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Prisoner rights

Incarcerated Transgender Women Challenge Trump’s Order

March 13, 2025 Betsey Piette, Workers World. , , , ,
Among the most horrific executive orders signed by Donald Trump on Jan. 20, were those withdrawing protection for transgender women incarcerated in federal prisons and terminating all their necessary gender-affirming medical care. The orders, which explicitly prohibit women’s prisons and detention centers from housing transgender female inmates, placed 22 trans women in imminent risk of transfer to a men’s facility where they would be subjected to strip searches and showering in front of men, violating the Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA).

This Black-Owned Bank Is Disrupting Recidivism

February 23, 2025 Hibah Ansari, Next City. , , , ,
For 21 years, Halim Flowers was incarcerated in prisons across the country, often spending his time reading books about economics, banking and finance. It wasn’t until 2018, during his last few months in the D.C. Department of Corrections, that 44-year-old Flowers was able to validate what he was learning, meet bankers from D.C. based-Industrial Bank, and open a savings account from prison with one of the only banks in the country offering services to incarcerated people. “They were good teachers. They humanized us as incarcerated people,” says Flowers, who is now an artist, author and runs his own fashion brand.

After 23 Years, Prisoners Remain In Guantanamo Without Charges

January 14, 2025 Margaret Flowers, Clearing the FOG. , , , ,
January 11 marked the twenty-third anniversary of the opening of the US military prison on occupied land in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Clearing the FOG speaks with Andy Worthington, an investigative journalist and author of The Guantanamo Files. Worthington explains that the United States opened the prison in Guantanamo to avoid legal restrictions. He describes the connections between Guantanamo and the CIA 'black sites' where prisoners were tortured and who the men are that were recently released as well as who remains. There are calls for Joe Biden to release all of the men and end the scandal of the prison at Guantanamo Bay before he leaves office.

Los Angeles Fires Ravage Communities, Expose Systemic Issues

January 14, 2025 Natalia Marques, People's Dispatch. , , , , ,
Several wildfires continue to burn in Eaton, Palisades, and other parts of the greater Los Angeles area, incurring a death toll of at least 24 people. Thus far the total area burned has reached nearly 40,000 acres, larger than each of the city limits of San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Boston and Miami. Over 150,000 people have been forced to flee from their homes, and the Eaton and Palisades fires alone have destroyed over 12,000 structures. As of the time of writing, the Palisades fire is only 14% contained and the Eaton fire is 33% contained.  Wildfires are highly unusual in Southern California during this time of year.

The ‘Ghost’ Of Guantanamo Is Freed

January 1, 2025 Andy Worthington. , , ,
In welcome news, the Pentagon has announced that it has repatriated from Guantánamo Ridah Al-Yazidi, 59, a Tunisian prisoner held without charge or trial since the very first day of the prison’s operations nearly 23 years ago, on January 11, 2002. Although almost completely unknown to the outside world, because of the mainstream media’s persistent lack of interest in investigating the mundane lawlessness of so much of the prison’s operations, Al-Yazidi’s case is one of the most outstanding cases of casual injustice at Guantánamo.

Milwaukee Demands Community Control Over Jail Audit

December 2, 2024 Fight Back! News. , , , , ,
Milwaukee, WI – On Monday, November 25, the Milwaukee Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression held a press conference to comment on the recent findings of the jail audit that was released the week before. Two inmates’ mothers, Laquita Dunlap and Kerrie Hirte, spoke of their fights for justice and accountability. The audit was conducted with input from fewer than 40 inmates, and with no public transparency or input whatsoever. The public expected to hear a preliminary report in December with the full audit report coming in 2025. Instead, the entire report was released suddenly and without any forewarning in November of 2024.

How Pandemic-Era Prison Life Shows The Stakes Of Abolition

September 17, 2024 Justin A. Davis, Waging Nonviolence. , , , , ,
A few months before COVID became a permanent part of life in the U.S., the New York City Council approved a plan to shut down the infamous jail complex known as Rikers Island and replace it with four smaller facilities. (That plan was later delayed — and city officials have since acknowledged that they likely won’t meet the plan’s legal deadline.) The vote to close Rikers Island came from years of extensive grassroots organizing by reformists and abolitionists alike. But for those left caged there in 2020, the risks posed by COVID were immediate — not just illness and death, but new forms of the isolation, neglect and violence that already shape life inside. 

From Death Row To Being Seen As Human

August 3, 2024 Kevin Cooper, Scheer Post. , , ,
Every person unlucky enough to be sentenced to death has often dreamed about getting off death row, especially those who have spent decades as a condemned person living in an inhumane and torturous man-made hell.  Some have been able to leave, whether because they received a new trial or hearing, a penalty phase reversal, or they received life without parole (LWOP) in the sentencing or penalty phase of their trial or hearing. Since 1978, 30 men have gotten off death row by committing suicide; 13 were executed by the state. On Jan. 31, 2022, Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered the dismantling of death row and moving all the condemned individuals to other maximum security state prisons.

Palestinian Lawyers Are Working Harder Than Ever To Support Prisoners

May 22, 2024 Eleftheria Kousta, Waging Nonviolence. , , ,
On May 11, CNN obtained footage of what appears to be Palestinian prisoners detained in Israel’s Sde Teiman military base in horrifying conditions, depicting prisoners being “warehoused” in an overcrowded camp and forced to sit blindfolded and handcuffed. While these revelations — which came from three Israeli whistleblowers — are causing an uproar worldwide on social media and prompting “concern” from the U.S. government, the mistreatment of Palestinian detainees held in Israeli-run facilities is hardly anything new. According to the Palestinian prisoner support and human rights association Addameer, there are 9,500 Palestinian political prisoners currently being held in detention — a quickly rising number since the events of Oct. 7.

Lawsuit Succeeds In Lifting Gag Rules At Pittsburgh Jail

May 14, 2024 Yale Law School. , , , , ,
In a win for government accountability in Pennsylvania, the Media Freedom and Information Access Clinic at Yale Law School and the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press have succeeded in lifting Allegheny County Jail rules that forbid employees from talking to the press or posting information on social media. As part of a settlement reached in the federal First Amendment lawsuit on April 23, the Pittsburgh jail has adopted new policies that affirm employees’ right to speak and to disclose wrongdoing at the jail. The policies also empower jail employees to speak out to the press on matters of public concern.

This Is Why Coming Home From Prison Is So Difficult For So Many

February 20, 2024 Mansa Musa, The Real News Network. , , ,
The US has one of the highest prisoner recidivism rates in the world: over 70% of incarcerated people who are released from prison in the US will be rearrested within five years of their release date. That is not an accident. Our system of mass incarceration sets people up to fail as they leave the prison system and try to reintegrate into society. That is why organizations like Hope for Prisoners in Nevada are working to provide returning citizens with the resources and support they need to rebuild their lives and maintain their freedom. In this episode of Rattling the Bars, Mansa Musa speaks with Jon Ponder, founder and CEO of Hope for Prisoners.

Solidarity With Mass Prison Strike In Alabama

February 12, 2024 Center for Constitutional Rights. , , , ,
The Center for Constitutional Rights stands in solidarity with the Free Alabama Movement (FAM) and incarcerated people in Alabama who announced a mass prison strike today. We unequivocally support the organizers’ demands for legislative reforms—including repealing the Habitual Felony Offender Act, abolishing death by incarceration (also known as life without parole), and reversing the near complete abandonment of parole—and their call for an end to the torture and dehumanizing treatment exacted on incarcerated people by the State of Alabama. Our solidarity with Alabama prison organizers dates back to the 1970s with our support for the Atmore-Holman Brothers’ Defense Committee.

Held For 1,000 Days Since Approval For Release From Guantánamo Prison

February 10, 2024 Andy Worthington. , , ,
In the first of a new series of profiles of men held at Guantánamo — specifically, the 16 men (out of the 30 still held) who have long been approved for release by high-level US government review processes — I’m focusing on Uthman Abd Al-Rahim Muhammad Uthman, a 43-year old Yemeni citizen, who, today, has been held for 1,000 days since the US authorities first decided that they no longer wanted to hold him. Uthman arrived at Guantánamo on January 16, 2002, five days after the prison opened, when he was just 21 years old, and, as a result, he has been held for over half his life at Guantánamo. The photo is from his classified military file, released by WikiLeaks in April 2011, and dating from April 2008, meaning that he would have been 27 years old, or younger, when it was taken.

Prison Lockdowns Are Becoming More Frequent And More Brutal

February 8, 2024 Silja J. A. Talvi, Truthout. , , ,
Every morning, Mary Frances Barbee wakes up and experiences a “microsecond of happiness before the terror sets in.” Barbee had a heart attack, transient ischemic attack and then a stroke after her sons were incarcerated. She puts on a brave front when they call. “I wonder what they are going through, will they be able to call today, and how long until they are out of lockdown again,” Barbee, 71, says as she chokes back tears. “Will it be for just three hours after many days or weeks locked inside? They have no exercise. Four, six or 12 days without a shower. It is inhumane treatment on a daily basis.” What Barbee is living through is something that millions of people inside and outside razor wire are also experiencing: The purgatory of endless prison “lockdowns” where prisoners are forced to live in isolation that typically exceeds punitive segregation conditions.

White Man’s Justice Is Black People’s Grief: A Black History Month Truth

February 4, 2024 Kevin Cooper, Scheer Post. , , , , ,
“It’s not whether you win or lose that counts, but how you play the game that matters.” That’s what my people are often told. But we are not told that this so-called game is rigged, and it’s rigged against us even before we are born. This “game” is life in the divided states of America. This is especially true in the system of criminal justice, a system that has been rigged against Black people since its  inception. There Is no better example than this country’s morbid use and fascination with the cold-blooded and premeditated imposition of the death penalty against poor people and its disproportionate use on Black people.
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