May 2006 newsletter
However, the claim was based on the application of this "Directive" that was alleged to constitute an Ex Post Facto Clause violation. Then we went on to cite case law precedent to support our argument. I am pointing out the significance between the facial challenge and the application of the Directive, so that lifers (like myself) who don't have an MR, will know the difference. I think we made our legal position very clear to the judge, so the issue will boil down to whether the court will accept it or not when he decides on my MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION.
I would also like to mention that I have been getting some personal mail from inmates who read PAC, in regards to what is the difference between my Ex Post Facto Federal Law Suit against the WDOC, and what PAC is proposing to do in court on behalf of all WDOC old law inmates. My lawsuit is personally tailored to me and my own particular circumstances and situation. That is why my Complaint covered 7 issues. Most of my issues don't directly involve "all" old law inmates. It's primarily the Ex Post Facto Clause issue that we share in common. If I can win my case against the WDOC, then the PAC class action lawsuit on behalf of ALL old law inmates can cite the court's decision in my case to buttress their case. I want to say to all the WDOC old law inmates, that I highly recommend you all throw your support behind PAC and their efforts to bring this Ex Post Facto Clause issue before the court on behalf of ALL WDOC old law inmates. Don't just sit on the fence and take that "wait and see" attitude. The PAC class action lawsuit that they are working hard at preparing to file is an appropriate venue for all WDOC old law inmates to get behind and actively support.
Well this is about THE BIG PICTURE at this time. I pray the blessings of 3John2 for all of my (both old and new law) fellow inmates.
Peace,
Terrance J. Shaw
*********************************************************
Whatever little we have gained we have gained by agitation, while we
have uniformly lost by moderation. - Daniel O'Connell, 1824
*********
He who allows oppression, shares the crime. --
Erasmus Darwin
Old Law Update May, 2006
After reading many letters from various individuals it has become essential for me to address some issues as they relate to the Old Law litigation. We hear your voices and the call for justice related to new policies and practices of the Program Review Committee (PRC). We also hear your cry against the injustice in which those who are denied placement in treatment programs cannot be considered for parole and work release.
I must reiterate as stated in the March issue of the New Abolitionist, while these issues are valid, members of the research committee all agree, that raising the PRC issue in this context would be a very serious distraction to the Ex Post Facto argument.
We must remember that a law need not be retroactive on its face to engage the ex post facto prohibition. It is the effect, and not the form of the law that determines whether or not the law has been applied ex post facto. The critical question is, whether inmates can prove that they have been substantially disadvantaged by the new law.
To satisfy this test, Old Law prisoners whether serving a life term or not must show that these new parole guidelines create a high hurdle to the exercise of discretion, and therefore exposed them to a substantial risk in their opportunity to be paroled.
Thanks to Mr. Norman Pepin, we have obtained charts which show sentence length and reincarceration rates; inmate releases 1980-1993 (excluding lifers); average sentence length, by year of release (excluding lifers); average sentence and time served for serious offenses from 1980-1993 releases; average percentage of sentence served, by year release (excluding lifers); average years served, by year of release 1980-93 (excluding lifers); effect of prior felony conviction on time served-releases 1980-93 (excluding lifers); and life sentence released, 1980-1993.
Mr. Pepin has also provided us with the January 1982 Overview of release experiences of Lifers in Wisconsin Institutions during 1967-81 compiled by the Department of Health and Social Services Wisconsin Parole Board, Fred W. Hinickle, Chairman. Like the parolability range provided us by Mr. McMillian these materials are essential to the litigation. We continue to seek
documents that will bolster our case. If you have any parole documents that suggest a change has taken place, send them to PAC.
The proper standard for determining whether or not any expression of state power, be it law, regulation or a parole practice, violates the ex post facto prohibition must consider two components. First, the law, regulation or practice must have been applied retroactively. Second, the law, regulation or practice must create a “sufficient risk” of increasing the punishment attached to the crime.
For your information, there is one person working for liberation on a full-time scale without any pay, and the vast majority of the cost for the newsletters comes out his pocket. He is not a selfish person who sits in society and does nothing to help his fellow men and women. He has never been imprisoned, but cares about the many of you inside who have no one who cares. Many family members have abandoned their incarcerated loved one. He has not given up despite the cost and difficulty of the task. Many inside sit back and spend their money on tennis shoes and other items; they should think about donating a few dollars to the cause every so often.
They can also ask family members and friends to volunteer and arrange speaking engagements so an “old law” speaker can educate the public about our cause. The more of us involved and the more family members the better our chances of getting support.
A storm is brewing in Ohio. A litigation just as the one we seek to file is before the courts in the summary judgment stage, and being argued by inmates with assistance from family members and friends. If you want to check it out please look for Michael, et al., v. Ghee, et al., Case No. 3:01CV7436. In the United states District Court for the Northern District of Ohio Western District.
Liberation Now! Liberation Forever!
research committee
At press time, there were over 300 prisoners signed onto the old law class. Some have written to ask if they have been added. To avoid confusion, on the reverse of this page, please find a form that will help the organizers analyze the class. PAC cannot answer legal questions. We will forward inquiries to the research committee. PAC
Old Law Class Action Suit
Prisoner information form
Many of you have already signed onto the class action suit, but we would like to have a more formal information sheet for all plaintiffs, and use some of the information requested to better form our argument to the court. Thank you, old law litigators.
Date_________________
PERSONAL INFORMATION
Name___________________________________DOC #______________
Current institution__________________________________________
Address____________________________________________________
City_______________________________________, WI Zip__________
SENTENCE
Date of conviction_____________County________________Case #__________________
MR - PMR (circle one) Date_______________Parole eligibility date___________
1st Parole hearing date_________________ recommendation_______________________
reason for defer/action taken by PRC __________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
2nd Parole hearing date_________________recommendation_______________________
reason for defer/action taken by PRC __________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
List other hearing/defers/actions on separate sheet of paper
SPECIAL NOTES
Please add as much information as you have about the following:
1. Approximate length of sentences of others convicted of a similar crime at the time of your conviction (this is to establish what your judge may have considered “enough” punishment when sentencing you).
2. Aside from program needs, what other changes have occured in extending the length of your sentence (how has the DOC/parole board changed its criterion for REAL parole consideration) ?
3. Have you initiated any litigation regarding parole? Please include your case # and disposition of the case.
4. Make copies of this form and give them to other prisoners similarly situated.
5. If you want confirmation that we have received this form, please enclose a SASE or a 39¢ stamp.
6. Get your family involved. Ask them to send PAC a donation.
********************************************************************************************************************
Dear Prisoners Action Coalition,
Enclosed is a donation of $_________ to be used in the effort to find justice for prisoners sentenced prior to Jan 1, 2000. These prisoners suffer under new political realities that were not in place when they were convicted. These new realities manifest themselves in lengthy defers and unreasonable hurdles in gaining parole. I want you to use my contribution to help with research costs, printing and mailing of updates, and in the search for legal representation.
Thank you,
_________________________________________________________date_______________________
The Slow Rot at Supermax
By Richard A. Serrano, LA Times
At Moussaoui's future home in Florence, Colo., inmates are reportedly not merely punished, but incapacitated and broken down.
Halfway through the trial, prison expert James E. Aiken looked straight at jurors and told them what Zacarias Moussaoui could expect if they sent him away for the rest of his life. "I have seen them rot," he said. "They rot." Aiken was describing what happens to the nation's highest-risk prisoners after they settle in at the federal government's maximum-security prison in Florence, Colo., known as Supermax.
Moussaoui was formally sentenced Thursday to life in prison after a federal jury rejected a death sentence for the admitted Sept. 11 conspirator. Officials at the Federal Bureau of Prisons said that Moussaoui was destined for the facility high in the Colorado Rockies.
Already there is a veritable "bombers' row" — Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, master-mind of the 1993 World Trade Center blast; Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski; Terry L. Nichols, an accomplice in the Oklahoma City bombing; Richard Reid, the so-called shoe bomber who Moussaoui testified was to join him in another Al Qaeda hijacking; and Eric Rudolph, who bombed abortion clinics and the Atlanta Olympics.
All, like Moussaoui, are serving life without parole — spending their days in prison wings that are partly under-ground. They exist alone in soundproof cells as small as 7 feet by 12 feet, with a concrete-poured desk, bed and stool, a small shower and sink, and a TV that offers religious and anger-management programs. They are locked down 23 hours a day.
Larry Homenick, a former U.S. marshal who has taken prisoners to Supermax, said that there was a small triangular recreation area, known as "the dog run," where solitary Supermax prisoners could occasionally get a glimpse of sky. He said it was chilling to walk down the cellblocks and glance through the plexiglass "sally port" chambers into the cells and see the faces inside.
Life there is harsh. Food is delivered through a slit in the cell door. Prisoners don't leave their cells to see a lawyer, a doctor or a prison official; those visitors must go to the cell. But prisoners can earn extra privileges, like a wider variety of television off-erings, more exercise time and visit-ation rights, based on their behavior.
There are 1,400 remote-controlled steel doors. Motion detectors and hidden cameras monitor every move. The prison walls and razor-wired grounds are patrolled by laser beams and dogs. The facility is filling up. Four hundred inmates are there now. There is room for 90 more.
Looking to restore order after a rash of prison violence at the federal maximum-security lockup in Marion, Ill. —the facility that replaced the notor-ious Alcatraz prison in San Francisco Bay — officials in 1983 put the prisoners on indefinite lockdown.
California was among the first states to copy the concept, opening super-secure units in Corcoran in 1988 and Pelican Bay in 1989. The federal Supermax prison in Colorado was opened in November 1994. Nobody has escaped. "We just needed a more secure facility," said Tracy Billingsley, a spokeswoman for the Federal Bureau of Prisons. "We needed to bring together the most dangerous, that required the most intense supervision, to one location."
In his trial testimony, Aiken said the whole point of Supermax was not just punishment, but "incapacitation." There is no pretense that the prison is preparing the inmate for a return to society. Like the cellmate of the count of Monte Cristo who died an old, tired convict, Aiken said, "Moussaoui will deteriorate." The inmate "is constantly monitored 24 hours a day, seven days a week," he said. "He will never get lost in a crowd because he would never be in a crowd."
Christopher Boyce, a convicted spy who was incarcerated at Supermax, left the prison about 100 miles south of Denver with no regret. "You're slowly hung," he once told The Times. "You're ground down. You can barely keep your sanity." Bernard Kleinman, a New York lawyer who represented Yousef, called it "extraordinarily draconian punishment." Moussaoui might be a haousehold name today, "but 20 years from now, people will forget him," Kleinman said. "He will sit there all alone, and all forgotten."
Ron Kuby, another New York defense lawyer, has handled several East Coast "revolutionaries" who went on a killing spree, and a radical fundamentalist who killed a rabbi in 1990. All were brought to Supermax. He thought Aiken's description that prisoners rot inside its walls was too kind. "It's beyond rotting," he said. "Rotting at least implies a slow, gradual disintegration."
He said there were a lot of prisons where inmates rot, where the staff "plants you in front of your TV in your cell and you just grow there like a mushroom. But Supermax is worse," he said. "It's not just the hothouse for the mushrooms. It's designed in the end to break you down."
WHO SAYS WISCONSIN DOESN'T HAVE TIlE DEATH PENALTY?
by Mustafa-El Ajala,
On Psychological Death Row
Green Bay, WI. - Technically, Wisconsin doesn't have the death penalty. However, it does have a penal system with a prisoner mortality rate exceeding the execution rates of any state in the U.S. Only here it is the conditions of confinement that has led to suicide as the form of exacting that ultimate punishment.
A January 2006 report by Wisconsin Department of Corrections (DOC) mental health director Kevin Kallas and psychology director Don Hands has revealed that suicides are committed within WI. prisons at a rate nearly twice the national average. The nation averages 14 suicides per 100,000 prisoners, while WI. averages about 25 per 100,000. From 2001 - 2005 there were 28 suicides at the state’s prisons, averaging 7 suicides per year.
The latest death is that of prisoner John Virgin, a striving Brother of the incarcerated Islamic Community and a personal friend. We spoke and saw each other regularly; that is, until he was taken to the segregation unit of Green Bay Correctional Institution (GBCI), and placed in "the box" (the boxcar cells of the unit). John, just 25 years old, with only 15 months remaining on a 2 years sentence, reportedly hung himself on April 7, 2006.
In the box prisoners are isolated from the general population and subject to much harsher conditions: 23-24 hour cell confinement, limited communication, sleep deprivation (cells illuminated 24 hrs... a day), loss of property (t.v..., radio, books, etc.), no-contact visits, denial of food, clothing and running water, among other similarly atypical hardships.
In July 2000, while confined to WI’s Supermax Prison, I and co-plaintiff Emir Shabbaz (a.k.a. Michael Johnson) filed a class action law suit which resulted in the U.S. . District Court for the Western District of WI. finding that such conditions as these described in the box violates the 8th amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment when prisoners exper-iencing psychological problems, or with a history of them, are housed there. See Jones-El V. Berge, 164 F.Supp.2d 1096 (W.D. WI 2001).
In spite of the Jones-El decision, nearly 5 years later Kallas and Hands’ report show a steady increase from 2001-2005 of mentally ill prisoners being subject to the conditions of “the box”. In fact, officials report that they are placing prisoners with mental illnesses in these type of "segregated settings" at a rate twice that of other prisoners.
Quoting Kallas, “We recognize that being in a segregated setting can lead to more mental health issues." There is clearly no lack of awareness of the debilitating and lethal effects of WI. segregation units, and especially at GBCI.
In July 2001 mentally ill and epileptic prisoner Kelvin Brooks was placed in GBCI’s box and accused of violating the rules. As a result, he was placed on a food restriction known as "seg. loaf" (a medley of congealed food particles) which caused him to vomit, making it impossible to keep down his anti-seizure medication. On July 12, 2001, disturbing videotapes show Brooks buck naked in the cell (on "clothing restriction") and having full blown seizures repeatedly, which GBCI staff claimed he was faking to get his clothes back. He was already in rigor mortis when medical personnel did respond. On November 1, 2004, his family settled a wrongful death suit against the DOC for $600,000 dollars in the case of Brooks v. Bertrand, #01-C-1017.
Just last year GBCI s notorious "box" claimed the life of prisoner Jae Sumners on October 17, 2005, reportedly a suicide. Method of death? Hanging. Who says WI. doesn't have the death penalty?
While WI.'s seg. units make up only 10% of its 22,000 person prison system, more than 50% of its suicides occur there. Most of these occur at the state's 6 maximum security prisons where more than half of the state's seg. units are, in some cases making up 20%-25% of the prison.
GBCI is one such prison with approximately 20% of its available bed space comprised of seg. cells. It's operating capacity is for a population of 749 prisoners, but it houses 1088 at this writing. The cry of prison overcrowding and the need for more building, and thus more jobs, is echoed throughout the state by proponents of the prison industrial complex.
However, instead of building more general population units, the DOC has chosen to build more and more high-tech, expensive, and draconian control seg. units, and are using them in place of general population units. Once built, these units, as a matter of necessity, must be filled. Since WI. state prisons aren’t known for frequent homicides, rapes, and riots, as are some more notorious prisons, these units are being filled up mostly with prisoners who have committed only minor offenses (shoes untied, pants sagging, talking too loud, etc.), and the mentally ill. These are offenses a prisoner would hardly be placed in seg. for in most prisons.
Moreover, prisoners in WI. are doing more time in seg. for minor offenses. WI. prisoners once housed out-of-state (Minn., Texas, Tenn., Miss., Ok., Federal prisons) invariably report doing no more than 30-90 days in seg. for the type of offense. (fighting, use or possession of intoxicants, soliciting staff, etc.) that prisoners here often find themselves doing years in seg. for. Thus, it is no strange wonder that WI is leading in prison suicides. It's basic mathematics. If most suicides occur in seg. units and by the mentally ill, and WI. is keeping its mentally ill prisoner there at twice the rate of other prisoners, for minor offenses, and for longer periods of time, you're gonna predictably have more suicides there.
So, why was our brother John Virgin placed in "the box"? For having a pair of state issued pants that didn't have his name and prison # on them, and it cost him his life. You would think that with these type of offenses being the DOC's usual worries, as opposed to more serious offenses, the prison population would be rewarded with more privileges, better prison jobs and wages, a greater good-time program, etc. Instead the reward in WI. state prisons has been new control seg. units, a ban on cassettes tapes, on smoking, on most hip-hop magazines, a 30% wage cut, and the building of an unjustifiable Supermax prison, at a cost of over 44 million dollars, which now
has to be made into a general population -- what it should have been in the first place.
Consider, prior to November 1999, when Supermax Correctional Institution (SMCI -now called Wisconsin Secure Program Facility) opened, there were only an average of about 30 WI. prisoners on administrative confine-ment (as security threats), out of 20,000. Less than a year of SMCI being opened that number increased to over 300, a 1000 % increase. Impossible, but true. There were no unprecedented violent incidents in the prison system, so what was the justification? There was and is none. It was simply a part of the prison industry’s evolution into a self-serving machine and placing its profit interest over the state's penological interests and prisoner's well being. A case of “We shape our buildings, and afterwards our buildings shape us.” (Winston Churchill, addres-sing the House of Commons, Oct. 28, 1943).
Punishment for crime is supposed to be loss of liberty, not humanity, and not a
person's sanity. It is clear that this problem with WI.'s prisons has grown lethal, making it impossible for some prisoners to survive within the system and obviously not capable of surviving outside it. However, “The human question is not how many can possibly survive within the system, but what kind of existence is possible for those who do survive?” - Dune. For the proponents of the death penalty the message should be clear: Before worrying about instituting a ~ death penalty, try fixing the one you already have.
My prayers and condolences go out to John’s family, and each family of those slain here on WI.'s psychological death row. Can anybody out there hear me? WI. definitely has a death penalty, because they are literally killing us in here!
Mustafa-El is prisoner at GBCI, a prisoner legal aid, social activist, and freelance writer. For more information he may be contacted at:
Mustafa-El K.A. Ajala (F.K.A. Dennis E. Jones-El #223971
P.O. Box 19033
GBCI Green Bay, WI. 54307-9033
or
1633 N. Wisconsin Street
Racine, WI. 53402
1632 N. Wisconsin Ave. Racine, WI 53402
WI prison suicides are twice national average
By Anita Weier
April 3, 2006
The Capital Times
More than half of state prison suicides in Wisconsin occur in single-cell "segregated" units where inmates are kept apart from the general prison population, though only 10 percent of the beds in the 22,000-person system are segregated.
The suicide rate in segregation units is about 10 times that of general units, according to a recent Department of Corrections suicide prevention report.
Suicides in Wisconsin prisons average about twice the national number.
A January report by Dr. Kevin Kallas, a psychologist who became the state Department of Corrections' first mental health director three years ago, and Department of Corrections psychology director Don Hands, said that the annual suicide rate averages out to about 14 per 100,000 inmates nationally, while Wisconsin's is 25 per 100,000.
"In recent years, the Wisconsin Department of Corrections has averaged six suicides per year, about twice the national average," the report said.
In 2002, the Criminal Justice Institute Corrections Yearbook ranked Wisconsin 12th highest among the states for suicides as a percentage of total inmate deaths in prison, with suicides running at 10.6 percent.
There were 28 suicides in Wisconsin prisons from 2001 through 2005, three that occurred out-of-state when Wisconsin was sending prisoners elsewhere, and one in the Wisconsin Resource Center, which is managed by the Department of Health and Family Services.
Most occurred at night and most were by hanging. For prisoners in the state system under age 35, suicide was the most common cause of death.
State institutions with the most suicides in 2001-2005 were Waupun Correctional Institution, with five; Columbia Correctional Institution, three; Jackson Correctional Institution, three; Racine Correctional Institution, three and the Green Bay Correctional Institution, three.
Discipline problems: More suicides likely occur in segregated settings - such as solitary confinement - because mentally ill people are placed there at twice the rate of other inmates, Kallas said.
"It is nearly always a discipline issue. It varies by unit and institution," he said, adding that people with mental health problems tend to have more disciplin-ary problems and more difficulty obeying rules.
Factors that may increase the suicide rate in segregation, according to a Department of Corrections training document, also include distress over a conduct report or placement in segregation and fewer options for dealing with stress or bad news.
"The extent to which people have problems depends on the individual person and his emotional makeup. Some do better in segregation because they are not in conflict with other people or because they do better in a quiet atmosphere. It can go both ways," Kallas said.
"We recognize that being in a segregated setting can lead to more mental health issues. That is why it is good to do regular rounds."
Corrections officials say they are trying to prevent suicides with training and better communication.
Since November 2002, all new correctional officers have been given eight hours of suicide prevention training prior to the start of employment. And since 2003, new health care staff have been trained in suicide prevention.
A new curriculum is also being taught to other front-line staff, with all expected to be trained by the end of this year. Such training concentrates on identification of people who are suicide threats through awareness of symptoms and causes.
"This is a curriculum psychologists are presenting to front-line staff including correctional officers, health care workers, chaplains and social workers. Other states have found one of the most effective things they can do to prevent suicide is staff training teaching them how to recognize signs and clues," Kallas said.
Communication between divisions is another vital factor, Kallas said. Eighty to 90 percent of "adverse outcomes"
had to do with lack of communication between divisions, such as security, psychiatry and medical.
"We started multidisciplinary meetings once a week where we discuss anyone who has a mental health challenge," Kallas said.
Roadblocks: One difficulty blocking suicide prevention efforts is the fact that the department's administrative code only requires that clinical staff have to respond within two days after security personnel place an inmate in "clinical observation" status, in which an inmate is watched closely for suicide and other mental health issues.
Moreover, the two-day limit can stretch to five days over weekends and holidays. Officials would like to change that maximum response time to 24 hours.
However, correctional officers check those under clinical observation status every 15 minutes and their cells are visible from the officers' posts.
"We would like our psychologists to respond in 24 hours. In some institutions, they would be going in twice a weekend to do inmate interviews. Our psychologists don't get paid at nearly the rate of other professions for on-call work. Nurses get four hours of pay for carrying a beeper, while psychologists get one hour of pay," Kallas said.
Psychologists have resisted more weekend work, Kallas told a committee on adult and youth inmate deaths.
"To keep our staff, we will attempt to get better compensation for being on call. We've identified that as something we want to improve," Kallas said.
Any changes related to compensation would have to be bargained with union representatives, and negotiations are going on now, he added.
He noted that the prisons' clinical staff works well under difficult circum-stances.
"But there is a reluctance to take an exponential increase, coming in on every non-working day on call. Nobody said, 'I'm not going to do it.' But they suggested that if it adds more difficulty to the job, 'I will look elsewhere.' "
I would also like to mention that I have been getting some personal mail from inmates who read PAC, in regards to what is the difference between my Ex Post Facto Federal Law Suit against the WDOC, and what PAC is proposing to do in court on behalf of all WDOC old law inmates. My lawsuit is personally tailored to me and my own particular circumstances and situation. That is why my Complaint covered 7 issues. Most of my issues don't directly involve "all" old law inmates. It's primarily the Ex Post Facto Clause issue that we share in common. If I can win my case against the WDOC, then the PAC class action lawsuit on behalf of ALL old law inmates can cite the court's decision in my case to buttress their case. I want to say to all the WDOC old law inmates, that I highly recommend you all throw your support behind PAC and their efforts to bring this Ex Post Facto Clause issue before the court on behalf of ALL WDOC old law inmates. Don't just sit on the fence and take that "wait and see" attitude. The PAC class action lawsuit that they are working hard at preparing to file is an appropriate venue for all WDOC old law inmates to get behind and actively support.
Well this is about THE BIG PICTURE at this time. I pray the blessings of 3John2 for all of my (both old and new law) fellow inmates.
Peace,
Terrance J. Shaw
*********************************************************
Whatever little we have gained we have gained by agitation, while we
have uniformly lost by moderation. - Daniel O'Connell, 1824
*********
He who allows oppression, shares the crime. --
Erasmus Darwin
Old Law Update May, 2006
After reading many letters from various individuals it has become essential for me to address some issues as they relate to the Old Law litigation. We hear your voices and the call for justice related to new policies and practices of the Program Review Committee (PRC). We also hear your cry against the injustice in which those who are denied placement in treatment programs cannot be considered for parole and work release.
I must reiterate as stated in the March issue of the New Abolitionist, while these issues are valid, members of the research committee all agree, that raising the PRC issue in this context would be a very serious distraction to the Ex Post Facto argument.
We must remember that a law need not be retroactive on its face to engage the ex post facto prohibition. It is the effect, and not the form of the law that determines whether or not the law has been applied ex post facto. The critical question is, whether inmates can prove that they have been substantially disadvantaged by the new law.
To satisfy this test, Old Law prisoners whether serving a life term or not must show that these new parole guidelines create a high hurdle to the exercise of discretion, and therefore exposed them to a substantial risk in their opportunity to be paroled.
Thanks to Mr. Norman Pepin, we have obtained charts which show sentence length and reincarceration rates; inmate releases 1980-1993 (excluding lifers); average sentence length, by year of release (excluding lifers); average sentence and time served for serious offenses from 1980-1993 releases; average percentage of sentence served, by year release (excluding lifers); average years served, by year of release 1980-93 (excluding lifers); effect of prior felony conviction on time served-releases 1980-93 (excluding lifers); and life sentence released, 1980-1993.
Mr. Pepin has also provided us with the January 1982 Overview of release experiences of Lifers in Wisconsin Institutions during 1967-81 compiled by the Department of Health and Social Services Wisconsin Parole Board, Fred W. Hinickle, Chairman. Like the parolability range provided us by Mr. McMillian these materials are essential to the litigation. We continue to seek
documents that will bolster our case. If you have any parole documents that suggest a change has taken place, send them to PAC.
The proper standard for determining whether or not any expression of state power, be it law, regulation or a parole practice, violates the ex post facto prohibition must consider two components. First, the law, regulation or practice must have been applied retroactively. Second, the law, regulation or practice must create a “sufficient risk” of increasing the punishment attached to the crime.
For your information, there is one person working for liberation on a full-time scale without any pay, and the vast majority of the cost for the newsletters comes out his pocket. He is not a selfish person who sits in society and does nothing to help his fellow men and women. He has never been imprisoned, but cares about the many of you inside who have no one who cares. Many family members have abandoned their incarcerated loved one. He has not given up despite the cost and difficulty of the task. Many inside sit back and spend their money on tennis shoes and other items; they should think about donating a few dollars to the cause every so often.
They can also ask family members and friends to volunteer and arrange speaking engagements so an “old law” speaker can educate the public about our cause. The more of us involved and the more family members the better our chances of getting support.
A storm is brewing in Ohio. A litigation just as the one we seek to file is before the courts in the summary judgment stage, and being argued by inmates with assistance from family members and friends. If you want to check it out please look for Michael, et al., v. Ghee, et al., Case No. 3:01CV7436. In the United states District Court for the Northern District of Ohio Western District.
Liberation Now! Liberation Forever!
research committee
At press time, there were over 300 prisoners signed onto the old law class. Some have written to ask if they have been added. To avoid confusion, on the reverse of this page, please find a form that will help the organizers analyze the class. PAC cannot answer legal questions. We will forward inquiries to the research committee. PAC
Old Law Class Action Suit
Prisoner information form
Many of you have already signed onto the class action suit, but we would like to have a more formal information sheet for all plaintiffs, and use some of the information requested to better form our argument to the court. Thank you, old law litigators.
Date_________________
PERSONAL INFORMATION
Name___________________________________DOC #______________
Current institution__________________________________________
Address____________________________________________________
City_______________________________________, WI Zip__________
SENTENCE
Date of conviction_____________County________________Case #__________________
MR - PMR (circle one) Date_______________Parole eligibility date___________
1st Parole hearing date_________________ recommendation_______________________
reason for defer/action taken by PRC __________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
2nd Parole hearing date_________________recommendation_______________________
reason for defer/action taken by PRC __________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________________
List other hearing/defers/actions on separate sheet of paper
SPECIAL NOTES
Please add as much information as you have about the following:
1. Approximate length of sentences of others convicted of a similar crime at the time of your conviction (this is to establish what your judge may have considered “enough” punishment when sentencing you).
2. Aside from program needs, what other changes have occured in extending the length of your sentence (how has the DOC/parole board changed its criterion for REAL parole consideration) ?
3. Have you initiated any litigation regarding parole? Please include your case # and disposition of the case.
4. Make copies of this form and give them to other prisoners similarly situated.
5. If you want confirmation that we have received this form, please enclose a SASE or a 39¢ stamp.
6. Get your family involved. Ask them to send PAC a donation.
********************************************************************************************************************
Dear Prisoners Action Coalition,
Enclosed is a donation of $_________ to be used in the effort to find justice for prisoners sentenced prior to Jan 1, 2000. These prisoners suffer under new political realities that were not in place when they were convicted. These new realities manifest themselves in lengthy defers and unreasonable hurdles in gaining parole. I want you to use my contribution to help with research costs, printing and mailing of updates, and in the search for legal representation.
Thank you,
_________________________________________________________date_______________________
The Slow Rot at Supermax
By Richard A. Serrano, LA Times
At Moussaoui's future home in Florence, Colo., inmates are reportedly not merely punished, but incapacitated and broken down.
Halfway through the trial, prison expert James E. Aiken looked straight at jurors and told them what Zacarias Moussaoui could expect if they sent him away for the rest of his life. "I have seen them rot," he said. "They rot." Aiken was describing what happens to the nation's highest-risk prisoners after they settle in at the federal government's maximum-security prison in Florence, Colo., known as Supermax.
Moussaoui was formally sentenced Thursday to life in prison after a federal jury rejected a death sentence for the admitted Sept. 11 conspirator. Officials at the Federal Bureau of Prisons said that Moussaoui was destined for the facility high in the Colorado Rockies.
Already there is a veritable "bombers' row" — Ramzi Ahmed Yousef, master-mind of the 1993 World Trade Center blast; Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski; Terry L. Nichols, an accomplice in the Oklahoma City bombing; Richard Reid, the so-called shoe bomber who Moussaoui testified was to join him in another Al Qaeda hijacking; and Eric Rudolph, who bombed abortion clinics and the Atlanta Olympics.
All, like Moussaoui, are serving life without parole — spending their days in prison wings that are partly under-ground. They exist alone in soundproof cells as small as 7 feet by 12 feet, with a concrete-poured desk, bed and stool, a small shower and sink, and a TV that offers religious and anger-management programs. They are locked down 23 hours a day.
Larry Homenick, a former U.S. marshal who has taken prisoners to Supermax, said that there was a small triangular recreation area, known as "the dog run," where solitary Supermax prisoners could occasionally get a glimpse of sky. He said it was chilling to walk down the cellblocks and glance through the plexiglass "sally port" chambers into the cells and see the faces inside.
Life there is harsh. Food is delivered through a slit in the cell door. Prisoners don't leave their cells to see a lawyer, a doctor or a prison official; those visitors must go to the cell. But prisoners can earn extra privileges, like a wider variety of television off-erings, more exercise time and visit-ation rights, based on their behavior.
There are 1,400 remote-controlled steel doors. Motion detectors and hidden cameras monitor every move. The prison walls and razor-wired grounds are patrolled by laser beams and dogs. The facility is filling up. Four hundred inmates are there now. There is room for 90 more.
Looking to restore order after a rash of prison violence at the federal maximum-security lockup in Marion, Ill. —the facility that replaced the notor-ious Alcatraz prison in San Francisco Bay — officials in 1983 put the prisoners on indefinite lockdown.
California was among the first states to copy the concept, opening super-secure units in Corcoran in 1988 and Pelican Bay in 1989. The federal Supermax prison in Colorado was opened in November 1994. Nobody has escaped. "We just needed a more secure facility," said Tracy Billingsley, a spokeswoman for the Federal Bureau of Prisons. "We needed to bring together the most dangerous, that required the most intense supervision, to one location."
In his trial testimony, Aiken said the whole point of Supermax was not just punishment, but "incapacitation." There is no pretense that the prison is preparing the inmate for a return to society. Like the cellmate of the count of Monte Cristo who died an old, tired convict, Aiken said, "Moussaoui will deteriorate." The inmate "is constantly monitored 24 hours a day, seven days a week," he said. "He will never get lost in a crowd because he would never be in a crowd."
Christopher Boyce, a convicted spy who was incarcerated at Supermax, left the prison about 100 miles south of Denver with no regret. "You're slowly hung," he once told The Times. "You're ground down. You can barely keep your sanity." Bernard Kleinman, a New York lawyer who represented Yousef, called it "extraordinarily draconian punishment." Moussaoui might be a haousehold name today, "but 20 years from now, people will forget him," Kleinman said. "He will sit there all alone, and all forgotten."
Ron Kuby, another New York defense lawyer, has handled several East Coast "revolutionaries" who went on a killing spree, and a radical fundamentalist who killed a rabbi in 1990. All were brought to Supermax. He thought Aiken's description that prisoners rot inside its walls was too kind. "It's beyond rotting," he said. "Rotting at least implies a slow, gradual disintegration."
He said there were a lot of prisons where inmates rot, where the staff "plants you in front of your TV in your cell and you just grow there like a mushroom. But Supermax is worse," he said. "It's not just the hothouse for the mushrooms. It's designed in the end to break you down."
WHO SAYS WISCONSIN DOESN'T HAVE TIlE DEATH PENALTY?
by Mustafa-El Ajala,
On Psychological Death Row
Green Bay, WI. - Technically, Wisconsin doesn't have the death penalty. However, it does have a penal system with a prisoner mortality rate exceeding the execution rates of any state in the U.S. Only here it is the conditions of confinement that has led to suicide as the form of exacting that ultimate punishment.
A January 2006 report by Wisconsin Department of Corrections (DOC) mental health director Kevin Kallas and psychology director Don Hands has revealed that suicides are committed within WI. prisons at a rate nearly twice the national average. The nation averages 14 suicides per 100,000 prisoners, while WI. averages about 25 per 100,000. From 2001 - 2005 there were 28 suicides at the state’s prisons, averaging 7 suicides per year.
The latest death is that of prisoner John Virgin, a striving Brother of the incarcerated Islamic Community and a personal friend. We spoke and saw each other regularly; that is, until he was taken to the segregation unit of Green Bay Correctional Institution (GBCI), and placed in "the box" (the boxcar cells of the unit). John, just 25 years old, with only 15 months remaining on a 2 years sentence, reportedly hung himself on April 7, 2006.
In the box prisoners are isolated from the general population and subject to much harsher conditions: 23-24 hour cell confinement, limited communication, sleep deprivation (cells illuminated 24 hrs... a day), loss of property (t.v..., radio, books, etc.), no-contact visits, denial of food, clothing and running water, among other similarly atypical hardships.
In July 2000, while confined to WI’s Supermax Prison, I and co-plaintiff Emir Shabbaz (a.k.a. Michael Johnson) filed a class action law suit which resulted in the U.S. . District Court for the Western District of WI. finding that such conditions as these described in the box violates the 8th amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment when prisoners exper-iencing psychological problems, or with a history of them, are housed there. See Jones-El V. Berge, 164 F.Supp.2d 1096 (W.D. WI 2001).
In spite of the Jones-El decision, nearly 5 years later Kallas and Hands’ report show a steady increase from 2001-2005 of mentally ill prisoners being subject to the conditions of “the box”. In fact, officials report that they are placing prisoners with mental illnesses in these type of "segregated settings" at a rate twice that of other prisoners.
Quoting Kallas, “We recognize that being in a segregated setting can lead to more mental health issues." There is clearly no lack of awareness of the debilitating and lethal effects of WI. segregation units, and especially at GBCI.
In July 2001 mentally ill and epileptic prisoner Kelvin Brooks was placed in GBCI’s box and accused of violating the rules. As a result, he was placed on a food restriction known as "seg. loaf" (a medley of congealed food particles) which caused him to vomit, making it impossible to keep down his anti-seizure medication. On July 12, 2001, disturbing videotapes show Brooks buck naked in the cell (on "clothing restriction") and having full blown seizures repeatedly, which GBCI staff claimed he was faking to get his clothes back. He was already in rigor mortis when medical personnel did respond. On November 1, 2004, his family settled a wrongful death suit against the DOC for $600,000 dollars in the case of Brooks v. Bertrand, #01-C-1017.
Just last year GBCI s notorious "box" claimed the life of prisoner Jae Sumners on October 17, 2005, reportedly a suicide. Method of death? Hanging. Who says WI. doesn't have the death penalty?
While WI.'s seg. units make up only 10% of its 22,000 person prison system, more than 50% of its suicides occur there. Most of these occur at the state's 6 maximum security prisons where more than half of the state's seg. units are, in some cases making up 20%-25% of the prison.
GBCI is one such prison with approximately 20% of its available bed space comprised of seg. cells. It's operating capacity is for a population of 749 prisoners, but it houses 1088 at this writing. The cry of prison overcrowding and the need for more building, and thus more jobs, is echoed throughout the state by proponents of the prison industrial complex.
However, instead of building more general population units, the DOC has chosen to build more and more high-tech, expensive, and draconian control seg. units, and are using them in place of general population units. Once built, these units, as a matter of necessity, must be filled. Since WI. state prisons aren’t known for frequent homicides, rapes, and riots, as are some more notorious prisons, these units are being filled up mostly with prisoners who have committed only minor offenses (shoes untied, pants sagging, talking too loud, etc.), and the mentally ill. These are offenses a prisoner would hardly be placed in seg. for in most prisons.
Moreover, prisoners in WI. are doing more time in seg. for minor offenses. WI. prisoners once housed out-of-state (Minn., Texas, Tenn., Miss., Ok., Federal prisons) invariably report doing no more than 30-90 days in seg. for the type of offense. (fighting, use or possession of intoxicants, soliciting staff, etc.) that prisoners here often find themselves doing years in seg. for. Thus, it is no strange wonder that WI is leading in prison suicides. It's basic mathematics. If most suicides occur in seg. units and by the mentally ill, and WI. is keeping its mentally ill prisoner there at twice the rate of other prisoners, for minor offenses, and for longer periods of time, you're gonna predictably have more suicides there.
So, why was our brother John Virgin placed in "the box"? For having a pair of state issued pants that didn't have his name and prison # on them, and it cost him his life. You would think that with these type of offenses being the DOC's usual worries, as opposed to more serious offenses, the prison population would be rewarded with more privileges, better prison jobs and wages, a greater good-time program, etc. Instead the reward in WI. state prisons has been new control seg. units, a ban on cassettes tapes, on smoking, on most hip-hop magazines, a 30% wage cut, and the building of an unjustifiable Supermax prison, at a cost of over 44 million dollars, which now
has to be made into a general population -- what it should have been in the first place.
Consider, prior to November 1999, when Supermax Correctional Institution (SMCI -now called Wisconsin Secure Program Facility) opened, there were only an average of about 30 WI. prisoners on administrative confine-ment (as security threats), out of 20,000. Less than a year of SMCI being opened that number increased to over 300, a 1000 % increase. Impossible, but true. There were no unprecedented violent incidents in the prison system, so what was the justification? There was and is none. It was simply a part of the prison industry’s evolution into a self-serving machine and placing its profit interest over the state's penological interests and prisoner's well being. A case of “We shape our buildings, and afterwards our buildings shape us.” (Winston Churchill, addres-sing the House of Commons, Oct. 28, 1943).
Punishment for crime is supposed to be loss of liberty, not humanity, and not a
person's sanity. It is clear that this problem with WI.'s prisons has grown lethal, making it impossible for some prisoners to survive within the system and obviously not capable of surviving outside it. However, “The human question is not how many can possibly survive within the system, but what kind of existence is possible for those who do survive?” - Dune. For the proponents of the death penalty the message should be clear: Before worrying about instituting a ~ death penalty, try fixing the one you already have.
My prayers and condolences go out to John’s family, and each family of those slain here on WI.'s psychological death row. Can anybody out there hear me? WI. definitely has a death penalty, because they are literally killing us in here!
Mustafa-El is prisoner at GBCI, a prisoner legal aid, social activist, and freelance writer. For more information he may be contacted at:
Mustafa-El K.A. Ajala (F.K.A. Dennis E. Jones-El #223971
P.O. Box 19033
GBCI Green Bay, WI. 54307-9033
or
1633 N. Wisconsin Street
Racine, WI. 53402
1632 N. Wisconsin Ave. Racine, WI 53402
WI prison suicides are twice national average
By Anita Weier
April 3, 2006
The Capital Times
More than half of state prison suicides in Wisconsin occur in single-cell "segregated" units where inmates are kept apart from the general prison population, though only 10 percent of the beds in the 22,000-person system are segregated.
The suicide rate in segregation units is about 10 times that of general units, according to a recent Department of Corrections suicide prevention report.
Suicides in Wisconsin prisons average about twice the national number.
A January report by Dr. Kevin Kallas, a psychologist who became the state Department of Corrections' first mental health director three years ago, and Department of Corrections psychology director Don Hands, said that the annual suicide rate averages out to about 14 per 100,000 inmates nationally, while Wisconsin's is 25 per 100,000.
"In recent years, the Wisconsin Department of Corrections has averaged six suicides per year, about twice the national average," the report said.
In 2002, the Criminal Justice Institute Corrections Yearbook ranked Wisconsin 12th highest among the states for suicides as a percentage of total inmate deaths in prison, with suicides running at 10.6 percent.
There were 28 suicides in Wisconsin prisons from 2001 through 2005, three that occurred out-of-state when Wisconsin was sending prisoners elsewhere, and one in the Wisconsin Resource Center, which is managed by the Department of Health and Family Services.
Most occurred at night and most were by hanging. For prisoners in the state system under age 35, suicide was the most common cause of death.
State institutions with the most suicides in 2001-2005 were Waupun Correctional Institution, with five; Columbia Correctional Institution, three; Jackson Correctional Institution, three; Racine Correctional Institution, three and the Green Bay Correctional Institution, three.
Discipline problems: More suicides likely occur in segregated settings - such as solitary confinement - because mentally ill people are placed there at twice the rate of other inmates, Kallas said.
"It is nearly always a discipline issue. It varies by unit and institution," he said, adding that people with mental health problems tend to have more disciplin-ary problems and more difficulty obeying rules.
Factors that may increase the suicide rate in segregation, according to a Department of Corrections training document, also include distress over a conduct report or placement in segregation and fewer options for dealing with stress or bad news.
"The extent to which people have problems depends on the individual person and his emotional makeup. Some do better in segregation because they are not in conflict with other people or because they do better in a quiet atmosphere. It can go both ways," Kallas said.
"We recognize that being in a segregated setting can lead to more mental health issues. That is why it is good to do regular rounds."
Corrections officials say they are trying to prevent suicides with training and better communication.
Since November 2002, all new correctional officers have been given eight hours of suicide prevention training prior to the start of employment. And since 2003, new health care staff have been trained in suicide prevention.
A new curriculum is also being taught to other front-line staff, with all expected to be trained by the end of this year. Such training concentrates on identification of people who are suicide threats through awareness of symptoms and causes.
"This is a curriculum psychologists are presenting to front-line staff including correctional officers, health care workers, chaplains and social workers. Other states have found one of the most effective things they can do to prevent suicide is staff training teaching them how to recognize signs and clues," Kallas said.
Communication between divisions is another vital factor, Kallas said. Eighty to 90 percent of "adverse outcomes"
had to do with lack of communication between divisions, such as security, psychiatry and medical.
"We started multidisciplinary meetings once a week where we discuss anyone who has a mental health challenge," Kallas said.
Roadblocks: One difficulty blocking suicide prevention efforts is the fact that the department's administrative code only requires that clinical staff have to respond within two days after security personnel place an inmate in "clinical observation" status, in which an inmate is watched closely for suicide and other mental health issues.
Moreover, the two-day limit can stretch to five days over weekends and holidays. Officials would like to change that maximum response time to 24 hours.
However, correctional officers check those under clinical observation status every 15 minutes and their cells are visible from the officers' posts.
"We would like our psychologists to respond in 24 hours. In some institutions, they would be going in twice a weekend to do inmate interviews. Our psychologists don't get paid at nearly the rate of other professions for on-call work. Nurses get four hours of pay for carrying a beeper, while psychologists get one hour of pay," Kallas said.
Psychologists have resisted more weekend work, Kallas told a committee on adult and youth inmate deaths.
"To keep our staff, we will attempt to get better compensation for being on call. We've identified that as something we want to improve," Kallas said.
Any changes related to compensation would have to be bargained with union representatives, and negotiations are going on now, he added.
He noted that the prisons' clinical staff works well under difficult circum-stances.
"But there is a reluctance to take an exponential increase, coming in on every non-working day on call. Nobody said, 'I'm not going to do it.' But they suggested that if it adds more difficulty to the job, 'I will look elsewhere.' "
posted by F. at 5:14 AM
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