http://angola3news.blogspot.com/2013/07/opening-box-sarah-shourd-on-herman.html
Opening the Box: Sarah
Shourd on Herman Wallace, California Hunger Strikers and the Horror of Solitary
Confinement
By Angola 3 News
Last month, we were devastated to learn that the Angola 3’s
Herman Wallace had been diagnosed with liver cancer, and that he was continuing to be
held in isolation in a locked room at Hunt Correctional Center's prison
infirmary. Reflecting on his confinement while battling cancer, Herman said:
"My own body has now become a tool of torture against me."
On July 10, Amnesty International launched a campaign
directed at Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, calling for Herman’s immediate release
on humanitarian grounds (take action here). "After decades of cruel
conditions and a conviction that continues to be challenged by the courts, he
should be released immediately to his family so that he can be cared for humanely
during his last months," said Amnesty USA campaigner Tessa Murphy.
In recent years, Amnesty has initiated other campaigns challenging the over 41 years spent in solitary confinement by Herman and Albert Woodfox, also of the Angola 3, including the April 17, 2012 delivery of a 67,000 signature petition to LA Governor Jindal demanding Albert and Herman's immediate release from solitary. Earlier this year, Amnesty called on Louisiana Attorney General James Caldwell to not appeal the US District Court’s overturning of Albert’s conviction. More recently, accompanying their call for Herman’s release, Amnesty also expressed concern about “the worsening conditions of confinement” for Albert at David Wade Correctional Center, where he remains in solitary confinement. “For approximately two months, Woodfox has been subjected to additional punitive measures – including strip searches each time he leaves or enters his cell, being escorted in ankle and wrist restraints, restricted phone access, and non-contact visits through a perforated metal screen. Temperatures in the prison cells are reportedly extremely high, regularly reaching up to 100 degrees Fahrenheit,” wrote Amnesty.
In recent years, Amnesty has initiated other campaigns challenging the over 41 years spent in solitary confinement by Herman and Albert Woodfox, also of the Angola 3, including the April 17, 2012 delivery of a 67,000 signature petition to LA Governor Jindal demanding Albert and Herman's immediate release from solitary. Earlier this year, Amnesty called on Louisiana Attorney General James Caldwell to not appeal the US District Court’s overturning of Albert’s conviction. More recently, accompanying their call for Herman’s release, Amnesty also expressed concern about “the worsening conditions of confinement” for Albert at David Wade Correctional Center, where he remains in solitary confinement. “For approximately two months, Woodfox has been subjected to additional punitive measures – including strip searches each time he leaves or enters his cell, being escorted in ankle and wrist restraints, restricted phone access, and non-contact visits through a perforated metal screen. Temperatures in the prison cells are reportedly extremely high, regularly reaching up to 100 degrees Fahrenheit,” wrote Amnesty.
Public outrage intensified on Friday, July 12, when a letter citing the Angola 3 case, was sent to the Civil Rights Division of the US
Justice Department by Congressman John Conyers, Jr. (D-Mich.), Ranking Member
of the full U.S. House Judiciary Committee, Congressman Jerrold Nadler
(D-N.Y.), Ranking Member of the Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil
Justice, Congressman Robert C. “Bobby” Scott (D-Va.), Ranking Member of the
Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security, and Investigations, and
Congressman Cedric Richmond (D-La.). The letter called for an investigation of the
Louisiana Departments of Corrections for its “abysmal history of protecting the
rights of its prisoners,” of which the “tragic story of the Angola 3 is a case
in point.”
About Herman Wallace, the Congressmen wrote: “We have heard
that he lost over 50 pounds within 6 months.
Despite that dramatic weight loss, and at 72 years old, the prison did
nothing to treat or diagnose him until he was sent to an emergency room on June
14. Given the late stage of his
diagnosis, his treatment options are now limited. He is frail and ill, but is still being
treated as if he is a threat to security, and we hear that he remains under
lockdown conditions. This is unconscionable.”
Within hours of the letter’s release, Herman Wallace was transferred
out of solitary confinement, when Louisiana’s Hunt prison reduced his
classification from maximum to medium security. Herman is now staying at the
prison hospital in a 10-bunk dorm, with access to a day room, and does not have
to wear leg irons anymore. While celebrating the more human conditions, Herman
and the International Coalition to Free the Angola 3 emphasize that the
transfer from solitary is not enough. They are asking folks to continue
supporting Amnesty International’s call for humane release. The Angola 3’s Robert H. King, himself released in 2001 after 29 years in solitary confinement, says,
“The wind is at our back and with your continued help our objective will be
realized - freedom is in sight.”
The case of the Angola 3 is at the center of a 42-day fundraising drive begun for a touring play, entitled Opening the Box, that will focus on the use of prolonged solitary
confinement in US prisons. The choice of fundraising for 42 days is a tribute to
the almost 42 years spent in solitary by Herman Wallace and Albert Woodfox. The
writer and producer of Opening the Box, Sarah Shourd, is herself a survivor,
having spent 410 days in solitary confinement while held as a political hostage
by the Iranian Government from 2009-2010. After returning to the US, she successfully fought for the release of her
now-husband Shane Bauer and friend Josh Fatal.
Conceived specifically “to add to the
momentum of a burgeoning movement” against solitary, Shourd will be working
with Solitary Watch to “collect real stories from a diverse spectrum of people
living in solitary confinement today--immigrants, children, lifers and women.
Then, I'm going to write a play about it and go on tour.”
“While watching this play, I want the audience to breathe
along with a young man having a panic attack after being denied a visit with
his mother, to crawl inside the skin of an immigrant detainee terrified of
being deported and to travel with a lifer on a magic carpet of memory--only to
be pulled back into the stark, implacable reality of the hole. By hearing these
stories, my hope is that the audience will be able to relate to the men and
women enduring this torture in our prisons, to their pain but also to their
resistance to the dehumanizing forces around them, their incredible
resilience...and their refusal to be institutionalized,” explains Shourd.
In this interview, which Shourd dedicates to Herman Wallace,
we take a closer look at her project, Opening the Box, as well as the ongoing
prisoner hunger strike in California, the Angola 3 case, and the politics of
prisons in the US. Currently based in Oakland, California, Shourd is an author
and Contributing Editor at Solitary Watch. Before being captured by the Iranian
government, Shourd was living in a Palestinian Refugee Camp in Damascus, Syria,
working as a journalist and teaching for the Iraqi Student Project. She’s
written for The New York Times, CNN, Newsweek's Daily Beast and has a blog on Huffington Post. Her memoir (co-authored by Shane Bauer and Josh Fattal) will
be published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in Spring 2014. To learn more visit
sarahshourd.com and/or follow her on Twiiter @SShourd.
(PHOTO: Sarah Shourd speaks in support of solitary survivor Bradley Manning) |
Angola 3 News: Why
did you choose to spotlight the case of the Angola 3 with 42 days of fundraising?
Sarah Shourd: I only knew a little about the Angola
3 before I was detained in Iran, but I thought about them when I was inside. I
also thought about Mumia Abu Jamal, Nelson Mandela, my friend Jafar Saidi (who
is being held in a Pennsylvania prison) and all the other prisoners I’d heard
of being held in prolonged isolation. I reasoned that if these people found the
strength to endure weeks, months or even decades alone, then that meant I could
get through it too. Their example helped me believe that it was possible to
survive indefinite solitary confinement, that with enough discipline and focus,
I could learn to stay afloat, to ward off depression & hopelessness and
even confront each day with some sort of dignity and purpose.
Now that I’ve studied Herman and Albert’s case, I know there
is absolutely no evidence that either of them is guilty of the crime (murdering
a guard) that landed them in solitary 41 years ago. The 70’s were an extremely
volatile and politicized time inside Angola prison and prisons around the
country. Herman, Albert and Robert were organizing and resisting mistreatment
by guards inside Angola—and I believe that’s why they were targeted by prison
officials and used to set an example.
Herman and Albert were given a sentence on top of their
original sentence—life in solitary confinement. This ruling was made
internally, without judge or jury, which in my opinion is unconstitutional.
A3N: Following
Herman Wallace’s recent cancer diagnosis and continued isolation, we are
mobilizing public support for compassionate release. Can you say something in
support of Herman’s medical release?
SS: Herman deserves a release on
compassionate, medical grounds more than any other prisoner I’ve ever heard of.
It couldn’t be more obvious that he’s no danger to anyone and the yet extent of
suffering that’s been heaped upon him over the last four decades is beyond
comprehension. No human being, under any circumstances, should be subject to
this kind of cruelty.
That said, there’s no changing what’s already been done. The
best hope for Herman is that he be allowed to taste freedom and be with his
loved ones for the last months or years of his life. After 41 years, Herman
deserves much, much more than that—but all we can really hope for is that
government officials decide to grant Herman a compassionate, medical release the
most expedient way possible. This is the only way to make right even a fraction
of the wrong that’s been done— before it’s too late.
A3N: Last
week, on the other side of the country, California prisoners began a hunger strike,
following up on the demands first made by hunger strikers in 2011. How did the 2011 hunger strike affect
you, following your release from Iran?
SS: I’d been fighting non-stop for over a year
when my now-husband Shane Bauer and friend Josh Fatal were finally released
from prison in Iran. Just weeks later, the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Torture,
Juan Mendez, issued a report condemning the long-term use of isolation on
prisoners and calling it torture. Mendez went on to say that any period over 15
days in solitary can cause permanent psychological damage and should be subject
to strict, mandatory review.
A few weeks later, the largest hunger strikes in history
erupted in my home state, California. It was such an intense, mixed time for
me. After more than two years since our initial arrests, the three of us were
all finally together, free and back in the US. Yet, I was acutely aware of the
tens of thousands of people in my own country, who were needlessly suffering
the same kind of torture that the three of us had been subjected to.
I began speaking and writing about solitary confinement,
connecting my own experience to what I saw happening around me. I knew the
fight for justice wasn’t over for me—this was now a lifelong commitment.
A3N: What do
you think of the current hunger strike? Do you support the strike’s
criticism of prison authorities’ response to the 2011 strike?
SS: I’m angry that ten of thousands of
prisoners have been forced to begin hunger striking again, but they have no
other choice. The response from California prison authorities to the demands of
the prison hunger strikers in 2011 was sorely inadequate. In fact, no tangible
changes have been made at all. Prisoners in our country have next to no
rights—they have to risk their health, safety and even their own lives in order
to be heard.
I’m impressed, but by no means surprised, by how widespread
resistance to solitary confinement has become inside our prisons—with 29,000
people refusing their food on the very first day. I think the renewal of this
hunger strike is a sign that prisoners have reached a tipping point. They’ve
made their grievances visible, so that now politicians, prison officials and
the public can no longer afford to ignore the horrors happening inside our
prisons.
A3N: With
over 2.4 million prisoners today, the US now has the most total prisoners and
the highest incarceration rate in the world. How do you think this
unprecedented level of mass incarceration relates to the widespread use of
long-term solitary confinement?
SS: Before I spent 410 days in solitary
confinement, I knew that isolating a person was a cruel form of punishment.
Still, it wasn’t until I experienced it myself that I realized it was torture.
Long periods with little to no human contact violates a person’s psyche in the
deepest, most insidious way—a way that usually leaves no physical marks but
leaves most people psychologically damaged and changed forever
I see solitary confinement as the deep end of our very
broken prison system. It’s the worst punishment our system dolls out. It’s also
used routinely, often arbitrarily and with little to no oversight.
There are other ways to run prisons that are better for both
prisoners’ individual health and public safety. However, instead of trying to
deal with serious issues like prison violence (by inmates and guards)
constructively, in U.S. we lock ten of thousands of people alone in cages where
they lose their minds, often hurt themselves and commit suicide at a much
higher rate than in the general prison population.
Still, prison authorities can’t keep them locked up forever.
The majority of people that have been subjected to prolonged solitary
confinement will one day be released back into society, where little to no
services exist to help them recover, reintegrate and move forward in a positive
way. That’s why so many ex-prisoners reoffend and the cycle continues.
Our prison system has veered so far from the path of
rehabilitation over the last 30 years, there’s hardly even an attempt on behalf
of prison authorities to give the impression they’re trying to provide inmates
with resources or opportunities to change. Instead, prisoners are treated like
raw material instead of human beings, warehoused away like surplus goods.
A3N: Who, in particular gets targeted for solitary
and why?
SS: Solitary confinement is a perfect
illustration of what our prison system has become. It’s used as a control
strategy against anyone who presents any kind of hassle to prison officials
and/or needs services that our prison system has neglected to provide. Guards
use any excuse to get rid of people by sending them to the ‘hole,’ such as petty
drug use, profanity and/or any small, petty (often non-violent) infraction.
The real reason many people wind up in solitary is because
they have unpopular or threatening political beliefs, because they’re gay or
transgender and need so-called ‘protection,’ because they’ve reported rape or
abuse by prison officials and/or simply because they are mentally ill.
Human Rights Watch estimates that one-third to one-half of
inmates in isolation had some form of mental illness before they were put
there. Using solitary confinement instead of providing mental health and other
rehabilitative services is inhumane, not to mention extremely negligent. This
practice doesn’t serve society and that’s why we need to hold prison officials
accountable and end this practice.
A3N: Looking
from an international perspective, how do other countries differ regarding the
use of prolonged solitary confinement?
SS: Many countries around the world only use
solitary in their prisons as a very last resort. England, for example, tried
implementing solitary confinement as a disciplinary measure. When prison
violence increased, and they realized how expensive and cruel this practice
was, they simply stopped relying on it. Today there are a few dozen prisoners
held in prolonged solitary in the UK—compared to our estimated 80,000 on any
given day.
The reason this mistake was caught and largely corrected in
England was simple—they have a system of oversight in place, a government body
that closely monitors what happens inside their prisons and keeps the public
informed. In the U.S. we have nothing like this in place. As a result, this
practice has gotten out of control and we’ve become by far the largest offender
of this inhumane, senseless practice in the world.
A3N: Why is
theater a useful medium for telling these stories? How do you foresee this
helping to build momentum against the practice of solitary confinement?
SS: I believe a play can reach a new and
different segment of the population with a human rights issue that should be of
grave concern to everyone in our country. ‘Opening the Box’ also has the
potential of humanizing this issue in a visceral, embodied way that an article
or report can’t.
In the late 90s a play called The Exonerated—based on true stories of innocent death row
survivors— came out and quickly spread like wildfire. Half a million people saw
this play and actors like Susan Sarandon & Danny Glover did cameos and the
Governor of Illinois was so affected by seeing the play he decided to commute
all the existing death row sentences in his state to life in prison.
I believe that hearing, seeing and reading real, complex
stories of people living through the daily hell of solitary confinement (there
is also a book in the works, slated to be published in conjunction with the
play) has the potential of effecting people in a way they can’t and won’t
forget. The play is not only about entertainment, of course, we want it to be a
catalyst for action, a humble effort to contribute to a nation-wide
movement—one that’s gained more momentum in the last few years than it did over
the last century.
‘Opening the Box’ is also a deeply personal journey—an
attempt to understand what happened to me during the year I spent in solitary
and to connect my own suffering to that of so many others.
--Angola 3 News is a project of the International Coalition to Free the
Angola 3. Our website is www.angola3news.com where we provide the latest news
about the Angola 3. We are also creating our own media projects, which
spotlight the issues central to the story of the Angola 3, like racism,
repression, prisons, human rights, solitary confinement as torture, and more.
--
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