MIM is waging a campaign to abolish the Security Housing Units (SHU) in the California prisons. These torture units house prisoners labeled as "gang members" including many who were active organizers in prison helping others to fight for their rights, those who fought legal battles, and others targeted by guards as "troublemakers." The prison collects evidence against prisoners, using informants. Then, during closed- door hearings where no self-defense is allowed, it routinely convicts them. Evidence used to entrap prisoners into gang validation and transportation to indefinite hell can be anonymous snitch notes, group photos, tattoos, innocent letters from home, or other flimsy items. Once charged, all are found guilty. Prisoners designated "a threat to institutional security" are sent off to be warehoused inside a bare SHU cell. The only way out is "parole, snitch or die."
Working with other activist organizations, we have been staging demonstrations, collecting petition signatures, distributing literature and working with our comrades behind bars to build public opinion against these torture units. During a recent protest in downtown San Francisco activists collected interviews with some of the people who stopped by to support our work. Interviews were mainly with former prisoners but also others who had something to say about the criminal injustice system.
One of the men interviewed was a former prisoner at the Corcoran SHU. He testified to the inhumane conditions in the SHU and the corruption and brutality of the guards: "The things I'm about to tell you are based on a true story from the Corcoran SHU in 1994... During that time period I was sent to a world of hell. It was in 1994, August 12th that inmate [X] was shot and killed in the administrative segregation yard while the fight was set up for me and my cellie to fight [Y] and his cellie [X]. The fight had stopped and they shot and killed him unjustifiably...
"When I was at Corcoran State Prison (CSP) the officers were setting people up to fight, they were beating people up, there were assaults. ... I seen people hang themselves. I witnessed police opening the doors to let other enemies in in order to hurt somebody. I've seen police put stuff in peoples food, they put something in my food one day. ... The uprisings in the prison throughout the 90s was something that was very very wrong. Any time officers have a code of silence you must question why. If they haven't done anything wrong there would be no reason for a cold of silence. Every single officer that shunned the other officer for coming forward should be fired. But the fact is that they know they are doing things unjustifiably and want to stay in control...."
Another former SHU prisoner also provided testimony to the conditions: "I'm a witness to it. I was in there. CDC. I know how they treat people in there. The SHU program ain't nothing nice. They treat you like a dog. I'm here to let you know that. I'm a witness to it and I know, I was there. I just discharged."
A young white man stopped by to tell the story of his awakening to the injustice system. While 61% of the population in California is white, whites make up only 35% of prisoners and only 18% of SHU inmates (according to CDC statistics). It is no surprise that Blacks and Latinos stopping by the SHU protests are more likely to already know someone in prison, or have been incarcerated themselves. And as a result of first hand experience of the oppression, they are more sympathetic to the fight against the criminal injustice system. As this white man comments, white people believe firmly in the Amerikan "justice" system until they see firsthand that it is not true. And even then, many will call instances of injustice anomalies. This young man was shocked out of his suburban white complacency by a few days in jail:
"I'm Caucasian, I'm 28 years old. I've never been processed for charges ever in my life. Four days ago my girlfriend and I had an argument. We raised our voices, as most couples do when they get into arguments. A neighbor got afraid and called the police. I hadn't hurt my girlfriend or would ever hurt my girlfriend. The police showed up and within seconds they put me in handcuffs and started pushing me. My girlfriend was irate, she was yelling and screaming. I was irate, I was telling them to go to hell. I was pissed. I did nothing wrong and I was being arrested. They slammed me against the car.
"Within 4 or 5 hours I had $10,000 cash ready to post bail. It took 3.5 days to get out because they were holding me because they were mad that I told them all to go to hell. One of the persons in my cell was Hispanic. He didn't speak English. An officer was trying to talk to him, losing his temper big time. Another one of the kids said 'officer, he doesn't speak English.' The officer pushed the kid and said 'no shit asshole' and slammed the door in his face. Under his breath the kid muttered 'bitch.' They dragged the kid out of the cell by the neck and beat his ass for 20 minutes.
"I don't know if you know how hard of a blow it takes for a head to make concrete echo, but it did, for a very long time. After this the officer came back in and said 'this is my house, who's the bitch now?' Another guy thought that was funny and chuckled. He got the same thing and was beat for 20 minutes.
"The temperature in the jail was maybe 60 degrees with 15 of us in there in an empty cell. They took both of those kids, stripped them down to their underwear, without blankets, and left them in a cell without food for 8 hours. It was the most inhumane thing that I have ever witnessed in my life.
"This just happened to me a few days ago. I'm in shock. I'm a white boy from the suburbs. I never thought something like this could happen in this country until I witnessed it with my own eyes. I'm afraid to make complaints to the police department. The people I was in jail with told me if you do that you'll be right back in here. I'm irate, it's sick, it's disgusting, it's torture. I think the majority of people in control, police officers and prison wardens, are the sickest twisted members of our society. Innocent until proven guilty is a joke, anyone who believes that is living in a fantasy land, and the idea that out prisons reform people in any way is a joke, they try not at all to reform people. They try to punish people and to use scare tactics."
Others who had not been in prison but had firsthand information about it also stopped to speak out against the conditions. Some had relatives in prison: "I'm from SF, I just have a problem with the prisons here and I would like to put my foot down on this, it's wrong. I have family in Folsom and San Quentin in Vacaville. One of my family members got raped and I just don't like this. There is an excess of abuse and I just want to stop it."
Others had relatives working in the system: "A couple of years ago I found out that there were guards ... that actually put in transfers to go to Pelican Bay [one of the California SHU prisons] because they looked forward to being able to do violence against the prisoners. And this was well known. The guards that used to work there, I don't know if they're still there or not, were known to have a pig on the back of their badges. This comes from personal experience from a relative who used to work in that system. I don't want to give my name because my relative still lives there and I don't want her to be hurt. I was always concerned for many years about what was going on at Pelican Bay."
The two million prisoners and their families and friends are already familiar with the repressive conditions in Amerikan prisons. MIM is working to educate others and organize everyone who can be united against the criminal injustice system. We are fighting winnable battles for reforms, like this one to shut down the SHU torture units, while we build for the complete dismantling of the system of oppression that locks up a higher proportion of Blacks than they had in Apartheid South Africa: Amerikan imperialism.
To get involved in the battle against the SHU visit MIM's web page and download a flyer and petition and hit the streets: http://www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/agitation/prisons.html
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