Mass Incarceration

Walter Scott, Million Moms March & Stop Mass Incarceration

April 16, 2015 Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, www.blackagendareport.com Organize! Mass Incarceration, police brutality, Racial Justice, Resistance

The killing of black men in America appears to have reached epidemic proportions. The fact of the matter is that murder of black men has remained a closely held prerogative of white supremacy exercised by agents of the state since the arrival of Africans in Jamestown, Virginia, in 1619. These agents, purveyors of state-sponsored violence in African communities, discharge their lethal weapons with effectiveness and efficiency under the cover of law. These agents have been known by various titles throughout US history: slave patrols, Klu Klux Klan, plantation owners, White Citizens’ Council or police officers. Last week, National Coast Guard veteran Walter Scott, 50 joined the thousands of black boys, men and women whose blood has soaked the soil of America and who die alone, frightened and terrorized while their assassins laugh at their handiwork.

Tues April 14th, First Day Of Solidarity

April 13, 2015 Lucasville Amnesty, www.lucasvilleamnesty.org Resist! Human Rights, Hunger Strike, Mass Incarceration, Ohio

As the Ohio State Penitentiary hunger strike approaches 30 days, we will rally at the Ohio Dept of Rehabilitation and Correction in Columbus, and deliver a letter to top officials demanding justice. Over 50 prisoners have been illegally denied religious and recreation programming. We stand with them The rally coincides with the 22nd anniversary of the Lucasville Uprising, where inmates in Southern Ohio took over a prison in response to religious discrimination. f you can't make it to Columbus, please be creative and find a way to support the hunger strike on Tuesday. Organize a solidarity fast like students at the University of Toledo did on Friday, with an evening "break the fast" get together. Or a call-in lunch, gather with friends mid-day and call the prison, Central Office, and The CIIC (numbers and scripts below).

Protests Explode Over KKK Plot To Kill Black Florida Prisoners

April 11, 2015 Zaid Jilani, www.alternet.org Resist! Mass Incarceration, Racial Justice

Last week, the state of Florida arrested three alleged members of the Ku Klux Klan who had plotted to kill an African American inmate after he was released from prison. While white supremacist terror plots are not uncommon, this one had a peculiar twist: two of the suspects involved were officers at the Florida Department of Corrections. The incident has incited outrage across the state. On Tuesday the Senate Criminal Justice Committee heard testimony from prisons chief Julie Jones, who said she's unaware of other Klan activity in the prisons, but that it's difficult to ascertain because the department is not allowed to ask about political affiliations during the hiring process. The residents of Tallahassee, Florida are not content to live with this uncertainty about extremists working in the Florida prison system.

National Lawyers Guild: Immediate Medical Attention For Mumia

April 9, 2015 National Lawyers Guild, www.nlg.org Resist! Human Rights, Law, Mass Incarceration, Mumia Abu-Jamal

The National Lawyers Guild (NLG) calls on the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections to give NLG Jailhouse Lawyer Vice President Mumia Abu-Jamal immediate independent and specialized health care, including his choice of medical specialists. On March 30, Mr. Abu-Jamal collapsed in the prison infirmary at SCI Mahanoy from diabetic shock before being hospitalized in the ICU at Schuylkill Medical Center. Despite his serious condition, he was transferred back to the prison just two days later. Although he had sought care for classic warning signs of the disease over the previous three months, including extreme weight loss and severe eczema, the prison infirmary had failed to diagnose him with type 2 diabetes which, with proper medical attention, could have potentially prevented Mr. Abu-Jamal’s current illness.

New Yorkers Protest Addition Of New NYPD Officers

April 9, 2015 Ashoka Jegroo, www.wagingnonviolence.org Resist! Mass Incarceration, New York City (NYC), police brutality

New Yorkers wasted no time hitting the streets this Easter weekend with multiple protests against racist policing and calls by politicians for new cops. Though protests against systemic racism and police brutality continued in New York City through the winter months, most actions consisted of disruptions of business-as-usual by smaller groups of activists. This past Easter weekend, New Yorkers welcomed the spring by marching against racist police practices and calls to add 1,000 new officers to the New York Police Department. In keeping with the celebration of Easter this weekend, one set of actions was part of a campaign by religious activists called #ReclaimHolyWeek. The activists sought to illustrate the similarities between the murder of Jesus by the state and people of color killed by the police in the United States.

Boycott, Divest And Sanction Corporations That Feed On Prisons

April 7, 2015 Chris Hedges, www.truthdig.com Strategize! BDS, Capitalism, Mass Incarceration

“Organizing boycotts, work stoppages inside prisons and the refusal by prisoners and their families to pay into the accounts of phone companies and commissary companies is the only weapon we have left,” said Amos Caley, who runs the Interfaith Prison Coalition, a group formed by prisoners, the formerly incarcerated, their families and religious leaders. “Mass incarceration is the most important civil rights issue of our day. And it is time for communities of faith to stand with poor people, mostly of color, who are unfairly exploited and abused. We must halt human rights violations against the poor that grow more pronounced each year,” Caley said here. He and other prison reform leaders spoke Saturday at the Elmwood Presbyterian Church.

Decriminalize School Discipline; Black Males Matter

April 7, 2015 Tyrone Howard, www.edweek.org Educate! Criminal Justice, Education, Mass Incarceration

Recent events in Ferguson, Mo., Cleveland, and New York City have ignited a series of debates about the lives of black males in the United States and how they are viewed in the larger society. Regardless of what anyone believes, however, the reality is simple: Black males are disciplined and punished disproportionately more than any other group. The historical narrative often depicts black males as violent, anti-intellectual, and resistant to authority. What needs to be understood, however, is how schools contribute to building this narrative, and what can be done to help change that. In many ways, young black men have a much lower threshold for engaging in inappropriate behavior while at school than their peers; overwhelming data show that black male students experience school in a very different way than do their nonblack peers.

Mothers Stage Hunger Strike At Immigrant Detention Center

April 6, 2015 Nadia Prupis, www.commondreams.org Resist! Human Rights, Immigration, Mass Incarceration, Texas

About 40 women being held at the privately-run Karnes Family Detention Center in southern Texas launched a hunger strike this week to demand their release and the release of their families, vowing on Tuesday not to eat, work, or use the services at the facility until they are freed. Nearly 80 women being held at the center, many of whom are said to be asylum seekers from Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala, signed aletter stating that they have all been refused bond despite having established a credible fear of violence if they are sent back to Central America—a key factor in the U.S. government's process for screening detained immigrants to allow them amnesty.

OSP Top Staff Refuse To Negotiate With Hunger Strikers

April 6, 2015 Lucasville Amnesty, www.lucasvilleamnesty.org Resist! Human Rights, Mass Incarceration

On Fri April 4th, top staff at OSP visited the hunger strikers to talk about their demands. Warden Forshey, Deputy Wardens Charmain Bracy and Jeff Remmick and Captain Brown visited the cell door of each of the eight hunger strikers for the first time after all the calls and complaints about it. They said the two main demands regarding recent policy shifts on range rec and access to religious programming are non-negotiable. Please call Warden Forshey and thank him for visiting with the hunger strikers. Ask him to honor their request to avoid conflict with problematic COs, and to negotiate with them regarding range rec and religious programming. The prison claims this change is necessary to prevent prisoners passing things to each other. A prisoner taking rec on the range is able to do favors carrying something from one friend's cell to another, this is known as passing.

How Detroit Police Slapped False Murders On Young Black Men

April 3, 2015 Aaron Cantú, www.truth-out.org Educate! Corruption, Law, Mass Incarceration, police brutality, Racial Justice

A 2005 report published by the Northwestern University School of Law traced the first documented use of "snitch testimony" in the United States to 1819, when the state of Vermont convicted Jesse Boorn for murder based on testimony from his cellmate. The cellmate told a judge that Boorn confessed to the crime inside their jail cell while awaiting his trial. In exchange for testifying, the cellmate was freed after Boorn's trial, and Boorn was sentenced to the gallows. This basic reward system underpinning jailhouse informant testimony persists into the present day. It's not difficult to imagine why a prisoner informant would lie about overhearing a confession if it means real material benefits.

Mumia Hospitalized In Diabetic Shock, Family Denied Access

April 2, 2015 San Francisco Bay View, www.sfbayview.com Educate! Mass Incarceration, Mumia Abu-Jamal, Political Prisoner, Racial Justice

From Mumia’s attorney Bret Grote of the Abolitionist Law Center: “Yesterday morning, March 30, Mumia Abu-Jamal was rushed to the hospital after passing out at State Correctional Institution (SCI) Mahanoy. He was admitted to the Schuylkill Medical Center with a blood sugar level of 779. Today, he received visits from his wife, Wadiya, and his brother, Keith Cook. Mumia’s blood sugar had dropped to 333 as of a couple hours ago. This is still elevated and at an unhealthy level. “Mumia does not have a history of diabetes but had been experiencing a series of symptoms that should have alerted medical staff at the prison to the onset of the disease. Instead, he was not given comprehensive diagnostic treatment and a medical crisis emerged that could have resulted in his slipping into a diabetic coma or worse. . .

Corporation Literally Served Inmates Trash

March 31, 2015 Carimah Townes, www.thinkprogress.org Educate! Capitalism, Human Rights, Mass Incarceration

Two weeks ago Progress Michigan uncovered emails revealing that a prison food provider served cakes nibbled on by rats to inmates. They’ve now discovered that employees from this same food vendor, Aramark, served inmates at another facility an equally unsavory meal: garbage. In an email exchange between the company’s general manager, Sigfried Linder, and the state’s Department of Corrections, Linder admitted that prisoners at Saginaw Correctional Facility were served food that was previously thrown in the trash. “Mr. Chisolm discarded the left-overs from the line before the last half unit was in the chow hall.

Mumia Abu-Jamal Hospitalized, Court Hears Mental Anguish Law

March 31, 2015 TeleSur, www.telesurtv.net Resist! Mass Incarceration, Mumia Abu-Jamal, Political Prisoner

The law was enacted in response to a broadcast Abu-Jamal made last year. The family of Daniel Faulkner, who was killed in 1983, claim that it distressed them. A federal judge heard an appeal Monday to a law allowing victims of crimes to file injunctions against perpetrators who afflict “mental anguish.” Meanwhile Mumia Abu-Jamal, the prisoner and activist who inspired the legislation, is held in hospital incomunicado. Little is known about the condition of the black revolutionary, who is serving life for the killing of a Philadelphia police officer, other than that he is being held in intensive care, and his family is unable to contact him.

Cost Of Incarceration In Baltimore’s Poorest Neighborhoods

March 28, 2015 Stephen Janis and Mark Schindler, www.youtube.com Educate! Baltimore, Capitalism, Mass Incarceration

Well, this is a significant issue for the state of Maryland and for the country as a whole, as you talked about. The amounts that we're spending to lock people up in our cities and states around the country is extraordinary. In Maryland, we spend nearly $1 billion on the corrections agency--and just in Baltimore City, almost $300 million a year to lock people up. And so one of the things that we talk about from a policy perspective--and I used to run a corrections agency--is: what are we getting for that investment? Are our communities safer? And, unfortunately, the answer largely is no. And so what we did when there was some data available here in Baltimore, particularly, was look more closely at the data, particularly where people who are incarcerated live prior to their incarceration and what's going on in those communities.

NYPD Is Slowing Down With Stop-And-Frisks

March 28, 2015 Prachi Gupta, www.animalnewyork.com Educate! Mass Incarceration, NYPD, police brutality, Police the Police

While he predicts that the number of cops on the streets of New York is going to increase this year, Police Commissioner Bill Bratton says that the number of stop-and-frisks are going to decline. Bratton told the New York Daily News that the NYPD will have one million fewer interactions with the public “based primarily on dramatic drops in stop-and-frisks, summonses and marijuana busts.” The drop in activity has not led to a spike in crime; in fact, the city currently faces a 10% drop in crime. Bratton hopes that the move will improve relations with communities of color, who are disproportionately targeted by stop-and-frisk.

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