lynne 1941 births Living people Temple University Beasley School of Law alumni District attorneys of Philadelphia 2004 United States presidential electors 2008 United States presidential electors Pennsylvania Democrats Politicians from Philadelphia Mumia Abu-Jamal