At the current time we are locked down due to an inmate stabbing. Mysteriously an inmate who has recently brought a $200,000 lawsuit against this facility gets stabbed while everyone else is at breakfast and he's in his cell asleep and only the prisoncrats have access to rolling the bars open! Coincidence? I don't think so!
-- an Indiana prisoner, 21 April 1997
SLAVE'S WAGES
i would very much like to contribute to MIM but my slave salary ain't nothing. i only make $1.20 a day. After i get my necessities i am broke.
-- a New Jersey Prisoner, 24 April 1997
RESISTANCE TO TORTURE TACTICS
I would like to correspond with you to give you an insight into the mechanics of the prison system. I have several administrative documents, detailing the various methods used to punish, control or outright liquidate "rebellious" prisoners. I have been subjected to every form of corporal punishment conceivable: chemical agents (C587 "irritant dust/gas"), overnight shackling (hands and legs), anti-psychotic drugs, straight jackets, four-point beds, beatings with night sticks (always by more than one officer -- they never come alone), strip cells, etc. That I am still alive is a testament to the Divine Will. I fought with officers, alone, on the offensive and defensive, for 9 months straight before securing a transfer (this occurred at Wende Correctional Facility, a facility next to Attica).
-- a New York Prisoner, 24 April 1997
THE PIGS JUST HAVEN'T GOTTEN CAUGHT YET
Nothing major happens, only A LOT of little things. I find a lot of unprofessional events happen. Officers write bunk cases, we call them "Haters". I say their job description is not to come make us miserable. We are already being punished.
The only difference between the men and women in this prison is the corrections officers (the men in gray) haven't gotten CAUGHT yet!
Prison life is a real trip. Rules change every day, every shift. It's real confusing.
-- a Texas prisoner, 10 April 1997
CHOO-CHOO
The gravy-train never stops building prisons, hiring cops.
Its boxcars filled both day and night with desperate men in endless fights.
Silver bracelets, lock-up time, laser-printed budgets climb, El Reno builds new "mega-max" to shore-up Public Income Tax.
So just act crazy, build up steam, you're working for The American Dream.
-- a Florida prisoner, 24 February 1997
TEXAS DENIES ACTIVIST PRISONER MEDICATION
To: the Honorable MIM
...I am being denied my heart medication, because of my legal activities in assisting other prisoners in filing their grievances, civil rights complaints and criminal appeals. Because I refuse to stop assisting other prisoners with legal matters, the Alfred D. Hughes Unit Medical Department is retaliating against me. And one of their retaliatory acts is to deny me my heart medication.
The law has been well established that it is unconstitutional to harass and retaliate against any prisoner for his past or present legal activities, as in this case. But the Alfred D. Hughes Unit Medical Doctors and personnel have decided to put me to sleep. And their deliberate indifference with malicious intent to cause harm with disregard for life will work unless you print this letter. And even then it may be too late to help me. But if in my death I can stop other prisoners from experiencing this cruel and inhumane treatment, then my death will not be in vain!...
Respectfully Submitted,
-- a Texas prisoner, 7 March 1997
**Letters of Protest can be sent to: The Warden, Alfred D. Hughes Unit, Route 2, Box 4400, Gatesville, TX 76597.**
TEXAS DEATH CAMPS
I was shipped to death camp, French Robertson Unit. I do not call it Death Camp for no reason. In 1996 the guard shot one inmate in the field due to [the prisoncrat's] marital problems. Then they beat another to death. Two guards just got indicted in court for that.
The Head Warden tried to cover their asses. As he did, other killings have happened on this unit. The Head Warden has not run this unit by humane standards. He has let the CO'zzz [correctional officers] run wild and all over [Texas Department of Criminal Justice] Policy.
The Captains on this unit clearly stated to me when I got here, and put in isolation then solitary, that Federal nor State law apply on this unit. Many of my medical restrictions have been taken. My special brace and limb have been taken. I have been threatened if I keep speaking out to the people in the Free World, I would end up Dead as others have on this unit.
My MIM Notes and my last letter sent to your office were not sent. I am keeping a record to file in Federal Court on the mail room as I did on the my last unit. In which the Mail Room Supervisor has been not only fired but blamed by TDCJ. The Head Lady of the mailroom has also been brought up on Federal charges.
Much of my legal mail has not left this unit. When I get enough, I'll be in Federal Court and will press Federal Charges on the Head of the mailroom for mail tampering. [I'm] not saying the United Snakes is the way to go, we need a change. We are building in Texas for a new way.
-- a Texas prisoner, 15 April 1997
STUDY GROUP MEMBERS FACE REPRESSION
The library staff here is against MIM Notes, so there is no way to get MIM Notes into the library here. As for study groups, small groups have formed and we discuss MIM Notes and other materials. Yet staff is plotting against these groups and many have been threatened with tickets or transfers to a high security joint. I will try to encourage prisoners here to write about the threats and mis- treatment going on here, yet that task may not succeed and I may up in the hole.
--A Michigan Prisoner, 15 April 1997
CALL TO STUDY AND UNITE FOR REVOLUTION
Since my last letters, I have been in segregation. My oppressors have beaten me and others as a result of my Study Group. I've had the pigs beat me for refusing to relinquish my love for the tremendous struggle we face.
I will sacrifice my life for what I believe and if my oppressor, Mr. Wayne Garner, thinks that revolutionary politics is a threat to security, planning/conspiring to participate a disturbance or strike then so be it.
Comrades unite with your brothers and sisters. Stand strong nationwide. Struggle together in revolutionary change. Frustrations and disappointments will come, the battles will be many, sacrifice will be high, but my dear Comrades in the end the oppressive, repressive regime of Capitalism will fall.
Comrades in prison continue your fight when you leave the walls. Start study groups outside as I have. Continue your study groups inside as well. Never let the oppressor get control and power over you or your study group by threats, intimidation, harassment, manipulation or humiliation. Let MIM be your heart. Stand Iron-clad and be willing to sacrifice. I call on everyone in the struggle with me to fight censorship of MIM and Unite. It will never be said my revolution was a pastime.
Respectfully, In Struggle,
-- a Georgia prisoner, 14 April 1997
FLORIDA PRISONER FIGHTS CENSORSHIP
My grievances about MIM Notes being censored continue to fall on deaf ears. I've learned however, despite what the institution claims, it's not your paper, but the person who reviews it.
Enclosed you'll find my attempts to resolve this problem. Funny how each level of grievance was answered by the same person. It took me three months of them doing nothing to finally realize how futile my lone fight with them really is.
On the brighter note, your last mailing DID make it passed the censors!
In Struggle,
-- a Florida prisoner, 20 March 1997
MICHIGAN PRISONER FIGHTS CENSORSHIP
Dear Friend: In response to your questions regarding my receiving the paper, I have not received any papers since my arrival at Lakeland Correctional Facility. This matter has been exhausted thru the Grievance procedure and was denied access to the paper, and it has been placed on the permanent restriction list.
Enclosed you'll find a copy of a court Order [I] recently received. I sent a copy of all the documents pertaining to the rejection of MIM Notes and the telephone Rip-Off. So I have not been idle in what I consider a blatant disregard for First Amendment Rights under the guise of security.
-- a Michigan prisoner, 8 April 1997
***Letters of Protest can be sent to: Warden, Lakeland Correctional Facility, 141 First St., Coldwater, MI 49036 or Frank J. Kelly, Attorney General, Corrections Division, PO Box 30216, Lansing, MI 48909, (517) 335-7021***
ISOLATION AND OPPRESSION IN ILLINOIS
Comrades, Revolutionary Greetings to one and all. My Brothers, here is an update on the situation at the Pontiac Correctional Center in Illinois.
As of yesterday indigent inmates and people, like myself, who are short of monetary funds will no longer be able to write or mail letters to our families unless we have some kind of money in our trust fund.
And as you already know, we have no phone usage either because of a new policy prohibiting the use of phone privileges by residents in C-grade. (Too bad we are all in C-Grade in Pontiac)
Well here goes a new oppressive move by these prisoncrats. As on Jan. 1st, 1997, Pontiac Correctional Center (PCC) will be made into an All Segregation Facility. We will be denied contact visits, as a glass partition will be placed in the segregation visiting room. We also have a condemned unit visiting facility. Through the c/o [correctional officer] grapevine it has been heard that all our clothes (jeans, shirts, color-striped socks, and any other accessories) will be confiscated and we will be made to send it home.
We will be given "state gear" (3 jumpsuits, 3 T- shirts, 3 pairs of underwear, 3 all white socks, 1 pair of boots) till we leave, this segregation facility. When we leave here we may again purchase our clothes at whatever facility we arrive at! This plan is going to be executed because of all the money they will be losing by turning PCC into a Seg-Facility (without the inmate organizations, phone calls and with a limited commissary, this facility will lose millions per year)
And this plan is also being executed to anger the already oppressed into giving them more reason to request more money from the state to oppress us further because of assaults.
They try to pull Brothers here into doing something that will hurt us and put money in the hands of these turn keys. (out of respect for the animal I will not refer to these assholes as pigs)
As of now, their motives are plain to see. All we are to them is expendable..
In total Resistance,
-- An Illinois Prisoner, 2 January 1997
MEGAN'S LAW UPDATE
Dear MIM, Wanted to respond to your request for info on the fascist "registration laws," commonly known as "Megan's Laws." [This is a reference to an Under Lock & Key letter in the Sept. 1, 1996 issue of MIM Notes entitled, "Prisoner Receives Longer Sentence For Maintaining Innocence"]
As of July 1996, every state in Amerika except Massachusetts required sex offenders to register their addresses with the police. In Maine, Vermont, Delaware, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, South Dakota, Kansas, Colorado, Idaho, and Arkansas the public can go to the police and learn about neighborhood offenders. Rhode Island, West Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan, Wisconsin, Montana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Nebraska, New Mexico, Wyoming and Hawaii have no notification provisions. In the remaining states police are required to notify community or designated groups about "dangerous" offenders.
Federal kourts in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut have held that notifications in cases of those convicted prior to passage of each state's Megan Law is unconstitutional and have banned implementation of those provisions. They have allowed, however, police to compel them to register and pigs began arresting people for failing to register even in cases of those whose "crimes" occurred years before passage of the new law.
The word "crime" is in quotes because "child sex abuse" has been so broadly defined to include everything from violent rape-murder to seeing your child naked. Virtually every citizen could be convicted of a sex offense, including grandmothers (who may possess the classic infant photo of us lying bars-assed on a bear rug) as child pornographers. Parents of offspring who 20 or more years later at the hands of "dys-psychotherapists" are convinced that all their current life problems stem from suddenly "remembered" abuse requiring hospitalization until their insurance runs out. Clergy (are targeted) for whom some ex-parochial school student figures s/he can hit up the church's deep pockets.
An even more blatant abuse of pig power are the new civil commitment laws which will make it possible to keep sex offenders indefinitely, even for life, AFTER they have served out their criminal sentences! You can serve time for murder and not be subject to commitment or even registration. Is the message we should take from this that it's OK to go out and kill your pig oppressors but, but don't dare jerk them off.
-- a Connecticut prisoner, 12 March 1997
P.S. Regarding the Pennsylvania Prisoner who wrote, he should be maxing out about now. He does not need to sign anything to be released. Pennsylvania however is in the Third Circuit with New Jersey, so he will have to register with his local pig department upon release or be subject to re-arrest.
MIM ADDS: We agree that the word crime should be in quotes, but for slightly different reasons. We recognize that the Amerikkkan imperialists are the real criminals and do not think they are fit to judge the guilt or innocence of others. It is true also that so-called "criminal behavior" targets oppressed nationals with in this country.
At the same time it is our goal to expose the myth that most rapists are black and strangers. The facts prove that most sexual abuse is done by family member and trusted adults, like clergy members. We oppose Megan's law because it perpetuates a myth that people don't know their sexual abusers and it criminalizes oppressed people.
MIM does not think Megan's Law is a joking matter. Just because there isn't an equivalent law pertaining to murder, doesn't mean there may not be one being drafted up. The police and these laws are used to as social control to support the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie. MIM would not encourage anyone to murder the pig oppressors at this time in Amerikkka.
***Additional information about Megan's Law was printed in September
1, 1996 issue of MIM Notes.***