Prisoners Report on Conditions in

California Prisons

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www.prisoncensorship.info is a media institution run by the Maoist Internationalist Ministry of Prisons. Here we collect and publicize reports of conditions behind the bars in U.$. prisons. Information about these incidents rarely makes it out of the prison, and when it does it is extremely rare that the reports are taken seriously and published. This historical record is important for documenting patterns of abuse, and also for informing people on the streets about what goes on behind the bars.

We hope this information will inspire people to take action and join the fight against the criminal injustice system. While we may not be able to immediately impact this particular instance of abuse, we can work to fundamentally change the system that permits and perpetuates it. The criminal injustice system is intimately tied up with imperialism, and serves as a tool of social control on the homeland, particularly targeting oppressed nations.

[Education] [Censorship] [California]
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Education is essential, must fight censorship

Revolutionary greetings to your staff. I just received your letter with the information on prison censorship. I'm fully schooled with the state's so-called laws. In the past I have not had any problems receiving MIM Notes or the study books. I fully understand that problems do come up behind the hands of the oppressor. This is why freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor, it must be demanded by the oppressed.

Let's test the water for now and please start sending me educational material. The struggle can not be stopped, I refuse to let them take control of my mind. I'm 50 years old, been in prison on and off for 30 years, and now three strikes have me. I refuse to lay down on myself or other oppressed people. The most dangerous weapon in this world is a fully focused mind.

MIM adds: MIM was banned in California prisons by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation in December of 2006. We are working with our comrades behind bars to fight this ban. We need support from prisoners to join this struggle, and support from people on the outside to demand an end to this ban. Write protest letters to: James Tilton, Secretary, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, 1515 S. Street, Sacramento, CA 95184


Campaign info:
MIM Banned in CA!
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[Education] [Legal] [West Valley Detention Center] [California] [ULK Issue 1]
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No access to legal materials or education

I am writing to let MIM comrades be informed on ever more injustice in our so-called system. As of today I have been awaiting trial almost four and a half years, since I was sixteen years old. At sixteen I was placed in a juvenile facility, then the day after my eighteenth birthday was placed in West Valley Detention Center for women in California.

There is not one program at this facility for those awaiting trial - we barely have a library that contains mostly old romance novels. I am not even convicted and have no access to any legal or educational materials. The facility will only provide "Christian" religious materials so any other religions basically do without unless materials can be provided by the outside. We even have some of our religious materials sent back saying they are "gang-related materials" because they are not common beliefs.

How am I to defend myself if I can not get any law books, or educate myself with no real library or any programs? I am 20 years old and have been facing 25 to life since age 16. I now sit idle with my life in the hands of California's injustice system.

Those who have no financial support must also do without personal hygiene and writing materials as these things are not provided free to indigent inmates. Our canteen prices are so high you'd think they could pay to provide us with something! At least get rid of all the gnats, roaches and rats in our facility! Some prisoners here are even kept in ad-seg for their whole waiting process with no real infractions.

I am only one young female inmate and I need the help from my comrades to fight this ridiculous system. I hope to be able to help in this fight, but I can't do it alone.

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[Legal] [California]
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Prisoners Denied Right to Public Records

Greetings from one of the realms of concrete and steel within California's massive prison industrial complex on the central coast in the sleazy valley. In my efforts to re-obtain copies of some records that have been improperly seized I have presented numerous written requests to prisoncrats who tend to ignore such requests.

If or when a prisoner seeks to present such matters on administrative appeals they are customarily mysteriously lost or screened out by the appeals coordinator who acts as a risk manager who systematically rejects administrative appeals on any manufactured ruse he can phantom with impunity, so after going through such headaches one tends to seek alternative means of accomplishing his endeavors.

The California legislature enacted California government code section 6250 which in the pertinent part states "that access to information concerning the conduct of the people's business is a fundamental and necessary right of every person in this state." This being a right and not a privilege when you look a bit further 6252 definitions sub (c) "persons" include any natural person, etc. sub (d) "public agency" means any state or local agency. Sub (e) "public records" include any writing containing information relating to the conduct of the public's business prepared, owned, used, or retained by any state or local agency regardless of physical form or characteristics, etc. sub (f) "writing" means any handwriting, typewriting, printing, photostating, photographing, photocopying….any record thereby created, regardless of the manner in which the record has been stored. Sub (g) "member of the public" means any person…etc.

The definitions nowhere state that a prisoner is not a person so the provisions should be equally applicable for a prisoner as it applies to anyone else one. Now pursuant to 6253(c) "each agency, upon a request for a copy of records, shall within 10 days from receipt of the request determine whether the request, in whole or in part, seeks copies of disclosable public records…" sub (d) "nothing in this chapter shall be construed to permit an agency to delay or obstruct the inspection or copying of public records…"

When considering the mandatory language of 6253(d) one would conclude that the legislature did not intend for any state agency, including the CDCR to have the right to delay or obstruct anyone from the obtaining of non-confidential public records. In fact 6258 "proceedings to enforce right to inspect or to receive copy of record" state: "any person may institute proceedings for injunctive or declaratory relief or writ of mandate in any court of competent jurisdiction to enforce his or her right to inspect or to receive a copy of any public record or class of public records under this chapter…"

All of this is quite clear and simple language, right? I challenge everyone to look up the public records act commencing at California government code section 6250-6276. Nowhere does it say that anyone can adopt regulations that are not applicable or conflict with the public records act provisions. Section 6253.4 reads "agency regulation and guidelines which authorize every agency to adopt regulations stating the procedures to be followed when making its records available in accordance with the section". In fact at 6253.4 (b) "guidelines and regulations adopted pursuant to this section shall be consistent with all other sections of chapter and shall reflect the intention of the legislature to make records accessible…"

How then can the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation simply ignore a prisoner's public records act request? When one presents the matter to the court for consideration, the state court would then take the position that the petitioner has failed to exhaust administrative remedies pursuant to 15 CCR 3084.1 because he is under the jurisdiction of the department! Yet no where in the provisions of the public records act do I see where it states that the provisions of Cal Gov. C. 6250 does not apply to persons under the jurisdiction of the CDCR or revoke the right to access public records.

It is wrong to compel a prisoner to submit an administrative appeal regarding obtaining a non-confidential information needed as of a result of a federal court order that directed the plaintiff to add some other specific information to an amended complaint within a specified amount of time. Prisoncrats know this and purposely seek to cause the prisoner to not comply with the federal order so as to indirectly cause an action to be dismissed for non-compliance with the courts directive. Well luckily I was able to make some of the required corrections without a complete copy of the administrative appeals. This problem serves to further expose the injustice that prisoners are subjected to in the pursuit of the legally guaranteed rights. Not to mention that a 602 can take over 6 months administratively.

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[Medical Care] [California]
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Medical Neglect in California

It is with pleasure, plus an urgency now that I have had time to read and sift through the MIM Notes you have sent me. As I began to go over the MIM Notes I noticed a lot of times we are of similar minds in the same thinking mode.

I am in a position to sue this particular institution/prison for what one can call straight out medical negligence. I have already begun with the grievance part being submitted.

I came to this institution in April of 2005. I was diagnosed with cancer in April of 2007. In May or June I had a seizure that busted my lower lip. At that point I began to submit paperwork as well as complain about pain, also bleeding that never was able to be stopped or controlled in any way.

It was as though my complaints of pain, as well as visual bleeding, sometimes even cracked lips, were of no concern, or even taken seriously. It was in early 2007 that a psychiatrist took it upon herself to get involved. I had been telling her about how much pain that I was in constantly, and this institution's yard doctor at that time would not send me out to an outside doctor or hospital for a real consultation. Instead for some reason they kept trying to keep it all in house. I kept telling her that they were trying to hide something, sweep something under the rug, even trying to slip something past me knowing my mental health was not up to par at times.

I was finally diagnosed with a type of cancer that attacked my lower lip mostly on the right side. I have had surgery on the bottom lip, as well as my throat cut. All this in a 9.5 hour surgery. I am doing radiation now 5 days a week, and I will probably have another surgery once radiation is finished.

I have taken it upon myself to get all my medical records Xeroxed in case this ever gets into a he says - she says predicament. Now my problem is I need a lawyer, I want to sue as well as expose the medical mistreatment in this system. It took close to two years to get the actual medical help that I needed and deserved to have. I have all the names of the players as well as their positions, plus their positions when it comes to me and this matter.

MIM adds: We hope that by publishing stories like this one we will both inform our readers about the injustice and outright negligence in the Amerikan prison system, and also inspire our readers to get involved in the fight against the criminal injustice system. It's not just individual cases that need to be tackled, but the entire system that is causing unnecessary deaths and suffering. The health care in California prisons is so bad that U.S. District Court Judge Thelton Henderson placed the prison health care system in receivership in 2005 after finding it responsible for as many as 34 prisoner deaths and far more cases of negligence.

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[Release] [California]
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No release resources in California prisons

First and foremost I want to start this missive by extending my respect and thanking my people at MIM for showing so much love to us convicts. I recently received your newsletters and I am strongly motivated to become a part of the struggle. I like the way my people at MIM view things and I believe if we stay loyal to each other we can make a change.

I think the only way us convicts can get rehabilitated is if we rehabilitate ourselves. I say this because the authorities get paid regardless of whether we get better or not, so they can care less about our rehabilitation. So if us convicts don't utilize the knowledge from places like MIM or whatever we can get our hands on, then rehabilitation is only a word. We are stuck in a situation where us convicts and our comrades on the outside must stick together and be strong to overcome the obstacles we both face. Each one teach one. We all need each other. Because this system is made for failure.

That's why they don't like to give us helpful information about the world outside, for example: last year I was next door to a youngster who was only 23 and had been locked up since he was 13. He came from CYA to prison and didn't know anything about the real world. He told me he was afraid to parole because he didn't have no place to go. So I helped him as much as I could, and I even asked my mom to let him parole to her home.

Well my mom agreed, and when he paroled he lived with my mom and her brother for six months until my mom helped him find a job, get his identification card, and paid for a little studio apartment for him. She even took him to the DMV, got him to take the drivers test, and gave him her 1997 Toyota. But the cold thing is that when he was in prison he was sending request forms to the law library to find resource addresses that would help him once released. But they always told the young brotha that they didn't have those resources. They didn't want to see that young brotha make it. They wanted him to re-offend so he can come back to the jungle of corruption (CDC).

That's why we need to help each other, because the pigs don't give a mad fuck about nobody that's anti-CDC. The biggest reason us konvicts re-offend is because when we are released into the free world we don't know how to function because the California Department of Korruption doesn't give convicts a helping hand on how to get back into the community properly. So some of us have to depend on the parole officer for a stepping stone, and most parole officers don't like convicts so they don't really extend help like they could. Furthermore since most convicts don't know about helpful organizations that can help them re-organize in the community they start robbing for survival. A one way ticket back to the land of corruption.

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[Campaigns] [California]
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Fight unjust Three Strikes law

I am interested in getting petitions for the Three Strikes law. I would very much like to contribute my time in collecting as many signatures as possible. I could easily be a victim of this so called Justice System, I have 2 strikes on my record as a first timer.

I really do have to fight for justice, because after being in the system just a few years I have heard all the stories of inmates who are serving a 25 to life sentences for such petty crimes as petty theft, drug paraphernalia, little petty stuff that I can't believe these sentences handed down. And the number of years these fellow inmates have served are unjustifiable. I've been to San Quentin, and to Old Folsom, in my 3 years I've met over 100 inmates who in total years probably served over 1000 years for such minor offenses as shoplifting at Safeway a $10 bottle of liquor (25 years). All too many to name, but as I go through the system I'm seeing more 3 strikers.

It is a crime in itself to take a man away from his family for so long, for so petty shit as taking a pack of batteries, or a pair of levis from the gap. No matter how much this merchandise may add up to, it can never add up to life. And I'm hearing a lot of horror stories like this about condemned men now facing 25 years to life. This is a crying shame, I do hope that the MIM continues to distribute its literature through these prisons so that more people can rally up and speak out on, for I could easily be the next victim of this so called justice system. I'd just like to say to keep up the good work and keep the MIM Notes coming!

MIM adds: A copy of our Three Strikes Petition can be found on our web site at http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/agitation/prisons under the California campaigns section.

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[Abuse] [Salinas Valley State Prison] [California]
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Visitation cut off at Salinas Valley State Prison

I am writing to let you know that these fucking pigs are at it again. Yesterday and today these pigs turned away at least fifty people from coming in to visit they're incarcerated loved ones. I myself was waiting on a visit yesterday and today. However since we are on lockdown at the moment there is no possible way for me to know whether my visitor did indeed come. If she did, then she would've come all the way from New York for nothing. Protocol for these pigs requires that they notify us inmates if they refuse our visitors entry into the facility, however that almost never gets done.

We here at Salinas Valley State Prison (SVSP) have been having many difficulties with our visiting for the past couple months, it is now beginning to come to a boiling point.

Our recent troubles mostly began a month and a half ago when rumors first started flying within the inmate population that there would be new visiting guidelines implemented. The main guideline affecting us at this moment is one which states that from now on all previously approved visitors must re-submit every two years. Now when rumors of this new implementation were first whispered, I as well as other inmates wrote and inquired to staff about it. Somehow visiting staff nor any other staff seemed to know anything about anything.

All of a sudden at the eleventh hour about 65 inmates on the yard received notices that some of the people on their approved visitors list were due to re-submit by July 9th or risk being taken off of their visiting list. Now they say that visitors were due to re-submit by the 9th of July, however no one was official notified until the last week of June and everybody knows it takes an average of 30 days or more to be approved. These pigs know damn well that even if visitors re-submitted before July 9th it still wouldn't have given anyone enough time to be re-approved by the deadline.

More than 65 people on the yard have had their visitors entry into the insitution denied, and furthermore they were never duly notified before or after the fact. They all had to find out from their own visitors days later via the phone and in some cases weeks later thru the mail. Total bullshit!

Now today there are new reports of these pigs callousness. It's like they're just making up their own new and special rules every other weekend. They have been changing the color which visitors are permitted to wear on a regular basis. In addition to prohibiting solid blue and solid red, which we all have know about for a long time, they recently added solid brown and solid green tops and bottoms. Today they denied a woman entry because she had on white pants. They are also now stating that there is to be no blue or red of any kind on any piece of clothing at all, no matter how minute. This is perposterous!

To add insult to injury these pigs don't even have the decency to communicate with our friends and family in a civilized or respectfull manner. They always speak to our families in a disrepsectful tone. And if our loved ones try to argue that point, then these pigs always have the same response, "Don't like it? Then you could leave" or "That's it, you're not coming in today." Now remember, these are grandmothers and mothers, fathers and brothers, with children in tow. More than half the people coming every weekend are coming from Los Angeles, San Diego and other parts of Southern California or further away in Northern Calif. It's one thing to deal with us in a certain manner, it's an entirely different thing to disrespect our families.

People are also being denied entry onto the grounds due to a new metal detector in the visitor processing area. If, after going through the metal detector three times, an individual is not able to clear it, then they are being denied entry for the day. We all know that women are not allowed to wear bras with metal wire, so nobody does, however now if the bra has a metal clip or button they are being forced to cut the metal off of the clothing/bra if they want to come in. I was told of a grandmother having to do this in order to come inside. She was forced to cut the metal clip off the bra and then tie it back together.

I will be 602ing this weekend's actions and hopefully everyone involved in these incidents will be held responsible. It would be of great importance and help if you could help us out by calling the institution head wardens office and anybody else who might be able to draw attention to these matters. Call and or write, bug the hell out of em.

Send protest letters to:


M.S. Evans, Warden
31625 Highway 101
Soledad, CA 93960

Send MIM(Prisons) a copy of your letters.

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[Organizing] [California] [ULK Issue 1]
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Young prisoner ready to step up

Please allow me to briefly compliment you on both your program of the MIM - what y'all want and what y'all believe - and your political platform for ways of getting those wants and beliefs.

As a 19 year old brotha locked down by a system who cares for no one but themselves, I admire someone who is willing to step to the plate and educate the people about the wicked system which they are a part of. When I first wrote to your organization I was looking for someone who I could turn to and gain political knowledge on this so-called land of the free. Not only does it seem as if I've found that, but also someone willing to teach and give me the tools I will need to change this wicked system that not only takes place here in America, but world wide.

While reading your brief letter I took notice of your speakings on the United Struggle from Within. It is something that I would definitely like to know more about because it sound like something that I'd like to be a part of. Being a young brotha of the struggle within this prison system has made me a young brotha seeking for knowledge and truth about this world and the forces that rule it. I want to learn how to change those forces to make them work for me and the people instead of working against us.

I am one who fully understands and believes in the saying "the blind can't lead the blind anywhere, but into a brick wall or off a cliff." Now while having that in mind, I wish to attain knowledge and see and then lead, or attempt to lead the blind into a safe place of being.

With your help and your guidance I can make that attempt or we can make that attempt together. I've been incarcerated for the past four years and I have plenty more years to go with nothing but time. If given the opportunity I will work and also learn at the same time.

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[Rhymes/Poetry] [California]
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My Rage

Inside this cage I spill all of my rage onto this blank white paper to expose this place
Where I'm not locked down held captive.
Living in an artificial world with no rights but my mind's still active
Thinking about the way things happened.
At 16 years old I caught a case and was sentenced like Osama Bin Laden
They say that the system's to serve me
But all I see is wicked court judges using laws to hurt me
C/Os and wardens at work see
Behind these prison walls you're no more than a fish in the dark see
The shark he'll eat your alive
Get ta talking too loud and the man'll put a hit on your life
See it's easy they'll just set you up.
Get another inmate to come at you no respsect or love
Once the fight starts their gone shoot.
And you better believe their only one real target is you
One shot then your life is gone.
And it's nothing to them but paperwork and a short call home.
Right now I'm in a four wall hell.
Locked up in the hole living life underneath my cell
With just enough food to survive.
if I'm given anything lesser then it I'm fa'show gone die.

Crying tears for the years they gave me.
I understand the pain that I caused but was it truely that crazy?
These rules that they make are amazing.
It seems they only trap me in a world with a system that hates me
And once I feel that time has arrived.
To stand up, and speak out they shut me down with a basket of lies
When will they ever abide
By the rules that they set in the shade while we stand outside
Probably never and we'll never survive until we all unite together to try and open the eyes
Of our brothers, sisters and mothers.
All families and friends
Cause even though we locked in prison we can still start trends

Ya feel my rage?

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[Control Units] [Calipatria State Prison] [California]
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Snitch or be locked down

Coming out of LA and the gang lifestyle to get here everything is different: everyone stuck together. But you aren't told this while out there in society. There everything is racial. Blacks and Hispanics are the majority here so the police find a way to keep us at each other's throats.

But after you hit these holes and SHUs [short and long term isolation cells], everybody is together, now that we all realize the police don't give a damn about none of us. If you ain't working with them (snitching, kissing they ass, doing they dirty work) they are gonna find a way to get you off the line. Your own might sell you out so they can stay out there and be susceptible to the bullshit. When you bring this to their attention it's always an excuse. It's sad because a lot of the ones who are accepting the BS know better.

These are the ones who been down twenty plus years and ain't getting out. If they ain't letting someone go for petty theft, how do you think you are going to get a date for 2 murders. It don't add up. But these are the role models who are pushing these brooms around this dayroom and getting called out to speak for the population. And if you bring it to their attention, they either drop a kite to get you rolled up off the line, or they leave to protective custody.

I don't promote violence, I'm just one who believes in truth, non-fiction. It is what it is and since I've been here in Calipatria, that's what this prison breeds (snitches, protective custody, illiteracy, racial tension, etc.) So many have debriefed that it has become the norm. I just can't accept befriending someone whose job is to fuck me over and use me and then throw me to the wolves.

The courts already sentenced me, let me just do my time and go home. But if you ain't laughing in their face, you are a threat somehow. It's ludicrous. So the end result is you are either going to conform and go against everything you believe in, or put a muzzle on your mouth and tie your hands together and sit around and deteriorate until you die or you're on you're way to a 180 degree design prison or a SHU term. If you show signs of aggression, Calipatria is gonna have you on a bus up outta here.

It's going to take a lot to open up eyes to truth, but one must continue to push forward towards a better tomorrow!

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