Thursday March 28 @7pmLa Belle Epoque1984 Wellington An informal dinner and letter-writing evening with an anti-prison focus – a space to meet and discuss, as well as to share updates on the situations of different prisoners. This month features a short presentation on the 2011 Pelican Bay hunger strike and
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Sketchy Thoughts: Video Interview with Sanyika Shakur
In this interview, New Afrikan Communist Sanyika Shakur discusses his personal social development, his time in Pelican Bay-SHU, the 2011 California prisoners’ hunger strikes, the effects of long-term isolation torture, New Afrikan nationalism, communism, and the struggle against gender oppression. In a biographical note written while in PB-SHU, Shakur explained:
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: Rock Vol.2 #2
The latest issue of Rock is out; this is a newsletter produced by former political prisoner Ed Mead with content for and by prisoners at Pelican Bay. Pelican Bay’s SHU is an isolation torture unit where people spend years and even decades in solitary confinement, deprived of all human contact.
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: September 26, the strike’s back on – Tortured SHU Prisoners Speak Out: “The Struggle Continues”
For the past 10-40 years thousands of California prisoners have been confined in CDC-SHU units indefinitely based on status [E.G., a gang label – active gang classification, based on innocuous association activity, and allegations from confidentia…
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: An Appeal from Ed Mead and California Prison Focus
The California Prison Focus newspaper was in good part responsible for carrying word of the now historic July hunger strike to SHU prisoners across the state. A hunger strike that CDCR admitted to 6,600 participants in 13 prisons. The SHU prisoners su…
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: Hungerstrike Recap: California Prisoners Showed the Way!
This spring, the news started going around that a hunger strike was being planned in the Security Housing Unit at California’s Pelican Bay State Prison (PBSP). Prisoners at the SHU had apparently united across “racial” lines, and promised to hung…
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: Support the California Prisoners’ Hunger Strike!
In the months before summer 2011, news spread that between 50 and 100 prisoners at Pelican Bay State Prison in the Security Housing Unit (SHU), Corridor D, were going on an indefinite hunger strike, starting July 1.What was initially expected to…
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: Hugo Pinell Participating in the California Hungerstrike
Excerpted from a letter to Kiilu Nyasha:A hunger strike has been in effect since July 1 and I’ve been with it, altho is very hard to know what’s going on? On July 1, one station up here announced the hunger strike, but nothing since and I don’t kno…
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: Revolutionary Prisoner C. Landrum On His Decision to Hunger Strike Indefinitely
It’s been a difficult and uphill battle, a lot of brow-beating and direct debate, but as it stands all are participating on a limited basis. Some, including myself, are going “indefinitely”… victory or death! I ask that you and those necessary …
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: Eddie Griffin’s Statement of Support for Prisoner Hunger Strike at Pelican Bay
Eddie Griffin, one of the surviving Marion Brothers who went on hunger strike in 1976, writes here of his support for the Pelican Bay strike, and his own experiences thirty five years ago. In solidarity with the California hunger strikers, Griffin has …
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: Life in Pelican Bay SHU
From IF THE SHU FITS: CRUEL AND UNUSUAL PUNISHMENT AT CALIFORNIA’SPELICAN BAY STATE PRISON:B. General Conditions Within the SHUFrom the outside, the SHU resembles a “massive concrete bunker.”[65] From the inside, it is a “windowless labyrinth of cells …
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: Letter from Bomani Shakur of the Lucasville 5
The Lucasville 5 are five prisoners who were framed for the murder of snitches and guards in the 1993 Lucasville prison riot. The 1993 riot and hostage taking was one of the longest in u.s. prison history, and yet it ended relatively peacefully. It was…
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: Sanyika Shakur, August Third Collective, On July 1 Hunger Strike
Due to the recent strike, i only received this letter dated June 13 a few days ago:i was given an indeterminate SHU term in 1989, for being a threat to the institutional security. The CDC cited writings i had from Comrade-Brotha George, exercising in m…
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: Pelican Bay Prisoners Go On Hunger Strike to Protest Grave Conditions: Lawyers, Advocates, Organizations Hold Press Conference, Voice Prisoner Demands
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE—June 29, 2011Press Contact: Isaac OntiverosCommunications Director, Critical ResistanceOffice: 510 444 0484Cell: 510 517 6612What: Press ConferenceWhen: Thursday, June 30, 2011, 11:00amWhere: Elihu M.&nb…
Continue readingSketchy Thoughts: Unlock the Box at the Maison Norman Bethune, July 1
This Friday July 1 in Montreal the comrades from the Maison Norman Bethune (the PCR/RCP’s bookstore) will be hosting a film screening of Unlock the Box, a documentary about isolation torture and control units in the united states.The film is in englis…
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