Federal Prisons

Revolutionary greetings to all. I’m back one again to report the activities here at Killa Kern for the week. To start it off, we’re still dealing with the same problems of the prices on canteen items risen. And the Arsenic poison being fed throughout our prison’s plumbing system.

Now on the count of California’s Governor failing to come up with a way to break bread and relieve its paper pushers of this cash crisis. I gotta give it (the rise of canteen prices) to the Dept of Corrections. They’re doing their thang, and not getting any criticism about it. The people ain’t trippin, cause the soldiers ain’t trippin. So what the hell! Let ’em do them which is a feeling that can be understood by a person who understands).

But when the war becomes physical, and the effect goes from psychological and financial, to actually harming ones internal organs, somebody has to stand up and shut it down. These folks here at Killa Kern (named that by me for the way they’re killing their prison population mentally, spiritually, financially, and physically) have already released data that shows a long consumption of this tainted water over a period of time could cause respiratory problems that could lead to cancer. But they say “it’s no emergency, it’s no biggy, we’ll have the problem fixed within 13 months. There’s no need to bring in an outside source of water. Just keep drinking the arsenic water. We’ll get around to it.”

With this sort of response by this prison and its agents, one should be able to see the reason for my naming it Killa Kern. I mean truthfully, how long is too long of a consumption? Three years, four years, or five? Shit, maybe it’s a decade.

I have been at this death chamber for over half a year, and I’ve been heavily drinking the water since my arrival. I work out a lot so I have to stay hydrated. But look what I have to stay hydrated to: Arsenic Lead. This is some shit I wouldn’t even let my hogs drink. And they’re said to be the nastiest animal of them all. This lead that they have us drinking is a weapon of modern day human destruction, and it’s killing us slowly.

I haven’t yet been able to obtain the scientific data needed to enlighten the convict body here, or those who read MIM(Prisons), if anyone reading can add facts of researched data on the damages and long term effects that Arsenic lead can cause to the body, please contact me with the info.

We need them to correct Kern Valley’s water problem now. If this can’t be done, they need to bring in a secondary outside water source for us to drink.

August is one of the hottest months in many ways. Many of the great New Afrikan slave rebellions, including Gabriel Prosser’s and Nat Turner’s were planned for August. It is the month of the birth of the great Pan-Africanist and Black Nationalist leader, Marcus Garvey, and also of our New African freedom fighter Dr. Mutulu Shakur. New Afrikans took to the street in rebellions in Watts CA in August 1965. On August 18, 1971 in Jackson Mississippi, the official residence of the Republic of New Afrika was raided by Mississippi police and FBI agents.

August 1989 marked the 10th anniversary of Black August commemorations. The promotion of a conscious, non-sectarian mass based New Afrikan resistance culture, both inside and outside the prison walls all across the U.S. Empire. Black August originally started among the brothers in the California Penal System to honor three fallen comrades and to promote a Black culture of resistance and revolutionary development.

The first brother, Jonathan Jackson, a 17 year old man child was gunned down August 17, 1970 outside a Marin County California courthouse in an armed attempt to liberate three imprisoned Black Liberation Fighters (James McClain, William Christmans and Ruchell Magee). Ruchell Magee is the sole survivor. George Jackson, Jonathan’s older brother and comrade, a great Black revolutionary theoretician and leader was assassinated August 21, 1971 by guards during a Black prison rebellion at San Quentin. In an unsuccessful effort to cover up the state’s pre-planned assassination of comrade George. The third brother, Khatari Gaulden, was victimized by the blatant assassination of capitalist corporate medical politics in prison August 1, 1978.

MIM(Prisons) adds: The original Black August Organizing Committee still commemorates this holiday each year. The group works to maintain the original focus of the commemoration on the ongoing war on oppressed nations in the united $tates. Over 40 people came together to form the BAOC in 1979 after a united front of New Afrikan prisoners formed in 1978 following Khatari’s murder. This year’s commemoration featured New Afrikan, Native and Asian cultural acts intermixed with the political presentations with a focus on promoting community.

MIM(Prisons) brought to the attention of the audience that the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) considers the celebration a “gang activity.” That was how the Institutional Gang Investigation unit justified withholding mail from a comrade to a prisoner that mentioned Black August. They don’t try hard to hide he fact that their repression and their so-called war on “gangs” is really about keeping the oppressed in their place. Members of Black August face persecution by the CDCR on the streets as well as in prison.

Meanwhile, a local weekly in Oakland ran a smear piece on Black August following the CDCR line. The article bad mouths Black Panthers George Jackson (falsely accusing him of being a convicted murderer) and Basheer Hameed (who just died this past week).

As always I extend my revolutionary love and respect to the comrades of your staff. As things here at KVSP have changed once again like the seasons, I write in to briefly report my captors’ activity.

After taking advantage of the economic crises here in the states and boosting all of its institution commissary store product prices sky high, the administrators are taking another path of destruction.

Recently there’s been talks of California’s budget crises and its effect on its massive prison population. But now ’ol Arnold is letting actions speak louder than words. With a so-called job cut for prisons Correction Officers, prisoners are seeing our little bit of program go down the drain with Amerikkka’s stranglehold of the world’s bottom class. They have come up with what they call “down days,” in regards to a total of four days out of the week where there will be no program at all, due to the so-called lack of staff. This means no yard for most, along with any other program or activity that has to do with one being outside his cell and not working for the prison.

Now I know that by U.$. law these folks are required to give us a certain amount of hours a week for recreational purposes, but with this new budget crisis (or whatever you want to call it) the judge is going to say their arguments of shortness of staff are valid. And to sum it up, they did that just like they took the weights and the family visits for lifers. Hell, they did that just like this prison is feeding its population “arsenic lead” through its plumbing system. They’ve had a memo on the issue floating around for almost eight months now, but its like the taste only gets stronger. They’ve admitted that it’s there (I guess as a warning) but have done nothing to change it, and we have no choice but to drink it. How about those apples?

Inraged by the blaze that’s been set by the states.
I have ingraved a personal aid in the fight against the snakes.
Yes against the Fakes and all its stragglers of the game.
I pledge the help of all myself from feet to full round brain.
Although Id like to skip the range and go straight to the field,
To skip the class would be my ass and that’s just keeping it real.
How can one dismantle the tank when one can’t assemble a gun?
I must learn true strategy, before attending true made fun.
A rise and true made revolution is destined in this land
As the turning of a power where the peasants take command
The winds blow a sharpness clearing smoke from Peoples War
with the sun high and smiling full of knowledge of what’s in store.
Nations come together baring arms to feed the starved
While also giving up the shots to cure all AIDS scared
No more injustice killings, or the kiling of true troops
No more miseducating or the raping of our youth
For I have inlisted

It is the exposure of the capitalistic heart, and the imperialistic mind,
that has me fine with the destruction of its total system.
Fill up the clip for my gun and place its barrel in its rectum.
The revolutionary trigger is pulled, and at best there’s a mess,
For its original insides will no longer exist
No longer resist,
The strong temptation to fin a deep dug black hole like a rabbit confined.
Hide in it like a snake on decline
From the troops on their fast paced way to demolish your lines
Class struggle with submission to time.
Off the break when admitting the crime?
Hell no!
I’ve committed the mind, and have purchased a nine for your conviction.
No Petition.
You are found guilty and will visit a mortician.
Get out the kitchen.
The people have spoke and for this is their mission.
Death to the oppressor and all its ways of oppression.

These are two prisons that have designated cells where prisoners are in solitary confinement for at least 22 hours a day with no congregate dining, exercise or other services.

1. Wabash Valley Correctional Facility, Secure Confinement Unit, PO Box 111 Carlisle, IN 47838

2. Maximum Control Facility, PO Box 557, Westville, IN 46391

I have been in both and the following statistics apply to both prisons:

There are around 250-330 prisoners
It is around 48% white and 48% Black and 2% Latino
The units opened 15-20 years ago
Prisoners have been abused physically by offers in the past
Prisoners are regularly subject to humiliation and refusal of showers

I am writing because I parole soon for the first time since I was 21 and have no employable skills, and was hoping I could get some trade, vocational, engineering, or even how-to cooking or baking books I could study to develop some. Where I parole there are a lot of restaurants.

MIM(Prisons) adds: This is the sad state of supposed “rehabilitation” in Amerika’s prisons, where people spend their young adulthood locked up, only to be released to the streets with no way to support themselves. This is just one of many reasons why prisons are very clearly nothing more than a tool for social control for this imperialist government.

I wanted to write and tell you about some of the things that we deal with in this plantation. One of the most serious and blatant violations we deal with is with basic medical services. I have witnessed a prisoner who had an aneurysm that led to a massive stroke. The man went to the person on duty and told him what was going on, first they told him they were busy. When they finally did see him they told him it was gas and go back to his cell. On the way back he had a seizure and they finally got him to the hospital. In less than one week they sent him back and now he is not coherent and the whole left side of his body, including his face, is paralyzed. He can’t even walk by himself or feed himself and they put him right back in population.

I’ve seen 3 people die here because of lack of medical treatment. There was a guy in the same dorm with me who had a history of heart problems. He went to the desk and told the officer on duty what was wrong, that he was having bad chest pains, and the office got medical to give him some pepto and tell him to go back. He came back a while later and told the officer he was still having chest pain so they sent him to the sergeant who told him “I don’t care if you die, get out of my face and go to your bunk before I lock you up,” The next count time he was found in his bunk dead from a massive heart attack. What makes me so sick is the fact that nothing was done to the officer. What kind of world is this that people charged with authority have such blatant disregard for human life?

This is just a very small part of what goes on in this country where people can invade a country and kill thousands of people and say “oh sorry, we thought you had some bombs” and the public just blindly follows along and it all boils down to this money and greed and people are so wrapped up in their own self-interest. People just accept anything as long as it doesn’t affect them. The mentality of this government is they don’t care who gets killed or who suffers as long as they get what they want. So how much money is enough? How much oil is enough? How many people need to die before people say screw this, we are tired of being pawns in your game, and stand up and fight?

MIM(Prisons) adds: We agree with this comrade’s analysis that the Amerikan public is wrapped up in their own self-interest. This economic interest is served by foreign invasions and the criminal injustice system. Because of this, we would not call these people “pawns” in the game of imperialism, as that implies they are being duped when in fact they are just lining up with their economic interests. Even as the Amerikan economy suffers one of the inevitable crises of capitalism that will cost the public millions of dollars and many people’s homes, Amerikans sit at home content to pick between one imperialist president or another. This is why it is so important to focus on the principal contradiction between the imperialists and oppressed nations, both within u.s. borders and around the world. We need to ally with those who truly have an interest in this fight and not sit around hoping that the white Amerikan citizens are going to wake up and fight the system that makes them rich.

I’m still hoping that Imperialism and Class Structure in 1997 shows up. These people here have gotten so audacious that they don’t even bother to follow their own regulations. One, there’s absolutely nothing whatsoever that “threatens the safety or security of the institution” regarding this piece of economics. Two, they’re illegally blanketing censorship of all materials from you without even looking at them. And three, they have a procedure that they’re supposed to follow, i.e. send the prisoner a rejection of mail form, stating why it’s being rejected, and give the prisoner an opportunity to send it back, destroy it, or challenge it via a 602 form.

Our control units here in Texas were called High Security Buildings, now they’re being called (at least on this unit) ECB. There are only five units that have these buildings:

• Allred Unit, 2101 FM 369 N, Iowa Park, TX 76367
• Bill Clements Unit, 9601 Spur 591, Amarillo, TX 79107
• Estelle Unit, 264 FM 3478, Huntsville, TX 77320
• McConnell Unit, 3001 S Emily Dr, Beeville, TX 78102
• Smith Unit, 1313 CR 19, Lamesa, TX 79331

I’ve been in the High Security Building here on the Clements Unit. There are ten pods on the building with about 800 to 1000 housed on the building. With the exception of the Smith Unit, the other four units above have at least 2000 prisoners. The Clements Unit where I am has close to 500 prisoners alone.

This high security building here houses a majority of Black and Latino prisoners, most white prisoners are at the highest level in Ad-Seg. Out of the ten pods, three are close custody and the rest are for Ad-Seg prisoners.

From the prisoner’s grapevine that’s why they changed the name of High Security to ECB, because prisoners were put in there for getting bullshit disciplinary cases. And it hasn’t changed.

The Bill Clements prison opened in 1990, the High Sec bldg opened in June 2000 and I was a prisoner who was put there then. The building hasn’t expanded because taxpayers won’t foot the bill to build new prisons here in Texas.

What I would like to add lastly about this HSB is the way classification houses offenders. You have three levels in Ad-Seg, three being the lowest and one the highest. Now guess what prisoners compromise these levels…yeah the level 1 Ad-Seg is filled with white prisoners at a 80% rate on the five level 1 pods and it flips to 80% of Blacks at level 3.

Until a few years ago the parole board didn’t allow prisoners who were in Ad-Seg to make parole. This changed when classification found that level 1 housed so many eligible white prisoners. The administration allows white prisoners to stay and live in segregation so they can make parole because most are in some Aryan family. Certain Mexican prisoners have this same privilege but Black prisoners who haven’t received disciplinary cases in a long while must go back to general population.