MIM(Prisons) is a cell of revolutionaries serving the oppressed masses inside U.$. prisons, guided by the communist ideology of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.
Under Lock & Key is a news service written by and for prisoners with a focus on what is going on behind bars throughout the United States. Under Lock & Key is available to U.S. prisoners for free through MIM(Prisons)'s Free Political Literature to Prisoners Program, by writing:
MIM(Prisons) PO Box 40799 San Francisco, CA 94140.
On Monday, 19 May 2014, 7 prisoners at Polk Correctional on the H-Con
Unit began a hunger strike due to inhumane conditions, and finally some
getting fed up with the mistreatment. It is day 4 and 8 comrades refused
their breakfast this morning. Some of the demands are:
need brooms to sweep cells
need nail clippers to exercise proper hygiene
need outside recreation
need new trays, ones now are cracked, split, peeling causing us to find
plastic in our food
staff need to wear hair nets/change gloves for food preparation and
serving
need headphones sold separately in canteen so we don’t have to buy a
whole new radio
stop taking mattress and religious property as punishment for up to 3
days
special housing cells need to be cleaned daily - currently have blood,
bodily fluids in them and comrades are placed in them naked on suicide
watch, only given 4 sheets of toilet paper, no hygiene, forced to eat
with dirty hands
need a law library
stop use of nutraloaf as punishment
stop keeping us on H-Con 18-24 months before letting us off even without
getting write ups
stop using restraints as punishment
These are just some of the most important of 33 demands. I am asking
other comrades to join in support and fast or to write to:
Frank L. Perry, Secretary Division of Prisons 4201 Mail Service
Center Raleigh, NC 27699-4201
and,
U.S. Dept. of Justice, Civil Rights Division Special Litigation
Section 950 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington DC 20530
or other forms of protest that do not cause you to receive an
infraction. Also, pump them fists as we got a victory in the Central
Prison Unit 1 case. They
have
to use a hand-held camera during all use of force, specifically
after the use of force or during/until you are put back in your cell and
no longer in contact with corrections staff. So hear it, can I get a
hell yeah from all my comrades!
On June 3 of last year a young Black man named Maynard Brumsey was
killed at the Dalhart Unit in Texas due to excessive use of force. As a
result of constant urging by comrades and their families calling for
justice, several of the top officials were removed. It’s more likely
than not that they were just placed at other units in similar fashion to
what the Catholics did in recent years with pedophiles within their
ranks. Nor was their removal likely officially directly related to
Brumsey’s death. So, we are a far cry from exacting anything like
justice upon the offender officers whose actions caused that man to die.
Officers Hay, Verlardi, Marquez, Jackson, Crawford, and Gambriel killed
this man through excessive force and in failing to take him to medical
after they brutalized him, even as he complained of having trouble
breathing. They need to answer for that. Those officials who failed to
investigate this matter correctly and according to procedure and/or who
covered this thing up need to face criminal sanctions. We don’t let the
Brumsey matter die until that happens.
This is the nature of our revolutionary struggle in the United States at
present. What happens in prisons is just one aspect of it. We need to be
vigilant in making the connections clear between prisons and hoods,
especially the projects to prisons pipeline that uses public schools as
a conduit. We need to understand the relationship between these
phenomena and political disengagement and economic disempowerment. In
clearly defining the nature of our social predicament, we are more
competent in our struggles’ strategic development.
Consistent and sustained vehicles of information and resource exchange
are paramount. I recently received literature from MIM(Prisons) under
the banner of our United Struggle from Within which outlined several
procedural codes of compliance that can be used effectively against
officers and administration. In our past three years of development we
have reached nearly 5,000 men with our advocating for our “Triple C Core
Concepts.” Each of those men should have such material to fight with. So
I praise MIM(Prisons) and the collective efforts of our USW comrades for
that.
[While MIM(Prisons) expressed cautious optimism following the election
of Chokwe Lumumba, we questioned his electoral strategy and
stressed
a clearer definition of dual power (see ULK 33).
Unfortunately, failure seems to have struck more suddenly than we could
have expected. In the piece below, PTT of MIM(Prisons) has woven updates
on the campaign in Jackson into excerpts from commentary by Loco1.]
On 22 April 2014, Chokwe Antar Lumumba lost the mayoral election in
Jackson, Mississippi to Councilman Tony Yarber in a run-off. Chokwe
Antar’s father, Chokwe Lumumba, was inaugurated as the mayor of Jackson
on 1 July 2013, and died 25 February 2014 from “heart failure.” Since
our last report, those close to Lumumba had indicated that an
independent autopsy was going forward, but results, or information on
whether an independent autopsy was conducted, are not readily available.
In
Under
Lock & Key 37, we raised suspicion over the cause of the Mayor’s
death in a country where New Afrikan leaders are regularly murdered by
the state with impunity.
As the electoral strategy of the former New Afrikan revolutionary ended
prematurely, some comrades are raising the question of whether the
nation would have really sown the seeds of progress for New Afrikan
self-determination into the heart of Mississippi, had Mayor Lumumba or
Chokwe Antar served the full term. We assert that when New Afrikans fail
to realistically distinguish themselves from Afrikan-Amerikans, it is
impossible to break from Black capitalism to form a new society centered
around humyn need.
One limitation Mayor Lumumba’s death raises in the Malcolm X Grassroots
Movement’s strategy of entering electoral politics is the vulnerability
of elected candidates. Lumumba wanted to build a movement based in the
people, but electoral politics necessitates focus on individuals as
leaders and representatives of the masses. In the context of joining the
Amerikan political machine, winning electoral campaigns amounts to
putting a Black face on Amerikan capitalism. Before his death, Mayor
Lumumba was planning to put $1.7 billion onto the streets of Jackson.
“The intent is to improve the city’s infrastructure, support businesses
and, in a first, rehab some Black neighborhoods.”(1) A keen eye can see
that building revolutionary education centers is not on the top of this
list, if it’s on there at all. We agree with Mr. Lumumba that the people
are smart. But if they are fed a false idealism of an end to oppression
under capitalism, then their opposition to the Amerikan imperialist
global machine will be limited. In fact, it is more likely that their
ties to Amerika will even be increased, as the benefits from the spoils
of imperialism are redistributed in their favor. Without real people’s
control of wealth, that $1.7 billion raised by Mayor Lumumba is easily
redirected by a suspicious death and a defeat in a run-off election.
The people of Jackson hope to continue building this movement for Black
capitalism in their city, and Chokwe Anton invited all small business
owners, enterpreneurs, prospective business owners, and people seeking
new and innovative employment/ownership opportunities to attend the
Jackson Rising conference that was held on May 2-4.(2) As communists, we
are definitely seeking new and innovative employment/ownership
opportunities! But as internationalists, we seek these opportunities for
all the world’s people. We don’t want worker-owned cooperatives for
ourselves built from wealth scraped off the backs of the Third World. We
know truly innovative employment/ownership opportunities can’t come
without civil war and an overthrow of capitalism. Success in electoral
politics can stifle progress in a revolutionary direction if politics
aren’t in command.
The late Mayor Lumumba is reported in an interview with the Nation of
Islam in The Final Call newspaper as saying, “our predominately
Black administrations can actually do better – to provide security to
everybody, prosperity to everybody on a fair basis, and, of course,
we’re going to be vigilant against the cheaters – but we think we can do
a better job. We’re talking about the new society, the new way, and
that’s a lot of what New Afrika was about.” To claim that New
Afrikans will do a better job at playing the Amerikan economic game
amounts to Black chauvinism and racism. We are products of our society.
What is it that New Afrikans can do better than whites: hate, steal,
cheat, kill, lie, destroy and oppress? The U.$. President is Black and
we still witness New Afrikan and Xican@ youth targeted by police for
death in the United $tates. Working within electoral politics will do
nothing to change Amerika’s impact on the majority of the world’s
people. Mayor Lumumba stated “We are impressed with the need to
protecting everyone’s human rights.” But this can’t be done
when the nationalist leaders are so misdirected that they can’t see that
there is nothing in U.$. politicians’ offices but documents with the
names of the billions of humyn beings murdered as a result of foreign
policy, or low-intensity warfare operations jumping off in the U.$.
semi-colonies. The electoral struggle in Jackson highlights the
differences between bourgeois nationalism and nationalism with
proletarian ideology.
The U.$. internal semi-colonies’ greatest connection to the reality of
the global contradiction in relation to their own material condition is
the lumpen, incarcerated and criminalized across the state. The lumpen
are most capable for the vehicular mechanism for transforming the shift
of imperialist control to proletarian control with real state power, by
leading national liberation struggles to free us from Amerika. Lumpen
hold no stake or stock in capitalism and have way more interest in
abolishing its control over the people than the bourgeois nationalists.
The Jackson Plan would like to turn all these lumpen into labor
aristocrats rather than vehicles for overthrowing capitalism.
The lumpen, particularly prisoners, will have to understand that there
is no future in placing higher values on profits than the welfare of
humyn life/needs. The Amerikan pie has to be completely disposed of and
the land redistributed fairly. Period. You get what you need. Nothing
more, nothing less.
If we gonna move, let’s move the world. Revolutionary nationalism, with
a proletarian ideology, is the key to any oppressed nation’s
self-determination and self-governance, or simply put national
independence. If New Afrikans are to have any chance at such, they will
first have to separate themselves from Black Amerika and move to the
tune of the proletariat. Chokwe Lumumba had a gift and will be missed
dearly by all who value his mind, but he appeared better in his dashiki
and afro. “Rather than going to church and yelling and screaming about
it, rather than bad mouth the youth, my plan is to engage the youth,”
quoting the former Mayor. This begs the question, how does this
transpire from behind a desk that is responsible for the city’s youth
being carted away to prison and jail facilities?
Three former California governors recently backed a petition for a
ballot initiative which would dramatically accelerate the execution of
death row prisoners. At the same time we have experienced a more extreme
than usual delay in the processing of death row SHUII and III mail. As I
will explain, there is an important connection between these events.
The main selling point for the proposed bill is saving loads of money by
arranging faster executions of the 747 prisoners currently warehoused on
San Quentin’s four death row SHUs and the women all but forgotten in
Cowchilla. In addition, death row prisoners would no longer be confined
exclusively in the San Quentin and Chowchilla torture units. They would
be placed among the general population.
It is noteworthy that the Calincarceration Corrupted Peace Officers
Association (California Correctional Peace Officers Association - CCPOA)
didn’t give financial support for this bill. Many assume the lackeys,
bullies and cowards who comprise that security threat group probably
thought it wasn’t in their best interest to all of a sudden meet face to
face with the un-cuffed death row prisoners they’ve been torturing their
whole career. But the fact of the matter is the higher ups in the CCPOA
actually had enough sense to realize no amount of their support could
buy enough votes to pass such political double talk into law in this
state.
Acting proactively in case the bill passes, the CCPOA at San Quentin
decided to mobilize in preparation. By citing wild interpretations of
prisoner correspondence to give the public an illusion that the bowels
of hell were opened upon them, the prison tried to transfer a large
number of formerly grade A and B SHUII and III prisoners to other SHU
programs across the state.
They almost had a window of opportunity to “justify” building more
control units within existing prisons. But as of today the death row SHU
expansion project in San Quentin’s Carson section is stalled.
“Persons other than inmates should address any appeal relating to
department policy and regulations to the Director of the Division of
Adult Institutions. Appeals relating to a specific facility [like San
Quentin or Chowchilla] procedure or practice [like excessive delays in
the processing of mail to and from loved ones and prisoners’ rights
organizations] should be addressed in writing to the warden…” -
California Code of Regulations, Title 15, 3137. Appeals Relating to
Mail.
MIM(Prisons) responds: This comrade is correct that the CCPOA has
been entirely silent on this new ballot initiative to accelerate death
row executions. But we don’t agree with h interpretation that the CCPOA
is just standing down because they don’t think it has a chance of
passing. Rather we see this position as lining up consistently with the
CCPOA’s primary goal: protect the jobs of the many prison workers.
Faster executions would reduce the San Quentin prison population, and
that would threaten jobs there, so it should not be surprising that the
CCPOA is silent on this new ballot initiative. This is a rare case where
their interests align with ours, and we can take advantage of the
situation to stop passage of this reactionary bill.
Enclosed is a notice that the Level 1 study group material you mailed to
me has been forwarded to Publication Review Committee for disapproval.
One of the reasons for disapproval is “material whose content could be
detrimental to the offender rehabilitative efforts…” I must ask, What
rehabilitative efforts? I’m serving a sentence of double-life plus 46
years. I’ve been incarcerated since June 1988. I’m not eligible for any
school programs. I’m not enrolled in any treatment programs. Nor do I
have a job inside the prison.
Further, the Virginia Department of Corruptions, um, Corrections (VADOC)
is truly ignorant and incompetent in the realm of rehabilitative
programs. In the 1990s the recidivism rate in the Commonwealth of
Virginia ranked among the highest in the nation. VADOC’s bungling
efforts at rehabilitative programming proved so abysmal that the state
legislature abolished both parole and early release good-time credits in
July 1995. With the governor’s blessing the prisoner population and
VADOC’s fiscal budget exploded. According to ABC news, prisoners in
Virginia serve more time in prison now than any other jurisdiction
except Florida.
This “Commonwealth of Virginia” is in truth a “colony” - a bastard child
of the united snakes of amerikkka. Like father, like son this colony
operates as a slave plantation of the kkkapitalist kkkrackers, with a
major exception: no one is directly profiting from the labor of
prisoners. But the labor aristocracy is profiting from our incarceration
while giving us materials enough to simply keep us alive.
My friends, notice that these prison autocrats also say that the
materials from MIM(Prisons) “…emphasize depictions or promotions of
violence, disorder, insurrection, terrorist, or criminal activity in
violation of state or federal laws…” Yet these same prison autocrats
suck their livelihood from the tits of the United $tates whose founding
fabricators once wrote that when people face a destructive government
“…it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to
institute new government…” What was Common Sense? Why were Crispus
Attucks and four other men martyred? What was the volatile resolution of
the First Kkkontinental Kkkongress?
On 1 May 2014, the united snakes of amerikkka warned that “global
terrorism is on the rise.” Since the kkkapitalist pigs refer to any
threat to their hegemony as terrorism, then the revolutionary has reason
to strengthen h resolve. The evidence reveals the pigs are in perpetual
distress, and this is most fitting. If the U.$. truly is the “greatest
nation on earth with the best form of government,” then why does more
than half of the world’s population seek to destroy amerikkka and
amerikkkans? Indeed, an ever growing number of so-called amerikkkan
citizens wish only for the abolition of the current go-vermine-ment.
MIM(Prisons) adds: This censorship is a blatant example of the
criminal injustice system’s real goals in the United $tates. There is no
rehabilitation in this system. It is merely a tool of social control.
The MIM(Prisons) prisoner study group is one of the only educational
opportunities for prisoners in Virginia, and education has been
demonstrated to have significant positive effects on reducing recidivism
of prisoners. So in denying prisoners this material VADOC proves its
focus on maximizing incarceration and sentencing. The “detrimental”
effects on rehabilitation can only refer to our positive impact on
prisoners and their ability to get by on the streets without returning
to prison.
In solidarity, I offer this suggestion: reduce your contribution to your
imprisonment; instead contribute to your child’s development.
Advantages: the prison system has less funding; the companies that lobby
for prisons lose money; you remain healthy to fight!
J. Paul Getty said, “If you owe the bank $100, that’s your problem. If
you own the bank $100 million, that’s the bank’s problem!”
The prison gets roughly $30,000/year for each general population
prisoner, but receives an average of $70,000 for us in solitary
confinement. Where does the money come from? Too much of it comes from
us! Federal prisoners spend $300 million a year in commissary. It is
estimated that prisoners contribute $3 billion annually toward their own
incarceration. We are allowing our money to be used as a weapon of war
against us. “Playing by your enemy’s rules is suicide.” Growth and
Development symbolizes growth of knowledge and development of new skills
and tactics to be successful!
If you want to bring the CDCR director to the negotiation, make Keefe
force him to the table. It is always about the money with capitalists.
You have to give them something to lose!
We never shop during September out of respect for the sacrifice of my
Attica brothers. Ask your family and friends to participate by not
purchasing products from Keefe, Bob Barker, Golden Valley and any other
company that profits from prisons. Eliminate the funding, and the
problem is solved. Stop contributing to your own suffering!
Request the public records, budget and audit for the California prison
system. It will show you how you are giving your money to your
suffering.
Grow your knowledge Develop new skills and
tactics Revolutionary strategy Intelligent sacrifice Stand
United Economic pressure to obtain your goal
MIM(Prisons) adds:Every September 9 the
United Front
for Peace in Prisons (UFPP) promotes a
solidarity
demonstration in honor of the Attica uprising. This peaceful protest
could easily expand to a month-long boycott of the parasitic industries
from which prisoners are forced to make purchases. We welcome input from
UFPP members and supporters leading up to this September’s
demonstration.
Lately, due to the continuing of the repressive injustice system, the
New Afrikan Maoist Brotherhood (NAMB) has restructured our organizing
and networking tactics. We continue our current study group raising New
Afrikan and internationalist consciousness. We are working on a peace
treaty/alliance between the Vice Lords, Latin Kings, MS-13, Bloods and
Black P. Stones. The Euro-Amerikan street organizations of the
Cincinnatti Caucasian Cartel and the Cincinnati White Boys have allied
against the Aryan Brothers and so, we are working to bring the Triple Cs
and the CWBs into the Ohio-wide treaty with the Vice Lords and Latin
Kings/MS-13 and Bloods. Our next focus will be to reach out to the
“heartless felons” of Northern Ohio (Cleveland based) to radicalize them
into revolutionary consciousness. These are uphill battles due to lack
of quality leadership, coupled with the terrain of lockdown blocks,
controlled movements, and confidential informants. But, the movement
must be pushed, no matter how fast/slow, hard/easy it may seem. History
is on our side! The NAMB is slowly but surely making headway in
spreading unity and revolutionary theory. We look forward to creating an
Ohio-wide, Ohio-produced treaty between all LOs inside of prison and
outside.
MIM(Prisons) adds: These comrades in Ohio are doing the essential
work of education and building peace and unity. Bringing lumpen
organizations together into a United Front (UF) is critical, but we must
always be clear what we are uniting around. The UF is a vehicle for the
oppressed to unite groups against a common and principal enemy. We learn
from history that this includes alliances between the proletariat and
the national bourgeoisie when the fight is against the imperialist
invading army. In Amerikan prisons today, this unity is among lumpen
organizations against the criminal injustice system which is used by
imperialist Amerika as a tool of social control.
Expansion Cell Blocks (ECB) were designed to hold two prisoners in order
to increase unit capacity. But Texas officials have labeled ECB as high
security in an attempt to negate the facts and distort the actual
security level of the ECB.
In order to justify this use of ECB, in spite of staff shortages and
unlawful conditions, the authorities create a hostile environment which
conforms to their false reality. Prisoners are agitated to commit acts
of violence, create disturbances, or become aggressive, so that the ECB
takes on an air of a high security prisoner housing area where sanctions
and restrictions are necessary. Sanctions and restrictions enable the
ECB to be operated even without the staff they are short. Constant
lockdown cameras have been installed to document everything. This
expense must be justified. The staff creates incidents for the
technology to record. Restrictions begin. Policy becomes practice.
Lights are turned on every time count is taken, food is delivered, or
staff feel it is necessary. Prisoners are required to regularly produce
ID and are disturbed to the point they are deprived of REM sleep. Cell
searches are performed irregularly during the day and throughout the
night. A heightened state of anxiety and stress is created. People kept
under high levels of stress are known to snap or break.
In addition to this high stress level, prisoners at ECB are provoked by
staff. Most lack the capacity to respond to chaos in a rational manner
thereby perpetrating the myth of high security and enabling the
authorities to further control and empower themselves.
There is a systematic campaign of psychological warfare being waged
against prisoners in control units. The evidence proves sensory
deprivations experienced in isolation produces extreme states of mind,
impulsiveness and irrational behaviors. Statistics show a decline in
mental health in prisoners confined to solitary confinement for years.
Without stimulation our minds and bodies begin to break down and decay.
Prisoners are conditioned through a system of punishments and
indifference to view all forms of resistance as futile. Requests aren’t
answered. Responses are purposely vague or misleading. Policy is
interpreted to undermine prisoner autonomy. The authorities use every
tactic available to promote complete dependency of the prisoner and to
ensure despondency is total.
All the while the public is being told prisoners are being provided with
forms of rehabilitation and that support is given to those who desire to
make modifications to their mentality.
Facilities designed to house 1200 prisoners are used to house 600.
Prisoners in control units, Ad-Seg or high security do not receive good
time, parole or work time. Their sentences are only discharged at their
maximum release date. The result is requiring more money to provide for
more prisoners and more staff to control them. The goal of the prison
staff is achieved.
MIM(Prisons) adds: These long-term isolation cells are a common
tool of oppression in the Amerikan criminal injustice system. And we
have plenty of evidence of the detrimental effect of this isolation on
humyns. Get involved in the campaign to shut down control units to
resist this repression in Texas and across the country.
Since my arrival at Kern Valley State Prison (KVSP) in July 2013 I’ve
had to file numerous 602 appeals just to be able to utilize my two hour
a week constitutional right to use the prison law library. At KVSP they
like to run a very oppressive program, or I should say lack of program,
and keep everybody on lockdown 24 hours a day, even on the general
population and non-discipline yards. This was done all under the guise
of “safety & security.” Their stratagem is that we can’t file any
complaints on them if we don’t have access to legal forms.
For the more creative prisoners, we’ve been able to bypass their little
games and still file 602s and habeas corpus writs in our
attempts to inform the outside world of the illegal practices here at
the prison.
One of our writs must have struck a nerve because on 10 April at 4am,
the prison’s “Institutional Gang Investigators” AKA the goon squad,
raided our building in full riot gear, and confiscated everyone’s
paperwork (books, family/legal letters, and writing materials) all in
the name of “safety & security.” It has been over two weeks now and
the warden has given no word on exactly when we will be given access to
our legal/personal documents.
Even though the majority of us have already bypassed their little
blockade and have filed writs or found ways of informing our lawyers and
family on the outside, these things take time. So here we sit on
lockdown, with very limited access to the courts and family, awaiting
relief or a full blown revolution to kick off. And although it is my
personal belief that the latter will happen at some point, I also feel
that it’s going to take a whole lot more hard work in order to open up
the eyes and ears of our fellow brothers and sisters around the world,
before we all as a whole, can shout “stop!” and really have the means to
add weight to our words.
Until then keep up the faith and hard work. Stay strong! This current
system is at the breaking point. There is light at the end of the
tunnel!
MIM(Prisons) adds: We agree with this comrade that we have a lot
of work to do to educate our brothers and sisters before we are ready to
kick off the revolution. In the meantime we need to do what s/he is
doing: the day to day work of exposing the abuse and brutality of the
imperialist system and organizing others. We all have a responsibility
to educate others however we can, whether that’s by writing articles for
ULK, talking to others on our block or yard, organizing a study
group, teaching someone to read, or whatever else you can do to use your
skills and talents to advance the struggle. Don’t just sit back and read
about it, get involved!
The Texa$ Board of Criminal (in)Justice implemented new prisoner
Correspondence Rules on 1 October 2013 restricting indigent prisoners to
5 one-ounce domestic letters per month. The previous policy allowed 5
letters per week. This is a clear attack on prisoners’ access to the
outside world, and in particular
impacts
politically active prisoners who use the mail to expose the
brutality and abuse going on behind bars in Texas. In response to this
new policy United Struggle from Within initiated a
grievance
campaign, organizing prisoners to appeal this restriction. Below are
several new updates to the campaign:
Successful Grievance Against Limits on Legal Mail
From Hughes Unit: “I won my grievance due to interference from the
department law library which deals with offenders who are indigent. They
were saying five letters a month for everything and they were trying to
stop my legal mail from going out to the courts. There is no limit on
legal mail! They were also trying only to give us supplies like 25
sheets of paper, one pen, five envelopes a month. But an indigent
offender who is doing legal work can have this once a week, and mail out
as much legal work he or she wants.”
One prisoner from Allred wrote Step 1 and Step 2 grievances requesting
additional stamps. Because of his need to use his 5 indigent mail stamps
to pursue legal research this prisoner was unable to write to family and
friends and so requested additional stamps from the Warden. The first
request prior to the grievances stated “I need to mail 5 more letters
this month using indigent [mail]. … This unit law library is giving me
the run around having me write and ask everybody under the sun. They
don’t know about the 83rd Legislature House Bill 634 by Farias of Texas.
It’s the holidays, I need extra 5 letters this month.” The response from
the Warden: “That doesn’t meet any legal requirement and I don’t have
the authority to allow you extra postage for that.” Responses to his
grievances following up on the Warden’s denial included denying the Step
1 for “excessive attachments.” The attachments were copies of his
initial attempts to resolve the issue without filing a grievance.
Based on the victory from the prisoner in Hughes Unit, we encourage
prisoners to appeal their access to stamps for legal mail separately
from the restriction on personal mail.
Restrictions on Receipt of Stationary
A comrade in Eastham Unit reported: “Each year the big wigs running
Texas prisons decide on what to take from the prisoners next. This year
it involves indigent mail and stationary sent in from the outside.
Prisoners who have no money on their trust fund account are able to
receive supplies (paper, pen, envelopes) and send out letters through
the indigent mail. Before this March prisoners could send out five
letters a week, now it’s just five letters a month… What’s worse is that
we’re charged for indigent mail services. Whenever we get money on our
account, the cost for every letter mailed and each supply is deducted.
“Prior to March our friends and family could have stationary from an
outside store sent to us. This was eliminated, and now our only option
is purchasing stationary from commissary, and paying their prices. Like
any oppressor, TDCJ enjoys coming up with new ideas and ways to make
life more difficult for their captors. There’s strength in numbers. The
more of us who write grievances, send letters to state politicians, and
get the word out to our family and friends, the better chance we have of
telling our oppressors that we’re not going to take this lying down.”
This comrade is right on about the strength in numbers. We have a number
of prisoners across the state working on this campaign to end the
restrictions on correspondence in Texas, and we’ve come up with a few
key
steps for prisoners and supporters to take.
Some jailhouse lawyers have created guides to fighting this injustice as
well as a broader
grievance
guide for Texas, and we are seeing an influx of prisoners requesting
these resources. We look forward to the results of this growing activism
in this state with the largest prison population and one of the highest
incarceration rates in the country.
For this indigent mail campaign in particular, we have a sample step 1
grievance for prisoners to use as well as a sample step 2 grievance for
those whose step 1 is rejected. Write to us for a copy of the indigent
mail campaign guide.
