June 23: TOGETHER TO END SOLITARY Actions

Ithaca, NY  — Oakland, CA —  Queens, NY  —
San Diego, CA  — San Jose, CA —  Santa Cruz, CA

June is Torture Awareness Month. Click on the large titles below to see action details for June 23rd.

Statewide Coordinated Actions To End Solitary Confinement began in March 2014 on the 23rd of every month -in recognition of the 23 or more hours a day that people in solitary spend in their cells. Monthly action coordination soon began nationwide, Together to End Solitary.  Please participate in a public action or event  planned in your area, or get one going yourself- however big or small.  Endorsing organizations here.

• Here is a great brochure you can print and distribute!  Together to End Solitary Brochure – Download, print two-sided, and fold
• Click HERE for more literature to hand out at California actions

Email togethertoendsolitary@gmail.com or phssreachingout@gmail.com for more info and to share upcoming actions to end solitary or reportbacks.

Ithaca, NY: Vigil- Together to End Solitary

5:00pm – 6:30pm

Please join our VIGIL to end solitary confinement. Organized by CAIC, Campaign for Alternatives to Isolated Confinement, in partnership with Amnesty International. …Read More…

 

Oakland, CA: Statewide Coordinated Actions To End Solitary Confinement

11:00am – 2:00pm

Please participate in an informational demonstration on Thursday, in conjunction with actions all over California and throughout the U.S. Connect with family members, formerly incarcerated people, activists, and attorneys who struggle for prisoner human rights. Unity inside, unity outside! … Read More…

 

NYC End Solitary Confinement Demonstration and Speakout

6:00pm – 7:30pm

This month we will be in Queens at Athens Square in Astoria at 30th Ave. & 30th Street (near the 30th Ave stop of the N/Q). The two legislators in this area, Assemblywoman Aravella Simotas and State Senator Michael Gianaris have been invited to attend. The former has signed on as a co-sponsor of the HALT (Humane Alternatives) to Solitary Confinement A4401/S2659. Come and join us.

 

San Diego, CA: Statewide Coordinated Actions To End Solitary Confinement

4:00pm – 5:30pm

Join California Families Against Solitary Confinement and the Chicano Mexicano Prison Project in our monthly action. We will be out talking with people and providing information to END SOLITARY CONFINEMENT and PROMOTE THE AGREEMENT TO END HOSTILITIES. We ask you also to help us stop the current SLEEP DEPRIVATION TORTURE in solitary units. Please come stand (or sit) with us for an hour or two after the work day. …Read More…

 

San Jose, CA: Statewide Coordinated Actions To End Solitary Confinement

5:00pm – 6:00pm

San Jose – 23rd of Each Month! (no more keeping people in isolation 23+ hours a day)  We will distribute leaflets and wear signs on our shirts demanding the end of the Sleep Deprivation and the end of Solitary Confinement. …Read More…

 

Santa Cruz, CA: Statewide Coordinated Actions To End Solitary Confinement

12:00pm – 2:00pm
RALLY, SPEAK-OUT, READER’S THEATER Facebook event: www.facebook.com/events/988617214527474/

STOP SLEEP DEPRIVATION  The CA prisoners’ 2012 Agreement to End Hostilities between racial/ethnic and geographic groups made possible the Prisoner Hunger Strike of 2013 by over 30,000 CA prisoners and 100’s more nationwide. Prisoners’ human rights organizing has built an amazing movement and led to the historic 2015 settlement ending indefinite solitary confinement in CA.  Now people are being awakened by guards every 30 minutes day and night in CA solitary confinement units: * in Central CA Women’s Facility Administrative Segregation death row since May 18, 2014 and * in Pelican Bay State Prison Security Housing Unit (SHU) since August 2, 2015 …Read More…

May 20th-23rd: Together to End Solitary Events/Actions

Bronx, NY — Ithaca, NY  — Manhasset, NY— Oakland, CA Richmond, CA — San Diego, CA  — San Jose, CA —San Francisco, CA —  Santa Cruz, CA —  Staten Island, NY

Statewide Coordinated Actions To End Solitary Confinement began in March 2014 on the 23rd of every month -in recognition of the 23 hours or more per day that people in solitary spend in their cells. Monthly action coordination soon began nationwide, Together to End Solitary.  Please participate in these public actions and events planned in your area, or get one going yourself- however big or small. Here is a great brochure you can print and distribute!
Together to End Solitary Brochure – Download, print two-sided, and fold

Click HERE for more literature to hand out at California actions.

Click on the action/event titles for details.  The below listing includes events on May 20, 21, 22, and 23rd.  Please email togethertoendsolitary@gmail.com or phssreachingout@gmail.com for more info and to share your action details!

Oakland, CA: CARE NOT CAGES, with film “Breaking Down the Box”

Friday, May 20th    7:00pm – 9:00pm

685 14th St, Oakland, CA 94612, USA

 

Richmond, CA: SOLITARY MAN – My Visit to Pelican Bay State Prison

Saturday, May 21st    4:00pm – 6:30pm
551 23rd St, Richmond, CA 94804, USA

 

Staten Island Performance: Mariposa & the Saint

Saturday, May 21st     7:00pm – 9:30pm
1 Campus Rd, Staten Island, NY 10301, USA

 

The way forward to End Solitary Confinement Torture: Where’s the army?

Jan. 25, 2015
by Todd Ashker

On the subject of SHU and Ad-Seg constituting torture, for those of us who may not be familiar with the specifics and in light of CDCr’s steady stream of propaganda – saying, “We don’t operate any solitary confinement units or cells in the California penal system, nor do we torture anyone” – here’s a summary of relevant facts supporting our position that these SHU and Ad-Seg units and the operations thereof are designed (modeled) after techniques designed to break political prisoners as a control mechanism. They are intended to break prisoners via coercive persuasion into becoming state informants.

I’ll begin by asking you a simple question?

Why is it that CDCr is able to get away with portraying PBSP SHU (Pelican Bay State Prison Security Housing Unit) prisoners as the “worst of the worst” sub-human monsters ever encountered in modern times as justification for their policies and practices of treating said prisoners as sub-human via decades of what is clearly a form of solitary confinement with sensory deprivation – and yet, as soon as these men agree to become state stooges via debriefing, they are no longer a threat and are released to the sensitive needs yard (protective custody) general population prison of their choice?

One of the main reasons they are able to continue to get away with their BS is the failure of the people to hold the lawmakers responsible.

I’ve been in the SHU for 28.4 years, to date, 24.7 years of which has been here in PBSP-SHU. [Editor’s note: This was written Dec. 30, 2014.] I’ve been challenging prison conditions in the courts since 1988, which is viewed as challenging prisoncrats’ authority, and up until our 2011 hunger strike protest, I’d never been formally charged with a gang related rule violation. (During our hunger strike I was issued two rule violations classified as serious. They were for: a) having a photo of my longtime friend; and b) a letter that someone had sent me, a stranger who represented herself as a supporter of our cause and wanted to be a pen pal. Staff gave me the letter, and then came around later and confiscated it and wrote me up.)

The above is intended to put the following into some perspective: Based on my personal experience in PBSP SHU during the past 24.7 years, I’ve experienced many techniques designed to break me. One is isolation from my social group. This is a tactic used here by prisoncrats to physically remove those prisoners deemed “problematic” to areas sufficiently isolated to effectively break or weaken close emotional ties, along with segregation of all natural leaders.

I’ve been challenging prison conditions in the courts since 1988, which is viewed as challenging prisoncrats’ authority, and up until our 2011 hunger strike protest, I’d never been formally charged
with a gang related rule violation.

What prisoncrats like to do is claim that this place can’t be considered a solitary confinement unit because you have eight cells to each pod and thus the prisoners in each pod are able to talk to each other. But here is how it actually operates. If you are deemed a “problematic” prisoner by any of the staff – for example, if you are a prisoner who is constantly challenging the prisoncrats’ policies and practices – their way of subjecting you to an informal form of punishment or to try to break you is to put you in a pod where there are no other people of your social group.

Artwork accompanies writing at this SF Bay View link
http://sfbayview.com/2015/01/the-way-forward-to-end-solitary-confinement-torture-wheres-the-army/