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.
