We have a lot of useful and important information for you in #22. First, let me tell you about some changes – additions, that 4sm will initiate in the next issue, #23.

Many of you 4sm people – readers are already familiar with The Jericho Movement, the national movement to support and free political prisoners in the United States. See Jihad Abdul Mumit’s article on Jericho and political prisoners in this issue. In the past, Jericho has published a paper and newsletter. Beginning in our summer issue, 4sm will include a complete Jericho newsletter in each issue. This is a natural fit for 4sm, and we think Jericho’s newsletter pages will add to the overall information and value of 4sm.

Many readers are probably also familiar with the work and writings of Ward Churchill. He is, of course, a noted author of many books, innumerable essays and articles, a scholar, educator and activist who has focused on Native American history and struggle. Ward Churchill will be a regular columnist-essayist for 4sm, and his first work with us will be in the next issue. We are also working on having a leader-elder of the Puerto Rican People’s Independence Movement contribute a column or essay on a regular basis.

We think these additions will make 4sm even more dynamic and useful for our readers, especially all you activists and Freedom Fighters, those in prison and outside.

In this issue, definitely check out the section on Lynne Stewart. She is dying in prison and we can and must give her our support and love, and get her freed, on a medical compassionate release.

Also check out the denver ABC article on the renewed ef- fort to develop a nationwide amnesty movement and cam- paign to free political prisoners in the u.s. I urge all p.p.’s to contact the Denver address with your thoughts and advice. Likewise collectives, organizations and activists outside who have the desire and interest to support an Amnesty for p.p.’s campaign, make contact with Denver and lets build the struggle to win freedom for political prisoners.

4sm is initiating a new discussion and struggle against par- triarchy and sexism in this issue. We are reprinting David Gilbert’s call for this discussion (from #21) and invite you to read and respond.

Check out Rashid Johnson’s unusual and harrowing piece about getting drugged and one bad thing leading to another. Then also read my article on drugs, prison life and the long established political prisoner position on drugs.

This issue has lots of other news and information for you. 4sm will put out two more issues this year – #23 in August and #24 in November. With our upcoming additions, espe- cially the Jericho newsletter section, 4sm will probably be bigger and will take more resources to put out. While 4sm is a professionally produced and printed magazine (both online and in hardcopy), this is a totally non-profit enter- prise. There are no paid staff or writers at 4sm. There are many costs in putting this magazine out and getting it in your hands. 4sm certainly could use some material sup- port from you for this revolutionary work, especially at this time. See you all in #23 – out this summer.

No To Imperialist War in Korea, Africa and Afghanistan! Free Lynne Stewart Now!

Jaan Laaman, editor Jaan Karl Laaman #10372-016 USP Tucson

P.O. Box 24550 Tucson, AZ USA 85734

BY JOHN HILL, Mohawk Nation News

mohawknationnews.com

A great loss to the people, to the nation, to the resistance, anti-imperialist movement right across Great Turtle Island.

On March 13th, Dacajeweiah, Splitting-the-Sky, 61, left us forever when he passed away in his home in Adams Lake, British Columbia. Dac’s colonial name was John Boncore Hill, from Six Nations. “From Attica to Gustafsen Lake,” and thereafter, he was a warrior, a comrade, a brother, a father, a grandfather, a friend.

We deeply mourn his loss.

The family will release a biographical statement and details of memorial arrangements in due course. With deepest love to his wife, She-Keeps-the-Door, and children. We stand with Dac’s many many co-fighters and friends. He loved the People. The AIM song is dedicated to the continuance of the resistance after a warrior has fallen

From Roslyn Cassells:

Splitting the Sky, also know as John Boncore, his colonial name, aged 61, was one of the most fierce, uncompromising, warriors I have ever met. He was fighting the pipeline in northern BC at the time of his death, but has been involved in sovereignty issues and many human rights and ecojustice campaigns all over the world.

As a survivor of the prison uprising in Attica and a member of AIM (American Indian Movement) he came to Surrey, BC during the trial of the Sundancers of Tspeten, the Gustafson Lake standoff, the longest trial in BC history. That is where I met him.

He tried to arrest George Bush for war crimes, and was an ally of social justice battles everywhere. His fierce spirit, big heart, and huge smile and sense of humour is what I will remember of Splitting the Sky.

I doubt he will rest in peace, as there is yet no justice. I suspect his fighting spirit will return to encourage those of us who remain to keep up the battle for all peoples, and all our relations.

I will always remember Splitting the Sky, and his cry for justice!

A MESSAGE FROM EDITOR JAAN LAAMAN

My family and friends,

I have VERY serious and important information to share with you, and literally, a life saving request — task to ask of each of you.

My friend, our friend and sister, Lynne Stewart, is dying in a federal prison in Texas.  I believe all of you are generally aware that Lynne was convicted under the infamous ‘Patriot Act,’ for too vigorously defending her (Court appointed) client, Sheik Omar Rahman.  She initially was given a 28 month sentence.  The government appealed and her sentence was increased to 10 years.  Just before Lynne went to prison, she was diagnosed with breast cancer.  While still on bail, she successfully fought the cancer.  But now, in the 4th year of her sentence, her cancer has come back and has spread to her lungs and back.  She presently has ‘stage 4′ breast cancer.

Lynne is a wonderful person, a 73 year old woman, mother, grandmother, a fierce former Human Rights and criminal lawyer.

Under federal law, the 1984 Sentencing Act, courts can reduce sentences for “extraordinary and compelling” reasons such as terminal illness.

Lynne Stewart must be released from prison so she can get back to good quality, non-prison, healthcare in NY City, where she fought back her initial breast cancer.  And back to the support, care and love of her family so she at least has a chance to fight her illness.

Federal law allows for this, but the Bureau of Prisons, and its’ boss the Justice Department, and the President, Barak Obama, must hear the voice of the people, asking and demanding that Lynne Stewart be released.  Our voices in the thousands and tens of thousands must and can reach all the way up to the White House.

The task is really simple: PLEASE NOW go to: www.lynnestewart.org   and sign the petition asking that she be given medical and compassionate release.  THEN PLEASE, pass this information and message on, along with your own thought and note, to EVERYONE on your email/contact lists.  Ask each and everyone of your people to also sign the Petition for Lynne Stewart’s Compassionate Release.  And ALSO ask all of your friends/contacts to send this message on to everyone on their lists, along with their own request that these people also send the message on to everyone on their respective lists.

This, my friends, is a doable thing.  It just takes each of us a little time to sign the petition and send on the message.  We can save a life.  We can do a good thing.  Please, be part of this noble, positive and crucial life saving effort.

Lynne is a long time friend of mine.  I love her like a sister, comrade and friend.  She needs our help — thanks for doing the right thing.

A cri de coeur from Archbishop Desmond Tutu on the persecution of Lynne Stewart

Lynne Stewart is renowned throughout the United States as a criminal defense lawyer who, for over 30 years, defended the poor, the disadvantaged and those targeted by the police and the State.

Such has been her reputation as a fearless lawyer ready to challenge those in power that judges assigned her routinely to act for defendants whom no attorney was willing to represent.

Now, Lynne Stewart needs our urgent help or she may die in prison.

In 1995, Lynne Stewart was appointed by a federal court to represent the blind Egyptian cleric Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, who was accused of conspiring to blow up New York landmarks. She became co-counsel with former Attorney General Ramsey Clark and renowned civil liberties attorney Abdeen Jabaar.

Despite Lynne Stewart having marshaled evidence demonstrating the innocence of her client, and pointing indisputably to the hand of the government in the plots attributed to her client, Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment plus 65 years!

Special Administrative Measures (SAMS) were imposed, violating first, fifth and sixth amendment rights of defendants and attorneys alike.

These measures placed severe restrictions on any communication of Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman communication with the outside world.

On April 9, 2002, Attorney General Ashcroft made an unprecedented appearance on the Late Night Show of David Letterman, a nationally viewed entertainment talk-show, to announce that the Justice Department was prosecutIng Lynne Stewart for providing “material aid to a terrorist organization”.

This “material aid” was her own person and her function as defense attorney. The “material aid” consisted of a Press Release conveying the views of the Sheikh and given to a Reuter’s correspondent – an action protected by the first amendment and the free speech rights of Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman and Lynne Stewart alike.

The Justice Department of George Bush and of Barack Obama prosecuted Lynne Stewart and demanded 30 years in prison. This attack upon due process and basic democratic rights was aimed at every attorney in the United States. The intent was and remains to destroy democratic rights and protections that date to the Magna Carta.

Lynne Stewart was railroaded to prison in a show trial evocative of the era of Joseph Stalin. Broad public protest caused presiding Judge John Koetl to declare Lynne Stewart  ”an asset to the nation” while sentencing her to 28 months in federal prison.

Pressed by the Justice Department, the Appellate Court, breaking precedent, directed Judge Koetl to increase her sentence drastically, to revoke her bail and remand her to prison despite the fact that Lynne Stewart had the right to appeal her conviction to the Supreme Court.

Judge Koetl, yielding to this immense pressure, increased his original 28 month sentence to ten years. This has become, effectively, a death sentence for Lynne Stewart. Urgent surgery was delayed 18 months by the prison authorities. Her breast cancer, in remission before imprisonment, metastasized and spread to her lymph nodes, bones and lungs.

For every person of conscience, there is no time to lose. We must mobilize world opinion to stop the judicial and political murder of Lynne Stewart, an ominous measure of the mass repression in preparation for working people and the oppressed.

The campaign to save the life of Lynne Stewart is a first line of defense against a ruling class rapidly destroying the rights obtained through generations of struggle as a ruthless system prepares to subjugate us all.

WE CALL UPON ALL TO SIGN THE PETITION NOW TO SAVE LYNNE STEWART

http://www.change.org/petitions/petition-to-free-lynne-stewart-save-her-life-release-her-now-2

PETITION TO FREE LYNNE STEWART: SAVE HER LIFE – RELEASE HER NOW!

Lynne Stewart has devoted her life to the oppressed – a constant advocate for the countless many deprived in the United States of their freedom and their rights.

Unjustly charged and convicted for the “crime” of providing her client with a fearless defense, the prosecution of Lynne Stewart is an assault upon the basic freedoms of us all.

After years of post-conviction freedom, her bail was revoked arbitrarily and her imprisonment ordered, precluding surgery she had scheduled in a major New York hospital.

The sinister meaning of the relentless persecution of Lynne Stewart is unmistakably clear. Given her age and precarious health, the ten-year sentence she is serving is a virtual death sentence.

Since her imprisonment in the Federal Prison in Carswell, Texas her urgent need for surgery was delayed 18 months – so long, that the operating physician pronounced the condition as “the worst he had seen.”

Now, breast cancer, which had been in remission prior to her imprisonment, has reached Stage Four. It has appeared in her lymph nodes, on her shoulder, in her bones and her lungs.

Her daughter, a physician, has sounded the alarm: “Under the best of circumstances, Lynne would be in a battle of the most serious consequences with dangerous odds. With cancer and cancer treatment, the complications can be as debilitating and as dangerous as the cancer itself.”

In her current setting, where trips to physicians involve attempting to walk with 10 pounds of shackles on her wrists and ankles, with connecting chains, Lynne Stewart has lacked ready access to physicians and specialists under conditions compatible with medical success.

It can take weeks to see a medical provider in prison conditions. It can take weeks to report physical changes and learn the results of treatment; and when held in the hospital, Lynne has been shackled, wrist and ankle, to the bed.

This medieval “shackling” has little to do with any appropriate prison control. She is obviously not an escape risk.

We demand abolition of this practice for all prisoners, let alone those facing surgery and the urgent necessity of care and recovery.

It amounts to cruel and unusual punishment, in violation of human rights.

There is immediate remedy available for Lynne Stewart. Under the 1984 Sentencing Act, after a prisoner request, the Bureau of Prisons can file a motion with the Court to reduce sentences “for extraordinary and compelling reasons.” Life threatening illness is foremost among these and Lynne Stewart meets every rational and humane criterion for compassionate release.

To misconstrue the gravamen of this compassionate release by conditioning such upon being at death’s door – released, if at all, solely to die – is a cruel mockery converting a prison sentence, wholly undeserved, into a death sentence.

The New York Times, in an editorial (2/12), has excoriated the Bureau of Prisons for their restrictive crippling of this program. In a 20-year period, the Bureau released a scant 492 persons – an average of 24 a year out of a population that exceeds 220 000.

We cry out against the bureaucratic murder of Lynne Stewart.

We demand Lynne Stewart’s immediate release to receive urgent medical care in a supportive environment indispensable to the prospect of her survival and call upon the Bureau of Prisons to act immediately.

If Lynne’s original sentence of 28 months had not been unreasonably, punitively increased to 10 years, she would be home now — where her medical care would be by her choice and where those who love her best would care for her. Her isolation from this loving care would end.

Prevent this cruelty to Lynne Stewart whose lifelong commitment to justice is now a struggle for her life.

Free Lynne Stewart Now!

Ralph Poynter and Family

BY NATE BUCKLEY

Seth was “hit” again at the Parole Board for the 9th time. The reason given was the same reason given for previous 8 parole board appearances “due to serious nature of the crime.”

Seth was given a risk assessment last year and it came back very low, Seth has had a great work record, discipline record, a family. Seth is also a Vietnam veteran, with a purple heart.

This reasoning has nothing to do with rehabilitation, with the community in mind, his family, nor mentioning the 15 year life sentence he has served past the mandatory 25. Seth, now in his 60′s has been incarcerated since 1973; he is now in his 40th year of incarceration!

Seth is not the only one either, the Department of Corrections and the Parole Board have much interest in keeping inmates inside. There is big money in prisons. More to come in the future.

Write to Seth and lend some support!

Robert Seth Hayes #74-A-2280

Sullivan Correctional Facility,

P.O. Box 116, Fallsburg, NY 12733-0116

Sundiata Acoli freedom campaign legal update

On March 4, 2010 Sundiata Acoli, at 73 years old, was denied parole for the third time by the New Jersey State Parole board. Sundiata had served 37 years in prison as he was convicted in the May

2, 1973 shooting of a New Jersey State Trooper on the NJ Turnpike.

Sundiata had last been denied parole in 1994. The parole board continues to cite among other things, that “He was not rehabilitated.” Sundiata has maintained an infraction-free prison record since 1996.

Over a thousand letters and petitions from a diverse group of influential peoples, including psychologists, lawyers, clergy, professors, journalists, and community members were sent to the parole board expressing love from the community and support for his release.

Nevertheless, Sundiata was denied parole just minutes after an in-person review by two members of the board. No time was taken to deliberate the decision, and notice of the denial was given to him on

a sheet with barely legible hand-written notes on it. Not only was he denied but he was told his case would be referred to a 3-member panel to establish a FET (“hit”) outside the guidelines. In mid July,

Sundiata received written notice that a three member panel,  two of which included the two members who denied him, had decided to give him a 10 year hit which means he must serve an additional 6 years in

prison before he will again be eligible for a parole hearing. He will be 79 years old.

The “hit” is particularly harsh since on August 1, 2010 a new law was passed in New Jersey capping to 36 months, the number of years the parole board can establish a FET. The New Jersey Parole Board rushed to send this letter to Sundiata to avoid the August 1st deadline. As of this posting, Sundiata has not yet received any explanation from the board for this 10 year “hit”.

The Sundiata Acoli Freedom Campaign (SAFC) continues to be vigilant in seeking justice for Sundiata and his right to freedom. Sundiata’s legal advisors have consulted with a NJ attorney to appeal the

decision. The attorney has been retained and has prepared and filed an administrative appeal to the NJ Parole Board outlining in very clear terms, the errors made by the panel in denying Sundiata’s parole. The appeal was filed on August 27, 2010.

In July, 2012 Sundiata appeared before the NJ Parole Board twice via video teleconference at FCI Cumberland, MD where he’s currently held. The panel denied parole and referred his case to a 3-member panel to establish a “hit” outside the guidelines.

On October 17, 2012 the 3-member panel set a 100 month, i.e., 8 1/3 year, ”hit” for Sundiata but did not deliver the written decision until January 17, 2013 to the now 76 year old Sundiata. This latest decision must also be appealed.

We believe the case for appealing the NJ Parole Board’s decision is strong! SAFC will continue to keep pushing for Sundiata’s release and raising awareness about his case. Members of SAFC are available to speak and share information with any group who requests it. Simply email thesafc@gmail.com.

Sundiata needs your love and support and SAFC needs to raise funds to cover Sundiata’s legal expenses. Regular commissary donations to keep Sundiata smiling and knowing he is loved are also encouraged. We understand the financial limitations of people during these times and we appreciate anything you can give.

Please take a moment and give what you can to support his release:

To make a contribution to Sundiata’s legal expenses, please send a check or money order payable to SAFC to:

SAFC

PO BOX 766

HARLEM STATION

New York, New York 10027

Please be sure to note in the memo field that your check is for Legal Fees.

To send  Sundiata a card, a photo, artwork or just a simple

letter saying you are thinking about him, write him at:

Sundiata Acoli #39794-066 (Squire)

PO Box 1000

FCI Cumberland

Cumberland MD 21501-1000

Any one of these things is a great way to show your love and support.

Thank you in advance!

Albert Woodfox

Amnesty International has launched a campaign to keep Louisiana Attorney General James D. Caldwell from appealing the court’s decision which once again overturned Woodfox’s conviction finding his trial flawed by racial discrimination. Woodfox, one the “Angola 3″ was initially targeted in prison for Black Panther Party organizing to the benefit of both black and white prisoners. Louisiana has previously appealed rather than honor court decisions in Woodfox’s favor. While Amnesty asks Woodfox be retried or freed, since he was unjustly convicted, having served forty years in solitary confinement, a retrial would only prolong an absolute injustice. Albert Woodfox should be freed immediately.

Roger Clement

Great news! Roger’s release date is currently scheduled for April 17, 2013. His friends are very excited to have him back on the outside. Unfortunately, his release from incarceration won’t mark the complete end to his monitoring by the prison system. It is likely Roger will be released with a number of conditions, which he will have to adhere to very closely. Details of these conditions aren’t fully clear yet, but they may involve being unable to associate with many of his friends and colleagues until June, 2014, his Warrant Expiry Date.

BY KEVIN “RASHID” JOHNSON

Things I don’t do

Even before I began my political journey in 2001, I maintained certain principles – a variety of things I just don’t do. And usually, if ever I deviated from those principles, even in error, I’d end up in a tangle of trouble.

February 2013 was an ordeal. I broke some of my rules and things got ugly. What happened is yet another experience that those who blindly trust the system – and those who don’t – need to know about.

Among my longstanding “don’t dos” are 1) I don’t do suicide and 2) I don’t do intoxicants. Suicide’s a no-brainer, since I couldn’t fathom caving in to pressure – especially not from the opposition. Which is the only way I could see taking myself out. But more important is the political principle that my life is not mine to take. It belongs to the people. And that’s not to posture nor sound “politically correct.” It’s a genuine commitment.

The intoxicant thing is a bit more complicated. For one, I don’t like not being in control of myself. Secondly, when under the influence, I go soft in the head, being what some call “chemically imbalanced” or, in other words, I literally go berserk when intoxicated. And since I don’t use, it doesn’t take much to tip me completely over.

Meet Mr. Highjinks

My troubles of February 2013 were the result of breaking these two particular “don’t dos.” Over a three day period I got intoxicated, then, under the influence, attempted suicide – twice. And the pigs and “professionals” quite blatantly watched and waited for me to die, which compelled me, once I sobered up, into yet another life and death struggle to not let that happen.

The intoxication wasn’t intentional (on my part), but the practical joke I might say of an apolitical and particularly mischievous peer. A fella who routinely makes and takes cocktails of various mind-altering prescription drugs he collects. Although he has consented to being identified by name, being remorseful and willing to confess his role in the ordeal his shenanigans caused, I’ll just call him Mr. Highjinks (for obvious reasons).

For some time he’d tried to convince me to pop some pills with him. Wanting to share his and many others’ method of escaping the maddening tedium of solitary confinement. I declined of course. But he kept at it, trying all sorts of enticements. To no avail. But what I didn’t realize was how determined he really was to get me pickled. Nor that he’d use devious methods to do it.

Mr. Highjinks spikes the spread

To give a bit of diversity to the otherwise bland prison diets, prisoners – when we can afford it – sometimes make homemade pizza-like or casserole concoctions by combining foods purchased from the prison commissary and foods taken from our prison meals. Sometimes several prisoners will contribute various food items and one person will make the “meal” that is then shared around. The concoction is called different names depending what prison system you’re in. Here in Oregon it’s called a “spread.”

Well, on Jan. 31, I “put in” with Mr. Highjinks to make a spread, contributing items left over from our special Christmas commissary purchase along with some ingredients from the meal trays. Turns out Mr. Highjinks decided to spike the spread with one of his pill concoctions that has him bouncing off the walls for days at a time. To him it was all in fun.

I didn’t consume my entire portion of the spread until Saturday, Feb. 2, and that’s when and how things went south. The result was a total loss of impulse control and an odd compulsion toward self-annihilation. In short, I lost my mind.

Outta my head

First I got into a fracas with the goon squad – about seven guards dressed out in full body armor with gas, tasers and a large plexiglass shield. Then I overdosed on dozens of my own prescription anti-inflammatory medications. Followed by another clash with the goon squad, as I was being prepared to be taken to the hospital for the OD.

At the hospital – St. Alphonsus Medical Center in Ontario, Oregon – no treatment was given, except a staged blood test while I was kept hidden away in an isolated back room. Within a couple of hours of arriving, I was discharged back to the prison, where that same night – shortly after midnight, Sunday, the 3rd – I was placed on a close observation suicide (SCO) watch inside a suicide monitoring cell, where I found a razor blade. Obviously no coincidence.

The next day, Monday, the 4th, still out of my head, I broke the razor blade into three pieces and swallowed them. This was witnessed by a sergeant and captured on camera. The entire experience played before me like I was standing outside myself watching someone else.

I was again taken to the same hospital, where again no care was given. Although they went through the motions of taking x-rays – which they wouldn’t let me see – the hospital staff, who were pretty blatant about not wanting me there (apparently a skin thing), claimed the films showed definitively that no razor blades were inside me. By then I was sobering up, and, losing my suicidal compulsion, I contested that they were wrong or outright lying and should do further investigation. With a bit of attitude, the doctor – named Bean – declined and told the guards to be off with me.

To eat or not to eat

Knowing the fatal danger of a punctured intestine, I protested to prison medical and security staff upon my return that I still had three razor blade pieces inside me. They blew me off, citing the hospital report to the contrary. So I declined to eat or drink, expecting that stimulating digestion would cause the razor blades to move along and slice through my contracting entrails. Meantime I repeatedly requested medical staff to order further x-rays. They refused, indifferent to my protests.

Several admitted my concerns were valid if I actually did have razor blades inside me, but of course I didn’t, they contended, because the hospital said so. I went six days without food or liquids, and dropped 20 pounds in just as long. I requested intravenous hydration from nursing staff and the doctor – named Garth Gulick – which was also denied. I was told that I was choosing myself not to eat and drink, so they would not intervene.

The new Hippocratic Oath: ‘Do nothing’

On the fourth day without food and water, I fell unconscious in the cell and was taken by gurney to the prison’s medical center. Gulick was called and simply told them to put me back in the cell. That my severe dehydration was my own fault.

To validate refusing me medical hydration, a nurse named Folkman lyingly documented in my medical file that she witnessed me drinking water on my fifth day without food or liquids. When on the sixth day without food or liquids, Gulick assured me he’d watch me dehydrate to death, and he cited Folkman as a witness that I really wasn’t going without liquids, although my tongue was white and “furry,” my lips parched and my skin scaly. I decided to risk drinking water.

Initially, I kept vomiting the water back up, while suffering extreme stabbing pains in my abdomen. Gradually, the water stayed down. Then later that night I defecated a puddle of blood laced with bile. A nurse Fritz was alerted to the situation and ordered x-rays, taking seriously my protests that I still had razor blades inside and obviously cutting me. The next day Gulick overruled her order for x-rays.

Meantime, everyday mental health staff attempted to meet with me to try and take me off SCO status. I refused to talk to them in order to remain on SCO status for as long as possible. This way I remained under documented close monitoring in case the razor blades otherwise caused serious complications. On SCO status I remained in a completely bare, cold cell, naked except for sleeveless nylon smock and nothing else but two nylon sheets. I was left to sleep and lie on a bare concrete slab.

Throughout the ordeal I endured constant severe abdominal and kidney pains, and was discharging blood in my urine daily.

Gulick made a game of it all. Being such a fanatic for denying prisoners needed care, every time I saw him he’d play a debating game with me attempting to rationalize how he knew I was faking about the razor blades and why he would give me no medical care for that, my pain, nor any of my other issues.

He accused me of everything from malingering for reporting the abdominal and kidney pain – although urine tests repeatedly confirmed blood in my urine – and “tricking” guards into thinking I’d swallowed the razor blades, to trying to “extort” x-rays just so I could look at myself on film (!?). He ultimately admitted a concern to save the state money by not giving prisoners needed care.

The uncover up

During the ordeal, several prisoner witnesses sent letters out to my supporters and comrades, only one of which actually made it out – a letter from Cory Freiberg. Cory’s letter succeeded in prompting outside protest and inquiries on my behalf. Apparently officials didn’t expect word to get out – in fact they acted at every turn to prevent it.

Although I’d had consent for release of information on my medical condition and treatments on file for several of the inquirers since February 2012, the prison’s medical staff lied to them for almost a week, claiming they had no such consents on file so they couldn’t discuss my medical situation with anyone who called. In fact the forms on record required them to alert the inquirers when I had to be sent out to the hospital or had any other serious medical problems, but they didn’t.

Each prisoner witness who sent out letters was promptly moved out of the unit with me under some pretext. Meantime my mail was withheld and denied, then ultimately a large amount of it was “confiscated” by an Assistant Superintendent Judy Gilmore, without explanation or justification.

Also, based on a completely fabricated disciplinary report from Feb. 2, 2013, that was later dismissed, I was placed on a completely unrelated status, where, once off SCO status, I could not possess any mail nor any other property – except legal papers in pending court cases – but for four hours per day.

A cutting edge discovery

After repeated documented complaints of severe abdominal and kidney pain, another nurse ordered x-rays for me. Gulick promptly overruled her, too. Only with mounting outside pressure about my situation and a lawyer, Benjamin Haile, having arranged a call with me, did Gulick finally allow the x-rays, just to “prove,” he said, that I had no razor blades in me.

On Feb. 21, the x-rays were filmed and the “independent” radiologist’s report came back confirming that pieces of metal were indeed in my intestinal tract, having passed through my system and settled in my transverse colon.

I didn’t see Gulick again nor find out about the x-ray report until Feb. 28, at which time he changed his tune. He knew word had gotten out about my actual situation and I was scheduled to speak with Mr. Haile for the second time the next day. So Gulick’s angle then became to try and interpret and “prove” the metal showing on the x-rays was something other than razor blades. He admitted consulting with other doctors to this end. Another set of x-rays was taken on that day also.

The next day, one of the more candid nurses assured me, with the Feb. 21 x-rays showing the razor blades having passed into my large intestine, they were unlikely to cause serious damage if I ate. I then accepted my first meal in 25 days. The next day I passed my first stool in 26 days, where one of the razor pieces was found and documented by the same nurse. Overall I’d lost 29 pounds since Feb. 4.

Ducking liability

I next saw Gulick on March 5, when the Feb. 28 x-ray results couldn’t be found, and he then claimed belief that the metal showing on the Feb. 21 x-rays were staples, or something I’d swallowed since my Feb. 4 hospital visit. Yet another theory he abandoned when I pointed out that I was on a closely monitored SCO status since returning from the hospital.

He finally admitted an initial concern to protect the hospital from liability, and now himself. Once again it came down to placing monetary interests before human life and professional integrity.

On March 8 the nurse who confirmed the razor blade fragment in my stool on March 2 searched for, found and showed me the report for the Feb. 28 x-rays, and it showed at least two pieces of metal in my lower large intestine, one of which she said matched exactly the measurements and dimensions of the razor blade piece I passed and she collected on March 2. She said Gulick had not yet seen the report, and I haven’t seen Gulick again since.

This particular nurse went on to express relief that the razor blades had passed through my system without any apparent serious injury in light of Gulick’s and others’ persistence in doing nothing to help me. She compared the “miracle” to one she said she’d experienced when her young daughter swallowed an open safety pin and it passed through her without injury.

Support Rashid by buying his book, “Defying the Tomb,” with foreword and afterwords by Russell “Maroon” Shoatz, Sudiata Acoli and Tom Big Warrior. Ed Mead, former political prisoner and publisher of The Rock, a newsletter for prisoners, advises readers to “buy multiple copies of this book, read it carefully, and then get it into the hands of as many prisoners as possible. I am aware of no prisoner-written book more important than this one, at least not since George Jackson’s ‘Blood In My Eye.’”

Conclusion

From all this I recognized that from the hospital to the prison staff, a series of events played out that showed at the very least gross neglect and at the worst a consistent and shared intent to see me die – no surprise to me by the way. However foolish my actions that created the predicament, their responses can’t be justified.

Now granted, I’m not exactly loved by prison officials, so they’ve some strong motives to see me out of the way once and for all. But the outright indifference and intransigence of these medical “professionals,” and the doctor’s admitting to prioritize penny-pinching over needed care even in life-threatening cases, demands that everyone who cares about human life – and anyone with loved ones behind these walls – raise a sustained hue and cry and mobilize resistance and awareness concerning medical “professionals” relating to us with such overtly fascistic mentalities.

Otherwise many loved ones will return to homes and others’ lives with all manner of medical disorders – even communicable ones – and expenses they didn’t leave with. As for others, we should remember that the evil people do is in knowing of abuse and turning a blind eye.

Dare to Struggle, Dare to Win!

All Power to the People!

Send our brother some love and light: Kevin “Rashid” Johnson, 19370490, Snake River Correctional Institution, 777 Stanton Blvd, Ontario OR 97914. This statement was transcribed by David Rovics.

mediacoop.ca

Ann Hansen is a former member of Direct Action, an underground anarchist group active in the 1980s, who presently lives as a writer, farmer and public speaker in the Kingston area. On August 3, 2012, Ann was arrested and had her parole suspended for ‘unauthorized associations and political activity’ in the context of growing anti-prison organizing in Kingston, Canada’s prison capital. Ann, with the advice of her lawyer, chose to not publicize her arrest until after her parole hearing. On October 30, the Parole Board canceled her parole suspension and released her on stricter conditions. This is her first public statement regarding her arrest and imprisonment.

—-

On August 3, I was at my home near Kingston, Ontario, sitting in a lawn chair after supper when out of the corner of my eye I saw a line of black SUVs speeding towards our driveway. With a sinking feeling, I realized one of my reoccurring fears as a parolee was becoming a reality. Four SUVs turned into our driveway, slammed on their brakes and out hopped about six to eight cops from the Ontario Provincial Police dressed in full Darth Vader gear with a couple of them brandishing automatic weapons for full dramatic effect. As I struggled to stay calm, I noticed the acronym ROPE (Re-Offenders and Parole Enforcement Squad) in bright yellow blazoned across their bullet proof vests.

They parked askew all over the driveway, and while a couple of them with their fully automatic rifles took positions at the top of our property, the rest walked rapidly up to where I was and handcuffed me without saying a word. I asked the one female cop what this was all about and she said my parole was being suspended.

I spent a few days at the local remand center, Quinte Detention Centre, before a new parole officer (my regular parole officer was suddenly replaced) and a Security Intelligence Officer (SIO) from Correctional Service Canada (CSC) came to see me for a post suspension interview. They spent an hour and a half interrogating me and trying to intimidate me into giving them the names of anyone involved in EPIC (End the Prison Industrial Complex) or any other anti-prison activists, as well as information about any possible “bombings and arsons” which the SIO warned me I would be responsible for “if it all went sideways.” Needless to say, they were not satisfied when I told them I didn’t have names for them. The interview would have made a hilarious Monty Python script with the SIO comparing me at times to Ghandi and then in the next breath to James Holmes, the “joker” who killed twelve people during the Batman film in Colorado. The outcome of the interview wasn’t quite so hilarious.

On August 13, I was transferred to the maximum security unit at Grand Valley Prison for Women in Kitchener. Ten days earlier I had been lounging in my slippers in a lawn chair after supper, and here I was suddenly transformed into a high security federal prisoner who had to be put in leg irons and handcuffs just to be led from the admitting area into one of the pods of the maximum security unit. It was so funny, I felt like crying.

A few weeks later I received parole papers stating that the CSC parole office was “strongly recommending” that my parole be revoked with a long list of reasons why. As I suspected, the library was the scene of the ‘crime;’ I was not charged with any actual crime. The ROPE squad had arrived the day after I had screened a film about Prisoners’ Justice Day (PJD) at the Kingston Public Library. The film was followed by a ‘direct action workshop’ conducted by a lawyer who explained what to expect at a blockade/picket, which was to be held at the entrance to Collins Bay Penitentiary on PJD. These ‘direct action workshops’ have become commonplace globally as training workshops for large scale demonstrations or civil disobedience actions in order to familiarize people with the legality of different kinds of activities. They also teach people how to participate in large consensus decision-making processes, how to interact with the media, what to do if one is arrested and other skills necessary for protests.

The planned Prisoners’ Justice Day blockade/picket of Collins Bay was the most obvious reason why my parole was suspended, but there were many other ‘reasons’ listed based on paranoid suspicions that are not worth the time and effort of explaining. It is worth noting, however, the political context in Ontario, which provides the most logical reasons for my parole suspension. I believe that the reasons for my parole suspension are similar to the G20 Main Conspiracy Group prosecution; that is, ‘preventative security measures’ aimed at arresting people before any ‘illegal act’ is even committed. These kinds of measures are used not only to disrupt political actions but also to have a chilling effect on political resistance in general. They put us on the defensive and force us to fight for our basic rights, which are supposedly entrenched in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

It could be viewed as a sad day indeed when we are reduced to fight for our basic human rights, but I think it is actually a sign of the strength of our resistance. In the minds of the authorities, they are so threatened by the potential of our movements that they are reduced to trying to pre-empt our organizing efforts by arresting us for going to meetings, speaking out, and demonstrating, which are supposed to be legal activities even in a capitalist society.

I think the back story to the latest rounds of preemptive arrests in Ontario begins in the year leading up to the Toronto G20 Summit in 2010 when undercover cops were embedded in the Guelph and Kitchener/Waterloo anarchist communities. Billions of dollars were spent on police security and intelligence gathering in the year leading up to and including the actual days of demonstrations against the G20 Summit. We see similar police preparations occurring now to counter organizing against the Alberta tar sands and the line nine pipeline reversal in Ontario.

In Kingston, local police forces were no doubt taken by surprise by the sudden emergence of a relatively large and diverse movement to stop the closure of the prison farms in 2009. Prison abolitionists saw this as an opening move to free up land and money at Collins Bay Penitentiary to construct a regional superprison, as outlined in the government’s “Roadmap to Strengthening Public Safety.” In August 2010, hundreds of people in Kingston participated in a two-day blockade of the entrance to Collins Bay and Frontenac Institutions to prevent the removal of the prison farm cattle herd. The local cops were not prepared for the size of the movement and had to call in provincial police reinforcements on the second day. There were twenty-four arrests. Local prison abolitionists had also begun organizing against the plans for a massive prison expansion, which by 2012 has translated into the construction of six new prison units in the Kingston area alone.

In the months leading up to August 10, 2012, local prison abolitionists and some people involved in the prison farms campaign worked to organize for Prisoners’ Justice Day. Across the city, posters invited people to participate in an early morning blockade/picket of Collins Bay to halt construction on the new prisons as an act of solidarity with the prisoners fasting and refusing to work inside the walls. In the minds of the cops and CSC, visions of hordes of anarchists and outraged locals danced in their heads. Based on the ludicrous expectations for PJD expressed by the CSC during my Quinte interrogation, I don’t think it would have surprised them if ‘what to their wondering eyes should appear, but a miniature sleigh and eight tiny reindeer.’

For three months I waited for my revocation hearing with the Parole Board. It’s hard to be optimistic inside the maximum security unit where Ashley Smith died, and Nyki Kish waits for her appeal after being convicted of a murder she did not commit. It’s always easier to do time when you have nothing to lose, but in my case I live with two others on a small self-sufficient farm and work with a great community of comrades locally, so I have a lot to lose. In the end the Parole Board released me with stricter conditions on October 30, 2012.

There is no doubt in my mind that I would have spent many more years in prison without the tireless support of a network of friends, family, anarchist allies and a good lawyer. It becomes clear in prison, that all the efforts of the CSC are directed towards isolating the prisoner from their networks of support both inside and outside the walls. I owe my ‘freedom’ to all those who supported me throughout this episode of my life, and I just hope I can reciprocate through my solidarity and by continuing the joyous lifestyle of resistance!!

Alex Hundert, writing from and about realities in a Provincial prison in Ontario, Canada, not only informs us about the harsh realities of segregation there, but his descriptions are strikingly similar to realities in seg/SHU units in u.s. prisons.

Alex reports that he was thrown into seg as “administrative segregation”, that is he wasn’t even accused of violating some prison regulation.  This is also done in prisons across the u.s.  The unified hunger strikes in California seg units last year, were in part based exactly on this type of administrative segregation hold.  Some men in that system have been in segregation for over 20 years, not for breaking rules, but for ‘administrative reasons’ – for being revolutionaries or gang affiliated.

Alex also speaks of large numbers of mentally ill prisoners in Canadian seg units.  This is also true throughout prisons in the u.s.  These men and women rarely get any help and wind up doing most of their sentences in segregation.

The ugly realities Alex informs us about are happening regularly in Canadian prisons and usa prisons.  Prison is just one front of the overall Freedom Struggle, but it is a front where state repression, brutality and abuse are a daily reality.  Staying informed about what is happening behind the walls in prisons in your area is important and can help prisoners and political prisoners.

BY ALEX HUNDERT, briarpatchmagazine.com

This is the kind of place where Ashley Smith died in 2007. It is also the kind of place where Julie Bilotta gave birth on a cement floor last year. 

It’s the place where prisons send people to punish the already imprisoned.

I’m writing with pencil and paper from a solitary confinement cell in the segregation unit – the “Hole” – at the Central North Correctional Centre (CNCC), a maximum security provincial prison in Penetanguishene, Ontario. Here we spend 23.5 hours a day or more locked in an eight-by-twelve-foot cell. We are allowed nothing but one religious book and a pencil and paper, in addition to our prison-issue clothes (but no shoes) and toiletries (disposable toothbrush and toothpaste, a bar of soap, a towel). We get access to the yard – a large caged balcony – for 20 minutes a day, and a shower every second day. On alternating days we’re allowed a 20-minute phone call.

People like me on “administrative segregation,” isolated for security rather than punitive reasons, are granted a few extra “privileges.”

By contrast, people in the Hole for misconduct are put on LOAP (Loss of All Privileges). Following adjudication, a fancy word for the extra-legal disciplinary procedures that masquerade as hearings, one may be put on LOAP for up to 30 days. This means no access to writing materials, phone, mail, or any reading material but the Bible. The luxuries of a mattress, sheets, and blanket are withheld 14 hours a day.

The deprivation of being on LOAP can become a vortex: a spiral into personal oblivion. At its upper reaches, spending 30 days in solitary confinement with no stimulus is tantamount to torture. In response to these conditions many people act out: from frustration, rage, and desperation. They revolt. This can lead to new misconduct charges, extending their time on LOAP, or even to new criminal charges, extending their sentences. Some become trapped in this torturous cycle indefinitely.

“They push you till you snap,” a man imprisoned in these circumstances told me. Days later, the prison equivalent of a riot squad rushed his cell. Dressed in full stormtrooper gear, they dragged him off to a separate section of the unit – medical segregation – and threw him into “the rubber room.”

People who have a history of self harm, or who threaten to hurt themselves, are often put in a “suicide gown,” which is designed to be untearable. They a get a flimsy mattress and blanket made from the same tough material, and nothing else.

Ashley Smith was wearing a suicide gown when she died.

Once someone is in the segregation unit, or Hole, there is almost nothing the guards can do if he or she is in distress. They can either be lenient (breaking the rules of the institution) or punish people further. Luckily, the segregation unit guards here at the CNCC seem to tend towards leniency.

Guards are not mental health professionals, yet an alarmingly high percentage of prisoners in segregation units suffer from inadequate support for mental health conditions, ranging from PTSD and ADHD to severe dissociative disorders and schizophrenia. Many days the halls echo with cries of anguish.

It could happen anywhere

The Toronto Star’s February 7 headline for its story on the inquest into 19-year-old Ashley Smith’s prison death reads: “Kitchener correctional officer fell in line despite orders that were ‘clearly ridiculous.’” Smith was imprisoned at the Grand Valley Institute (GVI), a federal women’s penitentiary in southern Ontario, where she cut a piece of fabric from her prison gown and choked herself to death. The guards, following orders, simply watched her die.

According to the Star, GVI correctional officer Melissa Mueller “shook with frustration” at the inquest and testified that “there are inmates who need a level of help that she doesn’t know how to provide.” It is painfully clear this is also true for the guards at the CNCC. There is only one psychiatrist for a prison population of 1,200. What happened to Ashley Smith in 2007 could easily happen in this place.

Ashley Smith wasn’t the only name of an imprisoned woman to appear in the Star on February 7. Also featured was the story of pregnant prisoner Julie Bilotta, who “said jail staff didn’t believe she was in labour and ignored her pleas […] She gave birth to a boy, Gionni Lee Garlow, on the cement floor of her cell.” But Bilotta’s pleas were not totally ignored. In fact, it was her refusal to stop crying for help that landed her in the segregation cell where she gave birth.

This too could happen at the CNCC. There are nearly 200 women imprisoned here on another unit. And unlike Ashley Smith, Bilotta was imprisoned in a provincial facility, like the CNCC, in Ottawa. The Star notes that Ontario’s Mother-Child Coalition for Justice “has repeatedly asked to meet Ontario Corrections Minister Madeleine Meilleur to discuss the plight of women in jail.” And “those calls have gone unanswered.”

Prisoners here at the CNCC are all too familiar with being ignored by the Ontario Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services. Many imprisoned people, as well as lawyers and prisoners’ advocates with whom I’ve spoken, feel there is no real accountability for what occurs in Ontario prisons.

Neither the Ontario Ombudsman nor the Client Conflict Resolution Unit of the provincial Ministry is receptive to queries and complaints by prisoners and their advocates. Cindy Berry, the prison warden who was fired after Ashley Smith’s death, is now a senior project officer at the Correctional Service of Canada’s Ontario regional headquarters.

Funding and fostering mental health

In a recent letter to me, my friend Danielle asked what I thought about calls for increased funding for psychiatric programs in prisons, given that “criminalization and pathologization work hand in hand,” and state-run mental health services seem to “range from paternalistic to full-on abusive.”

While there are indeed historic and ongoing linkages between pathologization and criminalization, as well as irredeemable problems with state-run services, the reality is there are thousands of prisoners in state-run institutions whose suffering is unnecessarily compounded by woefully inadequate mental health supports. There is thus a dire need for harm reduction strategies and initiatives, including psychiatric services.

Ideally, I believe mental health supports should be funded and fostered at the most grassroots levels to build community-based structures that meet people’s needs. This would keep people out of prison and freer from state oppression. That said, I support increased funding for prison-based mental health support, including psychiatric programs, and believe it is desperately needed.

Unlike many people who identify as prison abolitionists, I do not necessarily oppose all increases to prison spending. The key is that any budget increases must be directly tied to per-prisoner spending (on programming and services), not, as now, on an expanding regime of incarceration that slashes per-person spending while swelling the prison population.

Better support for mental health is needed in both federal and provincial prisons, especially with the recent tabling of the Not Criminally Responsible Reform Act by the federal Conservatives. This legislation concerns people found Not Criminally Responsible on Account of Mental Disorder, and would mean increased rates of potentially indefinite detention and incarceration for people with mental health issues. Under the Act, their release will depend on a risk assessment, whose outcome one can imagine will largely depend on the level of mental health support available while in custody.

With dedicated mental health professionals on all segregation units, with adequate staffing and better staff training, with robust mental health support programming, and with enhanced oversight and accountability, it would be easier to believe another death like Ashley Smith’s isn’t just a matter of time. Of course, if we really want to guarantee this failed prison system doesn’t take any more lives, we could stop locking people in cages.

Postscript: This article was written between February 6 and 12, before I was returned to general population after a four-week security review in the segregation unit. Once out of the Hole, I had a chance to read a blog post by Nyki Kish, an activist imprisoned at Grand Valley Institute, where Ashley Smith died. Kish is a brilliant writer and advocate against the prison system and I strongly encourage people to read her blog post “The Unempowerable Prisoner.”

Alex Hundert was released on March 26, 2013 after serving nine months in the Central North Correctional Centre on charges related to the G20 protests in Toronto. He looks forward to rejoining community and continuing to organize against oppression in this settler-colonial society. Alex maintains a blog called Narrative Resistance.

Turning the Tide, antiracist.org

For Black youth throughout the US, especially in Watts and South Central LA, Wolverine Shakur, AKA General T.A.C.O. of the militant Black Riders Liberation Party is a leader, a strong father and husband, a bold warrior, a ghetto hero and a down brother. Black people identify with the battle he has fought against the evil forces of white racism and reaction. They identify with this principled revolutionary struggle against the capitalist system that inevitably spells misery, suffering, and genocide for the mass of Black people held captive in Amerikkka.The Black Riders played a pivotal early part in unleashing the new wave of Black militancy that’s been taking place. In 1996, General T.A.C.O. (Taking All Capitalists Out, AKA Wolverine Shakur) came together with other former Bloods and Crips in unity and created the groundwork for the resurrection of the Black Panthers, under the official name Black Riders Liberation Party. We are the new generation, and we consider ourselves to be faster, stronger, smarter and upgraded. They formulated a basic Black Commune program while in YTS prison (calling for many points as in the original 10-point program of the BPP for Self Defense, like full employment, housing, education and an end to police terrorism, and some new points, such as demanding proper medical care for AIDS victims and an immediate end to white capitalist smuggling crack cocaine into the Black community). They were eventually released to the streets and took action. Their first step was an attempt to deal with one of the most immediate and injurious symptoms of oppression – police brutality!

Armed with law booklets, video cameras, camouflage fatigues and Black karate skills, bats, knives and any other legal weapons, they created the Watch-a-Pig program and began to patrol Watts and South Central L.A.’s poor Black community — monitoring the police, observing arrests and educating brothers and sisters of their armed self- defense rights. Their determined resistance to police terrorism produced a decrease in police harassment in areas they patrolled. Panther Power to the Black Riders!

The increasing influence of the Black Riders in the poor Black neo-colony and our fierce defense of the human rights of our people caused hysterical reactions in the police forces and government. Gov. Schwarzenegger and Brown, LAPD chiefs Bratton the Butcher and Charlie Beck, and buster ass homeland security overseers like Tom Ridge made no secret of their hostility toward the Black Riders. They see our efforts to change brothers’ and sisters’ criminal mentality into a positive revolutionary mentality as a threat to their capitalist system. Black unity has always been seen by pigs and racist politicians as a threat to their control.

In April 2002, our National Spokesman Comrade Bulldog delivered a strong speech in front of San Francisco City Hall and denounced Pres. Bush’s USA PATRIOT Act as racist. In his speech, he urged Blacks to defend themselves and oppose the imperialist so-called War on Terrorism. 45,000 anti-war demonstrators were present. Six months after the speech, Comrade Bulldog was assassinated by a mysterious undercover hit squad. Nobody was ever charged with his execution-style murder, despite appeals by his family to the so-called authorities. He was only 20 years old.

In this paper, it’s impossible to even scratch the surface of the legally sanctioned paramilitary police attacks on the Black Riders Liberation Party. A simple catalog of all the martyrs of the movement, or those wounded or presently incarcerated on trumped-up charges as political prisoners or prisoners of war would take volumes. We will focus here on attacks against one leader of the BRLP, General T.A.C.O.

As General of the Black Riders, T.A.C.O. has delivered many fiery analytical speeches in Black ’hoods (communities) throughout the US and internationally on the Internet on the period in which intense urban rebellions occurred in major cities throughout the nation mainly because of some form of police brutality and oppression. Even though 30 years ago, the government’s own Kerner Commission affirmed that white racism had to be held responsible for the rebellions, General T.A.C.O. was singled out as inciting Black people to revolt. His life has been disrupted by recurring official attempts to silence him forever. Despite many death threats on his life by racist pigs, this “Weapon of Allah (God)” has refused to give up on the new Black Power struggle. He will continue to “bang on the pigs” for life.

In Feb. 1998, LA County sheriff’s deputies from the Lennox station and FBI agents raided General T.A.C.O.’s home. He was arrested for allegedly having a legally registered SKS assault rifle. Even though the charge was dismissed, he spent a year in prison on a parole violation. His wife, comrade Aryana Shakur, also was arrested for allegedly assaulting a police officer. During the raid, Comrade Aryana was slightly wounded, but recovered quickly. She was released two weeks after the raid.

In January 2000, after a major raid at our headquarters in Watts, General T.A.C.O. and 20 Black Rider warriors marched inside the 108th Precinct at 10:00 PM at night. He was arrested for allegedly assaulting two police officers. The case against him was dismissed after just four days, but he spent six months in prison on a parole violation resulting from the incident. This confrontation left General T.A.C.O. severely wounded, but he emerged out of political imprisonment stronger and put forth a renewed call for the release of all political prisoners of war. If there is no conflict, there will be no progress!

In August 2002, General T.A.C.O.’s home was raided by the Lennox sheriff’s deputies on a search and destroy mission, but he was not home. After a six-hour armed stand-off with the pigs, three comrades were detained for an hour in pig cars. The Party’s chief legal counsel James Simmons was called to the tense scene and forced the pigs to abide by the law during the standoff. Therefore, no bloodshed occurred. Comrade Aryana Shakur was arrested for allegedly possessing an M-1 carbine assault rifle. After a year of legal battles, the case was dismissed.

In August 2003, General T.A.C.O. was arrested for allegedly assaulting a Lennox sheriff’s deputy, after the officer tried to brutalize a 16-year-old comrade. The trumped-up charges were later dismissed. In late August, General T.A.C.O., Minister of Public Relations Aryana Shakur, Chief of Security Nur Bey and Captain Nadia Shakur were all arrested. This clash happened after two white male deputies from the Lennox sheriff’s station jumped out of their car and began to frisk Aryana Shakur.

We are proud that none of these arrests were made due to infiltration or informants snitching inside the organization.

Despite these attacks, the Black Riders began to increase in size, membership and influence, and to spearhead more survival programs to meet the needs and desires of the people. These included the Kourt Watch program with free legal aid, the BOSS Black on Black violence prevention and intervention program, a petition for community control of the police, a Black Power Cultural Mountain boot camp, gang truce football games, the Squeeze the Slumlord project, and free food giveaways to homeless children and adults. The Watch-a-Pig program is still being implemented regularly because it is perfectly legal and necessary. The Black Commune is the vehicle for the ultimate drive-by against the fascist state. We must continue to confront the real enemy, educate the people about the nature of the system, and take the struggle to a higher level.

August, 2007, the FBI, LAPD and sheriff’s deputies launched a military-style raid on Black Riders HQ in the Inland Empire with armored vehicles, with intentions to assassinate General T.A.C.O., but he wasn’t there. He was arrested 3 hours later on traffic violations and held three days before being released.

Nov. 2007, General T.A.C.O., Mecca Shakur and comrade Stress were arrested in separate coordinated raids in northern and southern CA, for allegedly conspiring to possess machine guns, part of a supposed plot – never formally charged – to shoot up four police stations. After a massive campaign to “Free the BR3”, the Black Riders defeated, by a judge’s order, a prosecution attempt to impose a gang injunction and enhancements on the Riders. General T.A.C.O. sacrificed himself to gain his comrades’ release, and he was sent to Corcoran State Prison for 1.5 years. He was released May 12, 2009. In June, the state strapped a GPS tracking device on his ankle.

July 2010, parole officers and police raided Gen. T.A.C.O.’s home. He was arrested for associating with other Black Riders, and told he was being arrested for ordering them to go to support Oscar Grant’s family when killer cop Mehserle was on trial (the day before the verdict was expected). Released after two weeks, he was told he hadn’t violated parole.

Sept. 15, 2011, Gen. T.A.C.O. was arrested again for associating with other Black Riders while driving down Crenshaw. LAPD Chief Charlie Beck issued a memo to the head of the Parole Board in Sacramento to try to stop his release. In the memo, Beck stated that Gen. T.A.C.O.’s “leadership of the party has caused numerous assaults on police officers and is an organized attempt to kill, harass or injure police officers.” Meanwhile Occupy LA, Occupy the Hood and others mobilized to the court to demand T.A.C.O.’s release. Beck’s memo failed because he sent it in too late, and T.A.C.O. was again released, with strict stipulations against political speech and association, shackled with the GPS modern day slave shackle. We consider this racist memo a shocking reminder and exposure, akin to the J. Edgar Hoover memo describing the Black Panther Party as the greatest threat to internal security. We have become racist Amerikkka’s worst nightmare!

The court system in this country is increasingly becoming an important tool of repression on behalf of the exploiters. It’s being used to try to crush the struggle for liberation of peace-loving poor oppressed people, not only to crush the conscious revolutionary, but to attempt to break the rebellious spirit of Black people, Chicano/Mexicanos and Puerto Ricans in general. This foul system of government is designed to oppress, exploit and intimidate all people who are not from the white Anglo-Saxon ruling class. From the violent responses of the police forces, systematic and undoubtedly calculated, it can easily be understood that the Black Riders, as opponents of this rotten system, are victims of an official conspiracy to destroy our leadership and organization. The oppressor must be harassed until his doom! He must have no peace by day or night! Free all political prisoners of war! When the prison doors are opened, the true dragon will fly out!

Black Riders Liberation Party

P.O. Box 8297

Los Angeles CA 90008, 323 289 4457

by Heshima Denham, Zaharibu Dorrough and Kambui Robinson http://sfbayview.com/2011/california-prison-hunger-strikers-propose-10-core-demands-for-the-national-occupy-wall-street-movement/

“The Constitution illustrates the complexity of this American system: it serves the interests of a wealthy elite, but also does enough for small property owners, for middle-income mechanics and farmers to build a broad base of support. The slightly prosperous people who make up this base of support are buffers against the Blacks, the Natives, the very poor Whites. They enable the elite to keep control with a minimum of coercion, a maximum of law – all made palatable by this fanfare of patriotism and unity.” – Howard Zinn

Greetings, Brothers and Sisters:

A firm, warm and solid embrace of revolutionary love is extended to you all. These words by Brother Howard Zinn are particularly relevant to the survival of the evolving Occupy Wall Street Movement.

Most of you are familiar with the NARN Collective Think Tank (NCTT) from the programs and ideas that have come out of this body from both Pelican Bay SHU and here in Corcoran SHU, most recently our work in the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition. Like the Arab Spring, and our own struggle to abolish indefinite confinement in sensory deprivation SHU torture units, the Occupy Wall Street Movement expresses a fundamental rule of materialist dialectics, the transformation of quantity into quality, expressed eloquently by the Honorable Comrade George Lester Jackson some 40 years ago: “(C)onsciousness is directly proportional to oppression.”

The ruling 1% will never concede anything without struggle, which requires unity of purpose, broad-based organization, fluid strategy and effective tactics. Progressive movements in this nation have succeeded or failed based on how effectively they understood this reality. Following the Civil War, Reconstruction gains were repealed and Jim Crow was introduced. The Civil Rights Movement taught us the necessity of broad-based organization and accurate agreement of the opposition’s center of gravity: their point of weakness. We learned not to underestimate the power of the ruling 1% and its state tools, when the Counter-Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO) dismantled the Black Liberation Movement, and ushered in the world of greed, corruption, inequality and mass incarceration you have inherited.

As we watched the Day of Action unfold, witnessing the predictable brutal response of the tools of the 1%, with great effort we detached from our rage and analyzed the comments and responses of various pundits, common people, agents of the state and protestors. As you read this analysis, consider where the men who wrote it live: Here, in Corcoran State Prison, labeled the “worst of the worst,” they’ve survived decades in solitary confinement in the SHU (security housing unit), one of the worst hell holes on earth. Out of despair and unimaginable cruelty and brutality, they forge hope for the beloved community. These men were leaders in the hunger strikes [last] summer and fall that involved over 12,000 California prisoners.

Three things immediately became obvious from that analysis: 1) The mass media and pundits were counting on the national Occupy movements to peter out and fizzle. Those who own the mass media want that message to be disseminated to undermine support for the movement.

2) Though most in this nation not involved directly in the occupations agree with our opposition to corporate greed and institutional inequality, there were no clearly articulated demands around which the movement could organize the broader masses.

3) This lack of clear demands and coherent strategic and tactical organization by the national Occupy Movement was undermining its intent, diluting its potential, and degrading its motive force.

The first step in defeating an enemy as powerful and organized as the ruling 1% is understanding the basis of their power. When you analyze opponents, you must see beyond the superficial to the point of vulnerability on which their power is based. Striking this point will inflict disproportionate damage.

It must be understood that radical social change is no different than warfare, and warfare is a form of power. Power systems share the same basic structures. The most visible thing about them is their appearance, what is seen and felt. The outward display of repressive power is a deceptive fabrication, a manifestation of insecurity, since power dares not expose its weaknesses. The key lies in determining what their point of vulnerability is, and to do so you must understand the structure of the power system and the culture in which it operates. We began this discussion with a concise analysis of just this point by Howard Zinn.

The real point of vulnerability in American democracy is the social and political support of its citizens. The key factor thus far in failing to harness mass support is the lack of broad-based demands around which people who may support our message but not our movement can be educated, organized and mobilized to join the movement and transform not only the nature and structure of U.S. society, but the WORLD.

To that end the NCTT Corcoran SHU has made a comprehensive analysis of statements from participants of all the national Occupy movements and some of those abroad and compiled these ideas into 10 core demands of the Occupy Wall Street Movement. We call on you to disseminate these 10 core demands to all the Occupy movements across the nation and the world. We call on all the Occupy movements to convene a national forum – online or at a national convention – to discuss the adoption of these 10 core demands as the definitive goals and organizing points around which the movement is based and the next level of our struggle is to be waged. These 10 core demands can be augmented or amended to take into account the broadest cross-section of the 99% possible and the collective will of the movement:

The 10 Core Demands of the Occupy Wall Street Movement National Coalition

1. We want full employment with a living wage for all people who will work. The US Declaration of Independence states in part “that all men … are endowed … with certain inalienable Rights; that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among Men,

deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” Life is a right and thus the means to live – work, making a living wage – must be equally guaranteed. If corporate business will not provide full employment even as they sit on trillions of dollars fleeced from the surplus value of labor, then the means of production should be taken from them and placed in the community.

2. We want an end to institutional racism and race- and class-based disparities in access to, and quality of, labor, education, health care, criminal defense, political empowerment, technology and healthy food. Structural features of US capitalism prevent broad cooperation between the 99% from various racial, ethnic and cultural backgrounds. We will no longer allow this divide and rule arrangement to govern our relationships.

3. We want decent and affordable housing for all people. Housing is a fundamental necessity. But government has consistently sided with Wall Street, who are responsible for the single greatest loss of housing in the nation’s history[. F]ederal, state and local officials criminalize homelessness and poverty. The government should mandate a readjustment of home equity debt on all US homes so what people owe reflects what the properties are now worth. Empty Federal Housing Authority properties should be made into co-ops so communities can create decent housing for all.

4. We want affordable, equal access to higher education for all. We need education that teaches the true history of colonialism, chattel slavery, repression of organized labor, police repression and imprisonment as tools of capitalist exploitation, and the perpetuation of imperialism in US power systems and corporate financial markets. Speculative profiteering drives up tuition, leaving most in debt and pricing higher education out of reach for communities of color and the poor. Usurious student debt should be forgiven in full.

5. We want an immediate end to police brutality and the murder of oppressed people in the U.S., particularly in the New Afrikan (Black), “Latino,” immigrant and underclass communities and among those protesting in this nation. We recognize the police and other state paramilitary agencies are, and have always been, the enforcement army of the ruling 1%. We recognize such brutal and unwarranted treatment is the daily existence of New Afrikan (Black), Latino, immigrant and underclass communities and people in this nation. Self-defense is a human right. Community organized oversight and self-defense forces should be organized to monitor and record police and defend the people. We will suffer no more attacks like those at UC Davis, no more Scott Olsens or Oscar Grants to be injured or killed by the tools of the 1%.

6. We want an end to the prison industrial complex as a profit base – from our tax dollars – for the disposal of surplus labor and the poor. We want an end to indefinite solitary confinement torture units in the US. Mass incarceration of people of color and the poor will no longer be tolerated. The prison population in the U.S. has exploded 600% since 1981. The continued indefinite confinement of human beings in SHUs and other supermax torture units must be abolished. True rehabilitation, such as vocational programs, access to higher education and community-based parole boards must become the new order of the day.

7. We want an end to all corporate and financial influences in the political process in the U.S. The nature of U.S. society has been of the rich, for the rich and by the rich[. This] marginaliz[es] the people. The U.S. will finally become a nation of the people, for the people and by the people, where only individual citizens have influence in the democratic process. Ban all lobbyists, donors and special interest groups from local, state and federal electoral and legislative processes.

8. We want an end to imperialist wars of aggression and sending our youth off to kill and die to enforce the economic interests of big oil and other corporate concerns and as an impetus to keep from addressing domestic ills.

9. We want a bottoms-up approach to economic development and labor-capital relations in the US. The state has aligned itself so intimately for so long with the interest of the ruling 1% that it has become enamored exclusively to a top-down approach. This has resulted in a 281% increase in the growth of wealth in the top 1% of this nation, while the bottom 90% have seen their incomes flat over 20 years. We must now uplift the quality of life from the bottom rung up – empowering the disenfranchised, and directing bailouts and subsidies to the people, not banks and billionaires.

10. We want a more equitable distribution of wealth, justice and opportunity at every level of society. There is enough food that no one need be hungry. There are enough unoccupied structures that no one need be homeless. We have enough educators, institutions, knowledge and technology that no one need be without a degree or skilled trade. There’s enough work to be done that no one needs to be without a job. Only the stranglehold of the super-rich 1% on every institution and apparatus of this nation’s infrastructure ensures that their opulence and privilege are maintained at the expense of the 99%.

Please send this proposal to each Occupy Movement. In addition, we call on each individual Occupy Movement to begin organizing in and with the underclass communities in your city or town. We call for all my brothers and sisters in the ghettos, projects, barrios and trailer parks across this nation to begin organizing with Occupy around collective programs that can serve to begin realizing these 10 core demands by our unity and contributions alone. The NCTT, both here in Corcoran SHU and Pelican Bay SHU are committed to making meaningful contributions to the development of such community action programs, which we will outline in our next communication.

There are some 47 million people in Amerika living below the poverty line, another 150 million or so barely getting by – almost two thirds of this nation’s population, all of them part of the 99%. It is here that we will find our most lasting support, and thus it is here that you must begin forging meaningful ties. These are overwhelmingly New Afrikan (Black), Latino, immigrant and poor communities.

You champion us all with your ideas and the courage of your convictions, just as we continue to support you with our sacrifices and insight. It is now time to take the movement to its next evolution and ultimately to its inevitable conclusion: victorious revolutionary change.

Your greatest power lies in your unity and cooperation and ultimately your organizational ability. The power of the people far surpasses all the repressive violence attacking you/us, surpasses the wealth of the 1%, who will stop at nothing to silence us all.

This is a protracted struggle; there will be no 90-day revolution here. Victory will require sacrifice, tenacity and competent strategic insight. The question you must ask is: Are you prepared to do what is necessary to win this struggle? If you answer in the affirmative, commit to victory and accept no other alternative. The people, as we are, are with you. Until we win, our love and solidarity to all those who love freedom and fear only failures.