Tennessee Prisons

Recently I was front driver on a battle for education for another inmate. The prison industrial complex had him in a kitchen job at 17 cents an hour. He has been begging for GED for some time now, only to be told no and continue to work for private corporation Aramark in the Tennessee Department of Corrections (TDOC).

I recently wrote the commissioner for the Department of Education in Tennessee, which has zero to do with TDOC. I told her how many are being denied programming and education. How is one supposed to better him/herself without an education? I said “what social interest is served by prisoners who remain illiterate? What social benefit is there in ignorance? How are people corrected while imprisoned if their education is outlawed? Who profits other than the prison industrial complex itself from stupid prisoners?” The recidivism rate for Tennessee is 55% for/in 3 years. 55% will return to prison. That’s fact. And at $64.21 per day, you tell me who profits! Not the innocent women and children who the burden falls on when you get arrested and locked up again.

MIM(Prisons) responds: These are the right questions to raise: who really is benefiting from locking up so many people and then offering no services to help these people gain education and work skills, or address problems that make it hard for them to live outside of prison?

Ultimately we don’t see any profit coming out of the actual locking up of people: it’s a net money-losing enterprise paid for by the government (i.e. by U.$. taxpayers). But certainly there are lots of businesses and individuals working in the criminal injustice system who are making lots of money off this system and who have a material interest in perpetuating it. However, these people aren’t the main ones driving the creation, expansion or continuation of prisons, which we’ve analyzed in depth in past articles. The government, who is allotting so much money to prisons, is using them for the goal of social control, particularly targeting oppressed nations within U.$. borders.

Clearly the whole criminal injustice system needs to be dismantled. But in the short term it is folks like this writer, helping out fellow prisoners, who are doing the ground work to build a united movement strong enough to win the smaller battles today and the bigger battle tomorrow.

To whom it may concern:

With all due respect, I have prepared this correspondence in the hopes that I might shine some light on the unjustified, cruel, and unusual treatment/torture that is occurring here in the Tennessee Department of Corrections (TDOC) and hopefully find a solution and or remedy to the issues and problems we as prisoners face on a day to day basis here within the Tennessee Department of Corrections prisons.

For the past six years, to this day, I have been confined to solitary confinement, due to no fault of my own, and when I ask “why am I being segregated/isolated?” I am told, “we do not know for sure but it came from higher up” or “it’s for your own good” or “it’s a request from central office in Nashville.” I have written to central office in Nashville multiple times about the matter and have yet to receive any type of reply.

Since I have been in solitary confinement/isolation, I have lost a drastic amount of weight due to the lack of nutrients because of the small portions of food they are providing to inmates in solitary confinement/isolation units and or pods. They claim to give us prisoners the required sufficient adequate amount of calories each meal per day. But in reality, the prisoners are being deprived of basic human rights and or needs, as a punishment, being placed in punitive/isolation units or pods. For example, on the date of November 18th, 2015, for dinner, I received only a small slice of cornbread, two small hash browns, and a half of a Styrofoam cup of chicken broth, (cup size about ½ of a pint.) This was approximately 6:35pm. That was just one of the many nights I’ve went to sleep hungry, knowing I would not receive anything else to eat until 7am or 8am the next morning.

As an inmate here in the state of Tennessee, in the Tennessee Department of Corrections custody, myself and others are subjected to dehumanizing scrutiny on a daily basis and it does us no good to try to do things the right way in most cases as far as going through the proper channels like filing a complaint or grievances, because the people who pick up the grievances are the same officers (correctional officers) you are filing the complaint on, and or their co-workers/friends. Therefore, the grievance or complaint goes into the trash, leaving the inmate no option other than act out which in turn gives the officers validity to violate the inmates further, then it comes down to the inmate’s word against the correctional officer’s word and we all know how that turns out. Being that we are in punitive units or pods, solitary confinement, isolation (locked in a small 8x12 cell, twenty-three hours a day, Monday through Friday, and twenty-four hours a day on weekends and holidays), we are condemned, considered and labeled as trouble makers.

It is a known fact that isolation is a key to solitary confinement, and one cannot exist without the other, but what the TDOC has mastered is that they have orchestrated conditions which identify and then exploit the multiplicity of the tactical mechanics of isolation. Physical isolation is just one form of isolation: you would then discover its multiplicity.

Now allow me to give examples of these: social isolation, racial-cultural isolation, ideological isolation, political isolation, religious isolation, spiritual isolation and geographical isolation just to name a few.

Before I continue, I would like to take this opportunity to illustrate the malevolent and nefarious parasitic nature of the tactics of the TDOC agents and what they use to achieve mental dismantlement and social isolation. During and or within these past six years, I have been in solitary confinement/isolation, I have endured dehumanizing situations such as, I have been made to strip completely nude in front of a group of men and or correctional officers, (five for more), made to spread my butt cheeks and bend over on multiple occasions. I’ve been stripped down to my boxers and thrown into a cell that had no working plumbing, unable to flush the toilet, which was already filled with another person’s defecation and urination for days at a time. I have been put in cells and denied a mat to sleep on, forced to sleep on the cold hard metal or concrete floors, no sheets or blankets, toiletries for at least a week at a time. I have been beaten beyond recognition on more than one occasion and I have been denied food and given empty food trays for days at a time. I have also been given food that has had living bugs crawling in it and small broken pieces of glass in it and this is just to name a few of the torturous things I have experienced while in solitary confinement/isolation while in the custody of the TDOC.

Sometimes for days on in, reality itself can seem to vanish from this place, and yet, on other days as I sit, locked in solitary confinement for a minimum of twenty-three hours a day, I sometimes cannot block out the screaming that never stops, the screams of prisoners being beaten, mentally and or physically, screams of grown men retreating from the intolerable pain of reality into madness.

Now I ask what is solitary confinement? Wait I know at first glance and from its most simplistic perspective that question might seem rhetorical, if not insulting to one’s intelligence, but you would be surprised if not incredulous as to know there is so much more than just being separated from others. And even more perplexing is that most prisoners, not being able to formulate their own words in order to truly convey their answers, would probably give the same standard antiquated response which is, “a prisoner in a cell or behind a solid door where he or she is isolated from other prisoners and human contact.” I mean listen, by no means am I implying that is the wrong answer, but what I am implying is, that’s the right answer and yet so much more!

See the answer is more complex than just saying separated from all other inmates, like when physical isolation was the only criteria for defining what solitary confinement is. The science of solitary confinement/isolation has expanded beyond its original tactical application. From the beginning of the twentieth century on back, the answer given was applicable, but at the start of the twenty first century its theoretical concept remained, but its tactical application has transformed. This is directly due to two principal exponential factors, 1) the advancements in technology and 2) a more in depth and functional knowledge of the process, as a direct result of analyzing past applications of solitary confinement/isolation and their desired ramifications.

Please understand that social isolation has a dual nature and function. It is used to facilitate the isolation process as it pertains to the precision targeting of a specific prisoner or prisoners and to serve as a tactical instrument in the service of their (the TDOC agents) torture program. TDOC has taken isolation/solitary confinement to a scientific level. It has become so sophisticated in its execution, it is barely detected on the average prison-rights activist’s radar. In fact, the average prisoners often times are blinded to the deliberate manipulation of conditions that are not required to complete and complement the implementation of the new application of solitary confinement/isolation.

Allow me to employ a civilian example to illustrate the utilization of multiplicity of isolation, before I briefly elaborate on its utility within the TDOC. Okay, let’s say I have an eight-bedroom house and each has a television and I pick eight people to live in the house. There are four rooms upstairs and four rooms downstairs. Upstairs, I have selected the following four people: 1) a Jewish holocaust survivor, 2) a Nazi concentration camp guard, 3) a member of Hamas, and 4) an Israeli soldier. Downstairs, I have selected the following four people: 1) Nat Turner, 2) a slave master who had enslaved Nat Turners family, 3) A Liberal, and 4) Donald Trump.

Now see, I deliberately identified all contradictory bodies of politics. Can you imagine the outcome of such an orchestrated dynamic?

Now even though there are no bars on the bedroom doors, I have induced and orchestrated conditions that are designed to facilitate isolation. Most of these individuals would avoid each other and stay to themselves. I’ve manipulated conditions that produce a solitary state. Though there are eight people in this house, there will be little to no communication. For the most part, they will stay to themselves, reinforcing the isolation/solitary confinement. But it was I who induced these conditions, knowing the inevitable outcome. These individuals will become isolated in a solitary state but completely compelled by me.

Now let’s replace the eight rooms with eight cells in a pod with the same racial, cultural, geographical, political, ideology, religious, and socially diverse contradictions but intensified ten fold. This is the new anatomy of solitary confinement/isolation. Please understand that this new architectural structure of today’s prisons cannot structurally accommodate the old forms of solitary confinement/isolation. Their infrastructural designs have given birth to new forms of solitary confinement/isolation and torture! These modern-day dungeons are more technically sophisticated, intricate, and not to mention elusive to the average person in society.

I believe it is critical and overly necessary that I use every avenue and approach available so that I can expose the tactics that are being used to implement social isolation as it relates to the precision targeting for the sole purpose of increasing the degree of dehumanization and isolation for a specific target or targets.

These tactics are criminal and in direct violation of our constitutionally protected rights. The TDOC agents of oppression have developed these criminal tactics and deploy them at whim. I should know because I have been one of their primary targets for extreme isolation for years now!

Please don’t judge the content of this letter by the man who is writing it, my being incarcerated does not negate my intelligence nor does it take away from my capacity to articulate the complex dynamics of solitary confinement. In fact, my six years of being in solitary confinement, dealing with dehumanizing treatment, torture every day, three hundred and sixty-five days a year for six years, well qualifies me to speak and write on these issues.

I trust that I have provided a comprehensive illustration so that you can and will fully grasp, vividly, the significance of this torturous situation we prisoners, we the people within the TDOC, as human beings are enduring right here in America.

This report was signed by 37 prisoners

I am denied access to proper health treatment and was forced to endure a yeast infection in my ears and on my rectum for almost seven years. When I complained the nurses would take my blood pressure and pretend they could not comprehend my complaint. I was finally able to get neomyc and polymycin, B. Sulfates and hydrocortison solution for my ears and yeast infection cream for my rectum. After several years of them neglecting my complaints as if I was delusional and suffered from a phantom itch.

They totally neglected my medical rights by framing me as mentally ill. I had a stroke that made the whole left side of my body go numb. That went untreated and undiagnosed because I went unseen by the doctors and could not get past the firewall of nurses who would not tell the doctors my complaints.

I want to join the fight for change because of these capitalist pigs that are only fair to people they consider worthy. They do not offer equal treatment to the people. The low people ruled by the big pig of the government. That have sinister desires towards the people they have authority over.

I am a POW in the state of Tennessee and in these narratives I am providing exposure about this wicked prison system and Derrick Shofield, who came from Georgia. This dude is constantly applying new rules, with the latest being called tier management – something straight outta Georgia prison system. Of late all of Tennessee prisons are run like Georgia. This is the same Shofield who was instrumental in causing the largest sit down in the state of Georgia. On an I-team investigation on channel 4, Nashville, TN, it was reported that Shofield ordered two former wardens in West Tennessee to alter incident reports on assaults on staff.

As I write they are building security threat group management units at Riverbend Maximum security plantation in Nashville, Tennessee. This is the big sister of tier management. Both are part of the larger policy agenda regarding U.$. prisons. One of the standards that the federal government sets in order for the state to receive construction subsidies is to mandate the building of supermax units, security threat group units, such as the ones at Riverbend: steel and stone sensory deprivation cells.

In Georgia they have this tier 2 program of gang control for long-term lockdown. This same situation is being played out in Tennessee. The prisoners in Tennessee should take a page from Georgia, sit down and do nothing in a silent protest. It’s some wicked shit going on in Tennessee, it has to be said that for all the men and women trapped in the wretched crime and punishment morass, especially in the Tennessee system, we have to determine our fate. We got the power.

MIM(Prisons) responds: This comrade gets at the truth of prison control units, and in fact the broader prison system in general: it is a system built for social control. Prisons in general house the oppressed nation lumpen in disproportionate numbers, and for those who speak out, organize or otherwise challenge the system from behind bars, there are long-term isolation cells for even further control. These control units are torture and we must demand they be shut down. Part of this battle is documenting their existence, a project that we need help with from anyone who can complete our control unit survey about prisons in their state.

We offer the example of prisons in China while it was still Communist-led and Mao was alive, in stark contrast to the Amerikan criminal injustice system. In China prisoners participated in education classes with others where they studied politics and discussed the nature of their crimes and why their actions were harmful to the people. Prisoners were allowed to participate in productive activities of work and learned cooperative practices. Many who went into prison for actions like theft or even spying, came out dedicated to serving the people and grateful for a second chance. The example of Adelle and Allyn Rickett, two Amerikans who worked as spies for the United $tates until their imprisonment, wrote an inspiring book Prisoners of Liberation detailing these progressive practices and what they learned from years in prison in China.

When Republican Bill Haslam was elected Governor of the $tate of Tennessee, he appointed Derrick D. Schofield as Commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Corrections (TDOC). I assume the “D” in Schofield’s middle name stands for either dumbass or dickhead, because since then the conditions in prison have deteriorated. Schofield is one of the $nakes that was instrumental in causing the largest prison sit-down in United Snakes hystory.

It is no doubt that the Governor brought this individual to cause chaos and mayhem to the captives at all the prisons in Tennessee. They do this in the hopes of enticing the captives to riot so that they can receive federal funds and justify turning the state plantations over to Correctional Corporation of America (CCA). This way they can pad their pockets and implement new legislature that will rob the captives of what little dignity they may have left.

Many of your politicians have stock in CCA as well as political allegiance to their dubious goals. Recently it was revealed that CCA had sent letters to most state governments offering to buy up prisons on the condition that the state contracts with them for at least 20 years, and that the state keeps the prison at a 90% occupancy rate or more. Such a move would further cement the prison industrial complex that profits off humyn suffering while lessening government oversight in how prisoners are treated.(1)

Schofield has attempted to remove all identity and dignity from all captives. His agenda is to persecute instead of rehabilitate the captives. His tactics have been to disregard policies and procedures that have been in place for years and implement unwritten rules. He has caused an atmosphere of hate, discontent and danger for both his employees and the captives.

Captives are required to walk single-file under escort on the compound, a specified distance apart. Captives are not allowed to talk or have their hands in their pockets while under escort, even during cold weather, and the TDOC has not issued gloves to all captives. Captives must be neatly dressed and keep their cells in an orderly condition with beds made, and must stand at attention during morning inspections without speaking, engaging in any other activity or making eye contact with the inspectors. This includes captives who work night shifts who do not get off work until early in the morning, yet must be out of bed for inspection. When captives are called to meals, they are required to line up and wait outside until it is their turn to go to the dining hall, even when it is pouring rain. Captives must keep their property in specific locations in their cells, and property storage rules have been changed multiple times in an arbitrary manner, leading to confusion and frustration among both captives and staff. Captives may no longer possess coat hangers, which makes it difficult to dry wet towels. Permissible items on the property list have been changed and, rather than be grandfathered in, items that are no longer allowed have been confiscated or required to be mailed out.

Wardens have been transferred to different facilities, and it has been stated that Schofield intends to continue transferring Wardens every few years, which may have an adverse impact on institutional stability. There are daily cell inspections, including by Wardens and deputy Wardens, which means that all of a facility’s highest-ranking administrators are on the compound at the same time, which may constitute a security risk.

The policy changes that Schofield has implemented have significant consequences. This is not a concern that is only an opinion of the captives. At least four Wardens have resigned or retired since Schofield was appointed commissioner, some due to the implementation of Schofield’s new unwritten policies. Also, a number of TDOC staff, from the Warden level down, have contacted the Human Rights Defense Center to express their concerns about the effect Schofield’s policy changes have had on both captives and staff in terms of frustration and discontent among prisoners and decreased morale among employees. None of the staff members who spoke with Human Rights Defense Center were willing to publicly identify themselves, citing fear of retaliation. The atmosphere here is very vile and becoming extremely dangerous. As is the case in the state of Georgia, the fights, assaults on captives and assaults on staff have gone up significantly, all because of Schofield’s silly unwritten rules.

At Turney Center Industrial Prison (TCIX), captives are targeted to fill up the hole commonly known as segregation. It once held Close Security captives, and once they were transferred to other plantations, the oppressors began to target captives by issuing both arbitrary and capricious disciplinary reports for so-called infractions that the captives have never been informed of, not to mention the unwritten rules are as silly as the individual who implemented them. The ridiculous rules have no penological interest. Moreover, most of the disciplinary infractions issued are fraudulent and without legal authority.

Within the masses of captives at TCIX, you would be hard pressed to find many that are willing to fight against their oppressors for the liberation of the basic human rights. I call them the “i can’t crew.” I like to say that i am part of the “i can crew.” There is a famous saying, which goes like this, “if you won’t stand for something, you will fall for anything.”

Since the atmosphere here and at all the prisons has become vile, a few of us decided to get together and address our concerns in a petition. We recognize that the oppressor wants for us to riot and that we must first put our struggle out there before we start busting heads.

We got together and put all our concerns down on paper. We then found someone with a typewriter and asked him to type up our concerns. After this petition was typed up it was given to a person in each pod to go door-to-door asking individuals to sign. The only ones not asked to sign were known rats. The signatures were then sent out to be copied and we sent copies to many organizations, State Senators, State Representatives, Turney Center Warden, Commissioner Schofield and Governor Bill Haslam. The petition has also been placed on the internet and Facebook.

To protect the large number of captives who participated in brainstorming this movement, we submitted our demands in the petition. The demands included and were not limited to a meeting between the Warden, Commissioner, Governor and various other officials, with the Captive Counsel Members and different religious organizations. The purpose of having the other organizations present at such a meeting is because the individuals who go to counsel are generally intimidated by the current Warden. Even if they were allowed to speak freely, they are ill-equipped to speak on matters they have no interest in or have no knowledge about. As in the past, a majority of them cannot be trusted. Some are sincere, but most are there to be close to the oppressor to feel some sort of worth.

If the oppressor does not acknowledge or dialogue with us, we will be forced to conduct a sit-down. The sit-down will consist of all of us refusing to go to work, and refusing to purchase commissary items or use the phone. The oppressor can serve the food and make the beds in the metal plant for the new prison that they have built in Bledsoe County. We want all of the captives held against their will in all the prisons in the State of Tennessee to stand up for themselves, before they are unable to fight for their dignity, identity, freedom and justice.

What the captives don’t realize is that the fiscal year for the TDOC is July of each year. They can expect more legislation coming that will give the bourgeoisie more authority to take more inmate property and continue to deprive us of basic human rights. The food will become worse than it is presently; there will be less opportunity to access the fresh air; it will be mandated for all to cut our hair in a military fashion, including facial hair; and visits will be by monitor, thus denying human contact with your family, friends and loved ones. There is a laundry list of atrocities that are on the way, and instead of complaining about them, the captives must rise up and do something about it, in every single death camp in this state. If anyone wants to help in the cause and has ideas, please contact MIM(Prisons).

Warden Jerry Lester recently told one of his minions that he does not have to respect the captives. Is this a directive from Schofield, or is this the Warden’s mentality and/or the result of Schofield’s intervention that is causing this oppressive thinking?

The captives cannot change their condition until they want to change themselves. Every captive needs to realize who their real enemy is and come together so that they can maintain what dignity, respect, manhood and rights they have left.

West Tennessee State Penitentiary (WTSP) has a lot of house policy issues. For one, their policies are not always legitimate under Tennessee Department of Correction penological justifications. On Feb 1st 2001 WTSP Warden Henry Steward and AWO Tommy Mills put out a memo to the maximum/segregated prisoners about them violating in-house policies. I am a maximum security/segregated prisoner and therefore I can speak about the mistreatment and un-professionalism of the prison officials and administrators.

Max prisoners endure a lot of foul talk and other things that are unprofessional from the correctional officers who run the units/pods. Neither the Tennessee Commissioner or Governor has been notified nor approved of the memo from February. The memo allows the administrators to take away their personal property, such as TVs, commissary, and other articles we bought over the years of our incarceration. This is in clear violation of the 8th and 14th amendments. The 14th amendment protects prisoners against the deprivation of personal property and liberty without due process of law. When state law and regulations substantively limit the discretion of confinement, the state creates an expectation, and the 8th and 14th amendments protects against the intentional, malicious or sadistic acts by prison officials towards prisoners. At the end it’s all cruel and unusual punishment.

All the maximum/segregated prisoners have filed a petition on this issue and are waiting to hear back from the commissioner. I believe these prison administrators fail to realize that we as prisoners still have rights. I again thank you for the help in the U.S. prison struggle.

MIM(Prisons) responds: We welcome the news that our comrades in Tennessee are coming together to fight repressive policies. We encourage those in other states to take up their example, and be sure to report on your work in ULK so that we can share these reports and learn from each others struggles.

I am at DCSO in Tennessee. One of my pod-mates receives your publication, Under Lock & Key, and it has attracted a lot of attention. The line to read it has become so long and complex, I decided to write to you and request my own personal subscription. I’ve always been interested in subversive politics and your newsletter gives me a lot to think about. Also I am willing to write articles for future publications in exchange for a chance to take part in your free book program.

MIM(Prisons) responds: Don’t get stuck waiting in a long line for Under Lock & Key. Or worse yet, get moved to a new prison where you can’t get at ULK at all. Write to us today to get your own subscription!

I long ago came to the realization that oppression exists everywhere, regardless of our current position or circumstance. Within concentration camps such as this “La Lucha Continua” - The Struggle Continues! When we submit and allow our oppressors to dictate our actions and decisions then we lose major points within our struggle. Our oppressors know that we’re more of a threat alive than dead and so that’s why our oppressors strive to push us into that fatal state of defeatism. And so, for those comrades who’ve walked a suicidal line, for those who’re contemplating suicide, I say “Live! Our youth need you! The community needs you! And brothers within this crooked system such as myself need you!”

Every time I receive a newsletter from MIM(Prisons) I read about comrades in Wisconsin, California, Texas, Arizona, and Illinois! And so, I want to give our readers a peep behind these steel doors and concrete walls in the state of Tennessee. In a failed attempt to mentally and physically break me into submission because of my rebellious nature against oppressive authority, the warden at West Tenn State Prison (WTSP) had me transferred here to DeBerry Special Needs (DSNF) and placed in Unit 7 which is supposed to be a mental health program, but to all TDOC employees and correctional officers here, Unit 7 is knows as the “Gladiator’s Academy!”

Everyday, prisoners who are mentally stable or unstable are verbally, physically and sexually assaulted, abused, mistreated and tortured. In Unit 7, L, D and F pods, TDOC correctional officers will give a prisoner a razor blade or 2 sheets and tell him to make the world a better place! From 2003 to 2010 several prisoners died suicidal and violent deaths at the hands of these TDOC employees who’ve sworn to uphold the law (their law)! Certain prisoners won’t get fed for days and the results of this type of torture is fatal for the prisoners.

If a prisoner files a grievance in regards to this matter then he’s immediately placed on rec, shower, mail and food restriction. And it’s not uncommon to witness a gang of TDOC employees beating a prisoner or hitting him with the taser gun or electric shield because he refused his prescribed psychotic medicine. The warden here, Jennie L. Jobe, and the deputy warden Debra Johnson are fully aware of what’s going on in Unit 7 here, yet they’ve made no move to put an end to this madness.

Here at DSNF in the state of Tennessee and everywhere else in the world, oppressors/downpressors are at their best because they’re united! If only all of us would do the same…unite!! I don’t consume any type of psychotic (or non) medicine yet I’m still here. I’ve requested to be discharged several times but all of my requests have been ignored. And if I become too rebellious then in the name of mental health my oppressors will inject me with their poison medicine. I know that one small dose could alter or completely destroy my mind.

In the last 2 months I’ve fallen victim to the injustice system in prison. The first time was a sexual assault by a staff member. I’ll not get into that because I’m still dealing or should I say trying to find ways to deal with it. My other incident, I was working in Admin as a counselor aid and was assaulted by a corrections officer. We had had words previously because the job I had did not require me to do what he told me to do so he felt I was “walking on him.”

Well he was sitting in the counselor’s office and he was talking to the man I worked for. He was getting up to leave and I was shutting the door behind him and it hit his boot. He turned around and lunged at me so I threw my hands up in a blocking, defensive manner and he grabbed my pinky and ring finger and jerked it and twisted it which broke it.

My boss called for me to get medical attention (costing me $5) so I’ve got 5 x-rays and doctor’s notes on this incident. I have filed numerous Grievances on this core officer. The paperwork I filed was “too late” or “lost” so it was thrown out and I was placed in protective custody due to the incident. And since it has happened I’ve been treated worse than an old smelly mutt. It’s sad how much the injustice system can get away with here in the united $tates these days. I’ve tried going an alternate route by getting one of the neglected forms with response and mailed it to my lawyer.

A lot of my things have come up missing, they are constantly in my cell searching for items that’s not there. I’ve been trying to file a civil suit of negligence against the state and TDOC since this occurred but I’m having the hardest time from a control unit (23/1) and little if any help.

Since this assault my time has gotten really hard. It’s a struggle every day. Trying to use the phone, the excessive force used to and from the Dog Pen (recreation). A week ago a corporal shoved and spit on me for filing a grievance on him. I got to be on guard with them. They have done all they can do and more. A man can only take so much but it will only satisfy them to see me act out in violence on them so I’m taking every precaution to their games. It’s quite sad they stoop this low.

I wish there was another way to reach out. I know I’m not alone and we keep our heads up and keep on fighting from behind bars. I am trying to keep it cool and recruit all anti-imperialists and encourage them to start standing up for themselves and others. We’re not alone in this war.

MIM(Prisons) adds:
Stories like this one are a big impetus behind the grievance campaign that MIM(Prisons) and United Struggle from Within(USW) have initiated in prisons across the U.$. We are fighting to get grievances, like the ones this comrades has filed, handled fairly. Write to us for a copy of the petition.

Prison politics are one of the most corrupt manifestations brought into existence by Amerikkka. They are slavery and Jim Crow in one warehouse. These are warehouses for their legal (illegal) systems of “convicted” slaves. Every one of us who are conscious are political prisoners.

In the crooked fascist state of Tennessee’s prison system, or concentration camp system, racism is thriving. The brotherhoods and KKK members are allotted opportunities to study their facades of a culture, miseducated backgrounds. While unequally Afrikans, Puerto Ricans, Mexicans, etc. of the so-called “minority” groups are classified as STG members when we seek to become more informed about our cultural backgrounds and their legacies. It’s a constant battle in the heart of capitalism.

I, myself, have struggled with these oppressors for more than 5 calendar years about them attempting to classify me as an STG member. I’ve even gone so far as to clearly tell these savages that I’m a revolutionist not a senseless gang banger.

They verbally assault me and the comrades of like mind, hoping to provoke an attack from us because they can’t stomach seeing us unite as one mind, one body, one soul. But these fake Nazis do it and it’s cool because most prison officials are in one way or another believers in their theories. We must remember this so-called bible belt is the home of the Confederacy and it’s confederate concepts of racial superiority along the ideals of Hitler and his Nazism.

Since I’ve been at this prison, in the north eastern corner of Tennessee it has been no less than 4 white on Black stabbings where the white males who had the blades where treated better in apprehension than the Black/diasporic Afrikan victims. Whites use violence to solve their problems and simply get shipped, minus the acceptable few who are urban oriented. I don’t find this a coincidence. While if the Blacks or other “minorities” resort to violence to solve our issue/problems they resort to placing us on max for at least 18 months to 5 years, privileges taken, family communication taken, and then we’ll be shipped to another compound after our stretch behind the walls that are behind the walls.

This whole theory alone sounds insane if you ask any conscious human being. If you snitch behind these walls you get privileges unlike the ones who keep silent. And the cowards that do the snitch thang need their tongues cut out and tied around their throats by all revolutionary means. Our cultural celebrations are treated with mockery yet they’ll attempt placing you on meds and classifying you as insane/incompetent if you complain, but only because there is no unity amongst the oppressed.

They fear unity, for they know in it there is a power unstoppable. But we must, ourselves, believe it before we can achieve it. We are our only obstacle!

MIM(Prisons) responds: We hold that all prisoners are political prisoners, regardless of their consciousness, because they are in prison for political reasons. Barack Obama can bomb families in Central Asia and walk free, living a luxurious lifestyle while a Black man in an oppressed neighborhood with a little narcotics in his pocket can spend years in prison for possession. That’s political.