Pelican Bay Hunger Strike 2013 NOW The 5 Core Demands: 1. Eliminate group punishments. Instead, practice individual accountability. When an individual prisoner breaks a rule, the prison often punishes a whole group of prisoners of the same race. This policy has been applied to keep prisoners in the SHU indefinitely and to make conditions increasingly harsh. 2. Abolish the debriefing policy and modify active/inactive gang status criteria. Prisoners are accused of being active participants of prison gangs using false or highly dubious evidence, and are then sent to long-term isolation (SHU). They can escape these torturous conditions only if they "debrief," that is, become informants on other prisoners. Debriefing produces false information (wrongly landing other prisoners in SHU, in an endless cycle) and can endanger the lives of debriefing prisoners and their families. 3. Comply with the recommendations of the US Commission on Safety and Abuse in Prisons (2006) regarding an end to longterm solitary confinement. This bipartisan commission specifically recommended to "make segregation a last resort" and "end conditions of isolation." Yet California keeps thousands of prisoners in isolation units. Some prisoners have been kept in isolation for more than thirty years. 4. Provide adequate and nutritious food. Prisoners receive tiny quantities of spoiled or undercooked food on dirty trays. There is no accountability or independent quality control of meals. 5. Expand and provide constructive programs and privileges for indefinite SHU inmates. The hunger strikers are pressing for opportunities “to engage in self-help treatment, education, religious and other productive activities..." The prisoners also listed other specific needs. Since the 2011 hunger strike, they have won some of these, including: correspondence courses, if they pay for them themselves; wool caps; the right to buy sweatsuits (the cells and exercise cage can be bitterly cold); the right to buy some art supplies. They still do not have the right to worship together, talk to each other, receive vocational training or education from the prison, or hug or talk on the phone with their families.
Posted on: Wed, 19 Jun 2013 03:03:36 +0000
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