Two Nobel Peace Prize laureates are calling for all charges to be dropped against eight former Black Panthers

http://freethesf8.org/international_call_SF8.html
Friday, November 30, 2007, 11 am

At a press conference held at the Interfaith Church Center, World Council of Churches representative Lois M. Dauway officially released the International Call on the San Francisco Eight, a document drafted to bring the attention and the solidarity of the global peace and human rights community to the case. The Call, currently signed by three Nobel Peace laureates and two activists in leadership positions with Nobel peace prize winning organizations, is based on internationally recognized principles of prisoner rights, human rights, and against all forms of torture. Dauway, a senior executive of the Women's Division of the United Methodist Church, stated: "The time has come to set free those who have been bound. The case of the SF8 requires all of us to come together, and take an active stand for justice for all U.S. political prisoners."

In addition to Nobel peace related and church organizations, the International Call will bring world-wide and key regional associations into direct contact with the Committee in Defense of Human Rights, and other groups working on behalf of the SF8. Intended also as a tool for local activists within the U.S. to help reach out to local religious and community based organizations, the Call will eventually be used to put pressure on both federal and local California authorities to see that justice is done for all members of the Eight, and all who have suffered torture at the hands of the U.S. criminal justice system. Call organizer and War Resisters International activist Matt Meyer reported that interest in the Call has already been generated amongst the founders of the Nobel Women's Initiative, in academic circles, and in key constituencies across three continents. "We have a great opportunity," he noted, "and a great responsibility to bring news of this case far beyond our usual circles, until justice is finally done."

The full text and current signers of the International Call is attached and below.

International Call on the San Francisco 8
Given our commitment to and history in the global justice and human rights movements,

Given our commitment to reconciliation between peoples and governments,

Given that the U.S. government and Federal Bureau of Investigation has been shown, through past U.S. Congressional hearings and legal proceedings, to have been involved in illegal policing activities against civil and human rights organizations;

Given that these illegal activities, epitomized by the FBI Counter Intelligence Programs (COINTELPRO), targeted the Black Panther Party, and appears to have an ongoing presence;

Given that eight former Black Panthers--men now all in their fifties, sixties, and seventies-were arrested on January 23, 2007;

Given that these arrests were based on charges related to a 1971 murder, a murder investigated and brought to court in 1975 with the charges dismissed;

Given that no new evidence has been uncovered, and that the alleged evidence in the 1973 investigation was thrown out of court due to a judicial finding that statements were made under conditions of extreme torture, including: electric shock, cattle prods, beatings, sensory deprivation, plastic bags and hot, wet blankets for asphyxiation; and

Given that these new charges amount to little more than continued governmental harassment, violating basic principles set forth in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the United Nations Convention against Torture;

We call on all appropriate legal and governmental authorities to:

• Investigate and end all incidents of torture within the U.S. criminal justice system;
• Drop all current charges for all eight men in question, namely: Herman Bell, Ray Boudreaux, Richard Brown, Henry W. (Hank) Jones, Jalil Muntaqim (Anthony Bottom), Richard O'Neal, Harold Taylor, and Francisco Torres;
• Convene official investigations into the ongoing legacy and possible continued operation of COINTELPRO and similar programs, with an eye towards true reconciliation and human rights based on internationally recognized standards and principles; and
• Release immediately, on humanitarian grounds, Herman Bell and Jalil Muntaqim (Anthony Bottom)-each of whom has served over thirty years of disproportionately long sentences based on the COINTELPRO criminalization of the Black Panther Party and the U.S. civil rights movement.

The Most Reverend Dr. Desmond Mpilo Tutu, Archbishop Emeritus of Cape Town, Primate of the Church of the Province of Southern Africa; Nobel Peace Laureate 1984

Mairead Corrigan Maguire, Community of Peace People, Northern Ireland; Nobel Peace Laureate 1976

Betty Williams, Community of Peace People, Northern Ireland; Nobel Peace Laureate 1976

Darryl Jordan, Director-American Friends Service Committee* Third World Coalition (Nobel Peace Laureate 1947)

William Wardlaw, Executive Director's Leadership Council, Amnesty International* (Nobel Peace Laureate 1977)


* Organizations listed for identification purposes only

For more information on the International Call, contact: Matt Meyer, War Resisters International, 339 Lafayette Street, NY 10012 USA mmmsrnb@igc.org; and the Committee for the Defense of Human Rights, www.freethesf8.org

Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110

415 863-9977

www.Freedomarchives.org Questions and comments may be sent to claude@freedomarchives.org

Daniel McGowan on the Legacy of the Black Panther Party

http://supportdaniel.org/blog/
friendsofdanielmcg@yahoo.com

The legacy of the Black Panther Party

by Daniel on November 9th, 2007

On November 30th, there will be an event in New York City celebrating
 the legacy of the Black Panther Party and in support of the San 
Francisco 8. We will be co-sponsoring the event along with the 
Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, NYC Anarchist Black Cross, SEIU Local 
1199, The Jericho Movement, Campaign to End the Death Penalty, the 
Free Mumia coalition, and more local political prisoner 
organizations. If you are in the NYC area, it’s important you
attend  this event and show your solidarity with the 8 former Black
Panthers.  Let me back up and give some perspective on who these men
are.

The San Francisco 8 are former, original Black Panthers, and 
sympathetic community activists ranging from 56 to 72. Three men were
 arrested on January 23, 2006 on charges related to the killing of a
 cop in San Francisco in 1971. The original three were indicted on 
these charges in the early 70’s and the charges were dropped, 
because torture was used to extract confessions. I’ll repeat that 
— and mind you, I’m not using rhetoric: they were tortured in
ways  analogous to the torture committed by the U.S. abroad, in the
so- called “War on Terror.” Six of the defendants, due to intense
 legal advocacy and community support, are now out on bail awaiting 
trial– set to start, I believe in the Spring. Two of the defendants
 are ineligible for bail, as they have been serving a NY state 
sentence for over 30 years on similar charges. (Some speculate that 
these men, Jalil Muntaquim and Herman Bell of the NY3 were included 
in this indictment to destroy their chances of their getting parole 
in NY state. Parole was a hope given a new governor and perhaps, a 
parole board would grant parole).

As I said, the charges were thrown out due to torture by 
investigators– a detailed account of which is presented in the 
informative documentary Legacy of Torture (available from the Freedom
 Archives) including cattle prods used on genitals, beatings, sleep 
deprivation, being taped to chairs and simulated drownings, aka 
waterboarding. This is the process Attorney General nominee Michael 
Mukasy will not condemn in which plastic is pulled over someone’s 
face and water is poured producing the terror associated with 
drowning. Sometime in 2002, interest was reignited in the case 
(perhaps after former Attorney General Ashcroft’s statement about 
cleaning up old political cases) and some of the men received grand 
jury subpoenas which they resisted and were subsequently jailed for 
months.

At that point, supporters of the grand-juried men and animal 
liberation activists facing their own federal grand jury joined 
forces and held large rallies against the grand jury. The website 
fbiwitchhunt.com was started and reported on resistance to the grand 
juries nationwide. This collaboration was exciting and gave me great 
hope. It was a multi-generational, cross-movement display of 
solidarity and opened each group to each other’s perspectives.

That dynamic, of older and younger generations from the Black
Panther/ anti-Vietnam war and people’s movements of the 60s/70s and
the  younger, anarchistic and eco/animal liberationists mixing and 
providing mutual aid to each other captivated me. It also reflected 
work I had been engaged on in NYC with the Jeff Luers freedom 
campaign working with the Jericho Movement and former political 
prisoners. (In fact, I wrote about these ideas in the 2008 Freedom 
for Political Prisoners Calendar, which I highly recommend you get a 
copy of). My goal then was two-fold:

1)To help secure the release of political prisoners of previous 
generations by infusing their freedom campaigns with what we have to 
offer: youthful energy, online tactics and organizing, fundraising, 
and exposing their cases to a new generation of punks, anarchists, 
and anti-globalization activists.

2)To learn from older activists– about their experience, access to 
their lessons and to increase the legitimacy of our prisoners in the 
broader PP/POW support community.

Many have been working on these efforts and I hope they bear fruit. 
In NYC, there are good signs including a new NYC Anarchist Black 
Cross focusing on supporting Green Scare political prisoners and 
political prisoners from the Black liberation movement. There has 
been a greater coordination on the part of PP groups in the NYC area,
 leading to this SF8 event on November 30th.

So, if you are against torture, vindictive prosecutions trying to 
destroy the legacy of the Black Panthers and think that the Green 
Scare is COINTELPRO-lite, this is an event you should come to. Some 
of the defendants will be there as will their lawyer Soffiyah Elijah,
 and performers. It’s 7pm, on November 30th at the Martin Luther 
king, Jr. Labor Center, 310 West 43rd Street (between 8th and 9th 
Avenues).

I’ve used the name “SF8″, but these are real people we are 
talking about. They are:

1)Herman Bell
2)John Bowman*
3)Richard Brown
4)Henry W. (Hank) Jones
5)Jalil Muntaquim
6)Richard O’Neal
7)Harold Taylor
8)Francisco Torres

*John Bowman died of terminal cancer on December 23, 2006 after being
 imprisoned for refusing to talk to a grand jury.

For more information:

Regarding the N30 event: NYC Jericho Post Office Box 1272 New York, 
New York 10013 nycjericho@riseup.net
CDHR: Post Office Box 90221 Pasadena, California 91109 freethesf8.org
 415.226.1120 freethesf8@riseup.net
Freedom Archives: 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, California 94410
 415.863.9977 info@freedomarchives.org 

Democrats line up with Bush on torture

AMY GOODMAN
SYNDICATED COLUMNIST

Every Saturday, the president of the United States gives a radio address to the nation. It is followed by the Democratic response, usually given by a senator or representative. This past Saturday, the Democrats chose retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez to give their response, the same general named in at least three lawsuits in the U.S. and Europe for authorizing torture and cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment of prisoners in Iraq. That, combined with the Democrats' endorsement of Attorney General Michael Mukasey despite his unwillingness to label waterboarding as torture, indicates that the Democrats are increasingly aligned with President Bush's torture policies.

Sanchez headed the U.S. Army's operations in Iraq from June 2003 to June 2004. In September 2003, Sanchez issued a memo authorizing numerous techniques, from "stress positions" to the use of "military working dogs" to exploit "Arab fear of dogs" during interrogations. He was in charge when the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison occurred.

Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, who headed Abu Ghraib at the time, worked under Sanchez. She was demoted to colonel, the only military officer to be punished. She told me about another illegal practice, holding prisoners as so-called ghost detainees: "We were directed on several occasions through Gen. Fast or Gen. Sanchez. The instructions were originating at the Pentagon from Secretary Rumsfeld, and we were instructed to hold prisoners without assigning a prisoner number or putting them on the database, and that is contrary to the Geneva Conventions. We all knew it was contrary to the Geneva Conventions." In addition to keeping prisoners off the database, she described other abuses, such as prison temperatures reaching 120 to 140 degrees, dehydration and the order from Gen. Geoffrey Miller to treat prisoners "like dogs."

And it's not just about treatment of prisoners. In 2006, Karpinski testified at a mock trial, called the Bush Crimes Commission. She revealed that several female U.S. soldiers had died of dehydration by denying themselves water. They were afraid to go to the latrine at night to urinate, for fear of being raped by fellow soldiers: "Because the women, in fear of getting up in the hours of darkness to go out to the portolets or the latrines, were not drinking liquids after 3 or 4 in the afternoon. And in 120-degree heat or warmer, because there was no air conditioning at most of the facilities, they were dying from dehydration in their sleep. What (Sanchez's deputy commanding general, Walter Wojdakowski) told the surgeon to do was, 'Don't brief those details anymore. And don't say specifically that they're women. You can provide that in a written report, but don't brief it in the open anymore.' " Karpinski said Sanchez was at that briefing.

Former military interrogator Tony Lagouranis, author of "Fear Up Harsh," described the use of dogs: "We were using dogs in the Mosul detention facility, which was at the Mosul airport. We would put the prisoner in a shipping container. We would keep him up all night with music and strobe lights, stress positions, and then we would bring in dogs. The prisoner was blindfolded, so he didn't really understand what was going on, but we had the dog controlled. The dog would be barking and jumping on the prisoner, and the prisoner wouldn't really understand what was going on."

Reed Brody, of Human Rights Watch, elaborated on Sanchez: "For those three months of mayhem that were occurring right under his nose, he never stepped in. And, also, he misled Congress about it. He was asked twice at a congressional hearing whether he ever approved the use of guard dogs. This was before the memo came out. And both times he said he never approved it. (W)e finally got the actual memo, in which he approves 'exploiting Arab fear of dogs.' " Brody dismissed the military report clearing Sanchez of any wrongdoing: "It's just not credible for the Army to keep investigating itself and keep finding itself innocent."

This is not about politics. This is about the moral compass of the nation. The Democrats may be celebrating a retired general who has turned on his commander in chief. But the public should take pause.

The Democrats had a chance to draw a line in the sand, to absolutely require Mukasey to denounce waterboarding before his elevation to attorney general. Now they have chosen as their spokesman a discredited general, linked to the most egregious abuses in Iraq. The Bush administration passed Sanchez over for a promotion, worried about reliving the Abu Ghraib scandal during the 2006 election year. Now it's the Democrats who have resuscitated him. Have they no shame?

Amy Goodman is the host of "Democracy Now!," a daily international TV/radio news hour.

Global Write-A-Thon for Leonard Peltier, a Message from the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee

Save the Date: December 1st-10th, 2007
December 10th is International Human Rights Day.

The date was chosen to honor the United Nations General Assembly's adoption
and proclamation, on 10 December 1948, of the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights, the first global enunciation of human rights.
(See:  <http://users.skynet.be/kola/udhr.htm>
http://users.skynet.be/kola/udhr.htm )

The commemoration was established in 1950, when the General Assembly invited
all states and interested organizations to celebrate the day as they saw
fit. The day is a high point in the calendar of U.N. headquarters in New
York City, and is normally marked by both high-level political conferences
and meetings and by cultural events and exhibitions dealing with human
rights issues. In addition, it is traditionally on  December 10  that the
five-yearly United Nations Prize in the Field of Human Rights is awarded.

Many governmental and nongovernmental organizations active in the human
rights field also schedule special events to commemorate the day. We
celebrate Human Rights day because there are many people who do not have the
rights granted to them. This day was declared so that all of us can become
aware of our rights and create an  awareness among others, of people who are
deprived of their rights.

To mark this day, join people all around the world and participate in our
second Global Write-A-Thon for Leonard Peltier.

This year, we will concentrate on the release of the documents that the FBI
are still withholding. Our Write-A-Thon is directed at Senator Patrick
Leahy, the Chairman of the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary.

What's a "Write-A-Thon"?Simply put: a "writing marathon". Or write a ton of
letters... :-)

Each year, Amnesty International organizes a Write-A-Thon for December 10th.
This is where we found our inspiration. Their slogan is "Write = Might".
This is oh so very true! (Thank you Amnesty International) Your letters are
the watchdogs, putting perpetrators of abuse on notice. Your letters are the
light that shines through the despair prisoners of conscience & political
prisoners face on a daily basis. Your letters are tools of freedom, paving
the way for the abused and battered to finally find justice & freedom.

Participation is easy! You can either pledge to write a letter by yourself,
or, you can plan a letter writing event, at your home, school, church or
even at your local cafe. You can hold your event, and send your letter(s)
anytime from December 1-10, 2007. To make it even easier, we are providing
you with a sample letter that you can print out. You can download the letter
at:

the IPF website:  <http://users.skynet.be/kola/writeathon2007.pdf>
http://users.skynet.be/kola/writeathon2007.pdf

the LPDC website:
<http://www.leonardpeltier.net/documents/writeathon2007.pdf>
http://www.leonardpeltier.net/documents/writeathon2007.pdf

Senator Leahy's address is on the letter.

You can also fax your letter to Sen. Leahy at 202-224-3479 (for supporters
outside the USA: 00-1-202-224-3479)

Please inform us how many letters you and your friends/family have sent.
(note: have sent, not will send).

Send a message to the IPF at  ipforum@skynet.be> ipforum@skynet.be
or to the LPDC at  info@leonardpeltier.net> info@leonardpeltier.net
put "Peltier WriteAThon" as subject title tell us how many letters were sent
as well as your city + state (for the USA) or city + province (for Canada)
or city + country (outside USA & Canada)

Thank you for your support !
Let's write a ton of letters for Leonard.

Els Herten, International Peltier Forum

Toni Zeidan- Leonard Peltier Defense Committee

LPDC WEBSITE:  <http://www.leonardpeltier.net/>
http://www.leonardpeltier.net/

IPF WEBSITE:  <http://users.skynet.be/kola/index.htm>
http://users.skynet.be/kola/index.htm and
<http://www.myspace.com/leonardpeltierisinnocent>
http://www.myspace.com/leonardpeltierisinnocent

e-mail LPDC: info@leonardpeltier.net> info@leonardpeltier.net
e-mail IPF: ipforum@skynet.be> ipforum@skynet.be
info@leonardpeltier.net>

ONLINE PETITION FOR EXECUTIVE CLEMENCY:
<http://users.skynet.be/kola/lppet.htm>
http://users.skynet.be/kola/lppet.htm

NBC to promote Muareen Faulkner's new book, Murdered by Mumia Dec 6th

ACTION ALERT: Ensure Fairness For Mumia Abu-Jamal on NBC’s The Today Show!

On Dec. 6, NBC’s The Today Show intends to air a show about Michael
Smerconish and Maureen Faulkner’s new book “Murdered By Mumia.” According
to the announcement on Michael Smerconish’s website, the show is planning
to feature both Smerconish and Faulkner as guests.

The International Concerned Family and Friends of Mumia Abu-Jamal
(FreeMumia.com), Journalists for Mumia (Abu-Jamal-News.com), and Educators
for Mumia (EmajOnline.com) have initiated a media-activist campaign urging
people to write The Today Show at today@msnbc.com asking them to fairly
present both sides of the Mumia Abu-Jamal / Daniel Faulkner case, by also
featuring as guests, Linn Washington, Jr. (Philadelphia Tribune columnist
and Associate Professor of Journalism at Temple University) and Dr.
Suzanne Ross (Clinical Psychologist and Co-Chair of the Free Mumia
Abu-Jamal Coalition, NYC).

A sample letter ( http://www.abu-jamal-news.com/pr/TodayShow.doc
<http://www.abu-jamal-news.com/pr/TodayShow.doc> ), accompanied by an
extensive informational press pack (
http://www.abu-jamal-news.com/pr/PressPackNov07.pdf
<http://www.abu-jamal-news.com/pr/PressPackNov07.pdf> ) has been created
to use for contacting The Today Show.  Please take a minute and contact
them to ensure fair media coverage of this controversial and important
case.


Sincerely,


The International Concerned Family and Friends of Mumia Abu-Jamal
(FreeMumia.com)

Journalists for Mumia Abu-Jamal (Abu-Jamal-News.com)

Educators for Mumia Abu-Jamal (EmajOnline.com)



SAMPLE LETTER



Dear Today Show,

On December, 2007, the case of Mumia Abu-Jamal will be entering the 27th
year. In the course of those years, much of the media coverage has
contained pure speculation and falsehoods.  Media watchdogs like FAIR.ORG
have sharply criticized this coverage as being biased against Abu-Jamal.

We understand that on Dec. 6, the Today Show intends to air a show about
Michael Smerconish and Maureen Faulkner’s book “Murdered By Mumia.”
Interestingly, the scheduled interview regarding the new book focusing on
Mrs. Faulkner comes at a time of many startling new developments in this
historic case, generating international attention.

Reflecting the international interest in this case, in 2003, Abu-Jamal was
named an honorary citizen of Paris, and in 2006, the city of St. Denis
named a street after him.  While this was largely motivated by opposition
to the death penalty, they also cited strong evidence of both an unfair
trial and Abu-Jamal’s innocence.

One of these developments centers on extraordinary photos of the 1981
crime scene taken by Philadelphia-based press photographer Pedro Polakoff
(viewable at Abu-Jamal-News.com) that reveal manipulation of evidence, and
completely contradict the prosecution’s case, including Officer James
Forbes’ testimony that he properly handled both Abu-Jamal’s and Faulkner’s
guns (the photos show Forbes holding both guns in his bare hand). Also the
photos reveal that there were no large bullet divots or destroyed chunks
of cement where Faulkner was found, which should be visible in the
pavement if the prosecution’s scenario was accurate, according to which
Abu-Jamal shot down at Faulkner and allegedly missed several times while
Faulkner was on his back. Of particular note, this photographer twice
attempted to provide these photos to the District Attorney for both the
1982 trial and the 1995 PCRA hearings, and was ignored both times.

Since his incarceration, Abu-Jamal has published six books and countless
articles, and has delivered hundreds of speeches, including keynote
addresses for college graduations.  As a prolific writer and tenacious
journalist, he has earned the respect (and support) of such notable
prize-winning authors as Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, John Edgar Wideman,
and Salman Rushdie.  Just recently, he was accepted into the PEN American
Center, one of the highest honors a writer can achieve.  Additionally, at
the time of his arrest, he was president of the Philadelphia chapter of
the Association of Black Journalists, and was awarded the PEN Oakland
award for outstanding journalism after the publication of his first book,
Live from Death Row.  Since Live, he has garnered a following of dedicated
readers around the world, including scholars, college educators, and
journalists.  His work is, in part, testament to the dignity he has
demonstrated for the past 25 years he has been on death
 row.

The ethical interests in balance and fairness in presenting “news”
regarding the Abu-Jamal case, arguably requires providing Today Show
viewers with information evidencing Mr. Abu-Jamal’s innocence and unfair
trial.  To represent this other side, and to provide perspectives
addressing the informational needs of your viewers, I ask that you also
feature experts Linn Washington, Jr. (Philadelphia Tribune columnist and
Associate Professor of Journalism at Temple University) and Dr. Suzanne
Ross (Clinical Psychologist and Co-Chair of the Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
Coalition, NYC) as guests on your Dec. 6 show (they can be contacted via
Journalists for Mumia: hbjournalist@gmail.com).



While Mrs. Faulkner certainly has a “story” and is entitled to her
opinions, your viewers should be privy to other facts, such as the
prosecution withholding key evidence, witness coercion, racist jury
selection, and evidence that Judge Albert Sabo boasted about his desire to
help the prosecution “fry the nigger,” as enclosed in the press packet
provided here for you:
http://www.abu-jamal-news.com/pr/PressPackNov07.pdf

I also write to provide you with information (inclusive of material from
Abu-Jamal’s lawyer) in the interests of journalistic balance, fairness and
integrity. The press packet includes 1) A recent Black Commentator article
by Philadelphia lawyer/journalist David A. Love describing the
significance of the Polakoff photos, 2) An Educators for Mumia Abu-Jamal
press release about the Polakoff photos, written by Princeton University
Professor Mark L. Taylor, 3) Criticism of the 1998 ABC 20/20 program about
Abu-Jamal, 4) Background on the case, focusing on both the 1982 trial and
1995-97 PCRA hearings, with a focus on Abu-Jamal’s alleged “hospital
confession,” ballistics evidence, and the testimony of Veronica Jones, 5)
Recent police intimidation of Abu-Jamal’s supporters, including reported
death threats against Sgt. DeLacy Davis, of Black Cops Against Police
Brutality, and more.

Boston, MA: 12/3 dinner fundraiser with Ward Churchill, Lynne Stewart, Ralph Schonan

In Conjunction with International Day of Solidarity with Political Prisoners
Please join Jericho-Boston and the New England Committee to Defend Palestine

Monday, December 3, 2007 at 7pm for a Dinner Fundraiser with Lynne
Stewart, Ward Churchill, Ralph Schonan
The dinner will be held at the Community Church, 565 Boylston St., Copley
Square, Boston

For information: Jericho-Boston  (617) 830-0732

Lynne Stewart
http://www.LynneStewart.org
Ward Churchill's ZNet homepage
http://www.zmag.org/bios/homepagecfm?authorID=62

-------

Sunday, December 2nd 2-6pm Encuentro 5
Suggested Donation: $10
33 Harrison Ave., Chinatown
In commemoration of the International Day of Solidarity with Political
Prisoners
This panel is part of a three day series organized by Jericho Boston. Let
us remember and honor, not only the political prisoners being held in the
us, but also those being held everywhere in the world, in places like
Palestine, Turkey, the Basque Country to name a few.
We are honored to have as speakers:
Ashanti Alston (former Black Liberation Army Political Prisoner)
Dhoruba Bin Wahad (former Black Panther Party Political Prisoner)
Edwin Cortes (former FALN Prisoner of War)
Jihad Abdul-Mumia (former Black Liberation Army Political Prisoner)
Pam Africa (MOVE! Organization, ICFFMAJ)
Ward Churchill (American Indian Movement, Author)
Speaking on their struggle and of their people's struggle to overcome the
fierce repression and imperialism unleashed onto them for their fight for
self determination and freedom from oppression. Many of the root causes of
economic exploitation and social underdevelopment which were in place back
then are still affecting our communities today. CORI and other draconian
laws are being passed to keep people, especially people of color,
marginalized and disenfranchised.

Join us to strategize to bring our freedom fighters home and liberate our
communities!

Sponsors:
Jericho-Boston, (617) 830-0732, http://www.jerichoboston.org
NECDP, http://www.onepalestine.org

Jericho-Boston,  (617) 830-0732, http://www.jerichoboston.org

Eric McDavid Update 11/27/07

sacprisonersupport@riseup.net

Dear friends,

On Sunday we learned that the cardiologist finally made it in to visit

Eric. Thank you to everyone who’s calls and emails were an integral part

in making this happen. The doctor examined Eric and determined that he

“very likely” had a case of pericarditis in the spring. As of right now,

everything looks and sounds healthy with his heart. The doctor told him

which medications he should request if the pericarditis comes back, and

told him that if the jail refuses to provide these medications that he

should request to be taken to UCD Medical Center. Eric has finally

received the tests/examinations that he has been waiting for since last

April, but he has not yet been allowed to review the results.

Yesterday (Monday) Eric called to tell us that they took him down to the

doctor to “officially” end his hunger strike. They also finally drew

his blood to run tests. Now that Eric is eating and his heart condition

seems to have passed (for now), it seems likely that the blood tests might

serve only to absolve the jail of any responsibility for his previous

conditions. However, if they test for the right things, they might be

helpful in proving that Eric is in dire need of vegan food, as he is most

certainly not getting the nutrition his body requires.

Please continue calling the jail and demanding that Eric be given vegan

food and that they allow him to review his medical records.

Make sure you have Eric's x-reference number handy in case they ask for it

(x-ref 2972521):

Jail phone numbers: 916-874-6752 or 916-874-6905

Chief Deputy, Corrections & Court Services 916-874-5686

Captain Scott Jones: 916-874-5428 (This is the direct line for the jail

commander and it may only be answered during business hours)

You can also request to speak with Jail Operations Commander Douglas, as

he is allegedly the person who will probably make the final decision about

Eric's food.

Thank you all for your continued support!

Yours,

SPS

sacprisonersupport@riseup.net

Ahmad Sa’adat confined to “Collective Isolation”

In Nafha Prison

On Sunday, 25/11/2007, the Israeli occupation’s military court in the ‘Ofer barracks near Ramallah held another hearing in the case against Ahmad Sa’adat, the secretary general of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

In the previous court hearing, a week ago, we revealed that Sa’adat was deported to the remote Nafha prison in the Naqab desert, in punishment for his position against the US sponsored ‘Autumn Conference’ in Annapolis. Now, Sa’adat had a chance to say some words before the hearing begun, and we learned that he is in the “Collective Isolation” section. This special section used to be in the Be’er Sabe’e prison, but was transferred to Nafha.

The “Collective Isolation” section is used by the Israeli prison authorities against some of the political leaders among the Palestinian prisoners, to isolate them from the rest of the prisoners and to prevent them from continuing their political activities. Conditions in this section are worse than those in ‘ordinary’ sections, and the prisoners are deprived of some of the very limited rights that are still held for other Palestinian militants in Israeli prisons. It should be remembered that Israel treats all Palestinian militants much worse than criminals, and refuses to recognize them as political prisoners or as prisoners of war.

The court hearing was due to hear three witnesses, all of them spent some years as prisoners in Israeli prisons but were already released. Two of those were invited to the hearing, but didn’t care to show up. The third witness was not even invited, so that his non appearance in the court was postponed to the next hearing. In these circumstances, Ahmad Sa’adat’s boycott of the military court, due to his refusal to recognize the legality of the occupation and its institutions, was confined this time to refusing to stand up in front of the judges.

The military court decided to hold its next hearing on 27/1/2008.

For more details: www.freesaadat.ps

Dictators in the Empire's Employ

By Mumia Abu-Jamal

Dictators in the Empire's Employ

[col. writ. 11/18/07] (c) '07 Mumia Abu-Jamal

With the teeth of the Pakistani dictatorship now bared, we are beginning to see a mirror image of most of U.S. history throughout the last century.

Although perhaps best seen in the vicious wars of Latin America, it is a fact that the U.S. government supported brutal, violent dictatorships on every continent, almost always against popular, and especially workers movements.

Although most Americans would be hard pressed to actually recall the names of 4 U.S. backed dictators of the 20th century, it is a safe bet that the people who tried to survive in those countries will remember them for the rest of their lives.

From Haiti's infamous Duvaliers, to Cuba's Batista, there were no dictators too wretched, too violent, too vicious for the U.S. to support.

There's a good reason why when President Lyndon B. Johnson took the Oval Office after John Kennedy's assassination, he told one of his aides, "We've been running a damned branch of Murder, Inc. in the Caribbean."*

That's because Washington was essentially internationalizing its program of repression and McCarthyism, according to at least one Latin American country. Scholar (and former diplomat) Clara Nieto wrote, in her remarkable 2003 work, Masters of War, the story of how the U.S. got almost the entire continent to go its way:

At the Tenth Inter-American Conference requested by {former State Dept. chief John} Dulles and held in Caracas in 1954, he easily persuaded the meeting to adopt a declaration condemning international communism and advocating hemispheric solidarity and mutual defense against "Communist aggression." The chancellor of Guatemala, Guillermo Toriella, warned that on "the pretext of combating Communism, fundamental principles of democracy can be contravened, violations of human rights justified, and the principle of non-intervention infringed upon." The declaration, he argued was "the internationalization of McCarthyism." The majority - all dictatorships - supported it; Argentina (under Peron) voted against it and Mexico abstained. Costa Rica did not attend the meeting, since Jose Figueres refused to participate in this "assembly of dictators in a country governed by the most brutal and corrupt of them all, General Perez Jimenez" {C. Nieto, pp.138-139}.

Thus, generations were subjected to the terrorism of their own governments, their own armies, paid, and trained by the Americans. These U.S. trained terrorists launched wars against their own people; students, teachers, trade unionists, writers, intellectuals, priests, Indians, and beyond.

Yet, that was then. What now?

Despite all the gas and rap about "freedom", "democracy", and the like, the U.S. is, once again, depending on a dictator who has essentially shut down the Supreme Court, whipped lawyers in the streets, waged fraudulent elections, exiled his political opponents, and ruled with an iron fist. The differences between Burma and Pakistan could be measured in inches.

Yet, none of this really matters to the White House. What matters is what has always mattered. That the dictator do the bidding of his imperial masters - the people be damned.

There's a reason why Latin America has elected predominantly anti American governments in the past decade, and it had nothing to do with the easy media fiction that Hugo Chavez made them do it. For millions of people, they remember the so called 'secret wars' waged by armed puppets of the Americans-and they want no more of it.

Dictatorship 2 -- Democracy 0.

--(c) '07 maj

*[Source: Nieto, Clara, Masters of War: Latin America and the U.S. Aggression (From the Cuban Revolution Through the Clinton Years) {New York: Seven Stories Press, 2003} ]

Mumia Abu-Jamal is a political prisoner in the United States, framed and in prison, with what could be the final decision on his legal appeals possibly coming down this summer. That decision could give Mumia his freedom, a new trial, life in prison, or execution. It is time to turn up the heat against this injustice.

Free Mumia!

Ex-black militant becomes eagle scout

By KATRINA A. GOGGINS Nov 25, 2007
Associated Press Writer

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -- Cleveland Sellers called himself a black militant in his autobiography, and he was convicted - and later pardoned - of sparking a 1968 civil rights protest in which three students were gunned down by state troopers.

These days, however, he has a doctorate in education and is director of the African American Studies program at the University of South Carolina.

On Dec. 3, the 64-year-old man will become an Eagle Scout, an achievement he hopes will add an important layer to a personal narrative that to many people will always be linked to the protest known as the Orangeburg Massacre.

"People have tried to create these monsters and make us something that we weren't because it helped them make their case," Sellers said during a recent interview at his college office. "I think it's important for people to know who I am and maybe through the process that will help lower the barrier and lower the kind of imagery they have of me."

Sellers was on the path to becoming an Eagle Scout until his paperwork was lost nearly four decades ago.

He credits scouting for his appreciation of nature, and a sense of orderliness. He fondly recalls attending the Boy Scouts' National Jamboree in 1960, and thinks he still could cook up a mean coffee-can souffle. Sellers has helped start a troop named after Camp Brownlee, the blacks-only scout camp he attended as a young man.

The men who led the troop he once belonged to were father figures, which is what many youth lack today, Sellers said.

"I look around now and there's no organizations for them other than the gang banging and that kind of stuff," he said. "I just think we need to take another look at the Boy Scouts as an alternative to the idleness and the crime."

But after his formative years as a scout, Sellers became best known as the only person convicted of inciting a riot following the Feb. 8, 1968, Orangeburg shootings, which took place during protests over a bowling alley owner's refusal to allow blacks inside. Three people were killed and 27, including Sellers, were wounded.

He spent seven months in jail, but 23 years after his conviction he was pardoned.

After leaving prison, Sellers worked as a coordinator for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and sat in on planning sessions with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

While the Orangeburg shooting may not be well known outside South Carolina, Columbia University history professor Manning Marable said it was an important part of civil rights history. He said Sellers is an example of a leader who battled segregation on the local level.

"I think Cleve Sellers embodies many of the strengths of the grass roots organizers who didn't seek the limelight, but who had tremendous respect among working and poor people locally," Marable said.

Sellers acknowledges his place in civil rights history.

"There's a certain level of humility that makes me reluctant about being the face of Orangeburg, but I figure if nobody's the face then the story doesn't get told," Sellers said.

While the state has formally apologized for the Orangeburg shootings, Sellers believes the event still merits a closer look by authorities. The FBI, however, has not added the shootings to the list of civil rights-era cases it has reopened.

"I say Orangeburg is the litmus test for race," Seller said. "If we can't be honest and genuine and get to the facts and get to the trust and get justice, then how can we talk about anything else?"

Dec. 1st: The Trial/Cuban 5 Film

The Popular Education Project to Free the Cuban 5
freethecubanfive@hotmail.com and freethecuban5@gmail.com
______________________________________________________

Saturday December 1st, 2007 at 6:30pm

1199 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Labor Center Auditorium
310 W43rd St. (btwn. 8th-9th Ave.)
Take the A,C, E, 1, 2, 3, 7, N, Q, R, S, or W Trains to 42nd St. and Times Square

Suggested Donation: $10 (no one will be turned away for lack of funds)

PROCEEDS GO TO A SPECIAL HOLIDAY COMMISSARY GIFT FOR THE CUBAN 5!!

Join the Popular Education Project to Free the Cuban 5 for the New York
Premiere of 'El Processo' (The Trial: The Untold Story of the Cuban 5)!!

A brand-new (September 2007) 70-minute documentary from Cuban filmmaker Rolando Almirante that tells the story of the Cuban Five and their legal struggle. This documentary explores the U.S. government's use of false conspiracy charges and secret evidence which laid the basis for their conviction. It features revealing interviews with defense and prosecuting attorneys, Cuban and U.S. experts, and advocates for the Five's freedom.

English Narration by actor Danny Glover

The Program also will consist of a short Legal Update, Update from the Canadian Conference to Free the Cuban 5, and several campaign updates.

Light refreshments will be served.

Eric McDavid Update: Hunger Strike Ends, Struggle for Food and Medical Care Continues

sacprisonersupport@riseup.net:

Dear friends,

Eric called this morning to tell us that he has ended his hunger strike.

Today marked the two-week point in this leg of his struggle for vegan

food. Further down is a letter he has asked us to send to you.

Thank you all for your support these last two weeks! Based on the jail's

response to our calls, it was clear that they were feeling the pressure.

Unfortunately, this battle is not over. Eric is still requesting vegan

food AND medical care from the jail. We need to keep calling to demand

that he be provided both.

Eric has decided he will finish the commissary food he has left in his

cell, but will no longer be ordering items from commissary. This means

that he will, once again, be subsisting off of what little food he can

pull from his trays. Eric has tried this in the past. In fact, this is

what he was eating before his recent hunger strike. During the two months

he was doing so, he lost 20 pounds and suffered a bout of pericarditis.

Clearly, this is not an acceptable diet.

It is imperative that we keep calling the jail and and demand that Eric

be given food and medical care immediately.

Eric has still not received blood work. The doctors at the jail have told

Eric's lawyer a number of times that the cardiologist was schedule to see

Eric, but this has yet to happen. Eric needs to be given bloodwork, and

to see a cardiologist immediately so they can properly diagnose the cause

of his heart condition.

When Eric was last weighed by the doctors at the jail, he weighed 147

pounds. This is the lowest his weight has been since he entered the jail

, and it is dangerously low for someone of Eric's height and build.

When Scott Jones was interviewed by the press on Tuesday (after a press

conference held by his family, partner and supporters about his hunger

strike – for statements from Eric, his mother, and his partner about his

hunger strike, please visit www.supporteric.org soon, as these documents

should be posted in the next couple of days), he repeated the jail's oft

repeated lie that the jail does not have the resources to supply Eric with

vegan food. Please remember that this is absolutely false. The jail

provided Eric with vegan food for 16 months, and there is no reason they

cannot continue to do so.

Please keep calling the jail! When you call the Correctional Health

Services Division about Eric's medical situation please request that they

do the following things:

1) Give Eric the treatment they have promised. That means bloodwork and a

visit from a cardiologist. Until they do these things, they will not be

able to properly diagnosis the causes of and provide treatment for his

heart condition.

2) Eric needs to be given full access to his medical records and the

results of these tests.

3) Dr. Dutrick (possibly mispelled), the man in charge at medical

services, should recommend that Eric be given vegan food for medical

reasons (it would obviously improve his health). Scott Jones said in an

interview with the Sacramento Bee that they will give prisoners vegan food

with a doctor's order.

4) Dr. Dutrick should make a recommendation to the jail administration

that inmates who refuse to eat non-vegan food should be given vegan food

for medical reasons (clearly eating is healthier than starving)

The phone number to the Correctional Health Services Division is: (916)

875-9782.

You can also email them at: inmatepatientcare@saccounty.net

When calling the jail administration about vegan food for Eric and future

prisoners, request that they:

1) Provide Eric with vegan food immediately. His health is in very poor

condition – he lost 20 pounds after they cut off his vegan meals, and

suffered another bout of pericarditis – and this could be remedied by

feeding him nutritious, healthy meals. They provided Eric with vegan meals

for 16 months. There is no reason they cannot continue to do so.

(Remember, they always say that they don't have the resources to provide

“special” diets – but this is simply not true.)

2) Change the policy about vegan meals and ensure future access to anyone

that refuses to eat non-vegan food.

3) Jail Commander Captain Scott Jones or Operations Commander Lt. Deputy

Douglas needs to speak with Eric immediately about his requests so they

can begin remedying the situation.

Please continue calling the jail at the numbers below, and make sure you

have Eric's x-reference number handy in case they ask for it (x-ref

2972521):

Jail phone numbers: 916-874-6752 or 916-874-6905

Chief Deputy, Corrections & Court Services 916-874-5686

Captain Scott Jones: 916-874-5428 (This is the direct line for the jail

commander and it may only be answered during business hours)

You can also request to speak with Jail Operations Commander Douglas, as

he is allegedly the person who will probably make the final decision about

Eric's food.

A Letter From Eric

needing to land ashore & rocky shoals at low tide revealing no beach head,

the search for a harbor elsewhere must ensue… … …

upon reflection i noticed how procedure and policy had removed the humyn

element in how the jail handled hunger strikes (as much as there was one

in the first place), how my hospitalization was becoming unavoidable

(irking at my just say no instincts 2 western “medicine”), & most

important of all = something’s not feeling right in the direction i was

moving. these relations have brought me 2 the point where i’ve decided 2

no longer protest in this fashion; in the spring of 06 it brought forth

growth, seems like the soils of fall 07 may require a different type of

seed. i also fully acknowledge that some cycles are meant 4 others 2

complete but i still have some time left within these walls. my intent

was 2 B treated humanely in an inhumane system, perhaps that was my

mistake – oh well = live, learn, adapt, think about it, think about it

again & give it 1 more go (emphasis on the adapt bit)

i wish 2 thank from the depths of my being all those who have supported

me over the last 2 weeks with letters & contacting the jail on my behalf.

i especially want 2 thank my partner, family and SPS for all their

energies & support.

Much love and solidarity,

D

Find Your Joy

Jonathan Paul Update

friendsofjonathanpaul@yahoo.com

After 20 days, we finally received a call from
Jonathan yesterday.  He spent his first week in the
special housing unit on 23 hour lock-down.  Now that
he is out of the SHU, he is adjusting to his new
surroundings quite well.  He is able to get vegan food
and is keeping busy.   The yard is large and gives him
an opportunity to spend time outdoors.

He is working each day picking up garbage, which he
doesn't mind because it is an outdoor activity.  He is
taking a public speaking class and a National
Geographic certification course.  He will be in his
unit another few weeks before being transferred to
another more "permanent" unit.

No word yet on when he will be able to have visitors.
Jonathan misses his friends, family and his companion
animals, but most of all his freedom.  That said, he
is adjusting as well as can be expected.  Jonathan is
doing time for the animals, and that makes it easier.

The best part of Jonathan's day is mail call.  Please
continue to write to him and send him your support.
And please remember other political prisoners - you
are their lifeline.

For the animals and the earth,

Friends of Jonathan Paul

Jonathan Paul
#07167-085
FCI Phoenix
Federal Correctional Institution
37910 N 45th Ave.
Phoenix, AZ 85086

Please feel free to contact Jonathan's support group
at friendsofjonathanpaul@yahoo.com or e-mail me
directly at tamidrake@wildblue.net.  If you are
interested in organizing a fundraiser or a letter
writing event, please let us know.

We plan to get a support website up for Jonathan very
soon.

Here are some guidelines for writing: (We've taken
this from Daniel's support website - thanks to
Daniel's support group for these comprehensive
guidelines)

When sending a letter, it's best to keep it simple.
Write or type on blank notebook or copy paper no
bigger than 8.5x11 and don't use any special colored
or gel pens or pencils, stamps, or stickers. Don't
write anything on the outside or inside of the
envelope except the prisoner's address and your full
name and return address in the upper left hand corner
of the addressed side of the envelope. Use plain white
envelopes without a clear plastic address window, or
any special decorations. Most prisons also REQUIRE a
return address on the envelope.

Please take a minute to read the following VERY
IMPORTANT guidelines.
- Write on both sides of the paper, since the number
of pages he can have may be limited. It is also
totally acceptable to type your letters. More will fit
on a page.
- Write your address inside your letter/card if you
think he does not have it, but DO NOT put an address
label anywhere inside or on the letter/card. Address
labels are ONLY OK to go on your envelope.
- Do NOT send him stamps, envelopes (self-addressed or
otherwise), blank paper or notecards. He will not be
able to receive them and he will be denied your
letter.
- Do NOT send him any form of currency, whether cash,
check or money order.
- Do NOT send photographs larger than 4x6. Do not send
polaroids and make sure the content is appropriate.
- Do NOT include any paperclips, staples or any extra
things in your letter.
- Do NOT send a card that has glitter or any 3-D
objects in or on it.
- Do NOT send cards with paper inserts glued in them.
- Do NOT tape your envelope shut.
- Do NOT ever write "legal mail" or anything implying
that you are an attorney unless you are
- Please use your common sense; don't write about
anything that is likely to get a prisoner in trouble
in any way.

Jonathan will not receive the envelope your letter is
mailed in, so write your return address and full name
in the letter as well. Also, number the pages like
"1/5, 2/5,3/5..." so that a prisoner can tell if some
pages are missing.
If you send Jonathan a letter and it gets returned to
you, please let us know about it so we can add any
other restrictions to the guideline list.
Please do NOT send in any books to Jonathan yet.  We
are in the process of getting a system going for him
to receive books.

Jonathan's co-defendants:

Daniel McGowan
#63794-053
FCI Sandstone
Federal Correctional Institution
PO Box 1000
Sandstone, MN 55072

Nathan Block #36359-086
FCI Lompoc
Federal Correctional Institution
3600 Guard Road
Lompoc, CA 93436

Joyanna Zacher #36360-086
FCI Dublin
Federal Correctional Institution
5701 8th St - Camp Parks- Unit E
Dublin, CA 94568

SHAC:
Jacob Conroy # 93501-011
FCI Victorville Medium 1
Federal Correctional Institution
PO Box 5300
Adelanto, CA 92301

Lauren Gazzola #93497-011
FCI Danbury
Federal Correctional Institution Route #37
Danbury, CT 06811

Kevin Kjonaas # 93502-011
FCI Sandstone
PO Box 1000
Sandstone, MN 55072

Joshua Harper 29429-086
FCI Sheridan
Federal Correctional Institution
P.O. Box 5000
Sheridan, OR 97378

Andrew Stepanian # 26399-050
FCI Butner Medium II
Federal Correctional Institution
PO Box 1500
Butner, NC 27509

Other Green Scare:

Jeffrey Luers # 1306729
Lane County Adult Corrections
101 West 5th Ave
Eugene, OR 97401-2695

MCDAVID, ERIC X-2972521 4E231A
Sacramento County Main Jail
651 "I" Street
Sacramento, CA 95814

Friends and Family of Jonathan Paul
PMB# 267
2305 Ashland St., Ste. C
Ashland, OR 97520

Prison Profiteers: Who Makes Money from Mass Incarceration

Paul Wright & Tara Herivel

This is the third and latest book in a series of Prison Legal News anthologies that examines the reality of mass imprisonment in America. [The other two titles are The Celling of America: An Inside Look at the US Prison Industry and Prison Nation: The Warehousing of America's Poor, both available from PLN].

Prison Profiteers is unique from other books on the market because it exposes and discusses who profits and benefits from mass imprisonment, rather than who is harmed by it and how. Why is sentencing reform dead on arrival in every state legislature and congress? What is the biggest transfer of public wealth into private hands in recent history? Read Prison Profiteers and you will know! Hint: It has to do with prisons.

Positive: With the baby boomlet demographics, we foresee increasing demand for juvenile [incarceration] services. Negative: . . . it is often difficult to maintain the occupancy rates required for profitability.
—FROM A REPORT PRODUCED FOR THE PRIVATE PRISON INDUSTRY BY INVESTMENT ANALYSTS FIRST ANALYSIS SECURITIES CORPORATION

Locking up 2.3 million people isn’t cheap. Each year federal, state, and local governments spend over $185 billion annually in tax dollars to ensure that one out of every 137 Americans is imprisoned. Prison Profiteers looks at the private prison companies, investment banks, churches, guard unions, medical corporations, and other industries and individuals that benefit from this country’s experiment with mass imprisonment. It lets us follow the money from public to private hands and exposes how monies formerly designated for the public good are diverted to prisons and their maintenance. Find out where your tax dollars are going as you help to bankroll the biggest prison machine the world has ever seen.

Contributors include: Judy Greene on private prison giants Geo (formerly Wackenhut) and CCA; Anne-Marie Cusac on who sells electronic weapons to prison guards; Wil S. Hylton on the largest prison health care provider; Ian Urbina on how prison labor supports the military; Kirsten Levingston on the privatization of public defense; Jennifer Gonnerman on the costs to neighborhoods from which prisoners are removed; Kevin Pranis on the banks and brokerage houses that finance prison building; and Silja Talvi on the American Correctional Association as a tax-funded lobbyist for professional prison bureaucracies; Tara Herivel on juvenile prisons; Gary Hunter and Peter Wagner on the census and counting prisoners; David Reutter on Florida's prison industries; Alex Friedmann on the private prisoner transportation industry; Paul Von Zielbauer on the sordid history of Prison Health Services in New York; Steven Jackson on the prison telephone industry; Samantha Shapiro on religious groups being paid to run prisons and Clayton Mosher, Gregory Hooks and Peter Wood on the myth and reality of building rural prisons.


Tara Herivel is the co-editor of Prison Nation. She is a prisoner rights attorney and the author of numerous articles in the alternative press. She lives in Portland, Oregon. Paul Wright is the founder and editor of Prison Legal News and co-editor of Prison Nation and The Celling of America. He lives in Seattle, Washington and Brattleboro, Vermont.

This is an exclusive paperback printing made just for Prison Legal News.

The Death of Fred Hampton- Documentary Showing- December 1st

On December 1st, there will be a documentary showing of The Death of Fred Hampton at the SoCal Library in LA. This showing will mark the 38th anniversary of the death of the young Black Panther leader. We ask that every attend this event to honor the life and struggle of this dedicated revolutionary.

On December 4, 1969, Fred Hampton, the Deputy Chairman of the Illinois chapter of the Black Panther Party, was killed during a raid by Chicago police and the FBI. During the incident, police riddled the apartment with bullets, killing Black Panther Mark Clark, and injuring five other Panthers. Fred Hampton, one of those injured, was dragged out of his bed and shot pointblank in the head. It was later discovered he had been drugged by an uncover agent. This documentary depicts the rise of Hampton in the Panther Party and ultimately his brutal assassination.

December 1, 2007 • 5:00-8:00 pm
Southern California Library
6120 S. Vermont Ave.
Los Angeles, CA

Sponsored by Anarchist Black Cross Federation (LA), the Ida B. Wells Institute,
Black August (LA) and Some of Us Are Brave

Anarchist Birthday Brigade List for December

December

BASHIR HAMEED (J. YORK)
82A6313 / Box 51
Comstock, New York 12821
Great Meadow Correctional Facility
December 1, 1940

TSUTOMU SHIROSAKI
#20924-016
FCI Terre Haute
P.O. Box 33
Terre Haute, IN 47808
December 5, 1947

JEFFREY "FREE" LUERS
#1306729
Lane County Adult Corrections
101 West 5th Ave
Eugene, OR 97401-2695
December 5

MARILYN BUCK
00482-285 / Unit A
5701 8th St. Camp Parks
Dublin, CA 94568
Here is the birthday list for December. Please be
advised that addresses do change, so if there is
someone that knows of a recent transfer on this list,
please let us know.

Thanks You,
Matt
LA ABCF

December 13

ZOLO AGONA AZANIA
#4969 / P.O. Box 41
Michigan City, IN 46361
Indiana State Prison
December 12, 1954

JEROME WHITE-BEY
#37479
South Central Correctional Center
255 West Highway 32
Licking, MO 65542-9069
December 28, 1955

Suicide City

By Sara Olson

Right after 4:30 p.m. count on Halloween, there was the sound of a scuffle in D Hall. An alarm brought guards running from all parts of the yard. An ambulance pulled up to the back door of the hall in which we live. The attendant pulled open the back door, got back into the ambulance and backed the rear of the vehicle up to the door. Next thing we knew, a phalanx of guards came hot-footing down our hall toward the ambulance, three of them surrounding a tall, slim woman with her wrists cuffed behind her back, hair flying everywhere and a wild, terrified look in her eyes. She'd threatened to cut her wrists.

Later, we were locked down at 7:00 p.m. for the rest of the night. Even though several industrious inmates had worked hard to put on a Halloween party for the housing unit, with homemade decorations and cleverly-designed games and snacks, the guards squelched the fun and locked us down. They had to do "paperwork" on the cutter. Both are becoming more and more common, lock-downs and suicides. If it's the weekend---lock-down. If it's a holiday---lock-down. People are locked down and they become even more depressed, over and above the general pall produced by simply doing prison time. Bam! Another suicide attempt . . . or worse, a success!

It's suicide city at Central California Women's Facility (CCWF). One prisoner said to me, "I've never seen so many people trying to kill themselves as I have in the last year. Sure, people die of natural causes . . . well, 'natural' prison causes like years of poor diet, no medical care, ever-present tension, but this suicide stuff!" As one of my roommates said, "It's a madhouse."

The warden was compelled by the rising rate of suicide attempts to issue a memorandum in August. In it, she assured the overcrowded, crammed-in-for-life masses that she is, "committed to insuring that you all have access to any level of mental health services you might need to address any mental health issues you may be experiencing." Huh? More like, each attempt is a crazed reaction to emotional isolation in the midst of teeming predation. It is in prison that a human being comes to know that she really is, no matter what spiritual myths she may embrace to get her through each day, all alone in the universe.

Recently the CCCMS program was reevaluated. There are increasing numbers of CCCMS women in prison or it sure seems that way. CCCMS is pronounced Triple C-M-S. It means Correctional Clinical Case Management System. It is a designation for prisoners who are prescribed psychotropic drugs for behavioral management. CCCMS is enshrined in Title XV, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) bible of rules and regulations, that spells out the direct supervision of California's more than 173,000 prisoners in its prison industry. They may have been taking prescribed drugs on the street. Sometimes an inmate is given a medication to lower the incidence of anger and violence stemming from previous life experiences of abuse, whether personal, systemic, or both. Sometimes an inmate is medicated because of the way we are housed, woefully overcrowded, in dorm rooms, day rooms and the gym. Sacramento instructed mental health professionals to reduce the number of women prisoners at CCWF on behavior modification drugs because there are too many using them. "Get rid of the Topomax and Wellbutrin!" Often, pills are "cheeked" at the "hot med" window and sold . . .that is, bartered . . . for tobacco and food. Those pills were money in the bank--"were" because many women have already been precipitously de-scheduled from their meds.

Part of the reason to control the medication rolls was the plan to merge 600 women prisoners into the state's three women's prisons from California Rehabilitation Center (CRC) which, until Spring 2007, had been a co-ed facility. A few went to Community Correctional Facilities but most were sent to "ugly beds" (halls, gym, floors) at California Institute for Women (CIW), Valley State Prison for Women (VSPW) and CCWF.

The impact of the CRC transfers had a dire impact on medical care. The prison industry's health care is in federal receivership, no longer under supervision of CDCR. The receiver, Dr. Robert Sillen, got an email from a colleague, dated May 24, 2007:

". . . I got a call form (sic) Dawn Martin at VSPW this am and they are being overwhelmed with the influx of inmates and custody has closed down some of the off site transportation which is now causing a delay in care. She stated that they were at 200% of capacity and that there were inmates on the floors. She does not know how she is going to deliver care to these inmates."

This is the result of prison transport chaos on medical care. The mental health care that our warden assures us will be provided is similarly impacted. Sillen, in his supplemental Report Re Overcrowding in Spring 2007 wrote that CRC had 299 CCCMS inmates who would add to already-inflated CCCMS numbers at the other women's prisons. He stated:

"Each of these receiving prisons is already overcrowded with CCCMS patients. As of May 25, 2007, for example, (i) CCWF was operating at 132% of its CCCMS capacity, its Reception Center was operating at 145% of its CCCMS capacity and its administrative Segregation Unit housed 24 CCCMS patients;(ii) CIW was operating at 101% of its CCCMS capacity, its Reception Center was operating at 75% capacity, its Administrative Segregation Unit housed 89 CCCMS; and, (iii) VSPW was operating at 154% of its CCCMS capacity, its Reception Center was operating at 129% of its CCCMS capacity, its Administrative Segregation Unit held 15 CCCMS inmates and its Security Housing Unit housed another 32. In light of the existing overcrowding at these facilities, the influx of still more prisoners to these facilities may strain the system to the breaking point."

The "hot med line", which operates at breakfast and at the evening meal and where prisoners pick up their psychotropic drugs, grew to an insupportable number last summer. The line took two-and-a-half hours to process. Of course not all "hot med" prisoners were getting psychotropics. Some get pain-killers and there is a large number of diabetics who get insulin that's now being dispensed in their housing unit. But a large part of the "hot med line" did get them and something had to be done.

Prison psychologists have a huge caseload that they can't handle with any efficiency. There isn't time for proper evaluation on A yard, the receiving yard, of incoming inmates mental health conditions. Some scam the system. "Oh yeah, I was on such and such on the street. Yup!" All this prescribing of head meds got out of hand, so Sacramento stepped in.

From now on, lifers will be a non-priority. They're not going anywhere anyway. More and more women, no matter what their needs, will be pulled off meds and taken off CCCMS status. Many now get drugs such as lithium that they consider less effective and which can have undesirable side effects. One reason lifer and long-termer needs can be degraded is that these inmates have acclimated and they don't appear to cry out for help. However, taking people off CCCMS without a real diagnosis could lead to emotional explosions. One prisoner remarked, "I think they would want to cause explosions. I scares the outsiders. If a higher safety risk can be created in women's prisons, Sacramento can show that women are as violent as men."

CCWF and VSPW, our sister prison sited across the county road, together the largest mass of imprisoned women in one place in the world, were built per a dorm housing plan because women aren't considered dangerous to staff and to each other. Originally the two prisons were designed for four women per room but that was in the last century. I was transported to CCWF in 2002. Since I've been here, there have always been eight women in every room. A couple of years ago, we wrote letters to legislators to beat back an attempt to cram another woman in for a total of nine per room.

CIW, built in the 1950's with its two-person cells, is spoken of at CCWF in the hushed tones one uses to describe some kind of prison heaven. "Wow! Two! Only two people to a cell!" On the other hand, CIW's dayrooms have been housing women in bunks since the 1980's so, as common space, they've been off limits for a couple of decades.

With eight people in a room, women tend to achieve a natural ethnic balance. It makes it more difficult to cultivate the racially-based antagonisms that the "old CDC" (prior to the addition of Rehabilitation to the departments name and the U.S. Supreme Court ruling against racial separation in California's prisons) has done so successfully among the state's male prisoners.

However, as with the men, the ethos of violence, AKA "handling your business," permeates women's prisons. If a woman tries to kill herself, she'd better do a good job because, even if she has one, DNR's are not routinely honored. Also, if a woman fails at her suicide attempt, she may get jumped for her ineptitude because she didn't "handle her business" well.

There is no transfer from a room for a woman who feels or who is actually threatened until the inmate has tried, at least once, to "handle her business." It's all a bizarre situation. In the end, a transfer to another room with seven different women is no guarantee of safety anyway. Eight women living over and under each other in a small room, many for life, leads to patterns of behavior that would challenge brain surgeons or rocket scientists or ordinary Americans who never give a thought to how they'd manage to survive such an environment. We're all dumped together. There's no regard for an individual's social or cultural history. Background other than crime history, is wiped out. Previous medical or mental health history, all of it, counts for nothing. The most deranged person runs the room because she terrorizes the others. She may be genuinely crazy or a run-or-the-mill bully. Short-termers can be subject to the whims of people who don't have release dates. Lifers, who must face a parole board that grants no release dates, must deal with a short-term nut who threatens to beat everyone up for a spoonful of Folger's coffee.

Cruelty and disdain are the way, ladled out by staff and inmates alike. Fights occur in broad daylight, resulting in fifteen guards descending on two women with cans of Orange Crush pepper spray drawn like six-guns. Perhaps a fight might be completely ignored if staff don't feel like doing "paperwork". Women walk around sporting black eyes like merit badges.

Write-ups abound, on the other hand, often for minor infractions. Short-termers get longer short terms and long-timers . . . oh, well . . . stay longer and longer, perhaps with a dollop of extra time in Ad Seg which can end up seeming like a vacation from the pandemonium of dorm housing. In Ad Seg, cells house only two people, a real plus. A prison thrives on chaos, moment-to-moment instability, and imminent threat. The rule is "never get comfortable." The minute you do, everything changes. The atmosphere of eternal conflict prevents all solidarity among prisoners and keeps everyone fearful of and fighting with one another. It makes it easy for the staff to play people off against each other. Add mental illness to the list of ingredients and there's a perfect combat stew bubbling away twenty-four/seven.

###

Nov 11, 2007
Sara Olson, W94197; 506-10-04 Low; CCWF, P.O. Box 1508, Chowchilla CA 93610-1508

http://www.fresnoalliance.com/home

No Thanks to Thanksgiving

By Robert Jensen, AlterNet

Posted on November 23, 2006, Printed on November 22, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/44661/

One indication of moral progress in the United States would be the replacement of Thanksgiving Day and its self-indulgent family feasting with a National Day of Atonement accompanied by a self-reflective collective fasting.

In fact, indigenous people have offered such a model; since 1970 they have marked the fourth Thursday of November as a Day of Mourning in a spiritual/political ceremony on Coles Hill overlooking Plymouth Rock, Massachusetts, one of the early sites of the European invasion of the Americas.

Not only is the thought of such a change in this white-supremacist holiday impossible to imagine, but the very mention of the idea sends most Americans into apoplectic fits -- which speaks volumes about our historical hypocrisy and its relation to the contemporary politics of empire in the United States.

That the world's great powers achieved "greatness" through criminal brutality on a grand scale is not news, of course. That those same societies are reluctant to highlight this history of barbarism also is predictable.

But in the United States, this reluctance to acknowledge our original sin -- the genocide of indigenous people -- is of special importance today. It's now routine -- even among conservative commentators -- to describe the United States as an empire, so long as everyone understands we are an inherently benevolent one. Because all our history contradicts that claim, history must be twisted and tortured to serve the purposes of the powerful.

One vehicle for taming history is various patriotic holidays, with Thanksgiving at the heart of U.S. Myth-building. From an early age, we Americans hear a story about the hardy Pilgrims, whose search for freedom took them from England to Massachusetts. There, aided by the friendly Wampanoag Indians, they survived in a new and harsh environment, leading to a harvest feast in 1621 following the Pilgrims first winter.

Some aspects of the conventional story are true enough. But it's also true that by 1637 Massachusetts Gov. John Winthrop was proclaiming a thanksgiving for the successful massacre of hundreds of Pequot Indian men, women and children, part of the long and bloody process of opening up additional land to the English invaders. The pattern would repeat itself across the continent until between 95 and 99 percent of American Indians had been exterminated and the rest were left to assimilate into white society or die off on reservations, out of the view of polite society.

Simply put: Thanksgiving is the day when the dominant white culture (and, sadly, most of the rest of the non-white but non-indigenous population) celebrates the beginning of a genocide that was, in fact, blessed by the men we hold up as our heroic founding fathers.

The first president, George Washington, in 1783 said he preferred buying Indians' land rather than driving them off it because that was like driving "wild beasts" from the forest. He compared Indians to wolves, "both being beasts of prey, tho' they differ in shape."

Thomas Jefferson -- president #3 and author of the Declaration of Independence, which refers to Indians as the "merciless Indian Savages" -- was known to romanticize Indians and their culture, but that didn't stop him in 1807 from writing to his secretary of war that in a coming conflict with certain tribes, "[W]e shall destroy all of them."

As the genocide was winding down in the early 20th century, Theodore Roosevelt (president #26) defended the expansion of whites across the continent as an inevitable process "due solely to the power of the mighty civilized races which have not lost the fighting instinct, and which by their expansion are gradually bringing peace into the red wastes where the barbarian peoples of the world hold sway."

Roosevelt also once said, "I don't go so far as to think that the only good Indians are dead Indians, but I believe nine out of ten are, and I shouldn't like to inquire too closely into the case of the tenth."

How does a country deal with the fact that some of its most revered historical figures had certain moral values and political views virtually identical to Nazis? Here's how "respectable" politicians, pundits, and professors play the game: When invoking a grand and glorious aspect of our past, then history is all-important. We are told how crucial it is for people to know history, and there is much hand wringing about the younger generations' lack of knowledge about, and respect for, that history.

In the United States, we hear constantly about the deep wisdom of the founding fathers, the adventurous spirit of the early explorers, the gritty determination of those who "settled" the country -- and about how crucial it is for children to learn these things.

But when one brings into historical discussions any facts and interpretations that contest the celebratory story and make people uncomfortable -- such as the genocide of indigenous people as the foundational act in the creation of the United States -- suddenly the value of history drops precipitously and one is asked, "Why do you insist on dwelling on the past?"

This is the mark of a well-disciplined intellectual class -- one that can extol the importance of knowing history for contemporary citizenship and, at the same time, argue that we shouldn't spend too much time thinking about history.

This off-and-on engagement with history isn't of mere academic interest; as the dominant imperial power of the moment, U.S. elites have a clear stake in the contemporary propaganda value of that history. Obscuring bitter truths about historical crimes helps perpetuate the fantasy of American benevolence, which makes it easier to sell contemporary imperial adventures -- such as the invasion and occupation of Iraq -- as another benevolent action.

Any attempt to complicate this story guarantees hostility from mainstream culture. After raising the barbarism of America's much-revered founding fathers in a lecture, I was once accused of trying to "humble our proud nation" and "undermine young people's faith in our country."

Yes, of course -- that is exactly what I would hope to achieve. We should practice the virtue of humility and avoid the excessive pride that can, when combined with great power, lead to great abuses of power.

History does matter, which is why people in power put so much energy into controlling it. The United States is hardly the only society that has created such mythology. While some historians in Great Britain continue to talk about the benefits that the empire brought to India, political movements in India want to make the mythology of Hindutva into historical fact.

Abuses of history go on in the former empire and the former colony. History can be one of the many ways we create and impose hierarchy, or it can be part of a process of liberation. The truth won't set us free, but the telling of truth at least opens the possibility of freedom.

As Americans sit down on Thanksgiving Day to gorge themselves on the bounty of empire, many will worry about the expansive effects of overeating on their waistlines. We would be better to think about the constricting effects of the day's mythology on our minds.

AlterNet orginally ran this article on Thanksgiving 2005.

Robert Jensen is a journalism professor at the University of Texas at Austin, and the author of, most recently, "The Heart of Whiteness: Confronting Race, Racism and White Privilege" (City Lights Books).

ACTION ALERT/ SAVE THE DATE

Come Join Us,
Pass the word onto others it is time that these changes be made.
We must let the NYPD know enough is enough, we want Transparency, Intervention and Accountability.

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WantedNYPD11copy.jpg, 425 x 559 [~77K]

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WantedNYPD12.jpg, 425 x 549 [~90K]

other side of the News radio show

The other side of the News is a new radio show played   at Killradio
dot org an internet radio station,  discusses          environmental
issues,  indigenous struggles and political prisoners.  Today's show
features an interview with Hank Jones member of the San Fransisco
Eight who's currently on bail.  A statement was read before the
interview, stating that this material is not to be used for financial
and personal gain and that all inquiries must be directed to www dot
freedom archives dot org.

Connie from the South Central Farmers' Archive is also interviewed. 
She talks about the connection to land and makes a call out to
interested persons to contrivte to the archive, regarding the South
Central Farmers.  Go to the killradio dot org website and click on
archives.  The show is under Killradio the other side of the news and
under today's date.

Solidarity, Marisa

Available Soon: “Confrontations” by Kristian Williams

Available Early December 2007:

CONFRONTATIONS: Selected Journalism

By Kristian Williams
Foreword by Ward Churchill

“The theme of the articles collected here is the complex relationship
between ideas and what could broadly be called force—not merely violence,
but the whole spectrum of tactics that one side in a conflict uses to
disrupt the other. That includes sabotage, vandalism, blockades, boycotts,
and strikes—but also infiltration, intimidation, arrests, and
imprisonment.
“No one has a monopoly on direct action.… Winning in politics means
something more than having the best argument, the most votes, or the
biggest gun.”
—Kristian Williams, from his Introduction.

“Confrontations” collects together for the first time Kristian Williams’
essays examining political control in the United States. Williams, through
his journalism, uncovers the deep connections between liberal ideals of
democracy, and repression on the streets of America. The population is not
simply kept in line by violence, or conned by politicians, Williams
argues, but subject to overlapping methods of ideological manipulation and
physical restraint. The writings in this collection—many of which
previously appeared in publications such as Clamor, Dissent, CounterPunch
and the Earth First! Journal—expose the connections between liberal
discourse, insurgency and counterinsurgency, and government crackdowns on
dissent. This collection features a new introduction by Williams, setting
forth the lessons of earlier “anti-globalization” and anti-war movements,
which must now be grappled with by any sustained efforts for social
change. Each of the collection’s three sections—“Disreputable Action”,
“The Criminalization of Anarchism”, and “Crowd Control”—also feature new
commentary by the author.

Kristian Williams is the author of Our Enemies in Blue: Police and Power
in America (2004, reprinted 2007) and American Methods: Torture and the
Logic of Domination (2006), which has been short-listed this year for the
Oregon Book Award. Williams is a member of Rose City Copwatch in Portland,
Oregon, and is currently working on a book about Oscar Wilde and
anarchism. Information on Williams’ previous two books is available at the
South End Press website: southendpress.org

Ward Churchill, who contributed the foreword for this collection, is the
author, co-author or editor of over twenty books on indigenous issues,
history, media criticism and politics. He is a member of the autonomous
American Indian Movement chapter of Denver, Colorado. In July 2007,
Churchill was dismissed from his teaching position at the University of
Colorado under flimsy pretexts, as the result of a far-Right campaign
against dissenting voices on campus. For more information, see:
wardchurchill.net

Kristian Williams’ “Confrontations” collection is available for five
dollars postpaid.
(80 page printed pamphlet with cardstock cover.)

Pre-order your copy online ($5 postpaid) here:
http://tinyurl.com/2k7moe

Please contact Tarantula Publications for bulk distribution rates, to
obtain a review copy for your journal, or for information on our other
titles.

Tarantula Publishing & Distribution
818 SW 3rd Ave. PMB 1237
Portland, OR 97204
www.socialwar.net/tarantula

Promotional flyer (.pdf format) here:
http://socialwar.net/.pdf%20files/confrontations%20flyer.pdf
Spread the word—print and distribute!

November 2007 Update on Jeff "Free" Luers

Dear Friends and Supporters of Jeffrey Free Luers:

First, a brief announcement that we have a beautiful new design for Jeff's support website http://www.freejeffluers.org. A friend of ours, Javier, donated his time over the past few weeks and we are very grateful to him for his hard work.

Next, we want to thank you from the bottom of our hearts for all of the letters you have sent, events you have organized, and funds you have raised or donated, to help Jeff get through his time in prison and fight his outrageous 23-year sentence.

At the time of this writing Jeff is still at Lane County jail waiting for his resentencing hearing, yet to be scheduled. (See http://freejeffluers.org/background.html for appeal info)

We remain hopeful, but we need your help.

Legal costs and attorneys fees are mounting. In order to ensure that Jeff receives the best representation he can get at his resentencing, we are asking you, all of Jeff's supporters, to donate what you can to help him cover his legal costs and deal with the remainder of his time in prison.

In order for us to give something back, and to keep Jeff's case in everyone's mind, we've put together a few items to send out to his supporters. Items range from: benefit bracelets you can wear to show your support for Jeff and Green Scare prisoners; a brand new compilation CD of Jeff's (and our) favorite music (all donated by independent folk artists and punk rockers who are also Jeff's supporters); the documentary DVD "22/8: The Jeffrey 'Free' Luers Story"; great t-shirts with "Free Jeff Luers" above beautiful artwork by Nikki McClure on the front; and a book called "The Secret World of Terijian", by Crimthinc Northstar.

Anyone donating $150 or more will receive all of the items. For a donation of $75-$149, you will receive bracelets, the book and 2 other items (please specify). A donation of $25-$74 will receive bracelets, book, and 1 other item (please specify). All items will be shipped to the address you specify once we receive your donation. If you are outside the US please consider including a few extra dollars to cover the extra shipping costs.

Our price list for the items if you would like to purchase separately from your donation. Prices include US standard shipping. (all proceeds will go to Jeff):

Bracelets (2) - $4
CD - $14
DVD - $14
T-Shirt - $16
Book - $6

Please also continue to write to Jeff. He has told us how happy he is to be hearing from his supporters while he is at Lane County.

Write to:

Jeffrey Luers # 1306729
Lane County Adult Corrections
101 West 5th Ave
Eugene, OR 97401-2695

Thank you to all of you that have donated in the past. Your generosity is tremendously appreciated. It is with your help that Jeff may soon be able to once again be free. We look forward to the day we can sit down to dinner, walk to the park, watch the sunset, or hike an old-growth forest with Jeff again.

Thank you,

- Friends of Jeffrey "Free" Luers

Hushmail open to Feds with court orders

By John Leyden the Register
Published Thursday 8th November 2007 13:36 GMT

US federal law enforcement agencies have obtained access to clear text
copies of encrypted emails sent through Hushmail as part a of recent
drug trafficking investigation.

The access was only granted after a court order was served on Hush
Communications, the Canadian firm that offers the service.

Hush Communications said it would only accede to requests made in
respect to targeted accounts and via court orders filed through Canadian
court.

Nonetheless, the incident illustrates that Hushmail's marketing claims
that not even its own staff can access encrypted email is well wide of
the mark.

September cour t documents (pdf) from a US federal prosecution of alleged
steroid dealers reveals that Hush turned over 12 CDs involving emails on
three targeted Hushmail accounts, in compliance of court orders made
through the mutual assistance treaty between the US and Canada.

Hushmail is widely used by privacy advocates and the security-conscious
to send confidential emails. The service uses robust cryptographic and
encryption protocols (OpenPGP and AES 256) to scramble the contents of
messages stored on its servers, and to exchange encrypted messages with
other encrypted email users.

Breaking messages encrypted by the service by brute force would be
nigh-on impossible. So how was access to clear-text messages obtained?
An investigation by Wired reveals that a server-side encryption option
introduced by Hushmail in 2006 means that a copy of a user's passphrase,
which gives access to encrypted messages, might be obtained.

"In the case of the alleged steroid dealer, the feds seemed to compel
Hushmail to exploit this hole, store the suspects' secret passphrase or
decryption key, decrypt their messages, and hand them over," Wired reports.
Brewing up a storm

Hushmail introduced the server-side encryption option because some users
found installing and running a Java applet to be slow and annoying. In
its original form this Java applet was used to perform the encryption
and decryption of messages on a user's computer.

In this scenario, a clear text copy of a message would never hit
Hushmail's servers so Hush would only be able to respond to law
enforcement requests with scrambled messages, at least in theory. In
practice, Hushmail's Java architecture still permits a mechanism for the
recovery of scrambled emails in clear-text form.

Brian Smith, chief technology officer of Hushmail, declined to speak
about specific law enforcement requests. However he was more forthcoming
in explaining the technology implications of Hushmail's server-side
encryption options.

"The key point, though, is that in the non-Java configuration, private
key and passphrase operations are performed on the server-side. This
requires that users place a higher level of trust in our servers as a
trade off for the better usability they get from not having to install
Java and load an applet," he said.

"This might clarify things a bit when you are considering what actions
we might be required to take under a court order. Again, I stress that
our requirement in complying with a court order is that we not take
actions that would affect users other than those specifically named in
the o rder."

As Wired notes, Hushmail's marketing collateral fails to stress the
implications of using the non-Java option. Even the Java option might
not be entirely secure. Hush may be obliged to rig the Java applet sent
to targeted users with a backdoor designed to capture their passwords,
Wired implies.

It explains that "Hushmail's own threat matrix includes this
possibility, saying that if an attacker got into Hushmail's servers,
they could compromise an account - but that 'evidence of the attack'
(presumably the rogue Java applet) could be found on the user's computer."

The upshot of this is that a paranoid user might be able to detect - if
not prevent - if his Hushmail account is being interfered with, but only
if he uses the Java applet option.

"This means that in Java mode the level of trust the user must place in
us is somewh at reduced, although not eliminated," Hushmail's Smith told
Wired. "The extra security given by the Java applet is not particularly
relevant, in the practical sense, if an individual account is targeted."

Smith told Wired that those looking to Hushmail as a safe haven for
snooping on illegal activity were out of luck. However, he added that
the firm, unlike US telecoms firms involved in the controversy over the
Bush administration's warrantless wiretapping program, would resist mass
surveillance efforts.

"[Hushmail] is useful for avoiding general Carnivore-type government
surveillance, and protecting your data from hackers, but definitely not
suitable for protecting your data if you are engaging in illegal
activity that could result in a Canadian court order," Smith told Wired.

"That's also backed up by the fact that all Hushmail users agree to our
&g t; terms of service, which state that Hushmail is not to be used for
illegal activity. However, when using Hushmail, users can be assured
that no access to data (including server logs, etc.) will be granted
without a specific court order.

"We receive many requests for information from law enforcement
authorities, including subpoenas, but on being made aware of the
requirements, a large percentage of them do not proceed," said Smith.

"To date, we have not challenged a court order in court, as we have made
it clear that the court orders that we would accept must follow our
guidelines of requiring only actions that can be limited to the specific
user accounts named in the court order. That is to say, any sort of
requirement for broad data collection would not be acceptable."

Animal rights threats woman jailed

Urgent ELP! Bulletin (19th of November 2007)

Dear friends

ELP has just learnt that British animal rights activist Deborah Morrison has been sentenced to 8 months imprisonment for her anti-vivisection activities.

We don't know where she is being held. If anyone knows her or knows where she is, please contact ELP as soon as possible. Below is a mainstream media article about her:

http://www.thisisdorset.net/display.var.1840677.0.animal_rights_threats_woman_jailed.php

Animal rights threats woman jailed

A protester from Crossways who waged a five-year campaign of blackmail
and terror on people connected with animal research companies across
many parts of England has been jailed for eight months.

Deborah Morrison, 35, of Egdon Glenn, pleaded guilty at Stafford Crown
Court to six charges of blackmail, three of interference with intention
to cause harm to animal research, two attempted interference and one
attempted blackmail between January 2001 and October 2006.

Two blackmail charges involved the company of David Hall, the son-in-law
of 84-year-old Gladys Hammond, whose remains were taken from her grave
at St Peter's Church, Yoxall near Lichfield, in October 2004.

Her remains were recovered early in October 2006 after Mr Hall decided
to close his Darley Oaks guinea pig-breeding business at Newchurch near
Lichfield.

Judge Simon Tonking told Morrison: "It is plain you were acting on your
own in isolation and you were not a member of an animal rights organisation.

"But the fact is that for a period of five years you sent a variety of
threatening letters and emails to 11 separate people involved in
providing services for businesses involved in scientific research in
which animals were used.

"They were innocent people. Your threats were reinforced by sending
white powder in envelopes which, in fact, was harmless.

Your intention, quite plainly, was that they take them as something more
sinister. They were told the expect a visit from a car bomb and death
threats were taken to be just that.

"You were beligerent and ruthless and intended to change the ways
families lived. Through no fault of your own you have psychiatric problems."

Peter Grice, prosecuting, said John Goodyear, a vet who treated domestic
animals at the Darley Oaks business, got two letters and was told to
stop doing that business with animal killers. You have been warned'. Mr
Grice said white powder in one letter turned out to be starch.

Isabella Forshaw, defending, said: "She must be given full credit for
her pleas made in truly daunting circumstances.

"She is a very vulnerable person. She has had a very restricted and
very, very abnormal pattern of life."

Head of the Public Order and Protest Unit for Staffordshire Police
Inspector David Bird said: "Morrison carried out a widespread campaign
of intimidation over several years. She sought to cause financial loss
to companies engaged in lawful business, and caused genuine fear for
dozens of staff and their families."

++++++++

Earth Liberation Prisoners Support Network
BM Box 2407
London
WC1N 3XX
England
www.spiritoffreedom.org.uk

Eric McDavid - Hunger Strike, Day 10

 18.Nov.2007
author: Sacramento Prisoner Support via portland indymedia

Eric is still being denied vegan food and proper medical care...
As Eric ends the 10th day of his hunger strike we would like to take
the opportunity to thank everyone that is working to support him, to
update you on his health and clarify where things stand with the jail.

It has come to our attention that the Correctional Health Services
Division has told people that they are attending to Eric's health
properly and that there is nothing else that they can do. Though it
is true that some of the things Eric is demanding must be authorized
by the higher ups (such as Scott Jones), the jail medical staff can
help remedy this situation in four important ways:

1) Give Eric the treatment they have promised. That means bloodwork,
an ECG, and a visit from a cardiologist. This is not our idea of the
treatment he should get, this is the treatment the doctors and nurses
have said that Eric should get, or that they will provide. The
doctors did finally give Eric an x-ray on Friday, but they did NOT
discuss the results of the x-ray with him, or even show it to him.
They also told Eric on Friday that they would be checking his vitals
every day, but this has not happened since that time.

2) Eric needs to be given full access to his medical records and the
results of these tests.

3) Dr. Dutrick (possibly mispelled), the man in charge at medical
services, should recommend that Eric be given vegan food for medical
reasons (it would obviously improve his health). Scott Jones said in
an interview with the Sacramento Bee that they will give prisoners
vegan food with a doctor's order.

4) Dr. Dutrick should make a recommendation to the jail
administration that inmates who refuse to eat non-vegan food should
be given vegan food for medical reasons (clearly eating is healthier
than starving)

These things should be very easy considering only one point involves
the actual delivery of medical care, which seems to be their weak
point. Once these things have actually been done (not just empty
promises made to Eric) then there will be no need to call the
Correctional Health Services Division any more.

When calling the jail administration about vegan food, please request
that they:

1) Provide Eric with vegan food immediately.

2) Change the policy about vegan meals and ensure future access to
anyone that refuses to eat non-vegan food.

3) Scott Jones or Operations Commander Lt. Deputy Douglas needs to
speak with Eric immediately about his requests so they can begin
remedying the situation.

Please be aware when you call the jail that they may tell you Eric is
receiving medical care, or that he is receiving food. Both of these
statements are false. As soon as either of these situations are
remedied we will let you know. They may also tell you to call Eric's
mother, or that she will call you. This is completely absurd, as most
of you don't even know Eric's mother. The jail is merely attempting
to reduce the amount of calls they are receiving. Do not let this
deter you. If the jail wants people to stop calling, the solution is
easy - provide him with quality medical care and ensure vegan food
for him and future vegan prisoners.

Eric is still rapidly losing weight - he has lost approximately 10
pounds in the last 10 days - and his medical condition is quickly
deteriorating. He is still having problems with circulation in his
extremities, his energy levels are quickly decreasing and it is
becoming increasingly difficult for him to perform his normal, day to
day functions.

Please continue calling the jail at the numbers below, and make sure
you have Eric's x-reference number handy in case they ask for it
(x-ref 2972521):

The phone number to the Correctional Health Services Division is:
(916) 875-9782.

You can also email them at:  inmatepatientcare@saccounty.net

Jail phone numbers: 916-874-6752 or 916-874-6905

Captain Scott Jones: 916-874-5428 (This is the direct line for the
jail commander and it may only be answered during business hours)

You can also request to speak with Jail Operations Commander Douglas,
as he is allegedly the person who will probably make the final
decision about Eric's food.

We will send out more details as they become available. Thank you all
again for your continued support!

www.supporteric.org

homepage: homepage: http://www.supporteric.org

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Website and email for Chris McIntosh support

From: "Support Chris McIntosh" <info@supportchris.net>

Date: November 17, 2007

There is a now a support website and email address for Chris "Dirt" McIntosh.

The website will have more info soon, but we wanted to send this out right

away so everyone is aware of its existence. Note the ".net"

website: http://www.supportchris.net

email: info@supportchris.net

Please spread this around. Thank you!

Pigs nab G20 protester in Sydney update

A New Zealand man wanted for rioting in Melbourne at last year's
G20 economic summit has been arrested in Sydney on a holiday stopover
to Europe.

  Victorian police heading the taskforce into last November's
violent rioting said Gabriel Shanks was arrested in Sydney yesterday
en route to Spain and Britain.

  He was wanted for riot and affray offences committed during the
summit on November 18.

  The 22-year-old was arrested by airport police and remanded to
appear at Waverly Court for an extradition hearing on Monday.
  Victoria Police officers will fly to Sydney for the hearing and
expect Mr Shanks to appear in the Melbourne Magistrates Court on
Tuesday.

  It comes nearly one year on from the violent confrontation between
protesters and police in Melbourne's CBD.

  "He was arrested as he was travelling through Sydney airport from
New Zealand en route to Europe," said Detective Sergeant Adrian
Richards.

  "Police at the airport arrested him on our behalf, we believe he
was going to Spain or England.

  "It's unclear if he was going for political purposes and have no
idea of his travel intentions -- it's a coincidence that he has
happened to return to Australia the same week as the first
anniversary (of the riot)," Detective Sergeant Richards said.

  Mr Shanks was one of 28 "persons of interest" featured in police
photographs from the summit protest released to the media.

  Officers heading Operation Salver, the taskforce investigating the
riots, have arrested 12 of the people featured.

  The G20 demonstrations on November 18 injured 10 police officers,
with one constable bitten during a confrontation between 100
protesters and 60 police near Parliament House.

  In March, police charged another five people in Sydney over the
violent protests.

  Four men aged 20 to 25 and a 17-year-old youth were arrested in
raids in five suburbs.

  A total of 26 people have been charged in relation to the G20
economic forum riot with a total of 246 offences.

  Most who have appeared in Melbourne Magistrates Court since have
had their bail extended until February when they will appear for
committal hearings.

  Last month, Melbourne protester Akin Sari -- who was also arrested
in Sydney -- pleaded guilty to rioting during the summit.

Dec. 1st: The Trial/Cuban 5 Film

The ProLibertad Freedom Campaign is calling on all supporters of Puerto Rico and the work to free all political prisoners to support the NEW YORK PREMIERE OF "THE TRIAL: THE UNTOLD TORY OF THE CUBAN 5"

The Cuban 5 need our support!!
______________________________________________________________


The Popular Education Project to Free the Cuban 5
freethecubanfive@hotmail.com and freethecuban5@gmail.com
_____________________________________________________________

Saturday December 1st, 2007 at 6:30pm

1199 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Labor Center Auditorium
310 W43rd St. (btwn. 8th-9th Ave.)
Take the A,C, E, 1, 2, 3, 7, N, Q, R, S, or W Trains to 42nd St. and Times Square

Suggested Donation: $10 (no one will be turned away for lack of funds)

PROCEEDS GO TO A SPECIAL HOLIDAY COMMISSARY GIFT FOR THE CUBAN 5!!

Join the Popular Education Project to Free the Cuban 5 for the New York
Premiere of "El Processo" (The Trial: The Untold Story of the Cuban 5)!!

A brand-new (September 2007) 70-minute documentary from Cuban filmmaker Rolando Almirante that tells the story of the Cuban Five and their legal struggle. This documentary explores the U.S. government's use of false conspiracy charges and secret evidence which laid the basis for their conviction. It features revealing interviews with defense and prosecuting attorneys, Cuban and U.S. experts, and advocates for the Five's freedom.

English Narration by actor Danny Glover

The Program also will consist of a short Legal Update, Update from the Canadian Conference to Free the Cuban 5, and several campaign updates.

Light refreshments will be served.

Eric McDavid Hunger Strike- Day 7

Eric's hearing on the motion for new trial and judgement of acquittal has
been moved from November 15 to December 6. Eric's lawyer saw him tonight
and it sounds like his condition is the same. We are not aware of any
efforts made on the part of the jail to remedy his food or medical
situation. The Dr. claims that a cardiologist will see him but no date has
been given.

If you call the jail let them know that this is a life threatening
situation and they should change their policies about vegan meals, provide
Eric vegan food immediately and discuss these issues with him face to
face.
Jail phone numbers 916-874-6752 or 916-874-6905
Captain Scott Jones 916-874-5428 (This is the direct line for the jail
commander and it may only be answered during business hours)


The jail commander has said in the past that inmates can receive special
meals with a doctor's order. Request that the doctor make that
recommendation for Eric to help stabilize his heart condition as well as
giving him the tests that he needs (blood work, ECG, X-RAY).

The phone number to the Correctional Health Services Division is: (916)
875-9782.

You can also email them at: inmatepatientcare@saccounty.net


Eric's x-reference number: x-2972521 (if they ask, he is housed at the
main jail)

We would also like to let everyone know we will not be sending out alerts
everyday unless there is news to report. Please know that your calls and
other support is needed and helpful. We will report any progress
immediately.
Thank you for your support,
SPS

UK terror law change kicks in

By John Leyden → More by this author theregister.co.uk

Published Wednesday 14th November 2007 08:02 GMT

An animal rights activist has been ordered to hand over her encryption keys to the authorities.

Section Three of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) came into force at the start in October 2007, seven years after the original legislation passed through parliament. Intended primarily to deal with terror suspects, it allows police to demand encryption keys or provide a clear text transcript of encrypted text.

Failure to comply can result in up to two years imprisonment for cases not involving national security, or five years for terrorism offences and the like. Orders can be made to turn over data months or even years old.

The contentious measure, introduced after years of consultation, was sold to Parliament as a necessary tool for law enforcement in the fight against organised crime and terrorism.

But an animal rights activist is one of the first people at the receiving end of a notice to give up encryption keys. Her computer was seized by police in May, and she has been given 12 days to hand over a pass-phrase to unlock encrypted data held on the drive - or face the consequences.

The woman, who claims to have not used encryption, relates her experiences in an anonymous posting on Indymedia.

"Now apparently they have found some encrypted files on my computer (which was stolen by police thugs in May this year) which they think they have 'reasonable suspicion' to pry into using the excuse of 'preventing or detecting a crime'," she writes.

"Now I have been 'invited' (how nice, will there be tea and biccies?) to reveal my keys to the police so they can look at these files. If I do not comply and tell them to keep their great big hooters out of my private affairs I could be charged under RIPA."

The woman says that any encrypted data put on the PC must have been put there by somebody else.

"Funny thing is PGP and I never got on together I confess that I am far too dense for such a complex (well to me anyway) programme. Therefore in a so-called democracy I am being threatened with prison simply because I cannot access encrypted files on my computer."

She argues that even if she had used encryption she'd be disinclined to hand over her pass phrase. "The police are my enemy, I know that they have given information about me to Huntingdon Life Sciences (as well as hospitalising me)," she writes. "Would I really want them to see and then pass around private communications with my solicitors which could be used against me at a later date in the civil courts, medical records, embarrassing poetry which was never meant to be read by anyone else, soppy love letters or indeed personal financial transactions?"

Indymedia reports that similar demands have been served against other animal rights activists, a point we have not been able to verify.

The woman was issued a notice by the Crown Prosecution Service, and not (as might be expected) the police. According to the code of conduct, the authorities would normally ask a suspect to put the files into intelligible form, though how this would work when a PC is being held by the police is far from clear.

It's unclear if the woman was given an official Section 49 notice or simply "invited" to hand over the data voluntarily as part of a bluff by the authorities.

Richard Clayton, a security researcher at Cambridge University and long-time contributor to UK security policy working groups, said that only the police are authorised to issue Section 49 notices. "What seems to have happened is that the CPS (who couldn't issue a notice anyway) have written asking the person to volunteer their key," he adds.

"Should they refuse this polite request, they are being threatened with the subsequent issuing of a notice, which might or might not require the key to be produced (it might of course just require the putting into an intelligible form of the data)."

Clayton expressed concern that the incident illustrates possible holes in the long-delayed code of practice. "It would clearly be desirable to seek NTAC's views before approaching suspects with requests for keys (rather than requests to put into an intelligible form) - lest the authorities give the impression that they know rather less about the rules (and the operation of encryption systems) than everyone else," he said.

Interview with Christian S. on resistance inside the prison walls

About the definition of cooperation and confrontation within the prison
system: an interview with the antifascist Christian S. from Berlin, on
resistance inside the prison walls.
Christian is locked up in the prison of Berlin-Tegel because of his active
antifascist engagement.

”Why did you give yourself in?“
After the last time I have been released, in january 2006 after the
pretrial detention time, I have been asked often if I want intending to
serve the rest of the sentence, 40 months, or if I rather choose to go
underground. A topical question which appeared already often in the
history of resistance, and which have been answered in different ways. On
the one side, many people fought for my release and therefore the fact
that I choose to enter „freely“ the prison again, might take people by
surprise. On the other one, going underground means always more and more
charges for the one who support me, and it carries also some political
results. An escape reprents a huge financial and logistical
organizationally effort to be carried on by all the solidary environment,
a fact which does not make a person on the run very happy. Moreover, an
escape following a sentence for breaching the peace (ndr. Christian's
case), brings also grist to the mills of the ones who are responsible for
the inflactionary increase of arrest warrants after a demonstration or any
antifascist action; at least, it makes a decision for the release from
custody very difficult for all the others. As last, my eventual going
underground would have meant that nazis and the repression boards would be
able to decide who is aloud to be politically active in Berlin, and who,
instead, need to prepare his/her luggage and get on his/her own way.

„Does the decision of giving yourself in then representing an act of
cooperation with the state?“
In the case of short sentences, it is not a problem to not give yourself
in and to wait until the moment you will be then arrested. Talking about
long ones, going underground represents the only true alternative.
Regarding my case, I was hoping to pass the message that it is possible to
keep on living despite prison, say not renouncing to your friendships or
your political desires. To push the possible mistakes that lead to being
caught, put into custody and process back it is necessary to point them
out to others. Indeed, how many people choose to step away at least from
the antifascist scene, following their first „contact“ with the pigs?

„How is resistance possible inside prison?“
Cooperation in prison means for example to accept important workplaces,
such as in the workshop or in the sanitary and so on...Exaclty those kind
of jobs have to be refused, also the contact with with the officials has
to be avoided, beside the absolutely minimal one. Instead, the usage of
your own „rights“ and the communication of any kind of abuse, through an
intensive work within the public sphere, might be contributing to a fully
desiderable confrontation inside and outside prisons. Despite the usage of
a wide spectrum of oppressive means – as of ones, intended to destroy your
own personality – not all the ones willing to resist are being extirpated
by the prisons of Berlin. The rage within the prison for young offenders,
in Moabit (prison for the ones awaiting trial) and in Tegel is very big,
but a lighting spark from the outside is missing.

„Are you aware on how resistance is looking alike in other countries?“
In Greece or Spain the level of political consciousness and of resistance
within prisons is much higher, also because many actions of solidarity are
happening on the outside, actions that here are almost unimaginable.
Surely, also in Greece no prisoner is being released because a bank have
been bombed in his/her name, but these kind of actions are contributing in
making the prisoners collective consciousness stronger, as well as of
their supporters and of all the movement. Absolutely fatal would be
leaving the resistance within prisons to our enemies, who gather around
the Neonazisinger from the band Landser, Michael Regner. The solidarity
demonstration done by the nazis to the Tegel prison produced a structural
increase of the nazis here inside.

More informnations about Christian:
http://www.infoshop.org/inews/article.php?story=20070724105544911

Our passion for freedom is stronger than any prison!
ABC Berlin

McDavid Hunger Strike Day 6

As Eric enters day 6 of his hunger strike we wanted to give the latest

news on his health and the response from the jail.

Yesterday Eric requested to see the nurse because his kidneys hurt and his

right tonsil was inflamed and bleeding. He was seen by the nurse today but

they refused to examine his kidneys or his tonsils. They just took his

vitals. He is 152 pounds which means he has lost 8 pounds since Friday.

Last Friday Eric sent a message to the Dr. asking what would be the effect

of taking the steriods they wanted to give him for his pericarditis if he

wasn't eating. Today he received the utterly confusing response that he

never had pericarditis so they would have no effect. Obviously this does

not explain whether or not it is safe to take these drugs while hunger

striking.

We have a report that the direct line for Captain Scott Jones is

916-874-5428. He is the main jail commander and decides whether or not

Eric gets fed and what policies should be in place for feeding other vegan

prisoners. You may want to mention to him that states such as Florida have

chosen to offer vegan meals as the special meal in all of their prisons.

The jail has provided Eric with vegan food before and can do it again.

Eric is hunger striking with the demand that he be given a garauntee of

healthy vegan meals and that the jails policy be changed to provide vegan

food for other prisoners that request it.

Apparently the Correctional Health Services Division has been flooded with

call about Eric's case. It appears they are just begining to be informed

about this issue and take his dire medical situation seriously. A staff

person from the Correctional Health Services Division and a man who

identified himself as the Medical Director of UCD Medical Center both

called Eric's mother today and asked her to tell people to stop calling.

Eric's mother explained to them what Eric's condition was and why people

were concerned. They both said they did not know about Eric's food

situation. Be sure to mention the link between Eric's lack of food and his

heart condition as well as his hunger strike if you call them. Here is the

pertinent information for calling the Correctional Health Services

Division.

1) Eric's x-reference number: x-2972521 (if they ask, he is housed at the

main jail)

2) Eric needs to be given vegan food immediately. His heart condition is

almost certainly linked to his atrocious nutritional intake, and until

they provide him with healthy food, his heart problem will persist.

Because Eric is demanding that they talk to him about changing their

policy, it is imperative that they speak with him right away about working

on an agreement. You should request to speak with Captain Scott Jones,

the jail commander, about these issues.

3) Eric needs to receive an ECG, blood work and an x-ray ASAP. These tests

are imperative to determining other possible causes of the pericarditis.

Again, until they fully understand what is causing the condition, they

will only be treating symptoms.

The phone number to the Correctional Health Services Division is: (916)

875-9782.

You can also email them at: inmatepatientcare@saccounty.net.

On Thursday November 15 at 10am Eric with appear in Judge England

courtroom for the hearing on his motion for a new trial.

Thank you to all those who have been writing and calling the jail, it

sounds like we may be finally getting through to them. It is important for

them to know that they are being scrutinized and that there are many

people that are concerned about Eric and will continue to be concerned

until this situation is resolved. Everyday that this continues his health

is in jeopardy.

Thank you for your support

SPS

sacprisonersupport@riseup.net

McDavid Hunger Strike Day Five

sacprisonersupport@riseup.net

Nov 13

Dear friends and supporters,

We wanted to give you the latest news about Eric’s medical and food

situation. Things are still quite critical, and we need everyone’s help

as Eric enters day five of his hunger strike.

After visiting the doctor on Friday night, the jail began offering Eric

the same medications he took for his pericarditis in the spring. Due to

his hunger strike, however, Eric is declining to take the medication until

the jail can tell him if there would be any adverse affects. They have

yet to do this. While his heart condition persists, it has lessened in

intensity. On Saturday he was finally able to lie down again, although

when he called us this morning (Monday) he said he had trouble getting to

sleep last night.

His hunger strike is beginning to take its toll on his body. This morning

he told us the circulation to his hands and feet is getting weaker, and

eventually he had to get off the phone because his legs were tiring.

Because Eric has not received vegan meals since a week before his trial in

September, he is starting his hunger strike with an already weakened body

and immune system. He informed us on Sunday that he has lost

approximately 20 pounds in the last two months (he discovered this when

they weighed him during his visit with the doctor).

Despite this, Eric stands firm in his decision to continue his hunger

strike. In fact, he has expanded the objectives of his hunger strike, and

is now requesting the following from the jail:

“A written, notarized and signed document consisting of the following

agreement between the parties involved, i.e. myself and Sacramento County

Main Jail:

1. A healthy provisionary diet will be provided by the jail that does not

consist of animal products and byproducts

a. This healthy, provisionary diet will be provided to individuals

requesting it due to their moral, ethical and religious needs

2. Within the next three months dates will be allocated for the meeting of

parties who fund, operate, manage and oversee issues dealing with the food

services at SCMJ; whereas the central intent will be to secure the

necessary steps in creating a complete vegan diet, as well as its

implementation at the soonest possible date [There are currently models in

place for vegan food in jails and prisons. Florida prisons recently made

vegan diets available to everyone who needs a “special diet” (kosher,

halal, Seventh Day Adventist, etc.) ]

3. This agreement would be binding to the current administration as well

as all successive administrations”

This means, in essence, that the jail must now not only feed Eric, but

also must change their underlying policies about vegan food. This

decision is motivated by Eric’s desire that no one have to endure this

struggle in the future. All prisoners should be afforded their right to

healthy, nutritional food – it is the jail’s responsibility to ensure that

this happens.

Eric knows this will not be an easy battle, and he needs all of us on the

outside to support him as much as possible. There are a number of things

you can do to support Eric at this time, including calling the jail,

spreading the word about his hunger strike, and sending him letters of

support.

The most urgent thing you can do right now is call the jail and request

they agree to Eric’s demands AND that they respond properly to his medical

needs. Here are some things you should say when you call:

1) Eric's x-reference number: x-2972521 (if they ask, he is housed at the

main jail)

2) Eric needs to be given vegan food immediately. His heart condition is

almost certainly linked to his atrocious nutritional intake, and until

they provide him with healthy food, his heart problem will persist.

Because Eric is demanding that they talk to him about changing their

policy, it is imperative that they speak with him right away about working

on an agreement. You should request to speak with Captain Scott Jones,

the jail commander, about these issues.

3) Eric needs to receive an ECG, blood work and an x-ray ASAP. These tests

are imperative to determining other possible causes of the pericarditis.

Again, until they fully understand what is causing the condition, they

will only be treating symptoms.

The phone number to the Correctional Health Services Division is: (916)

875-9782.

You can also email them at: inmatepatientcare@saccounty.net.

Their website says that they log all calls and emails to the Correctional

Health Services Division and that you will receive a response within 24

hours (this has NOT been the case, as those of you who have called or

emailed probably know). If you get an answering machine, leave a long

detailed message, including your name and number if you would like to

receive a call back

You should also call the main jail line at: 916-874-6752 or 916-874-6905,

leave a message with them, and also request to speak with Captain Scott

Jones.

Please spread the word about Eric and his hunger strike. The more people

we have working for his health and safety out here, the more likely he is

to receive the food and medical care he needs. We must not let the bars

and concrete silence his voice, but to do that we must be vocal ourselves.

We hope to post a flyer on the website soon that you can pass out around

town or use at events. Encourage your friends and family to call and

email the jail – it only takes a few minutes out of your day, but its

critically important for Eric. This fight is not only for Eric’s life,

but for all those after him who refuse to abandon their ethics and

compassion in jail.

And please keep writing Eric during this difficult time. Our letters help

feed his spirit, even when his belly is empty… For guidelines and info on

writing Eric at the jail, visit his website at www.supporteric.org.

Our deepest thanks to everyone who has been calling and emailing the jail

– we need you to keep it up!

We’ll keep you updated on this situation as more information becomes

available.

Yours,

sps

Sadie and Exile need funds!

From: solidaritywithsadieandexile@gmail.com

Date: November 12, 2007 10:41:03 PM EST

Warm Greetings,

As Autumn takes her grip and we venture indoors there is an

opportunity to wonder about the state of our friends and loves. Our

thoughts are currently drawn towards our disappeared, Sadie and Exile,

languishing in their respective prisons. As some of the freshness of

the new environs begins to fade and the specter of at least 5 more

years of imprisonment looms, their resilience is likely flagging to

some degree. The generous spate of donations that continued throughout

their time in Oregon has abated, and there is concern on their part

that there won't be money for them to get their needs met.

While we feel uncomfortable continually harassing you folks for money,

we are seeking a way to ensure their ongoing financial support. They

require a stipend for commissary each month, and sadly their support

fund has run dry. We are wondering if it might be possible for people

to commit to a monthly donation, obviating the need for these pesky

emergency pleas. Even a small $5.00-$15.00 donation on a regular basis

will make necessary items available to them. Sadie recently wrote to

tell us that her Reeboks were wearing out and that she needed another

pair of shoes. While we are greatly saddened to know that someone who

once displayed such a brilliant aesthetic has been reduced to wearing

Reeboks, we know that comfortable shoes are pretty crucial.

Sadie and Exile are currently gestating ideas for an internet

presence, which will bring to light their lives for those of us on the

outside. This will also hopefully ease the financial burden, as people

not on this list will be able to donate to the support fund via

Paypal. In the meantime, any monetary offerings you can send their way

would be heartily appreciated!

Both of them report doing well, enjoying listening to the radio and

getting the opportunity to work. Sadie has taken a job as a plumber,

learning more than she probably ever wanted to know about this arcane

profession. She's glad to be picking up what is surely such a useful

skill, but looking forward to the time when she will no longer have to

work the full 40 hour workweek. Exile seems to have become the

groundskeeper for the prison chapel, which if you know him, you will

recognize as an astoundingly appropriate job for such a mystical soul

(who is also a gardener by trade)! They are both being paid prison

wages, which I'm sure you can guess are pitiful, and even these will

be garnished by the government in an attempt to collect remunerations

for the corporations who incurred financial damage from their actions.

We hope that all of you are faring well and have enjoyed the changing

shades of the surrounding world. Please be in touch if you have any

questions.

Be well.

PP Chris "Dirt" McIntosh in need of support

Chris is currently in his 3rd year of an 8

year sentence for arson at a McDonalds in Seattle.

His website is no longer active.

Please write to Chis and add him to your support lists. He

can be reached at:

Chris McIntosh #30512-013

USP Hazelton

PO Box 2000

Bruceton Mills, WV 26525

Statement from Chris McIntosh

Some time ago, I asked the movement to remove my name from

prisoner lists and support efforts. Unfortunately, because

at the time my reasons for doing so were in conflict with

certain persons' ideologies, my prepared statement was not

posted on my website. So it seemed as though I took my

leave without explanation, which was not the case. Also,

it seemed like I was “quitting.” But that was not and

still is not the case.

I had become frustrated and disillusioned by the

resistance to evolution within the struggle. I see

evolution as one of the main principles to be harnessed in

order to escape the entropic fate that destroys all life

that doesn’t progress in being or survival tactics. Also,

I don’t understand why the foremost natural law – might

makes right – is not held paramount. The fact we have no

inherent rights other than what we conquer through our

manifest physical will.

Now I still don’t understand why those principles have not

become the North star of our resistance movement, but I

realize after much contemplation and reflection upon my

responsibility in the struggle for the preservation of all

life, bailing out was not the most responsible step and

not the healthiest choice.

So it is, I humbly request that those who still care for

my situation and would in some way help in the support of

my personal struggle during this incarceration by whatever

is in their means – be it a letter or much needed funds

(would be much appreciated) as my diet and maintenance of

such is still an issue, commissary funds are necessary.

The Administration is and has been very unsympathetic to

the veg diets of the prisoners here. It has even caused

me, at times, to eat meat – which is a strain on me.

Also I need mental and emotional support. This institution

being a U.S.P. (maximum security) sees a lot of violence –

stabbings, attempted murders… We are on lockdown for our

second murder in a little over a year as I write this. I

am also struggling with the race dynamics here. Ignorant

behavior finds some way to oppress you no matter where you

turn and creates high race tension. I have fought hard and

long to combat within myself the anger and hatred caused

by this tension. As I move through time further and

further from the streets and the good people I knew, this

situation seems more and more like reality and I need help

in grounding myself back on the other side of this wall.

I need your help to regain my sense of hope for the future

in a place where survival is not guaranteed. I need your

help to maintain my long held anarchist beliefs in this

environment of debased, sickening individuals.

I appreciate your help.

Your anarchist brother in continued resistance

-Chris “Dirt” McIntosh

13 October 2007

PS. I don’t think any of the people that were doing my

support will be available to do it again, so I’m thinking

even low level support will be better than none.

(see

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2002688656_mcdonalds17m.html)

Support SF8 and PRican PPs!!

The ProLibertad Freedom Campaign
http://www.ProLibertadWeb.com
ProLibertad@hotmail.com and ProLibertad.Campaign@gmail.com
ProLibertad Hotline: 718-601-4751
_______________________________________________________________________________

SUPPORT THE SAN FRANCISCO 8 ON FRI. NOV. 30TH AND THE PUERTO RICAN
POLITICAL PRISONERS ON SAT. DEC. 15TH!!
_______________________________________________________________________________

Celebrate and defend the legacy of the Black Panther Party:

Drop the charges against the SF-8

NYC, Friday, November 30, 7 pm
Martin Luther King Jr. Labor Center
310 W. 43rd Street (between 8th & 9th Ave.) NYC

Speakers Include: Gil Noble, respected producer and host of ABC-TV's Like It
Is Francisco Torres, Harold Taylor and other SF-8 defendants
Soffiyah Elijah, Esq., lawyer on the SF-8 case
Performing: alixa + naima/Climbing Poetree

The San Francisco 8 are eight former "original" Black Panther Party members
and active supporters (ages 56 to 72), who were arrested last January in
California, New York and Florida on charges related to the 1971 killing of a
San Francisco police officer. Some of these men faced virtually identical
charges almost 35 years ago—charges that were dropped after it was revealed
that police torture had extracted "confessions."

But that was in 1973. Now that torture has been made acceptable in this
country, the case is back on—based on the same flawed evidence.

The judge has released the 6 bail-eligible defendants on bond, suggesting to
legal experts that this case is a shaky one.

Two of the 8 defendants—political prisoners Herman Bell and Jalil
Muntaqim—are not eligible for bail. They remain in jail in San Francisco,
having already served more than 34 years in New York state prisons. This new
case charges them again with actions for which they are already doing time.

Learn more about the case and welcome home defendant Cisco Torres, released
on bail, now back with his family in Queens, New York.

For Information Contact: Committee to Free the SF-8 (freethesf8.org), Local
1199 (Michael@1199.org), (Malcolm X Grassroots Movement (mxgm.org)
The Jericho Movement (thejerichomovement.com) or call: (718) 254-8800 or
(646) 246-0770

Come support the SF-8—and defend the history of all struggles for justice.

Sponsors so far: SEIU Local 1199, Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, NY State
Taskforce for Political Prisoners, the Jericho Movement, Resistance in
Brooklyn, Campaign to End the Death Penalty, Pro Libertad, Frances Goldin,
Safiya Bukhari-Albert Nuh Washington Foundation, Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
Coalition (NYC), Black Panther Commemoration Committee (NY), Malcolm X
Commemoration Committee, NYC Anarchist Black Cross, Gabriela Network USA
______________________________________________________________________________

¡SALSA FOR FREEDOM 2007!

PROCEEDS GO TO THE COMMISSARY OF THE PUERTO RICAN POLITICAL PRISONERS!!

Saturday Dec. 15th, 2007 at 7pm-2am
St. Mary’s Episcopal Church 521 W126th St.
(Btwn. Amsterdam Ave. and Broadway. Take the 1 train W125th St.)

Join us for a night of amazing music, non-stop dancing, delicious Puerto
Rican Food and bring your check book for annual Freedom Auction!! Suggested
donation: $10 (no one will be turned away)

Music Provided by “DJ CARLITO AND HIS MAMBO/SALSA SPINS”!! Party to all the
Salsa, Merengue, and Hip Hop you can dance too!!

For tickets or more information contact The ProLibertad Freedom Campaign:
ProLibertad@Hotmail.com or call 718-601-4751

End of the game: Indigenous Peoples' bringing down Apartheid wall

by Brenda Norrell
Saturday, November 10, 2007 at 10:56 PM

Mohawks were among 19 Indian Nations at the Indigenous Peoples' Border Summit of the Americas 2007. The four-day summit concluded Saturday with a challenge from Mike Wilson, Tohono O'odham who puts out water for migrants. Lenny Foster, Dine', spoke on Native inmates' ceremonial rights and freedom for Leonard Peltier. Petuuche Gilbert, Acoma Pueblo, shared insights into law and the border, with the summit culminating in a Blackfire resistance concert.

Mike Wilson, Tohono O'odham, said it is important to dispel the myth of sovereignty. "We have no sovereignty. We only have the sovereignty that the US Congress allows us that day."

Wilson said if the Tohono O'odham Nation was truly sovereign, it would not have an occupying army and unchecked police power on its land, including the Border Patrol, National Guard and Immigration and Customs agents. Wilson said children as young as six-years-old have been imprisoned in the unit known as "the cage" on O'odham land at San Miguel.

Wilson described searching for the bodies of migrants who have died. Since 2006, 246 migrants have died in the Tucson Border Patrol sector, where the Border Patrol's inhumane border policies are enforced.

On the Tohono O'odham Nation, 65 people perished in the desert. Wilson is now searching the desert for the remains of another five human beings.

"Where is the moral outrage?" Wilson asked. In July, Wilson found the remains of a 17-year-old who was seven-months pregnant.

Wilson said the Tohono O'odham Nation spent $16 million to build a new cultural center. "Not one penny was spent to prevent migrant deaths."

It is time, he said, for Native people to stop the romantic myth of sovereignty and the cloaking and choking on victimization. It is time to emerge from silence about the women, men, children and unborn children who die on Indian lands for want of a drink of water.

"Do not think your silence honors me as a Tohono O'odham person. It dishonors me." Wilson said it is time for all people to become a voice for the mummified migrants found dead in the desert.

Singing with a strong voice a song for Leonard Peltier, Foster called for freedom for Peltier. Foster said he visits Peltier three times a year for the sweatlodge ceremony. "They gave him the Pipe, but they will not let him have tobacco."

"Leonard's health is not good. We miss him and pray for him," Foster said as he described the hope of Peltier's release. "Leonard sends his love and support and is in solidarity."

Petuuche Gilbert, Acoma Pueblo from New Mexico, described the colonized thinking that the border delegation experienced on Tohono O'odham land on Thursday, during a tour of where the border barrier is being built.

Gilbert recalled the words of an Acoma Pueblo referring to the Catholic Church.

"They made slaves out of us to make this church. I guess that's why we are Catholics now."

Gilbert said the border wall is going up on Indian lands because Indian Nations are not functioning as true sovereign nations.

"Because we do not have that sovereignty over our lands, territories and natural resources." Gilbert said that one day, Indian Nations would be sovereign nations again.

Jay Johnson Castro described abuses at the prisons for profit. Those include Don T. Hutto Detention Center near Austin, Texas, where migrant babies and children are imprisoned, and Raymondville migrant internment camp near Brownsville, Texas.

"Near the Texas capitol, there are hundreds of children in prison for profit," Castro said of Hutto. Describing conditions before the protests began, he said children were kept in cells separate from their parents, wore prison uniforms and given out-dated milk to drink at Hutto.

"If they were to take a cookie to their cells, they would be punished." In the cells, when they used the toilet, anyone walking by their cells could watch them.

One woman was sexually assaulted by a guard in front of her child and was never charged. "We don't know what happened to the mother and child," Castro said.

Homeland Security denied entry to the United Nations' Rapporteur on migrants, Jorge Bustamante, in May. At Raymondville internment camp, a prison guard exposed the fact that migrants were being fed food with maggots in it. The United States is one of only two countries in the world, the other one being Somalia, who does not ensure the rights of the child and has not ratified the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Castro also described the "Endgame," a United States policy to remove all "aliens" that is now in its fourth year.

The Border Summit concluded with the chicken scratch sounds of Gertie and the TO Boys, followed by the resistance vocals and chords of Blackfire, sounding out the need to keep San Francisco Peaks sacred from waste water. Blackfire's Navajo family band of Klee, Jeneda and Clayson Benally called for justice for the political prisoners: migrants at the border and Leonard Peltier.

Klee Benally told the gathering that the arrest of Maoris in New Zealand, organized for self-determination, was both a test and an indicator for what is to come here.

Standing in solidarity with Maoris and Apaches protecting Mount Graham in Arizona, Blackfire joined the summit in declaring an end to borders, discrimination against migrants and a new era of human rights. Jones Benally joined his children onstage for traditional Dine' songs with the drum.

The Border Summit, emboldened by the delegation of Mohawks, renewed their determination on Saturday to halt the border wall and hold the Tohono O'odham Nation responsible for the deaths of men, women, children and unborn children who have died on O'odham lands "for want of a drink of water."

After traveling to the Tohono O'odham Nation border with Mexico, an Indigenous Peoples' delegation from the summit unleashed a new movement to honor the lives and deaths of migrants.

Diana Joe, Yaqui, among the Indigenous women present who worked the fields as a child, said, "May the farm worker people live long!"

Indigenous Peoples called for action to bring down the wall and stop the deaths of Indigenous Peoples' walking to a better life. This land, all of Turtle Island from the north to the south, is the home to Indigenous Peoples.

As Indigenous Peoples here stood in solidarity with those walking, Native people said it is the white people in the United States who are the invaders. They arrived here without papers, visas or passports.

As one Mohawk warrior put it, "It doesn't take a lot of people to bring down this border wall!"

Eric McDavid is Now on Hunger Strike - Your Help Needed!

From: sacprisonersupport@riseup.net

Date: November 10, 2007 1:39:27 AM EST

Dear friends,

Eric called this evening with an update on his medical condition. At 8:00

this evening he was called out to talk to a sargeant who discussed his

medical situation with him. After this conversation, the sargeant sent

Eric back to medical to be seen by a doctor. The doctor (a different

doctor than the one he saw earlier in the day) took his vitals and

acknowledged that he had pericarditis in the spring. She asked him if this

felt like the same thing, and Eric said that it did. The doctor said she

would request that blood work, an ECG, and an x-ray be done - but more

than likely none of this will happen until after the holiday weekend (on

Tuesday). She also went over with him the medication he received in the

past and said she would put in a request that he begin receiving it again.

Eric received medication at around 9:30 this evening. When Eric tried to

discuss the cause of the pericarditis (more than likely, his diet) the

doctor was evasive and sent him back to his cell.

Because his diet is almost certainly a cause of the pericarditis, Eric has

decided to begin a hunger strike, once again, to gain access to vegan

food. The last "meal" he ate was at 8:30 am - a banana and two pieces of

bread. The jail has provided Eric with vegan food in the past and there

is absolutely no reason they cannot do it now. Please call the jail and

request that Eric be given vegan meals immediately.

The phone number to the Correctional Health Services Division is: (916)

875-9782.

You can also email them at: inmatepatientcare@saccounty.net.

You should also call the main jail line at: 916-874-6752 or 916-874-6905,

leave a message with them, and also request to speak with Captain Scott

Jones.

Their website says that they log all calls and emails and that you will

receive a response within 24 hours. If you get an answering machine, leave

a long detailed message, include your name and number if you would like to

receive a call back.

When you talk to them (or leave a message) make sure you mention the

following things:

1) Eric's x-reference number: x-2972521 (if they ask, he is housed at the

main jail)

2) Eric needs to be given vegan food immediately. His heart condition

will persist until the underlying causes are treated, and his nutrition is

integral to this.

3) Eric needs to receive an ECG, blood work and an x-ray ASAP. These

tests are imperative to determining other possible causes of the

pericarditis. Again, until they fully understand what is causing the

condition, they will only be treating symptoms. [When Eric visited the UC

Davis Medical Center in the spring, the hospital requested that the jail

do blood work to determine what might be causing the pericarditis. It is

uncertain as to whether or not this ever actually happened.]

Eric has not received vegan meals from the jail since one week before his

trial - the beginning of September. It has been difficult for him to

maintain his health since that time, with so little nutrition available.

Because of this, he begins his hunger strike with a body whose health is

already depleted. We cannot stress how urgent it is that the jail begin

feeding Eric food he can eat, and that they fully address his medical

situation.

Thank you all for your continued support.

For more information about pericarditis, go to:

http://heartdisease.about.com/cs/pericarditis/a/pericarditis.htm

www.supporteric.org

Tune In: Indigenous Border Summit

From: info@FreePeltierNow.org

Date: 11/9/2007 11:47:59 AM

Subject: Tune In: Indigenous Border Summit

* Around 10:00 am MST (Noon EST) on Saturday, Len Foster (Navajo,

International Indian Treaty Council) will speak at the Indigenous

Border Summit of the Americas about detentions and prisons and Native

inmates' rights, including ceremonial rights. Foster's talk also will

focus on Leonard Peltier. Connect to the live webcast by visiting

http://www.FreePeltierNow.org. *

The Schedule for the last day of the Indigenous Border Summit of the

Americas 2007:

06:00 am Sunrise Ceremony

07:00 am Breakfast

09:00 am Humanitarian Aid: Tohono O'odham Mike Wilson

10:00 am Detentions and prisons: Lenny Foster, Navajo, Native inmates

rights, including ceremonial rights, focus on Leonard Peltier; Texas:

Imprisoning migrant children and border wall protest, Jay Johnson

Castro from the Texas border

11:00 am Oral Testimony

12:00 pm Lunch

01:00 pm Conclusions, Summaries, Recommendations and Resolutions

02:00 pm Break

06:00 pm Concert: Gertie and the TO Boys

07:00 pm Concert: BLACKFIRE

Tune in.

Time to set him free... Because it is the RIGHT thing to do.

Friends of Peltier

http://www.FreePeltierNow.org

URGENT - Eric is being denied critical medical care!

From: sacprisonersupport@riseup.net

Date: November 9, 2007 8:07:28 PM EST

Dear friends,

This morning Eric called and informed us that his pericarditis woke him up

at 6 am. He was having chest pains, trouble breathing, and was unable to

lie down. Because of this, he went out for sick call and was given an

EKG. The jail doctor told him that he was fine and that he NEVER had

pericarditis - in direct contradiction to the diagnosis from the doctors

at UC Davis Medical Center in the spring. When Eric asked to see the

results of the EKG, the doctor refused and sent him back to his cell.

Later, Eric requested to see the doctor again and they refused to see him.

Eric's lawyer has filed a memo with the court and sent it to Scott Jones

(the jail commander) and the US Marshalls Service.

It is imperative that Eric be allowed to see a doctor and that he be given

the proper medical care. Pericarditis can be a VERY serious condition -

especially left untreated. It is URGENT that everyone call the jail

immediately and demand that Eric be allowed to see a doctor and that they

give him the medical care he needs. If the jail cannot provide this, they

need to send him back to UCD Med Center where he can get the proper care.

The phone number to the Correctional Health Services Division is: (916)

875-9782.

You can also email them at: inmatepatientcare@saccounty.net.

You should also call the main jail line at: 916-874-6752 of 916-874-6905,

leave a message with them, and also request to speak with Captain Scott

Jones.

Their website says that they log all calls and emails and that you will

receive a response within 24 hours. Make sure that you have Eric's

x-reference number when you call: x-2972521. They might also ask for his

location, which is the Sacramento County Main Jail. If you get an

answering machine, leave a long detailed message, include your name and

number if you would like to receive a call back.

We are fairly certain that this recent flare-up of pericarditis is

directly linked to Eric's atrocious diet. He is still not receiving vegan

meals. His substandard diet consists primarily of small amounts of empty

carbs, hydrogenated oils, and a bit of protein. It is crucial mention

this when calling the jail about his condition, and demand that he be

given vegan meals immediately. They have given him vegan meals and outside

medical treatment before and can easily do it again, anything less could

have severe repercussions for Eric's health.

We will keep you updated about this situation as more information becomes

available.

Sentencing Postponed

Eric's sentencing has been moved to January 10. This is an upsetting

development, as Eric was looking forward to getting out of the Sacramento

County Jail - once moved to a federal facility, his general living

conditions will likely improve dramatically. He will probably have access

to better food, more outdoor time, more social interaction, contact

visits, etc. The longer we have to wait for sentencing, the longer we

have to wait to start the appeals process. Please continue writing Eric

during this time (details about writing Eric can be found on his website:

www.supporteric.org). This is proving to be a particularly difficult time

for him, and he needs everyone's support.

Also, please plan on coming to sentencing on January 10 to support Eric.

We would love to have the courtroom full for him on this day.

Finally, please consider writing a letter to the judge to urge the lowest

possible sentence for Eric. The US Attorney is still indicating that they

will be pushing for the maximum sentence of 20 years. The judge needs to

hear from Eric’s friends and family – he needs to know that Eric is a

well-respected, honest, compassionate, non-violent person. It is

important for Judge England to know that the acts charged in the

indictment are out of character for Eric. Some things you might mention

in your letter include:

(1)How long you have known Eric

(2)How you met him and how you know him (i.e. school, work, mutual

friends, etc.)

(3)Any experiences you have had with Eric that demonstrate what you think

are important aspects of his character

Address your letter to:

Judge England

U.S. District Court, Eastern District of California-Sacramento

501 “I” Street

Sacramento, CA 95814

Please DO NOT send your letter directly to Judge England. Instead, please

send them directly to Eric’s lawyer:

Mark Reichel

555 Capitol Mall, 6th Floor - Suite 600

Sacramento, CA 95814

Please mail your letter with your original signature as soon as possible.

Again, letters should be sent to Eric’s lawyer, Mark Reichel, and not to

the judge.

Reminders and Miscellaneous

Eric is still doing fine on books. Please refrain from sending him more

until further notice.

Eric's next hearing is still on calendar for November 15. This will be a

hearing on the motion for a new trial and acquittal, which can be viewed

on Eric's website.

Earth First! journal recently published an article about Eric and his

case. The article can be viewed online at:

http://www.earthfirstjournal.org/article.php?id=326

Matt Lamont Raided by the Feds - Help Needed

Yesterday Matt Lamont - former anarchist political
prisoner- pulled up to his house only to find find
federal agents sitting in wait for him. Once he parked
his car federal agents rushed in with their badges-
intent on making a scene.
Agents told Lamont that as part of his parole
conditions- they were engaging in a search of his
person and property. When he asked about why the
federal government was involved in a "random search"
they commented that all policing agencies had a right
to said searches.
During the search, agents continued to make threat
against Matt. At one point they commented about how
Jen- his wife- was expecting to have a child and that
his would be a shame for their child to grow up
without their father. Apparently this meant that Matt
may return to prison due to parole violation. It is
important to note that Matt's probation is going to
expire in February 2008.
Throughout the raid, Matt demanded to know what this
was really about. Finally, the agents informed Matt
that they wanted him to provide information to the
federal government about the movement. An agent told
Matt that he was going to contact him in two weeks.
The agent was going to sit down with Matt and another
unmentioned individual and that Matt better provide
information. Matt asked who the other unknown person
was and the agent retorted that he would find out at
the meeting.
Matt is in need of a lawyer. It would be unwise for
him to attend the meeting without a lawyer. The agent
informed Matt that he would regret it if he did not
answer or return the agents call when he calls again.
In short, Matt needs a lawyer now! If someone knows a
lawyer who can help Matt out, please take action. You
can email the lawyers information to me and I will
pass it on to Matt.
Thank You
Matt Hart
LA ABCF

LEONARD PELTIER HOLIDAY GIFT DRIVE

from friendsofdanielmcg@yahoo.com:

I want to ask you for your participation in this year's Leonard Peltier Annual Holiday Gift Drive for the children of the Pine Ridge reservation in South Dakota. This project has gone on for years and I'm happy to be part of it this year in a supporting capacity. My support crew will be creating a registry of gifts that will make it simple for you to buy a gift or two for the Native children on the Pine Ridge reservation. I'm honored to be working on a project initiated by Native political prisoner Leonard Peltier and run by the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee - true allies in the struggle for political prisoners and environmental protection. Please participate as much as you can to make a real difference in the lives of these children who live on one of the poorest reservations in the nation and also by lending your support to the struggle to free Leonard Peltier. Check www.supportdaniel.org and www.leonardpeltier.net for more information.

Thanks for all the letters and support!
Daniel

GET ALL THE DETAILS ON THIS PAGE:
http://www.supportdaniel.org/morehelp/holiday.html



Daniel McGowan is an environmental and social justice activist. He was charged in federal court on many counts of arson, property destruction and conspiracy, all relating to two incidents in Oregon in 2001. Until recently, Daniel was offered two choices by the government: cooperate by informing on other people, or go to trial and face life in prison. His only real option was to plead not guilty until he could reach a resolution of the case that permitted him to honor his principles. As a result of months of litigation and negotiation, Daniel was able to admit to his role in these two incidents, while not implicating or identifying any other people who might have been involved. He was sentenced to 7 years in prison on June 4, 2007 and began serving his time on July 2, 2007.

Swollen feet and a wanted apology

Controversy renewed with new book about Penn experiments

By: Jessica Sidman

Posted: 11/8/07

Yusef Anthony thought participating in a Penn-conducted study on Johnson & Johnson bubble bath would be a safe way to earn easy money.

And so during his first week as an inmate in Philadelphia's Holmesburg Prison, Anthony was led into a cellblock-turned-laboratory. There, an inmate in a lab coat peeled off patches of skin from his back and sprayed chemicals on the open wounds.

Pus-filled blisters formed overnight, and his black skin turned "strawberry" red. After several days of excruciating pain, he was taken off the test.

He earned $37.

But the medical and psychological side effects of this and other tests continue to cost him, more than 40 years later.

The experiment was one of thousands Penn conducted under the direction of dermatologist and professor emeritus Albert Kligman in Holmesburg Prison from 1951 to 1974.

The controversy, for which the University and Kligman continue to deny wrongdoing, has been stirred up yet again with the recent release of Sentenced to Science by Temple University urban studies professor Allen Hornblum, which details Anthony's experiences and ongoing struggle.

According to Hornblum, the inmates - some of whom signed waivers, though most were virtually illiterate- were exposed­ to infectious diseases, radioactive isotopes, psychotropic drugs and other dangerous chemicals for skin-related research.

Some of the studies led to the development of anti-wrinkle cream Retin-A and have made Penn and Kligman millions.

"These were Frankenstein-style practices going on," Anthony said. "Crimes against humanity."

Today, the 64-year-old sees a doctor at least once a month. Peeling an orange causes itching and irritation that only scalding hot water can relieve.

His hands used to swell to the size of boxing gloves, and his size 10 feet would barely fit a size 14 shoe. Brittle bones, fatigue and severe stomach problems also plague him.

The University acknowledges that the prison studies took place but still stand by Kligman.

"In the 1950s and 1960s, the use of willing, compensated prisoners for biomedical research was a commonly accepted practice by this nation's scientists," University officials wrote in a statement.

The statement focuses on the "strict rules and regulations" in place today and invites former inmates with long-term harm from the experiments to contact the University for a free medical evaluation.

Medical School spokesman Marc Kaplan did not offer further comment.

In 2000, Anthony and nearly three hundred former Holmesburg inmates sued Kligman, Penn, the city of Philadelphia and two of the pharmaceutical companies involved, but the case was thrown out two years later because the statute of limitations had run out.

Meanwhile, dermatologist Bernard Ackerman said Kligman, now 91, has stopped giving interviews, but he continues to conduct research. His portrait hangs prominently in the dermatology department's reception room.

"Kligman was and is an intelligent man. He is not a dope. He knew what he was doing," said Ackerman, who did his second year of residency under Kligman in the 1960s. "He doesn't feel one iota of shame."

"He loved to say we've got acres of skin at Holmesburg prison," added Ackerman, who researched dandruff in the prison and left Penn after a year of residency. He is one of the only Penn researchers to speak out against the University's practices in Holmesburg.

But inmates were just the tip of the iceberg, Ackerman said. Penn also tested on retarded children and the elderly.

He and other critics say that the research was a direct violation of the Nuremberg Code, which was created after World War II in response to the inhumane experimentation on Jews in Nazi Germany.

"Ethics tend to keep you away from the goal," Hornblum said. "The goal is to make money."

aboriginal homes raided in the Norther Territory australia

Dear Kerry O'Brien and 7.30 researchers,
  I have just returned from the Northern Territory.  I want
John Howard
  to explain why house to house raids without warrants are being
  conducted by the AFTERP in all the Alice Springs
town camps.
  I also want to know why at least two of the senior women who toured
  major cities speaking out against a uranium waste dump on their
  traditional lands have been raided by the AFTERP on warrants issued by a
  Federal Magistrate in Canberra, their furniture slashed with knives,
  belongings damages, laptops and mobile phones seized, and phones
  tapped.  I was told by one of the women that the warrant gave 12 hours
  access to her home, and that she was told that the measures were
  justified because of the security crackdown for APEC ministers.  One
  of those women is an elderly grandmother.
  I have also been told by town camp residents that the AFTERP has set up
  surveillance on all households in the town camps, and have
  photographed without consent, every Aboriginal child in those town
  camps.  In the 1990's the AFTERP were successfully taken to court for
  exactly the same violations in Redfern.
  Please report on this disgraceful conduct, and pursue a full
  explanation from the Howard Government.
  regards,
  Jennifer Martiniello
  Member, Advisory Board
  Australian Centre for Indigenous History,
  Australian National University
  Aroha Groves

Commentary: Court Learns Best Way to Keep a Secret Is Not by Posting It on the Internet

Howard J. Bashman
Special to Law.com
11-05-2007

Related: Bashman Archive

Timely coverage of appellate decisions is one of the main emphases of the "How Appealing" weblog that I author -- but on those occasions when I have to be away from my computer due to my day job as an appellate lawyer, one or more readers of my blog will often e-mail me to alert me to the issuance of an especially noteworthy ruling.

Exactly that happened several times on the morning of Oct. 18 of this year, after the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals posted online its ruling in a case captioned Higazy v. Templeton.

Abdallah Higazy is an Egyptian national who was staying at a hotel across from New York's World Trade Center on the night of Sept. 10, 2001. He was evacuated from the hotel along with other guests on the morning of Sept. 11, after two passenger jets slammed into the two largest of the World Trade Center towers.

Sometime thereafter, hotel employees claimed to have found in Higazy's hotel room a radio that could be used to communicate from the ground with someone aboard an airliner. When Higazy returned to the hotel to retrieve his belongings several months later, an FBI agent confronted him about the radio, which Higazy initially said did not belong to him.

The FBI detained Higazy and later, during the course of a lengthy and intense interrogation, Higazy said that the radio did belong to him, leading the FBI to believe that he was involved in the conspiracy that resulted in the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center. In fact, Higazy had nothing to do with that attack or the criminal acts surrounding it.

Nearly one month after Higazy was taken into FBI custody, an airline pilot who had been staying in that same hotel returned to inquire about his property -- which included an airline radio transceiver. The FBI promptly confirmed that the transceiver that supposedly had been found in Higazy's hotel room actually belonged to the pilot and that the pilot and Higazy had had no contact with each other. Higazy was subsequently released from custody, after 34 days in federal detention.

Higazy later sued the FBI agent who conducted the interrogation that had led to his false confession. After the U.S. District Court in New York City granted summary judgment in favor of the agent, Higazy appealed to the 2nd Circuit. And, on the morning of Oct. 18, 2007, the 2nd Circuit issued a decision reinstating one aspect of Higazy's lawsuit against that FBI agent.

That same morning, while I was at my clients' 3rd Circuit mediation, I received several e-mails alerting me to the 2nd Circuit's issuance of the Higazy decision. Early that afternoon, I received a follow-up e-mail telling me that the 2nd Circuit had removed the decision from its Web site. When I returned to my office shortly after 3 p.m. that day, the 2nd Circuit's Web site still featured a link to the Higazy decision, but the link destination site merely read, "The opinion has been withdrawn."

At 3:24 p.m., I posted an item to "How Appealing" noting that the 2nd Circuit had issued its decision in the Higazy case earlier in the day but had later withdrawn it. In addition, I linked to another blogger's post about the substance of the 2nd Circuit's ruling. I concluded my post by asking any readers who had saved an electronic copy of the decision to forward it to me so I could post it on my blog.

Less than an hour later, a regular reader of my blog sent me a PDF copy of the Higazy decision that the 2nd Circuit had posted to the Internet earlier in the day. Because I knew this particular correspondent to be a trustworthy source, I had little doubt that the attachment was indeed the Higazy ruling. Nevertheless, before posting it to the Internet myself, I looked at the file to confirm that it conformed to what I had come to recognize as an actual 2nd Circuit decision. And indeed it did.

Thus, at 4:15 that afternoon, I posted again, this time explaining that the decision now available for download via my blog had been withdrawn from the 2nd Circuit, after the court had initially put the decision online earlier that morning. (The 2nd Circuit ordinarily posts its new rulings online by 10:30 a.m. Apparently the Higazy decision remained online on Oct. 18 until about noon. My purpose in posting the ruling was to allow readers to see for themselves how the 2nd Circuit had apparently decided to rule in this very newsworthy case, without having to rely solely on the accounts of some other blogger who happened to write about the decision before it was taken off-line.)

After making the Higazy decision available for viewing and download via my blog's Web server, I turned my attention to other matters. Then, around 5:30 p.m., an unfamiliar 646 prefix telephone number appeared on my office's caller ID. On the line was Catherine O'Hagan Wolfe, head of the 2nd Circuit clerk's office, asking me to remove the Higazy decision from the Internet, much as the 2nd Circuit itself had done.

In the more than five years that I have operated my blog, this marked the first time that anyone connected with any court had ever asked that I take off-line a decision that the same court had itself previously posted to the Internet. I was interested in learning from Ms. Wolfe why the 2nd Circuit had removed the decision. All she would say was that the original ruling referenced information that had been filed under seal with the 2nd Circuit. She also told me that the court intended to post online at 10:30 the next morning a revised version of the decision omitting reference to the information under seal.

Ms. Wolfe did not identify for me which information in the original version of the Higazy decision had been filed under seal, nor did she say whether the 2nd Circuit's decision to take its original version of the decision off-line occurred in response to a request from one of the parties, and, if so, which one. I responded to Ms. Wolfe that her request was unprecedented and that I would need to consider it further before deciding what to do.

After that phone conversation, I decided to read closely through the Higazy decision to see whether anything in the decision seemed so inflammatory that I should join the 2nd Circuit in taking the decision off-line. However, I did not find anything that resembled an important government secret or information that would prove harmful to anyone. I also realized that the 2nd Circuit's ruling had been available on its own Web site for nearly 90 minutes, and available on my blog for nearly an hour and 45 minutes, and that, furthermore, the ruling was, by that time -- almost 6 p.m. on Oct. 18 -- also in the possession of many other individuals who undoubtedly were circulating it to an even wider audience.

I thus decided to leave the decision up at my blog's Web server, fully confident that, had I taken the decision down, that same information would have appeared elsewhere immediately, causing me to have looked quite foolish. As promised, at 10:30 a.m. on Friday, Oct. 19, the 2nd Circuit posted to its Web site a revised version of the Higazy ruling from which the details of the FBI agent's interrogation of Higazy had been redacted. The redaction notice stated that, for purposes of the summary judgment motion, it was undisputed that Higazy's confession had been coerced.

And now you know the story of how my blog became, for a time, the one place on the Internet where someone could learn the details of how the FBI caused an innocent Egyptian young man to falsely confess to having been involved in the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center. There has been much speculation that it was the FBI or the federal government that caused the 2nd Circuit to withdraw the original opinion, to avoid being cast in a bad light by the opinion's description of Higazy's interrogation, which some have described as amounting to torture.

I have no doubt that the original version of the 2nd Circuit's ruling in the Higazy case was the version that the three-judge 2nd Circuit panel intended to make public. If the details of the interrogation were irrelevant, the original version of the decision would not have provided them. And if the judges thought that those details should have remained private, the original version of the opinion would not have described them. Perhaps the judges "forgot" that this information had been filed under seal, and, had they remembered, they would have drafted a different opinion to be posted initially to the Internet.

For better or worse, once the 2nd Circuit posted its original opinion online, there was no taking it back. What that court should have done, upon later realizing that any information under seal in the original opinion was under seal no longer, was to reissue on Oct. 18 the opinion that had originally been posted on the Internet. Instead, you'll have to access the original version of the 2nd Circuit's ruling hosted at "How Appealing" to see how the federal government caused an innocent man to confess to involvement in the Sept. 11 attacks.

Howard J. Bashman operates his own appellate litigation boutique in Willow Grove, Pa., a suburb of Philadelphia. He can be reached via e-mail at hjb@hjbashman.com. You can access his appellate Web log at http://howappealing.law.com/.

Saturday 12/1 - Third Al-Awda West Coast Regional Conference

[Please forward widely]

November 5, 2007
For Immediate Release

Third Al-Awda West Coast Regional Conference
Saturday December 1, 2007, Carlsbad, California
10:00 am - 6:00 pm

As part of the activities set to coincide with the International Day of
Solidarity with the Palestinian people, Al-Awda San Diego will be hosting
Al-Awda's Third West Coast Regional Conference on
Saturday December 1, 2007 at the Al-Awda Center in Carlsbad, California.
Palestinian, Arab and other community members, grassroots activists,
students, solidarity organizational representatives and supporters are
invited to attend.

Among the topics that the regional conference will address are the plans for
the 6th Annual International Al-Awda Convention, which will take place May
16-18, 2008 in Anaheim, California. The convention will commemorate 60 years
of Nakba and honor the Palestinian struggle for return, and against the
theft of our land and for its restoration.

The conference will also discuss plans and progress related to the
establishment of The Palestine Media Center and The Palestine Library, as
well as the regional refugee support and divestment programs.

Advance registration for the conference is required. Please write to us at
info@al-awdasandiego.org if you are planning to attend.

Refreshments and a lunch of delicious Arabic food will be provided to those
who register in advance.

Please note that admission is free!

Conference Location:

Al-Awda's Center is located at 2734 Loker Avenue West
Suite K, Carlsbad, CA 92010. For driving directions, please use this page
http://www.mapquest.com/directions/main.adp?bCTsettings=1

Airport Information:

The closest airports are McClellan-Palomar Airport in Carlsbad
http://www.sdcounty.ca.gov/dpw/airports/mcpal.html
and San Diego International Airport http://www.san.org/airport/splash.asp

Hotel Information:

A listing of hotels in the general Carlsbad and nearby areas is provided on
the following pages http://www.carlsbadcahotels.worldweb.com/index.html
http://www.greatersandiego.worldweb.com/SanMarcosCA/WheretoStay/HotelsMotels/
http://www.greatersandiego.worldweb.com/VistaCA/WheretoStay/HotelsMotels/

For more information, contact:

Al-Awda San Diego
The Palestine Right to Return Coalition
PO Box 131352
Carlsbad, CA 92013, USA
Tel: 760-685-3243
Fax: 360-933-3568
Email: info@al-awdasandiego.org
WEB: http://al-awdasandiego.org

---------------------------------
Save the Date!
Sixth Annual International Al Awda Convention
On The Sixtieth Year of Al Nakba
Anaheim, California
May 16-18, 2008
http://al-awda.org
---------------------------------

Support Al-Awda, a Great Organization and Cause!
Become an Al-Awda Sustainer:
Monthly: http://al-awda.org/sustainers.html
Annually: http://al-awda.org/sustainers2.html

Nov. 30th Free the SF8

The ProLibertad Freedom Campaign
http://www.ProLibertadWeb.com
ProLibertad@hotmail.com and ProLibertad.Campaign@gmail.com
ProLibertad Hotline: 718-601-4751
_______________________________________________________________________________

Celebrate and defend the legacy of the Black Panther Party:

Drop the charges against the SF-8

NYC, Friday, November 30, 7 pm
Martin Luther King Jr. Labor Center
310 W. 43rd Street (between 8th & 9th Ave.) NYC

Speakers Include: Gil Noble, respected producer and host of ABC-TV's Like It
Is Francisco Torres, Harold Taylor and other SF-8 defendants
Soffiyah Elijah, Esq., lawyer on the SF-8 case
Performing: alixa + naima/Climbing Poetree

The San Francisco 8 are eight former "original" Black Panther Party members
and active supporters (ages 56 to 72), who were arrested last January in
California, New York and Florida on charges related to the 1971 killing of a
San Francisco police officer. Some of these men faced virtually identical
charges almost 35 years ago—charges that were dropped after it was revealed
that police torture had extracted "confessions."

But that was in 1973. Now that torture has been made acceptable in this
country, the case is back on—based on the same flawed evidence.

The judge has released the 6 bail-eligible defendants on bond, suggesting to
legal experts that this case is a shaky one.

Two of the 8 defendants—political prisoners Herman Bell and Jalil
Muntaqim—are not eligible for bail. They remain in jail in San Francisco,
having already served more than 34 years in New York state prisons. This new
case charges them again with actions for which they are already doing time.

Learn more about the case and welcome home defendant Cisco Torres, released
on bail, now back with his family in Queens, New York.

For Information Contact: Committee to Free the SF-8 (freethesf8.org), Local
1199 (Michael@1199.org), (Malcolm X Grassroots Movement (mxgm.org)
The Jericho Movement (thejerichomovement.com) or call: (718) 254-8800 or
(646) 246-0770

Come support the SF-8—and defend the history of all struggles for justice.

Sponsors so far: SEIU Local 1199, Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, NY State
Taskforce for Political Prisoners, the Jericho Movement, Resistance in
Brooklyn, Campaign to End the Death Penalty, Pro Libertad, Frances Goldin,
Safiya Bukhari-Albert Nuh Washington Foundation, Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
Coalition (NYC), Black Panther Commemoration Committee (NY), Malcolm X
Commemoration Committee, NYC Anarchist Black Cross, Gabriela Network USA

SHAC7 PP Jake Conroy on Lock-Down

from shoelacetownabc@hushmail.com . . .

SHAC 7 prisoner Jake Conroy's prison is on lockdown--again. That

means no phone calls, no visits, no vegan food...he cannot leave

his cell at all for anything. We have no idea how long lockdown

will last, and as you can imagine, it's a very boring and

frustrating time for Jake. Getting mail is literally the only

contact he has with the outside world at this time. Please take a

few minutes to write, and remember that it may take him a while to

get back to you right now as he has a limited supply of stamps and

paper until lockdown ends.

*Remember, letters, cards, photocopies, and photos (no polaroids)

are all great. But the prison does not allow stickers, food, items

that are glued on, etc. Just stick with the basics and your letter

should get through without a problem!

Jacob Conroy #93501-011

FCI Victorville Medium I

PO Box 5300

Adelanto, CA 92301

And please keep writing the rest of the SHAC 7 prisoners!

LAUREN GAZZOLA # 93497-011

FEDERAL CORRECTIONAL INSTITUTION

FCI DANBURY

ROUTE #37

DANBURY, CT 06811

lettersforlauren@shac7.com

JOSHUA HARPER # 29429-086

FCI SHERIDAN

FEDERAL CORRECTIONAL INSTITUTION

P.O. BOX 5000

SHERIDAN, OR 97378

lettersforjosh@shac7.com

KEVIN KJONAAS # 93502-011

UNIT I

FCI SANDSTONE

P.O. BOX 1000

SANDSTONE, MN 55072

ANDREW STEPANIAN # 26399-050

FCI BUTNER MEDIUM II

FEDERAL CORRECTIONAL INSTITUTION

P.O. BOX 1500

BUTNER, NC 27509

lettersforandy@shac7.com

Victim's father wants West Memphis 3 set free

http://www.wreg.com/global/story.asp?s=7304775&ClientType=Printable
Updated: Nov 2, 2007 05:16 PM CDT

MEMPHIS,TN-"I believe I would be the last person on the face of the earth that people would expect or dream to see say free the West Memphis 3," said Mark Byers.

Of all the parents close to the West Memphis 3 case, John Mark Byers has been the most outspoken about the convictions. Now, he and his new wife, Jacki, proudly wear their Free West Memphis 3 t-shirts. He is convinced after meeting privately with defense attorneys that Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley are innocent of the 1993 murders of his stepson, Christopher and the other two 8 year old boys, Michael Moore and Stevie Branch.

"From looking at the evidence and the facts that were presented to me, I have no doubt the West Memphis 3 are innocent," said Byers.

Byers remarried after Christopher's mother, Melissa died in 1996. That was just three years after he son was killed. Byers was never arrested but he was questioned about his possible involvement in the killings. Now, learning DNA tests done by defense lawyers could place another step-father, Terry Hobbs, at the crime scene, Byers wonders why West Memphis police never questioned Hobbs in their investigation. Hobbs has denied any involvement in the crime.

"I feel very strongly that the dark cloud that has been over my head for years is going away and the sun is shining. I have known of my innocence. Never a question mark," said Byers.

Byers is writing a book about the murders, called "Untying The Knot". He says it's a real account of what happened. Also, his life is set to be spot lighted in a movie about the murders. Due out in 2008, Brad Pitt is among those being considered to portray Byers. Byers says producers told him it will be based on facts. That is one reason why he believes this is a movie with an ending that is still being written.

"I believe it will be the story of the 21st century when this crime is totally uncovered. When you know what I know," said Byers.

Four anarchists arrested in Italy

A night of ordinary democracy in Bologna: 5 anarchists are beaten and arrested

On Saturday October 13, at around 4am, a girl who is sleeping in piazza Verdi is noticed by police on patrol. The latter decide that the girl’s behaviour is ‘abnormal’ and must be corrected by compulsory sanitary treatment (TSO). They call the ambulance while keeping the girl under their custody against her will.

Five comrades of the anarchist place ‘Fuoriluogo’ witness the episode and cannot help expressing their contempt at the police. They do their best to prevent the arrest of the girl. The police’s answer is brutal: armed with truncheons and even guns they chase the comrades. As the latter flee, six more police vans are called on the scene and the short escape ends in piazza San Vitale. The 5 are handcuffed while being severely beaten by the cops. A few residents in the area are clearly indignant at the police’s behaviour but do not intervene.

The accusations against the comrades are quite heavy: aggravated robbery (the cops have lost a pair of handcuffs), resistance and damage (of a police van in which one of the comrades had been taken). The 5 are immediately imprisoned in La Dozza prison. Two girls are eventually put under house arrest.

We know even too well what the ‘crime’ of the 5 is, that of having chosen to oppose with courage a legal world of violence in which resignation live along with repression and exploitation. Struggle and action against the oppressor are the only way not to be accomplices of the silence imposed by this murderous society.

FREE MADDA, MANUELA, TEXINO, FEDE AND FACO!

That very night and the following morning the police search the houses of other comrades in Bologna with the pretext that they are searching for the disappeared handcuffs.

In the evening a spontaneous march in solidarity to the arrested anarchists is carried out. Some of the demonstrators decide to express their solidarity also through ‘dangerous’ writings on the walls of the town. Caught by Digos officers, they are arrested and tried summarily: Juan and Bogu are sentenced to 10 months and taken to prison whereas Davide, Alessio and Belle are sentenced to 4 months and put under house arrest. A 17 year-old comrade from Rovereto is also accused.

Here are the addresses of the imprisoned comrades:

Cristian Facchinetti, Federico Razzoli, Andrea Tessarin (arrested on Saturday 13), Miroslav Bogu (arrested on Sunday 14)

Casa Circondariale La Dozza
Via Del Gomito 2
40127 Bologna
Italy

Juan Antonio Sorroche Fernandez (arrested on Sunday 14)
Casa Circondariale di Ferrara
Via Argione 37
44100
Ferrara (Italy)

Eric McDavid Update

From: sacprisonersupport@riseup.net

Date: November 1, 2007 11:58:59 PM EDT

Dear friends and supporters,

Please see below for the latest news on Eric’s case and how you can

continue to support him.

New Trial Motion Hearing

On November 15, at 10:00 am, Eric will have a hearing before Judge England

(the same judge that presided over his trial) on the motion that Mark

filed to request a new trial. The basis for the motion is the long list

of egregious errors made by the court during Eric’s trial. The motion is

now posted in its entirety on the website, so please take a minute to

check it out. If the motion is granted, Eric will receive a new trial,

which could take months. If the motion is denied, then the court will

proceed with sentencing on December 6 and we will begin the process of

appeals. Either way, Eric will continue to live in captivity for a very

long time. Please keep up all the amazing support you have offered for

the last 22 months!

Sentencing

Eric’s sentencing is set for December 6. This will be a critical and

stressful time for Eric and his loved ones. Please consider coming to

court on this day to show your support for Eric. He needs to know we are

with him, and will continue to be with him, throughout this ordeal.

There is one more very important thing you can do to help with sentencing.

Please take a few minutes and write a letter to the judge, urging a

minimal sentence for Eric. The US Attorney is still indicating that they

will be pushing for the maximum sentence of 20 years. The judge needs to

hear from Eric’s friends and family – he needs to know that Eric is a

well-respected, honest, compassionate, non-violent person. It is

important for Judge England to know that the acts charged in the

indictment are out of character for Eric. Some things you might mention

in your letter include:

(1)How long you have known Eric

(2)How you met him and how you know him (i.e. school, work, mutual

friends, etc.)

(3)Any experiences you have had with Eric that demonstrate what you think

are important aspects of his character

Address your letter to:

Judge England

U.S. District Court, Eastern District of California-Sacramento

501 “I” Street

Sacramento, CA 95814

Please DO NOT send your letter directly to Judge England. Instead, please

send them directly to Eric’s lawyer:

Mark Reichel

555 Capitol Mall, 6th Floor - Suite 600

Sacramento, CA 95814

Please mail your letter with your original signature as soon as possible.

Again, letters should be sent to Eric’s lawyer, Mark Reichel, and not to

the judge.

Vegan Food

Eric is still not receiving vegan meals. PLEASE continue calling the jail

and requesting that they give him vegan food. We realize this can be a

frustrating process, but it is very important for Eric’s health and

morale. Be aware that the person who answers the phone may very well lie

to you about what is actually happening, or give you a prepared response

(such as “we are aware of the situation”). If the jail were to give Eric

vegan food, you would be the first to know! And if they give you a

prepared response that only means that enough of us are calling to at

least annoy them. But not enough of us to change the situation – so keep

calling!

The person who made the decision to cut off Eric’s food is Lt. Ilg, and

the person who oversees him is Scott Jones. Feel free to request to speak

to either of these people when calling the jail.

It’s always helpful to have Eric’s x-reference number handy when calling

the jail, in case the person you are speaking with asks for it. Eric’s

x-ref is: x-2972521. You can call the jail at :

916-874-6752

916-874-6905

Fundraising

Yes, the ubiquitous fundraising plea… We realize this one can start to

feel a little monotonous and tiresome. Unfortunately, it is also one of

the most important things we can do for Eric right now. To appeal Eric’s

case to the 9th Circuit will cost approximately $35,000 in legal fees, a

number that can seem overwhelming and distant. But with everyone’s help

we have no reason to believe that it cannot be accomplished. Please start

organizing your next fundraiser now.

To make an individual donation online (via Paypal) visit Eric’s website at

www.supporteric.org. Or you can send a check/money order made out to

Sacramento Defense Fund to:

SPS

PO Box 163126

Sacramento, CA 95816

Please remember to make it out to Sacramento Defense Fund, otherwise we

won’t be able to deposit it.

And speaking of fundraisers, some folks in DC have put together a really

amazing event. If you are going to be in DC on November 17, don't miss

it! Details are at the end of this email.

New Flyers

New flyers have been created (thanks to the fellow who helped make that

happen!) and will be posted soon on Eric's website. Please make copies

and distribute them at your next event, at your favorite infoshop or

coffee shop.

T-Shirts

Support Eric t-shirts are still available online from the great folks at

In Our Hearts. They are $10 in person or $15 for national mail order.

See Eric’s website for more details.

Reminders

Eric says he is currently doing fine with reading material and has asked

that everyone wait to send him any books you have in mind until further

notice. He will not be able to bring anything with him when he is

transferred to a federal facility, and will probably not need any more

books before that time.

Also, please remember that if you would like to visit Eric, you should

contact him first so he can put you in touch with his family. He has very

limited visit times and would like to make sure they are used in the most

effective/efficient way possible.

Thank you all for your continued support!

Yours,

SPS

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

Fundraiser in DC

State Repression in the Era of the War on Terrorism

A discussion of the Criminalization of Animal Rights and Environmental

Activists and the Continued War on the Black Liberation Movement

Featuring:

Ashanti Alston, former political prisoner and Black Panther

Ramona Africa of MOVE

Gideon Oliver, Civil Rights Attorney, member National Lawyers Guild

Will Potter, Journalist and creator of GreenIsTheNewRed.com

Saturday, November 17 at 7 p.m.

at St. Stephen's Church

1525 Newton Street NW

Washington, D.C.

Join journalists, attorneys, and former political prisoners at a forum

discussing the links between past and present instances of state

repression of social justice movements. From the targeting of animal and

environmental activists being dubbed by many as the "Green Scare" to the

37-year-old charges being brought against former Black Panthers in San

Fransisco, hear how history is repeating itself as state repression

intensifies in the era of the "War on Terrorism" -- and what we can do to

fight it.

$5-10 sliding scale donation to benefit:

Eco-Prisoner, Eric McDavid (www.supporteric.org)

and the Jericho Movement (www.thejerichomovement.org)

NO ONE TURNED AWAY FOR LACK OF FUNDS.

For further information and updates, go to: www.dcinfoshop.org

Or call, 202-986-0681

Co-Sponsored by: Brian MacKenzie Infoshop; Red Emma's Bookstore and

Coffeehouse; Friends and Family of Daniel McGowan; Black August Planning

Organization; The National Jericho Movement

For Women Behind Bars, "Health Care" Can Be Deadly

By Silja J.A. Talvi, Seal Press
Posted on November 1, 2007
http://www.alternet.org/story/66637/
Why a book about women in prison?

Readers of Women Behind Bars might ask the logical question of why an entire book should be focused on female incarceration while men are still, by far, the majority of people getting arrested and locked up. To many criminologists and writers who cover prison issues, the percentage of women in prison is so small as to warrant little, if any, attention or analysis. (Indeed, at many of the prison-related conferences that I have attended over the years, prisoners are referred to by the male pronoun almost exclusively.)

This question is entirely valid, and deserves a response. Men do face unique issues and hardships in prison, and the overrepresentation of men of color (especially African Americans), the mentally ill, and poor people in general has been more of an overall focus in my work than women's issues in prison until this point.

The deeper I began to delve into the underlying reasons for the rapid growth of girls and women in lock-up, the more insight I gained into a world that few outsiders see, much less understand. Once I began to pay particularly close attention to the ways in which females in the criminal justice system were portrayed in the media, it became clear to me that stereotypes and judgments about "fallen women" from centuries ago were still holding fast.

There's much more to all of this, of course, from the overt medical neglect of women's chronic health needs; to the prevalence of sexual coercion and abuse in women's detention facilities (primarily at the hands of correctional officers, as opposed to other inmates); to the fact that girls and women enter the criminal justice system with far higher rates of drug abuse, sexual violence, childhood abuse, mental illness, and experiences with homelessness. Women are also being punished heavily with undeserved federal "conspiracy charges" for their general unwillingness (or inability) to "snitch" on their loved ones or friends in drug cases -- to the point that this has began to be known as the "girlfriend problem" in the criminal justice system.

Today, the number of girls and women doing time is utterly unprecedented in U.S. history. In 1977, there were just slightly more than 11,000 women in state or federal prison. By 2004, the number of women in prisons had increased by a breathtaking 757 percent. At the end of 2006, there were 203,100 women in jails, state and federal prisons, plus another 1,094,000 women on probation or parole, for a total of 1.3 million females under some form of correctional supervision. (Another 15,000-20,000 girls are being held in juvenile detention.) While Euro-American women still outnumber any other demographic group in jails and prisons, African American women are four times more likely to be locked up than their Euro-American counterparts. (Collectively, African American women and Latinas represent more than 60 percent of women doing time.)

The following excerpt provides just one woman's story from Women Behind Bars. She did not live to tell it, but I am able to share it with you here.

****

I was already several months into the process of writing Women Behind Bars when I received an e-mail from a woman by the name of Grace Ortega. Grace had heard about the book project, and wanted to know if she could tell me what happened to her daughter, Gina Muniz, after she was incarcerated for the first (and last) time in her life. In truth, I already had enough women's stories to fill the pages of a few books -- if anything, I was overwhelmed trying to figure out which stories not to include -- but there was something about Grace's letter, the sheer urgency of it, that made me want to talk to her.

In our first conversation, Grace and I talked for two hours -- or, to be more precise, I listened for those two hours. It actually didn't click until a few days after that conversation that something sounded very familiar about what Grace had been telling me in great detail. Sure enough, I had once actually written about Gina, albeit briefly, in an article about the allegations and emerging evidence surrounding shoddy, abusive, and sometimes life-threatening medical "care" in two adjacent women's prisons: Valley State Prison for Women (VSPW) and the Central California Women's Facility (CCWF) in Chowchilla.

Grace and I stayed in touch, and I made it known that I would be interested in researching the details of her case for Women Behind Bars. I asked her to send me court documents, medical records, prison memos, grievances, or anything else she might have that would enable me to grasp the chronology of events in Gina's life, and to look more deeply into her situation. A few weeks later, a cardboard box the size of an orange crate arrived at my home. Grace had taken my request seriously and literally; from what I could tell, she had sent me absolutely everything she possessed pertaining to her daughter's case.

I didn't actually examine the contents of the box closely until I was already well into a few chapters of this book. When I did finally start to sort through the material, I saw that Grace had included four 8" x 11" color photos of her daughter. I set them down on my kitchen table and just stood there, staring at them. I don't know how much time passed, but I know it was long enough that the images were actually seared into my mind.

When I mentioned earlier that I was haunted by Gina's story, I meant that I have also been haunted by these images. For a time, I actually buried the photos under piles of paper in a strange attempt to block out my emotional reaction to them. It didn't matter; my mind couldn't erase any of it.

As I write this, these pictures are out of hiding, because I can finally give Gina's story a voice. The photograph that I have placed next to me is of her emaciated body, shackled to a bed in a community hospital near CCWF. Another of Gina's photos, which was taken just two months before her arrest on August 8, 1998, is on top of my desk. This is a snapshot of a naturally, strikingly beautiful woman with thick, dark curls framing her wide smile. Gina's warmth and kindness radiate from that picture, just as the one taken just a few weeks before her death conveys the agony of living in a body taken over by cervical cancer, which had started out as an entirely treatable, early-stage illness.

Gina's face in the hospital picture is that of a much, much older woman. The only parts of her that still look young are her hands and long fingers, which resemble a pianist's. Her left arm is shackled to the bed, per the requirement of the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation that even terminally ill prisoners be shackled to their beds and guarded twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Her right arm tenderly cups the head of her then-eight-year-old daughter, Amanda.

Her eyes give away the intensity of her suffering, which started out as horribly as it ended. When she was first taken to the LA County Jail, Gina began to bleed so profusely that she would go through many sanitary pads in the space of a few minutes; most of the time, she was just left to bleed all over herself and her cell. When her cries got loud enough, jail guards would typically come over and look at her with disgust, and then throw toilet paper rolls into her cell.

All of this went on until Gina passed out while talking to her mother on the phone after nearly eight months of nonstop bleeding in jail. Gina's collapse was apparently what it took for her pleas for medical assistance to be heard. Even then, it would be months before she was examined properly and diagnosed with Stage IIB cervical cancer, which has a high success rate of being treated and stopped in its tracks if it is treated aggressively and consistently.

Gina's pleas for justice, however, were not heeded. She received a life sentence in state prison, with an additional seven years tacked on. A life sentence would seem to indicate that she had committed a heinous crime, and most certainly a crime of violence. But Gina had actually committed a nonviolent act, although even she thought she should be punished for stealing $200 from a fifty-one-year- old Vietnamese American woman. Gina did not have a gun, knife, or any other weapon with her, but she admitted that she "strong-armed" the woman into going to a nearby ATM and giving her the money. Even the victim herself, when the police arrived on the scene, stated that Gina had not hurt her in any manner. Gina hadn't been a career criminal by any stretch of the imagination.

Her only violations were for car-related misdemeanors, including a June 30, 1998 charge for driving without a permit. (Gina did not do jail time, although the incident did go on her record.) What happened that pushed this twenty-seven-year-old, with no history of criminal behavior, to the point of rob- bing someone?

Grace explained to me that Gina's father's death on April 22, 1998, triggered a serious, debilitating spiral of depression in her daughter's life. Although Gina's father had periodically been a heavy cocaine and heroin user, and Grace had left him when Gina was just a child, Gina still adored him and tried to see him as much as possible.

By all accounts, cocaine hadn't even been a part of Gina's life until after her father died. Although she had gotten involved with men who hadn't exactly done right by her, Gina had set her sights on becoming a nurse and paving the way for a good life for Amanda.

Seeing her grief, a much older, married male family member offered his "support" to Gina, and then gave her a taste of a drug that he promised would help her get through the pain. His encouragement of her cocaine use was obviously far from being in Gina's best interest. When her use turned into dependency, he started demanding sexual favors, which she provided to him for a time in exchange for money to buy more drugs.

The "exchange" went on for a few months, until a day when she asked for $200 and this relative demanded another sexual favor. As Gina later admitted to her mother, she was suddenly consumed by hatred and disgust -- toward him and toward herself. She refused his advances, and he in turn refused the money. But Gina's desire for more cocaine overtook her ability to think clearly. As her mom put it, "Gina did something that she would have considered unthinkable" in the not-so-distant past.

A mere surface examination reveals that Gina's poor attempt at a crime was obviously a fumbling act of desperation by a woman addicted to drugs. But that's not how the court saw it. Gina's own defense attorney took Grace's hard-earned money (which he was eventually forced to return when Grace filed a complaint with the California Bar Association), did nothing to argue her case, and then urged Gina to plead guilty in exchange for a short sentence. While the judge was announcing the terms of her sentence, Gina heard the words "life" and "seven years," and anxiously asked her lawyer what was happening.

As a bailiff would later testify, Gina's lawyer had lied to her, telling her that entering a guilty plea would get her only a seven-year sentence, not life in prison. Gina did not find out until she was sent to CCWF that she was going to spend the rest of her life in prison. Medical "decisions" made at some level in the process ensured that she was denied the necessary hysterectomy, radiation, and chemotherapy that would have saved her life. In essence, her already cruel and unwarranted life sentence was hastened into a death sentence over just a few horrible months of pain and suffering, during which she and her mother pleaded constantly for medical intervention and urgent treatment.

It took many months of letter writing, and the volunteer assistance of the San Francisco-based advocacy group Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, for Grace to get her daughter out of a depressing community hospital room under the constant watch of prison guards. Gina wanted to die at home, and so she did. On September 29, 2000, Gina Muniz slipped away in silence, surrounded by her immediate family, just two days after her mother took her home.

Where is the healing or hope in a story like this? Gina was certainly not given the chance to experience either.

Instead, they have manifested themselves in Grace's ability to turn her own grief into advocacy on the part of other women in prison. Grace has traveled across California, testifying before legislators and advocating for compassionate release for terminally ill women in prison so that they do not have to endure anything akin to the needless and slow death that Gina suffered.

Grace still looks at the pictures of her daughter every day, and she worries that her daughter's life will be forgotten entirely or, worse yet, dismissed as the plight of a criminal whose life and death were of no particular significance. "Please," she asked me again at the end of our last conversation, "Please make sure that Gina isn't forgotten."

Ms. Talvi will be reading at In These Times (Chicago) on November 7 at 7:00 p.m., in discussion with filmmaker Salome Chesnoff about the criminalization of prostitution. Other upcoming readings include Powell's (Portland,OR) on Nov. 12 at 7:30 pm; and Elliott Bay Books (Seattle) on Nov. 17th, 2 pm. Send e-mail to womenbehindbars@gmail.com for further updates and correspondence.

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