AG Holder: restoring civil life for ex-felons part of ending racial disparities.

It's going to take a lot more than this to really respond to the consequences of felonization for people once they leave prison and try to start a new life. But it's impressive how aggressive Holder has been about fighting racial disparities, now in the last year of his likely stay in office. Every week he's talking about ending harsh drug sentencing, telling prisoners in for drug crimes to apply for clemency this year, and so on. He really seems to be trying to address racism, classism, and injustice in the system he administers, where for the longest time there has only been silence or denials when confronted. That's way overdue.

-----------------------------

AG urges restoring voting rights to ex-inmates

KTAR.COM (2/11/14)

WASHINGTON (AP) - Attorney General Eric Holder called on a group of states Tuesday to restore voting rights to ex-felons, part of a push to fix what he sees as flaws in the criminal justice system that have a disparate impact on racial minorities.

"It is time to fundamentally rethink laws that permanently disenfranchise people who are no longer under federal or state supervision," Holder said, targeting 11 states that he said continue to restrict voting rights for former inmates, even after they've finished their prison terms.

"Across this country today, an estimated 5.8 million Americans- 5.8 million of our fellow citizens- are prohibited from voting because of current or previous felony convictions," Holder told a symposium on criminal justice at Georgetown University.

Now into his fifth year as attorney general and hinting that this year might be his last, Holder survived political controversies that, early on, placed him on the defensive. Now, he is doubling down on the kinds of issues that have long held his interest during a career in law enforcement- prison overcrowding, overly harsh mandatory drug sentences and school disciplinary policies that he says push kids into street crime.

Congress used to be the place that highlighted Holder's problems, including a plan to try terrorists in New York City and the failed Justice Department investigation of gun smuggling in Arizona that ended in the death of a border patrol agent.

Now, Holder is talking about partnering up with conservative lawmakers like Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., who shares concerns such as mandatory minimum prison sentences that can put away low-level drug offenders for decades. On Tuesday, Holder took note of the fact that Paul was to be a participant in the criminal justice symposium later in the morning.

On a topic with racial overtones, Holder said 2.2 million black citizens, or nearly one in 13 African-American adults, are banned from voting because of these laws, and he said the ratio climbs to one in five in Florida, Kentucky and Virginia.

"Although well over a century has passed since post-Reconstruction states used these measures to strip African-Americans of their most fundamental rights, the impact of felony disenfranchisement on modern communities of color remains both disproportionate and unacceptable."

The 11 states identified by the Justice Department as restricting voting rights of former inmates are Arizona, Florida, Alabama, Iowa, Kentucky, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, Wyoming, Tennessee and Virginia.

In Iowa, action by the governor caused the state to move from automatic restoration of rights following completion of a criminal sentence to an arduous process requiring direct intervention by the governor in every individual case, Holder said.

"It's no surprise that, two years after this change- of the 8,000 people who had completed their sentences during that governor's tenure- voting rights had been restored to fewer than 12," the attorney general added.
Reaction was swift. In Iowa, the governor's office disputed Holder's figures, saying that in 2013, the voting rights of 21 individuals were restored. No applications were denied, and seven applications are pending, the governor's office said.

Iowa Republican Gov. Terry Branstad "believes that when an individual commits a felony, it is fair they earn their rights back by paying restitution to their victim, court costs, and fines," said Jimmy Centers, the governor's spokesman. Centers said Branstad has no plans to change the current process and that too often, victims are forgotten.

Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley said if a prisoner has served a sentence and is a productive citizen, "I believe the people should have their rights." Those convicted of most felonies in the state can apply to the parole board to get their voting rights restored once they have finished their sentences and probation and paid all fines and restitution.

If Holder has been on an aggressive streak, it's by design.

A year ago, he ordered up a review to find areas in the Justice Department's mission that needed change.
The first results became public last August, when Holder instructed federal prosecutors to stop charging many nonviolent drug defendants with offenses that carry mandatory minimum sentences. He said long mandatory terms have flooded the nation's prisons with low-level drug offenders and diverted money away from crime fighting.

A month ago, Holder joined Education Secretary Arne Duncan in pressing the nation's schools to abandon disciplinary policies that send students to court instead of the principal's office. The two Cabinet officials said "we have found cases where African-American students were disciplined more harshly and more frequently because of their race than similarly situated white students."

Then over the weekend, Holder applied a landmark Supreme Court opinion to the Justice Department, declaring same-sex spouses cannot be compelled to testify against each other, should be eligible to file for bankruptcy jointly and are entitled to the same rights and privileges as federal prison inmates in opposite-sex marriages.

His call for restoring voting rights for ex-prisoners are part of what the attorney general calls his "Smart On Crime" program.

On Tuesday, Holder said that because of state laws that restrict former inmates' right to vote, about 10 percent of Floridians and 8 percent of people in Mississippi are disenfranchised. Mississippi Attorney General Jim Hood said it would require voters to change the state's constitution.

On the positive side, Holder said 23 states, including Nebraska, Nevada, Texas and Washington state, have enacted recent improvements and Virginia has adopted a policy that automatically restores the voting rights of former prisoners with nonviolent convictions. The Virginia policy was carried out by order of the governor, but Holder said legislation is needed to make permanent change.

Kentucky is studying a proposed constitutional amendment that would put on the state ballot the question of whether to automatically restore voting rights for certain felons who've completed their sentences and probation. Championed by a Democratic lawmaker, the proposal also has drawn support from Republicans, including Paul.

A measure introduced in the Wyoming Legislature would allow restoration of voting rights for non-violent felons at the end of their parole and probation or sentence. State law lets people who have been convicted of a single nonviolent felony seek restoration of voting rights once they've waited five years after they served their sentence.

Nebraska restores voting rights to felons automatically, two years after they've finished their prison sentences and any parole or probation.
___
AP reporters Catherine Lucey in Des Moines, Iowa, Brett Barrouquere in Louisville, Ky., Ben Neary in Cheyenne, Wyo., Phillip Rawls in Montgomery, Ala., Jack M. Elliott in Jackson, Miss., and Grant Schulte in Lincoln, Neb., contributed to this report.

Women's health in prison: Breast Cancer Behind Bars

The following article was just published on Truthout by Vikki Law, author of "Resistance Behind Bars: The struggles of incarcerated women," and editor of Tenacious, a national zine written by and for women in prison.

In light of some of the distressed correspondence I've been receiving lately from women at Perryville prison complaining of serious medical neglect, I'll be making a point of researching and posting more on women's health in prison here in coming weeks.

In the meantime, for a first-person account on women's health care in Arizona state prisons, see Sue Ellen Allen's book "The slumber party from hell."

Thank you for this, Vikki. Can't wait for this state to finally be sued. What they've done to our people is criminal.

----from Truthout---

Breast Cancer Behind Bars: How a Prison Sentence Can Become a Death Sentence

Wednesday 25 January 2012

by: Victoria Law, Truthout

  .

Imagine finding a lump in your breast. Imagine that your efforts to schedule a medical check-up are stymied and you have to wait weeks, if not months, for that initial exam. In the meantime, the lump continues to grow. Imagine that, when you finally do see a doctor, you are told that you have breast cancer. When you walk out of the office, you are locked into your prison cell with no more information or sympathy than when you walked in. This is the daily reality for women in prison

In 2006, a Department of Justice (DOJ) study found that women in prison are at significantly greater risk for cancer than their male counterparts. Out of every 10,000 incarcerated women, 831 had cancer, compared to 108 per 10,000 men. Of those, 91 of every 10,000 women behind bars reported having had or currently having breast cancer. Given that 114,979 women were behind bars at the end of 2009, this would mean that over 1,000 women have had or currently have breast cancer. 

Despite these numbers, prevention, screening, diagnosis, care, pain alleviation and rehabilitation for breast cancer remain virtually nonexistent in prisons. In 1998, a study at an unnamed Southern prison found that, although many were at high risk because of family histories, women were not provided with a clinical breast exam, information or basic education on self-examination upon admittance. Seventy percent of women who should have had mammograms under standard medical procedure had never been tested. [Williams, Roma D, Terry D. Mahoney, and R. M. Williams, Jr, "Breast Cancer Detection Among Women Prisoners in the Southern United States," Family & Community Health 21.3 (1998): 32.]  Even women who enter prison already diagnosed with cancer must fight to receive lifesaving medical care.

Fifty-two-year-old Margaret DeLuca had already been diagnosed with stage 3A breast cancer and undergone a left-breast mastectomy before arriving at Clinton Correctional Facility in New Jersey. "She knew exactly what she needed, but was unable to get it," stated Bonnie Kerness, a human rights advocate and coordinator of the American Friends Service Committee's (AFSC) Prison Watch Project, who helped DeLuca fight for proper medical care. Their advocacy resulted in incremental improvements in DeLuca's medical care but did not change the prison's health care system. [Interview with Bonnie Kerness, December 28, 2011]

Like DeLuca, 57-year-old Sue Ellen Allen entered Arizona's Estrella Jail with a diagnosis of breast cancer (hers was Stage 3B). She had also undergone six sessions of chemotherapy and was awaiting a mastectomy. Two and a half months later, she was awoken at midnight, then handcuffed, shackled and transported to another jail. At 9 AM, she was moved to the hospital for the mastectomy.

"I am locked in a room alone, freezing. I ask for a blanket. No, they snarl. Why is everyone so nasty?" she recounted. "I haven't eaten in twenty hours, I haven't slept, I'm freezing and facing surgery alone." After the mastectomy, Allen should have begun chemotherapy, but the jail delayed it to avoid shouldering the costs. Allen did not receive chemotherapy until she was transferred to the Perryville prison three months later.

The chemotherapy made Allen sick.

"On my way back to my yard, I collapse, vomiting. A guard comes and asks if I can walk the three blocks to medical. There are no wheelchairs." Allen collapsed and vomited twice while walking to the medical unit. Staff watched her, but the only acknowledgment she received about her condition was when a sergeant asked, "What's the issue, Allen?" 

Allen made it to the medical unit, where she continued to vomit into a wastebasket. The prison's doctor was not available to administer the shot that would stop Allen's vomiting. Allen continued to vomit for an hour. "Even the nurse is frustrated. She says there is no other emergency. He's doing paperwork." When the doctor arrived an hour later, Allen recounts, he was obviously irritated. "He acts like I'm faking and reluctantly administers the shot. Eventually, I am sent back to my room alone. I am dismissed."

Allen underwent three more chemo treatments. "Despite the rigid schedule, never is the medication ready on time, nor is the newly discovered chemo diet ready. I have to spend my sickest days walking to Medical, begging for what I'm missing. When I'm supposed to be healing, I'm worn out battling for proper treatment."

Allen is one of the more fortunate; she survived the ordeal. When 36-year-old Christina found a lump in her breast in April 2002, Perryville's medical staff ignored her concerns. By the time she was taken to the hospital in September, the lump had grown so large that the hospital skipped the chemotherapy and performed an immediate mastectomy. By then, however, the cancer had already spread to her other breast. Christina died the next year, three months after being released from prison. "If her cancer had been diagnosed and treated when she discovered her lump, maybe she'd still be alive," Allen wrote.

While breast cancer survivors and advocates outside prison would be horrified at these obstacles and delays, Allen received relatively prompt treatment under what passes as current standards for prison health care. Sherrie Chapman, a woman incarcerated in California, waited much longer.

In 1985, Chapman, who had a family history of breast cancer, found a lump in her right breast. She alerted the prison's doctor, who dismissed her concerns. Chapman persisted in demanding that the lump be further examined. In 1994, when the lumps were visibly protruding from her right breast, she finally received a mammogram. The radiologist at the outside hospital found "extremely dense breast parenchyma" and recommended a follow-up mammogram within one year. Chapman was unable to convince the prison's medical department that she needed the follow-up mammogram until late 1994. This time, the radiologist recommended immediate follow-up tests. The prison's doctor, however, refused to order a biopsy, ultrasound or fine needle aspiration. The prison labeled her a "drug seeker" for her repeated requests for something stronger than Motrin for the pain in her breast.

In 1995, Chapman was examined by a different prison doctor, who immediately ordered a biopsy. By that time, the cancer had spread to both breasts and metastasized in her neck, forcing her to undergo two mastectomies. Post surgery, guards signed her out against medical advice to return her to the prison. Staff ignored chemotherapy appointments. In addition, her uterus began to hemorrhage. Medical staff allowed her to bleed for 18 months before performing a hysterectomy. In 2000 and 2001, Chapman discovered other growths in her neck and shoulder areas. The prison doctor's response? "You've just got swollen glands. Don't worry; they're not cancerous." 

Chapman appeared before the parole board in June 2002. The board rejected her and admonished her to use the self-help available in the prison, ignoring the fact that, by then, she was too ill to participate in groups that required regular attendance. She died on December 12, 2002, at the age of 45, under the custody of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR), with a prison guard posted in her room.

Women have not quietly accepted this gross medical neglect and failure. They have attempted to advocate for themselves and draw attention to the issue. In California, Chapman testified before the legislature about the dangerous medical care in the state's women's prisons. She also filed a lawsuit against the CDCR and the prison doctor for ignoring her initial complaints about painful breast lumps. Chapman won and was awarded a $350,000 settlement. Her efforts also led to several magazine articles exploring the failures of the prison health care system to address the needs of those battling cancer. [See: "A Cancer Grows," in The Nation, and A. Clay Thompson, "Cancer in the Cells," San Francisco Bay Guardian February 24, 1999 (not available online)]

Breast cancer survivors imprisoned in other states have had less success in finding advocates and attorneys to help them push for change. Allen wrote letters to numerous lawyers, all of whom declined to file suit. "Most firms don't have the resources to fight the state," she noted.

Allen did not allow the lack of legal support to deter her from trying to change the culture of prison indifference and isolation. Recognizing that each woman battled both breast cancer and the prison's life-threatening and indifferent medical care, Allen began a cancer support group. The process of starting such a group would be simple enough on the outside, but behind bars, nothing is ever straightforward. "It took me a year of begging," Allen recounted, "but I finally got permission." The group, which quickly grew to include 14 other women, met once a month with an outside volunteer from the American Cancer Society.

Allen remembered that women were initially reluctant to attend: "They didn't expect anyone to help them or care. They didn't know how to talk about their fears." The support group provided them with a space to talk - and to vent. "There is no place in prison to vent," said Allen. The volunteer also brought information about cancer, enabling the women to understand the protocols and procedures of cancer treatment and to know what questions to ask. Given that women are told nearly nothing about their illnesses, treatments and recuperation, such information is invaluable. [Interview with Sue Ellen Allen, December 27, 2011]

Looking back, she notes that, with the exception of Christina, all of the support group members were white. Although white women are more likely to get breast cancer (125 per every 100,000), African-American women are not far behind, with 116 per 100,000 diagnosed. Latinas, who make up the largest proportion of Arizona's women's prison population, have a rate of 91 per 100,000. Given these statistics, Allen wonders how many women of color remain undiagnosed.

Although Allen was unable to find an attorney or legal group to help file suit against the Arizona Department of Corrections, other prisoners' attempts to change the prison's medical care system over the years finally sparked outside action. In October 2011, Prison Law Office, a legal advocacy group for prisoners nationwide, sent a letter to Arizona Corrections Director Charles Ryan. The letter listed dozens of specific allegations of deliberate indifference to prisoners' health needs and asked Ryan to agree to a court injunction to address problems as a way to avoid a lawsuit in federal court. On November 17, 2011, Arizona's Department of Corrections signed an agreement to investigate the medical claims. Prison Law Office and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Arizona agreed to delay any lawsuit for three months.

In New Jersey, DeLuca reached out to the AFSC to help her advocate for the care she needed. "It was a partnership between inside and out, which is often the most effective way to obtain change," Kerness remembered. Although their efforts did not improve the overall quality of prison medical care, it did have a ripple effect within the circle of women around DeLuca. Through her example, other women became aware of the power of advocacy and their ability to help outside supporters advocate on their behalf. [Interview with Bonnie Kerness, December 28, 2011] Sadly, many women battling breast cancer and other serious medical issues lack outside support. Breast cancer survivors and advocates need to recognize that, for women with breast cancer and other life-threatening illnesses, a prison sentence may mean a sentence to death by neglect. Then they need to speak out and take action to help women inside successfully fight for their lives.

WSJ Review: The Collapse of American Criminal Justice

Crimes, Courts And Cures

Why the justice system does a bad job of separating defendants who deserve punishment from those who don't.

Wall Street Journal

OCTOBER 26, 2011

By PAUL G. CASSELL

How has the American criminal-justice system become one of the most punitive in the world without providing a corresponding level of public safety? In "The Collapse of American Criminal Justice," William J. Stuntz—a revered Harvard law professor who died of colon cancer earlier this year at the age of 52—offers a provocative big-picture answer.

Perhaps aware that "collapse" in the book's title requires justification, Mr. Stuntz begins by reviewing some statistics. As he shows, in the 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s, amid the largest crime wave in American history, the U.S. prison population declined. Imprisonment rates plummeted to some of the lowest ever seen in the modern Western world. High-crime neighborhoods, as Mr. Stuntz puts it, were "abandoned to their fate."

The backlash to this crime wave was equally striking. Since the mid-1970s, America has punished crime more and more severely. New York's imprisonment rate, for example, has sextupled. In a span of a little more than 30 years, "America first embraced punishment levels lower than Sweden's, then built a justice system more punitive than Russia's."

Mr. Stuntz readily acknowledges what many legal scholars do not: America's current lock-'em-up philosophy has dramatically helped to reduce urban crime. Since 1991, violent-crime rates have declined roughly a third nationwide and as much as two-thirds in a few cities (New York among them). Even so, Mr. Stuntz counts these declines as a pyrrhic victory, given that violence per capita in the U.S. today remains significantly higher than in 1950. And he is unwilling simply to assign all the credit for recent crime drops to increased punishment. He wonders, for example, why crime rates began falling only around 1991—two decades after prison populations started steeply rising.

To unravel such complexities, Mr. Stuntz tries to place America's contemporary criminal-justice problems in their historical legal context. He first looks at the 14th Amendment's effort in 1868 to ensure that newly freed slaves received "the equal protection of the laws"—a promise that fell apart a few years later when the Supreme Court eviscerated the equal-protection guarantee and left generations of Southern blacks to be victimized by Klan violence. Mr. Stuntz argues that narrow equal-protection jurisprudence helps to explain why, nearly a century later, Chief Justice Earl Warren began spinning constitutional restrictions from the 14th Amendment's other important provision, the Due Process Clause.

Justice Warren faced a Southern criminal-justice system that treated blacks unequally. More generally, he was dealing with an American system that did little for indigent defendants. But rather than address racism and poverty head-on as equal-protection matters, the Supreme Court let old precedents divert its attention to due-process claims. The court ended up dealing with such problems indirectly through an array of new procedural requirements. For example, the Warren Court tried to rein in questionable police evidence-seizure tactics by imposing an exclusionary rule on the states (in Mapp v. Ohio). The court likewise responded to unequal treatment during police questioning by creating its famous warning and waiver requirements (in Miranda v. Arizona).

This web of new procedures had an important effect: Defense attorneys, embracing the new rights, did not bring forward evidence of their clients' innocence but instead sought to suppress evidence of their guilt. Whatever the other merits of the procedures, they were bound to make the justice system do a worse job of separating defendants who deserve punishment from those who don't.

Mr. Stuntz powerfully argues that such decisions have perversely worsened inequality in the criminal-justice system. The Miranda rule, for example, gives sophisticated suspects—mainly recidivists and white-collar defendants—the ability to "lawyer up" and avoid questioning altogether. Many other suspects—including the innocent but poor—waive their rights and receive less protection than they did before Miranda.

These excessive procedures contributed to a new punitiveness in criminal sentencing, Mr. Stuntz says. With fewer violent criminals successfully prosecuted under Warren-court restrictions, those who are convicted are incarcerated longer. And because of the difficulty of finding witnesses willing to testify against gang members and other violent criminals, easily proven "surrogate" crimes (namely, drug possession) are punished more harshly.

"The Collapse of American Criminal Justice" concludes that our system suffers "from the rule of too much law and the wrong kind of politics." Mr. Stuntz recommends a host of reforms, including decentralization that would encourage local control responsive to local crime. He also argues for expanding city police forces—because the increased police presence would discourage the commission of crimes.

But he seems to back away from his argument that excessive proceduralism is part of the problem. While critiquing decisions such as Mapp and Miranda, Mr. Stuntz never urges that they be overturned or restructured, even though such changes could lead to the decentralized decision-making that he supports. Instead, he singles out for overruling Supreme Court precedents limiting equal-protection argument by defendants. He targets United States v. Armstrong, for example, which barred drug dealers from arguing that prosecutors must be racially discriminating when statistics indicate disparities in charges being brought. But overturning the law would lead to precisely the kind of procedural litigation that Mr. Stuntz deplores.

Nonetheless, the overarching themes of "The Collapse of American Criminal Justice" deserve wide discussion, and the book as a whole can be rightly seen as the capstone to a distinguished legal career. Americans may debate whether our criminal-justice system has truly collapsed, but few would argue that it can't be improved.

Mr. Cassell is a professor of criminal law at the S.J. Quinney College of Law at the University of Utah.

The Long Road Ahead: The National Criminal Justice Commission.

While I fear this means that the system will be "fixed", as opposed to being scratched completely and replaced with neighborhood-based models of community problem-solving and restorative justice, I do hope the process exposes the serious flaws in how we implement "justice" via "law and order" in this nation.

Besides, we've been hearing about this commission in the wings so long, that it's good to finally have a place to get things out on the table - like the ethics of privatizing prisons, racial disparities in arrests and sentencing, the horrendous health care prisoners receive, the damage done by the PRLA to the overall cause of prisoner rights and protections in this country, and the outrage that innocent people continue to languish for years in prison - as their families suffer their absence - while smug or lazy DA's sit on the very evidence that could and should set them free immediately. Any county attorney (or underling) who fails to act on new evidence in such a case is in grievous violation of their own ethical standards, and perhaps the law.Perhaps they'll even address how the feds can deal with rogue sheriffs and prosecutors abusing their power a little more promptly than they have of late (it's been over a year, now, dear DOJ. What's the hold up?)

That's just to name a few of the things on my list tonight...


Dare I say "at least" Rick Romley has taken back the County Attorney's office from Thomas? He had the guts to admit he'd been wrong himself when it was Ray Krone, one of his own convictions, who needed to be exonerated. Will he show the same courage and sense of urgency to helping to free Courtney Bisbee?

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U.S.: Overflowing Prisons Spur Call for Reform Commission
Inter Press Service
William Fisher

NEW YORK, May 16 (IPS) - Despite the lacklustre performance of  so-called "blue ribbon commissions" in the United States over the years, sponsors of the latest proposal - the National
Criminal Justice Commission - are optimistic that it will become a reality and that its recommendations will be taken seriously by the president, Congress and the U.S. public.

The reason, says its sponsor, Senator Jim Webb, a Democrat from  Virginia, is that "America's criminal justice system has deteriorated to the point that it is a national disgrace".

 He added, "We are wasting billions of dollars and diminishing  millions of lives. We need to fix the system. Doing so will require a major nationwide recalculation of who goes to prison and for how long and of how we address the long-term consequences of incarceration."

 Given the chequered history of blue ribbon commissions in the  nation's capital, a spokesman for Sen. Webb told IPS that "with nearly 40 Democratic and Republican cosponsors, there is a strong
likelihood of success".

 In the past, Congressionally-appointed commissions are  typically set up, staffed, complete their investigative and analytical work, make recommendations that are received by a senior official, a press release is issued, and then the commission's report is consigned to a shelf where it gathers dust.

 Throughout U.S. history, there have been relatively few bodies  that have gained the notoriety, media coverage, and attention from Congress and the president as the 9/11 Commission,
established in the wake of the terrorist attacks if Sep. 11, 2001.

 Over time, most of its recommendations were implemented. One  reason was the severity of the issue - almost 3,000 deaths. Another was ongoing, well-organised, effective support from the
families of the 9/11 victims.

 A prison commission has none of those attributes - and  prisoners can't vote. So the political inventive appears minimal.

 But the issue is not. Statistics compiled by the Congressional  Research Service begin to tell the story.

 The United States has the highest incarceration rate on the  planet - five times the world's average. A total of 2,380,000 people are now in prison. The U.S. has five percent of the world's population, but 25 percent of the world's prison population.

 Minorities make up a disproportionately large share of inmates.  Black males have a 32 percent chance of serving time in prison at some point in their lives; Hispanic males have a 17 percent
chance; white males have a six percent chance.

 African American men and boys are grossly over-represented at  every stage of the judicial process. Although African Americans make up just over 12 percent of the national population, 42
percent of those currently on death row are African American.

 African American women have the highest rate of incarceration among women in the U.S. - four times higher than that of white women.

 Initial contacts with police officers are often driven by  racial profiling and other racially tainted practices, and the disparities exist through the sentencing phase: African Americans routinely receive more jail time and harsher punishments.

 Cocaine laws in particular disproportionately affect African  Americans, who account for 25 percent of total crack cocaine users, yet who comprised 81 percent of those convicted of federal
crack cocaine offences in 2007.

 Drug offenders in prisons and jails have increased 1200 percent  since 1980. Nearly a half million persons are in federal or state prison or local jail for a drug offence, compared to an estimated 41,100 in 1980. A significant percentage of these offenders have no history of violence or high-level drug selling activity.

 As a result, spending on corrections rose 127 percent at the  state level while higher education expenditures rose just 21 percent.

 Prisons and jails have also become holding facilities for the  mentally ill. There are an estimated 350,000 men and women prisoners with serious mental disorders - four times the number in mental health hospitals.
 It is against this background that Sen. Webb introduced the  National Criminal Justice Act, authorising the Commission. There has been no in-depth or comprehensive study of the entire
criminal justice system since The President's Commission on Law Enforcement and Administration and Justice, impaneled in 1965.

 A companion to the Webb bill has been introduced in the House  of Representatives with bipartisan sponsorship. The Senate Judiciary Committee has approved the proposal with strong
bipartisan support. The legislation is now awaiting action by the full Senate and is pending in the House.

 The Commission would carry out a comprehensive review of the criminal justice system, and make reform recommendations to improve public safety, cost-effectiveness, overall prison administration, and fairness in the implementation of the criminal justice system.

 It "would also be charged with looking at how we have arrived  at this convoluted mess, how many of our problems are interrelated and often feed off of one another, and how we can correct a system that is badly in need of a new course," Sen. Webb said.

 Other powerful actors agree. Among them is Hilary O. Shelton,  director of the Washington Bureau of the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP).

 In a telephone interview, Shelton told IPS, "At every stage of  the criminal justice process serious problems undermine basic tenets of fairness and equity, as well as the public's expectations for safety."

 "Perhaps the most glaring problem inherent in today's system is  the number of racial and ethnic minorities who are disproportionately treated more harshly and more often by our nation's criminal justice system," he noted. "From initial contact to sentencing to the challenges facing those reentering the community after incarceration, racial and ethnic minorities are disproportionately represented in the number of people stopped, arrested, tried, convicted and incarcerated."

 The Commission would include members appointed by the president  and by federal and state politicians, as well as private sector specialists in law enforcement, criminal justice, national
security, prison administration, prisoner reentry, public health, including drug addiction and mental health, victims' rights, and social services.

 The bill has also been endorsed by the International  Association of Chiefs of Police, the largest organisation of police executives.

Davis: The Challenges of Prison Abolition

Celebrate the International Observation of the Anniversary of
the Abolition of the Transatlantic Slave Trade:

ABOLISH THE PRISON INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX!!
--------------------

this is a great article from a few years back, posted in History is a Weapon, with Angela Davis making the connections between the institution of slavery and the prison industrial complex of today.

-------------------

The Challenge of Prison Abolition:

A conversation between Angela Y. Davis and Dylan Rodriguez

2004

History is a weapon

Angela Y. Davis teaches in the History of Consciousness program at the University of California (215 Oakes College, Santa Cruz, CA 95060), and has been actively involved in prison-related campaigns since the events that led to her own incarceration in 1970. Dylan Rodriguez is an Assistant Professor at University of California - Riverside and was involved in the formation of Critical Resistance. Rodriguez’s first book, Forced Passages: Imprisoned Radical Intellectuals and the Formation of the U.S. Prison Regime will be published in 2005 by the University of Minnesota Press.


Dylan: Your emergence as a radical prison activist was deeply influenced by your experience as a prisoner. Could you talk a bit about how imprisonment affected your political formation, and the impact that it had on your eventual identification as prison abolitionists?

Angela: The time I spent in jail was both an outcome of my work on prison issues and a profound influence on my subsequent trajectory as a prison activist. When I was arrested in the summer of 1970 in connection with my involvement in the campaign to free George Jackson and the Soledad Brothers, I was one of many activists who had been previously active in defense movements. In editing the anthology, If They Come in the Morning (1971) while I was in jail, Bettina Aptheker and I attempted to draw upon the organizing and legal experiences associated with a vast number of contemporary campaigns to free political prisoners. The most important lessons emanating from those campaigns, we thought, demonstrated the need to examine the overall role of the prison system, especially its class and racial character.

There was a relationship, as George Jackson had insisted, between the rising numbers of political prisoners and the imprisonment of increasing numbers of poor people of color. If prison was the state-sanctioned destination for activists such as myself, it was also used as a surrogate solution to social problems associated with poverty and racism. Although imprisonment was equated with rehabilitation in the dominant discourse at that time, it was obvious to us that its primary purpose was repression. Along with other radical activists of that era, we thus began to explore what it might mean to combine our call for the freedom of political prisoners with an embryonic call for the abolition of prisons. Of course we had not yet thought through all of the implications of such a position, but today it seems that what was viewed at that time as political naivete, the un-theorized and utopian impulses of young people trying to be revolutionary, foreshadowed what was to become, at the turn of the century, the important project of critically examining the political economy of a prison system, whose unrestrained growth urgently needs to be reversed.

Dylan: What interests me is the manner in which your trial -- and the rather widespread social movement that enveloped it, along with other political trials -- enabled a wide variety of activists to articulate a radical critique of U.S. jurisprudence and imprisonment. The strategic framing of yours and others' individual political biographies within a broader set of social and historical forces -- state violence, racism, white supremacy, patriarchy, the growth and transformation of U.S. capitalism -- disrupted the logic of the criminal justice apparatus in a fundamental way. Turning attention away from conventional notions of "crime" as isolated, individual instances of misbehavior necessitated a basic questioning of the conditions that cast "criminality" as a convenient political rationale for the warehousing of large numbers of poor, disenfranchised, and displaced black people and other people of color.

Many activists are now referring to imprisonment as a new form of slavery, refocusing attention on the historical function of the 13th Amendment in reconstructing enslavement as a punishment reserved for those "duly convicted." Yet, when we look more closely at the emergence of the prison-industrial complex, the language of enslavement fails to the extent that it relies on the category of forced labor as its basic premise. People frequently forget that the majority of imprisoned people are not workers, and that work is itself made available only as a "privilege" for the most favored prisoners.

The logic of the prison-industrial complex is closer to what you, George Jackson, and others were forecasting back then as mass containment, the effective elimination of large numbers of (poor, black) people from the realm of civil society. Yet, the current social impact of the prison-industrial complex must have been virtually unfathomable 30 years ago. One could make the argument that the growth of this massive structure has met or exceeded the most ominous forecasts of people who, at that time, could barely have imagined that at the turn of the century two million people would be encased in a prison regime that is far more sophisticated and repressive than it was at the onset of Nixon's presidency, when about 150,000 people were imprisoned nationally in decrepit, overcrowded buildings. So in a sense, your response to the first question echoes the essential truth of what was being dismissed, in your words, as the paranoid "political naivete" of young radical activists in the early 1970s. I think we might even consider the formation of prison abolitionism as a logical response to this new human warehousing strategy. In this vein, could you give a basic summary of the fundamental principles underlying the contemporary prison abolitionist movement?

Angela: First of all, I must say that I would hesitate to characterize the contemporary prison abolition movement as a homogeneous and united international effort to displace the institution of the prison. For example, the International Conference on Penal Abolition (ICOPA), which periodically brings scholars and activists together from Europe, South America, Australia, Africa, and North America, reveals the varied nature of this movement. Dorsey Nunn, former prisoner and longtime activist, has a longer history of involvement with ICOPA than I do since he attended the conference in New Zealand three years ago. My first direct contact with ICOPA was this past May, when I attended the Toronto gathering.

Dylan: Was there anything about ICOPA that particularly impressed you?

Angela: The ICOPA conference in Toronto revealed some of the major strengths and weaknesses of the abolitionist movement. First of all, despite the rather homogenous character of their circle, they have managed to keep the notion of abolitionism alive precisely at a time when developing radical alternatives to the prison-industrial complex is becoming a necessity. That is to say, abolitionism should not now be considered an unrealizable utopian dream, but rather the only possible way to halt the further transnational development of prison industries. That ICOPA claims supporters in Europe and Latin America is an indication of what is possible. However, the racial homogeneity of ICOPA, and the related failure to incorporate an analysis of race into the theoretical framework of their version of abolitionism, is a major weakness. The conference demonstrated that while faith-based approaches to the abolition of penal systems can be quite powerful, organizing strategies must go much further. We need to develop and popularize the kinds of analyses that explain why people of color predominate in prison populations throughout the world and how this structural racism is linked to the globalization of capital.

Dylan: Yes, I found that the political vision of ICOPA was extraordinarily limited, especially considering its professed commitment to a more radical abolitionist analysis and program. This undoubtedly had a lot to do with the underlying racism of the organization itself, which was reflected in the language of some of the conference resolutions: "We support all transformative measures which enable us to live better in community with those we as a society find most difficult, and most consistently marginalize or exclude" (emphasis added)¹. A major figure in ICOPA even accused a small group of people of color in attendance of being "racist" when they attempted to constructively criticize the overwhelming white homogeneity of the conference and the need for creative strategies to engage communities of color in such an important political discussion. Several black student-activists I met at ICOPA told me how alienated they felt at the conference, especially when they realized that the ICOPA organizers had never attempted to contact the Toronto-based organizations with which these student-activists were working: a major black anti-police-brutality coalition, a black prisoner support organization, etc. So I certainly share your frustrations with ICOPA. At the same time, I find myself wondering how a new political formation of prison abolitionism can form in such a reactionary national and global climate. You have been involved with a variety of prison movements for the last 30 years, so maybe you can help me out. How do you think about this new political challenge within a broader historical perspective?

Angela: There are multiple histories of prison abolition. The Scandinavian scholar/activist Thomas Mathieson first published his germinal text, The Politics of Abolition, in 1974, when activist movements were calling for the disestablishment of prisons -- in the aftermath of the Attica Rebellion and prison uprisings throughout Europe. He was concerned with transforming prison reform movements into more radical movements to abolish prisons as the major institutions of punishment. There was a pattern of decarceration in the Netherlands until the mid-1980s, which seemed to establish the Dutch system as a model prison system, and the later rise in prison construction and the expansion of the incarcerated population has served to stimulate abolitionist ideas. Criminologist Willem de Haan published a book in 1990 entitled The Politics of Redress: Crime, Punishment, and Penal Abolition. One of the most interesting texts, from the point of view of U.S. activist history is Fay Honey Knopp's volume Instead of Prison: A Handbook for Prison Abolitionists, which was published in 1976, with funding from the American Friends. This handbook points out the contradictory relationship between imprisonment and an "enlightened, free society." Prison abolition, like the abolition of slavery, is a long-range goal and the handbook argues that an abolitionist approach requires an analysis of "crime" that links it with social structures, as opposed to individual pathology, as well as "anticrime" strategies that focus on the provision of social resources. Of course, there are many versions of prison abolitionism -- including those that propose to abolish punishment altogether and replace it with reconciliatory responses to criminal acts. In my opinion, the most powerful relevance of abolitionist theory and practice today resides in the fact that without a radical position vis-a-vis the rapidly expanding prison system, prison architecture, prison surveillance, and prison system corporatization, prison culture, with all its racist and totalitarian implications, will continue not only to claim ever increasing numbers of people of color, but also to shape social relations more generally in our society. Prison needs to be abolished as the dominant mode of addressing social problems that are better solved by other institutions and other means. The call for prison abolition urges us to imagine and strive for a very different social landscape.

Dylan: I think you make a subtle but important point here: prison and penal abolition imply an analysis of society that illuminates the repressive logic, as well as the fascistic historical trajectory, of the prison's growth as a social and industrial institution. Theoretically and politically, this "radical position," as you call it, introduces a new set of questions that does not necessarily advocate a pragmatic "alternative" or a concrete and immediate "solution" to what currently exists. In fact, I think this is an entirely appropriate position to assume when dealing with a policing and jurisprudence system that inherently disallows the asking of such fundamental questions as: Why are some lives considered more disposable than others under the weight of police policy and criminal law? How have we arrived at a place where killing is valorized and defended when it is organized by the state -- I'm thinking about the street lynchings of Diallo and Dorismond in New York City, the bombing of the MOVE organization in Philadelphia in 1985, the ongoing bombing of Iraqi civilians by the United States -- yet viciously avenged (by the state) when committed by isolated individuals? Why have we come to associate community safety and personal security with the degree to which the state exercises violence through policing and criminal justice? You've written elsewhere that the primary challenge for penal abolitionists in the United States is to construct a political language and theoretical discourse that disarticulates crime from punishment. In a sense, this implies a principled refusal to pander to the typically pragmatist impulse to demand absolute answers and solutions right now to a problem that has deep roots in the social formation of the United States since the 1960s. I think your open-ended conception of prison abolition also allows for a more comprehensive understanding of the prison-industrial complex as a set of institutional and political relationships that extend well beyond the walls of the prison proper. So in a sense, prison abolition is itself a broader critique of society. This brings me to the next question: What are the most crucial distinctions between the political commitments and agendas of prison reformists and those of prison abolitionists?

Angela: The seemingly unbreakable link between prison reform and prison development -- referred to by Foucault in his analysis of prison history -- has created a situation in which progress in prison reform has tended to render the prison more impermeable to change and has resulted in bigger, and what are considered "better," prisons. The most difficult question for advocates of prison abolition is how to establish a balance between reforms that are clearly necessary to safeguard the lives of prisoners and those strategies designed to promote the eventual abolition of prisons as the dominant mode of punishment. In other words, I do not think that there is a strict dividing line between reform and abolition. For example, it would be utterly absurd for a radical prison activist to refuse to support the demand for better health care inside Valley State, California's largest women's prison, under the pretext that such reforms would make the prison a more viable institution. Demands for improved health care, including protection from sexual abuse and challenges to the myriad ways in which prisons violate prisoners' human rights, can be integrated into an abolitionist context that elaborates specific decarceration strategies and helps to develop a popular discourse on the need to shift resources from punishment to education, housing, health care, and other public resources and services.

Dylan: Speaking of developing a popular discourse, the Critical Resistance gathering in September 1998 seemed to pull together an incredibly wide array of prison activists -- cultural workers, prisoner support and legal advocates, former prisoners, radical teachers, all kinds of researchers, progressive policy scholars and criminologists, and many others. Although you were quite clear in the conference's opening plenary session that the purpose of Critical Resistance was to encourage people to imagine radical strategies for a sustained prison abolition campaign, it was clear to me that only a few people took this dimension of the conference seriously. That is, it seemed convenient for people to rejoice at the unprecedented level of participation in this presumably "radical" prison activist gathering, but the level of analysis and political discussion generally failed to embrace the creative challenge of formulating new ways to link existing activism to a larger abolitionist agenda. People were generally more interested in developing an analysis of the prison-industrial complex that incorporated the local work that they were involved in, which I think is an important practical connection to make. At the same time, I think there is an inherent danger in conflating militant reform and human rights strategies with the underlying logic of anti-prison radicalism, which conceives of the ultimate eradication of the prison as a site of state violence and social repression. What is required, at least in part, is a new vernacular that enables this kind of political dream. How does prison abolition necessitate new political language, teachings, and organizing strategies? How could these strategies help to educate and organize people inside and outside the prison for abolition?

Angela: In order to imagine a world without prisons -- or at least a social landscape no longer dominated by the prison -- a new popular vocabulary will have to replace the current language, which articulates crime and punishment in such a way that we cannot think about a society without crime except as a society in which all the criminals are imprisoned. Thus, one of the first challenges is to be able to talk about the many ways in which punishment is linked to poverty, racism, sexism, homophobia, and other modes of dominance. In the university, the emergence of the interdisciplinary field of prison studies can help to trouble the prevailing criminology discourses that shape public policy as well as popular ideas about the permanence of prisons. At the high school level, new curricula can also be developed that encourage critical thinking about the role of punishment. Community organizations can also play a role in urging people to link their demands for better schools, for example, to a reduction of prison spending.

Dylan: Your last comment suggests that we need to rupture the ideological structures embodied by the rise of the prison-industrial complex. How does prison abolition force us to rethink common assumptions about jurisprudence, in particular "criminal justice?"

Angela: Since the invention of the prison as punishment in Western society during the late 1700s, criminal justice systems have so thoroughly depended on imprisonment that we have lost the ability to imagine other ways to solve the problem of "crime." One of the interesting contributions of prison abolitionists has been to propose other paradigms of punishment or to suggest that we need to extricate ourselves from the assumption that punishment must be a necessary response to all violations of the law. Reconciliatory or restorative justice, for example, is presented by some abolitionists as an approach that has proved successful in non-Western societies -- Native American societies, for example -- and that can be tailored for use in urban contexts in cases that involve property and other offenses. The underlying idea is that in many cases, the reconciliation of offender and victim (including monetary compensation to the victim) is a much more progressive vision of justice than the social exile of the offender. This is only one example -- the point is that we will not be free to imagine other ways of addressing crime as long as we see the prison as a permanent fixture for dealing with all or most violations of the law.

http://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/davisinterview.html

Racial Disparities in Prison: Remedies.

The evidence has long been in that the justice system is inherently a tool of racial, class, and gender oppression. I think we all need to form one of these task forces for our states and figure out how to dismantle it...

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Treatment Alternatives for Safe Communities, Inc.

TASC Public Policy Blog

Archive for the ‘Racial Disparity Prison’ Category

State Lawmakers, Criminal Justice Experts to Scrutinize Racial Impact of Illinois Drug Laws

without comments

Springfield, IL – State legislative and criminal justice leaders gathered in Chicago on Monday to evaluate the impact of Illinois drug laws on minority communities. Members of the Illinois Disproportionate Justice Impact Study Commission will begin work to determine if current state laws and policies contribute to the disproportionate percentages of minorities in jails and prisons.

The Commission, co-chaired by State Senator Mattie Hunter (D- Chicago) and State Representative Art Turner (D-Chicago), is the outcome of Senate Bill 2476, which passed the Illinois Senate and the Illinois House unanimously last year and became Public Act 095-0995.

Commission members, named in the law or appointed by the Senate and House leaders, will examine the causes and consequences of findings such as these:

• In Illinois in 2005, whites comprised 66% of the general population, African-Americans 15%. That same year, whites comprised only 28% of the Illinois prison population, and African-Americans 61%.[1]

• In 2005, African Americans were 9.1 times more likely to be incarcerated in prison or jail in Illinois than whites, ranking Illinois 14th worst in the nation, and well above the national average of 5.6 times more likely.[2]

• From 1990 to 2000, the number of African Americans admitted to prison in Illinois for drug offenses grew six-fold from 1,421 to 9,088. In contrast, the number of whites admitted to prison for drug offenses remained relatively stable.[3]

• The proportion of African Americans arrested for drug offenses in Illinois increased steadily from 1983 to 1992, from 46% to 82% of those arrested for such crimes. The proportions of whites arrested decreased steadily during those years, from 41% to 11%.[4]

These significant disparities exist despite the fact that rates of illicit drug use vary relatively little by ethnicity. The just-released 2008 National Survey on Drug Use and Health shows rates of past month illicit drug use among persons 12 or older to be 10.1% among African Americans, 8.2% for whites, and 6.2% for Latinos.

“These incarceration trends are disturbing and we need to remedy them,” says Senator Hunter, who co-sponsored the legislation creating the Commission. “When rates of drug use among minorities are relatively similar, but rates of incarceration are wildly disproportionate, we need to understand why that is happening and what we can do about it.”

According to a 2008 report by the Center for Health and Justice at TASC, the disparities in incarceration trends relate in part to changes in the drug laws in the late 1980s. Between 1986 and 1991, the number of African Americans incarcerated for drug crimes rose four times as fast as the number of whites.

“No legislature sets out to make a law that disproportionately imprisons a particular racial community, but I believe our laws here in Illinois do just that,” says Senator Hunter. “Now we have an opportunity to examine what’s happening and right the wrong.”

The Commission’s work will yield legislative and other policy recommendations designed to address any disproportionate impact found to result from state drug laws and/or their application.

State budget woes have cut funding for alternatives to incarceration, including the statewide TASC (Treatment Alternatives for Safe Communities) program, which places and monitors nonviolent, drug-using offenders in substance abuse treatment as a condition of their probation.

“When the State cuts funding for drug treatment, alternatives to incarceration, and community probation and supervision, the consequences of those cuts are felt by minority communities that are already being affected disproportionately by current drug laws,” says Pamela Rodriguez, president of TASC and its Center for Health and Justice, which is assisting the work of the Commission. “We need to be vigilant about not cutting the very programs that divert nonviolent, drug-using offenders out of the justice system and into community-based treatment.”

The Commission’s work will be informed by advisory groups that examine research, policy, and economic impact. The research advisory group comprises researchers from Loyola University, the University of Illinois at Chicago, Roosevelt University, the Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority, and the Illinois Department of Corrections, along with staff researchers and legal and policy consultants from the Center for Health and Justice at TASC. The policy and economic impact advisory groups will be composed of a variety of university and community members with interest and expertise in economics and public policy related to criminal justice.

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[1] U.S Census Bureau and Illinois Department of Corrections, 2005 Department Data.

[2] Uneven Justice: State Rates of Incarceration by Race and Ethnicity, Marc Mauer and Ryan S. King, Sentencing Project, July 2007.

[3] The Disproportionate Incarceration of African Americans for Drug Crimes: The Illinois Perspective. Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority, Arthur J. Lurigio and Mary Harkenrider, November 2005.

[4] Ibid.

Written by dbaille

September 21, 2009 at 2:51 PM

Scott Watch: International Day for Abolition and Blogging for Freedom.

I've been MIA, folks. Actually, I'm still in action - just otherwise occupied with things off-line. Blogging from Conspire today since my internet has been down since Monday morning. The folks here are pretty decent (it's an anarchist hangout). I may well be here tomorrow, too, blogging for the Scotts, now that I'm back.

FYI (more on this later) - tomorrow is also the "International Day for the Commemoration of the Abolition of the Transatlantic Slave Trade" (that's just a little history). Since there are direct links between plantations and prisons, the end of slavery and the enslavement of prisoners in America , Jim Crow and felon dis-enfranchisement laws, and the institution of slavery and persistent racial and economic inequalities, it seems appropriate to blog that day for the Scott Sisters - as well as for the awesome women who have been anchoring this campaign, including their Mom, Mrs. Rasco.

So, remember the day, tomorrow, in honor of those who have passed in the streets, in shelters, and in prison while fighting for human liberation, and out of respect and gratitude for those who fight on with everything to lose - including those who end up in our prisons on this journey...disproportionately the poor and people of color, ironically.

That's got be something like being drafted into the Vietnam War. You go or they take you, and you don't get back home until they're done with your body; no guarantees you'll still be alive. We need to be watching prisoners' backs more closely, now, addressing their and their families' trauma, and getting them out as soon as we can.

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SPREAD THE WORD & DON'T BE MIA FOR THE 3/25 DAY OF BLOGGING FOR THE SCOTT SISTERS - ALL PARTICIPATING BLOGS WILL BE LISTED AT http://www.facebook.com/l/7f874;www.freethescottsisters.blogspot.com

**SPECIAL SNEAK PREVIEW**

Sis. Terry Howcott answers this call as only she can, please check out "SCOTT SISTERS ARE US" right now at http://www.facebook.com/l/7f874;terryhowcott.com/greenspace.asp?id=1296
and be inspired!!

Please send your blog URL's to nattyreb@gmail.com so that they can be acknowledged,
help to make the Scott Sisters case one that no one can say they've not heard of, together we can save the life of Jamie Scott and free she and Gladys from their 16 years in that prison hellhole!!
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PLEASE PARTICIPATE AND SPREAD THE WORD!
3/25 DAY OF BLOGGING FOR THE SCOTT SISTERS

Thanks to the many excellent bloggers who participated in our initial Day of Blogging for the Scott Sisters on 3/18!! The notices didn't reach everyone in a timely manner and so we are happy to announce a new date for bloggers to unite around this case of Mississippi injustice and particularly to intervene in the prison's medical malpractice being suffered by Jamie Scott!

In early January both of Jamie Scott's kidneys shut down and she has been swiftly declining due to unprofessional medical care that is inadequate, cut-rate and frighteningly inept. Jamie was rushed to the hospital last week due to severe infection
and the need for prolonged medical attention. However, Jamie continues to require ongoing close monitoring as when she is returned to the prison it is well documented that the medical staff there has provided abysmal health care in filthy conditions that have put Jamie's life at risk far too many times to be acceptable. Jamie needs to be released from prison, period!

We ask that bloggers put out calls for students, clubs, churches/temples/mosques, organizations, creative artists, media, politicians, community leaders, journalists, etc. to
become aware of the case of the Scott Sisters and to make certain that all of their contacts are informed, as well. There is something that each person can do and we need to get Jamie home while she still has time to be with her family!

Thanks to all who will participate in this and help to raise the call to FREE THE SCOTT SISTERS throughout the blogosphere 3/25 and beyond! In the spirit of International Women's Month, please support our women! Please send notification of any blog postings to nattyreb@gmail.com!
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In conjunction with: http://www.facebook.com/l/7f874;www.blackperspective.net

For Immediate Release Afrosphere Action Coalition – March 22, 2010

Contact: Marpessa Kupendua of the Committee to Free the Scott Sisters at nattyreb@gmail.com

Wrongly Convicted In Dire Health Situation
3/25 DAY OF BLOGGING FOR THE SCOTT SISTERS

On 12/24/93, the Scott County Sheriff’s Department arrested Jamie and Gladys Scott for armed robbery even though three young males, ranging from ages 14 to 18, confessed to committing the crime and the women have unwaveringly maintained their complete innocence. Despite this, the corrupt Mississippi sheriff used coercion, threats, and harassment to compel the young men to turn state’s evidence against the Scott Sisters due to a long-standing vendetta against a family member. In 10/94 the Scott Sisters were sentenced to extraordinary double-life terms each, despite the facts that no one was harmed, neither sister had prior convictions, no weapon was ever recovered, and the amount alleged to have been taken was approximately $11.00. Even if they were guilty as charged, this sentence is completely outrageous and cruel.

Jamie Scott, who entered the prison system as a healthy young woman, is now suffering from complete kidney failure and other life-threatening medical conditions. Since January, 2010 Jamie has endured almost weekly severe health setbacks that the state has either outright refused to address or handled in a slipshod manner. Jamie has had weeks of serious infections that could have taken her life, has gone into shock, been given sporadic dialysis treatments, and suffered the state's refusal to provide her with adequate nutrition as required for her serious medical condition.

The Scott Sisters are now in their 16th year of incarceration and their five children and grandchildren are being raised by their now ailing mother. The defendants and their family are wholly dependent on support from the press, organizations, and all those dedicated to justice in making this debacle as public as possible. The lengthy incarceration of these women to date and their draconian sentences are completely shocking and must be challenged, enough is enough!

Mrs. Rasco and Afrosphere Bloggers are calling on the public to press the governor's office to pardon the Scott Sisters and release them, particularly Jamie who needs to be at home with her family during her very serious illness. Please ask that the media and politicians do an investigative inquiry about this tragic situation and the outrageous case of the wrongfully convicted Scott Sisters!