Under Lock & Key

“Solitary confinement is not something that the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitations engages in,” according to CDCR Spokesperson Terry Thorton.(1) According to our surveys, California has around 14,444 people in Control Units, defined as “permanently designated prisons or cells in prisons that lock prisoners up in solitary or small group confinement for 22 or more hours a day with no congregate dining, exercise or other services, and virtually no programs for prisoners.” This is more people than any other state.

Thorton claims that prisoners in Pelican Bay State Prison’s Security Housing Unit (SHU) have access to cable TV, books, yard time, the law library, weekly visits with family, and correspondence courses.

Yes, it is true that prisoners can occasionally receive books through the mail, as long as they aren’t by or about Blacks or Mexicans. If you’re not in SHU yet, such books might be used to validate you as a gang member and throw you in SHU on an indeterminate sentence. Otherwise they are often just censored as “gang material.”

Correspondence courses are occasionally allowed, too. But we’ve confirmed 35 incidents of study materials from a MIM(Prisons) correspondence course being censored in California, 15 of which were at Pelican Bay. We’ve also been told that a radio show that broadcasts to Pelican Bay was shut down there after broadcasting a correspondence course on a show popular among prisoners.

Interaction with family, inmates and staff is greatly exaggerated by Thorton. We’ve known comrades whose only physical contact with another humyn being for many years has been guards putting cuffs on their wrists. And while Thorton makes family visits out to be a regular thing, the distance to Crescent City, California for most families is the first barrier that makes visits rare at best. One family member who spoke with MIM(Prisons) at a table while we did outreach in support of the strike described how they went to visit their brother at Pelican Bay once and had to talk through a TV screen. They have not gone back since. Others who visit Pelican Bay talk about how their freedom of association is limited just as the prisoners’ is. If they are seen speaking to the wrong persyn (another visitor) while going on visit they can be restricted or banned from coming back.

Thorton described “the two ways” one can get into SHU in California, painting prisoners as either violent attackers or mob bosses running organized crime. Yet, as those who were there when Pelican Bay was being conceived can attest, it was built in response to those who dared to organize and stand up for their rights as the thousands of prisoners who went on food strike across California have done. As prisoners continue to organize and move in a positive and united direction, it will become harder and harder for the state to paint the organizations of the oppressed as enemies that deserve any torture or punishment they receive.

Within the Black Order Revolutionary Organization we educate to create real meaningful change. The old saying says “action makes the front.” But to take this analysis a step further, “bold, intelligent, revolutionary actions make the front.” The war is real and it’s a war that is physical as well as psychological and educational. The imperialist strives to physically as well as psychologically dominate, subjugate, manipulate and control the masses in prison and out of prison by creating and engineering social conditions that fit their agenda. The enemy of humanity understands the driving force behind action is man’s mental orientation. So if they control our mental atmosphere and mental appetites they will control our social behavior. This is the reason why we as front line Askaris must always understand our greatest weapon is a correct analysis of concrete conditions as we strive to crush imperialism/colonialism in its total. To do that the Askari must keep his/her mind sharp.

Comradez, I’ve been on lock down in a federal SMU program since 2008. Since the fedz closed Marion max the fedz have created the same lockdown scheme with the Special Management Units (SMU). It continues to be for the express purpose of controlling outlaw/anti-authoritarian revolutionary conduct. Every organizational structure across amerika can be found held within the lockdown yet there is no meaningful dialogue between parties, groups or organizations to effect meaningful change.

The project for peace in prison is a foundation laid so that inter-organization/multi-organizational communication can begin. But for the project for peace to work we need the leaders and spokesmen for these street and/or progressive organizations to accept the peace project. In a lot of these organizations, directions flow down the chain of command. The Latin King wrote in [to ULK] about Kingism, which was good. But he is only one man and cannot make an organizational commitment to accept the peace in prison project. That must come from Lord Gino, their crown. So I am calling on all leaders nationally from the Crips, Bloods, Vice Lords, Latin Kings, Mighty Mighty Black Nation, G.D.s, and all those in between to unite in principle and contribute to our collective struggles. T-fly, Bay Bay, Minister RKO for the Vice Lords where y’all at? G.D. Crusher holler at us brotha, Crown Prince AB for the MMBN, OG Mojo New York Damuz and all the other unmentioned men and women that have a voice in their organizational community, let’s squad up so that the peace in prisons project can be real and used as a weapon.

MIM(Prisons) replies: We echo this call to those in leadership positions to represent what so many of the LOs already have in their bylaws and histories. But we want to reach all potential comrades with the message of the United Front for Peace in Prisons, from the capo to the pee wee on the street. While some of the leaders mentioned above could have a quick impact, we’ve learned from the past the short-comings of LOs whose leadership went radical, but the soldiers only followed the leader and never embraced the movement. It is not sustainable. Slowly recruiting a hundred local chapters or representatives to sign on to the Statement of Principles will mean more in the end. And building solidarity between organizations around common struggles at each locality is how we can build real peace. In many places this is already happening.

[Editor’s note: We want to remind our readers that USW is open to anti-imperialist prisoners of all nationalities, just as the strike is being led by prisoners of all nationalities. MIM(Prisons) agrees with the line put forth here, because it is by building movements for national liberation
from imperialism that we can best conquer the oppressive system we currently live in. And any genuine national liberation movement supports the liberation of all people. We want to be clear about this because there have been reports of the CDCR attempting to fuel divisions among the prisoners on strike along long-standing organizational and national divisions as they always do.]

A people’s salute goes out to all who find themselves under lock and key in Amerika! I wanted to write and send a brief update on the conditions here in Pelican Bay coming from one of the participants of the hunger strike (HS) that began two weeks ago, on July 1 of 2011. I figured the historic precedent that the HS has accomplished thus far is worth noting as the cause of the non-violent protest is one in which many people find themselves in across Amerika. The material conditions that have forced prisoners to deny themselves nutrients and sustenance are not exclusively bound to Pelican Bay, California. Whenever imperialist lackeys run a country they will also be expected to round up the most rebellious and potentially revolutionary populations and bury these people alive as these are the ones who pose the highest threat to the ruling class.

The fact that the protest is in regard to torture chambers known as the Security Housing Unit (SHU) in California, a state that has more prisons than any other state in a country that has more prisoners than any other country, should be examined more closely for what it means to oppressed nation prisoners in general but to people of Aztlán in particular. The fact that the state of California, which is geographically in Aztlán, has initiated what amounts to a war on the people of Aztlán by setting up more koncentration kamps (prisons) in Aztlán than anywhere else in Amerika, along with incarcerating more Latinos in California than any other oppressed nations, and the fact that Latinos are now the largest population of captives held in Federal prisons, and the fact that most of the prisoners held in California SHUs are Latinos, all show that oppressed nation are under attack via the injustice system, and that prisoners from the Aztlán Nation are particularly targeted in Aztlán. California is also the state with the largest Latino population in Amerika.(1) Thus the scope of what is taking place should be seen for what it is - the assault on Aztlán is real and should be met as such.

What is occurring here at Pelican Bay is an attempt to break the will and desire to resist state repression plain and simple. The SHU was opened in 1989 and this facility was designed to isolate and deprive people of the most basic “human rights.” Things like human contact, a cell mate, the ability to eat salt in one’s food, the ability to correspond with friends and family via the mail, the ability to have natural sunlight or even to be able to read political literature have all been stripped from prisoners in the SHU. Brutality here has been documented for decades. Beatings and physical torture have even been brought to the courts to no avail. Recently the U.$. Supreme Court has ruled that California prisons constitute “cruel and unusual punishment.” They are telling the state of California to clean up its act.

Medical services are even used as barter. One prisoner was told if he wanted medical treatment then he should “debrief” (snitch on another prisoner). This is the depraved culture that has thrived here in SHU. This is a world where prisoners who are most often poor Brown and Black people are subject to a whole plethora of experimental depravity which in some cases would probably have Mengele raise an eyebrow.

It is well known that solitary confinement causes very real psychological damage even if used for a few weeks, yet here in SHU prisoners have endured solitary for years and even decades in some cases. Human rights groups have condemned solitary confinement, yet the SHU continues this brutal practice. Once here in SHU the only way back to general population is to snitch on others (even if it is false accusations), die, or parole. Keep in mind the vast majority sent to SHU have not committed any crime or physical acts but are labeled a “gang member or associate” and thus locked in this control unit for one’s supposed gang affiliation, i.e. one’s beliefs. They are locking one in a solitary confinement cell, sometimes for life, for what amounts to thought crimes!

Placement in the “hole” or SHU is frequently due to political affiliation of prisoners who are members or may associate with revolutionary groups or lumpen organizations that the state labels as “gangs.” In their play on words, any attempt at oppressed nations to organize in a way that is not state sanctioned, is a gang. Similarly, they call uprisings “riots” in a derogatory way, to hide the real causes behind them. But many times people aren’t even members of any organization and are falsely accused by others who are trying to get themselves out of SHU. In either case, prisoners held in SHU conditions overwhelmingly qualify as political prisoners.

The world would gasp should they find out the thought police are goosestepping in lock step here in Pelican Bay, jack boots and all. The Gestapo in Nazi Germany rounded up communists and others and placed them in kamps and jails under “preventative custody.” And now the imperialists’ first line of defense keeps oppressed nations in neo-kamps (SHUs) under “validation custody.” This is what the lumpen face in the United $tates; this is our apple pie in the home of the incarcerated, land of the oppressed.

Yet, prisoners have always defied the lash, because as Mao said, where you find much repression you’ll find much resistance. This is the dialectical materialism that manifests itself and blossoms, even within cinderblock gardens, in the form of our united resistance.

The first of the five demands issued for the hunger strike here at Pelican Bay is to end group punishment. This happens frequently where one prisoner breaks a rule and that whole group or ethnicity will be locked down or penalized in some way. We are talking about one person doing something against prison rules and two or three hundred people are then locked down for months over it. This is common practice and is meant to pit prisoners against prisoners.

The second demand is to abolish debriefing and modify active/inactive gang status criteria. Debriefing is used to force people held in SHU to give up names and activities of others in order to leave SHU - even if the information provided is false. The accused cannot even present a good defense as the informants are not identified and often times the accusations themselves are considered “confidential.” Active/inactive status is when after six years if one has no new activity one may be given “inactive” gang status and released to the general population. But this is rare since anything qualifies as “activity.” For example, participating in this hunger strike will be considered new gang activity.

The third demand is that the CDCR complies with recommendations from a 2006 U.S. Commission which called for an end to isolation. The fourth demand is to provide adequate food. The food here would make a racoon’s stomach turn. Often we don’t know what it is we are eating and we get no salt, so all food is bland. For punishment often times we get boiled beans with no salt, and this has gone on for years. The fifth demand is to expand and provide constructive programs and privileges for indefinite SHU prisoners. This means those of us who must stay in SHU will be able to have educational courses, art supplies, and the ability to make a phone call, which some have not done for 30 or more years.

These points are basic things that should be given, especially to people who have not broken any rules to be placed in SHU in the first place! What is happening here in Pelican Bay SHU amounts to crimes against humanity. To have people in solitary confinement in some cases for decades is incredible, and it’s incredible that this has gone on so long and that for the most part the public has been silent over this. Well, today the light is shining on these torture chambers and Pelican Bay prisoners will no longer be silent while taking the lash.

The hunger strike is reaching critical stage for those who have pledged to strike indefinitely, especially the elder and ill. The CDCR still refuses to negotiate and the leaders of the oppressed locked in Pelican Bay continue to exert their leadership. Here is the latest report being circulated by a point persyn on the outside:

Tuesday 8:30 AM: According to a SHU nurse, things are bad at Pelican Bay. The prisoners have not been drinking water and there have been rapid and severe consequences. Nurses are crying. All of the medical staff has been ordered to work overtime to follow and treat the hunger strikers. As of Monday, there were about 50 on C-SHU and 150 on D-SHU. They are not drinking water and have decompensated rapidly. Some are in renal failure and have been unable to make urine for 3 days. Some are having measured blood sugars in the 30 range, which can be fatal if not treated. They have refused concentrated sugar packs and ensure. The staff has taken them to the CTC and given them intravenous glucose when allowed by the prisoners, but some won’t accept this medical support. As of Monday, no one has been force fed with a nasogastric tube. A few have tried to sip water but are so sick that they are vomiting it back up. Some of the medical staff is freaked out because clearly some of these guys seem determined to die. Not taking the water is crushing the staff because the prisoners are progressing rapidly to the organ damaging consequences of dehydration.(1)

CDCR is reporting 800 prisoners continue to refuse food at 6 prisons.(2) However there are multiple reports of groups of prisoners joining the strike this week and even planning to join later in the month.

The campaign initiated July 1st by prisoners in Pelican Bay State Prison (PBSP) against the torturous conditions of long-term isolation has received broad support going on for weeks now. The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation [sic] (CDCR) has admitted that 6600 prisoners refused food trays last weekend across 13 of their 33 prisons.(1) Meanwhile, numerous organizations have organized demonstrations and mobilized support across the United $tates and Kanada leading up to and following the start of the hunger strike. Over five thousand people have signed an online petition pledging their support. Volunteers with MIM(Prisons) have interacted with thousands of people on the streets inside and outside of California with info on the hunger strike, gathering dozens of signed letters and a handful of donations.

According to CDCR 1,600 prisoners remain on food strike one week after the start.(2) The media is reporting a sharp drop in the number of prisoners refusing food in a tone that implies the strike is losing steam. But this is hardly the case. Many prisoners we’ve heard from outside of Pelican Bay only pledged to strike one or two days in solidarity. One reason for this is because it is hard for them to know when the strike ends or what is happening despite the efforts of outside supporters to send updates. Even in Pelican Bay many of those protesting specified the number of days they would fast beforehand. Only a minority of participants have pledged an indefinite strike until the demands are met. The rest of us work in solidarity with them until the end.

Despite all the noise being made, word from those organizing to mediate negotiations is that the CDCR is refusing to negotiate with strikers or mediators.(3) We know the CDCR has been talking to hunger strike organizers, but it seems that no resolution is in the works as of July 8.

We’ve seen the ripples of this campaign in our own work as we connect with many new people in California and reconnect with people who we have been cut off from by the state. We’ve also seen record traffic on our website with the hunger strike campaign page and the article featuring the prisoners’ demands bringing in a lot of hits. This increase in readership is a direct result of the organizing of prisoners in California. However we must admit that a good chunk of the traffic is coming from state officials trying to gather intelligence from our reporting.

Donations we’ve collected so far are less than a tenth of the printing and postage expenses for outreach, mailing protest letters and sending communications to prisoners in California. As always, we can use donations of money and labor to keep up with this important work.

Building Support

The hunger strike comes almost a year and a half after a formal complaint was filed with the governor of California regarding the torture and violation of Constitutional rights that prisoners face in Pelican Bay. After being ignored by official channels, they turned to outside supporters who came together and organized a press campaign and negotiation support. There was enough lead time that MIM(Prisons) was able to send campaign info to all of our California subscribers prior to the strike. We also hit the streets to gather signed letters of support and explain to people the importance of this struggle leading up to the strike.

A rally in San Francisco in June against the drug war featured the Pelican Bay prisoners’ demands prominently. A comrade representing MIM(Prisons) spoke on the upcoming hunger strike, stressing that Pelican Bay was developed as a tool to repress political organizing in the California prison system and that those being targeted with indefinite SHU terms are largely leaders and influential people among the imprisoned oppressed nations. A former California prisoner also spoke about the torturous conditions in Pelican Bay, urging people to support the hunger strike.

During the march, supporters of the “Revolutionary Communist Party - USA” (rcp=u$a) were chanting, “Once we have the revolution, there’ll be no mass incarceration!” Which revolution are they talking about? Even on a simple issue like opposing torture in prisons, rcp=u$a’s idealist/chauvinist colors showed through. As we point out in every issue of Under Lock & Key, all Amerikans should be viewed as criminals who need to reform under the dictatorship of the proletariat. When the revolution finally hits U.$. soil there will likely be an increase in incarceration of U.$. citizens, as the majority of the world experiences freedom they have not seen for centuries. The difference is that proletarian prisons focus on reform and reintegration into society not torture and isolation as the imperialist system does.

The Campaign Continues

Once the strike began, MIM(Prisons) stepped up efforts to reach the public about the sacrifices and struggles of our comrades in prison. While comrades were able to reach visitors coming to CDCR prisons with fliers and letters of support, repression was reported from a few public spaces inside and outside California. In one case police forced comrades to leave for accepting donations without registering with the state, in others merely handing out fliers on public property got shut down. One police officer claimed that activists could not set up a table on a public sidewalk to solicit support for the strike, contradicting California laws and illegally shutting down our free speech. There are contradictions in a country that locks 100,000 of its citizens in isolation cells and prevents people from distributing leaflets in public space to support their struggle against torture. Their repression only strengthens resistance, and this campaign is a prime example of that. It is ludicrous to consider the label “free country” for a country that does not even provide equal access to political dialogue to all people.

In addition to talking to people on the street, comrades made efforts to reach people through independent media and art. MIM(Prisons) hosted a video clip on its website from the documentary Unlock the Box explaining the history of control units and how they were developed to repress those whose politics were in opposition to the state. Comrades also did outreach at hip hop shows and talked to a revolutionary Chicano group called BRWN BFLO who pledged active support to spreading the word about the hunger strike. Allies in the United $tates and Kanada hosted screenings of Unlock the Box as part of the campaign. Other organizations did interviews and programs on various radio shows.

Those doing outreach reported many interactions with people who had been in Pelican Bay State Prison, in some cases multiple people in the span of a couple hours. All strongly agreed with our criticisms of the conditions there. However, some people concluded that there was nothing that could be done, and that oppressed nations will always be treated this way.

There is a common attitude among current prisoners as well that struggling is useless. The SHU was invented to reinforce that idea. The best way to change those people’s minds is by showing them the possibilities. We do that by fighting smartly, as these comrades in Pelican Bay have done resulting in people all over the world knowing about their fight. Serious, diligent organizing work is needed in our struggles for liberation, and basic rights such as the right of association, communication with the outside world and access to educational materials and programs. There are no quick fixes.

I’m writing you this brief missive to update you on things here at 4B SHU - CCI. The pigs are using any and all of the smallest things to validate a person as a member/associate of a prison gang. Speaking to someone in passing, roll calls, working out on yard together, drawings, etc. This includes literature (MIM, Prison Focus) and any stuff dealing with Afrikan or Latino culture, and especially having the name and CDC number of your homeboys/friends in your phone book. Once they validate you it’s for a minimum of six years plus you have to do 100% of your sentence.

All of the bullshit that you can expect a repressive/imperialist power hungry regime to do takes place here. That stuff is expected. One can’t expect anything else from a pig. So our focus should be on elevating our minds to find ways to get out, stay out and bring light to all this by connecting the free world to those held captive, so that we all realize that we are all sinking on the same boat.

MIM(Prisons) adds: As we hit the streets building support for the food strike in California we are stressing to people that this is about the First Amendment rights of the oppressed nations to associate with (and read about) themselves. California Prison Focus recently released their Prisoner Self-Help Manual to Challenge Gang Validation (SHGV), 5th edition. They can be contacted at 1904 FRANKLIN STREET, SUITE 507, OAKLAND, CA 94612. We need to keep challenging these repressive tactics at the group level, to defend the rights of all oppressed people to self-determination.

Attention: beginning July 1, 2011, several inmates housed indefinitely in PBSP-SHU D-Facility, Corridor Isolation, will begin an indefinite hunger strike in order to draw attention to, and to peacefully protest, 25 years of torture via CDCR’s arbitrary, illegal, and progressively more punitive policies and practices, as summarized in the accompanying Formal Complaint. PBSP-SHU, D-Facility Corridor inmates’ hunger strike protest is to continue indefinitely until the following changes are made:

OUR FIVE CORE DEMANDS:

1. Individual Accountability - This is in response to PBSP’s application of “group punishment” as a means to address individual inmates rule violations. This includes the administration’s abusive, pretextual use of “safety and concern” to justify what are unnecessary punitive acts. This policy has been applied in the context of justifying indefinite SHU status, and progressively restricting our programming and privileges.
   
2. Abolish the Debriefing Policy, and Modify Active/Inactive Gang Status Criteria - the debriefing policy is illegal and redundant, as pointed out in the Formal Complaint [IV-A, p. 7]. The Active/Inactive gang status criteria must be modified in order to comply with state law and applicable CDCR rule and regulations [eg, see Formal Complaint, p. 7, IV-B] as follows:
   
   1. Cease the use of innocuous association to deny inactive status,
      
   2. Cease the use of informant/debriefer allegations of illegal gang activity to deny inactive status, unless such allegations are also supported by factual corroborating evidence, in which case CDCR-PBSP staff shall and must follow the regulations by issuing a rule violation report and affording the inmate his due process required by law.
      
   
   
3. Comply with US Commission 2006 Recommendations Regarding an End to Long-Term Solitary Confinement - CDCR shall implement the findings and recommendations of the US commission on safety and abuse in America’s prisons final 2006 report regarding CDCR SHU facilities as follows:
   
   1. End Conditions of Isolation (p. 14) Ensure that prisoners in SHU and Ad-Seg (Administrative Segregation) have regular meaningful contact and freedom from extreme physical deprivations that are known to cause lasting harm. (pp. 52-57)
      
   2. Make Segregation a Last Resort (p. 14). Create a more productive form of confinement in the areas of allowing inmates in SHU and Ad-Seg [Administrative Segregation] the opportunity to engage in meaningful self-help treatment, work, education, religious, and other productive activities relating to having a sense of being a part of the community.
      
   3. End Long-Term Solitary Confinement. Release inmates to general prison population who have been warehoused indefinitely in SHU for the last 10 to 40 years (and counting).
      Provide SHU Inmates Immediate Meaningful Access to:
      
   4. Adequate natural sunlight
      
   5. Quality health care and treatment, including the mandate of transferring all PBSP-SHU inmates with chronic health care problems to the New Folsom Medical SHU facility.
      
   
   
4. Provide Adequate Food - cease the practice of denying adequate food, and provide wholesome nutritional meals including special diet meals, and allow inmates to purchase additional vitamin supplements.
   
   1. PBSP staff must cease their use of food as a tool to punish SHU inmates.
      
   2. Provide a sergeant/lieutenant to independently observe the serving of each meal, and ensure each tray has the complete issue of food on it.
      
   3. Feed the inmates whose job it is to serve SHU meals with meals that are separate from the pans of food sent from kitchen for SHU meals.
      
   
   
5. Expand and Provide Constructive Programming and Privileges for Indefinite SHU Status Inmates. Examples include:
   
   1. Expand visiting regarding amount of time and adding one day per week.
      
   2. Allow one photo per year.
      
   3. Allow a weekly phone call.
      
   4. Allow Two (2) annual packages per year. A 30 lb. package based on “item” weight and not packaging and box weight.
      
   5. Expand canteen and package items allowed. Allow us to have the items in their original packaging [the cost for cosmetics, stationary, envelopes, should not count towards the max draw limit]
      
   6. More TV channels.
      
   7. Allow TV/Radio combinations, or TV and small battery operated radio
      
   8. Allow Hobby Craft Items - art paper, colored pens, small pieces of colored pencils, watercolors, chalk, etc.
      
   9. Allow sweat suits and watch caps.
      
   10. Allow wall calendars.
       
   11. Install pull-up/dip bars on SHU yards.
       
   12. Allow correspondence courses that require proctored exams.
       
   
   

The purpose of the Hunger Strike is to combat both the Ad-Seg/SHU psychological and physical torture, as well as the justifications used of support treatment of the type that lends to prisoners being subjected to a civil death. Those subjected to indeterminate SHU programs are neglected and deprived of the basic human necessities while withering away in a very isolated and hostile environment.

Prison officials have utilized the assassination of prisoners’ character to each other as well as the general public in order to justify their inhumane treatment of prisoners. The “code of silence” used by guards allows them the freedom to use everything at their disposal in order to break those prisoners who prison officials and correctional officers (C/O) believe cannot be broken.

It is this mentality that set in motion the establishing of the short corridor, D1 through D4 and its D5 though D10 overflow. This mentality has created the current atmosphere in which C/Os and prison officials agreed upon plan to break indeterminate SHU prisoners. This protracted attack on SHU prisoners cuts across every aspect of the prison’s function: Food, mail, visiting, medical, yard, hot/cold temperatures, privileges (canteen, packages, property, etc.), isolation, cell searches, family/friends, and socio-culture, economic, and political deprivation. This is nothing short of the psychological/physical torture of SHU/Ad-Seg prisoners. It takes place day in and day out, without a break or rest.

The prison’s gang intelligence unit was extremely angered at the fact that prisoners who had been held in SHU under inhuman conditions for anywhere from ten (10) to forty (40) years had not been broken. So the gang intelligence unit created the “short corridor” and intensified the pressure of their attacks on the prisoners housed there. The object was to use blanket pressure to encourage these particular isolated prisoners to debrief (i.e. snitch on order to be released from SHU).

The C/Os and administrative officials are all in agreement and all do their part in depriving short corridor prisoners and its overflow of their basic civil/human rights. None of the deliberate attacks are a figment of anyone’s imagination. These continuous attacks are carried out against prisoners to a science by all of them. They are deliberate and conscious acts against essentially defenseless prisoners.

It is these ongoing attacks that have led to the short corridor and overflow SHU prisoners to organize ourselves themselves around an indefinite Hunger Strike in an effort to combat the dehumanizing treatment we prisoners of all races are subjected to on a daily basis.

Therefore, on July 1, 2011, we ask that all prisoners throughout the State of California who have been suffering injustices in General Population, Administrative Segregation and solitary confinement, etc. to join in our peaceful strike to put a stop to the blatant violations of prisoners’ civil/human rights. As you know, prison gang investigators have used threats of validation and other means to get prisoners to engage in a protracted war against each other in order to serve their narrow interests. If you cannot participate in the Hunger Strike then support it in principle by not eating for the first 24 hours of the strike.

I say that those of you who carry yourselves as principled human beings, no matter you’re housing status, must fight to right this and other egregious wrongs. Although it is “us” today (united New Afrikans, Whites, Northern and Southern Mexicans, and others) it will be you all tomorrow. It is in your interests to peacefully support us in this protest today, and to beware of agitators, provocateurs, and obstructionists, because they are the ones who put ninety percent of us back here because they could not remain principled even within themselves.

The following demands are all similar to what is allowed in other super max prisons (e.g. federal Florence, Colorado, Ohio and Indiana State Penitentiaries). The claim by CDCR and PBSP that implementing the practices of the federal prison system or that of other states would be a threat to safety and security are exaggerations.

The names of representatives of all major races listed as co-signers. The prisoners say they are “All races Whites; New Afrikans; Southern Mexs., and Northern Mexs.”

I’m writing to enlighten you of the new millennium oppression going on in Pelican Bay short-corridor. Since 2006 over 210 prisoners are being housed here unjustly by IGI (the gang task force) AKA “Green Wall” which is known to utilize prisoners who will debrief against other prisoners. Their inhuman treatment towards prisoners who will not lie and become false informers for IGI “Green Wall” helps keep the short-corridor program of oppression functioning.

We have been placed in short-corridor Group D, falsely labeled as gang members and housed here isolated for non-disciplinary actions. We are not allowed Group D privileges; the short-corridor has its own set of rules structured by IGI. They have no oversight and are allowed to be inhuman towards prisoners who don’t believe in their devilish propaganda! We understand we are in prison, we are serving our time disciplinary-free, all we are asking for is fairness. Below are just a few of many reasons why on July 1 2011 the short-corridor and SHU will go on a food strike to protest our inhuman isolation.

1. If we must be placed in this short-corridor let it be for disciplinary actions we have done.

2. IGI must stop the abuse of their power to manipulate/intimidate prisoners to falsely accuse other prisoners of being so-called gang members to justify their inhuman objective.

3. We must be allowed to receive all of Group D privileges, especially us in the short-corridor who have not done anything to warrant inhuman isolation.

4. We must be allowed to at least send our family members a picture. It’s been over 18 years since I have sent my family a picture, and other prisoners go even longer!

5. We must be able to talk to family on the phone. It is important that we have family support and help on personal rehabilitation.
   

I would like to ask if you can help us spread the word and on July 1 2011 have a candlelight vigil in support of us and to show solidarity in our struggle, or any other such act that may be able to help bring attention to our conditions.

I am interested in filing suit against California Department of Corrections & Rehabilitation(CDCR) as well as those in contract with them. I am aiming at their pockets because money seems to be all they understand. I am currently one victim of close to a hundred classified “hispanics” who were targeted by an OCS (Office of Correctional Safety) operation that was launched here in North Folk Oklahoma.

In all, around 80 classified “hispanics” were validated and approximately 150 to 200 Latino prisoners were affected. Our legal property was seized (as well as bibles, etc.) while we were being interviewed handcuffed, in our underwear, totally oblivious to them seizing our legal and religious property.

Those who exercised their constitutional protections against self-incrimination, considering all the elements surrounding this suspect “interview,” were retaliated against by receiving a prison gang validation point for refusing to “interview.”

All prisoners validated had their 1st amendment rights violated, for not one of us were given a meaningful opportunity to be heard at a “required” interview that we must be afforded before IGI can even send our validation pack to OCS for determination. Further, IGI committed fraud by writing/documenting that we did. In addition, the vast majority of our source item(s) used in our prison gang validation do not even meet departmental standards.

Nevertheless, these facts are not enough to overturn our validations through our appeals. Not to mention 95% of us were denied legal library access and legal materials to adequately defend ourselves, nor can this institution facilitate our legal library rights for it is constructed in a way that is physically impossible with regards to the security measures required with the number of ad-segs that resulted from the rogue operation.

I can seriously go on, and on but I think you get a relatively good idea of what we’re up against. So any assistance you may be able to provide in light of my/our situation would be highly appreciated as well.

MIM(Prisons) responds: This is yet another example of the illegal validation practices used to lock prisoners in higher security units based on supposed gang affiliation. Our ongoing fight against Control Units brings out many similar stories. Many of our Latino comrades behind bars are being targeted with mass validations, using evidence as flimsy as receipt of a birthday card, or being seen talking to someone in the yard. This validation leads to lockup in segregation (also known as control units). Filing lawsuits to fight these practices is one part of the struggle, although MIM(Prisons) does not have the legal resources to pursue these lawsuits ourselves.