Beautiful Op-Ed on BART Police Shooting

Yesterday morning at the Oakland Local: The physician who treated the latest BART police shooting victim wrote an evocative letter. Read it here in its entirety.

Last month, I learned that one of my former patients – Charles Hill – was shot and killed by BART police. Per the police, he was armed with a bottle and a knife and had menacing behavior. Per eye witnesses, he was altered and appeared to be intoxicated, but did not represent a lethal danger.


I remember Charles vividly, having taken care of him several times in the revolving door, which is the health care system for the people who do not fit neatly into society. Charles was a member of the invisible class of people in SF – mentally ill, homeless and not reliably connected to the help he needed. While I had seen him agitated before and while I can’t speak to all of his behavior, I never would have described him as threatening in such a way as to warrant the use of deadly force.


…


I would like to lend my voice to the growing protest of the BART police’s excessive use of violent force and know that weekly protests are being organized on Mondays until demands are met for BART to fully investigate the shooting of Charles Hill, disarm its police force and train them properly, as well as bringing the officer who shot him to justice.


The media is portraying the annoyance of the protests to commuters more than the unbelievable horror that an innocent man was shot dead by the force that is meant to protect us. I don’t want to upset commuters or be a nuisance. I would like to be part of educating and not letting this slip under the proverbial rug, in honor of Charles Hill and in order to help prevent something like this from ever happening again.

Crimmigration: The Dark Side

The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights, with the ACLU and several other civil rights organizations, have filed a lawsuit seeking to stop the practice of shackling undocumented immigrants appearing before immigration court. The Huffington Post reports:

According to the lawsuit, the overwhelming majority of prisoners who show up in immigration courts have no violent criminal history. The lawsuit seeks to compel the Department of Homeland Security to make individual determinations about shackling rather than have a blanket policy. DHS officials declined to comment Wednesday.

This practice, and others, are an example of the false dichotomy between criminal and immigration matters. Make no mistake – these two issues are closely interrelated, as the financing of Arizona’s SB 1070 by private companies demonstrates. Shackling is a distressing practice, and we’ll be following this lawsuit closely.

Extra credit: As always, the question if one of incrementalism versus radicalism: Is the call to “stop treating undocumented immigrants as criminals” equivalent to a call that perpetuates treating criminals the way we have been treating them? Hmmmm.

BART Riots and Police Brutality: More on the Othering of Crime

As I write this post, BART is finally opening its downtown stations, after shutting them down in an effort to curb protests against police violence. What has been referred to in the media as “civil unrest” is yielding broad coverage, not least because of BART’s decision to cut down cellular phone service within its premises. Now that’s what some would call grounds for “civil unrest”.

But back to the topic of protest. So, the stations have been shut down, and it is rush hour. The Chronicle reports:

BART police closed the Civic Center station after at least one protester blocked a door of a Dublin-Pleasanton train for two minutes as others chanted “No justice, no peace.” The train continued east, and a dispersal order was soon issued.


“Once we got to a situation where the BART platform was unsafe, we cleared the station,” said BART Deputy Police Chief Daniel Hartwig, referring to the first closure. “We cannot jeopardize the safety of the patrons or the employees here.”


Some transit riders were infuriated. Jennifer Cohn, an attorney who works downtown, arrived at the Civic Center station at about 6 p.m. with her two sons, ages 3 and 4, after picking them up from day care. She was trying to get home to the Glen Park neighborhood.


With the station closed, she tried to catch a cab, but they seemed to be avoiding the area.


“This is an outrage. We just want to get home,” Cohn said. “I don’t really see why they should be shutting down the stations. If they have an issue with BART, they should go to BART headquarters.”

No, Ms. Cohn; what’s outrageous is that the police shoot innocent people. This “issue” is a prime example of people standing up to police abuse. And there are good reasons for all rush hour commuters to join them, rather than complain. We posted here before about the scathing review of BART police practices in the aftermath of Oscar Grant’s tragic death.

Now, why would Ms. Cohn and other riders be indifferent to this important issue? Could they possibly think that the abuses of force, unfettered discretion, and lack of professionalism at BART are good things? In all likelihood, they have not been paying much attention to the news. Or maybe, like Costelloe, Chiricos and Gertz’s survey subjects, they think that, at the receiving end of police abuse, are only people who deserve such abuse. Thuggish people. Scary people. Gang-y people. People who don’t look or behave like them.

Because, as we all know, if you don’t finish the vegetables off your plate, a cop will come get you. But if you do, no harm will befall you.

I heartily wish to all those perturbed rush-hour BART passengers, that they will never be shot in the back when handcuffed by an officer who was, assuming the best of scenarios, untrained in distinguishing between his gun and his taser (gentle reader, you can assume other scenarios if you prefer.) And that, if by any chance or bad luck, they are ever mistaken by an overzealous cop with poor vision for one of those “other” “bad” people, that others will be willing to stand up for them and raise their voice in protest. Even if it means that a few good, law-abiding citizens get home for dinner fifteen minutes late.

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Many thanks to Kathryn Nettles and Tom Oster for the conversation that inspired this post.

Tony Platt on Pelican Bay

Historian Tony Platt has a wonderful blog post out about the Pelican Bay hunger strike, titled The Shame of California. You should really read the whole thing, but here is a short excerpt:

On July 1st, a small group of prisoners in Pelican Bay’s SHU, calling themselves the Short Corridor Collective, initiated a hunger strike, calling for the abolition of long-term solitary confinement, improvement in programs for SHU prisoners, and an end to various abusive administrative procedures. Unlike a similar action by prisoners in 2002, this strike drew the support of thousands of prisoners throughout the state. Moreover, Prison Hunger Strike Solidarity was so successful in getting out information about the strike that European human rights organizations urged the Governor to respond to prisoners’ demands and the New York Times carried an Op Ed condemning the “bestial treatment” of prisoners in Pelican Bay State Prison (Colin Dayan, “Barbarous Confinement,” 17 July 2011).
During the strike, according to the Short Corridor Collective, at least seventeen strikers, including three leaders, were transferred to another prison for medical treatment. The Collective ended the action on July 22nd after gaining the right to wear cold weather caps, to have calendars in their cells, and to have access to educational programs in the SHU. Though these concessions by prison authorities are modest, we should not underestimate the larger significance of the strike. It draws worldwide attention to the widespread use of torturous practices by the United States against its own citizens; it forces the government of California to sit down, face-to-face, and negotiate with people who have been demonized as semi-human beasts; and it raises the possibility of once again incorporating prisoners into a larger struggle for social justice.

More on Prison Diet: Food Choice as a Site of Autonomy and Self Expression

Giuseppe Arcimboldo, “Summer”

A story on the New York Times’ Bay Citizen tells of a jail inmate, Dave McDonald, who was denied a vegetarian diet during his jail term.

He refused to eat anything that he did not know was animal-free, and as a result, his weight plummeted nearly 50 pounds to 155.


“I don’t want animal corpses on my plate,” said Mr. McDonald, who is now free on bail. “My belief in not hurting animals is more powerful than any religious belief.”


Had Mr. McDonald said he was a vegetarian for religious reasons, or because of a medical condition, the county would have been legally required to comply. But Marin County officials said that simply believing in the sanctity of animal life was not enough.

This story, dealing perhaps with whom some might see as an atypical inmate, may bring to middle class’s consciousness the deeply rooted problems in an incarceration system based on selective incapacitation and a refusal to see its charges as individuals. We’ve discussed diets here before, when reporting on the addition of a Halal food option as one of the “five faiths” recognized by CDCR and on a study finding a decline in inmate violence when prison diet improves. But today’s story highlights another important aspect of prison nutrition.

Food plays a fundamental role not only in human survival, but also in self expression. The Internet is populated by abundant food blogs and articles. Food is a source of pleasure for many of us, but for many it is also an opportunity to live our beliefs and values through out palate. Recent online battles in the wars of vegetarianism and veganism brought home just how much people care about these food choices. Michael Pollan has proclaimed a set of rules for omnivores: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly Plants.” Author Jonathan Safran Foer has written Eating Animals in defense of vegetarianism. Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation, and the movies Food, Inc and Super Size Me, highlighted the many harms of an agribusinesss-managed food economy. Nina Planck’s critique of vegan diets for children was strongly criticized for its portrayal of vegans. A well-known vegan food blogger recently moved away from her vegan diet for health reasons and received harsh critique and death threats from the vegan community. And then there’s Lierre Keith‘s recent book The Vegetarian Myth, in which she speaks against industrialized, monopolized agriculture, saying vegetarianism and veganism still participate in a system that is fundamentally unjust – opinions for which she has been assaulted in public appearances. While it’s best to leave the discussion of the nutritional and political merits of vegetarianism and veganism to blogs that focus on such matters, clearly these folks’ food choices – on both sides of the debate – are inexorably tied to their identities, to the point that they are willing to endure harm to themselves or threat harm to others in the name of these choices.

The point is not to admire or criticize vegetarian, vegan, locavore, organic, paleo, low carb, low fat, or any other diet choice. The point is to remind all of us that people in custody are denied these choices. And for many people, the choice not to consume flesh or use animal product is as important and as deeply held as someone else’s sincere belief in one of the “five faiths.”Apparently, in California, vegetarian and vegan options are offered in state prisons as a courtesy; vegan meals started being provided after mass arrests of PETA members, prior to which they were only offered on a religious basis. As we see in today’s paper, in local jails the situation can be more precarious. As to other ideological choices, individualization is problematic. The implications of dietary choices touch on fundamental issues of prison management. Will the meal be served buffet style, so inmates have some choice in what is put on their plates? In supermax institutions and SHU units, does one have a say in what is pushed into one’s cell? Understandably, a system providing food to 160,000 people cannot make concessions for people’s tastes and whims, and I imagine the political outcry that would result if it did. But as it stands, the official stance on food choices, tying them inexorably to religion and offering few concessions beyond that, is discriminatory and illogical. Moreover, cheap as it may seem to feed many people uniformly (and badly), the price is paid in the form of violent behavior and health costs.

I’m also wondering what prison and jail policies are with respect to people whose diets are shaped not by their ideological preferences, but by their allergies and intolerances. If you’ll allow me a personal comment, it is difficult enough to be wheat intolerant in the accepting world of the Bay Area, where abundant choices exist. Bread is a basic food stable; it is cheap and mass produced, and as such, is the cornerstone of any attempt to feed people on a large scale in an industrial complex. The prison industrial complex is no different. So, is an inmate diagnosed with celiac, for example, offered an energy source in lieu of bread, like rice and potatoes? How can a system of mass incarceration ensure no contamination, when consuming even a small amount of wheat can be extremely debilitating and, in the longer term, lethal? And what about inmates who have anaphylactic reactions to certain kinds of food? True, exquisite shellfish are not on the menu in most prisons, but what about folks extremely sensitive to albumin, a component of egg? And what about the many people who have suffered digestive, respiratory, and musclo-skeletal debilitating conditions all their lives because they do not have the resources to be diagnosed with an allergy? In California’s broken correctional medical system, what are the odds that someone like that will be flagged as suffering from a real condition, let alone diagnosed with a specific allergy? Managing allergies is difficult enough for us average folks on the outside. I can’t even imagine what the protocols for such a situation are on the inside, nor can I imagine any concessions made to the general diet to accommodate them. If any of our readers is better informed about this, please share your information in the comments.

On October 24, the UC Hastings Consortium will hold a Food Day event on the topic of Food Deserts. Our conference will feature discussions involving food professionals, lawyers and physicians regarding the social sites that have no access to healthy, nutritional choices, including prisons and jails. Yours truly will be there, and I hope you will, too.

Addendum: Of course, all this discussion underscores the use of food refusal, in the form of a hunger strike, as a political tool. We remember Pelican Bay inmates and other inmates and their hunger strike. Stay strong.

Support for Hunger Strikers in the New York Times

A New York Times editorial this week picked up the story about the Pelican Bay hunger strike, offering support for the strikers.

With their health deteriorating, those inmates continuing to fast resumed eating after state prison officials met a few modest demands. Inmates in Pelican Bay’s isolation unit will get wool caps for cold weather, wall calendars to mark the passing time and some educational programming. Prison officials said current isolation and gang management policies are under review. But the protest has raised awareness about the national shame of extended solitary confinement at Pelican Bay and at high-security, “supermax” prisons all around the country.


Once used occasionally as a short-term punishment for violating prison rules, solitary confinement’s prevalent use as a long-term prison management strategy is a fairly recent development, Colin Dayan, a professor at Vanderbilt University, said in a recent Op-Ed article in The Times. Nationally, more than 20,000 inmates are confined in “supermax” facilities in horrid conditions.


Prison officials claim the treatment is necessary for combating gang activity and other threats to prison order. It is possible to maintain physical separation of prisoners without ultraharsh levels of deprivation and isolation. Mississippi, which once set the low bar for terrible prison practices, saw a steep reduction of prison violence and ample monetary savings when it dramatically cut back on long-term solitary several years ago.

And there’s a humonetarian angle, too:

Holding prisoners in solitary also is very expensive, and several other states have begun to make reductions. In any case, decency requires limits. Resorting to a dehumanizing form of punishment well known to induce suffering and drive people into mental illness is beyond them.

The Benefits and Discontents of Incremental Reform

A few recent events have made me think about the advantages and drawbacks of reforming the correctional system incrementally, that is–by “fixing” one aspect of it at a time. Two things in particular came to mind.

The first is the tension between death penalty activism and life imprisonment, or long-term imprisonment, activism. Last year, at the World Coalition Against the Death Penalty meeting, I talked about the perils limiting activism only to the grounds that would “work”, such as innocence and cost. In the same meeting, Senator Mark Leno, for whose good intentions and immense contributions to correctional reform I have much respect, said that  abolishing the death penalty would not hamper public safety, as we could still throw dangerous convicted felons into prisons for the rest of their lives. This idea, of limiting the struggle to the death penalty under  the assumption that life imprisonment was somehow okay or even advisable, worked well in a room in which people were gathered as a narrow coalition – there were representatives of Murder Victims’ Families for Reconciliation in the room, as well as law enforcement agents who oppose the death penalty but are otherwise on board with law and order policies. So, politically, narrowing the struggle to “just” the death penalty is necessary to bring together all these groups of activists. However, narrowing the focus of the struggle to the death penalty under the argument that life imprisonment in a supermax facility, say, under SHU conditions, is not as bad, is a severe blow to the struggle against isolation, debriefing, and other humiliating conditions suffered by inmates who were not sentenced to death–precisely the conditions leading to the hunger strike, now entering its third week. Is this why the strike is getting so little press coverage? Because, in California, it is now politically easier to stomach a potential death penalty abolition than humane conditions for presumed gang members? Both of these goals are worth fighting for, and I wonder whether patience and incremental gains here will be to the inmates’ advantage or detriment.

The second is SB9, the Fair Sentencing of Youth Act, which for all its noble purpose and fancy name affects the sentencing of very few juveniles in CA, and less than 3,000 nationwide should it become national policy. Happily, SB9 recently passed 5 to 2 in the Assembly Public Safety Committee meeting; that is a very good thing, and it may make a meaningful difference in the lives of the few young men and women behind bars with no glimmer of hope for freedom in their future. However, as some blog commentators mentioned here in the last few days, the proposal is limited in effect to those juveniles, rather than giving more hope to juveniles sentenced to life with parole (say, 25 to life) or to otherwise lengthy sentences. Both groups of inmates – and the second group is, of course, more numerous – are worth fighting for, and again, I hope the incremental system will work to the benefit of the second group over time.

Changes and reform in criminal justice policies have historically been incremental. SB9 would not have existed without Roper v. Simmons, after which many activists may have asked themselves why it made sense to separate the fight . Similarly, the current proposal to end the death penalty in CA would not have come to life without years of moratoria and incremental struggles about amounts of this or that drug. And none of this would have been achieved, in my opinion, without the mundane, gray backdrop of the financial crisis, serving as a constant reminder to activists and disinterested citizens alike that we cannot afford mass incarceration and punitive extravaganzas. The current hunger strike in Pelican Bay, which I hope will finally start attracting more media now (mainstream news coverage of this event of seminal importance has been pitiful, with the exception of the L.A. Times), might not have come into existence had the Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Plata not given inmates hope for change.

So, the revolution will not come in a shiny parade. It will happen stone by stone, proposal by proposal, shutting down the mechanism not because all policymakers will suddenly come to the realization that what we have done is excessive, brutal and inhumane, but because we will gradually be unable to afford more and more pieces of the puzzle. It will be less dramatic, but the end result will be no less gratifying, and it is still worth fighting for, step by step, brick by brick.

Monday Protest in Sacramento

click to enlarge text

This Monday, supporters of the striking inmates will meet at the CDCR headquarters in Sacramento.

Previous statements from CDCR denied the existence, or minimized the size, of the strike. Now, it appears that CDCR is admitting that thousands of inmates are striking. The disappointing bit, however, is that the interpretation by the authorities completely misses the point. Look at this odd CDCR statement in the Chronicle: 

Prison administrators said the 676 remaining inmates who have refused meals since the strike began July 1 probably synchronized their statewide effort through organized criminal networks.


“This goes to show the power, influence and reach of prison gangs,” said Terry Thornton, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. “Some people are doing it because they want to do it, and some are being ordered to do it.”

What is being missed here is that, as opposed to the common race-related segregation and animosity within walls, this strike uniquely bridged people of different races. Probably, as in any form of public protest, there is leadership, and it would not be a big surprise if leaders are charismatic and had leadership status prior to the strike. What is remarkable here is CDCR’s refusal to acknowledge the elephant in the room. Why would thousands of people in deplorable conditions make their conditions even more deplorable by risking their health and well being in refusing food? Maybe the actual substance requires institutional attention? No, let’s just say “gangs”, and it will make the demands of thousands of people incarcerated in abysmal conditions disappear.

If you, too, are upset, and can make it to Sacramento on Monday, make your voices heard.

Edited to update: It appears that an attempt to negotiate with striking inmates has been made. CDCR has promised it would conduct a “comprehensive review” of SHU. Unsatisfied and displeased with these vague statements, inmates continue striking. Mediators report some of the strikers have lost 25-35 pounds and their health is deteriorating.

News from Pelican Bay

Image courtesy: SPCR (full story here)

Yesterday’s protest at UN plaza was an inspiring and uplifting event, even as it reminded us of the horrifying, hellish conditions inmates are subject to at SHU units.

Anti-death-penalty activist, author and journalist Barbara Becnel gave us some news about friends inside, as did a number of family members and friends. It’s not easy to go without food or drink in prison, let alone under an isolation regime, in which food is one of the few things you have to look forward to. Health is deteriorating, but the men are determined to go all the way with the strike, said Becnel, because “we are already dead.”

Some of the publications I read, as well as evidence from visitors and family members, suggests that the CDCR publicized its 4th of July menu, which included items the inmates had not seen in a long time, in an effort to break the strikers’ spirits. And some former SHU inmates spoke up about their horrifying experiences in small, metallic, windowless cells, where they were locked for 23 hours a day save for a “dog run” for an hour.

The full formal complaint, including the inmates’ demands, can be read in this issue of Prison Focus (or, in a nutshell, here). The inmates ask for an end to collective punishment and “behavior modification”; for solid evidence, rather than conjecture, in labeling an inmate as a gang member; for an end to the abysmal, pshchologically harmful isolation regime; for adequate food; and for adequate programming. These are not demands for privileges, but rather for basic human rights.

Reports on the scope of the strike are misleading. Moreover, several newspapers have not even picked up the story. Please, inform the uninformed. Even in the era of Brown v. Plata, something must be done. Favorable decisions from the Supreme Court mean nothing if the outcome of relief isn’t felt in the darkest corners of the California correctional machine.

Pelican Bay Inmates to Begin Hunger Strike on July 1st

Prisoners to Begin Hunger Strike on July 1st in Pelican Bay State Prison (from www.indybay.org)

Prisoners in the Security Housing Unit (SHU) at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City, California announced that they are beginning an indefinite hunger strike on July 1st to protest the conditions of their imprisonment, which they say are cruel and inhumane. An online petition has been started by supporters of the strikers. While noting that the hunger strike is being “organized by prisoners in an unusual show of racial unity,” five key demands are listed by California Prison Focus: (http://www.prisons.org/)

1) Eliminate group punishments; 2) Abolish the debriefing policy and modify active/inactive gang status criteria; 3) Comply with the recommendations of the US Commission on Safety and Abuse in Prisons (2006) regarding an end to long term solitary confinement; 4) Provide adequate food; 5) Expand and provide constructive programs and privileges for indefinite SHU inmates.

The CA Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation prides itself on Pelican Bay being “the end of the line,” and is part of a continuation since the 1960s of prisons using solitary confinement as a main tactic to crush rebellion and resistance.

Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity states, “As anti-authoritarians and anarchists, this is a crucial moment to show our solidarity with those on the inside who are ready to die in their fight for dignity and the most basic necessities of life that the state continues to deny. This will be the third major hunger strike in a US prison in the past year and those of us fighting on the outside need to make a visible show of support for this wave of prisoner-led organizing.”

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A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

Vowing to die, if necessary, inmates at the dreaded “SHU” section of California’s Pelican Bay prison begin a hunger strike on July 1. “Like the strike by inmates in Georgia’s prison system late last year, the Pelican Bay protest cuts across racial lines.” The core issue: a brutal, soul-killing policy of solitary confinement and other deprivations aimed at turning every inmate into a snitch on everyone else.

Pelican Bay: Hunger Strike in Super-Max

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

“Inmate organizers say prisoners have been subjected to solitary and a whole range of deprivations for ten, twenty, even forty years.”

On Friday, July 1st, between 50 and 100 men at the Security Housing Unit of California’s infamous Pelican Bay prison go on hunger strike to protest cruel and unusual punishment. It is a punishment inflicted, primarily, on their minds. At the heart of the protest is solitary confinement, the barbaric torture that deprives prisoners of contact with fellow human beings, condemning them to a kind of “social death” – some for decades.

This is the “dark side” of the American repressive arsenal that Vice President Dick Cheney was so happy to unleash as a weapon in the so-called War on Terror: the stripping down of captive people through methodical deprivation of everything that makes them human. Yet these excruciating mind-destruction techniques are routinely deployed on the domestic front, in the American prison gulag, at places like Pelican Bay.

Inmate organizers say prisoners have been subjected to solitary and a whole range of deprivations for ten, twenty, even forty years. They are most incensed at the policy euphemistically called “debriefing,” in which inmates are pressured to confess to every crime they have ever committed in life. They are then expected to inform on other prisoners, their crimes, conversations and gang affiliations. This information – whether true or false – is then used to throw fellow inmates into the special Hell of solitary confinement. It is a brutal, sadistic cycle of degradation, a bizarre world in which everyone is compelled to “snitch” on everyone else. Prisoners are routinely given indeterminate solitary on the mere word of an informer. The worst section of the SHU is called the “short corridor,” where 200 men languish in the deepest isolation. These are the men at the center of the hunger strike.

“It is a brutal, sadistic cycle of degradation, a bizarre world in which everyone is compelled to ‘snitch’ on everyone else.”

One of them is named Mutope Duguma, formerly known as James Crawford. The “call” for the hunger strike was put out under Duguma’s signature. It asks that “all prisoners throughout the State of California who have been suffering injustices in General Population, Administrative Segregation and solitary confinement…join in our peaceful strike to put a stop to the blatant violations of prisoners’ civil/human rights.” Like the strike by inmates in Georgia’s prison system late last year, the Pelican Bay protest cuts across racial lines, involving, in the prisoners’ words, “united New Afrikans, Whites, Northern and Southern Mexicans, and others.” The organizers warn inmates to “beware of agitators, provocateurs, and obstructionists” among the prisoner population.

The Pelican Bay hunger strikers vow to die, if necessary, in a struggle against dehumanization. In the San Francisco Bay area, supporters from the outside have formed Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity (prisonerhungerstrikesolidarity@gmail.com), to let the inmates know that they are not alone, and “to make sure their voices are heard outside of prison.”

From the inside, inmate Gabriel Huerta reminds us that “Using indeterminate total lock down to extract confessions is torture by international standards as is the use of prolonged solitary confinement.” This is a global, human rights issue.

For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to www.BlackAgendaReport.com.

BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.