Federal Prisons

1 June 2015 marked the third anniversary of the Brown Berets - Prison Chapter (BB-PC). This was a significant event, one that should be reviewed and put in context for what it means for Chican@s and what other oppressed people can learn from this development. Although Chican@s have been showing a rise in consciousness and political activity, we need to also reach farther and dig deeper in our efforts. The following four points are some of the contributions which this anniversary marks. All Chican@s should understand that we can accomplish much more with more participation and with more prison activism. There are four points that are important ways in which this development has progressed.

• Book project: The BB-PC was happy to participate in the newly released book Chican@ Power and the Struggle for Aztlán. This is a much needed book based on today’s Chican@ nation, and it was time for such a project. The BB-PC saw that there is a shortage of contemporary Chican@ revolutionary literature showing today’s gente the way forward. After collaborating with MIM(Prisons) and other Chican@s who were also working to rebuild the nation, the book project was launched. This book marks a new level of consciousness for the nation and it is ground breaking. We believe that this book has signaled the next wind in the Chican@ movement.

• New Chapter: Another development in these three years was the formation of the BB-PC Colorado. The fact that Chican@s in Colorado have been able to rise above their circumstances and contribute to advancing Aztlán is a beautiful thing. When people can look outside of themselves and, despite their own oppression or repressive circumstances, stand up with the nation, it should be applauded. It is no surprise that comrades in Colorado did not waste time in getting involved in today’s Chican@ movement because Colorado has always contributed strong cadre to Aztlán. In 1974 Los Seis de Boulder Colorado gave Aztlán the martyrs which fueled Aztlán at that time. But the Colorado chapter also confirms our analysis which can be found in Chican@ Power, and which explains that we suspect imprisoned Chican@s are developing politically at unprecedented rates and as this continues so will more chapters rise throughout the U.S. pintas.

• Release of Chican@s out of the control units: Another development has been in the fact that after years and decades of Chican@s and other oppressed people being held in control units we have now seen many moved back out to the general populations. We believe that this was accomplished by a multitude of actions. The hunger strikes, the heightened education/agitation behind prison walls, and the involvement in more Chican@s speaking out and creating literature and political theory to guide the prison movement, has all helped to push the prison movement for human rights forward while ensuring that the demands within prisons remain progressive and continue to revolutionize. All of these efforts were supported by the imprisoned Chican@ movement and the BB-PC participated in various ways.

• Future efforts: We see the need for more Chican@ study material and the newly released book Chican@ Power was just the first step in this regard. More material is being developed which will add to transforming the hearts and minds of captive Aztlán.

It can be said that in these short three years a contribution has been made to Aztlán. But this is an ongoing long-term project and we have only begun. Thought reform takes time, and undoing the damage that colonialism has done on our nation’s minds is hard work. We are freedom-loving people who have tasted freedom through our actions, and our activism will not stop until we are all free.

The coming year will see more leaps forward as more Chican@s are let out of the control units, and as more torture is stopped. The first step in contributing to Aztlán is educating oneself and those around you. Learning Chican@ hystory and discuss how to advance the gente. Nobody will free you if you will not free yourself. We look forward to better days and a re-charged Chican@ movement.

I want to comment on the September 9 Day of Peace and Solidarity. This idea is the greatest, but fasting for the day is pointless. We have to focus on the name of the day: peace and solidarity. The best way to do this is to print a challenge to all who want a change in this hellish world. The challenge is for the change-seeker to go to an “enemy” and commit an act of kindness. No act is too big or too small. If you see someone in the struggle in need of some support, be that support. The number one reason for mistreatment in prison is lack of solidarity amongst prisoners. When pigs know they’ll only have to deal with one race or a certain number of prisoners they feel comfortable committing the acts of mistreatment.

If prisoners moved as a unit against mistreatment and injustice these pigs wouldn’t behave how they behave. I’m not saying, hey everybody, let’s hold hands and sing Kumbayah, but we need to start supporting each other in order to have a livable life. The line has to be drawn so the pigs understand this is how things are going to be and we will no longer be divided on certain issues. When we fast, to me it shows strength and dedication, but to the pigs they couldn’t care less. We have brothas dying while fasting to support their cause and the pigs couldn’t be happier. Fasting has become ineffective.

On September 9 and beyond we have the opportunity to create our own peace. There was a movement called “pay it forward.” In that movement you just did a good deed for someone with no expectation of a reward. You let the person know “I want nothing, just do for someone else what I’ve done for you.” So we take from that and mold the peace and solidarity movement similar to it. On our end we’ll call it the “peace and solidarity challenge.” This can be big as, if not bigger than, the worldwide “ice bucket challenge.” The Klansman pigs don’t expect enemies to get along. Through our cause not only will we get along but we’ll support each other when needed. All the world thinks about prisons and gangs is that we kill each other and inflict harm on one another. We can show our little brothers, sons, nephews, daughters, nieces, sisters, and cousins that the enemy is not each other. We’re all going through the same struggle. “Peace and solidarity” is the only way out.

September 9 – Join the Movement!

I found a copy of Under lock & Key 39 and saw that right here in Texas concentration camps there are likeminded brothers struggling in other facilities in the same predicaments. Resist! Resist! Don’t get discouraged! I am among you and our numbers are slowly growing.

This very morning I got the various gangs to quit talking bullshit by speaking to my likeminded neighbor about what I’ve read and studied from ULK 39. These white gang members normally talk over me and try to drown me out, but my voice is loud and I want to be heard by all; Black, Brown, Red, and white. Everyone finally got quiet and me and my neighbor talked. For about 45 minutes we talked about organized prison protests in California, of the 30,000 prisoners hunger strike, and the fact that in Texas you can’t get more than two to agree to do it and they give up after commissary.

Then a Mexican brother got into our conversation and told me about MIM and MIM(Prisons). I told him I had found ULK 39 in my cell. He said it was his and they move him around every two weeks because he’s a “threat to security.” He then shot me ULKs 38 and 37, several Prison Action News publications, and the Texas petition to have our grievances addressed! I’ve been doing something similar for several years. It’s really helped a few people out. There is a right way and a wrong way to write step one and step two grievances. It’s the most asinine case I’ve ever run across, but if you use their own game rules against them most times you prevail. There are small victories. They just circumvent new policies with bogus practice.

MIM(Prisons) adds: The Texas activist pack is available to anyone in Texas who wants guidance on fighting to get grievances heard, and it also includes information on how to fight the medical copay as well as the restriction on indigent mail supplies. Just write to us for a copy. It’s a big packet of information so if you can send a donation to cover the cost of printing and mailing, that would help us send more lit to other prisoners in need!

As a jailhouse lawyer my mission is always the same: to fight for justice where injustice lives. My mentor, the late Johnny Cochran, embraced the adage “an injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” I believe that’s what led me to law school and now I possess two law degrees and I’m an outstanding member of the National Lawyers Guild.

In December 2014, I submitted a Georgia open records act request for the names and titles of all staff at Hays State Prison in Trion, Georgia. Hays is the most high profile maximum security prison in Georgia and it is the most racist. The Georgia Department of Corrections legal office mailed me records responsive to my request after I paid the fee for the copies.

On 2 April 2015, Hays Correctional Emergency Response Team (CERT) searched my cell and found the request I made for those records. I was immediately locked in segregation/Tier I pending investigation. I was told by five white CERT Officers and one white CERT sergeant that I had no business requesting such information as they slammed my head into the Tier I housing unit door. I was also threatened with being beaten if I told anyone about the assault I had just ingested. All my personal and legal property was taken without due process and not returned. After reporting this to chief of security (who is Black) he laughed and said “you had no business with these folks’ information.” All I did was exercise my right to acquire public information like any Georgia citizen. I’ve committed no disciplinary or prohibited act. Yet I remain committed to my mission and will fight injustice wherever it may be found.

I was discussing the difficulty of forming a study group in Intensive Management Unit (IMU), which is Oregon’s Security Housing Unit (SHU), with a comrade (we are both in IMU) and we have figured that we two can at least do a study group with the two of us. We are hoping that you guys will be able to help with the literature. We are wanting to study “The Communist Manifesto” by Marx. If that is not a possibility we are hoping for “On Contradiction” by Mao. I don’t believe my comrade is on the Under Lock & Key (ULK) list, but if you could put him on the mailing list and send us both copies of Marx or Mao or both or whatever is available. His info is enclosed.

We are, of course, willing to do political work for trade. Besides the essay enclosed, I am also working on an essay about “The Chicago Anarchist Trial” of 1886, in which the in-justice system fixed a trial and put four revolutionaries to death. My comrade is also working on a separate essay about revolutionary nationalism. We will send them in when they are completed.

On the invoice it was asked to answer those four questions, so here we go.

1. The most valuable thing I learned was about the “labor aristocracy.” I had some prior knowledge, but the concept was expanded greatly in my mind.

2. I can’t say that I disagree with the idea of a “white working class” as “labor aristocracy.” But I am just trying to assimilate this fact with my previous revolutionary theories.

3. I would like to learn more about dialectical materialism and social sciences in general.

4. What most relates to the day-to-day struggle is to stop seeing the U.$. working class as potential revolutionaries. They are part beneficiaries from imperial exploitation.

As I said before, I am in IMU or SHU and so face different challenges when it comes to group study. I am really hoping ULK 45 will address the special circumstances that are part of the SHU study groups, and how to deal with and get around those challenges. But, if you can help us with the literature we will report back on how our SHU study group works out!

About 150 of us are currently at Macon State Prison and 20 of the Family are in other camps. I’m currently in the hole for going to war with the officers and the Bloods for breaking a peace treaty. I extend my hand in assistance to stop imperialism and oppression through paperwork or blood.

When the officers see Bloods, Crips, GDs, Muslims, Vice Lords, Piru, coming together, they don’t know what to do. One day we were in the rooms meeting and no one was hardly on the floor. They came in telling us to lock down for no reason, just because they had the authority.

I had to use the scientific method in coming up with a peace treaty. I went around surveying the people of different parties about what makes them fight and kill each other. It’s not the color no more, it’s about different creeds stealing and tricking each other. So I came up with the antithesis to it, which was to give out prizes at chess and basketball tournaments. It had other things such as a poor box in each dorm where the UFAO is at, which is for everybody.

Nothing happened in the dorm I was in until the Bloods stole out of the box of the GDs and Muslims and they broke the treaty. So, me being the General didn’t approve of it, so a war broke out. Because once you say you’re revolutionary, your word and peace treaties mean a lot in my eyes.

I am also asking for guidance and support because people are getting free, going home, and I don’t want the impression of a gang or drug lord. I’d rather finish what Assata Shakur, Martin L. King, Malcolm X, Frederick Douglass and other great leaders left off on. I’m open for all political and friendly advice. My goal is to support all oppressed people no matter their affiliation, and under a treaty with people with affiliations in gangs.

We as a whole must unite and become one family to end the criminal label that the United $tates put on us, to disguise what their gang is doing. Because they have abandoned and malignant hearts when it comes to power and wealth. And I’m going to stop the real terrorists at all cost.

MIM(Prisons) responds: We commend this comrade for pushing for peace on their unit, and for pointing out that the imperialists are the real enemy. It makes sense that in organizing the lumpen for peace, we will still see lumpen tendencies arise, like the one our comrade described above about stealing the poor box. Even though we’re bringing people together for revolutionary reasons, we are still heavily influenced by our capitalist culture and indoctrination. We need to make it a priority to bring thorough revolutionary education to all the comrades we’re working with, in order to combat this lumpen mentality of getting up on the backs of others, and undermining our struggles for peace.

Prisons are a volatile environment. And we’re building for peace in prisons. It’s somewhat ironic to enforce a peace treaty using physical violence. We should take this incident as a lesson that while we’re discussing how to begin a peace treaty, we also need to discuss how we can hold others accountable to the peace treaty if they break it. Is a prison war the only possible method of accountability?

If anyone needs literature to help educate others about the role of the United Front for Peace in Prisons in our overall fight against our common oppressor, then write in for back issues of Under Lock & Key. If you’ve been able to develop a sound peace treaty and have experimented successfully with how to hold others accountable when they fall out of line of the treaty, then please send a report to ULK so we can grow stronger as a movement.

“Religion is what keeps the poor from killing the rich.” - Napoleon Bonaparte

It seems Napoleon had a firm understanding of the opiate of the masses. Imperialism has been using religion as a tool of oppression for hundreds of years. It isn’t any less apparent today inside the U.S. prison systems. In some cases, units offer 2-3 times as many religious classes as educational courses.

Most religions, especially Judeo-Christian ones, champion punishment, often unjustly, under the reasoning of “because I say so.” There’s no objective investigating, and nothing is circumstantial. This propaganda is flooded into the prison system to create the mindset that prisoners are bad people and do not belong in society. This also helps the people in the free world who do not see us as deserving of human rights. So they allow the imperialistic oppression to continue. Criminals shouldn’t be punished, they should be rehabilitated.

They claim Jesus once said to “turn the other cheek.” Pacifists rarely enact change. Religions for the most part promise a better afterlife which gets people to overlook and ignore what’s going on here and now. They preach that if you sit on your hands and keep your mouth shut, it will be better after you are gone. I’m sure the imperialist pigs have no qualms about expediting your departure. Amerika loves this “shut up and take it” mentality; it’s what the country was founded on. Every day, I see prisoners take verbal and physical abuse from the institution and do nothing because they are “trying to be good Christians.”

The lumpen need to take off the blindfolds placed on their eyes by the church, synagogue, or mosque and realize materialism is the vehicle to a better life of freedom. Meaning true freedom from oppression in this current life they’re living, not down the road after they’re dead.

I received the unconfirmed mail form last week and am replying back to you all. I have not received the indicated items (The Autobiography of Malcolm X and tips on writing for ULK) from you all. There corrupt prison officials are implementing all types of censorship tactics which unequivocally violate our First Amendment rights.

They have implemented a program called Tier II which is a strategy to atrociously inflict cruel and unusual punishment based upon past disciplinary sanctions and redress of retaliation methods by diabolically corrupt prison authorities when you file grievances against them. This program restricts you from having reading materials, newspapers, and/or magazines until you reach a certain phase.

The living condition are inhumane and unsanitary which further violates our protected constitutional rights. In fact I have killed a huge roach and sent it to the Eleventh Circuit Court as an exhibit in one of my lawsuits. A judge called Warden Gregory McLaughlin retaliated by having the Correctional Emergency Reponse Team recklessly search my property and have me repeat phase one as a vindictive retaliation method.

I recently killed a rat and attempted to send it to the U.S. Supreme Court but they intercepted it to prevent the truth from being exposed about the inhumane and unsanitary living conditions. An associate/roommate did the same by exterminating another rat and of course they retaliated by putting me in a strip cell and illegally confiscating all my legal materials for days.

I’m writing because I feel I’m not receiving the right treatment. I have stated this to the doctors and therapists here but the mental health staff don’t care. I’ve been suffering from major depression since I was 12 years old, after I was molested by my mother’s boyfriend. I’ve attempted suicide in the past; most recently was April 14. I had to be sent out to the hospital. I’ve been on life support twice. For the last 10 years I’ve been in and out of the hospital for suicide attempts.

The staff don’t give a damn about what happens to us prisoners. This is supposed to be a mental health unit to help prisoners with their mental illness, but University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) does nothing at all to help. And the warden knows what’s going on. A few months ago a prisoner killed himself and nothing happened. I’ve had nurses tell me they don’t care if I kill myself. I’ve written grievances about the matter, and I’ve also written to senator John Whitmire and the executive director of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) Brad Livingston. I’m not receiving any kind of treatment I feel I should be getting. I’ve asked for a new therapist and doctor. I’ve written the clinic director Dr. Farley, and Dr. Khawaja.

I’ve been having a lot of problems with my therapist (Mr. Dalazrer). Other prisoners and I have filed numerous complaints against him. I filed a sexual harassment complaint against him. He came to my cell door and stated if I wanted to get off psych and be able to come out of my cell I would show him my penis, so I filed a complaint. I wrote to the Ombudsman office, and the Inspector General Investigations Department. I tried talking to the warden. I filed the complaint on May 8, and it was complete on May 21. Nothing was done. Mr. Salazar has continued to come to my cell door. I feel very uncomfortable around him. On May 21 UTMB and the warden Comstock had a meeting with Mr. Salazar. Then on May 22 I was told I was being discharged from the mental health unit. I was told by a staffpersyn that I can continue to write to who I want, but that nothing would happen to Mr. Salazar.

Since I started filing complaints on Mr. Salazar and Dr. Patel they have retaliated against me by continuing to place me on psych cell, where I am on a “behavior management plan” and I can’t come out my cell. Mr. Salazar has stated that if I don’t talk to him, he will place me on psych cell. The reason I was placed on this behavior management plan was because I wrote a letter to my family explaining how I felt and the type of treatment I was receiving. I haven’t engaged in any aggressive behavior to be placed on the behavior plan. They have prisoners here who throw things on officers and medical staff, have uses of force, and get disciplinary cases and nothing is done to them. This is only retaliation. Once you’re placed on this plan all your property is taken for a period of time. None of this is right. I have had an organization called “Inmate Assistance League” here in Texas contact a Dr. Penn in Huntsville Texas about this matter. But nothing was ever done.

I refuse to give up. I found out at visit from my brother that he hasn’t been receiving my mail about the complaints I’ve filed. I will appreciate any kind of help you can give at this time, cause things is at its limit. The mental health system here in Texas is not good at all. I would like to request a subscription to ULK.

I was in building B2 and saw officers Lawson and Gibson starve a prisoner for 3 days straight because the prisoner wrote them up for messing with him.

We were in the hole in B2, in segregation. When we get fed we have a box on our door. The officer puts the food in and then slides this piece of metal to the side so we can reach in to get the tray and put it back. All trays have tops on, and this is how they get away with it on camera. The tray is empty when they get to the cell, but with the top on the camera just shows them placing the tray in the box. If someone writes them up the officer will claim he delivered the food, but the whole time there was never anything on the tray.

To punish prisoners who expose them, the officers do things like plant knives in their cells to do a staged cell search, or put the person in segregation to have better control over them.

The main two people who call all the hits here at Red Onion Prison are Walter Sweeney, the Unit Manager for B building, and Yonce, Unit Manager for A building. They both use the word “nigger” here frequently with prisoners. The warden does nothing; he lets the unit managers run this place however they want.

MIM(Prisons) adds: There is no justification for torture of prisoners, yet it happens all the time in the Amerikan prison system. This description of deliberate starvation in Virginia in retaliation for prisoners exercising their legal rights fits in with the overall goal of the criminal injustice system as a tool of social control. There is nothing rehabilitative or corrective about these actions. This is why we call for a complete dismantling of the system. We are not just writing about a few bad apples perpetrating evil deeds, while the rest of the system is otherwise working well. Prisons help control oppressed populations within the United $tates for the imperialists. We won’t be able to end this through the legal system that is part of the overall criminal injustice system. That doesn’t stop us from taking on legal battles when they are winnable, but at the same time we must build a movement that can take down the entire system.