Commemorating California Hunger Strike, Continuing Fight Against Control Units

I’m writing to contribute to the continuing exposure of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR)’s corrupt capitalist-imperialist system locking up human beings in long-term solitary confinement for decades.

As we know, the anniversary of the 1st hunger strike just passed 1 July 2012. We must remember the three soldados who lost their lives in this battle for our basic human rights and to end all indefinite isolation units (SHUs and Ad-Segs).

And to all who participated and those who gave and continue to give us moral support over our torturous and inhumane conditions of being segregated and placed in solitary confinement, known as CDCR’s SHUs and Ad-Segs “Crypts”, indefinitely with no rights or due process.

It’s also very important we don’t forget about the women and girls locked up in women prisons, Central California Women’s Facility Chowchilla, Valley State Prison for Women, California Institution for Women, White Oaks, CRC, etc. I can’t imagine the hardships and torturous conditions these women/girls have to endure. I would bet my life on it that thousands of these women/girls are also locked away in isolation confinement crypts. So let’s walk side by side with our equal counterparts women and girls who are being isolated to indefinite SHUs, where concerns around living conditions of mental/physical torturous behavior fall on deaf ears.

I know this first hand because I’ve been in solitary confinement indefinitely since 1993 and counting. All we’re asking for is to be treated as humans. Our 5 core demands are very reasonable.

But as the world now knows, California CDCR continues to deny that we are human by placing us in their “crypts” based on lies and making it a priority that we don’t get basic necessities: medical, mental health treatment, human contact with our family, and sunlight.

I ask everyone who is a part of this struggle to join the fight to eliminate unjust solitary confinement.

The prisoncrats will never admit they are terrorist dictators who are allowed to run California’s prisons with no honest oversight or accountability for their terrorist ideology, behavior and actions. They falsely use so-called “prison security concerns” to label thousands of human beings as prison gang members or associates to justify decades of isolation practices.

Attorney Peter Schey, from the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law, has filed a petition to the United Nations concerning our solitary confinement. There is also a separate federal civil rights action in motion. This will take time, as we know how the court system operates.

Don’t give up hope, this is gonna be a long battle and journey. A lot of us are stuck in these “crypts” until real change comes. It’s up to us to protect the new generation - so they don’t have to go through torturous inhumane isolation.