The Indypendent e-news
July 11, 2011
What began as a hunger strike among inmates of the isolation wing of California’s Pelican Bay prison has turned into a statewide display of solidarity. A number of prisoners in Pelican Bay’s Security Housing Unit, California’s highest-security complex, refused their state-provided morning meal on Friday to protest the inhumane conditions of their confinement. Inmates in the Security Housing Unit spend 23 hours per day in soundproofed, windowless cells. Their daily hour of exercise is walking around a small, walled space. The intent is to keep prison-gang members and those considered dangerous to others separated from fellow inmates.
Despite original claims by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation that the hunger strike was limited to fewer than two dozen Pelican Bay inmates, spokesperson Terry Thornton said yesterday that the weekend had seen a peak of 6,600 protesters. According to Thornton, there are currently around 2,100 prisoners declining meals. Thirteen of California’s 33 penal facilities have counted protesters among their inmate populations and it appears that the sentiment of solidarity is spreading beyond state borders. On Friday, a number of those incarcerated at Ohio State Penitentiary refused their food trays for a full 24 hours.
Molly Porzig, spokesperson for Critical Resistance, an organization dedicated to developing alternatives to incarceration, highlighted the significance of the strike’s timing. “California has been ordered by the Supreme Court to release prisoners due to the neglect and overcrowding in the state’s prisons. They recognize that the conditions of California’s prisons are absolutely atrocious.” Additionally, Porzig pointed to the state’s recent budget, which includes $140 million in overtime for guards, especially those in SHUs. “California is demonstrating that it prioritizes prisons over education, parks, health care, keeping our libraries’ doors open and other things that our communities need.”
The strikers’ demands include better food, warmer clothing and a phone call each month. They also hope to end the unit’s debriefing policy, which allows inmates to leave the unit in exchange for information about the actions of other gang members and prisoners. “Its an incredibly dangerous system for prisoners and their families because of retaliation,” said Porzig. “On the other end, all someone needs to do is point a finger at you and you’re in SHU indefinitely.”
Security Housing Units, like the one in Pelican Bay, were created in the 1960s to repress political organizing, especially among prisoners of color. For years, the conditions of SHUs have routinely been the target of human rights organizations. Critics call the units “prisons within prisons,” and on top of the controversial conditions, its an administrative decision that puts an inmate in solitary confinement. Guards, not judges or juries, make the call. Ending up in a Security Housing Unit can also effect a prisoner’s sentencing. Time spent in an SHU can’t be counted as “good” time, and Molly Porzig points out that it’s essentially an unwritten rule that ending up in isolation prevents an inmate from getting parole hearings.
“It’s not just Pelican Bay,” Porzig added. “The prisoners in California are showing solidarity, not participating in separate hunger strikes. It really shows that across the state, prisoners are in similar conditions.”
This was originally posted on colorlines.com.
Comments
This is indeed a cause for basic human rights. Has America gone so low in moral values that they forgot who gave them their next breath and who also want to control the minds of their fellow men. These inmates at Pelican Bay and other prisons are not the animals that the media has portrayed them to be for so long. Yes, there are child molesters and rapists who are in prison who probably belong there. The imates in the SHU are mostly political prisoners who stood up for their rights and were labeled "dangerous" The Governor has the power to force the CDCR to meet with the inmates and meet their dmands. But will he do it?
Maybe these inmates should have thought about the crap conditions of prison before they committed their crime or violated someone. Did they think prison was going to be a cake walk? Maybe they should understand our students are in old classrooms, minimal supplies, over crowded, and funds are at a minimum because inmates are enjoying the luxuries of a cell, 3 meals a day, workout time, MEDICAL CARE, individual beds, areas to wash, visitors, and LOTS of free time all the while being monitored by some people who make more money than many teachers!
Oh, let's not forget once they are released they also get someone to monitor them out in public. Too bad these ignorant inmates don't have the common sense to show solidarity to do the right thing in society. I'm tired of hearing of inmates complaining about the terrible conditions. My family is a victim to a murder victim and these some of these fools can't imagine the impact their actions have played on families. Inmates like to whine that they are treated inhumanly...they don't even have to work like the rest of us on the outside who are striving to make it in this bad economy!
Let these lame brains go on a hunger strike for a year or two, maybe they won't complain so much once they have faded away from not eating of their own will!! Send the money saved from their meals to a public school...our kids could use it and would appreciate it much more than the ungrateful morons! Nuff said!!!
GOVERNMENT IS THE POBLEM BY NOT STANDING BY THE CONSTITUTION, THEY TAKE BRIBES / CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS AND THEY EITHER GIVE HUGE BAILOUTS OR THEY GRANT RETRO ACTIVE IMMUNITY FROM PROSECUTION,
SBX211 Retro Active Immunity given to California judges for openly taking bribes. Judges are employees of the state they receive their pay and benefits from the state. The Los Angeles Superior court judges are currently receiving an additional $57.688,00 from the county of Los Angeles. there is no bigger user of the court than L.A. County.(A party to the case and has a financial interest in most cases in the courts) Those payments were found to be unconstitutional / illegal in Sturgeon vs L.A. County. After that decision the judges paid a lobbyist to pass SBX211 ( RETRO ACTIVE IMMUNITY )
SBX211 does not restore due process
SBX211 violates Article 1 section 9
SBX211 violates the 14th amendment (no equal protections)
SBX211 violate checks and balances between legislative and Judicial powers.
Judges do not disclose the county payments at the onset of any trial where the county is either a party to the case or has a financial interest. (Judges violate Judicial codes of ethics)
Judges refuse to recuse themselves when requested under CCP170
Judges find themselves unbiased and then file an order striking statement.
In the year of 2010 alone $57,688.00 per year per judge X 460 judges = $26,709.544.00 paid to judges from L.A. County from tax payer money to only have the judges rule against the tax payer in favor of L.A. County or the County's interest. THE BRIBES WORK.
HISTORY OF RETRO ACTIVE IMMUNITY IN THE UNITED STATES
1. given for unconstitutional use of torture
2. given for illegal merger of banks (we can see the effects of that now)
3. given to telecom company for illegal wire taps. (Fisa bill that led to the patriot act)
4. SBX211 given to Judges for taking bribes.
SBX211 is evidence of conspiracy of the California legislative branch of government to cover up the multiple felony's committed by the Judicial branch of government. By an act of Legislation, California's judicial branch has admitted to be corrupt.
SECTION FROM SBX211
This bill would provide that no governmental entity, or officer or employee of a governmental entity, shall incur any liability or be subject to prosecution or disciplinary action because of benefits provided to a judge under the official action of a governmental entity prior to the effective date of this bill on the ground that those benefits were not authorized under law.
MOTION TO VOID ALL ORDERS BASED ON FRAUD ON THE COURT. A VOID ORDER IS VOID AT ALL TIMES, A VOID CAN NOT BE MADE VALID BY ANOTHER JUDGE, CAN NOT BE MADE VALID THOUGH THE PASSAGE OF TIME, A VOID ORDER IS SIMPLY VOID.
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