California prisoners have been on hunger strike for one full week,
today, in protest of long-term solitary confinement. The hunger strike
began on July 8th with participation of approximately 30,000 people in
two-thirds of California’s prisons, as well as several out-of-state
facilities holding California prisoners. In the first days of the
hunger strike, approximately 3,200 others also refused to attend work
or education classes as a form of protest in support of the hunger
strike. Currently, there are an estimated 4,487 still on hunger strike
as of Sunday. On Thursday, July 11th, the California Department of
Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) put out a press
release summarizing information about the strike. Notably, unlike
the strikes of 2011, CDCR declared the strikes to be a “mass hunger
strike disturbance.” The press release indicated CDCR’s intention of
punishing participants in the hunger strike, saying that participants
of the strike would be subjected to disciplinary procedures and that
hunger strike leaders would be placed in Administrative Segregation
Units (Ad-Seg). Ad-Seg placement was commonly used against strike
leaders in 2011, who reported being placed in cells generally smaller
than their SHU cells and were significantly barer. As hunger strike
leader Todd Ashker wrote in 2011:
We were all isolated on a tier, in strip cells with nothing but a set of clothes and fish kit – spoon, cup, bar of soap etc. – with ice cold air blasting outta the vents! The warden personally told us, “As soon as you eat, you can go back to your SHU (Security Housing Units) cells.” My “mattress” was not even a mattress. It only had lumps of padding in places and was only 50 inches long – on ice cold concrete. This was all intentional, by design. They know that when a person is subject to cold, the body requires more energy. When you’re not eating, the ice will cause your body to feed on muscle and internal organs and the brain etc. much faster. Permanent damage can happen a lot faster.
Solitary Watch was able to confirm that identified strike leaders at
California State Prison, Corcoran, had already been placed in Ad Seg by
Friday. Further, Corcoran Public Information Officer Lt. Anthony Baer
confirmed that canteen items had been removed from the cells of
participants. Lt. Baer also explained why CDCR ordered prisons not to
divulge information as to how many individuals were striking at their
facilities, saying “if word gets out that certain prisons are not
participating or the number at a particular prison isn’t high enough –
those inmates could be in extreme danger.” This position was also
repeated by the Officer of the Receiver, which oversees health care
services in CDCR facilities. A spokesperson there told Solitary Watch
that she could not report how many hunger strikers were being medically
monitored because: “Inmates have told prison staff that they are
feeling pressured and coerced to participate. We are concerned about
the safety of inmates who are being pressured to do this.” However, she
did report that the hunger strike at High Desert State Prison, which
began a week prior to the statewide strike, had ended by Friday, and
that 10 participants had been medically monitored. Information from
Pelican Bay State Prison was more difficult to gather. PIO Lt.
Christopher Acosta repeatedly responded to questions emailed by
Solitary Watch with one line referrals to ask CDCR spokeswoman Terry
Thornton any questions about Pelican Bay. A sister of a hunger striker
at Pelican Bay told Solitary Watch that she had visited with her
brother on Saturday. She reports that all canteen items had been taken
from strike participants’ cells, that strike leaders had been removed
to Ad-Seg, and that individuals in the SHU are being threatened with
three-month extensions to their SHU term for participation. The wife of
another hunger striker also reported to Solitary Watch that strikers
were being written up for rules violations. One issue notably revealed
by the CDCR press release is that CDCR has halted the case-by-case
reviews of all 3,000 individuals in the SHU. The reviews began in early
2013 at all facilities holding gang validated CDCR inmates who were
subject to an indeterminate SHU term. The purpose of the reviews was
to determine whether or not individuals presently determined to be gang
members or gang associates should be retained in the SHU, placed in the
Step Down Program, or released to the general population due to lack of
evidence of gang activity. As the press release states, 215 of the 382
individuals reviewed have been endorsed for release to general
population. In other words, CDCR has put on hold a review process that
has revealed that CDCR gang investigators have been placing individuals
in the SHU with standards that failed to identify security threats by
their own (now-revised) standards. Meanwhile, the San Francisco Bay
View has published letters from California State Prison-Sacramento and Calipatria
State Prison, from individuals confirming strike activity at their
facilities. Calipatria’s Ad-Seg holds many individuals who are
currently awaiting transfer to a SHU, but have instead been held in
ASUs due to all SHU cells being occupied. One letter from
CSP-Sacramento, written as the strike began, reads:
“There’s only a chosen few of us Afrikan brothaz left in the struggle
on C-Facility with many tapping out from threats of losing
materialistic privileges – threats that all our property will be taken
and we’ll be placed in isolation and force fed if we continue
striking.” One mother, who requested anonymity, told Solitary Watch
that she visited her son at CCI-Tehachapi this past weekend. Her son, a
hunger striker held in the SHU at CCI, told her that correctional
officers (along with dogs) had seized all canteen items from the cells
of strike participants. Sandbags have been placed at the cell doors of
strikers in order to prevent “fishing,” or note-passing. “My son says
that the sandbags prevent the air from circulating in his cell,” she
says. She also reports significantly grimmer news. “The nurse does
check on them every two days as well, and that the nurse asked if he
wanted to be resuscitated and he said yes. My son said that his
neighbor, did not want to be resuscitated because he has a life
sentence and he does not want to grow old in the SHU. My son is
feeling the effect of the hunger strike and he said they are holding
out to the end.”
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