Dear Comrades at MIM, Revolutionary greetings and  a clenched fist salute! While reading "Under Lock  and Key" in the January 15, 1997, #132 Issue, I  ran across a letter written by a comrade in  Pennsylvania (Red Alert! Revolution Postponed in  Pennsylvania). I was struck the instant I laid  eyes upon this letter. I know exactly how he  feels. My fellow incarcerated brothers here are  very similar to those he is attempting to educate.  The inmates in Arizona are quite pacified and  extremely uneducated when it comes to the  revolutionary ideas of MIM.

I am attempting to spread the word, as well as MIM  Notes, to those I come in contact with. Not much  progress, I'm sorry to report. But that's where my  point comes in:  IT'S OK!! Not everyone is going  to be open to the truths we tell. Lest we forget,  this country spread such propaganda throughout the  "Cold War" with state-capitalist Russia that even  the word, communism, causes automatic withdrawal!  Not all is lost, however!!

We are planting the seeds today that bring about a  bountiful harvest tomorrow. Our mission right now  is to raise the consciousness of the public. We  can't do that overnight. But like our comrade,  RCG1 stated, "The greatest of waterfalls starts  with one drop of water." Be strong and lead by  example. Others will notice, and awaken to the  cause. The revolution is very much alive!!

Don't let anything dissuade you or distract you  from the path that is before you, comrades. We  shall be victorious. And, one day, we will all  stand side by side and join the masses to dispel  the oppressors from before us! The people WILL BE  TRIUMPHANT!!! DON'T BE DISCOURAGED, COMRADES!! ALL  POWER TO THE PEOPLE!!!

Your Comrade in Captivity,

 -- An Arizona Prisoner, 27 Feb. 97

UNITE AGAINST OPPRESSIVE CONDITIONS

I am writing concerning the conditions here at  Northern Correctional Institution in March of '95  and since my arrival here I have been a victim of  racism and physical assaults. I have also  witnessed the same treatment toward other black  and latino prisoners. The conditions here at  Northern Correctional Institution are nothing more  than a form of mental genocide (torture) designed  to prevent as from rehabilitating ourselves.

All prisoners at Northern Correctional Institution  phase 1 are subjected to a 23 hour lock down. We  are being warehoused and deliberately isolated  from our loved ones and families. In addition  there are no programs at all-nothing-just total  confinement 23 hours a day. The effect on one's  mental state is very serious. Many of the brothers  confined in this racial concentration camp are  from Hartford, Bridgeport, New Haven and other  surrounding cities. Some brothers' families will  never be able to visit them and assist them in  fighting the conditions because of geographic  distance involved.

Thus it is important for all concerned political  as well as other organizations and the churches to  motivate them to raise the issue of mental  torture. And we who are the victims of this  dehumanizing treatment must also come together  with unity and strength and collective thoughts to  determine how we must approach the situation here  at Northern Correctional Institution.

Now just to give you a few details that took place  with me being verbally and physically abused by  different white officials who work here at  Northern Correctional Institution. On May 3, 95 at  10:15pm, I was in my cell, talking to a few  brothers that lived on the same block with me,  when this white nurse named Debbie Kindess and  another nurse named Erinn Dolan (who is also  white) came on the block to bring someone their  medication. Now, my next door neighbor, threatened  to kill himself. The two nurses then went and told  a white male lieutenant by the name of B. Beeman  that I made the threat to do harm to myself.

About a half hour later, 6 correctional officers  who were all white, as well as the two nurses and  the lieutenant came to my cell door. [The  lieutenant] told me in a very loud and harsh voice  to put my hands out the slot in my cell door so  that I could be cuffed and chained to the bed. I  tried to explain to the lieutenant that I was not  the person who made the comment, but it was the  other brother who was in the block with me.

The next thing I knew I was maced with tear gas  and beaten for almost 20 minutes. After all the  beating, I was put in a cold shower with all my  clothes on. Then I was chained down to a steel bed  frame for 18 hours in soaking wet clothes in a  freezing cold cell, that still had the scent of  tear gas in it. As a result of these 2 white  nurses being racial, I was treated with cruel and  unusual punishment.

After all that I went through, on the next day,  May 4, 95, the guy who originally made the threat  [to kill himself] ended up cutting his arms,  wrists and other parts of his body.

Now ever since that incident, these 2 nurses  Debbie Kindess and Erinn Dolan have been verbally  abusing me by making racial statements, such as  calling me horse, monkeys, etc. I have also been  denied medical treatment from these 2 nurses.  [These nurses] who still have not been questioned  from their supervisor or any other high rank  official about their unprofessionalism they have  been showing toward me, as well as other black and  latino prisoners.

I have written numerous complaints about these 2  nurses. But no action has been take to resolve  this racial issue, which is well know to Northern  Correctional Institution's high ranking officials  such as: Warden Giovanni Gomez; Nurse Supervisor,  Jean Walden, Major Krajniak, Captain Case, Captain  Chapdelaine and a host of others. They are a part  of the same system and refuse to confront one of  their staff members, which is all based on  protecting the system for the injustice that  they're showing toward myself as well as other  prisoners.

I would like for this matter of racial hostility  and injustice from this Institution to be know to  the whole public as well as an investigated case.  I shouldn't have to live under these very serious  and racial conditions..

 -- A Connecticut Prisoner, Dec. 20, 1996

CALL FOR UNITY

We as: Black Men and Women, Latin Men and Women,  Asian Men and Women, Indian Men and Women,  Hispanic Men and Women have been treated  murderously and torturously and sadistically by  White Americans and Anglo Europeans. We have to  stop patronizing Whitey all the time. We have to  Patronize each other. We have to stop using drugs  in prison and use hacksaw blades instead if we  have the means.

We have to get rid of manual labor for prisoners  and make them go to prison in school until they  are able to read and write. We have to forgive  prisoners when they do things against us our of  ignorance, especially when they come and  apologize.

The war is against the lackeys of the United  Snakes. Prisoners stop robbing and stealing from  each other, especially when you do it to people  who are of color and a minority in the U$.  Prisoners think of home, think of escape.

All prisoners locked up for child molesting should  stay in prison and do their time. All prisoners  who are locked up for killing GOOD Black Brothers  and Sisters and other minorities killing each  other in the U$ should stay in prison and do their  time. I am locked up for robbing white  Amerikkkans, the ones who benefit from my  forefathers and mothers who were slaves in the U$.

I have over 18 years in the Maryland House of  Corrections (MHC) Annex. I am not a racist, but I  want fair treatment for all human beings. I have  been locked up too long for this shit. I know you  people have too. Fuck Capitalism, Power to MIM and  the masses.

To MHC Annex, Do not kill another prisoner for  some Bullshit. The pigs disrespect us all the  time. If you want to kill someone, kill a pig.  Many Black Brothers have died in the Annex, but no  pigs. I tell you what. If you have nothing to lose  lifers, kill a pig.  -- A Maryland Prisoner, 6 April 1997

MIM RESPONDS:  While we agree that the principle  enemy of the struggle is Amerikkkan imperialism,  we do not suggest that random killing of pigs is  the answer. We agree that prisoners should unite,  educate themselves, practice good health and get  organized. Random killing of pigs by lifers will  not solve the problem of oppression in the U$ or  its prisons. At this time, the revolution benefits  most from study groups, exposing the crimes of the  real criminals -- the imperialist pig oppressors,  and political organizing.

Additionally, MIM argues that all prisoners are  political prisoners. The means that the arrests,  convictions and sentences as well as the laws  themselves are political tools to control  oppressed nations. The injustice system in the  country does not enforce its laws equally for all  people within its borders. The police use the laws  to incarcerate members of the Black, Latino and  First Nations, to oppress them and maintain the  dictatorship of the bourgeois. We do not encourage  singling out people convicted of certain crimes  and say that they deserve their punishment. We do  not recognize the U$ injustice system fit to dole  out the appropriate punishments, since they are  greater criminals themselves. Until the system  serves the interests of the oppressed at its very  root, we can neither trust the pigs, lawyers and  judges to incarcerate people correctly for crimes   nor can we trust the system to help people to  actually rehabilitate and become productive  members of society when they are punished for  crimes. Under the current system of settler nation  domination, the criminalization of poverty and  national status serves the interests of the  oppressed and the crimes committed by the  oppressor criminals are the principal crimes for  which punishment is due.

The important thing is that prisoners should work  together against the common enemy, the  prisoncrats. Work with MIM for revolution by  educating and organizing yourselves and exposing  the oppression you face.

EXPOSE PIGS, POLITICIZE THE MASSES

A letter of special interest, ["Michigan divide  and conquer"] that appeared in the August 15, 1996  issue of MIM Notes in the section reserved for  prisoners, written by a Michigan State prisoner  merits a few comments.

The prisoner writes that a fellow comrade was  labeled a "snitch" by the pigs, hoping to  manipulate and instigate other prisoners to kill  him. "Unlawful methods and practices that are as  old as the institutions themselves are very much  in vogue throughout most federal and state prisons  and have become a favorite weapon of the pigs.  Countless prisoners have met their untimely and  unwarranted death at the hands of other prisoners  as a result of the criminal intervention by the  pigs." The guilty pigs should be held accountable  and should answer for the crimes created and  instigated by the state for not legitimate  penological reasons other than to justify the  building of more joints and nourish their  perverted whims.

For example in the November issue of Prison Legal  News there appeared an article entitled, "The  Pelican Bay Factor", that seemed to document how  the pigs manipulated the different prison gangs in  California to slaughter each other in order to  generate public support to justify building the  joint [Pelican Bay State Prison]. Criminal  activity that clearly rises to being, was murder  to justify to the public building a lockdown  penitentiary and sanctioned by the state.

Nevertheless, our comrades at MIM Notes and other  revolutionaries should make use of such criminal  activity by state criminals. Expose the lawless  prison tyrants and create a mass situation to  politicize the masses and haul them pig asses in  court to answer for the crimes even though it  would still be bourgeois justice.

The principal contradiction facing all prisoners  at this point in time is clearly between the  limited freedom available to all citizens and  imprisonment. A principal task of all prisoners is  to expose the double standard of bourgeoisie  justice in this country. The pigs throughout the  country are being allowed and sometimes rewarded  for committing crimes against the most oppressed  sectors of society in their total and absolute  control.

 -- A Colorado Prisoner, 24 February 1997

MIM ADDS: This article does a great job at showing  the classic ways that pigs try to manipulate  prisoners into killing each other, and then use it  as an excuse for more prisons.

We agree that revolutionaries should expose these  tactics of oppression use the information to  politicize and organize the people. While we may  support reformist appeals for justice, history  proves they are mostly ineffective. The Rodney  King trial is a classic case in point. Instead,  our main focus of anti-prison work is to unite all  who can be united to smash imperialism and all its  tools of oppression.

The contradiction between imperialism and  oppressed nations is principal. Thus the principal  contradiction for prisoners is between prisoners  and their imperialist captors. Prisoners principal  tasks are to expose this oppression, educate  themselves and organize for revolution.

PIG TACTIC: ANTI-GANG UNITS

A CALL UNITY IN RESPONSE TO ANTI-GANG UNITS

Fellow Comrades, [I am] writing in regards to an  article that I had the privilege to read.  "Criminal injustice system resists challenges to  anti-gang units" (MIM Notes, No. 125: Nov. 1996).  First and foremost, La Familia, Latin Kings and  Nita are all considered to be organizations, not  gangs. Brought forth to protect the rights of all  Latino prisoners.

The article was very much needed for. In voicing  your opposition to these discriminatory tactics  being used against us by these pigs, in print, you  are opening up many avenues with the assistance of  the concerned communities in Massachusetts and  beyond. And that is very much needed.

I am a Latino prisoner being held in the  Department of Disciplinary Dungeon on the grounds  that I was a known "Gang" leader of La Familia and  that I was going to start a gang war behind prison  walls. (How that can be done while being locked  down 23 hours a day has me perplexed.) This was a  well thought about set-up to keep me out of  commission for several years for several reasons.  (Divide and conquer non-manipulative, strong  minded Latino brothers with vocals.)

I've been in the hole since 1995. I lasted only 6  days in population before I was set up. When I  returned to population, these Devils were  distributing forms that we had to sign admitting  gang members hip and at the same time renouncing  it in order to get moves out of these control  units. Obviously I did not agree so they felt it  better if I was far away as possible while they  put this plan into effect.

My issue is that we (the Latino peoples) very much  appreciate your concern for our rights and your  help in getting the outside world involved in this  struggle, but to have outside assistance one must  have the full support of all the prisoners behind  the walls. For without inside struggle the outside  struggle will prove to be meaningless "in the eyes  of these Devils."

The unity is breaking apart little by little as  the Administration continues to break the souls of  these young brothers who were not properly  educated. The discrimination is obviously a major  issue concerning these control units. You stated  that 90% of those housed in the control units are  Latino. It is more like 98%.

If brothers are not willing to face these ongoing  problems like me and continue to allow these pigs  to control them by form of manipulation, scare- tactics, and promises then those who were willing  to sacrifice will sacrifice in vain.

I ask of all the Latino brothers and sisters (all  oppressed peoples) incarcerated in the  Massachusetts prison system to rise up, come  together and fight, not only for your rights, but  also your respect.

Forget about all these minor differences that we  may have against one another and if you want to  get in contact with those of the different  Organizations and lets bring ourselves together as  one.

"Together we stand, divided we fall" Thank you for  your support.

We hope that others will grasp our concept.

In the struggle,

 --Familia Representative, A Massachusetts  Prisoner, Jan. 4, 1997

MIM RESPONDS:  For the most part we agree with the  above letter. The one exception is that the  statement "to have outside assistance one must  have the full support of all the prisoners behind  the walls." We encourage prisoners to unite but  disagree that all prisoners must be united in  order to give outside support to prisoners. MIM  and RAIL's many publications expose the atrocities  of prisons and the Injustice system. Often this  helps prisoners better understand their oppression  in seeing who their real enemies are. We on the  outside know the tremendous revolutionary  potential of prisoners and will support and guide  it. We can not wait for all prisoners to recognize  this potential before acting.

BUCK THE CROOKED SYSTEM

Dear Brothers of Struggle, In MIM Notes #125, I  read an article titled "Criminal injustice system  resists challenges to anti-gang units". I can  identify completely with the article.

Currently I am on Administrative Segregation for  "Posing a threat to the safety and security of the  institution, threatening conduct, collusion,  creating a disturbance and/or inciting a riot, and  creating a health, safety and/or fire hazard."

I have those charges just because I am a Crips  gang member. I and eight others are being held on  security threat group status for no other reason  than the fact that we hang out together. I alone  am on SSR (Substantial Security Risk) status  because I am admittedly the leader of my set. We  are all charged for nothing. Being a gang member,  or in my case the leader of a gang, is not a  crime.

What the pigs fail to realize is that gang members  like me and mine make the world go around. There  ain't no such thing as bring in that world and  escaping what was meant to be. It's called fate.  The so called "powers" of Amerikkka need to wake  up so they can analyze, recognize and realize that  they can't escape the inevitable. Gang banging  ain't a fad, it's a culture. Pigs need to start  accepting the fact that it ain't gonna go away. In  actuality, it's getting stronger as the days go  by. That's why they say the "G" is strong and the  world is weak.

The pigs also say that Crips are always causing  "unreasonable disturbances". That's not true  because any trouble or disturbance I have ever  caused, seen, or taken part in had reasons behind  it. No matter how superficial they may have been,  you could always find it if you opened your eyes  wide enough.

I want everyone to realize that gangs are not just  a Black or Latino thing. My father is Puerto Rican  and my mother is White. I have seen shit from all  points of view. I have seen Black, White, Latino,  Chinese, Japanese, or any other race, creed,  nationality as gang members.

I am down with anything that will buck the crooked  system. I have received no help from internal  affairs, the chaplain, or the grievance counselor  on this matter. This blatant disregard for our  rights as human beings must be stopped!

Since I have been on lock-up I have been slapped,  pinched, kicked, spit upon, tripped, cursed, --  you name it and it's happened to me. This prison,  McCormick Correctional Institution, is in South  Carolina. These pigs are from the country and do  not know anything about gangs. Then how could they  hope to prevail against us? They locked nine of us  up and let 79 more of us at the yard, out of 1100  inmates.

Thank you for your time comrades,

 -- A South Carolina Prisoner, 25 April 1997

MIM RESPONDS: MIM agrees that gangs are not  criminal or a fad, but a culture created to deal  with imperialist oppression. MIM does not agree  that gangs are strong, and the rest of the world  is weak. Instead we recognize that gangs are a  lumpen proletariat force with great potential for  political organizing. Oppressed nations comprise  the majority of the world's population. The  contradiction that the majority of the world is  oppressed by the minority of the imperialist  nations is a contradiction which will help lead to  the downfall of the evil empires of imperialism.

The state and the media have gone to great efforts  to criminalize gangs and oppressed nationals  within U$ borders. Prisoncrats will often label  politically active prisoners as "gang members" or  "security threats" in order to isolate them to  prevent prisoners from organizing.

Revolution is inevitable, but it is not fate. Most  of the world's people are oppressed by  imperialism. Gradually they are educating,  organizing and building for revolution. People  will not take oppression forever and will rise up  for revolution. The revolution starts today with  political agitation and organization.