Victoria Law's Blog, page 5

pictures

In 2011, people incarcerated throughout California launched 2 mass hunger strikes demanding an end to indefinite solitary confinement. The strike was first called by prisoners at Pelican Bay State Prison’s Security Housing Unit (SHU). Over 1,100 prisoners are in the SHU, where they spend at least 22 hours locked in their cells each day. In the SHU, people are locked in their cells for at least 22 hours a day. Prison administrators place them in the SHU either for a fixed term for violating a prison rule or for an indeterminate term for being accused of gang membership. These accusations often rely on confidential informants and circumstantial evidence.

One of the concessions the hunger strikers won was the ability to take photos of themselves to send to their family and loved ones.

While I am neither family nor loved one, I have been covering the hunger strikes and the conditions in the SHUs. With the latest hunger strike, now entering its second month, I received two photos from one of the hunger strikers:

"I sent those pictures so that you could personalize me if I died," he wrote.

With one participant in the hunger strike already dead, these words seem especially ominous.

For my most recent pieces on the hunger strike, see:
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/17...

and

http://www.thenation.com/article/1755...

For those of you who prefer video to text: http://truth-out.org/news/item/18116-...

FCC passes prison phone justice

http://phonejustice.tumblr.com/post/5...

For those not familiar with the prison phone justice issue, here’s a quick summary (courtesy of Alex Friedmann of Prison Legal News):

1. While incarcerated, prisoners primarily use phone calls to communicate with their families and children. Such calls are overwhelmingly paid not by prisoners but by those who receive their calls — primarily their families.

2. Prison phone rates are the most expensive phone rates in the nation; it’s cheaper to call Mongolia from the US than to accept an interstate phone call from prison or jail. The rates range up to $17.30 or more for a 15-minute call, not including extra charges imposed by prison phone companies such as Global Tel*Link, Securus and CenturyLink.

3. Prison phone rates are so high in large part because contracting government agencies, such as state Departments of Corrections and county sheriff’s offices, accept “commissions” (kickbacks) from prison phone companies of up to 70% of gross phone revenue. 42 states receive prison phone commissions. In any other context, such kickbacks, which are primarily paid by prisoners’ family members, would be illegal — but it is the industry norm for prison phone services.

4. Prisoners who maintain strong family connections while incarcerated are more likely to stay out and not commit more crimes after they are released — e.g., they have lower recidivism rates. Thus, high phone rates that make it difficult for prisoners and their families to communicate constitute a public safety problem.

Today the FCC voted to regulate and decrease the cost of prison phone calls.

Really California? You can't find enough people whose health is compromised by incarceration?

California-based advocacy group Legal Services for Prisoners with Children drew my attention to this article in which the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is supposedly having a hard time finding people whom it can release from prison to comply with the Supreme Court order to reduce overcrowding:

In documents filed late Thursday in U.S. District Court, the state identifies preliminary criteria for freeing elderly and medically frail inmates, as well as continuing to house nearly 9,000 prisoners in private facilities out of state.

But Corrections Secretary Jeffrey Beard warns the three federal judges behind the release order that there are not enough nonviolent inmates left in the California prison system to meet the court's goal of reducing crowding to 137.5% of what state prisons were built to hold. Eligibility for the proposed geriatric parole program, for instance, would be limited to those over 60, who have served 25 years in custody and are not condemned or serving a life sentence without possibility of parole. The court-appointed medical receiver is drawing up a list of potentially eligible candidates for medical parole.

The courts had calculated that even with medical and geriatric parole and increased time off for good behavior, California would have to release more than 4,000 additional inmates. Beard said the state can find only 1,205 inmates who committed nonviolent crimes, have a low risk of committing new crimes once out of prison, are not tied to a prison gang and have less than a year left to serve on their sentence.

Therefore, he said, the state is trying to come up with other criteria for release. "These evaluations and decisions are not quick, clear or easy," he said.

Perhaps they should ask Jane Dorotik, incarcerated at the California Institute for Women (CIW). She's written quite extensively about aging women at CIW, women who repeatedly are turned down by the parole board. In Issue 26 of Tenacious: Art & Writings by Women in Prison, she details the stories of five such women:

Five Women, Five Denials

This week five women here at CIW were scheduled to appear before the Parole Board seeking parole suitability, seeking that elusive approval to be released from prison and returned to society. It is the job of the Parole Board Commissioners to determine if these women pose any threat to public safety, and if so, then they should remain in prison.

At least that's how it's supposed to happen. That is what the regulations that govern parole suitability hearings say.

Four of these women, Beverly, Belitta, and Yvonne and Eara are "Golden Girls," that is they are ages 55 and older. Mary Alice is only a few years behind them, although she has been in prison the longest—her stay now spans 27 years. All five came away from the hearings without being granted release back into society.

Collectively these five women have spent 116 yaers behind bars. Collectively they are 63 years past their minimum eligible parole date. And you should know that lifers do not even appear before the Parole Board until they have already done their time. So, of course, your next question would be, "What horrible activities have they engaged in, what callous disregard, what total lack of remorse must they have, that the Parole Board keeps them in prison?" Good question.

Beverly, who is 16 years past her minimum release date, has been a model prisoner, no disciplinary write-ups, actively programming, gaining certificates in self-help rehabilitation classes, taking leadership positions in activities, helping others, obeying all the rules. She was told that the nature of her crime, now 23 years ago, was too heinous to grant her parole. This is the same boiler plate language that the Parole Board repeatedly relied on to deny parole, directly disregarding the language and intent of the regulations. Commissioners utilized this rationale to deny parole in the majority of cases, until the California Supreme Court said they could no longer rely solely on the nature of the crime to deny parole. So, I don't know, maybe these commissioners didn't get the memo. Either way, Beverly must wait another three years before she begins a new attempt at gaining her freedom.

Mary Alice was praised for all her programming, her insight, all her self-ehlp, but she was still denied because she received a "counseling chrono" for failing to "get-down" quickly enough last year during an alarm. Now this was not an RVR (a rules violation report), it was just a counseling chrono, a reminder, if yoyu will, but it still kept her from her rightful freedom. Maybe she was a little slow to get down. After all, at age 48, with arthritis and other medical concerns, it is not easy to quickly place your rear end on the ground, whether it's raining, where there is a mud puddle under you, or any other reason. The prison system expects you to respond with your rear end smacking the concrete like a well-trained dog. Mary Alice, who is 20 years past her minimum release date, also will wait another three years for her next attempt at freedom.

Eara didn't even stay for her full hearing. The Parole Board told her she should have had a new psychological evaluation prior to the hearing. Eara had actually tried to get a new psychological evaluation, but the Administrative arm of the Parole Board had told her, in writing, that it was not necessary, that the new psych evaluations are only repeated every five years. These commissioners pretty much told her that she would not be found suitable if she were to proceed, so she took her only option at that point, to stipulate her own unsuitability and hope they eventually would give her a new psych evaluation.

Yvonne, who is "only" 8 years past her release date, had tons of laudatory chronos in her file, many from the CIW staff who knew her well and applauded her work ethic. Her crime occurred 22 years ago as a consequence of Battered Women's Syndrome, and all of this is well-substantiated in her file. The commissioners also told Yvonne she should have a more recent psych evaluation. She stood her ground, producing documentation of her attempts to be provided a new psych evaluation, and the same Administrative letter informing her that psych evaluations are provided every five years. She proceeded with the hearing and was denied parole because of two non-violent rules violations four and five years ago (possession of a cigarette and refusing a medical transport). How does this make Yvonne a threat to public safety?

Belitta is 63 years old and has been in prison for 22 years. She must have been given the full gamut of the Parole Board's decision making powers because her denial was based on the heinous nature of the crime, her (supposed) lack of insight, and questions about her psych evaluation…although they praised her for remaining disciplinary free and for her positive changes.

I could give you so many more stories, outrageous reasons the commissioners offer as rationale for denying parole, but after a while it gets almost too ludicrous to list anymore.

If we look at the financial cost to keep these women behind bars, the numbers quickly become astronomical…Sixty-three years past the minimum eligible parole date, the date the judge who sentenced them, and society who believed the system was fiar, assumed they would be released from prison. Four of the five women are "Golden Girls" and so each woman, each year, costs another $138,000. A non-Golden Girl costs $50,000 each year to continue to incarcerate, so:

43 years x $138,000 per year = $5,934,000

20 years x $50,000 per year = $1,000,000

So the total cost to the taxpayer is $6,934,000 to keep these women in prison 63 years beyond their minimum release date.

Now of course, you should question, "How can you put a price on safety?" You are right…what price is public safety worth? Does it promote public safety to underfund education, let our youth fail in school and eventually drop out…knowing that 50% of all high school drop-outs end up involved in the criminal justice system? Does it promote public safety to deny a single mother food stamps, or deny subsidized childcare so she can work…knowing that, as a mother, she will do whatever it takes to feed her kids?

We know that the state has a finite amount of money to spend. We know therefore that every dollar spent on prisons is a dollar taken from education and social supports. No one wants society to be harmed. The media seems to hysterically report how some parolee got into trouble with the law, but you might want to know the real statistics, published by CDCR's own research divison.

According to CDCR's own 2011 Adult Institutions Outcome Evaluation Report, of 860 convicted murderers who have been released between January 1995 and March 2011, five have been returned to prison for new crimes (2 for second-degree burglary, one petty theft, one robbery, 2 for possession of a weapon). This represents a less than 1% recidivism rate, or less than one one-hundredth of California's overall 70% recidivism rate.

So when we talk about public safety, let's talk about the whole picture.

The CDCR could also go back and actually follow their Alternative Custody Proposal, which they had estimated would be applicable to 45% of its women's prison population. (Note: the Alternative Custody Proposal still places people under CDCR custody. It is not an alternatives-to-incarceration proposal. But it does take them out of the prison system.)

They could also ask advocacy groups like Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, Justice Now and California Coalition for Women Prisoners for suggestions. I'm sure that they can easily come up with 10,000 people whom the state could safely release from prison.

and yet more about the sterilization in CA's women's prisons

I was on Viewpoint last night to talk more in depth about the sterilizations that happened in California women's prisons and the issues of reproductive justice (or injustice) happening in women's prisons across the nation.

You can see me (super made-up...wow!) here:
http://current.com/shows/viewpoint/vi...

Everyone Should Be Horrified that CA Sterilized 250 Women in Prison

Now up on Bitchmedia:

In 1923, 17-year-old Carrie Buck was raped and impregnated. Her adoptive family, trying to avoid the public shame of having an unwed mother in their midst, had her committed to an institution for the "feeble minded." Because she was supposedly "feeble-minded" and the daughter of an unwed mother herself, the State of Virginia sought to sterilize her and, in 1927, the Supreme Court ruled in its favor.

One would think we've come a long way since 1927. But apparently we haven't.

Starting in 2006, Christina Cordero spent two years in California's Valley State Prison for Women for auto theft. She arrived at the prison pregnant and was taken to see the the prison OB-GYN James Heinrich. "As soon as he found out that I had five kids, he suggested that I look into getting it done. The closer I got to my due date, the more he talked about it," said Cordero, now age 34. Cordero finally agreed to the procedure before being released in 2008. "Today," she said, "I wish I would have never had it done."

Cordero is one of nearly 250 women who have been sterilized while in the California prison system over the last few decades. While millions of eyes were focused on reproductive-rights debates happening in Texas, Wisconsin, and North Carolina this month, the Center for Investigative Reporting released a report that revealed nearly 150 women were sterilized in California prisons from 2006 to 2010 without proper state oversight. According to state documents, approximately 100 additional women had been sterilized in the late 1990s. Several women said Heinrich had pressured them into the operation, sometimes when they were actively in labor or on the operating table for a C-section.

You can read the whole post, including hyperlinks, at:
http://bitchmagazine.org/post/califor...

entering the world of TV land

This past Saturday, I was on the Melissa Harris-Perry show to talk about the Pelican Bay hunger strikes, the issue of solitary confinement in general, and the sterilization of nearly 150 women in California prisons between 2006 and 2010. I diverted a little from the topics to talk about the fact that *women* are also in solitary confinement and have been (and continue to be held) in California's Security Housing Units, spending 22-23 hours a day in 7x11 foot cells and not being allowed to call their children and loved ones.

You can watch me talking about these issues here:

Segment on solitary confinement and Pelican Bay hunger strikes (with Shane Bauer, Pardiss Kebraei, and Glenn Martin): http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/07/13/why-th...

Segment on sterilization of women prisoners: http://www.nbcnews.com/id/49263362#52...

This morning, I had a super-brief appearance (along with CCR President Jules Lobel) on MSNBC's Jansing & Co to talk about these issues: http://www.nbcnews.com/id/49263362#52...

And this Wednesday night at 8 pm EST, I'll be on Current TV's Viewpoint with John Fugelsang (and will be joined again by Jules Lobel): http://current.com/shows/viewpoint/

If you want to know more about issues in women's prisons and the resistance and organizing around these issues, my publisher is offering a 50% discount (on both the e-book & the paper book) through August 20th if you order it on-line: https://secure.pmpress.org/index.php?...

The checkout code to get the 50% discount is: summer

New on Truthout: Pelican Bay Two Years Later: Those Still Buried Alive Vowing Hunger Strike "Till the End"

I've been keeping up with the struggles of the people entombed in California's Pelican Bay State Prison's Security Housing Unit (SHU) since they launched their three-week hunger strike in July 2011. Today is the start date of yet another hunger strike demanding an end to indefinite solitary confinement. SHU prisoners are joined by people incarcerated throughout California as well as people in Washington state's adult and juvenile prisons.

July 1st marks the two-year anniversary of the start of the 2011 Pelican Bay hunger strikes protesting indefinite solitary confinement and SHU conditions. The hunger strikes, each lasting three weeks, ended after CDCR agreed to negotiations with hunger strike representatives over their demands. In late 2012, the CDCR implemented a pilot program to release those held in the SHU on gang charges. Prisoners and their advocates have denounced the program for keeping the most objectionable aspects of the old program and expanding qualifications for SHU placement. Prisoners are calling for a hunger strike to begin on July 8, 2013, vowing not to eat until their demands are met.

"A lot of people aren't aware that thousands are buried alive in solitary confinement cells in this country's prisons - for no legit reason," Todd Ashker reminded Truthout in a recent letter. Ashker should know - he has been locked in the Security Housing Unit (SHU) in California's Pelican Bay State Prison since 1990 after confidential informants claimed he was a gang member. In the SHU, which comprises half of Pelican Bay prison, people are locked into their cells for at least 22 hours a day. Prison administrators place them in the SHU either for a fixed term for violating a prison rule or for an indeterminate term for being accused of gang membership. These accusations often rely on confidential informants and circumstantial evidence. Hundreds have been confined within the SHU for over a decade. Until recently, the only way to be released from the SHU was to debrief, or provide information incriminating other prisoners, who are then placed in the SHU for an indeterminate sentence.

My entire article is here: http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/17...

For earlier articles, see:

California Prison Hunger Strike Ends, Conditions of "Immense Torture" Continue

and

Pelican Bay Prison: One Year Later, Policy Remains "Debrief or Die"

a week jammed w deadlines

I had 6 deadlines all jammed up late last week/earlier this week. I got through them all and the first of those pieces has seen the light. It's a
blogpost on Bitchmedia looking at the implications for greater incarceration/deportation under the Senate's Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act:

Last Thursday, the Senate passed what some have touted as a "sweeping immigration reform bill" by a vote of 68 to 32. Many people have applauded the bill as a "path to citizenship for the vast majority of the country's 11 million immigrants." What's been missing from the conversation is focus on who loses from this reform: for many immigrants, the bill increases the chance of incarceration and deportation.

Here's how it works: the bill allows immigration judges to stop a deportation proceeding if it would result in hardship to a US citizen parent, spouse, or child. However, it plays on the "good immigrant" vs. "bad immigrant" binary, denying that same opportunity if the immigrant has a criminal conviction. It doesn't allow for explanations, such as when the conviction happened or under what circumstances. The bill also keeps in place provisions that mandate the deportation of non-citizens with criminal convictions, even for minor offenses, without the opportunity for a full hearing before a judge.

This past fall, I met Dede Adnahom, an activist, organizer and mother of three who is facing deportation. Dede came to the U.S. at age ten with her sister, brother-in-law, and their children. Several years earlier, the family had fled war-torn Ethiopia, where their parents had been killed. They were granted permanent residency under the 1980 Refugee Act. Three years later, Dede was removed from her sister's home and placed in foster care. The foster care agency severed all ties between Dede and her sister.

At age 18, Dede aged out of the foster care system and was expected to take care of herself. Without resources or support, Dede slept in cars and, occasionally, at her former foster mother's house. In 2002, 19-year-old Dede was caught selling $20 of crack cocaine. It was her first—and only—time in trouble with the law. She was convicted for controlled substance delivery and sentenced to nine months in a work-release center. She served six months and was released to begin rebuilding her life.

In 2006, Dede gave birth to her first daughter. Months later, she received a letter from the US Board of Immigration Appeals mandating her to appear for a deportation hearing. In 2007, an immigration judge ruled in Dede's favor. The board appealed the decision and, although Dede had received a gubernatorial pardon in 2011, reopened her deportation case in 2012.

While Dede has been fighting her deportation case, she has also been raising her children and remaining involved in social justice organizing around Seattle. Under the immigration reform bill, none of that would matter. What would matter is that, at age 19, Dede Adnahom was convicted for selling $20 worth of crack.

This is just one case, but Dede is not the only person who would be negatively impacted by this bill. While immigration reform could certainly create a "a real, substantive difference to the lives of millions of aspiring citizens," it's important to recognize how it will hurt the very groups supporters hope it will help.

For the full post (complete with links), see http://bitchmagazine.org/post/immigra...

TENACIOUS spotlighted on POC Zine Project

Just before leaving for the Allied Media Conference, I sat down with POC Zine Project founder Daniela Capistrano to give her copies of TENACIOUS (and some of my other zines) for the POC Zine Project and to speak with her about working with incarcerated women writers.

The first part of my interview is now on the POC Zine Project site. You can read it at:

http://poczineproject.tumblr.com/post...

more on science fiction by writers of color

Community organizers, educators, writers and self-proclaimed nerds Walidah Imarisha and Adrienne Marie Brown are publishingan anthology of radical science and speculative fiction written by organizers and activists entitled Octavia's Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements.

Stories include a zombie apocalypse set in an internment camp!! There are also a few essays by more "established" writers like Mumia Abu-Jamal (who contributed an essay about Star Wars and U.S. imperialism!) and sci-fi writer Tananarive Due (with an essay on Octavia Butler).

They're self-publishing it and have an indie go-go campaign to fund the project (and you can find out more about the anthology when you watch the video): http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/oct...