News from the Gulags
By Carol Strick, NCX East Coast Correspondent
I am tired of the lies, the lack of accountability and sadists
controlled by state lies. How do you answer these letters?
"Dear Parole Board, My name is Andy. You denied me parole in August
even though I had no misconducts and completed all my programs. Two weeks
ago I was diagnosed with liver cancer and was found to be terminally ill
(see attached Dr. reports). They gave me less than 3 months to live. My
family wants me to be home with them and I love them so much. Would you
please let me go home? I've done everything you asked of me. Respectfully,
Andy"
"Dear Carol, Andy died last night. It makes me sick. Andy, a dear friend
and Brother, was doing a 5-10 sentence. He had no write-ups or misconducts
and had completed all of his programs. Upon his minimum, the parole board
said NO, and gave him a one-year hit."
Who are these judges/sadists on parole boards? Who are they to decide and
get paid for it to boot?
Mental "Health"
Mental Health Units in the Gulags are as danger- ous to the well-being of
inmates as any form of torture. Prisoners are held hostage to whatever is
necessary to break their will and spirit.
"Hello, please help me! I was arrested in Dallas at the age of 15 in
1987 and certified to stand trial as an adult. I was convicted and sent
to the Texas prison system at age 16. I am now 24. In Administrative Segregation
we are handcuffed every time we exit our cells. I have been attacked several
times by prison staff. They attack us for things they don't like and for
taking legal action. They lie at disciplinary hearings and have started
to plant shanks in our cells. They have taken our radios, TVs, school programs,
and commissary privileges. There are no newspapers or magazines for indigent
inmates.
Can you imagine the mental state of a person in this type of environment
for months or years? These officials are creating madmen who will one day
be released into the free world. No one can predict how we would act after
suffering this type of isolation and treatment. I have filed my last lawsuit.
It's time to meet these people head on.
Stiles Unit, Beaumont, TX."I could kill myself and I could kill these
prisoncrats. Look at my life. I have none. I am mentally ill from being
raped here so many times."
"The mental health counselor talked about nothing but sex. She used
the Delilah method to get inside my psyche with the protracted purpose of
introducing me to some form of psychotropic drug. The sweet-talking lady
tried to convince me that my life would be better if I had some Benadryl
to help me sleep at night. The Benadryl would advance to Sinequan. At that
point I would be turned over to the "undertaker"! He would prescribe
Benadryl, Sinequan, Prolixin, Haldol, and more. Jailhouse lawyers, activists,
radicals and so-called troublemakers received this treatment.
"The sweet lady counselor would send you a birthday card, build you
up psychologically, make you dependent on her, hoping to replace that dependency
with drugs. Psychiatric betrayal has been well documented to force people
to become state junkies. Many of the drugs forced upon us have dangerous
side-effects. Haldol can cause grand mal seizures, blackouts, dizzy spells,
and severe headaches, yet it is freely used in here. Men who have lived
their whole lives without drugs are having them shoved down their throats."
Lawmakers are in cahoots by passing the Prisoners Litigation Reform Act,
making it impossible to recover damages for mental or emotional injury suffered
while in custody. The intent is clear: to allow psychological torture and
torment with complete impunity by prison and state officials."
Campaign to End Control Units
On November 8, 9, and 10, the Campaign to End Control Units met in Chicago.
Hosted by the Puerto Rican Cultural Center and its ebullient director, Alejandro
Molino, our diligent sisters from AFSC-Bonnie Kerness and Pat Clarke-were
organizers, and Nancy Kurshan (CEML) provided excellent housing arrangements.
All of us who attended are familiar with the torturous conditions in these
units: 23 or 24-hours a day locked down, horrendous torture that exists
in this confinement without accountability.
One prisoner in a unit summed it up: "Control units are the wave of
the future. It's not just the isolation and sensory deprivation that's the
worst part. Although try to imagine never focusing your eyes farther than
15 feet away for two or three years, then being let out and find that you
have problems seeing things at a distance. It's the brutality so prevelant
in every control unit that is so shocking." Control units by design
and function promote senseless violence. They are touted as housing for
"the worst of the worst"-the most dangerous and violent prisoners,
which is a lie. All it takes is a couple of bogus D.R.s (disciplinary reports)
to change your institutional score and automatically reclassify you there.
This "We're-not-going- to- take-any-shit-from-them" and "We're-going-to-show-these-animals-who's-running-things-even-if-it-kills-them"
attitude of the brass trickles down to the guards. The worst sort of torture,
the most sadistic beating, becomes commonplace, a daily occurrence, until
it no longer shocks the conscience of even the best intentioned guard. I
have seen some really deranged behavior in here. Imagine beating a prisoner
senseless, ripping off his clothes, shackling him spread-eagle to a large
piece of plywood, then picking up the plywood and leaning it up against
the hallway walls so that he is hanging upside down, and leaving him like
that for a week-on display." Auschwitz? Dachau? No, a control unit
in Arizona, USA!
The meeting was attended by activists from many states, including New York,
New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Florida, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin,
Colorado, and California. It was especially uplifting to find students and
recent university graduates included. The students are trying to expand
their network. Anybody interested can contact O.A.A.P, P.O. Box 285, Oberlin,
Ohio 44074. Their journal, Caged In, is a collection of statements and resources
professionally compiled by exemplary students. Other students are working
at the Rocky Mountain Peace Center, 1520 Euclid Ave., Boulder, CO 80302.
The networking and camaradery from the Campaign are invaluable. We discussed
ways to get this information to the public. People interested in joining
can contact Pat Clark, AFSC, 1501 Cherry St., Philadelphia, PA 19102 or
Bonnie Kerness, AFSC, 972 Broad St., 6th Floor, Newark, NJ 07102.
We discussed the strength of organizing and sharing information and helping
each other. A survival manual for prisoners locked in these cages 23 and
24 hours a day was suggested. The meeting was inspiring. We are strongly
united, and our strength comes from brothers and sisters on the front lines
inside the kamps.
It is more than 50 years since the Holocaust, but ordinary sadists, and
ordinary brutes are committing torture with technology. We cannot let this
uncivilized situation continue any longer. BRING IT DOWN!
Hitler's Willing Executioners
Hitler's' Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans & the Holocaust by
Jonah Goldhagen N.Y. Knopf, 1996, 619 pp. -$30.00
In a new book, Daniel Goldhagen questions the causes of the Holocaust. He
expounds on two theories: the "eliminationist" theory that the
goal of genocide was a consideration of Hitler in the twenties and that
the holocaust occurred with the approval of the German population. A group
that Goldhagen refers to as "willing executioners" included Germans
who were not members of the Nazi party; therefore "representatives
of the executioners certainly occurred outside Germany in countries such
as Poland.
He emphasizes the mentality of anti-Semitism amongst the "ordinary
executioners" and places the number of "executioners" between
100,000 and 500,000 from a population of 700,000,000. When the war was nearing
the end, Himmler thought it best to stop killing Jews and ease up on the
brutality inflicted upon them. He issued orders to that effect, which were
ignored by the men he commanded, so ingrained with hatred that they couldn't
change!
Goldhagen's theories can be extended to the current situation in the U.S.
prison camps. The prison population is disproportionately Black, Latino
and Native American. Racism has been the political agenda in this country
since its founding. How many people are employed in America today as hangmen,
members of riot squads or as "ordinary" sadistic employees in
the Gulags? Who are these people in brown uniforms or white shirts? Do the
"ordinary" citizens have any idea what is going on in these camps?
Goldhagen describes the German conception of Jews as "subhuman, satanic
and cancerous," reasons to justify annihilation, torture and degradation.
How has the state managed to desensitize the "ordinary" American
to human suffering?
Emergency AlertS
George Skatzes is sentenced to die at the hands of the State of Ohio for
his part in the Locasville uprising. Actually, George is responsible for
saving the lives of guards taken hostage. He is being wrongly accused because
he refused to be a snitch. Write to his sister and ask what you can do to
help.
Mrs. Jackie Bowers
P.O. Box 1591, Marion, OH 43301-1591
On January 7, 1983, Tyrone Moore, AS1858 (SCI, Box 244, Graterford, PA 19426),
was charged with robbery/murder. Tyrone was a boxer in Joe Frazier's gym
at the time of the robbery. He was forced to be represented by two extremely
ineffective public defenders who failed to investigate his alibi witnesses
at the gym and never communicated with him about relevant issues involving
clear violations of his rights.
The prosecution tainted the jury by sending suppressed evidence into the
deliberation room. His first trial ended in a mistrial due to prosecutorial
misconduct. Tyrone was attacked by prison guards at Luzerine County Prison
during a mock riot, beaten severely and cut, then made to appear at his
retrial wearing the same bloody clothes. Attorneys held back crucial evidence
of a prosecution witness who lied and perjured himself. A judge commented,
"Even though Mr. Moore wasn't identified doesn't mean he wasn't involved"
and misled the jury in directing them.
Readers-inside and outside prison-the anti-death penalty sentiment in this
country is going nowhere in fast forward. We have to start a real mass movement
to end this obscenity. A concerted letter-writing campaign must stop the
state from murdering Tyrone Moore and end capital punishment everywhere
in the country.
Write to Gov. Thomas Ridge, Statehouse, Harrisburg, PA to stop the planned
murder of Tyrone and tell the governor of your state to say NO to the death
penalty.
Medical Care
Inmate Raul Gonzales in a Texas prison had a heart condition and the doctor
(if you can call him that) took away his nitroglycerin heart pills, saying,
"You're all right." Two days later, the man died of a heart attack
in his bunk. He had gone to medical numerous times that day, saying he needed
help, but the infirmary door was always locked. After the locked door, there
is a steel-barred gate, also locked. This is medical care?
A young guy, 21 years old, was playing ball. He got hurt. They said it wasn't
serious. He was screaming with pain all night. In the morning they found
him dead.
"Upon reviewing the video, it became apparent that [the guard] was
on video wearing the same handbrace used to assault me, to insure injury
by lacerating my right eye." Handbraces, sticks with steel tips, countless
devices to hurt people-who invented them? Who manufactures them? Find out.
Boycott them!
A man who is HIV positive has been prescribed double portions of food. The
guards, "ordinary sadists" with no accountability, decided not
to give him the second portions. Sick as he is, he has been beaten by guards
recently. He writes, "A 5-man team of officers, suited up in protective
gear, with plastic shield and helmets, slammed the shield on my cell door.
Immediately, without having asked me to submit to a strip search, the Sgt.
yelled, "Inmate's refusing to comply with orders for a strip search"
to get the 5-man team to have my cell-door opened so that they could run
in and assault me." Fifty years after Hitler and nothing has been learned!
Scam Department
Whackenhut, one of America's giant privatized prison companies, is trying
to spread its ten-tacles further. Their latest scam: "employee leasing."
Companies lay off workers then contract with another company (Whackenhut)
to hire the same workers back and lease them to the original company!
Whackenhut donated $500 to three Palm Beach county candidates running for
sheriff. The company was hoping to thereby sell their services to the sheriff's
office. Correction officers are worried that privatization would oust them.
Sounds like a good fight ahead.
From Belleview (different spelling but they got the name right), Florida.
"Dear Inmate, you are most likely angry, unhappy and lonely [no kidding,
Dick Tracy!], but we can offer you something positive. We have an offer
for your benefit: money! You can prepare for your release and an exciting
life. We are offering inmates an opportunity to invest in the stock market.
Money markets and mutual funds may be out of your grasp [small investors
making 35¢ an hour], but investing with [crooks like] us can bring
you a return. Do not forget the $2.50 handling charge required with each
payment.
[P.S. Any homeless friends? We're devising investment schemes for the homeless.
We take loose change, food stamps, and WIC checks-anything not nailed down!
That's why we're rich and you're inside!]
The Prison Litigation Reform Act
The 59th Annual Convention of the National Law-yers Guild was held in Miami
from October 24-28. Five hundred lawyers and political activists from 40
states were estimated to attend. The Convention focused on organized labor,
anti-poverty, affirmative action, and immigration, among other topics. Spirited,
informative discussions were rewarding.
On Saturday afternoon an excellent panel, consisting of Audrey Bomse, Angus
Love, and Charles Holman, described the negative effects of the Prison Litigation
Reform Act. The Act, in essence, is a way of keeping prisoners with less
representation. It is a Kafkaesque erosion of their rights. The thrust is
to make it even more difficult or impossible for prisoners to litigate.
Even outside attorneys who defend prisoners (besides jailhouse lawyers)
are affected. Their salaries have been predetermined by the Act. This is
the first time that attorneys who represent prisoners are addressed separately
from the rest of the legal profession. It is an extremely dangerous precedent.
Every provision in the PLRA is unconstitutional. It violates everything
we have been told about guaranteeing basic rights for all. This plan to
strip prisoners of their rights can very easily become a precedent to strip
other groups (especially immigrants) of their rights.
Law enforcement, the D.O.C., or prosecutors can intervene and stop a "lawsuit"
if they can show that releasing a prisoner will be dangerous to society!
The conditions for litigation are now so stringent that the PLRA plan is
obviously to stop all forms of litigation, including class action suits.
Just in case there are any loopholes in the PLRA, states are putting their
own versions into law. Also, to insure themselves against prisoners finding
themselves up against a stone wall in federal court and going into state
court.
The PLRA addresses the fact that inmates should pay for medical visits and
worse: room and board! If these charges aren't paid from inmates' canteen
fund or any other moneys, gain time can be attacked and for parolees, collection
agents will be used to haunt prisoners a la Jean val Jean!
More than 100 years ago, Victor Hugo, a prison abolitionist, decried the
inhumanity behind incarceration.
Things have worsened with technology and as prisoners' rights are further
eroded and they have nothing at stake, unrest will spread.
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