Federal Prisons

Let The Memory of Marcellus Khaliifah Williams, A New Afrikan Poet and Revolutionary, Reaffirm Our Commitment to the Struggle

Marcellus Williams, also known as Khaliifah ibn Rayford Daniel, was murdered by the amerikkkan state on 24 September 2024. He was a proud Muslim New Afrikan, a poet, an advocate for Palestinian children, and a prison imam at Potosi Correctional Center. Despite a vast quantity of evidence showing that Williams did not commit the crime of which he was convicted -

“Williams was convicted of first-degree murder, robbery and burglary in 2001 for the 1998 killing of Felicia “Lisha” Gayle, a 42-year-old reporter stabbed 43 times in her home. His conviction relied on two witnesses who later said they were paid for their testimony, according to the Midwest Innocence Project, and 2016 DNA testing conducted on the murder weapon “definitively excluded” Williams.”

The state nevertheless passed the decision, with the approval of the Supreme Court, to murder him in cold blood.

Williams was convicted in 2001, by a jury consisting of 11 white men and one New Afrikan. According to Al Jazeera, a New Afrikan juror was improperly dismissed from the jury, with the justification that they would not be objective.

Prosecutor Keith Larner said that he had excluded a potential Black juror because of how similar they were, saying “They looked like they were brothers.”

In a country that supposedly grants everyone the right to a “trial by their peers”, the fact that a New Afrikan on trial for the murder of a white woman was not allowed a jury of his peers – of New Afrikans – makes it clear that amerikkka cannot be “reformed” into “accepting” the New Afrikan nation, no matter how much surface-level anti-racist rhetoric is in the media nor how many bourgeois New Afrikans are elected to positions of power. For skewing Williams’s jury towards white men the judge would owe blood debts to the oppressed nations and the proletariat far greater than any average criminal under the dictatorship of the proletariat. Ey was right about one thing – a jury of New Afrikans, of Williams’s peers, would have been more likely than a jury of white men to consider his innocence. That is why more than half of the people with death sentences in the United $tates are Black or Latin@ according to the Prison Policy Initiative.

Williams’s conviction, for the murder of a white woman, shines clarity on why it is necessary to have a proper analysis of the gender hierarchy in the First World. The trope of a New Afrikan man murdering or “raping” a white woman has been used to stir up the most vile representations of national oppression ever since New Afrikans were imported as a permanent underclass and oppressed nation, from Emmett Till to Marcellus Williams. The rapidity at which the criminal injustice system will commit atrocities against New Afrikans accused of violence against white women makes it clear that the question of “gender oppression” is far more tied up in national and class oppression than pseudo-feminists would have one believe. Since time immemorial, the oppressor-nation men and women both have been spurred into action by the suggestion of a New Afrikan acting violently towards a white woman; Williams’s case is no different.

“From 1930 to 1985, the white courts not only executed Black murder and rape convicts at a rate several times that of white murder and rape convicts, it executed more Black people than white people in total.”(2)

Hours before ey was executed, the Supreme Court reviewed Williams’s case, and denied the request to halt or delay his execution. This is despite millions of signatures on a petition, and a great deal of social media activism around the case. The righteous anger of millions was not enough to save Williams’s life. True radicals, not reformists nor revisionists, need to look past the idea of incremental reforms, of politely asking the amerikkkan state to consider the humanities of those it has deemed worthless. If the time and energy that had been put into the (nevertheless righteous) cause of petitioning for Marcellus Williams had been put into studying, organizing, and building towards a movement of New Afrikan liberation, or towards an overturn of the amerikkkan empire and its justice system, not only would Williams’s life have likely been saved (as he would have been granted a true trial by his peers), but the lives of many others convicted (wrongfully or not) of crimes that pale in comparison to the crimes against humanity committed by the First World bourgeoisie and its lackeys would have been saved as well. Any justice for Williams can only be attained when we feed this righteous outrage into such systematic solutions.

Many of the narratives from supporters surrounding his death would have the reader believe that the only reason he was undeserving of death was his lack of culpability. Undoubtedly, the murder of an innocent man is something that will tug at the heartstrings of many, and can be used as an agitational opportunity. But as communists, we recognize that the use of the death penalty by the bourgeois state, and especially a jury of euro-amerikans deciding the fate of a New Afrikan, is always murder. So too are the deaths of New Afrikans at the hands of the police; so too are the deaths of the Third World proletariat by starvation, natural disaster, or oppression by paramilitaries serving as U.$. attack-dogs. Whether or not Williams was guilty of his crime, whether or not the hundreds of others on death row are innocent, the system will never prosecute those who uphold the world order that leads the oppressed into a life of crime, will never order the lethal injection of those with the blood of millions of oppressed-nation proletarians on their hands.

Williams was a devout Muslim and served as an imam for those in prison. The topic of religion has been covered many times before in Under Lock and Key, but this case serves as an example of how religion serves as a liberatory force for many in prison – helping them to transform themselves, and to find allies among all those fighting against amerikkka and the capitalist system throughout the First and the Third World alike. Williams’s last words were “All praise be to Allah in every situation!!!”; the author sees this as an example of why, rather than condemning religion as some pseudo-“Maoists” and chauvinists will do, we recognize religion to be, as Marx explained, the sigh of the oppressed people. Islam brought Williams a sense of comfort and cosmic justice as he headed to his death, without keeping him from organizing and speaking out against the moribund and oppressive priSSon sySStem.

Let Marcellus Williams’s death remind all of us that this country’s injustice system doesn’t care how much people protest, or petition. Ultimately, polite pleas to higher authority will go ignored. The only thing that will keep such high-profile injustices like this, as well as the more covert violence against New Afrikans and other oppressed nations, from happening again, is freedom from the amerikkkan state, won through struggle and revolution. And we must remember, unlike so many of the liberal activists who took up this cause, that we fight for Marcellus not only because the evidence shows he has a higher chance of being innocent than most people on death row, but because the oppressive and racist amerikkkan empire should not have the right to decide whether a single New Afrikan lives or dies.

Williams’s poetry is a beautiful and striking example of proletarian-internationalist art, in how it captures the revolutionary consciousness of New Afrikans in the United $tates, and in how it draws the link between New Afrika and Palestine.

^Note: 1. Elizabeth Melimopoulos, 25 September 2024, Why was Marcellus Williams executed? What to know about the Missouri case, Al Jazeera.
2. see MIM Theory 2/3:Gender and Revolutionary Feminism for more on the intersections of nation and gender*^

I recently received my first Under Lock and Key (Winter 2023, No. 80) newsletter. I really wish I’d been receiving it years ago, cuz it’s a good read, and very informative.

Just read page 7. Drug addiction remains a primary barrier to unity, and I would like more info on United Struggle from Within’s Revolutionary 12 Step training program. And if, and how, I can get involved, cause here in the Illinois prison system, drugs have become a major issue, especially since Covid hit. Prisoners are having their people dip/spray letters, cards, books, magazines, and even obituaries with drugs and other chemicals in order to eat or smoke the paper to get some type of high. Whatever these guys are smoking is causing them to have episodes such as freaking out, seizures, and even O.D.ing. It’s so bad at times you can see a smoke cloud in the air, and C.O.’s, Sgt’s, Lt’s, and even Major’s have been on a wing during this and have done nothing but tell the wing to put that shit out and spray something in order to cover up the odor, and they’ve even said, smoke it at your own risk and don’t call for help if you O.D. There ain’t a unit, wing, or housing that don’t have an issue with this stuff. Seg and even the infirmary are smoking it up. To a point the staff have given up trying to get this under control and these substances have caused multiple issues for all of us in here.

They’ve gotten real strict on the mail and what we receive and how we receive mail such as letters, cards, photos, and books/magazines. They’ve told us that our letters can’t be more than 3 pages, we can’t receive 2-ply cards, and they can’t have any glitter on them. All photos have to go through a company such as Freeprints or Pelipost, can’t come from our family, friends, Walmart, or Walgreens any more. All books and magazines must come from a vendor or company, and even then, a lot is not allowed, no hard cover books, and can’t be over a certain size.

Also, it plays on us prisoners that have health issues and altered immune systems such as myself. I have breathing issues and I’ve even had a sinus surgery in order to open my nose so I could breathe better. And I use a rescue inhaler and have been put in by my surgeon to have a sleep study done due to my breathing and my surgeon has even said that I need a CPAP machine which is what the sleep study is for.

I’ve even gotten into arguments/fights with cellies that I’ve had over them wanting to smoke this stuff.

I have wrote the warden and the placement officer multiple times, the warden has never responded. And it took me three times writing the placement officer before I got a response. I had asked, “which wings exactly are the non-smoking wings?” “This is a smoke-free institution.”, word-for-word the response I was given.

Staff C.O.’s and nurses crack jokes and talk about how bad the smoking is on a unit or on a wing, and I’ve heard/been told by a few C.O.’s and nurses that some staff have lawsuits in due to them coming in contact with said substance and/or smoke.

There is nowhere in this prison that is smoke free, and with them not having a place for those of us that don’t want to be around this stuff, they are putting us in harm’s way and putting our health at risk.

A couple questions: is this a violation of my rights? What should/can I do about it?

Please help me if you can, thank you!

Please send me the Grievance Campaign – petition for Illinois.

MIM(Prisons) responds: This is the same story we’ve been hearing across the country, and one of the reasons we launched our Revolutionary 12 Step program when we did. It’s almost as if this drug plague prisoners are facing was intentional. You should have received a copy of our 12 Step program by now. Unfortunately we do not have an active training program. But we are looking for experienced comrades to restart our training program, and for comrades on the ground to implement the program and send in reports on its successes and failures and how to improve it. This is an important challenge that the anti-imperialist prison movement must overcome to be successful.

Is the smoke a violation of the law? Yes, as the staff told you it is a non-smoking facility and you have a legal right to not be exposed to second hand smoke there. The Smoke-Free Illinois Act (SFIA) of 2008 forbids smoking in all buildings (with exceptions like homes and designated hotel rooms), where smoking is defined as:

“Smoke” or “smoking” means the carrying, smoking, burning, inhaling, or exhaling of any kind of lighted pipe, cigar, cigarette, hookah, weed, herbs, or any other lighted smoking equipment. “Smoke” or “smoking” includes the use of an electronic cigarette.

Is the smoke a violation of your rights? Well, we’d say there are no rights, only power struggles. So you can use the SFIA to grieve this issue, but if they don’t listen you’ll have to get organized, find allies inside or outside and apply pressure. We’ve sent you the grievance petition, this is one tool you can use to try to organize people around this issue.

The oppression which prisoners face in this country is one result of the global system of imperialism whose primary victims are the oppressed nations globally, meaning that this system is our primary enemy. We must spread the word that prisoners in this country are suffering because the Amerikan empire’s wealth is based on class and national barriers; the Amerikan nation does not want to share its privileged position with Black and Brown people, so they restrict them from employment, from education, from housing, and force them into a life in the “underground.” The solution for the oppressed is not to fight to get into the club, but to unite with the oppressed in the Third World to destroy the club system as a whole and build a socialist world. A world where peoples’ needs are put first, not the current world where people are constantly struggling for petty basic rights like not to have your life threatened by toxic smoke.

I have received two much-needed documents from you: “How to Form an Effective Study Group” and the “Revolutionary 12 Step Program” during the holy month of Black August. During Black August (B.A.) there were three young neophytes who also embarked on the journey of Kebuka (remembrance) by studying the works and examples of ancestors, comrades and many of the beautiful souls that sparked the momentous flow of resistance.

Prior to B.A., I was invited to a think tank class where the serious minded men here can come into a space to talk, think and reflect on solutions to problems that plague the prison population and society at large.

After attending a few of the sessions I realized the class lacked a starting point to build and grow on.

However, I shared the 12 Step Program with the facilitator, and the brothers all agreed that the layout was a great format and that the five principles of the United Front for Peace in Prisons enumerated on page 2 of ULK should be the pillars that hold this class.

Thanking you for all the tireless work that’s being put in.

28 September 2024 – Protestors gathered across the world to mourn the killing of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, a founding member and leader for 32 years of Hezbollah (the Party of God) in Lebanon.(1) We know some readers in U.$. prisons will be mourning as well. Nasrallah was the strongest anti-imperialist voice among world leaders for a generation. And the recent killings of Lebanese and Palestinian political leaders have been significant victories for I$rael, at least in the short-term.

Over 1,000 people have been killed, including Hezbollah’s top leaders, and 6,000 injured by a series of attacks by I$rael on Lebanon in the last couple weeks. These included exploding pagers and walkie-talkies, as well as massive bombing strikes. Amidst these attacks, the Communist Party of Lebanon has called for national unity to focus on fighting I$rael, at a time when Lebanon faces its own crisis in government. They pledged to not let I$rael (and the United $tates, we’d add) separate the struggle of Lebanon in support of the Palestinian struggle.(2)

Hezbollah, however, has been the lead party defending Lebanon and Palestinians from I$rael for decades. They have proven there is still a progressive role for bourgeois forces to play today, even in our highly-developed imperialist world.

Nasrallah had a clear analysis of U.$. imperialism:

“America itself is the decision maker. In America, you have the major corporations; you have a trinity of the oil corporations, the weapons manufacturers and the so-called ‘Christian Zionism.’ The decision making is in the hands of this alliance. ‘Israel’ used to be a tool in the hands of the British, and now it is a tool in the hands of America.”

The Samidoun Palestinian prisoner solidarity network commented on Hezbollah’s role in the liberation of political prisoners of I$rael:

“Sayyed Nasrallah’s leadership and struggle was also directly connected to the prisoners’ movement and the liberation of the prisoners of the Zionist regime. From the liberation of Khiam prison by the victorious Lebanese resistance in 2000, liberating the torture dens of the occupiers and their collaborators and turning it into a museum of honour for those who struggled and sacrificed there, to the repeated prisoner exchanges achieved by Hezbollah, the Lebanese Resistance, including the 2004 prisoner exchange, which liberated 400 Palestinian prisoners as well as 23 Lebanese, five Syrians, three Moroccans, three Sudanese, one Libyan and one German-British prisoner jailed by the Zionist regime. These exchanges, in which Sayyed Nasrallah himself played a major role, illustrated once again that the only viable mechanism available to liberate the prisoners in occupation jails is to liberate the land and to achieve an exchange.”(3)

Hezbollah arose from the 1982 I$raeli occupation of Beirut. MIM founders organized to oppose that 1982 occupation at a time when MIM was just emerging.(4) The war in 1982 also forged the Joint Leadership, in which the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine joined forces and attempted to further unite the Palestinian liberation movement away from conciliation.(5) During the 2006 war between Lebanon and I$rael, MIM condemned RCP=U$A, various alt media, and the U.$. state department for attacking Iran and Hezbollah using gender.(6) In 2024, the imperialists are circulating clips of Nasrallah making comments calling for punishment for adultery and homosexuality. We salute the “Queers for Palestine” in the United $tates who recognize the children being bombed in Gaza and now Lebanon are a lot more gender oppressed than any of us are here in the belly of the beast.

The history of the anti-imperialist united front in the region is beyond the scope of this article. But the region has certainly demonstrated the expediency of uniting classes on the basis of national liberation to fight imperialist occupiers. Hezbollah has remarked in the past that their alliances are closer to some Marxist groups than certain Islamist groups. This shows the emptiness of those in the imperialist countries who want to pit Marxism against Islam on principle. Nasrallah also wrote that Muslims have the duty to provide charity support to any Palestinian taking up armed struggle – Marxist, nationalist or any other shade.(7)

A Hamas spokespersyn responded to the death of Nasrallah saying that it will not make I$rael any safer:

“Is Israel’s problem with armed groups with limited agendas that can be eliminated by killing their leaders, or with peoples who have rights that they have been striving to achieve for decades and have not stopped or surrendered despite the killing of many leaders? Has any resistance group disappeared after the assassination of the leaders?”(8)

Despite these recent losses by the oppressed nations in the Middle East, Hezbollah won the war with I$rael in 2006, killing as many soldiers as I$rael did without all the civilian deaths caused by I$rael in Lebanon. Just as the war on Gaza, one year out, has not been an easy victory for I$rael, further escalations into Lebanon will certainly not be either. Hezbollah and Ansar Allah (Supporters of God) in Yemen continue to be the front line of the struggle against genocide in Palestine and against U.$. imperialism in general.

You can kill a revolutionary, but you can’t kill the revolution!

<sup>Notes:
1. The New York Times, 28 September 2024, Protestors Mourn Nasrallah’s Death Around the World.
2. Omar Deeb, 25 September 2024, Transcript of interview on SSawt al-Shaab Radio.
3. Samidoun, 28 September 2024, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah: The martyrdom of a great international revolutionary leader of our era.
4. MIM, 2007, Substantial Hezbollah book appears finally.
5. Interview of Habash and Hawatmeh on the Joint Leadership and PLO (Draft Translation)
6. MIM, 2006, Six percent of Amerikans support Hezbollah’s side in Lebanon
7. Nicholas Noe ed., 2007, Voice of Hezbollah: The Statements of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, London: Verso, p. 269
8. Tom O’Connor, 27 September 2024, Hamas Warns Killing Hezbollah’s Nasrallah Will Not Make Israel Safer, Newsweek.</sup>

We hope those who have been following our series of articles this week have been both angered by what is going on inside U.$. prisons and inspired to action. (see campaign link below to read previous articles)

MIM(Prisons) is in a period of growth, after some setbacks. In recent years we’ve gradually reinstated each of our 3 different levels of correspondence study courses for prisoners. Just this summer we put out a long-planned Reference Guide that contains historical timelines, maps and a glossary to provide background for many of the things we talk about regularly. We’ve released the Revolutionary 12 Steps Program and Power To New Afrika, both written by prisoners, in the last couple years. We continue to put out Under Lock & Key every three months. And we’ve updated a number of other study packs and resources. And we do it all out of our own pockets and volunteer time. So if you can spare some money or some time to support us it can go a long way.

By the time this series of articles reaches most of our readers inside, in Under Lock & Key 87, the holiday season will be approaching. In that spirit and inspired by all this talk about banned books, we are pledging to mail out more books this winter than any other winter in the 2020s so far!

Please see our get involved page for ways to donate and other ways to help out. Outside supporters can help us make this happen by sending cash or stamps, helping acquire in demand books like dictionaries, Black Panther Party, or Marxist classics, or by volunteering in various ways. All of the new publications listed above have been censored in various prisons, even the Reference Guide was censored in Michigan’s Thumb Correctional Facility for being more than 12 pages long! So continued campaigning and legal support is much needed.

Prisoners can help us get more books out by taking the steps to join our Serve the People Free Political Books to Prisoners Program. Get others to sign up for a subscription to ULK or become a distributor of ULK in your prison. Let us know what organizing work you are doing, what your local study group is discussing, what questions are coming up for you and your comrades. By doing these things you can receive books to help with your local work and studies. We have books on Black/New Afrikan studies, Chican@ studies, First Nation studies, gender, economics, history of Chinese socialism, the Soviet Union, books by Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin and Mao and more.

Sergeants here are not doing rounds and when they do they’re not signing grievances, so my grievances don’t get signed and they expire. We have to hold the shower or yard down just to get someone down to sign something. Even that doesn’t always work.

The Lieutenants and Captains feel they’re too high in rank to sign grievances, and they don’t make their Sergeants do anything. My question to you is what do I do? I’ve wrote it up and all they do is deny my allegation and find it without merit. I have a paper trail on the same issue though.

Also, our due process is being violated at Disciplinary Court. 1) The Serving Officer is refusing our court appearances because she doesn’t like us or is trying to get done early; 2) The Disciplinary Hearing Officers are not even trying to see if the prisoner is not guilty. You can’t use the camera as a witness but they can to find you guilty. They’re putting “staff eyewitness is accepted” but policy states they cannot just put that, they have to list all “evidence relied upon.” Finally, policy states you have to sign a waiver if you refuse court, but they’re getting away without that.

We can’t get a notary here, no problem solver, so most guys end up “bucking” and ultimately they lose. I know Arkansas is a little better than other prisons, but it’s not all green down here. We’re one of the few states that still do “hoe squad” for free, prisoners don’t get paid to work in Arkansas. I’m here to fight and spread the word!

MIM(Prisons) responds: It sounds like the people held at Tucker Max Unit have tried a number of different tactics to get grievances heard and have begun to assess which ones work when and how they might be improved. In that sense, you are in a better situation to answer your question of “what do I do?” than we are.

We can offer some advice for how to approach this problem. All of the tactics you mention above should be on the table. Tactics are things that we must choose day-to-day based on specific situations, and there will not always be a “right” answer. Strategy however, is our overall approach, and this can decide whether we succeed or fail. Strategically, we must rely on the masses to win. In other words, your real strength comes from collective struggle, whether that’s holding down the yard or filing 100s of simultaneous grievance petitions to state officials.

As this comrade recognized in their letter to us, there are often no quick solutions. The grievance petitions that prisoners have developed and that we distribute cannot solve the problem of oppression in prisons. They can be a tool in getting state officials to support your ongoing collective struggle.

As we recently reiterated, freedom from oppression can’t be won through the courts. The law is a tool of the oppressor. Keeping paper trails is part of the struggle to hold them to their word, which can sometimes be done, and should be done to advance the struggle of the oppressed.

Please continue to send us updates on the struggle there. We will print them on our website and maybe in ULK. This is one more tactic to expose what is going on and to share lessons with others struggling in similar situations.

As a person who has been the target of long-standing censorship campaigns, i would like to give my voice to the discussion around censorship in this time of organizing against this tool of counter-insurgency.

Recently, in Texas’ prison system, an anthology that speaks to the torture of solitary confinement was censored. The reason given is that it purportedly contains content that threatens the security of the prison by encouraging prisoners to engage in disruptive behavior such as strikes, etc. i took part in this anthology and to be clear there is not any language speaking to the disruption of the prison system. There is language that speaks to the dismantling of long-term/indefinite solitary confinement, which is illegal in many places, is considered torture internationally, and which the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) itself admits may cause harm or damage to the mental health of the affected person. So the thinking of the thought police is that it is a threat to security to speak out against torture, but it is not a threat to security to maintain torturous conditions. What sense does that make?

This censorship is of the second volume of this anthology series called Texas Letters (see: texasletters.org). Volume one, which contains the same sort of content from many of the same writers, is approved. So what happened between the time of January 2023 and May of 2024, the respective release of each volume? A one word answer: Success. The first volume was released at the beginning of the last state legislature session. A session where a coalition of people were behind House Bill 812 (HB812), a bill intended to end indefinite solitary confinement. As a way to increase the popularity of the bill the book was distributed to all the law makers. Ultimately the bill didn’t pass, however the promotion of the direct letters and experiences of those incarcerated in solitary confinement in Texas grew. The prolific female writer Kwaneta Harris, who has been in solitary confinement for years, was featured in various high profile publications including The New York Times, speaking to the experience of solitary confinement in Texas, particularly how it is in prisons designated for women. Al-Jazeera and NPR featured interviews on the book and the experiences of Texas solitary confinement. Advocates continue to build momentum and public opinion against the use of solitary Confinement, and it is upon this back drop that when Texas Letters Volume 2 appeared, it was censored throughout the state prison system.

This is a move tyrants use to quell social discourse; to control the narrative and therefore evolution of the system never comes. This is a move to quell any form of resistance. Even that which is peaceful becomes a “threat to the security of the institution”, those who take part in such actions become “threats to the security of the institution” people known for “organizing and influencing other inmates” and therefore are confined in solitary confinement or held in said confinement if already there.

This process of events is no surprise. It is a reflection of the practices coming out of the highest level of government in the state, directly a representation of the tyrannical regime Greg Abbott desires and runs himself.

See, in Texas, the Governor appoints the Executive Director of TDCJ, the Texas Board of Criminal Justice, and the parole and pardons board. The Director’s Review Committee (DRC) is the body that governs censorship inside the prisons. This committee is appointed by the Director. So what We end up with is a DRC of political appointees, appointed by a political appointee, a gang of political careerists, all kissing the ring of the top man, the governor of Texas, all falling in line with his neo-confederate agenda. As such We have a prison system that is over saturated with Christian fundamentalism, stale reforms, faith-based programs, and because any volunteer program has to go through the chaplaincy department there is no secular, dissident voices, programs or activities. All because TDCJ is in the business of cultivating ZOMBIES, those who talk when and how they’re told, walk when and how they’re told, think when and how they’re told. This is considered reform and anything outside of that is a threat to security worthy of censorship.

This type of tyranny should be important to everyone because We should want to stop this sort of government over-reach before it becomes too extreme. Tyranny only becomes emboldened with time and a lack of resistance of its subjects.

I am lucky this far to have received my mail [including many newspapers, study packs and books from MIM Distributors], but the tablets are soon to arrive. As far as books go, I am unable to order any as there seems to be some type of mystery in that realm. No books until further notice, and nobody appears to be able to guide you in the proper direction.

Their goal seems to be to stop the flow of contraband into the prison. Yet, there seems to be more of it than food on your tray. People are falling out and sent right back to the place they came out of to be back in the same shape they left in: on drugs. They appear to do nothing about the problem. A person on drugs can walk right past an officer and he acts as if he doesn’t see him. The smell of something on fire stays in the air. You are forced to sleep in a room with unbearable smoke fumes in the air. All they want is for the alarm to not go off. Smoke bailing out of some buildings; isn’t that something?

Yes, we’re going to have to accept the tablets because they can solve the problem of unbearable conditions - or so they say!

MIM(Prisons) adds: Despite word from prisoners in Tennessee that there are new restrictions on books coming in, we have not been able to confirm the new rules. We have heard from other Books for Prisoners programs that they have stopped sending books to Tennessee. The Tennessee Department of Corrections’ website hosts the Inmate Mail policy dated 8 December 2023, which states:

“Printed materials may be received by inmates in an unlimited amount, provided they are mailed directly from the publisher(s) or recognized commercial distributor.”

Despite some censorship, and mail gone missing, MIM Distributors has been able to deliver books to TN prisoners prior to December 2023. And lately our biggest problem has been with Tennessee rejecting manila envelopes because they think they might harbor drugs!

As we’ve reported in Texas and elsewhere, drugs in prisons have risen to all-time highs, despite Covid-19 restrictions on visitations and new digital mail policies. And science has proven that drug addiction is a product of bad living conditions. So not only are prison staff bringing in drugs, they are driving prisoners to use them through their repressive and alienating conditions.

UPDATE 28 September from a TN prisoner: I’m currently being held at Morgan County Correctional Complex and I need your help/advice. Excluding religious books, I’m only allowed to receive 5 books, from only 3 vendors that prison officials have chosen! How can I further my education if I’m only allowed to receive 5 books? I’m working on my pending criminal and civil cases, and of course I’ll need more than 5 law books, but with this restriction, that’s not possible! This restriction is under the guidance of Warden Shawn Phillips who can be reached at (423) 346-1300.

The comrade included documentation showing the only approved vendors to be: Abebook.com [sic], bookshop.org and 21st century Christian bookstore. And apparently prisoners can give books to mailroom to be thrown away in order to receive additional books!

As we approach the end of Prison Banned Book Week we are pausing our campaign, which has been going on over the last couple months, to support prisoners in Pendleton Correctional Facility, Indiana. Supporters should stop gathering signatures and mail out any remaining postcards soon.

It was reported to MIM(Prisons) that 6 prisoners were threatened with drug charges, and torture in long-term isolation, for mail received from MIM Distributors. The mailroom claimed smudges of ink (that were obviously from the printer) were indications that the mail was laced with drugs. Of course, subsequent testing of the mail proved there were no drugs on them. This type of treatment has earned Indiana state a grade of D for their mail censorship, not an F because most letters do get through as does some literature.

In response to these threats, comrades in Anti-Imperialist Prisoner Support (AIPS) and other supporters hit the streets with a postcard campaign. We told people about what was going on, and asked them to sign a postcard and mail it to the administration. The postcards called out the political repression and demanded that it be stopped. Dozens of postcards were mailed to the Pendleton Administration, from near and far away, over the last couple months.

In the midst of the postcard campaign we received news that the threats had seemingly been dropped. But censorship has continued and a lawsuit is still being pursued. One of the comrades targeted at Pendleton says:

“I have not received Under Lock & Key 86 mailed out [1 month ago]. I’ve written the mailroom 2 times now and as of today have not received it.”

Ey did receive our article on the postcard campaign, which has been copied and distributed around the prison. Ey says:

“Thank you all for bringing this injustice to light!”

Thanks to the comrades on the outside who supported this campaign. We are declaring this phase over, but will continue to report on the happenings in Indiana prisons.

Outreach Report

In one locale, over 35 petitions were collected alongside distributing ULK 86 directly to passerbys. There was substantial immediate enthusiasm for discovering a publication written by prisoners, especially regarding solidarity with Palestine. Each persyn AIPS met was interested both in receiving a newsletter as well as signing a petition to mail.

AIPS also maintained a presence at Socialism Conference 2024 which took place in Chicago during the end of August. Here, over 100 copies of ULK were handed out and dozens of postcard petitions were signed by those interested in the struggle of prisoners. It was also encouraging to see those on the outside were interested in learning about the abuses and injustices prisoners face, either through attending panels hosted at the conference or by talking directly with passer-bys.

While there was no negative reception, no recipients in either location were familiar with ULK or MIM(Prisons). Only very few recognized the MIM name from prior exposure. It is indicative of a low tide in the movement here that most are completely unfamiliar with anti-imperialist prisoners. This represents an opportunity and responsibility to publicize our work and recruit more volunteers.

Among this small sample of the public, found tabling in busy urban areas, at local leftist events, or at the aforementioned conference, there were multiple people who were very enthusiastic about the newspaper and our work in spite of lacking all prior familiarity. This welcome enthusiasm also resulted in some “pig questions”: those which, if AIPS answered publicly, would inevitably feed valuable information to the pigs (in other words, agents of the state). The size of a political group, their location, and their leadership structure are examples of questions unnecessary to answer in order to work with others. That information only helps enemies who wish to study, surveil or even infiltrate anti-imperialist organizations. And we don’t say this to pretend that we are a big organization but rather to encourage people to do the work that they see as the most correct.

AIPS comrades encountered some popular confusion about MIM(Prisons)’s line on (non)exploitation of prisoners. Some people thought MIM(Prisons) was fighting against the for-profit prison system. Most prisons are not private. And even companies like JPay, Securus, and GTL that are profiteering off prisoners are making very small amounts of money compared to the cost of running the criminal injustice system, which the Prison Policy Institute put at about $182 billion. MIM(Prisons)’s actual line is that prisons are an immense cost to Amerika: a cost sustained for the purpose of social control, especially for the national oppression of First Nation, New Afrikan and Chican@ liberation movements. In the end, this cost is worthwhile if Amerika is able to prevent the masses of oppressed nations from fighting for autonomy in land and resources. But still, the benefits yielded are not profits in terms of capital but the containment and suppression of the internal semi-colonies within the United $tates. Imprisonment is a form of absolute immiseration that we think of in the realm of genocide rather than exploitation. The suppression of rebellious groups helps the settler Amerikan nation maintain its position on top. AIPS incorporates this understanding in our prisoner correspondence and campaign work.

The Florida Department of Corrections has been on a censorship tirade, which serves as a nice compliment to their habit of banning books.(1). The FDOC has a rule (Section 15 of 33-501.401) which authorizes the impoundment or rejection of any publication which “depicts how to make an instrument to apply a tattoo … describes tattooing techniques … or contains a tattoo pattern or photograph …”

ULK’s have been censored because certain pages “Could be used as tattoo patterns.” That is, the FDOC has the right to censor any publication which contains anything which could possibly serve as a pattern for a tattoo, and whether it could be a tattoo pattern is up to their discretion. Their censorship “rules” say “censor whatever you want!”

Not a single one of our publications has ever listed tattoo patterns. We print the art that prisoners send us, and images that help express the articles they accompany. We have a recommendation for the FDOC: prisoners could use their cell bars as tattoo patterns. How about you remove them?

In the last four years, of all the prison systems where we’ve sent 10 or more books, Florida has the highest rate of censorship at about 30% of books or pamphlets (excluding our newsletter and letters to prisoners). Meanwhile only 26% of books we’ve sent to Florida in that time have been confirmed received by the prisoner. The week before Prison Banned Books Week, JPay returned some articles we printed and mailed to a reader after many publications we sent were censored. JPay enclosed FDOC censorship forms in each envelope that were not filled, therefore not providing any justification for returning our mail. We give Florida a grade of D for their mail policies and practices. They are one of the worst, but not as bad as states that block any piece of mail we send in.

We will continue to be censored so long as we reveal the oppression in the United $nakes. We will fight it until the oppressed have been liberated.

1: Patricia Mazzei, 22 April 2023, “Florida at Center of Debate as School Book Bans Surge Nationally”, The New York Times