I'm Just Asking

How can we the People of this nation/world end the suffering of countless men and women held inside; man-made, 'manufactured' torture chambers called: solitary confinement?

Can we call on the humanity of this nation/world to lend their voice, their time. Their strength and heart, their money toward ending torture in Amerika?
Is it reasonable to ask why so many human beings have been allowed to suffer for so long, such a cruel and brutal fate, simply because they're considered the outcast of a society?

Do the state and federal government have a responsibility to its citizens, or does it have the right to subject its poorest incarcerated citizens to an ongoing physical and psychological torment with no end in sight?

I'm just asking.

Mutope Duguma
s/n James Crawford
D-05996, D2-107L
Pelican Bay State Prison – SHU
P.O. Box 7500
Crescent City, CA 95532

CDCr calls hunger strike supplemental demands reasonable, then reneges; prisoners respond

December 1, 2013

In: SF Bay View  

by Mutope Duguma

In all policies, the truth is in the details of their implementation. On the surface, a policy can appear reasonable, but once you get into the actual working out of the details, you can see that it’s not what it seems like. For example, the war on crime, the war on gangs, the war on drugs and the California three strikes law are policies which we have come to learn in practice were nothing but phrases – and very costly phrases. 

The cost of those policies must be measured in the billions, because the actual carrying out of these policies ends up indicting and outright assaulting the poorest communities in Amerika, the same communities that populate the prison industrial slave complex today. So in responding to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitaion’sresponse to our 40 supplemental demands , I would like to get into the actual details of what the CDCr is and is not saying in response to prisoners.

There have not been any policy changes by CDCr or by Pelican Bay State Prison that verify the statement in the third introductory paragraph: “Despite policy changes that had already addressed the concerns raised during the two previous hunger strikes, gang leaders initiated a third strike and made 40 additional demands.” The term “gang leader” is offensive and baseless. It also has nothing to do with anything but character assassination to criminalize, devalue, degrade and dehumanize all prisoners who are demanding to be treated humanely.

No policy was addressed before the July 1, 2011, hunger strike. The program changes thus far have been based on operational procedural (OP) changes, which any warden can take or give anytime they desire to. The 40 supplemental demands are crucial for anyone who has to spend one day in these modern day torture chambers, where we exist in physical and psychological bondage.

Solitary confinement units are graveyards. You’re buried alive in a tombstone, confined to your own personal cube. Each cell is a concrete slab box to which you are restricted for the rest of your life. Then you’re tormented by your keepers to see how much you can take before you break. This is the format for all solitary confinement units throughout the United States, and almost 80 percent of the people who enter these tombstones are broken.

A friend of mine, Vikki Law of Truthout, once asked me, “Mutope, what about those who say, why would you want to make solitary confinement comfortable?” I told her it’s humanly impossible to make solitary confinement comfortable. What you attempt to do is keep people connected to their humanity; that’s it. Mere placement in solitary confinement is torture; looking in or out, it’s torture.

Supplemental demands 1-40

The Pelican Bay Human Rights Movement wrote 40 supplemental demands to detail what prisoners are entitled to and need to have re-instated.

Supplemental Demand No. 1 calls on CDCr to rescind all Form 115 RVRs (Rules Violation Reports) issued to hunger strikers during the peaceful protest. The CDCr has refused so far. Following is the prisoner representatives’ response:

CDCr’s own policy says that we have a right to go on a hunger strike without suffering any reprisal from the state. What CDCr officials in Sacramento did was retaliatory because they didn’t like the fact that there were a mass of prisoners on hunger strike protesting the inhumane conditions of solitary confinement, so they penalized all hunger strikers by saying it was a mass disturbance and that hunger strikers were manipulating the words from the CCR Title 15 to justify it.

The four representatives and I had read everything to make sure anything we did wasn’t against state rules or policies, and going on a hunger strike was not. So when we went on the July 1, 2011, hunger strike, the undersecretary of the CDC at the time, Scott Kernan, had the PBSP warden give us all CDC 128B chronos [informative documentation placed in a prisoner’s file] saying if we were to do the hunger strike again, we would face serious disciplinary action. This threat was arbitrary and an abuse of his administrative authority.

So when the second hunger strike came, Scott Kernan had Lt. Barneburg of IGI (Institutional Gang Investigations) at the time give each and every one of us a CDC Rule Violation Report (RVR) 115 for inciting a riot or mass disturbance. We couldn’t believe it, but it was true. They had misused the specific act in order to embellish an RVR from nothing to a real serious RVR offense.

Lt. Barneburg is now a captain of ISU (Investigations Services Unit). I can only suspect his promotion was for the many evil deeds he has carried out against prisoners throughout his stay as a so-called gang officer, where they manipulate confidential information, along with documenting words, all toward persecuting prisoners. This is why the CDCr RVR 115s should be dismissed, because they were illegal.

The RVRs we received for this July 8, 2013, hunger strike caused us a loss of credit for time served of 90 days for participating in the hunger strike. This time they left out “inciting a riot.”

Supplemental Demand No. 2 asks that no RVR be issued during July 8, 2013, hunger strike. CDCr refused to observe this request. The regulations do not apply here in relation to the hunger strike because refusing to eat does not equate to a disturbance and anything can be considered a disruption of orderly operations in the institution. But a hunger strike is definitely not an interruption. CDCr’s arbitrarily issuing RVR 115s was illegal, an outright abuse of their authority.

Supplemental Demand No. 3 asks that no retaliation happen when the July 8, 2013, hunger strike occurs. CDCr ignored this request. Notice that CDCr said policies and operational procedures are again a process in which the warden institutes the OP (operating procedure) concerning the safety and security of the institution. This OP does not supercede CDCr’s standing policies, state penal codes, or constitutional law.

These, again, are arbitrary attacks on all hunger strike participants by the warden at PBSP. Although the hunger strike OP 228 stipulates that all men who are identified as hunger strike representatives will be removed from the rest of the hunger strikers and placed in Ad Seg, CDCr and PBSP deviated from this practice and placed every last one of us on hunger strike in Ad Seg.

We found out that this OP was revised by gang officers at PBSP to retaliate against all hunger strikers in September 2012. It’s a clear case of abuse of authority by prison officials who use their power to punish prisoners.

There was never any policy before the July 1, 2011, hunger strike that punished prisoners for going on a hunger strike. Undersecretary Kernan arbitrarily drafted up a memorandum to this effect and the PBSP warden inserted that memorandum into the OP with the gang officers’ twist to punish prisoners.

Supplemental Demand No. 4 concerns the re-opening of a visiting room in Facility D, which PBSP is slowly working on. They have reopened Facility D, which should have never been closed in the first place, but the mismanagement of the prisoners’ program and the deliberate attack on solitary confinement prisoners and our families were part of that suppression of all relationships with our families. This was done by way of arbitrary order from the warden at PBSP. No policy or OP, just outright wickedness.

Supplemental Demand No. 5 calls for weekly phone calls to families and friends for all prisoners in SHU. CDCr is actually drilling holes in concrete walls for wires now. What about prisoners who will be literally waiting months, if not years, to get into a step?

This is where people in the public and prisoners have to be very cautious and conscious of the continual games by CDCr, because there are prisoners who have not talked to a family member in countless years. It’s been so long for some, it’ll be like calling strangers.

Again, it’s a policy and actual procedure that has been extremely wicked in its application and suppression of family and prisoner relationships. Phone calls should be instituted instantly, because families, friends and prisoners have already suffered enough.

Supplemental Demand No. 6 concerns access to hobby and art supplies and one photo per year, no matter what the prisoner’s record is. Well, there is a problem with putting photos down as a privilege, because photos are connected to the rehabilitation of the prisoners, like phone calls, visits etc., which build on family ties and friendship ties. People become re-humanized by being able to communicate who and what they are to the outside world through photos. To allow arbitrary, overzealous, racist, prejudiced and biased prison officials use an RVR 115 to deprive a prisoner of such important social, cultural and family-oriented treasures like photographs is in itself cruel.

Supplemental Demand No. 7 calls for prisoners to be allowed to sell or give away art work, no matter what their record is. Now here’s where safety and security are an excuse used to suppress people’s natural talents and creativity. The very system that claims to be about “free enterprise” is now using fascist-like suppression tactics to deny prisoners the human right to express themselves based on their God given talents.

This is criminal. There is no security concern here. This is where “group punishment” is applied, a policy where every prisoner is punished based on the act of one individual. We all are made to suffer for an individual’s action.

Every man and woman should be paid for his and her labor. Here there should be no exception. Any violation of a program should be punished to the fullest extent of the restrictions assigned to that violation, but to arbitrarily take away that program from everyone is exactly why our Core Demand No. 1 is so important. Nothing is non-negotiable where it suppresses the talent of a prisoner’s creativity. This goes to the heart of their rehabilitation.

Supplemental Demand No. 8 is to allow the Inmate Welfare Fund to be used to re-stock books for prisoners in the prison library. CDCr gave an excuse for not doing it. If this is true, why haven’t we seen one “new” book issued to prisoners? Yet, when we order a book from the library, it’s missing pages and is old. The CDCr’s state prison budget covers these expenses with taxpayer money. CDCr has to be honest about their responses. We have been held in these solitary confinement units, and we know the real truths. Independent investigation would prove these monies are being re-routed elsewhere.

Supplemental Demand No. 9 regards CDCr allowing funds for education programming. Compliance is yet to be seen. Plus, I would like to add that we are living in the 21st century and prisoners’ educations are like relics when it comes to the education of the average Amerikan. We are so far behind that we will know nothing when we parole.

The prisons have to move toward technological education systems. This is real rehabilitation for prisoners. For society to not move prisoners in this direction, to keep up with overall society, is a disservice to them and the communities they are returning to. I can only hope that CDCr is sincere about the educational programs, because if you truly want to civilize prisoners, then education is the key. And no prisoner should wait to be educated by CDCr, especially since they have a track record of over 40 years of not educating their prison population.

Supplemental Demand No. 10 concerns legal books not being counted in the 10 book allowance for each prisoner; inmate-owned legal materials need to be in separate category. The June 5, 2013, memorandum does not go far enough, and clarity is crucial in respect to how staff are directed to deal with legal mail when they have possession of the prisoner’s mail.

Supplemental Demand No. 11 is about allowing prisoners to donate old appliances to other prisoners. Again, here’s where safety and security is again abused by the CDCr. The real reason CDCr has applied their safety and security concerns to this supplement demand is because it is an underground profit incentive for CDCr. Where is the safety and security concern? The process is real simple. Make sure the TV is functional – no parts missing etc. Then sign it over to the next prisoner who is without an appliance or one who needs one due to their TV going out. When prisoners have to “donate” their TVs to staff, it becomes a lucrative business for the prison staffers.

Supplemental Demand No. 12 increases money allowed for canteen because of higher prices in canteen. Price gouging is the problem here in PBSP canteen, because prices fluxuate through a manipulation of product changes. For example, in the CSP-SAC canteen list there is a 1 pound bag of hot cocoa for $3.85. In PBSP the exact same bag costs $4.85, a dollar difference. PBSP canteen managers have been scheming on money from prisoners for years. So, it should be granted that all prisoners be able to spend $65 per month, regardless of whether they are in a step-down program or not.

Supplemental Demand No. 13 regards prisoners being able to donate to outside charities. Now this exposes the true wicked intentions of CDCr’s claim that they rehabilitate prisoners, when they bar us from supporting community projects like charities. We know that no matter where people are at or what color they are, if they are poor, they are struggling. Prisoners have good in them and should be able to benefit the communities. Allowing us this project is the least CDCR can do. Times are bad. Allow food drives to occur as much as possible in order to serve the community around us.

Supplemental Demand No. 14 regards typewriters being allowed. CDCr in Sacramento approved that prisoners in solitary can have a typewriter, but now some overzealous property officers at PBSP have interfered with the process, repeating their famous line that it affects the safety and security of the prison.

Supplemental Demand No. 15 allows prisoners to have multiple appliances. CDCr has approved the purchase of radios through their designated vendor, so allow us to have them. The games continue.

Supplemental Demand No. 16 calls for electrical outlets in cells and fire sprinklers in cells. CDCr mandated through a 602 appeal process that was granted that all Ad Segs can have electrical outlets, and yet PBSP is being disingenuous when they deny us the right to have them.

Supplemental Demand No. 17 reinstates family visits for General Population lifers. The CDCr campaigned against allowing conjugal family visits for prisoners, saying it was not economically feasible for them. But this puts them in contradiction with their own rehabilitation policy that family visits are the most beneficial to families and prisoners, as well as an incentive for controlling prison violence, hopelessness, depression etc. because prisoners value the union with their families and so do the families. It was a wicked attack against the family program.

Family visits were initially banned for sex offenders, yet when it was all said and done, CDCR ended up banning conjugal visits for all prisoners. Hell, all non-sex offender prisoners hate child molesters, rapists and domestic abusers. Any abuses against women or children are seriously looked down upon by a high percentage of prisoners.

So when CDCr proposed the order to the Legislature and got it through, they did it by attaching the sex molester stigma to it. The Legislature will now have to change it back in order to allow family conjugal visits again for non-molesters. But let’s be clear: The CDCr is the one that destroyed this important family-based program, which was effective and a more humane deterrent for prisoner misbehavior than some savage debriefing program. Reinstate the Bill of Rights for Prisoners, and a lot of these issues will be resolved.

Supplemental Demand No. 18 calls for Prison Industries of America, California, to supply standard quality products and food. PIA is fleecing taxpayers all across Amerika. Monopolies shut out citizens and small businesses from getting contracts with the state, by demanding that all prisons purchase only their items, and then they can produce low quality products, from food to mattresses. Their lumpy mattresses are like sleeping on a bunch of softballs, causing one’s blood circulation to be cut off if sleeping on one’s side and also causing crooks in the neck and hip pain. PIA’s poor quality food is infamous.

Supplemental Demand No. 19 regards PIA producing substandard clothing. Again, PIA is incompetent in manufacturing its products.

Supplemental Demand No. 20 concerns the contents allowed in annual and semi-annual packages for prisoners. On June 5, 2013, CDCr officials granted T-shirts, along with sweats, thermals, etc. Now it should be obvious that all these non-food items can and should be able to be purchased once a year. We shouldn’t have to compromise one of the two annual food packages that prisoners are allowed to have, by including clothing as part of one of the two food packages.

The supplemental demand requests one non-food package per year, solely for clothing, which can be heavy when a pair of shoes is enclosed. Here the supplemental demand is requesting a non-food package in order to get these items. CDCr’s answer was deliberately evading the question. Plus, special purchases can easily be implemented through the warden’s OP procedures, which is allowed once a month already. So CDCr’s designation of the contents in the boxes, i.e., clothing, ribbons, cups, bowls, headphones, paper, colored pencils, etc. is reasonable. Making it necessary for us to include clothing in one of our food packages is outright unreasonable.

Supplemental Demand No. 21 regards the list of items allowed to be purchased. Well, I’m glad CDCr said “partially,” because there’s no food or spices that we should be denied. But having it written on the matrix specifically shows the psychological torment – power play – that we are subjected to by prison property officers who get a sadistic kick out of confiscating food items, which are our property, on only a technicality.

Supplemental Demand No. 22 calls for getting rid of PIA as a food supplier. CDC did not respond to the request from prisoners to “refrain from utilizing CAL-PIA for food products due to poor quality,” and we are left with food not worth taxpayer dollars for the poor quality provided. This monopoly is double taxing taxpayers, because the poor quality food does not provide nutritional value, and that leads to medical problems, creating another expensive contradiction where taxpayers foot the bill.

The only way to demonstrate the truth about the food is to allow an independent dietician to investigate the actual food being served to prisoners. Currently, the prison dieticians can call the food we get a “heart healthy diet,” because the CDCr dieticians never examine the food, just the menu. The prison food managers are the real conspirators (criminals) when it comes to the feeding practices, because they do not provide, nor prepare, adequate nutritional calories in food items. Using terms like “one each,” they serve you a muffin for breakfast the size of a biscuit and tell you it’s adequate because the menu says “one each.” These are price shaving tactics and schemes most prison food managers use at the expense of prisoners’ health.

Supplemental Demand No. 23 concerns portions of food now served to SHU prisoners. I know for a fact that PBSP does not provide an adequate amount of nutrition and calories, and SHU prisoners do not receive the same amount of food as do GP prisoners. Whoever in Sacramento responded to this question is lying outright. I have studied extensively the food at PBSP and the deliberate games employed to inadequately feed prisoners in order to profit. Plus, I have the evidence to prove it, if CDCr’s Michael Stainer and Kelly Harrington are interested in the truth. Oh, there is no need to tear my cell up; it’s in the hands of the lawyers.

Supplemental Demand No. 24 regards the severely limited movies available to prisoners. Again, the CDCr has implemented policy around discrimination by cutting out R-rated movies and programming documentaries, plays, etc. CDCr has been able to take away 85 percent of the New Afrikan and Latino-Mexican movies and programs, because most of our programming is R-rated. This is the situation now with the implementation of this race-based policy.

Furthermore, the state has abused the obscenity penal code policy by deliberately misinterpreting its purpose and meaning as defined by the court in the Martinez case. The PBSP warden has been censoring PG-13, PG and G movies by cutting away whatever some officer feels is too offensive or too suggestive for the viewer, and his personal standard is cutting 40 percent of the movies.

But what’s really disturbing about PBSP practice is that they are paying $100 per video, which some if not all the time they edit to only an hour and 10 minutes per movie. OIG (Office of the Inspector General) Renee Hanson told me she was reviewing the expenditures of the IWF, Inmate Welfare Fund, and I informed her that PBSP officials have been embezzling, stealing as well as misappropriating IWF monies, when they claim to be paying $100 per video, which adds up to $2,400 to $2,600 per month. I find this to be outright criminal. I have the evidence to back up these facts, if Undersecretaries M. Stainer and Kelly Harrington wish to look into these allegations.

No need to search my property; the lawyers already have these facts in their possession. CDCr has to, in the interest of fairness, remove this silly state regulation that is designed to racially discriminate against prisoners.

Supplemental Demand No. 25 concerns the limited number of TV channels provided. CDCr claims PBSP prisoners have access to 23 channels. Now this is a lie that has already been proven to be a lie. Under no circumstances does PBSP provide 23 cable channels. I am shocked that they even claim it in the public media. The public should demand the name of all 23 channels they say they provide.

This is what I mean by the arrogance and abuse of power. The CDCr and PBSP officials feel they can lie, steal and cheat the people and then just provide some lame nonsense of a story and that justifies it. There needs to be an open, independent investigation of these outright lies, because this is why we went on two hunger strikes and are again on a peaceful protest hunger strike, due to lies.

Scott Kernan, former undersecretary of CDCr, admitted he was duped on the 23 channels. Now I see Michael Stainer of the Inspector General’s Office and his cronies are using this same lie as a means to deny a reasonable supplemental demand.

These actions speak to the wickedness of CDCr to deny adequate, meaningful programming for prisoners held in solitary. They are bent on punishment and this has been their core drive – punishing prisoners until they break us. I wouldn’t be surprised if they are taking taxpayers’ money out of the state budget for those 23 channels. PBSP only provides one cable channel. There should be an independent investigation of these allegations, enough so there is public outcry.

Supplemental Demand No. 26 regards access to cable channels for prisoners. Well, taxpayers already cover these fees and the PBSP officials are able to reroute these fees by writing down that they have purchased educational programs, when in all actuality they have paid for nothing. And when we do get to see education programs, they are repeats of the same programming we’ve been seeing for over 20 years, which allows them to pocket the funds that were meant for new programs.

This is where the real crime is committed. Ask what they spend for the 23 channels, and it’s probably a ridiculously low price. But again, we get nothing for it. It’s the same as with the $100 they say they spend for each video. There needs to be an independent investigation as to these allegations.

Supplemental Demand No. 27 calls on CDCr to purchase dip and pull-up bars with IWF funds. Some people stay in ASU (Administrative Segregation Unit) for months and years, and these isolation units can be worse than the SHU in most cases, with no personal property and nothing to do on these so-called ASU recreation yards. The excuse being made is weak and disingenuous because CDCr knows they should not hold people in ASU for years. So be truthful, CDCr.

Supplemental Demand No. 28 asks for weight-lifting equipment on yards. Again, CDCr has gone on a smear campaign about how letting prisoners lift weights is a threat to citizens. They put a bunch of money behind the bill and into politicians’ campaigns, urging that we have to get rid of these weights because prisoners are getting out stronger and can then victimize Amerikans. This is how our privileges for weights were lost.

The California Legislature needs to immediately reverse this bill, because all it did was create a medical crisis, where there were many prisoners whose health deteriorated due to lack of exercise. Taxing who, again? Yes, taxpayers.

The CDCr claims its policies are about the safety and security of the public and the prisons. You can easily see the truth when you look at the details. For instance, the weights that we used to have access to on the yards kept the prisoners occupied, exercised and tired after weightlifting.

This was one of those situations where CDCr took away the weights out of pure spite, nothing else. It’s kind of a sad state how prisoners are being caged on prison yards, locked in concrete slabs with nothing to do, sectioned off by race, just looking at each other all day, as if they are in Roman caged gladiator fights. And here we are in the 21st century.

Supplemental Demand No. 29 calls for a stop to “contraband (potty) watch” practices immediately. Let’s call it what it is, “potty watch,” for the sole purpose of humiliating the prisoner. It is a savage practice where you are taken to some cage and held in “slave shackles” until you defecate. This is a reflection of the nature of the beast that we are dealing with: CDCr uses the procedure to entrap the bowel movement in your jumpsuit.

These savages tape the jumpsuit to your ankles. They make you defecate three times before they relieve you of this torture. There is no real reason for a high percentage of these potty watches. It’s speculative for the most part and, as requested, they need to be banned immediately. The whole procedure is nothing but a trauma, and points to the military personnel working inside the prison. It’s a brutal practice; some prisoners have been known to spend three nights and days on potty watch.

Supplemental Demand No. 30 calls for Medical Doctor Sayre to be fired and never hold a position of authority over prisoners again. CDCr stands behind their crooked Dr. Sayre, who is head of medical care at PBSP. They don’t seem to be able to get rid of Dr. Sayre. He has done too much and he knows too much. He can destroy the whole system’s secrecy, which is why he will never be fired.

The mere fact that he attacked one of his own co-workers over a parking space that he claimed was his speaks to the instability of Dr. Sayre. He has been demoted, but the irony is that he still runs everything. They simply put his girlfriend in his spot, so he still runs medical at PBSP.

Just so you can see his arrogance, he took away many men’s medications before the hunger strike and during this hunger strike. This guy is a threat and a danger to all Pelican Bay prisoners. When who ask to see outside doctors for serious health issues, no matter how sincere the request nor how well it is documented, he denies it.

This is why CDCr keeps him, because he saves CDCr money in medications and treatments. Dr. Sayre, in my opinion, is a heartless murderer by proxy. Many PBSP prisoners have suffered under him and continue to suffer. This is no doctor.

Supplemental Demand No. 31 regards maintenance of cells, painting them. We have been locked down for cell painting each week lately, so it shouldn’t be a problem to meet this request.

Supplemental Demand No. 32 concerns maintenance of the ventilation system. Now the problem here is that Pelican Bay is breaking down and they are trying to do maintenance when the buildings are structurally incapable of functioning for another 20 years. The whole system is collapsing from the inside out, and the bandaid fixes will only be temporary fixes.

The ventilation is extremely poor, and we prisoners are made to suffer due to this poor structure. We might as well be outside when we’re inside a building as far as temperatures are concerned, because there is no insulation anywhere in the prison. So if it’s freezing cold outside, we are freezing cold in the building. If it’s burning up outside, we’re burning up inside. The PBSP plant operation cannot protect us from this reality, because the problem is in the structure. Independent investigation will bring out these facts.

Supplemental Demand No. 33 regards Lexan plastic plates on cells. CDCr is still using them, making excuses that are disingenuous, because there are many avenues to gas or attack an officer, if that’s the prisoner’s objective. To have Lexan or Plexiglas on cells is a health hazard.

What does the Occupational Safety and Health Board say about the plastic being a health hazard to prisoners due to collecting bacteria in the cells? They didn’t put me behind them because I made them spray the door regularly in order to get at that bacteria. Plus people with real bad asthma and allergies are at risk.

There’s hardly any violence in PBSP solitary units despite all the hype by CDCr about how dangerous we are. If you cut away the plastic at the bottom of the cell walls, there’s no real threat to staff, no matter who is in the cage.

Supplemental Demand No. 34 regards the percentage CDCr can take for restitution. Now here is a policy that is exploitative in all its practices. Here is the state abusing its authority by taking 55 percent of each dollar that a prisoner who owes restitution gets from his friends or family. And to say it is benefitting “crime victims,” well, the statistics say that most convicted felons commit offenses against their own race – New Afrikan on New Afrikan, Mexican on Mexican, or white on white. One thing we do know, poor lower class on poor lower class applies.

None of these victims are receiving any of this restitution money. So where is the money going and where is it at? If the dollars were going to them, the state would have never raised it to 55 percent, because they don’t want them to have it either. The injustice is that there is a conspiracy where the judicial proceedings tack on all these outrageous restitution fees and the CDCr then collects them for the court, and then CDCr charges the prisoners a 5 percent fee for removing them off your books (trust account).

This is criminal and the real victims never see a penny of this money. The 33 percent is a reasonable request, but I would go further and say that it should not be taken from anyone who owes restitution unless it’s going to the victim of the crime they committed or any prisoner who does not have a pay number.

The money that family and friends send in from the streets should not be touched at all. The prisoners should have access to a pay number to pay off their restitution. Independent investigation is needed to locate where this money is going!

Supplemental Demand No. 35 allows mail to be delivered and legal and family visits to be normal again. The SSU (Special Services Unit), IGI, ISU and OCS (Office of Correctional Safety) are the biggest SHAM I’ve ever been able to witness and the public should be outraged at all the time consuming hours and taxpayers’ dollars wasted into this sham of a system. Although there is a lot of hype on gangs, these guys have not even been able to manufacture any criminal gang behavior convictions.

The extent of their service is gang validations, which they have given 80 percent of the prison population. They have a track record for terrorizing poor, weak citizens of this nation, they sweat everything too frivolous to mention, and they do nothing but harass prisoners and their families and communities. They have been sued countless times and their arrogance allows them to commit the same constitutional violations of a prisoner’s rights, over and over again.

But this is because they do not foot the bill; therefore, they have no discipline in their actions. They have not made communities safer, nor prisons. So what is it all for? There has to be a benefit from such an expensive gang investigative unit, but in 30 years the CDCr gang investigators have only allowed gangs to expand – in and out of prisons. So where is the safety and security? Independent investigation is necessary here.

Supplemental Demand No. 36 concerns timely hearings when RVRs are issued, or dismiss them. Well, CDCr is the one that changed the state law and it should be changed back, because it goes against the fairness of our procedural due process, in which we are punished for time constraints violations. Yet staff violates time constraints all the time; it is considered harmless and they are still able to impose on us the worst punishment by violating prisoners’ time constraints. But if we dare to violate the time constraints, we have our complaint dismissed. Unfair practice!

Supplemental Demand No. 37 calls for timely hearings for serious RVRs. The answer to this response from CDCr is above, in No. 36.

Supplemental Demand No. 38 asks for an independent audit of IWF. CDCr did not comply. The key word here is “independent,” because it will show the misappropriation of the IWF monies. OIG’s Renee Hanson is doing a review of IWF and we want those findings released to the public. Independent investigation is key here.

Supplemental Demand No. 39 would reinstate the monthly meetings between the associate warden and prisoners to address problems. If this ever becomes fact again, few if any of our complaints would be necessary. The [now former] warden at PBSP, G.D. Lewis, was as incompetent as they come. He did not have the backbone to put an end to the gang officers basically terrorizing other staff and then dictating to every functionary in the solitary confinement units, so that they now feel free to attack prisoners in those areas through mail restrictions, bad food, property abuses, corrupt canteen practices, poor movies, and lack of medical care, education, supplies, law library access etc.

They make it a living hell for prisoners and not one supervisor or manager has ever made rounds to talk to prisoners, even after receiving complaints, and nothing has changed at all. So supervisors and managers have not been doing their jobs in over 23½ years at PBSP; I’ve never seen them walk in my 15 years here.

I have been here, and the avoiding by the guards of answering our questions is deliberate. The question asked was that the associate warden ensure that prison issues will be resolved and we prisoners should not have to wait until we can’t take the suffering any more and act on our own. When prison officials get paid good money – some better than college or university graduates – to maintain prisoners’ lives along with the safety and security of all prisoners, then we expect that to happen.

Supplemental Demand No. 40 asks for hunger strike and work stoppage negotiations to be conducted with the prisoners’ mediation team and the press in attendance. CDCr has never been supportive or about transparency. They know they are not going to be trusted in a closed room with our representatives, without witnesses or third parties, but they continue with the lies they have told about our reps.

Hell, Michael Stainer told our mediation team that he sees all of the 40 supplemental demands as being reasonable and that it is just a matter of working out the details. Then he two-faced everyone, so no way can we now trust what comes out of CDCr’s mouth.

Plus, the governor vetoed the Media Access Bill, because CDCr is not about transparency. And the question was clear during hunger strike negotiations, and no one said anything about any of the points made in any of the hearings on these matters! CDCr is evading the real issues again.

These counter-responses were written by Mutope Duguma toward the end of the 60-day hunger strike and work stoppage in 2013 – i.e., when he had eaten nothing for nearly two months. Send our brother some love and light: Mutope Duguma, s/n James Crawford, D-05996, PBSP SHU D2-107 up, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95532. In the past, statements like this have come from a collective, and the Bay View has published the names of all those involved. Now, however, Mutope Duguma must be shown as sole author to avoid an accusation by officials that multiple authorship is evidence of gang activity. 

  

Hunger strikers: Our resolve remains strong

SF Bay View, October 26, 201

Our resolve remains as strong as ever, and we continue to press forward despite our torture being taken up a notch. We send a clenched fist salute to everyone who has been supportive of our on-going struggle to be liberated from these man-made gulags called Security Housing Units (SHUs) and Administrative Segregation Units (ASU).

The 30,000 prisoners who spoke out against the dismal reality in which prisoners are being held should be a clear message to CDCr [California Department of Corrections and rehabilitation – prisoners often write the “R” in lower case because rehabilitation is denied them] officials that the dire, desperate conditions that we continue to endure are unacceptable!

No one should receive a sentence from a court and then have those responsible for carrying out that sentence exact revenge and arbitrary punishments at their whim. This is the reality that 30,000 men and women lent their collective voice to opposing.

No one should receive a sentence from a court and then have those responsible for carrying out that sentence exact revenge and arbitrary punishments at their whim. This is the reality that 30,000 men and women lent their collective voice to opposing.

The “crying gang” game is all cried out. It’s time to treat human beings like humans. A third of the prison population has clearly said that the inhumane conditions of long term solitary confinement and prison oppression must end.

The exploitation of prisoners must end. The exploitation of California taxpayers must end. There is no justifiable reason why a man or woman imprisoned in the 1960s or 1970s or even 1980s should still be languishing in prison.

We stand in solidarity, continuing to press forward with our protracted struggle to end these inhumane conditions.

Against all odds

Within Pelican Bay SHU, within our struggle to shed light on the inhumanities of prison conditions and state sanctioned acts of aggression and torture, we would like to extend our prayers and thanks to the 16 hunger strike representatives who were kidnapped from Pelican Bay State Prison (PBSP) Short Corridor on July 11, 2013, and unjustly placed on “hell row” in the Ad Seg torture chambers. New Afrikan Abdul Olugbala Shakur was unceremoniously kidnapped from the Short Corridor as well, on July 24, 2013, and subjected to the same atrocities. We stand with you.

With the addition of Abdul Shakur, one should take notice that he is not a rep, but instead is a critical New Afrikan thinker, who is a strong adherent to New Afrikan politics and an accomplished jailhouse lawyer. He has five pending lawsuits against the state tools of repression, CDCr and PBSP, for the injustices and inhumane conditions and treatment in blatant disregard of prisoners’ First Amendment rights that are continuously inflicted upon kaptives.

It’s a clear fact that Abdul was targeted by prison officials for removal and containment with the 16 reps in order to subject him to the pain and suffering handed down to all our reps, for his and their unwavering stances against prison injustice.

As a result of this system’s propensity for corrupt practices and the constitutional violations of prisoners’ rights, we contend the following prison officials conspired against Abdul Shakur and all 16 hunger strike reps to place them in Ad-Seg torture chambers [the first three with the CDCr’s Division of Adult Institutions and the second three at Pelican Bay State Prison]: 

Chief Deputy Administrator for Special Projects Susan Hubbard, 

Chief Administrator for Special Projects George Guirbino, 

Director of Adult Institutions Michael Stainer, 

Pelican Bay Warden G.D. Lewis, 

Investigative Service Unit (ISU) Capt. G. Barnenburg, 

and Institutional Gang Investigator (IGI) Lt. J. Frisk.

It’s a clear fact that Abdul was targeted by prison officials for removal and containment with the 16 reps in order to subject him to the pain and suffering handed down to all our reps, for his and their unwavering stances against prison injustice.

These acts against Abdul and the reps were purely retaliatory by CDCr officials, who utilized a peaceful protest as a pretext to justify subjecting each and every one of us to a more intense and discriminatory torture.

We will not be broken by vicious systematic attacks carried out by the CDCr hierarchy.

Animals: CDCR human exploitation in the 21st century

July 10, 2013

By Mutope Duguma

In: SF Bay View

Holding animals in solitary confinement breeds savagery. You are placed in a concrete slab of a cage for 22 ½ hours a day and let out for 90 minutes to another concrete slab of a cage only to be returned to your animal cage like an animal in a zoo, where correctional officials walk by your cell as if they’re watching exotic animals: tall ones, short ones, little ones, big ones, dark ones, light ones etc. etc.

They section off the cages as if to say these are our wild animals. We hold them in the short corridor, the long corridor. We got a variety of animals that are just as dangerous, just like the zoo. The animals do not have a voice; therefore, us overseers control the narrative, explaining to the world why we have to hold these animals in cages, because if we let them out, they will go wild or wouldn’t know how to survive in the free world on their own. So we hold them in these animal cages in order to tame them, just like at the zoo.

We do charge a fee to hold our animals. It’s Big Business in Amerikkka. For minding “our” animal cages, we get $70,000 annually in tax dollars for our animals held in solitary confinement. But in our tame animal cages on General Population, we get $53,000 annually, and this is for each animal we have in a cage.

This is why we must continue to build more prisons-zoos, especially solitary confinement cages in the 21st century, to build on our profits. But we have to maintain a surplus of animals for our Prison Industrial Slave Complex Zoos, by manifesting as well as manufacturing 21st century slaves throughout the United States.

Imprisoning “animals” will produce an output of animals, who will perpetuate the practice of savagery … toward serving our interest.

Mutope Duguma is a 21st century prison slave, as sanctioned by the 13th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

http://sfbayview.com/2013/animals-cdcr-human-exploitation-in-the-21st-century/

Treating us like slaves: an analysis of the Security Threat Group Step Down Program

June 28, 2013

by Dadisi Kambon, Sitawa Nantambu Jamaa, Abdul Olugbala Shakur, Sondai Kamdibe Dumisani, Mutope Duguma and Abasi Ganda

In: SF Bay View

For the past two years we’ve heard the state claim it’s reforming its long term segregation policies and practices by implementing a Security Threat Group (STG) Step Down Program (SDP). Officials claim the program is a significant move towards a more behavior-based system, yet they remain extraordinarily vague about the “ultimate conclusion.” What exactly is “gang activity”?

The state’s motives are and always have been about the targeting and creation of informants, snitches and other low lifes for the sole purpose of creating a population of prisoners who mindlessly operate against their own interest to the benefit of the state.

This powerful drawing, “Step Down Program” by F. Bermudez, was enclosed with this statement by the writers.

To the state, rehabilitation means rat, because the only way to ensure that the targeted population or prisoner is no longer a threat is by their willingness to inform or lie. The state is not concerned whether or not you know anything; all they are concerned with is whether you are willing to inform.

We are dealing with an entrenched mindset. State officials have created their own paranoia with the sheer sensationalization of the unproven, unchallenged reports they fabricate in order to justify keeping hundreds of us confined to control units indefinitely.

It’s important to understand that prisoners are by way of the 13th Amendment slaves and are essentially dealt with as such by the courts and state officials who have essentially unchecked authority to treat prisoners as they see fit with very minor limitations. The 13th Amendment says, “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”

Folks tend to underestimate the wording of this amendment. We tend to think and/or are conditioned to think that slavery is over. It’s important to reflect upon this because it places into context the role that the judicial branch – the courts – have played in permitting this 148-year experiment to continue.

We need not look far to see that in the history of this nation there were no rules governing the operation of a prison. Those matters were left to the absolute discretion of the warden.

With the emergence of the prison movement in the 1960s, prisoners began to win some important rights. The United States Supreme Court decided two very important good cases in this regard: Monroe v. Pape, 365 US 167 (1961), and Cooper v. Pate, 378 US 546 (1964).

These cases transformed Section 1983 into an extremely valuable tool for state prisoners. [Section 1983 is today the most important provision of the Reconstruction-era Klan Act, originally meant to protect Black voting rights. After Reconstruction, the 1871 law fell into disuse for nearly 100 years. It makes relief – in the form of money damages – available to those whose constitutional rights have been violated by someone acting under state authority, such as a prison guard, and the statute is most often used today by prisoners. – ed.]

Powerful, racially united strikes and rebellions shook Folsom Prison, San Quentin, Attica and other prisons throughout the country during the early 1970s. These rebellions brought the terrible conditions of prisoners into the public eye and had some positive effects on the way federal courts dealt with prisoners.

Prisoners won important federal court rulings on living conditions, access to the media, and procedures and methods of discipline, such as the right to some due process before being placed in disciplinary segregation (Wolff v. McDonald, Cluchette v. Procunier, Wright v. Enomoto), the right to send and receive letters (Procunier v. Martinez), and the “Prisoner’s Bill of Rights,” which guaranteed prisoners a measure of human decency. Accordingly, prisoners won the right to access the court (Bounds v. Smith) and the right to outdoor exercise (Spain v. Procunier).

These were pre-validation rulings and were high on the target list of Supreme Court Justice William H. Rehnquist, an extremely activist judge appointed by President Ronald Reagan in 1986. President Richard M. Nixon had first attempted to appoint Rehnquist in the 1970s, having been furious with what he felt was a liberal Supreme Court granting citizens Miranda Rights and the right to be represented by counsel at trial.
Rehnquist, like Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia today, does not believe that the constitution applies to prisoners. Rehnquist openly questioned whether the constitution afforded prisoners the right to access a court or whether the state should be required to inform arrested citizens about their right to remain silent.

In the meantime, prison officials invested a lot of capital in their scheme to divide and conquer, fomenting violence, pitting prisoners against each other and effectively stifling the political influence that the 1960s era of “progress and struggle” had on the concentration camps, giving rise to the era of “roll back and repeal” and “gang validations” under the guise of fighting gang activity.

Rehnquist, like Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia today, does not believe that the constitution applies to prisoners.

Unfortunately, the federal courts did not stay receptive to prisoner’s struggles for long. In 1996, Congress passed and Bill Clinton signed into the law the Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA). The PLRA is extremely anti-prisoner and designed to limit prisoners’ access to federal courts, legally permitting discrimination against a specific class of individuals: prisoners. The PLRA has given rise to what is known as judicial deference – deferring to the judgment of prison officials – in matters of prison management.

This analysis was brilliantly articulated in an article in the January issue of Prison Legal News (PLN) by Sharon Dolovich entitled, “Forms of Judicial Deference in Prison Law.” I will only paraphrase the article here as it is important to the analysis of the STG/SDP Pilot Program. We must pay attention to this phrase and what it actually means.

In her article, Ms. Dolovich explains that in cases concerning prisoners’ rights, the imperative of judicial deference takes three forms: First, and most obvious is doctrine constructing. In this respect, deference to prison officials is written right into the substantive constitutional standards yielding rules of decision that tip the scales in favor of the defendants – the state.

Second, deference is used to justify procedural rule revising in ways that transform familiar aspects of the legal process into more inherently defendant (state)-friendly procedural mechanisms. In other words, if the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure require the pleadings to be read in the light most favorable to the party against whom summary judgment is filed, typically a prisoner, in most cases, deference prevents this rule from benefiting the prisoner.

Third, deference spurs situation reframing or recasting of a procedural or factual history in ways that enhance the defendant’s (the state’s) position at the plaintiff’s (the prisoner’s) expense. Here is where a court will completely ignore a prisoner’s factual allegations and reframe them in a way that bolsters the defendant’s position and make it easier for the court to dismiss and/or deny the prisoner’s case.

In sum, Ms. Dolovich points out that “far from achieving a balance between appropriate deference and appropriate constitutional enforcement, the Court’s prisoners’ rights case law seems instead to be a jurisprudence of evasion, justified by talismanic reference to the need to defer to prison officials.”
This explains what’s kept their policies so vague and their constant schemes to replace one hoax with another any time their methods are questioned to any appreciable degree.

When the courts permitted indeterminate confinement for non-disciplinary reasons, it did so because the state convinced them that said confinement was not for disciplinary reasons or punishment (Toussaint v. McCarthy) and that CDCR would review those placed in segregation for administrative reasons, considering them for release every 120 days.

Well, 30-plus years have yielded ample evidence of the punitive nature of this kind of segregation with the opening of Pelican Bay in 1989 and administrators smugly proclaiming to the world that these guys are the “worst of the worst” and then going about the task of selling that notion, which necessitated the creation of a little crime and some violence to a certain degree! Who says crime doesn’t pay?

With this scheme, they arbitrarily changed the Toussaint requirement to review for release. Now the only way out would be to parole, debrief or die! Shortly thereafter Madrid v. Gomez was litigated. The case was initially taken because – to his credit – U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson grew concerned about the large number of excessive force complaints the court was receiving from Pelican Bay prisoners.

The case, while setting some guidelines to monitor the use of force, turned its focus largely toward the mental illness aspect of confinement to Pelican Bay SHU – i.e., sensory deprivation. It would add another layer to the validation procedure by requiring three independent sources to justify SHU confinement, while changing absolutely nothing.

The court side-stepped the issue, leaving prisoners to languish and die, based on sensational allegations of gang activity dreamed up by IGI (Institutional Gang Investigations) and OCS (Office of Correctional Safety) and their informants, individuals they’ve rewarded for their fantastic lies and grandiose imaginations. Informants invent spectacular tales of slander, yet they themselves have worked in concert with the state, much like lackeys in a Third World country, instigating and spurring chaotic dissention and violence to benefit their handlers.

CDCR now says it recognizes that new STG group affiliates and corresponding gang-type behavior has emerged within the department’s sensitive needs yards (SNY) population. Now remember we were told that SNY inmates were those who chose to debrief and disassociate themselves from the gangs, yet they have this gang-type behavior cropping up on the SNY yards.

It begs the question, did these inmates debrief and lie on other prisoners in order to escape torturous conditions only to resume their prior criminal activity? Or did they debrief and lie on other prisoners only to be given greater access to resume their gang activity? Whichever it is, CDCR admits its debriefers are exhibiting the gang-type behavior that they’ve supposedly disassociated themselves from by providing information about others!

The Madrid ruling changed absolutely nothing and gave prisoners no protection at all when it came to arbitrary gang validations, except to require their independent source item rule, with one item establishing a direct link to a validated member. Again, there is no interpretation of what a direct link is, which left the gates wide open to the scandalous imagination of the gang investigators to invent bogus gang validations as long as they established that one source item was directly linked to a validated member.

They accomplish this in several ways: The most common at the moment is 1) during a debriefing you were identified as a member of X gang, or 2) during a cell search your name was discovered on a roster listing validated members of X, or 3) – this is a good one – you were found in possession of other validated gang members’ property.

In In Re Cabrera, the California Court of Appeals interpreted CCR (California Code of Regulations) Title 15, Section 3378(c)(4), finding that in order to establish a direct link to a validated member or associate, IGI was required to prove that the prisoners formed a mutual or reciprocal relationship. Seemed fair, seemed reasonable; however, CDCR didn’t want the burden of having to prove its slander so they appealed to the California Supreme Court, claiming the lower court didn’t show or give enough deference to its judgment. And, as you might have guessed, the highly activist anti-prisoner court agreed, stating “courts are bound to defer to CDCR’s intervention of its regulations in gang identification process” (In Re Cabrera, 55 Cal.4th 693 (2012)).

We’ll talk more about the California Supreme Court later. To date, that court has rolled back every prisoner case that’s come before it following a lower court victory for the prisoner – every one.

Turning our attention to Castillo v. Alameda, this is another highly touted, highly publicized case that was supposed to change the validation process and afford prisoners substantially more due process in validation proceedings and supposedly change what source items could and could not be relied on without an articulable basis.

Turned out “articulable basis” meant anything about anything they wanted it to mean. For example, when validated prisoners speak to or greet other validated prisoners, their basis for using a “hello” is this: “Validated gang members are known to engage in roll call. Sending regards to one another using their gang monikers (nicknames) is a sign of respect for the gang. Based on my training and experience, this constitutes gang activity.”

A court cannot say this is ridiculous because Cabrera and other cases say courts are bound by CDCR’s interpretation of its regulations. That’s substantial deference.

The California Supreme Court has rolled back every prisoner case that’s come before it following a lower court victory for the prisoner – every one.

The articulation of a basis is limitless. Being validated, anything you do or say is characterized as gang activity – anything. When mail is confiscated, to scare and/or intimidate family, friends or the public, their basis is: “Gang members must communicate in order to recruit and spread their gang propaganda. They are known to use coded messages to recruit through the mail, etc.” This is a scare tactic.

The so-called Castillo Agreement was supposed to have defined gang activity as knowingly furthering, promoting or assisting a gang in activities that violate the law.

But what actually has become the definition of gang activity is any documented activity between validated gang members. This can be talking in the library or the yard, sharing a look or a simple hello.

Being validated, anything you do or say is characterized as gang activity – anything.

The changes Castillo purported to make to the validation process resulted in the mistaken belief that SHU review is to occur every six years as opposed to every 180 days. Courts, afraid to even question CDCR lawyers and the like, all accepted this erroneous persecution, despite Toussaint v. McCarthy, clearly holding review must occur every 120 days and said review must amount to more than meaningless gestures.

While prisoners were told they could be released from SHU after six years of no documented gang activity – and true to form CDCR initially released about 90 prisoners from 2000-2004 and sent about 100 or so to Corcoran SHU – the word was Pelican Bay was releasing people. The same stunt is being employed now. CDCR says it has about 83 prisoners scheduled to be released per a case-by-case review.

However, this was only a slick hoax. Those prisoners released remained under constant threat of being returned to Pelican Bay unless they debriefed. By 2008, 90 percent of all inactive releases had been returned to SHU. The process was looked upon by prisoners as a hoax designed to quell the brewing storm waiting behind parole, debrief or die!

So here we are again with the new Security Threat Group/Step Down Program of 2012. We are again told that we can, via the SDP, be released from SHU without having to debrief, by participating in a five-year Step Down Program. Sound familiar? CDCR says it will implement an incremental four-year STG/STP which by design will replace the existing six-year inactive review process for validated STG affiliates.
The STP will be an individual behavior-based program for STG affiliates that will provide graduated housing, enhanced programs, inter-personal interactions, as well as corresponding privileges and personal property enhancements for participating STG affiliates. Sounds a lot like the failed policies of the past.

Get this: CDCR says additionally you have the responsibility to report STG or criminal activity when known or observed by you. This process is not intended to compromise your safety but to enhance your safety through the identification and removal of those involved in STG or criminal activities. Reporting your observations can be accomplished via many avenues, including 1) contacting staff directly; 2) writing a request for interview (CDCR GA-22); 3) notifying your counselor or classification committee; 4) writing a letter to the institutional gang investigator (IGI) at the address of your assigned institution; 5) writing a confidential letter to the warden of your assigned institution.

If you have access to the inmate telephone system, you can call a friend or family member who is willing to contact the prison directly on your behalf so the staff can follow up and take your report confidentially.
This cannot be reconciled with anything other than what it sounds like: a brainwashing. They expect you to report on the conduct of others around you and they give you several ways to do it. These kinds of requirements encourage inmates to lie.

It appears that their mindset is about creating informants – snitches – because in their mind the only way one is not a threat is if he or she is an informant. No snitch, no threat. This is the prescription they have for our lives!

The behavior and conduct of other individuals should not be the responsibility of other prisoners to report on. What the hell is this?

The STG/SDP is nothing but more of the same window dressing with a new coat of paint. They now seek to employ more aggressive brainwashing techniques aimed at inducing snitching. We continue to be held here for the past 10, 20, 30 and 40-plus years because we refuse to be and/or become government agents.
While they will undoubtedly release individuals, these individuals will remain at risk of being returned to the SHU if they fail to inform on the conduct of others. You must participate in the program.

Without a real change of substance to the gang validation policies, the STG pilot program is only a continuation of the same old methodology of re-wording what already exists.

They seem to think they’re dealing with children. They are trying to enforce a no-talking policy! Don’t talk to so-and-so or so-and-so or you’ll get a time out. They seek to have an entire population of men running around with their heads down, scared to speak or share simple reading material for fear of being validated.

We continue to be held here for the past 10, 20, 30 and 40-plus years because we refuse to be and/or become government agents.

If you’re already validated, this STG policy requires that you don’t associate with other STG affiliates. Remember, association remains undefined and non-STG affiliates will be validated for associating with validated STG affiliates. The entire gimmick is a catch-22.

What is association? Personally we know it is anything they want it to be – reading newspapers, books and magazines, sharing a cell or simply a greeting. This is why the first requirement in their SDP contract is for you to comply with the double cell policy. What does that have to do with STG activity?

It seems as though the conspiracy to continue using any old thing to ultimately create snitches and justify parole denials is actually at the root of their scheme. This conspiracy ought to be evident by the explanation given before the BPH (Board of Parole Hearings) by George Giurbino explaining the STG policy.

It’s the BPH that’s been the chief validator of CDCR’s management policies, operating with a carrot and stick approach, validating otherwise sensational, unproven fabricated accounts of gang activity by issuing vague, lengthy parole denials with references like “You gotta get out the SHU” or “You have to decrease your custody level” or relying on confidential information that the prisoner has no knowledge of. So it’s no wonder the first place they ran to explain the rewording of their latest scam was the SDP.

The SDP contract that one must sign before being placed in or advancing through the SDP, folks are reporting that it doesn’t appear to be a requirement. Well, that’s not what the policy says.

In fact, No. 3 of the contract says, “Follow all staff recommendations and directives.” If by chance staff recommend that you debrief and you do not comply, you have violated the contract.

The so-called STG disciplinary matrix is really a method to exact punishment for things like participating in a hunger strike or talking to another prisoner or the way you criticize them in the media or the subjects you study. The STG disciplinary matrix is a cheap way to exact punishment for your thoughts in a way that justifies your continued involvement in STG activities.

It’s worth noting that the new STG disciplinary matrix has a violation for violating the STG contract. Interestingly now, CDCR admits that the STG policy is not entirely behavior-based.

Of course not! Because it would be impossible to continue running this racket without having the discretion to fabricate and invent gang activity. An example is found in CCR Title 15, Sec. 3378, validation criteria being a direct link to a current or former validated member or associate.

The only way to be validated on a link to a former validated prisoner is to debrief, so by hinging any validation on a link to a former validated prisoner is a gimmick to validate young, unsuspecting new prisoners when they arrive in the kamps, unaware of anything and intentionally placed around debriefers who then become the catalyst for their validation, and the cycle continues.

The current STG policy still hasn’t determined what or who they will designate as a STG, because STG 1 members will be housed in segregation based solely on their validation. And while they are claiming to be moving away from focusing solely upon the groups they have traditionally focused on, like the BGF (Black Guerilla Family), the Mexican Mafia, Northern Familia (NF) and the Aryan Brotherhood (AB), it’s hard to believe that their supposed shifting focus won’t mean a STG designation for those traditional groups. They haven’t said. It’s like they want us to sign a blank contract and wait while they fill in the blanks.

They say STG associates will remain in general population unless confirmed STG behavior or activities are present. If these behaviors or activities are present, the STG associate will be considered for segregated housing and placement into a five-year Step Down Program.

Here’s the gist of it: A validation will still mean punitive segregation without being found guilty of anything at all, and validation as an associate will still mean a minimum of six years in a SHU. Until one advances through a maze of a five-year Step Down Program that now will employ advanced brainwashing techniques to induce snitching, i.e., reporting on the conduct of others.

The STG pilot program is not a credible revision of the policy to supposedly end long-term solitary confinement based on status. There is nothing in the wording to prevent arbitrary validations, something Madrid was supposed to address, then Castillo. But each time the vagueness got vaguer, such as the term “training material,” which can be anything a validated prisoner reads or studies – anything.

This has become the catch phrase as pointed out by Shane Bauer in the October 2012 Mother Jones article. He says: “California officials frequently cite possession of black literature, left-wing materials, and writing about prisoner rights as evidence of gang affiliation. In the dozens of cases I reviewed, gang investigators have used the term ‘[BGF] training material’ to refer to publications by California Prison Focus ….”

The stories are endless about what constitutes “training material.” Slavery is alive and well inside the free world. Anything you read can be considered training material if it offends them and enough prisoners read it.
They want us to sign some vague contract that can be breached depending on their mood. But they refuse to agree not to fabricate information in order to target and validate prisoners they wish to remove from the general population and subject to long-term torturous conditions until and unless they debrief or submit to their brainwashing techniques.

They steadfastly refuse to accept responsibility for subjecting thousands of prisoners to solitary confinement for upwards of 40 years for no justifiable reason, other than it has been profitable to do so.

If they were required to prove the sensational allegations they create against individual prisoners, they couldn’t, which is why the court invented the grandest scheme of all called the “some evidence” rule (Superintendent v. Hill), which doesn’t require them to prove anything at all.

So while they test the new STG policy as being some sort of reform of what they admit are draconian policies, we must not forget that they also sold their inactive policy as also being a correction of previous unconstitutional practices that were accepted by and justified in a series of unpublished rulings by the courts.
As one looks at this so-called new STG policy, it really is an expansion of the validation model and a continuation of the six-year SHU terms upon an initial validation as an associate, albeit characterized as a five-year Step Down Program, where the coercive tactics to debrief will be applied more systematically at each step.

They steadfastly refuse to accept responsibility for subjecting thousands of prisoners to solitary confinement for upwards of 40 years for no justifiable reason, other than it has been profitable to do so.

The fabrication of STG activity will increase with a so-called disciplinary matrix that employs vague code words like “training material.”

As we have seen in In Re Cabrera, CDCR fought to remove the definite definition of the term “direct link” because to do so would defeat their purpose. They claim that we’re here because of acts of violence. We say, then charge us. Prove what you say!

As much as our struggle is with CDCR and its policies, it is even more so a struggle with the courts and legislators that have permitted this to continue, not to mention the prisoners themselves with the courts’ slave-era approach to permitting prison officials to punish – and we know now that this is punishment – based on allegations, without our having been charged with or found guilty of any misconduct at all. Yet we are treated as if we had committed a crime, much like the institution of slavery was expanded by the U.S. Supreme Court in the Dred Scott decision of 1857.

Basically the Supreme Court would decide a similar issue in Scales v. United States, 367 U.S. 203 (1961), holding: “In our jurisprudence, guilt is personal, and when the imposition of punishment on a status or on conduct can only be justified by reference to the relationship of that status or conduct to other concededly criminal activity …, that relationship must be sufficiently substantiated to satisfy the concept of personal guilt in order to withstand attack under the Due Process Clause of the 5th Amendment.” The Court concluded that without more, mere membership in an organization engaged in illegal conduct is not sufficient to establish the required relationship between that membership status and criminal activity.

Since prisoners are essentially slaves, this reasoning does not apply. Prisoners are only entitled to minimum constitutional protection, since the state says prisoners’ status (segregation) is not for punishment but for safety and security (Toussaint).

But when justifying this crap, they’re quick to paint with a broad brush that we’ve earned our way into SHU with acts of violence and other misconduct. They’ve had it both ways for 40-plus years. Charge us or release us – period!

There’s 30 years’ worth of evidence of punishment based on status that they’ve substantially tried to justify with ploys like Madrid and Castillo, while actually changing nothing, one ploy after another. This ought to be revisited to determine, based on the 30 year period, are we being punished? And if so, then the Toussaint ruling ought to be carried to its only logical conclusion and mandate the full panoply of constitutional protections for those placed in segregation for so-called gang affiliation.

If the U.S. Supreme Court can revisit the 1965 Voting Rights Act to determine, based on evidence, whether discrimination still exists in voting so as to determine whether the 1965 voting rights act is still necessary, then there is no reasonable reason why the ruling in Toussaint can’t be revisited for those very same purposes.
In fact, in Wolff v. McDonnell, Justice Marshall advocated the in camera review of confidential informants which, of course, was rejected by the Court, citing legitimate institutional concerns.

A couple of years later, in Baxter v. Palmigiano (1976), the Supreme Court took up the issue again, holding “the better course at this time, in a period where prison practices are diverse and somewhat experimental, is to leave these matters to the sound discretion of the officials of state prisons.” However, the court emphasized that its limited list of inmate due process protections was not “graven in stone.” “As the nature of the prison disciplinary process changes in the future, circumstances may then exist which will require further consideration and reflective of this Court.”

The Prison Industrial Complex (PIC) rose to its zenith on the backs of prisoners, and ultimately it will meet its decline on the backs of our united collective determined efforts. It is what they fear the most.

The time is now. We have 30 years’ worth of evidence that shows state officials have abused their discretion by carrying forth old vendettas under the guise of gang suppression.

The so-called STG disciplinary matrix is really a method to exact punishment for things like participating in a hunger strike or talking to another prisoner or the way you criticize them in the media or the subjects you study. If you thought the articulable basis was far out there, wait until that basis is employed in conjunction with the STG disciplinary matrix.

In other words, the matrix is a cheap way to exact punishment for your thoughts in a way that justifies your continued involvement in STG activities.

So while we find all manner of excuses to avoid acting, and while we lie in the corner and pretend it’s somebody else’s problem, ultimately we must drag ourselves to act. This is our problem. The martyrs of yesterday are not here.

For decades folks would spout about what prisoners needed to do, when they thought the divisions were insurmountable. Well, our reps have done that so stop the happy-happy-feel-good talk and drag yourself to the table. What can you contribute? How can you support the effort? Those are the only questions that ought to be asked.

We can either die quietly, paving the way for future generations to endure this crap, or we can do something about it. We have absolutely nothing to lose. “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.” – Frederick Douglass

The time is now. We have 30 years’ worth of evidence that shows state officials have abused their discretion by carrying forth old vendettas under the guise of gang suppression.

Prisoners are well within their human rights to demand an end to state-sanctioned torture. Now is not the time to be intimidated into silence. If the courts will not act to protect our constitutional rights or provide us with the full panoply of constitutional protections when a so-called validation brings a wide array of punishments yet the prisoner hasn’t broken any rules, then it’s our duty to act. This crap has lasted this long because as a class we accepted it.

The Prison Industrial Complex (PIC) rose to its zenith on the backs of prisoners, and ultimately it will meet its decline on the backs of our united collective determined efforts. It is what they fear the most.
The SDP is a hoax. It simply rehashes old failed policies. Our reps have put forth the correct solution that incorporates an experienced, comprehensive approach towards an end to long-term solitary confinement. It’s worth reiterating the reps issued the Pelican Bay Human Rights Modern Management Control Unit (MMCU), a counter proposal to the STG strategy published in the April 2012 Bay View.


Send our brothers some love and light: Dadisi Kambon (Lorenzo Benton), B-85066, PBSP SHU, D2-101L, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City, CA 95532-7500; Sitawa Nantambu Jamaa (Ronnie N. Dewberry), C-35671, PBSP SHU, D1-117L, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City, CA 95532-7500; Abdul Olugbala Shakur (James Harvey), C-48884, PBSP SHU, D1-119L, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City, CA 95532-7500; Sondai Dumisani (Randall Ellis), C-68764, PBSP SHU, D1-223L, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City, CA 95532-7500; Mutope Duguma (James Crawford), D-05596, PBSP SHU, D1-117U, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City, CA 95532-7500; Abasi Ganda (Clyde Jackson), C-33559, PBSP SHU, D2-107L, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City, CA 95532-7500. This statement was transcribed by Adrian McKinney.