Under Lock & Key

When exploring the ethical implications of some socially sanctioned institutions, it is understandable how society at large might not invest due attention to human rights questions that arise based on the severe conditions within prison control units. After all, the ones who are affected may not be society’s most beloved individuals and may even be regarded as deserving of less than compassionate treatment.

This logic, however, does not fully encompass the extent of the issues that control units present. Practically speaking, these types of environments inevitably serve as breeding grounds for a wide range of psychological disturbances. What the average person might not realize is that these disturbances manifest themselves in behavior and it is precisely for this reason why people who don’t care should.

One specific dynamic that is universally present in inmates who endure long-term isolation is social starvation. Not being exposed to regular social situations creates a profound loss of touch with the world from which they came - the world that bore them. This severed connection can lead to distrust (to the point of extreme paranoia), introversion, and a distorted path of normal, healthy social development.

Anxiety, insecurity, and ultimately, resentment, are also common elements that contribute to an individual’s alienation from their community. In fact, isolation is the antithesis of the concept of community and is, in itself, implicative of cruelty and abandonment.

The very term “control unit” is an irony. Yes, while an inmate is housed in one of these places he is under control. However, it is this very “control” that precipitates a wholly negative change in one’s character. The inherent coldness of such a barren place demonstrates a disregard for the monstrous effects such a cruelly oppressive environment creates. Instead of nurturing improvement and growth, it actually fosters hostility. It is insanely counterproductive.

Long-term isolation forces inmates to construct elaborate coping mechanisms to deal with the psychologically crippling conditions. It requires an emotional detachment, which is a precursor to antisocial behavior and is not in any way healthy or helpful.

It is for this reason that the notion of control units being effective deterrents to future, disruptive behavior is absolutely illogical to a laughable degree. These coping mechanisms become so entrenched into one’s personality, that it completely alters their entire psyche. The process is allowed to continue for so long, that inmates become accustomed to isolation at a hefty expense to their emotional well-being.

Strangely, it can become a perverse measure of mental strength - being able to withstand the crushing weight of isolation as a show to “prove” they cannot be broken, when in fact, this contempt may be evidence that they have already been cruelly affected. It amounts to no less than psychological mutilation - a perpetually self-defeating attitude.

It is difficult to believe that control units have any redeeming qualities. The fact is this: nearly all inmates housed in control units will re-enter prison populations, or in many cases, will be released directly back into society.

Human beings are known for being products of their environments. So what do you get when you subject a person to inhumane conditions and an utterly complete lack of compassion? It appears to be as simple and reliable as working out a mathematical equation. It seems though, if you don’t get the answer you were looking for, why would you stick with the same formula?

That’s not how progress is made. Reexamination, acknowledgment of mistakes, and the redressing of faults are the key to a healthy, moral society.

• a prisoner at Walpole MA in the Department Disciplinary Unit, March 2004

I have currently signed up for your MIM Notes. But due to my recent transfer to another “Correctional Facility” I am delayed in my response back to you. Fortune has it that another comrade is on my tier to help me out.

He read to me from your latest edition about Control Units, SHU, IMU, DSU, and AD-SEG. I am currently serving 16 years (190 mo) under mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines (Measure 11) and have spent 7 years in DSU and IMU. I have not even stabbed anyone or killed a cop and yet Oregon Dept of Corruptions has kept me consistently locked down for not lining my shoes up under my bunk, hanging too many shirts on my clothing hooks, and various disobediences of order and disrespect.

As your article alluded to, I have lost a good deal of my long range and medium range vision. And because the ODOC doesn’t provide toothpaste, only baking soda, my teeth are rotting out of my mouth due to lack of Flouride and breaking because baking soda is an abrasive which strips tooth enamel, making the teeth susceptible to cracking and breaking.

It’s not like providing inmates with toothpaste would break the bank. DOC confiscates inmate money for every and all rule violations. I recently got fined $75.00 for not making my bed in a timely and fashionable manner. Times this by 20,000 inmates a week and “Inmate Welfare fund” has the money for basic elements of hygiene.

I finally got my MIM Notes and I really enjoyed reading about how you expose the department of corrections dark side. Here in Oregon you see a lot of human rights violations such as: being placed in a program called IMU (Intensive Management Unit) without a probable cause, if your institution feels you’re a threat to them or the prison population you’re placed in this program, but first you go to segregation for six months, then you go to IMU and depending on what DOC says you could stay there up to five years. IMU is a max custody unit. But they have made it out to be like segregation. According to DOC if you’re in a max custody unit you’re supposed to receive your property in IMU. You have to earn it by doing programs. Because you people expose such acts and believe that it should be changed I enjoy your MIM Notes.

I extend greetings of solidarity and strength to those who remain intransigent in view of the ongoing onslaught of oppression. Brothers and sisters, due to the fact that MIM does not publish the names of comrades, all my communications will be addressed to you as Matulla. I will also be submitting future articles on a variety of issues, and petition you all to become or remain active with MIM as we strive for a revolutionary vanguard to defeat imperialism and this repressive prison industrial complex.

I have been reading of your struggles against our oppressors, even as you are interned deep within the belly of the beast, i.e. MCU, SHU, etc. This isolation and its barbaric nature are common to you and I. However our seclusion must solidify our opposition to repression, and must not cause you to become dispirited. We must continue to resist and withstand the force and effect of their deceptive practices.

I have been subjected to every form of terrorism and brutality that the state can throw at me. I’ve been beaten and tortured, starved and whipped. They’ve tried to break me, and desired to see me crawl. Instead I decided on resistance by any means possible. Don’t get me wrong, I am no hero, and sure as hell would like to have been someplace else, but like many of you, I understand why it is so important to defy our captors, even while we fight to survive, literally in hell. It is also important that you have the support of those on the outside, which is the primary reason I’ve been effective.

In spite of my circumstances, my resolve is steadfast, because I fully understand why I’m being subjected to the draconian degrees of selective political persecution that I have been forced to endure over the past 4 1/2 years. I am innocent of all the repressive administrators’ false allegations. Because I am militant, I am being subjected to selective political persecution by the state for merely entertaining such militant thoughts.

I’m aware of many of the conditions you speak of at your facilities, if not all. Many prisoners, here as throughout the united $tate$, are placed in these [isolation] units without having broken any prison rules. Prisoners who have been identified as being politically subversive, or incorrigible (political), and possess or display leadership qualities or potentials are assigned to the prison’s repressive “MCU” and/or “SHU” unit(s).

Many of these placements are based solely on uncorroborated administrative or confidential informant reports that are never provided to the prisoner before or after the classification hearings so they can prepare some type of defense against the confidential informants uncorroborated allegations, or seek some kind of redress after the fact, via the kourt system (which often sides with the repressive prison administrators).

Some prisoners (political and apolitical) are placed in the MCU, SMU or SHU before they are convicted or right after they are sentenced on the charges they are arrested for. In general, these units will base its decisions to intern a prisoner in these units upon its evaluation of the following factors: records of past imprisonment, disciplinary records, prison records on work assignments, adjustment to prison programs, records on past housing assignments, attitude toward authority, psychological makeup, and involvement in political, social and criminal activities while in prison. In many instances prisoners are isolated due to their involvement or alleged involvement with street organization.

We must also begin to take an in depth look at the goals of these units and how they achieve these goals. Politicized social prisoners, political prisoners, some radicalized religious prisoners, prison lawyers, apolitical prisoner leaders or potential leaders are isolated from the general population with the goal of reshaping their beliefs or to psychologically break us.

During my years in the MCU, SHU and SMU units I’ve seen prisoners renounce their political, religious and “gang” affiliations in order to win their release from these repressive units. It has long been my position that convictions are not a matter of convenience, because if an individual is serious about his or her convictions, no matter the consequences, he or she will remain true to them. I have seen prisoners suffer emotional breakdowns because they could no longer cope with the constant lockdown. They sometimes start taking the mind-controlling psychotropic drugs administered by the psychiatrist, to escape the realities of this never ending insanity.

Brothers and sisters, being in captivity is a terrible adversity. Many prisoners are affected in different ways. I’ve witnessed many become complacent in an institutionalized way, capitulate, or they become more rebellious and speak of vengeance. Other prisoners start identifying with their oppressors, the guards, and start seeing them as being humane instead of sadistic. They develop hostile tendencies towards other prisoners who recognize and expose the true sadistic nature of the guard. It all depends on the individual prisoner and his internal composition over a protracted period of time.

My petition to you is that you withstand the direct frontal assaults being unleashed against us. We must all continue to struggle, even while interned in the belly of this most relentless beast.

I too am subjected to the same deprivations as you, which are designed to make us kow-tow. Restricted contact visits, restricted law library access, “no” work and education privileges, restricted religious access, as well as having my correspondences and reading materials carefully scrutinized (more so than the prisoners in general population.) In addition, we are carefully searched every time we leave the control unit (going and coming ) in the presence of two armed security guards carrying black night sticks that they call “nigger beaters.” We are subjected to restrictive outside recreation and 24 and 23 3/4 hour days locked down in these cages year-round.

In reading your missives to MIM, many of you have been given the same options as I to obtain release from these repressive units. They have advised me that I need to improve my social profile and abandon my oppositional stance prior to release consideration from the MCU. Renouncing my politics will never happen. I’ve never contemplated the thought of being apolitical again in my life because I have suffered so, and to pay homage to the late George L. Jackson, I want to say there is no turning back from awareness because it is our obligatory duty to act once we become aware of what is, as well as what must be done and not just spoken about.

MIM has been active when it comes to about the history and reality of control units, i.e. SHU, MCU, SMU etc., especially in the state of California. We must do our part as prisoners, to organize and form a collective behind the walls to assist them. If this means resisting physically we must resist. If we must die, let it not be like hogs, hunted and penned in an inglorious spot.

Other prisoner support organizations, and most advocates, lose interest after a while because combating the existence of SHUs and control units necessitates a protracted commitment and most people are not willing to make such a commitment. In addition, prisoners around the country who have experienced the fascist repression of these units and prison existence do not stay the course upon release. Many ex-prisoners don’t help those who helped them and stayed the course with them when they were locked down deep in the repressive confines of some state or federal SHU and/or control unit. Once released they failed to act upon the promises they previously made about advocating the propaganda of serious struggle in the community at large.

I encourage all of you to remain strong and uncompromising. We must work relentlessly to replace the bourgeois injustice system with proletarian justice.

– Matulla, a prisoner in Alabama, April 2003

Menard Correctional Centers Segregation Unit consists of one abnormally large cell house, which has the capacity of 490 inmates. Menard had only one major incident this year and there’s hardly anyone getting into trouble. So in order to justify using so much space for segregation, the staff issued quotas for each population cell house on how many inmates they need to send to segregation. So the staff sets out to find reasons to place inmates in segregation.

During quota filling time, correctional officers exaggerate disciplinary reports, by writing tickets for “intimidation and threat” because an inmate stared at them too long. Or they charge people with “gang activity” when six or seven people are standing in a small group on the yard. Oftentimes, they can’t exaggerate tickets so they talk loudly and curse at inmates to provoke a verbal or physical response. If all else fails, they will utilize the Internal Affairs Confidential Sources procedure, which uses inmate trustees to lie on gang members. Law advocates say that the inmates are planning some outrageous security threat, so that they can lock them in segregation anywhere from 30 to 60 days under “investigative status.” I encourage any and all inmates to remain dormant to force the staff here to open at least half the segregation unit’s building to the general population, and at the same time neutralize Menard’s Segregation quota procedures.

RAIL and MIM respond: The prisoner is correct to expose the everyday injustice as prisoncrats use their power to fix their stupid mistakes. Like this prisoner, we also do not encourage prisoners to fight the pigs since they are currently armed and dangerous. The demand to reduce the size of Menard’s segregation unit is a correct one. Segregation brings with it such increased suffering for prisoners as sensory deprivation, reduced yard time, highly restricted contact with other prisoners if any, denial of the ability to work, and tighter controls on visitation. All this is in addition to the loss of good time from tickets, forcing prisoners to serve longer sentences before getting the opportunity to parole.

As we point out in every issue of MIM Notes, the size of the U.$. prison population is too big and growing, with more prisoners per capita than any government since Stalin’s during World War II and more Black prisoners than Apartheid South Africa. While we work to bring down this system in its entirety, for the short term we look to fight winnable battles that we can win by legal means. Bettering prisoners’ conditions now is a good thing. Any honest persyn can see that getting the Menard Correctional Center to stop manufacturing charges against prisoners is a positive reform that deserves support. To express your views to the Warden, write or call (please send MIM a copy of any correspondence):

Warden George Welborn
Menard Correctional Center
711 Kaskaskia Street
Menard, Illinois 62259
Phone: (618) 826-5071

I would like to advise MIM that my issues with NYS DOCS on keeping me in admin seg for being a leader of the New York State Latin King Chapter is now in the Albany Co, Supreme Court. The continued segregation and solitary confinement of minority Latinos and Blacks must come to an end. These Special Housing Units (SHU’s) in New York State were built under the pretense of placing extremely violent prisoners within them. These new prisons have been built within the past 4 years and 12 new prisons have been built for these reasons. These prisons are not being used for the violent, they are being used for Security Risk Groups: Latin Kings, Bloods, Crips, Rat Hunters & so on.

These new SHU’s are filled with people who are here for dirty urine. To justify the money being spent for these prisons they must keep them full! New York State is the only state that gives 5 years solitary confinement on a dirty urine for smoking a stick of weed!(joint) This is their reform and rehabilitation for the drug users!

The article on U.S. prison officials use of torture and biological weapons in MIM Notes 256 is 100% true, because I live it every day of my life since 2000. I’ve been in the New York State SHU restricted diet (the “loaf”) bread mixed with cabbage then baked into a solid gruel. The teargas, pepper spray and so on to an asthmatic is a deadly practice. The stun guns, and electric riot shield is a deadly practice for anyone with a heart problem. The United States Supreme Court abolished cruel and unusual punishment. If these practices aren’t cruel and unusual then deadly force along with the governments dumbocracy has just stepped up onto a new plateau!

It’s time to wake up and become a part of the resolution to fix the problem.

Peace almighty today, tomorrow and forever. King’s love,

My comrades and I have just recently won a battle to get out of the SHU unit here in Indiana. We won it through appeals and are now back in the general population. Our release is just a drop in the bucket, though, considering that no one should be subjected to such torments and inhumane treatment. Where some would be happy with gaining their own releases, I will only be happy when the SHUs are abolished. So until that time I must continue to work towards this goal.

Keep in the struggle

There are various rumors going around that we will soon be transferred to the new Federal prison complex at Florence, Colorado. Some say we all won’t be transferred there; some say only those of us who are classified as “sixes,” which is the highest security level in the Bureau of Prisons (BOP). We hear that we will be isolated from other convicts, and then we hear we will participate in recreation in groups of nine men. Some say the transfer will begin in September; other indications are that it will be sooner.

We won’t know for sure until it happens, and that’s the way the BOP wants it–shrouded in mystery.

Whatever happens here in regards to the transfer to Florence, CO, this marks the beginning of a new era in repression of the ever-increasing, restless and angry prison population in the U.S.

With the closing of Alcatraz in 1962 and the simultaneous opening of Marion in Illinois, the Federal BOP has had 32 years to study Marion prisoners, and has shared this knowledge with the state prison systems and prison systems throughout the world. They concentrated what they called High Security Level prisoners here at Marion and began their experiments. For years it was common knowledge that Marion’s water was contaminated with PCBs. Several ex-Marion prisoners have died or still suffer from various forms of cancers and central nervous system disorders such as multiple sclerosis.

In 1972, after an institution-wide work strike [and, notably, after the 1971 Attica prisoners’ rebellion –MC49], 150 prisoners were put in disciplinary segregation. Sixteen months later, 36 prisoners were still in what had been officially designated the control unit. The control unit on H-unit was a mini-Alcatraz. There, in that strictly- regulated environment, Marion concentrated its most “disruptive” inmates and, of course, the system’s revolutionaries.

Today, there are many control units in prisons throughout the United States and the world, and they have been perfected for the purpose of burying any activist, POW, political prisoner, and any prisoner the administration doesn’t want to influence other prisoners.

Repression is mounting throughout the world, as the powers that be attempt to contain and silence the just grievances of the oppressed peoples who are doing what is necessary to survive in a world where greed is king and is protected by the power of the gun. “Power comes from the barrel of a gun,” said Mao, and today we see how right he was.

Peace and power,

–a Marion prisoner

The Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC) has the authority
and obligation to establish rules and regulations to provide
prisoners with access to published materials including newspapers
and magazines approved by the Director of the IDOC. (730 ILCS 5/3-
7-1)

The IDOC’s regulations for prisoners’ access to publications is
set forth in title 20, Sections 525.200 through 525.230 of the
Illinois Administrative Code (20 Ill. Admn. Code Sec 525.200
through 525.230). A prisoner may subscribe to, solicit free copies
of, or buy individual copies of approved newspapers, magazines,
books and other publications for delivery to the facility of
confinement. “A member of the [prisoner’s] family or a friend may
also order, solicit or bring approved publications to the
facility.” 20 Ill. Admn.Code Sec 525.210(c).

The warden of the Pontiac Correctional Center implemented his own
personal policy which prohibited friends and family members of
prisoners from bringing in approved publications.

A complaint for mandamus was filed in the Circuit Court of
Livingston County, Illinois, seeking an order compelling the
warden to allow family members and friends to bring in approved
publications for prisoners in accordance with established
regulations.

The warden filed a motion to dismiss, arguing that the decision to
allow friends and family members to deliver approved publications
to a prisoner is a discretionary act. The warden argued that the
use of the word “may” in the last sentence in Sec 525.210(c)
indicates a discretionary act. Thus, mandamus is inapplicable.

In response to the motion to dismiss, the prisoner argued that the
use of the word “may” does in fact allow for discretion. However,
the plain reading of Sec 525.210(c) clearly indicates that the use
of the word “may” refers to what the prisoner’s family and friends
may do, not to what the IDOC employees may do.

The Circuit Court agreed with the prisoner and denied the warden’s
motion to dismiss. In its holding, the Court ruled that Sec
525.210(c) indicates that discretion lies with the prisoner’s
friends and family members, not the warden. The Court further
ruled that the IDOC must allow prisoners’ friends and family to
bring in approved publications.

The warden subsequently rescinded his policy and permitted friends
and family members to deliver approved publications to prisoners.
[See Markiewicz v. Gilmore , No. 97-MR-22 (Order Filed
July 1, 1998)]

(Note: This action was litigated pro se.)

MIM organizes the Serve the People Prisoners’ Legal Clinic
(PLC). This is a revolutionary program geared toward serving needs
of the oppressed masses as we build opposition to imperialism. PLC
activities vary widely (with room for expansion) and include
fighting censorship, prisoners providing guides on grievance
procedures and the publication of MIM Legal Notes. MIM leads this
program with the knowledge that only armed revolution to seize
state power and establish a dictatorship of the proletariat will
liberate the oppressed. This is one aspect of how we fight
winnable battles to create more maneuverability for political
organizing within the current corrupt system.

MIM Legal Notes is researched and written by comrades behind the
walls. We publish these articles because we believe that the legal
research and information will be useful to other prisoners. But
comrades should be aware that differences in laws between states,
changes in laws and legal precedents over time, and different case
circumstances all mean that even something that was successful for
one person might not work for others. We print the best legal news
and information available to us with the understanding that this
program will only grow stronger with increased exposure and
participation. We encourage prisoners and non-prisoners to
contribute to this program with research and writing.

In mid-July a prisoner had an epilepsy seizure on the second tier. It took 20 minutes for the nurse to get to the control unit. The nurse could do nothing but stand at the door and attempt to calm the prisoner.

According to the standard policy of the Fourth Reich the security methods are that the keepers have to be dressed out in full riot gear, shields, helmets, bullet proof jackets, riots sticks, mace, etc. It took 15-20 more minutes for the keepers to suit up.

A stretcher was brought into the pod, the prisoner’s cage was opened and he was told to remain STILL. A man having a seizure is old to remain still – that’s deep. The prisoner was handcuffed and shackled in leg irons, placed on the stretcher, hauled out of the pod as though he was a piece of meat.

This was a demonstration of what the hooligans think of the dispossessed classes. Prisoners screamed and cursed, they were visibly upset.

We see the wake up calls, however, we need to desperately wake up. The prison movement has to regain the organizational functioning of unity among ourselves.

On September 3, 100 and something New Mexican prisoners were transported to Wallens Ridge State Prison. You know, the slaves cannot be separated from one to the other, however, the state will utilize every tactic possible to have the edge. If we’re transferred 2,000-3,000 miles from our roots what of it? The slave-owners are doing no more than what they did during chattel slavery.

How you grasp the realities of the world makes the difference. When you don’t see the realities, the ruling circle will have us at each other’s throats, still killing one another for reasons which have no merits, other than our being manipulated to destroy the outcasts, whether it’s for drugs, turf disputes, because of the color of one’s skin, gang-banging etc. The deck of playing cards have been stacked against the poor, word.

Solidarity forever!