A Prisoner's Perspective ®

2011-02-02T16:45:00.000-08:00

Fight for Your Democracy

During Barack Obama’s presidential campaign he spoke to America’s anger and disillusionment of the rampant political corruption in Congress that has increasingly stifled America’s business.

The American educational system is in shambles; we have imprisoned more of our own citizens than at any time in history; the infrastructure is dilapidated; the poor, the disfranchised and the homeless reach historic numbers now.

Even before the greed-fueled, deception-ladened financial meltdown, the mass export of American jobs by unpatriotic corporations was in full gear.

A disenchanted America knows its problems all too well. As presidential candidate, Obama resonated with a disheartened America when he said both parties have allowed “lobbyist and campaign contributions to rig the system.”

It’s no wonder just forty five percent of Americans have “trust and confidence” in Congress, and just twenty five percent approve of how Congress is doing its job.

When hospitals and schools in America are closing and prisons are booming, gun sales and victims are at historic levels, and the very ones who caused this national failure are rewarded with taxpayer-funded spoils, then we know something is amiss. The taxpayer, meanwhile, is left starved, stranded, and stupefied.

The fight against undue corporate influence must begin today, right now. Put another way, the sale of American democracy must end today, right now.

For it is here that an ever appealing Obama expressed his most profound wisdom and challenge to you: “If we’re not willing to take up [this] fight, then real change—change that will make a lasting difference in the lives of ordinary Americans—will keep getting blocked by the defenders of the status quo.”

As I record this ongoing history, over a year after these words were uttered, democracy, your democracy, is still under siege. Americans, taxpayers, citizens, all the ordinary people of this otherwise proud country, must come together to form a wave of change; today, right now!

Sources:

Lessig, Lawrence, How to Get Our Democracy Back, The Nation, February 22, 2010, pp. 11, 13, 19

2011-02-02T16:40:00.000-08:00

For Christ’s Sake, Where’s the Compassion?

Some might call it irony, others hypocrisy. An overwhelming majority of Americans claim Christianity as their religion, yet America is the only so-called civilized, industrial nation that practices vengeance with such gusto.

I was reminded of this fact earlier this week as NBC’s Ann Curry interviewed Ingrid Bettencourt, the Colombian politician who’d been captive for six years by Colombian leftist guerrillas called the FARC. She and a number of others were rescued by helicopter in a spectacular game of deception, ordered by Colombian President Alvaro Uribe Velez.

Now picture on the canvas of your mind being restrained against your will deep in the dense darkness of Colombia’s jungles; imagine being chained for weeks on end to unrelenting trees, and forced to subsist in the most primitive conditions, exposed to the elements. As a woman, perhaps, you’re threatened with rape, or maybe even violated by foul-smelling, unsanitary rebels who treat you like the animals they are.

In spite of these atrocities, and so much more, the 1992 presidential candidate retained her dignity, her values. When Ann Curry asked if she was angry, if she wanted revenge, Bettencourt responded with poise.

She said, paraphrasing here, “When I looked down from the helicopter, I said I will not take this experience with me. I have compassion for the people who did these unspeakable things. Compassion and forgiveness are very important to me; they make me more human.”

This mind-blowing display of divine humanity was aired to an American audience bent on the death penalty—an eye for an eye penchant—despite their proclaimed allegiance to the Christian Christ whose top edict is to forgive.

Such humanity isn’t an aberration among foreigners. Both America’s state neighbors, Mexico to the south and Canada to the north, not only abhor the death penalty but consider the “lock ‘em up, throw away the key” mentality equally inhumane.

Across the globe, in Uganda, Africa, nearly two million victims of a horrible, twenty-year conflict forge ahead in a “forgiveness” campaign. This noble effort is aimed at the infamous Lord’s Resistance Army, a terror-laden rebel group that utilizes heinous tactics such as maiming and disfiguring civilians, and forcing children to be soldiers and sex slaves.

It takes a uniquely groomed heart and maturity to forgive, divine qualities Americans apparently haven’t yet grasped.

Still, I have faith that one day my country will be a compassionate nation; a nation that forgives its poor, pardons deserving prisoners, and recognizes the wealth and worth of every human being.

Unfortunately, today is just not that day.

Sources:
Ann Curry, NBC, The Today Show, July 11, 2008

Okeowo, Alexis, “Uganda’s Rebels on ‘Forgiveness’ Tour, Christian Science Monitor, November 9, 2008, p. 7

The World Almanac and Book of FACTS: 2005 (World Almanac Education Group Inc., New York, NY, 2005): p. 765

2011-02-02T16:34:00.000-08:00

Mergers V. Coalitions: Power V. So-Called Powerless

It’s a never-ending story, these corporate mergers. They combine, join forces and consolidate—growing ever stronger while the consumer, especially the ethnic consumer, grows more fractured and divided.

In May, 2005, Regions Financial Corporation struck a $10 billion deal to merge with rival AmSouth Bancorp. Prior to that, heavy-hitter software giant Adobe Systems combined with Macromedia for $3.4 billion. And Verizon successfully bid with NBC-Universal to compete in cable and satellite TV.

Meanwhile, we people on the bottom are divided; struggling like crabs in a bucket, or running on hamsters’ wheels that keep us moving but take us nowhere.

It is during divisions and disturbances in prison that the institutional alarms sound and we are obliged, even forced, to freeze. No one is allowed to move until the disturbance is quelled or an assessment is made as to how to proceed. Perhaps this facet of prison life should be our societal model.

Assessment: The elite and established have health care, employment, and property; and the privileged have education, cohesion, and power.

In sad contrast, we struggle for employment, education, and decent health care—we strive for a mere voice!

Ailments like diabetes, heart disease, and hypertension plague our people; and gangs, guns, and prisons drastically minimize our presence.

Some of us are so deceived we see the other as the enemy.

Meanwhile, ExxonMobile pulled in a first-quarter profit of $8.4 billion this year. Many other American-born multinational corporations also did well. And it seems the better they do, the more they get from Congress, and the less we get from either.

But our curse is also our blessing.

After all, in a capitalistic society, money rules. And though hardly realized, money is a resource we have plenty of.

African Americans reportedly spend $761 billion annually, while Latinos dole out $760 billion a year. Our combined ethnic purchasing power, including Asians, Indians and others, is expected to exceed $1.5 trillion in the U.S. by 2009.

That’s power. But power, to be effective, must be channeled.

The days of blindly rewarding discriminatory, unpatriotic and exploitive corporations must end—today.

“How we spend our dollars has a big impact on corporate profits,” says Jeremy Siegal, author of “Stocks for the Long Run.” Samuel Gompers of organized labor told us in the ‘60s that we must “reward[] labor’s friends and punish[] labor’s enemies.”

Punish them by withholding that which they covet most—money.

Boycotts are not new to us. The recent boycotts of “anything gringo”—on both sides of the border—for immigrant rights was impressive. as was the December 12, 2003, boycott, sponsored by the Mexican American Association in response to the repeal of the California law allowing undocumented residents to obtain driver’s licenses. Governor Schwarzenegger has since softened his hostile tone on immigrant issues, and the passage of a new law granting them the privilege to drive appears promising.

The solid unity of Latinos and their willingness to sacrifice brings to mind the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott spawned by the late civil rights activist Rosa Parks. It was hailed as one of the most effective boycotts of the time, lasting over a year and costing the Montgomery Bus Line Company $750,000 in lost revenues. Some 17,000 African Americans refused to ride the buses, instead ride-sharing or walking if they had to.

As history has taught us, values often come in second to profits in a capitalistic world. This point is made clear when one considers the history of the United States, not to mention the exploitation of countries like Africa or our western neighbors in Central and South America. Here in North America we have yesterday’s abominable period of trans-Atlantic slavery, followed by horrific child labor abuses and less than humane sweatshop conditions. Now, prolific immigrant exploitation and heartless job outsourcing plague the country’s moral stance. Yet corporate economics has always been the catalyst fueling this evil.

On the other hand, we now wield an unprecedented potency. Take for instance the knee-bending $50 million loss Safeway, Inc. suffered in just 4 short months during the 2004 worker strike over a dispute with white shirts over health care and a proposal for wage reductions for new workers. Safeway’s devastating loss in revenues also sent their stock plummeting, further hurting their bottom line.

The vociferous complaints bellowed by Los Angeles Unified School District officials following mass student walkouts in protest to anti-immigrant legislation was also telling. According to news reports, in just three days the walkouts caused a loss of $1 million in federal student subsidizing.

In the interim, while we casually consider the urgent need to coalesce, phone giant Sprint bought Nextel for $6.5 billion, Procter & Gamble purchased Gillette for $57 billion and K-Mart seized Sears for $11 billion; all spawning layoffs, fewer consumer options and much more power for corporations incessantly flexing the consolidated muscle we, as consumers, fortify.

2011-01-26T16:01:00.000-08:00

Sex Offenders: The Math and the Money

There are 83,000 sex offenders on the streets of California. The average parole officer has a caseload of 70 parolees. The average sentence for your run-of-the-mill sex offender is 2-8 years in state prison.

In distinct contrast, there are an estimated 5,000 nonviolent people locked up for 25 years-to-life under California’s notorious Three Strikes law at a cost of $49,000 a year per prisoner—just over half the salary of a tenured teacher.

The list of nonviolent (and violent) celebrities and other elite in free society extends itself daily, yet Americans seem okay with that. These miss the vengeful eye of the victims’ rights focus so often directed at the poor.

Three Strikes was enacted in response to paroled sex offender Richard Allen Davis, who kidnapped and murdered our young, promising Polly Klaas.

In 2004, an amendment to Three Strikes was placed on the ballot, increasing the penalties for sex offenders and relaxing that retroactive, mandatory life sentence for petty thieves and trespassers. The prison guards’ union and the Schwarzenegger administration defeated the measure.

Instead, toothless laws named after still more innocent child victims were passed: Megan’s Law, creating a federal, mandatory sex offender registry, and Jessica’s Law, localizing the same tenets, including school zone restrictions in California.

Still, the Phillip Garridos and John Gardners stand accused of carrying on their sexual deviations at the cost of our most vulnerable with little hindrance.

Meanwhile, with the media machine’s sensational focus on the nonviolent and their inevitable releases, we’re all made aiders and abettors to this sick, backward, and deadly madness. With California budgets suffering, we can’t look up those we’re merely mad at and those we have true reason to fear. Can I get an amen?

March 2010

Sources:

California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/)

Families to Amend California’s Three Strikes Law (http://www.facts1.com/)

Fox 11 News, March 4, 2010, “John Gardner Believed Killer of Second Girl”

KABC-7 Eye Witness News, March 24, 2010, “California Law Makers Grill CDCR Officials for Failure to Protect Public from Paroled Sex Offender John Gardner”

NBC’s Today Show, March 3, 2010, “83,000 Sex Offenders in California”

2011-01-26T15:42:00.000-08:00

The State of Corrections

The state of California is often touted as a growth state. Shamefully, one of its biggest and fastest growing institutions is its massive penal system of 170,000-plus prisoners, the largest in the nation. And as huge as the penal system is, its still too small for its burgeoning occupancy, which is almost double over what it was physically and constitutionally designed to hold.

Over thirty-three concrete and steel prisons hold this independent-county-sized population of people. That’s a lot of growth from the first California prison in the 1850s, which was actually a rotting three-mast ship. (Imagine how different things might be if we focused on growing the educational system with similar zeal.)

Following a derailed attempt at badly needed prison reform by the legislature this Spring, this massive monster of a penal system is now slated to grow even more. In a hurried effort to hold three federal judges at bay—who see the need to intervene or outright takeover the failed system—Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger recently announced that he had forged a deal with lawmakers to add nearly sixty thousand new beds to existing sites, unsightly, matte-gray sites that dot California’s otherwise lively green landscape like a bad case of acne.

Of course, the price tag for these ungainly places must grow as well. Californians already strain to pay the current $9 billion a year budget, which translates to an estimated $40,000 a year, per prisoner. Add to that $7 billion for the expansion—which one insider estimates will balloon to $15 billion with interest.

The justification for the expansion is to ease overcrowding. It’s the exact same so-called remedy each governor has implemented; governor after governor, term after term, for the last thirty years. Each one passing along a more dire crisis.

Today, the state of corrections can best be described in two syllables: a mess!

Yet, this band-aid of a fix does nothing to address the causes of the mess.

-There’s no plan for parole reform, though California has the highest recidivism rate in the nation.

-The CDCR’s Board of Parole Hearings is in complete shambles; releasing only two percent of lifers who come before it—though the system was actually designed to release reformed men and women, like other states manage to do. As a result, the hopelessness increases violence and suicides—and again, California has some of the highest rates in both categories.

-And thousands of non-violent three-strikers still hopelessly linger within, though just about everyone, including a number of judges, agree the law is bad policy and needs desperate reform—in fact, the only opponents seem to be those who profit politically or financially from the yearly growth.

-Robert Sillen, the federal court appointed receiver of the failed medical division of the CDCR, has charged repeatedly that the department wastes billions of dollars because of chronic mismanagement.

-Incessant overtime due to staff shortages has caused persistent cost overruns over the years. Last year, alone, overtime totaled $277 million. This year is expected to be no different.

Astonishingly, there was no remedy offered for these obvious problems, which actually go on and on but were limited for this essay.

In sum, the state of corrections is so tattered that even those who host the most unfettered hatred towards prisoners should be white-hot at the failures because each parolee who fails after release, and makes a new victim, is but a reflection of the bigger picture.

Sources:

William Wan., “Parole Museum Pays Tribute to Unsung System,” Los Angeles Times, May 17, 2004: B3 (First prison, according to parole agent Paul Toma).

Pacifica Network’s KPFK Evening News (90.7 FM), February 8, 2007, (billions wasted).

Pacifica Network’s KPFK Evening News (90.7 FM), February 9, 2007, (billions wasted).

Pacifica Network’s KPFK Evening News (90.7 FM), April 26, 2007, (Prison expansion deal).

KNBC4 News, April 27, 2007 (Prison expansion deal).

“California Parole Board Squelches Life Prisoner Writs on Procedural Grounds,” Prison Legal News, October 2006: p. 38, (98% of paroles denied).

“California Prison Guards’ Overtime Doubles to $277 Million,” August 2006.

Don Thompson (AP), “California Inmate Suicides Climb, Security Changes Blamed,” August 6, 2005 (Herald.com).

Inmate Price Tag $43,287 – Legislative Analyst’s Office, Sacramento Bee, February 2007.

cdcr.ca.gov – violence statistics and other information.

2010-04-04T20:53:00.000-07:00

Prisons, Immigrants, and a Culture of Life

There is one place where immigrants are not only unwanted but also where they absolutely shouldn’t be—prison.

Like prisoners, immigrants are already stigmatized, discriminated against and exploited by a voracious labor market. Immigrants, like prisoners, are all too familiar with being profiled, abused, and having their families separated by the system.

Many prisoners can relate to the plight of the immigrant for other reasons, too. Immigrants are largely undereducated and many are poor. Like those who generally become prisoners, immigrants find it extremely difficult to contest state charges, even when not guilty of the crime accused. Like prisoners, immigrants often find themselves the scapegoat for society’s ills when, in reality, disparate social policies—here and abroad—make up our collective ills.

With all the commonalities, a cynical mind just might believe we actually belong together. Perhaps that’s what Congressman James Sensenbrenner was thinking when he introduced H.R. 4437, the onerous bill that would make felons out of an estimated twelve million misdemeanor border-crossers; much like what California’s Three Strikes law did to 43,000 nonviolent poor and petty offenders; that’s according to a 2005 State Legislative Analyst Office report.

On a national scale, there are already 2.1 million prisoners behind bars in this country. A number that surpasses any period in our history, and shamefully exceeds every other nation—including China, which has almost five times the general population of the U.S.

So where would we put twelve million new felons if H.R. 4437 became law? Realistically, if just three million, or one-third of the twelve million immigrants, were caught we’d have to build two times the prisons we currently have. And for what? To maliciously incarcerate scores of hard working, contributing and otherwise law-abiding people?

On the inside we’re already woefully overcrowded. Instantly doubling the national prison population would turn prison yards into friction-agitated powder kegs.

As it is, we’re pitted against one another for scarce resources like mattresses—though they’re wafer thin. Library seats come twelve per session, though there are one thousand prisoners in each yard. Jobs and educational assignments are frustratingly limited, not to mention the food rations and lack of medical care so egregious that a prisoner a week was dying until a federal judge intervened in early April.

So be warned; let the recent murderous melees and racial riots at California’s inundated jails and prisons serve as an omen to the rest of the nation. Needless, expensive, massive and inhumane incarceration is, in many ways, murder and should be vehemently resisted by a nation that boasts a culture of life.

Sources:

California State Analysts Office, 2005, “Three Strikes: The Impact After More Than a Decade.”

Jennifer Warren, State Prisons Chief Resigns After 2 Months on the Job,” Los Angeles Times, April 20, 2006, A1

You can hear audio commentaries of Dortell at www.thousandkites.org.

2010-04-04T20:47:00.000-07:00

A Shrinking Middle Class: A Growing Prison Population

Remember when President George W. Bush and his corporate cronies told us everything’s good and the economy is as rosy as can be? It probably was in the Bush gardens, but here in the tangible world where real people are affected by one malignant policy after another, the situation has disintegrated into a field of thorny weeds.

In contrast to a future filled with prospects, we, on the ground level, see some of America’s corporate icons sinking fast; from major airlines to a couple of America’s premiere automakers. Some sectors of corporate America seem to be see-sawing between senior lay-offs and low wage hiring; others are unpatriotically abandoning American workers for cheap labor abroad.

And it gets uglier: In August, 2005, the U.S. Census Bureau reported that 37 million Americans live in poverty, up 1.1 million from the previous year, and up consecutively for 5 years straight.

The lamentable irony is that China, our emerging rival in everything from consumer spending to economic growth, is fostering a middle class at a rate of 1 million a month; obviously fueled by regrettable neo-American policies.

Kind of engenders a sinking feeling America might be imploding. Falling apart for the same reasons socialism in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics crumbled in the ‘80s: cronyism and greed at the top. Likewise with Rome, which neglected its interior and over-extended its might and hubris abroad.

Meanwhile, according to a variety of news reports, foreclosures, bankruptcies and homelessness in America are up. College enrollment, especially in minority sectors, is down and dropout rates downright shameful.

So the middle-class is shrinking, the working poor is a growing class, and poverty is robust.

According to the Department of Justice, Bureau of Statistics, there are over 2 million prisoners in the U.S. (we are beating China at something), and we’re locking up an average of 900 people a week.

You name it and there’s a new law against it. American policing has reached unparalleled heights, along with media reports of police brutality. But despite convictions of executive cheats like former Enron CEO Kenneth Lay, or the guilty plea of former Boeing executive Darlene Druyun, stemming from a nefarious conspiracy involving a $23 billion Air Force contract, it’s the Wall Street elite who invest in the poor’s imprisonment. For it is the poor, not the elite, who fill up America’s prisons; yet the crimes of the elite are so much more extensive.

Progressives and the conscious call it a war on the poor. Unfortunately, too many at the bottom haven’t even realized they’re under attack.

The most frightening aspect of it all is that it is primarily the poor and middle-class who finance and support our very own demise. We tolerate deception from those we privilege to hold office instead of forcing a cycle where the new guy, any new guy, is given a chance. After a few of these cycles it will become evident to policy makers that keeping it clean is the only way to remain in office. Moreover, too many of us continue to patronize crooked corporations and re-elect sellout political figures without any demands or accountability.

Until this changes, that is until we change it, those of us already in the know can assure you, it’s getting pretty crowded in and down here.

Source list:

John O’Dell, “Fired Boeing Executive to Plead Guilty to Conspiracy,” Los Angeles Times, April, 2004: C1, C4

U.S. Census Bureau

U.S. Department of Justice, Bureau of Statistics

Alan Mendohlson, “Troubled Economy, Economic Woes,” KCAL-9, June 5, 2006

Bill Alexander, NBC, The Today Show (Challenging Economic Times), May 14, 2006

Michael McCarthy, “[Lou] Dobbs Fires Away Against Outsourcing,” USA Today, February 23, 2005: 3B

Mark Trumbull, “Inflation’s Rising Toll on Consumers,” Christian Science Monitor, May 18, 2006: pp. 1, 10

Update, June 2006: On his way out of the White House, President Bush acknowledged that the American economy was sliding downhill fast. During emergency congressional sessions economists suggested a massive $7 billion dollar bailout of the banking industry was needed, and they (the rich) got it with no strings attached.

2010-03-20T20:24:00.000-07:00

Marching for a Better Future

It was a rare and exciting sight, an event of historic proportion. On April 15, 2008, California’s beleaguered labor force took to the streets. United for better jobs, some 300,000 unionists, construction workers, longshoremen, and baggage carriers, shot to the offensive to protect the middle class citadel.

This unprecedented ensemble of unions, representing firemen, janitors, and more, called their demonstration “Hollywood to the Docks March for Good Jobs.” The three day trek was the first of its kind in modern times but a centuries-old battle between the interests of employees and employers; uber-capitalists and consumers.

Indeed, as recorded in Howard Zinn’s popular book, A People’s History of the United States (The New Press, 2003):

In 1835, twenty mills went on strike to reduce the workday from thirteen and a half hours to eleven hours; to get cash wages instead of company script, and to end fines for lateness. Fifteen hundred children and parents went on strike (p. 170).

Ultimately, they won twelve-hour workdays, nine on Saturdays. During the next two years there were 140 strikes in the eastern region of the U.S. The strikes helped forge more humane conditions that workers still enjoy today.

It’s more important to note that it wasn’t corporate mercy that brought about change; it was collective opposition by you, the people.

For sure, business wants as much productivity as it can get with the least amount of wages and benefits expended. Workers want as much family time as possible with as much recompense and benefits to care for their families.

Corporate interests and people interests are diametrically opposed. In this scheme of opposites, consumers fall on the side of the worker, for they are the workers, and they want as much for their hard earned cash as possible.

Yet, in today’s world, it’s often hard to discern between one side of the fence and the other. The pockets of some consumers burn hot until they cast all their dough into the troves of the big corps.

There is little of no demand in exchange from them. No requirement that corporations invest locally; repairing infrastructure, building community centers for the kids, and hiring those within the same zip code. Nationally, they don’t demand that their jobs, their neighbors’ jobs, and their friends’ jobs remain in America. They simply fork over their spoils for little in exchange.

The marchers want better job security and benefits that rise along with inflation. They realize that it is their hands and their money that have made the corporation.

The middle class is shrinking with depression-era likeness. Millions are losing their homes due to corporate corruption. The once friendly bank is now a rapacious, multi-national corporation that claws ever closer to the foreclosed home; ever so ready to add to the swelling homeless population, and the prisons they build.

It is the corporations—those voracious beasts—that dispatch armies of lobbyist to the halls of Congress to bump your vote. It is the corporations that pollute the land, threaten the ecology and blatantly renege on pre-paid health care insurance when one is ill stricken.

Yes, this was an historic march, not just for Californians but for the country, for you and yours and me and mine. This was a march for the nation, for the world against a ravenous, diabolical fiend that will eat you out of house and home if you don’t tame him.

Sources:
KNBC, March 15, 2008

California Budget Project Report, March 2008

Realfacts.com (Housing market crash)

To reach Dortell, please e-mail him at dortellwilliams@yahoo.com. Please also leave your e-mail address with any comments so that Dortell may contact you. Thank you for your interest!

2010-03-20T20:08:00.000-07:00

Rehabilitating CDCR with Honor

I realize that many in society are hard pressed not to believe that all prisoners are dangerous, violent or incorrigible.

It is true that prisons are dangerous places—for all, guards and prisoners alike. California’s prisons, in particular, make for perfect peril by a lethal combination of chronic overcrowding, repressive idleness and an obstinate, embittering model of punishment, and punishment only.

Prior to forfeiting my seat in society in 1989, I had always assumed the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation meant just that, a place where the broken in society were sent to be fixed—or to at least have rehabilitation available if desired.

The reality of my fallacy hit me square in the face when I was sent—as a 26-year-old first-timer—to the notorious state prison called Pelican Bay.

I was given no plan or suggestion for self-improvement. I was not encouraged to do anything positive and, to my surprise, classes one would think to be a given in the department of “corrections” were starkly absent; no anger management despite the rampant violence, no gamblers’ anonymous to counter that pervasive and addictive vice—that all too often leads to violent repercussions for unpaid debts, not even victim orientation to instill some reality and empathy for the hellish consequences of victimization.

The only admonishment received was from fellow prisoners just as ignorant and misguided as myself: this prison clique is warring with that prison clique, or we aren’t on speaking terms with this race, and so and so is gonna get hit today for not paying a dope debt. Those were the extent of my many advisements.

Despite the haunting deprivations and neglect by prison officials, I desired more than the daily, vexing emptiness that surrounded me. My drug dealing days were shipwrecked along with my freedom. I certainly didn’t want to continue that lifestyle in prison. Neither was gang-banging an option for me in prison, or ever. Like the outside world, all of the street-hustle paths of prison led to darkness.

Then, in 2003, by pure serendipity, I was transferred to the state prison at Los Angeles County, a facility where a few reform-minded men cut through the institutional thicket of obstacles to open a route towards self-amendment. It was then that I eventually learned of a little known secret called the Honor Program.

Initiated in 2000, this conglomerate of men, tired of the madness and irresponsibility, proposed a bright vision for change that would stand in stark contrast to the damaging model of force and violence utilized for prisoner control.

The most glaring distinction of the Honor Program was that it was completed voluntary. Participants had to agree to random drug tests, to relinquish gang ties and racial politics, and to draw up a program plan.

As in the past, prisoners gave me a heads up, but the language and tone was much more inspiring: “This yard is different, man. We don’t [gang] bang here; we respect all races and push the positive,” I was told.

As the days peeled away, I was astonished to see integrated sports teams on the yard, and I kind of felt neurotic as I searched in vain for any hint of tension. Here prisoners utilize each other’s skills to teach one another through peer-education, and are given leeway by progressive staff to do so. Writing class, critical thinking, yoga and Spanish are all offered, to name a few.

The success has been indisputable. In its first year of existence, a study was conducted by prison officials that revealed a decrease in weapons infractions by 88 percent, and violence dropped by 85 percent. The Honor Program had saved CDCR (and taxpayers) $200,000.

To our dismay and disappointment, the Honor Program has been virtually ignored by past secretaries of CDCR, refusing to make it official. Still, ever so optimistic, it is our hope that the new secretary, Mathew Cate, will adopt this self-sufficient, money-saving program and secure its longevity.

It is without question that rehabilitated prisoners not only make prisons safer, but society is also made safer upon the release of the majority of those who will eventually be paroled.

Sources:

www.prisonhonorprogram.org

www.cdcr.ca.gov

Faucett, Richard, “Honor Program Success,” Los Angeles Times, 2003

Lawrence, Susan, “Creating A Healing Society,” (Elite Books, Santa Rosa, CA: 2006): p. 101

Widdison, Marissa, “Bodies Imprisoned, Minds, Go Free,” Antelope Valley Press, October 7, 2006

Senate Bill 299, The Honor Program, 2006 (vetoed by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2006)

2010-03-11T13:35:00.000-08:00

It’s the System that Needs Corrections and Rehabilitation

It was kind of like asking a captured robber voluntarily handcuff himself without the threat of authority, or expecting a rabbit to hold still while you aim and fire. Today, the prison guards distributed a survey asking if we’d be interested in voluntarily transferring to out of state joints to help them ease overcrowding. The survey was initiated by the legislature as they contemplate the viability of such transfers, along with sentencing reform and other avenues to alleviate a severe population overflow.

Of course, the true nature of the beast is force. Everything in prison is done by force—directly or indirectly. However, this time we got saved by the parched, yellowed and dog-eared sheet of paper called the Constitution.

The survey said, as if we didn’t know, that the prison system is dangerously overcrowded and voluntary transfers would help relieve the pressure.

I’ve been captive to these hell holes for nearly two decades and marvel that our quixotic legislature has finally decided to act on this re-occurring problem.

The stakes are high, so they want us to help dig them out of this mess.

So, let’s say the needed 5,000 of us agree to transfer. The problem is temporarily countered. Yet laws like Three Strikes continue to gobble up petty thieves for life, the Board of Parole Hearings, which is designed to actually parole people, continues to release its annual 2 percent trickle and the newly released continue to get tripped up on technical violations and recidivate. Before you know it, we’re up to the brim again. Then what?

Meanwhile, for the rest of us, there’s little by way of job training, or rehabilitation or drug treatment—though 85 percent of offenders have drug or alcohol directly or indirectly related to their imprisonment. Opportunities to gain productive skills are slim to none in California prisons, so we abide in a world of idleness where violence reigns as a result.

That pretty much describes the cycle every time they build a new prison as well. California has been trying to build its way out of overcrowding—without releasing lifers or rehabilitating those with fixed sentences for over 20 years. It hasn’t worked in the past and nothing suggests that failure won’t repeat itself with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s two proposed prisons or multimillion dollar extensions to existing sites. These always amount to nothing more than temporary plugs—been there, done that.

The survey graciously related that we’ll continue to earn good-time credits if we help ‘em out and transfer out of state. Sure we will, and every other detail of our sentences will also apply. No sentence adjustments commensurate with the accepting state’s sentencing guidelines, which are usually far less than that of California. And perhaps no furloughs, or family visits for the general population, or other incentives that California refuses to give. The survey listed 28 applicable states, from Alabama to Wisconsin, none of which lock up their citizens for 25 years to life for video game theft or other such petty offenses, but, again, even if we were to transfer to Jupiter, California will want its quarter-century in time.

So “what do we get out of the deal?” was the echo on the yard. Or how does the taxpayer benefit, for that matter? It’s just a shell game, but with bodies. Just more of the same.

Still, there are other options. We can hold out and make our captors actually fix the problem. They can honor the punishments originally meted out and start releasing the thousands who have met their Board of Parole Hearings requirements. The legislature should enact sentence reform, and implement genuine rehabilitation like other states with successful prison systems, or better yet, let U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson take over and bust up that dominating guard’s union (the California Peace Officers’ Association), said to be the most influential in the state. They’re constantly pushing for more prisons, more guards and repressive laws to ensure the need for prison growth. It’s as immoral as slavery.

Judge Henderson has already seized control of the Youth Authority, along with a portion of the prison administration that deals with prison guard discipline (due primarily to a pervasive code of silence within their ranks that hindered criminal and misconduct investigations on prison guards), and most recently Judge Thelton has taken control of the prison system’s health care department where an average of 52 prisoners were dying a year of preventable deaths as a result of gross negligence—that’s about a prisoner a week.

According to a 34-page report released in July by special master John Hagar, appointed by Judge Henderson to investigate the corrections department and possible violations of prisoner’s civil rights, the guard’s union is too influential, is impeding positive reform, and the governor’s office has become too chummy with the union, apparently trying to curry favor for the November election. Hagar also accused the governor of back peddling on his promise to fix the problems which have now grown into a crisis.

I checked the “Not Interested” box on the survey without the slightest hesitation. In spite of the myriad of criminal allegations we see those in power spin their way out of, they hold us responsible to the Nth degree for our slightest slipups. I say it’s time we finally hold them accountable for something; namely this overcrowded, mismanaged, wasteful and out of control prison system they’ve created that now needs a good dose of correction and rehabilitation itself.

Sources:
Don Thompson (AP) “Prison Watchdog Rips Governor,” Antelope Valley Press, June 22, 2006: A10 (Hagar report, Officer code of silence).

Don Thompson (AP) “Prison Problems Prompt Special Session,” Antelope Valley Press, August 2006: A1, A6 (Hagar report; governor chummy with union).

Jennifer Warren and Jordan Rau, “Prison Reform Plan Falls Short,” Los Angeles Times, August 30, 2006, B1, B7 (Need rehab, forced transfers unconstitutional).

2010-02-22T19:35:00.000-08:00

The Fear Mongering of Early Release

It amazes me to hear of all the fear mongering and panic spread in response to any talk of early prison releases.

History has proven repeatedly that early releases—releasing people who will get out anyway—does not culminate into significant crime spikes.

To illustrate, in 1963 the U.S. Supreme Court interpreted the Sixth Amendment, in Gideon v. Wainwright, as fulfilling the need to grant poor people accused of felonies the right to counsel. As a result, the 1,252 detained indigent Floridians who weren’t afforded counsel were point blank released. Fear and hysteria were understandably rampant, yet 28 months later the FDC found their recidivism rate amounted to a mere 13.6 percent.

Furthermore, history has proven that the mass demonization of prisoners as “dangerous” is Politics 101. The facts: The vast majority of imprisoned people made a mistake and simply wish to peacefully do their time and stay out of the way. Likewise, the vast majority of prison guards are professional/ In either case, if the bad apples ruled the system would completely implode.

Early releases here in California have proven no different. In the 70s, under Senate Bill 42, Governor Jerry Brown released 11,000 prisoners, the majority of them lifers; with no significant crime increase. Moreover, due to the same type of overcrowding the prison system is experiencing, the Los Angeles County Jail system has been doing early releases as a matter of course for over a decade.

Considering that we’re spending 45 percent more on prisons than the university system, and that the state budget is still $20 billion in the hole, I think early releases are long overdue. Just think, $49,000 per prisoner annually. That’s almost a salaried teacher’s pay. Yet we’re keeping the prisoners and releasing the teachers!

Indeed, these prisoners are no more dangerous than singer Chris Brown, who pled guilty to a domestic violence case or film director Roman Polanski, who accepted a plea deal for statutory rape. However, these proposed felons are non-violent.

Sources:
American Bar Association Project on Minimum Standards for Criminal Justice, Standards Relating to Sentencing Alternatives and Procedures, 59, quoted in ronald L. Goldfarb and Linda R. Singer, After Conviction (Simon & Schuster, New York, 1973) p. 183

DeWayne Wickham, “Polanski’s Supporters Look Past Pedophilia,” USA Today, October 27, 2009: 11A

Fay Knopp and Jon Regeir, Instead of Prisons: A Handbook for Abolistionists (Prison Research Education Action Project, Syracuse, N.Y., 1976, 2005) p. 39-41

Henry J. Steadman and Gary Keveles, The Community Adjustment and Criminal Activity of the Baxsrom Patients: 1966-1970, American Journal of Psychiatry, 129
(1972) pp. 304-310

2010-02-15T20:59:00.000-08:00

Plea Deals, But No Mercy

Plea bargains are a main staple of the criminal justice system, yet the public knows little or nothing of what they entail. According to Los Angeles District Attorney Steve Cooley, ninety-six percent of California’s criminal cases end by plea bargains, which is about the national average.

Plea bargains are the pressure valve for overburdened court systems where a never-ending line of criminal trials can endure for as little as a few days or drag on for years at a time. These courtroom deals, as they’re sometimes called, relieve stressed public defenders’ offices, save taxpayers millions of dollars by circumventing costly trials where lawyers and investigators charge hundreds of dollars by the hou8r, and relieve civilians of time-consuming jury duty.

For the accused, plea bargains save people from the experience of humiliating and invasive public trials; from the expense of financially draining defense counsel, and sometimes, they reduce probable harsher sentences that could potentially follow a jury conviction.

A plea bargain is a formal agreement with the government—a contract, if you will—for a guaranteed and specified outcome. A plea bargain is supposed to be a win-win situation. However, as the story of Eric Davis illustrates, win-wins are not always the case.

Davis, a California three-striker, suffers from a sixty-year sentence for, as many call it, an ancient history of robberies. On its face it might seem just that a repeat offender got what he deserved. Yet, as with most legalese, it’s much more complicated than that.

Davis, a fifty-six year old father of two, committed his first robbery at age nineteen—in 1968—twenty-six years before the enactment of the Three Strikes Law.

After his release from the ’68 robbery, Davis went straight, adopting a career in upholstery, while practicing music on the side./ Some eight years later, having fallen on hard times, he reverted back to robbery. Following a four year prison stint, from 1976 to 1980, he was released and managed to keep himself clean for fifteen years, until he was arrested in 1995 for the third time for another robbery (with mitigating circumstances because he used no gun during the crime).

Davis now sits warehoused in prison, expected to languish for more than twice the time a person would get for two homicides. Imagine, a sentence of six decades in prison for three completely isolated incidents, albeit, criminal, in which no one was ever injured. His offenses spanned some thirty-seven years, two of which occurred before the Three Strikes law was even a concept.

Davis readily acknowledges that criminal behavior shouldn’t be overlooked simply because he fell on hard times. Indeed, millions of people are subjected to hard times and don’t revert to criminal behavior. Still, the fact that the government would go back decades to strike a person out for life is wholly unfair and unjust.

According to Davis, his first offense was supposed to be sponged from his record when he turned twenty-one; after he met all the conditions of his parole term. Normally, that would have been the end of the case. Had that conviction been stricken, according to the plea agreement, the maximum sentence for his current offense would have been fourteen years; still a stretch to any observer who values human life.

Davis considers himself a victim of the state by deception. He, like scores of others, took plea agreements that saved the state time, inconvenience and money in exchange for what should have been settled and closed agreements, only to have the state renege and arbitrarily hold those plea agreements against them decades later. For the objective onlooker, giving people strikes for settled cases, years after the fact, is a gross breach of contract.

In legal terms, this constitutionally offensive practice is referred to as ex post facto, which in Latin literally means “after the fact.” The Three Strikes Law makes past criminal convictions, for which were already paid, eternally greater after the deal—with no warning of possible changes or future application; a complete departure from the original agreement.

Normally, ex post facto laws prohibit the retroactive application of new laws to past offenses.

Using a rather conspicuous but current case is that of Dennis L. Rader and how the retroactive application of the death penalty was prohibited in his circumstances. The fifty-nine year old Kansas man tortured and murdered ten men, women, and children from 1974 to 1991. Many people assumed Rader, definitely one of the worst of the worst, would be eligible for the death penalty. However, Kansas hadn’t enacted the death penalty until after Rader’s infamous killing spree had quietly subsided. Keeping within the framework of ex post facto, Kansas officials announced that Rader was ineligible for death after he was finally arrested in 2005. The harshest sentence he could receive was one hundred seventy-five years.

In the 1970 case of Santabello v. New York, the court explains the injustice of violating ex post facto and almost prophetically describes what later came to be California’s Three Strikes Law: “By retroactively increasing terms to be imposed for enhancement purposes, the state has changed a factor of consideration to the detriment of the [contractee]. This is fundamentally unfair; which could result in a doubling of a sentence, or even life imprisonment for future offenses. Without foreknowledge of this [shift] in liability petitioner’s plea agreement was neither voluntary or knowing.”

Unfortunately, the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in the case of In re Andrade and Ewing v. California in 2003 drastically strayed from these protections and allowed California’s practice of violating ex post facto to stand, retroactively striking out thousands of California citizens accused of crimes. Reprehensibly, the majority of those struck out constitute African Americans. While African Americans make up just seven percent of California’s overall population, they represent forty-seven percent of the three-striker population.

It remains to be seen how this turnaround could affect other laws, perhaps arbitrarily affecting the work place, civil cases and other aspects of American daily living.

When I asked Davis how he felt about the Supreme Court’s departure from the common interpretation of ex post facto he said, “I hope that people will wake up and realize that when it comes to stripping down civil and other protections, the wide gap between even the rich and the poor grows a lot closer.”

Sources:

Eric Davis, CDCR# K-4206

Erica Warner, “Report: States 3-Strikes Law Needs to be Changed,” AVP, September 23, 2005: All; Families to Amend Three Strikes, facts1.com, (the law affects minorities disproportionately).

Steven H. Gifis, Barron’s Law Dictionary, Third Edition, (Barron’s Educational Series, Inc., New York, NY, 1991): p. 176.

Patrick O’Driscoll, “Witcha Cheers Arrest of BTK Killings,” USA Today, February 28, 2005: 3A (Re: Dennis L. Rader arrest).

David Savage and Henry Weinstein, “Justice Finds California’s Sentencing Law Flawed,” Los Angeles Times, January 23, 2007.

2010-02-15T20:46:00.000-08:00

Mass Arrests: A Call to Question

Stealth in the cover of darkness, they descend like a swarm of mad hornets clad in full riot gear, guns drawn, battering rams in the lead, ordering everybody down.

Police raids, sweeps and outright invasions have become so frequent around the country, like fierce hurricanes, they’re given names: Operation Shield, Operation Clean Streets, and so on.

These aggressive, action-packed maneuvers, conducted by local, state, and federal police are usually found by a press conference describing the nature of the bust, the suspects arrested and the contraband seized. We’re all made to feel safer; “Everything’s okay,” they say. But is it?

There are many untold problems associated with mass arrests. They’re typically based on profiling of some sort; relegated to a particular venue, racially confined, or perhaps used to target some other narrowly defined group.

Another troublesome aspect of these mass arrests is that they’re conducted by fallible souls: real people, some with deep biases, political and other aspirations and a very suspect history. Of course, not all cops are rogue, but it only takes a few. The LAPD’s Rampart disgrace here and the Abu Ghraib torture scandal abroad are a couple of recent examples of why police actions should be questioned.

Furthermore, as with every human endeavor, people simply make mistakes; and on the flip side, there’s always somebody in the wrong place at the wrong time. Not to mention it’s just bad business to arbitrarily label sums of people who reside in select geographical boundaries or persecute people belonging to a distinct group or who share the same way of life.

President Bush was quick to remind us of this point last January during a news conference. ABC’s Martha Radditz asked Bush about allegedly cozy-looking pictures taken of him with former kingpin-lobbyist and admitted defrauder Jack Abramoff. Bush adamantly down played the link, retorting that pictures don’t mean anything. Irony and truth make his statement evident when one thinks of the satellite pictures his then secretary of state, Colin Powell, used to convince the world that an invasion on Iraq would be justified. In the end, the pictures didn’t mean anything.

Apparently, individual members of the Republican party share the president’s view on the inherent unfairness of generalizations—at least when it comes to them. Still, they’re quick to label immigrants criminals, make “terrorists” of untried detainees; and I have yet to see them consistently define what a gang member is, though they’ve initiated a wide law enforcement net over thousands of mainly minority youths—under the political spotlight of media cameras.

Yet with each of their former colleagues named in one corruption scandal after the next, they’ve responded with distance and asserted distinction. The latest is that of Mark Foley (R) of Florida accused of harassing under-aged House pages with unwanted sexually explicit internet messages – a federal crime.

By far the most unsettling aspect of mass arrests is their preluding pattern to genocide. Whether we’re talking about the mass round-up of Africans during the trans-Atlantic slave trade, the thousands of Armenians collected for slaughter from 1915 to 1923, the millions of Jews, Blacks and Christians killed in the 1930s holocaust or the 900,000 massacred Rwandan Tutsis in 1994, these mass actions of evil needed questioning and intervention.

Likewise with the Afghans and others detained in Cuba’s American occupied Guantanomo Bay, or the thousands of Sudanese being massacred and displaced as I write, they need more questioning and intervention now.

Meanwhile, the inhumane history of mass arrests and our moral fortitude compel us to be suspect of these actions; demanding public and highly scrutinized trials that go beyond reliance on emotion-evoking labels, underhanded tactics, or mere circumstantial evidence.

So the next time you hear about police raids on gangs, the homeless or immigrants, hold your applause until after you ensure subsequent fair and transparent trials. Only in a true and genuine democracy is it the people’s responsibility to make certain checks and balances are a reality by questioning its public servants.

Sources:

Martha Radditz, ABC News, January 26, 2006

Linda Feldman, “Political Fallout of Foley’s Resignation,” Christian Science Monitor, October 2, 2006: P. 3

2010-01-24T22:50:00.000-08:00

Ten Reasons for Prison Reform

Avid conservatives want smaller government; they believe in the independence and ability of the people. Ironically, it’s the conservatives that support and fortify one of California’s biggest government agencies, the corrections system, a massive juggernaut that has proven to be a failure.
Here are ten reasons why it needs to be downsized and totally revamped:
1. The recidivism rate is the highest in the nation, at 69 percent—a leading indicator of failure.
2. In 2004 the prison budget was $5.3 billion. Five years later it’s double that—eclipsing higher education – and increasing an average of $1 billion a year.
3. In addition, the feds want $11 billion to reform the failed prison medical system they commandeered due to rampant malpractice and neglect.
4. Another $7.4 billion is needed to pay for the 53,000 bed expansion aimed at temporarily reducing overcrowding.
5. It is a known fact that prisons facilitate and proliferate destructive gang culture—on both sides of the walls.
6. According to psychologists and other behavioral and health specialists, prisons are enduringly harmful to prisoners and guards.
7. The majority of prisoners are non-violent, elderly, and mentally challenged, and should be patients, not prisoners.
8. The Board of Parole Hearings was created to reform prisoners and release them, yet it grants less than 5% of lifers release a year—a glaring failure.
9. Prison systems relegated to housing violent offenders—with rehabilitation programs—are the safest and most successful; Google it, field your own research.
10. California can’t afford not to downsize and revamp!

2009-12-27T07:14:00.000-08:00

Politics, Profits and Prisoners

His cool swagger on the prison yard is a confident one, not that exaggerated stride of bravado so common within the clink, that overcompensating stride that serves more often than not as a mask of fear; fear of being perceived as weak; fear of showing any inkling of vulnerability; fear of being a victim—so they victimize.

For the contrast McCoy stands out. McCoy is like a lost leader with no following; a shot caller with no gang; a CEO with no company to run. Deep mahogany brown with corresponding eyes and a snub ponytail, McCoy walks about this concrete and steel spread like most: with an agenda, an angle. Only McCoy’s agenda is larger than the simple swindle of a $.25 soup, or the con of a $.65 candy bar.

A proud father of five, with a cogent ability to synthesize people and talent, this aspiring music and entertainment promoter mends toxic racial rifts and deconstructs violent gang rivalries with live music shows he produces on the compound.

Countless times have I visited cell 221 to find McCoy arduously at work dreaming up the next event, or preparing to expand his “Badd Azz Productions” when he’s released later this year. McCoy’s success in blending and fitting jagged talent is indisputable, yet there is a re-emerging failure that closely pursues him, mutilating his long-term potential for success each time he’s paroled. That failure is driven by monstrous substance abuse problems that the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) has repeatedly neglected to address during his many short stints in prison. Blatant neglect despite the fact the majority of his arrests for the last five years have been for drug-related offenses.

And in spite of the protective brigandine that Proposition 36 offers—the drug court measure voted in by 61 percent of the voters in 2000—he doesn’t qualify. Why? Because he was on parole each time he applied. Imagine that, being denied help when most vulnerable. What he would have qualified for is Proposition 5, the Non-Violent Offender Rehabilitation Act of 2008. Sadly, the measure was defeated (No: 59.5% to Yes: 40.5%) after a barrage of misleading television ads against it paid in large part by those poised to benefit: the guards’ union.

The California Correctional Peace Officers Association (CCPOA), described by the Associated Press as “wealthy” and “influential,” rescinded a disgruntled effort to recall Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger after feeling slighted with overdue contract negotiations, and instead decided to concentrate on propitious ballot measures like Proposition 5. It was also the CCPOA that shoveled in the dough to bury Proposition 66, the ballot measure that would have amended California’s draconian and expensive Three Strikes law.

It’s apparent that the CCPOA believes in the job security of its members. It was the CCPOA that, for the most part, propelled the largest prison expansion in U.S. history, having lobbied vigorously for the construction of twenty-one new prisons since the 1990s—vigorous construction that eclipses higher learning institutions in both construction and annual budgets.

Here an old German proverb seems most appropriate: “An old error is always more popular than a new truth.”

California currently has the most pronounced recidivism rate in the nation, 69 percent. Senator Gloria Romero, a Democrat representing Los Angeles, called the chronic problem a policy of release and return, return and release—never giving parolees a real shot at freeing themselves from gripping substance use issues or the long leash of the state.

Federal Justice Thelton Henderson, of the Northern District of California, who is monitoring the CDCR to order changes within, said that California has one of the longest parole tails in America, with parolees enduring oppressive technical restrictions for up to thirty-six months as opposed to the national average of twelve months. For many, this translates into a systemic set-up-to-fail, where parolees are repeatedly cited for violating parole for the most minute transgressions.
Imagine being paroled, starting completely from scratch and successfully securing a job, an apartment and struggling against the stigmas to succeed, only to lose it all in an instant for attending a family funeral where there happened to be other parolees—a violation. Think of the vexation to finally be free, having enrolled in a local college and striving to make ends meet, only to have your life and efforts interrupted for the butt of a marijuana cigarette found in the car you borrowed—a violation. Even if it was yours, you were never offered drug rehab while in custody, where they had complete control of your life.

Meanwhile, the state of California faces an estimated $42 billion deficit. The prison budget, along

with construction has steadily increased, up a consistent $1 billion a year for the past five years; it’s $10 billion now. Last summer, just a few months ago during the first chapter of the state budget deficit, $419 million was cut from Medi-Cal, $7 million was slashed from food stamp recipients and $6 million was snatched from mental health care patients, a growing number of them ending up in prisons. Billions in other damning cuts were made as well.

Yet, there’s no talk of revisiting the potential release of some 4,000 non-violent Three Strikers languishing behind the gray suffocating walls of California’s overcrowded grottoes; no talk of releasing the scores of lifers who’ve completed their minimum sentence—trouble-free—and who statistics show only a 1 percent return to prison rate. No, for the sake of ideology and pure but despicable political showmanship. For the infamous right to toot the “tough-on-crime” clarion children and the elderly are being kicked to the curb while the state stubbornly forks over $43,000 a year to incarcerate people who don’t belong.

Indeed, according to the non-partisan Legislative Analysts Office, Proposition 5 would have saved taxpayers between $1 and $3 million a year. And the success of DeWayne McCoy and the silent but suffering scores of others his circumstances represent? Priceless.

Sources:
California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation: http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/
DeWayne McCoy, CDCR #C-40569 (FAB2-22, Box 4430, Lancaster, CA 93536)
Domanick, Joe, “Cruel Justice,” (University of California Press, Los Angeles, 2004): pp. 65, 74, 112-115, 198, 199, 214, 221
Drug Policy Institute: www.NoraYes.org/www.drugpolicy.org
Friends Committee on Legislation: July/August 2008 Newsletter (Vol. 57, No. 4)
James, Koren, “Health Programs End Up Biggest Losers,” Antelope Valley Press, September 20, 2008: A3
KPFK Radio, Noon News, October 3, 2008: http://www.kpfk.org/
KABC-7 Eyewitness News, September 26, 2008 (The monetary drain of prisons)
Schou, Solvej, “Five California Governors Oppose Drug Initiative,” Antelope Valley Press, October 31, 2008: A9

2009-11-27T14:45:00.000-08:00

Prisons: the New Growth Industry

America, the great America, is renowned throughout the world for its entrepreneurial opportunities and economic prowess. Its methods of ascension haven’t been the most glamorous, though. Almost immediately after its birth, infant America embarked on one of the most brutal and horrific human exploitation schemes known to man—slavery.

Native Americans, and particularly black slaves, were beaten, worked and beaten, to a deathly demise for profit. Their owners, with delicate, manicured hands and dressed immaculately, quickly grew rich from their chattel labor.

Later, the Industrial Revolution spread that wealth to an extent, growing the middle class. Even a portion of the descendents of slaves got a piece of the action.

Growing beside the Industrial Revolution, and then surpassing what is now a bygone age, is the military-industrial-complex. Profits in the unfathomable trillions are collected off of wars, destruction and grisly death.

Emerging still is yet another profit monster—America’s multi-billion dollar prison matrix; sixty billion dollars a year to cage and confine a large and growing mass of non-violent human beings.

The state of California alone doles out $10 billion annually for its prison system; the largest in the world with 174,000 prisoners and another 125,000 on parole or in juvenile detention. Just four years ago Californians were paying just half that for so-called “corrections.”

To put this in perspective, check this out:
*The U.S. watch industry pulls in $6 billion a year;
*U.S. mass transit collects $8.8 billion a year

Yet the state of California’s annual prison budget alone exceeds these national numbers. There’s more:
*American fuel and coal consumption amounts to $16.9 billion annually;
*Our use of stationery supplies adds up to $17.7 billion;
*and we spend $35.6 billion on personal care:

None of which comes close to the national $60 billion prisons suck up while sapping the life out of their inhabitants.

Prisons are one of the fastest growth industries of our time. The brutal and horrific business of locking up people; separating families, stigmatizing for life drug addicts and other non-violent souls is the financial life-line of a few rich folk against the poor masses.

And what does America get for all those greenbacks? Not much… the highest recidivism rates in the world; the highest unemployed parolee pool on the globe, and the highest prison-to-homeless rate on record.

In other words, dismal failure is what taxpaying citizens see in return for this thing we call “corrections.”

With every new prison, and the breaking of new ground for each new penal site, we’re just digging society deeper into a bigger financial hole, with the gravest of possible societal returns, for the few that profit off prisons—the new growth industry.

Sources:
U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics
California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation
The Today Show, January 12, 2008 (U.S. Watch Sales)
The World Almanac and Book of Facts: 2005 (World Almanac Education Group, Inc., New York, N.Y., 2005) p. 113 (Economics—U.S. personal consumption)
DeNeal Young, CDCR#J-55381, came up with the financial comparisons

2009-11-27T14:26:00.000-08:00

A Dark Testament to Our Two Americas

When a twenty-three year old Latino was stopped for what police called “a routine pedestrian stop," no one imagined the tragedy that would ensue from this seemingly innocuous encounter.

According to a police spokesperson, the young man was being patted down when he inexplicably decided to make a run for it. He wasn’t a suspect for anything, nor was he found to be in possession of any contraband. Only he knows why he took off, but one could easily assume that, like so many others in our oppressed inner-cities, he simply got tired of being picked on by the police. And though it isn’t a crime to run from the police, unless, of course, you’re a suspect in a crime, the penalty for his passive resistance, unfortunately, was death.

Even more unfortunate is the fact that these types of bloody occurrences happen with a dreadful frequency in our inner-cities—almost exclusively so.

Police cruisers deployed to patrol the city streets are commonly used to “occupy” select neighborhoods, and as a result the citizens in them become hapless subjects to profiling, discrimination, and distressing illegal street searches; searches that result in extremely disproportionate arrests and imprisonment of minorities and the poor, primarily for illegal drugs.

Yet we see the elite—Tinseltown celebrities, athletes, and politicians—addicted and entangled in a voracious web of illegal drug habits. However, these are comfortably guided through the bright and colorful doors of rehabilitation centers while minorities and the poor are chained and escorted through the unforgiving gates of penitentiaries, too often never to be released.

For America’s elite, rehabilitation is a foregone conclusion. For America’s poor, prison is a foregone conclusion; as if to say the poor are somehow genetically incapable of rehabilitation.

Yet there was a day, not long ago, when the elite, our elected officials, said women could not hold jobs or public office or even own property. Women were labeled incompetent. They said Blacks, Latinos and other minorities were subhuman. For the most part, American society has overcome these retarded lines of thought. Yet, discrimination in so many other forms persists.

Still, after the enormous achievements of first lady Betty Ford, civil rights leader and humanist Coretta Scott King, and Supreme Court justice Thurgood Marshall, isn’t it about time we advance our thinking about nonviolent addicted prisoners? I mean, considering the great contributions of others given a fair shot, like humanitarian Oprah Winfrey, journalist Helen Thomas, and Sally K. Ride, the first American female in space, can we really afford not to give these misplaced people a chance, perhaps even the same opportunity the affluent routinely get?

Time and time again our elected leadership has been proven very wrong and now, like no other, presents the greatest moral opportunity for society to prove them wrong again, and build yet another link to close this immoral divide of our two Americas.

Sources:
Mia Lee, KTLA News, Ch. 5, May 16, 2005, (Re: Latino youth, aka: Jessie Ramirez).

2007-06-14T22:37:00.000-07:00

WHEN A GRAINY VIDEO IS BETTER THAN A WITNESS
By
Dortell Williams
(Approx. 650 words – non-fiction)

The case had all the elements of a whodunit – but CSI style. A 1998 robbery murder. Forensic evidence was strewn all about the Los Angeles area mini-mart storeroom.

The broken glass, displaced boxes, and an upended table told only part of the story. A scuffle - a violent scuffle – had occurred. The treasure of micro-evidence would surely tell the rest of the story; pools of blood, fingerprints (forty-eight, as a matter of fact), and even hair samples were found at the scene. It was a “eureka” moment for the crime scene investigators – or so they thought.

In the end it was all fruitless.

Their was a grainy video of one of the assailants, but he was out of range; capturing only his lower extremities.

Detectives were forced to rely on the age-old traditional methods of homicide investigation: interviews, witness surveys, calls for anonymous tips and clues apart from forensic science.

The surviving victim, a female store clerk, described the robbers as two black men. The killer was distinctive and indelible. A big man weighing about two hundred and eight pounds and about six-two with striking grey eyes.

The detectives were determined. They rounded up dozens of suspects and interviewed dozens more “persons of interest.” Anonymous tips clogged the phone lines, yet, when all was said and done, they had nothing.

The case lay dormant for close to five years until a tip led to Moses Lee Turner. The thirty-eight-year-old father of ten (he started when he was eleven-years-old) adamantly denies any involvement. “They railroaded me, man…my attorney dumped me,” Turner says energetically.

Turner, darkly toned with wired-rimmed glasses; a martial artist and talented oil painter was found guilty by a racially diverse jury of twelve on each and every count. He is now two years and some months into a sentence of life without the possibility of parole.

Case closed? Not quite.

A quick review of Turner’s trial transcripts reveals that there seems to be more evidence of his innocence than his guilt.

According to court records of the trial, when asked if Turner was one of the two assailants the state’s main witness – the female store clerk – said emphatically, “No.”

Turner, who is barely five-six in stature, with dark brown eyes, sat relieved that the witness was consistent in her testimony. Of the forty-eight fingerprints collected at the scene, not one was a match to Turner. Likewise with the hair samples found. Oddly, the state refused to present any blood evidence – for or against Turner. It was lost they claimed. Still, it had been established that the blood found was from more than one source.

So what was it that gave the state’s case such weight with the jury? Such weight that they were willing to overlook the apparent incompetence that caused the loss of crucial evidence? For one, they didn’t know and second: The grainy video.

The poor quality of the video was bolstered by the testimony of Turner’s parole agent. An agent recently assigned to supervise him following his release from custody stemming from an arrest for possession of drugs (for personal use) and a gun. “That stuff actually belonged to my brother, but I took the case because he was facing a strike,” Turner volunteered.

His parole officer testified that he believed the stride and nature of the person walking in the grainy video matched that of Turner’s. And such was the anemic evidence that outweighed all of the other evidence. Evidence that effectively ruled him out – or at least should have.

It is exactly this type of malpractice that led The Blue Ribbon Rampart Review Panel of July 2006 to conclude that the Los Angeles criminal justice system lacks sufficient checks to prevent such egregious cases of injustice.

Turner is vigorously pursuing the appeal of his case, but when the courts exercise such blatant endorsements of injustice there’s little room for hope. Meanwhile, a division of The Innocence Project has taken an interest in his case and that has helped his faith. Yet he reserves an obstinate doubt in a criminal justice system that has for too long trampled over the rights of the indigent. There’s no question that if Turner had the financial means he wouldn’t be here.

For now, his biggest hope and most fervent source of strength; in his own words, is the prospect of being able “to see and finish raising my kids.”

Sources:

(AP) “County Police More Likely to Search Black, Hispanic Drivers,” Antelope Valley Press, July 13, 2006: A6 (Re: The Blue Ribbon Rampart Review Panel)

The People of the State of California v. Moses Lee Turner, Superior Court No. BA179907

Reporter’s Transcripts: Volumes 11 through 14, pp. 2401-3000 (Witness said Turner was not one of the assailants – p. 2473; No fingerprints – pp. 2793-2798; No forensic evidence matched Turner – pp. 2805-2807.

November 2006

2006-12-27T23:36:00.000-08:00

THE LAST REQUEST OF A CONDEMNED MAN:
IT’S A GOOD THING
By
Dortell Williams
(Approx. 250 words non-fiction)

The era was the 1940s. The scene, California’s death row; the actors: Carl Dobbins, Mr. and Mrs. Fred Jordon and thousands of faceless helping hands.

Dobbins had been convicted of shooting three women while in the haze of a drug and alcohol binge. Two of the women died. He was sentenced to death.

During a visit, before his execution, Dobbins asked Mr. Pacesetters, Ms. Jordon expressed her desire to give hope to the hopeless because “hope is the oxygen for the soul.”

She estimates that there are 65,000 to 100,000 homeless who need such hope; and defines homelessness as having no shelter, no security and no safety – “owning nothing or having nothing.” She also says 40 percent of the homeless are women and children, a growing trend, and a good number of the homeless are mentally ill and/or suffering from drug addiction.

Ms. Jordon is motivated by, among other things, the secret sweet satisfaction one gets from giving to others and the biblical mandate in Isaiah 58:7: “Feed the hungry, provide for the homeless [and] clothe the naked…”

To learn more about these “prisoners of penury” and how you can get involved, please contact the Fred Jordon Mission and help rescue a needy soul; experience that secret sweet satisfaction of helping others that Ms. Jordon told us about.

www.fjm.org

Sources:
Ray Gonzales, Pacesetters, KTLA-5, November 19, 2006
www.fjm.org

Date: November 2006

2006-12-06T11:41:00.000-08:00

THE MEANING OF OVERCROWDING

Dortell Williams

(Approximately 200 words Non-Fiction)

The word overcrowding associated with California prisons and jails has become such common place that it’s hardly shocking to the senses anymore – even for the most patriotic of citizens who still hold value to yesterday’s higher mores.

Perhaps it's time to reiterate the definition of overcrowding, not with Webster’s but with blood, death, and souls:

Overcrowding means an average of one prisoner death a week in the medical ward – due to apathetic neglect – and the highest suicide rate in the nation: 22 deaths per 100, 000 compared to an average of 13 per 100,000 around the nation.

Overcrowding translates into constant stress and frustration and escalates into occasional rioting.

Overcrowding, in general, means sleeping outside in the elements – as if in some underdeveloped country – or in a gym or dayroom not designed for anything close to humane housing.

Overcrowding means undue and constant tormenting strain and tension. Overcrowding means excruciatingly long lines for taxpaying family and friends desiring to visit.

Overcrowding means public safety put at grave risk because thousands of prisoners are released daily who had no access to the rehabilitation, drug treatment or meaningful job training you’d think would be a given in facilities bearing the name “corrections” and “rehabilitation.”

Overcrowding means failure, pain, embarrassment and danger for everyone – directly or indirectly, inside or outside.

Overcrowding in California means an ineffective $9 billion debacle rolling and increasing in steam ahead.

Overcrowding in a word means: inhumanity.

October 2006

Sources:
http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/ (Department of Corrections’ website).

Don Thompson (AP) “California Inmate Suicides Climb, Security Changes Blamed,” http://www.monterreyherald.com/, August 6, 2005.

Jennifer Warren, “State Prisons Chief Resigns After Two Months on the Job,” Los Angeles Times, April 20, 2006: Al.

2006-12-04T22:51:00.000-08:00

WHEN NOT GUILTY MEANS PRISON TIME
by
Dortell Williams
(Approximately 1,000 words - Non-Fiction)

Imagine a few sheriff's deputies flanked by Child Protective Custody representatives showing up at your door demanding to take your child for something your ex-spouse may or may not have done. You refuse, having no idea what they are talking about. Now imagine an army of Sheriff's deputies arriving later, suited for what seems like war, guns drawn knocking down your door and forcefully taking your child, and you for something you know nothing about nor
had anything to do with. Still imagine having to endure a weak circumstantial trial for which you are found not quilt of the main charges but guilty of a supporting misdemeanor charge.The judge disagrees and overturns the guilty findings, describing it as incoherent. The prosecutor appeals and the appellate court sides with the prosecutor - you get a life sentence for a misdemeanor. That would be quite a stretch of the imagination for some, but according to a fellow prisoner, "It could happen to anyone".

That is how Anthony Hammonds a lively thirty- four year old sums it up as he enthusiastically volunteered the circumstances of his sentence of twenty five years to life. It was not that Ant, as we call him, was in the wrong place at the wrong time. He was safely tucked away in the warmth of his Victorville CA home attending to his five-year-year old son when the drama went down.

His quiet afternoon peace was abruptly broken by a simple knock on his walnut colored front door: followed by an authoritative "Its's the San Bernardino Sheriffs and C.P.S"! (Child Protective Services). Ant's coffee brown eyes were intense now as he related his story. As he spoke, camly and sure, his naturally contagious smile melted into his light oak-colored round face. "I opened the door and they were demanding my son", he stated in a deflated voice. "I refused and they left", he continued. However, his relief was short lived. They returned in full force riot gear and all. They violently broke through his front door and gave the neighbors a live and- in your -face episode of COPS on scene. This time they not only wanted little Antione, but now they wanted Ant too.

With two prior felonies in the hole already, Ant suddenly found himself subject to Californians notorious Three Strike Law. My eyes widen as I learned that Ant had prior convictions. Ant did't carry himself like a two-time loser. I could not imagine him as a career criminal always polite, decked with mannerisms that indicated a good upbringing alomg with a warm character that invited wholesome trust.

Ant's swift perception keyed in on my surprise and he immediately explained; "It was just two fights", what the state calls assaults. His first assault charge was for defending himself following an unprovoked attack during his high school years. Ant's second assault charge, of which he emitted a bit of a smile upon mentioning, was for beating up his little sisters over aged boyfriend. He didn't take lightly that his fifteen year old sister had been seduced by a twenty six year old man. When Ant confronted the depraved man about the illicit affair, the man already in the wrong got belligerent. Ant commenced to beating the crap out of him right there on the spot. "It could have happened to anyone", he said again.

As a result a result of the raid on his home, Ant found himself facing five counts of manufacturing methamphetmines and one count of child endangering.

According to court records I later perused, Ant's estranged wife, we will call her Ms. Jackson was renting the rear dwelling of a Victorville duplex on Verde Streer. The front of the pecan toned -structure was rented by another couple who used to feud quite frequently according to court documents. The couple were the landlords of the place. Apparently having had enough of the drug life, the landlords wife, (Susan Burch Not her real name) called the police on her husband. An ensuing raid and search of the property yielded a stash of five separate chemical containers used to manfacture meth. The color-coded containers were each housed in a storage shed behind the rear apartments - considered a common area accessible to both sets of occupants. Yet keys fitting the shed was found in possession of the couple residing in the front of the duplex.

Still a dinner plate thought to have traces of meth on its surface, but never tested or confirmed was found on top of the refrigerator in the rear dwelling, where Ms. Jackson and an unnamed five- year- old boy were present.

Ant's attorney David Elder, vigorously argued before the jury that Ant not only had nothing to do with the illegalities happening at the duplex he was not aware of any illicit activities there. He was not, did not live there and had no control over what his ex-wife might have been involved in, stated Elder. Elder also pointed out that Ant had no prior history with drugs, although his ex-wife's landlords did (and the containers behind the storage shed was pratically painted with the landlord's fingerprints.)

Still, the prosecutor, Richard Golden counter argued that Ant "Should have known that the drugs were there". His theory was that Ant visited on weekends, while picking up or dropping off his son, he should have what was going on. The prosecutor also emphaized that the apartment was in Ant's name which was not the truth.

"Did the neighbors know?" I interjected, fury sweeping from my voice. "How are you suppose to know what's going on miles away at your former residence? You were not intimate with your ex anymore, I continued. Ant's bright eyes morphed form their normal conversational gaze to intense golf-ball -sized orbs when I compared the scenario to the recent White House leak scandal: "It would be more likely that President Bush had greater opportunity to know his top advisor Karl Rove, and Rove's aide, Lewis "Scooter" Libby were involved in the outting of CIA operative Valarie Plame." After all, these men worked directly under president Bush.

Ant's case is just one example of the type of expensive, wasteful prosecutions that exposes the Three Strike Law for what it is. The authorities had not initially sought Ant until they learned he had a record. Such prosecutions are also a bulls eye for those circumstantial evidence cases are just down right unreliable. Prosecutors are allowed to use almost completely unfettered theories, inferences and conjecture to make a case. As long as these elements follow the line of actual evidence, they can simply fill in the blanks with good story telling.

President Bush's assertion that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction is an international example of what can go wrong in such cases. The WhiteHouse relied on circumstantial evidence to launch a pre-emptive war that turned out to be totally baseless.

In Ant's case the injutice was exacerbated when the prosecutor failed to mention that the boy found in the home during the raids was not his son, yet that is what the jury went into deliberation believing. To make matters worse, as with any Three Strike case the jury wasn't apprised that Ant was facing a quarter-century behind bars should they find him quilty.

Fortunately the jury refused to buy into the prosecutors theories, or otherwise weak case regarding the drugs. The jury acquitted Ant and Ms. Jackson of the entire array of drug charges. Obivously confused by the prosecutor's failure to clarify which boy was present during the raid, they found the estranged couple quilty of endangering their child.

It was then that Judge Jules Fleuret threw out the groundless verdict, reasoning that it can't rain without clouds. In other words, Judge Fleuret explained that if the estranged couple was not quilty of the manufacturing charges then they couldn't be held liable for the child endangering charge which stemmed directly form the drug charge.

The case was over and Ant was a free man-or so he thought. The prosecutor immediately went over Judge Flueret's head and appealed to the Fourth District Appellate Court. Ant was ordered back to the San Bernardino County Jail where he waited fifteen long months in legal limbo with technically no charges pending against him. Finally, a decision came down: The three judge panel sides with the prosecutor opining that despite their aquittal for the drug charges the estranged pair should have known that the chemicals and manifested dope was potentially dangerous to the child. The misdemeanor child endangerment conviction was reinstated against Ant and Ms. Jackson. The court ignored the fact that Ant was not even there during the bust nor did he live there. Ms. jackson walked! For Ant the misdemeanor was tantamount to a felony and he was given twenty-five years to life due to his "violent" criminal history. Under the onerous Three Strike law misdemeanors can be converted into felonies at the prosecutors whim after two prior felonies.

"Daddy, are you ever comming home, huh?" demanded his now thirteen-year- old Antione during a recent visit. The irony in this story is that the system, and specifically Child Protective Services are supposed to act in the best interest of the child. Like most backward thinking government agencies, it seems the best interest of the child meant breaking the apparent close and loving bond shared between father and son.

Ironically, the night following my conversation with Ant I watched a televised news story that further emphazied the injustice in Ant's case.

Vikki Vargas, of our local KNBC-4 News reported that a large sting operation at a nearby swapment concluded with the arrest of several high-end fashion counterfeiters. Vargas ended her report by stating that buyers who may have purchased some of the counterfeit items need not worry about complicity- unless they knew before hand that the items purchased were fake. After that eerie reminder of Ant's story and the Valerie Plame case, in comparison to Ant's case. I am more confused than ever by what it means TO KNOW.

Sources:

Vikki Vargas, KNBC-4 News, October 13, 2005

People v. Anthony Hammonds, Case No. FVI-09361 (San Bernardino Superior Court)

Anthony Hammonds CDCR #T-52558

2006-12-04T11:45:00.000-08:00

A THING OR TWO ABOUT ME (MUSINGS)
By Dortell Williams
(Approximately 2300 words)

I feel for people less fortunate than I, such as those with HIV/AIDS, the so-called handicapped, substance addicts and the homeless, to name a few. I am particularly sensitive to victims of crime, aren’t we all in one form or another? I don’t believe in being “politically correct” if that entails calling black and white other black and white or being less than honest or sincere. I have always been tactful, respectful and polite. To compromise truth for placation is immoral in my eyes. I miss my sweet and dear late.

The beach is my favorite spot in the world, besides various islands, known or unknown to me. To clarify the latter: curiosity is a catalyst for me. The unknown is mysterious and colorful, pristine beauty of the playa atmosphere allures me. I also love fish and the world of water. I think tropical anything and exotic and I enjoy all water activities.

I encourage women in sports, if that is their desire. I can be a perfectionist, although I can settle for simple organization and efficiency. I like eating fish and especially sea food. I believe in adoption and wish we had more. I despise divorce and wish we had less.

My favorite singer- or at least one of them – is Anita Baker. My favorite fruit is cantaloupe, though cherries, grapes and other finger-tip fruits arouse my appetite.

I adore women who know how to carry their femininity. I like the Road Runner and Tasmanian Devil, along with other Looney Tunes animated characters. I enjoy viewing cartoons with the children and hate the new format that last hours at a time. Four of five minutes each of Bugs Bunny and Friends laden with classical music in the background was clever enough for me. I believe strongly in education. I am in love with the animated queen Jessica Rabbit. I believe the female mind is equal to that of a male.

I respect and enjoy the fables Aesop and the stories of Dr. Seuss. I am extremely proud to be Black. I love the different color hues of my people and the strength we have exhibited in the midst of so much adversity. African and African American history is over flowing with drama. I relish Jazz (progressive and contemporary) and appreciate the array of founding artists such as Coltrane, “The Duke”, and many others. I also like Reggae, Gospel, Maringae, Calypso, and can appreciate any other type music save for vocal opera and heavy metal.

I don’t approve of hitting women and abhor abuse by the strong. As I experience incarceration and such limitation, I can relate and empathize with those who are oppressed, in pain, disadvantaged and deprived. I thank Jah ( the poetic form of God or Yahweh, Psalm 68:4) for the valleys and peaks of life, as I journey on.

I like large and small scale models and remote control cars and vehicles. I like kites and anything to do with the outdoors, i.e. mountains, forests, lakes, lagoons. I like all types of art except for obscenities and disguised as art. I like soccer on the beach, jogging on the beach and similar physical challenges. The mere aroma of the beach: the sand, the moisture’s waft, and the aqua-marine scent of paradise-like milieu just makes my hair stand in arousal.

I am affectionate and enjoy expressing those feelings to my intimate mate. I have an extremely passionate side that I am proud of. I am a “kid at heart” and love children – they are a gift from God. I do possess a serious side when it comes to making things happen and taking care of business; being responsible. I believe in growth and accomplishment –contribution. I am a positive person with a cheerful disposition. I absolutely adore my beloved daughter.

Learning simply fascinates me. I am a humble person by nature, but certainly can be provoked to roar up. I am an honest and straight-up person, at all times to my detriment. When I fall in love…I…fall…in…love. That has served as both a blessing and a curse. Yet I will never let the sour side of the experience ruin the beautiful utopia that true love holds for me in the future. I am a fighter and not easily won over by circumstances.

I love the rain as well as the sun, equally. I deeply appreciate nature and the work of Jah’s hands…I marvel at it! I like all sports-the competition of it. My favorite contact sports are: boxing, basketball, soccer and football.

I love the Spanish language and am enraptured by Anglo, Arab Asian and African accents spoken in English. I bask in writing and reading. The Bible is a favorite and most interesting book to me, I have read the Quran, The Torah, books on Hare Krishna, L.R. Hubbard’s and others. I like writing short stories, commentaries, poems, prose and letters to friends and family. My favorite type of letters are those I write to my soul mate: Sensual, flirtatious, and appreciative. I love all people- although they test me at times. I hate ignorance and the pain, pangs and poverty it brings.

I despise racism in any flavor. I think America is a selfish, opportunistic, hypocritical, and wasteful nation. I love America for its educational and entrepreneurial opportunities. I love America for its rich cultural diversity. I believe in family, unity and caring for others. Learning about other cultures and seeing how much we really are just people with only language and nationalistic attitudes to separate us. Meeting other people of other nationalities makes me feel closer to humanity.

I love diamonds as a favorite commodity, although I am aware that they are a man made and manipulated rarity controlled primarily by a few European brothers surnamed DeBeers. The marquise is my favorite cut. I like soul, Chinese, and Latin food. Sushi is another dish that I like to experiment with. I love to cook and bask in experimenting in the kitchen.

My favorite color is purple and it’s alluring cousins, ie. lilac, lavender, violet etc. Purple gives hope as I hate the red and blue wars of my young brothers (Bloods and Crips). When the two colors are united they make purple. It makes for a symbol of unity and it has a very antiques and royal history. I also like tropical colors and earth tones: turquoise, Tanzanian blue, forest green…

I relish the feelings and motivations of love, Floating aloft in the drift of an amorous breeze opens my emotional world of expression within, and cause a unique creativity to flow out with no labor involved: smooth, natural, incessant, and flowing.

Romance, whether in giving or receiving, thrills my heart. I live for it. I am generally calm, cool, and collected. I am often told that. I am also told that I have a reserved spirit. Few know that it is heightened by this prison (public) environment. I am proud and private. Yet I do possess an adventurous side. I believe there is a time and place for everything. I believe in family and friends over money and materials.

I like being different. I am far from a follower. I appreciate and respect truth. I admire people working together and the Olympics is a good example of what people can do despite language and hue differences. I am enchanted by the sincerity of the children and long for five (5) more of my own. I love both sons and daughters, equally. I hate racism.

I am enchanted by femininity expressed well. Body language is a favorite study of mine, although mine is at times awkward and funny. I am a bit old-fashioned and believe subtle, respectful, and patience ways of the past were more promising and less destructive than those of this day.

I do not judge. I have a knack for noticing the idiosyncrasies of others. I am a stickler for details. I like people to be themselves around me, whether I agree or disagree with their way. I am turned off by people who try to impress me or be other than themselves. It is pretentious. I like people who tell it like it is. I don’t always like what is being said, but do like being able to trust that person’s sincerity.

Favorite stones of mine are opal, onyx, and of course, amethyst. I love the smell of fresh coffee and like diverse exotic flavors, but borderline hypertension limits my intake. Experimenting with the various flavors of tea is also fulfilling to me. I like trying new things and really like living life to the fullest.

I would like to learn to fly a plane and a helicopter; play key boards and ski. I am thrilled by the Tom Cat F-series planes and the technology of the day excites me. I like miniatures: scale models, towns, people, bridges, boats, ships, and trains. I like alcoholic beverages and the various tastes and ways one can experiment, but think drunkenness is silly. How can one really enjoy himself out of his right mind? And how worthy can fun be when one can’t remember? I like the perfect practical advice of the Bible. I respect authority and hate unfinished projects.

I get real irritated when people consistently cut me off in conversation. We all do it, I know, but it’s only bothersome when it’s consistent. I get short when hungry, unless I am fasting. I have a very brief attention span if I don’t get my six hours rest the night prior. I need “space” when going through trials or changes in my life, or when I just get in from work- just a quarter-hour, or so, in my mental cave is usually sufficient. I am the type who needs time to re-group because I habitually analyze everything.

I enjoy reading. I read everything I can get my hands on, in spite of the challenges of confinement. Many people say that I am smart. But I simply read and absorb the contents of the literature I take in. I have a vast array of cognitive knowledge because I read. It gives me the ability to assimilate other people’s ideas, experiences and knowledge into my own. I think I can be rather slow, actually.

I can be stubborn and have been known to rebel in my youth. But these are traits I try to fetter because they offend Jah and others. For the most part I am humble, at times to my own embarrassment; people just don’t understand the motivations of sincerity or love. I like peace and getting along. I am much more productive in such an environment and I live to produce. I view mist things of this life vanity and too small to trip on anyway. I am very devoted. I absolutely hate oppression.

I find it extremely hard to get bored in this life. There are just too many beautiful things that Jah had made here that I know little or nothing about to get bored. I like being creative in things I have interest in, such as cooking, romancing my lover, recreation, and playing with children. I am touched by people showing affection toward one another.

I have been told many things about me. I have been told I am quiet. I have been described as a peace maker, humble, and even handsome.

I have been called various called names such as Still Will, causing me to assume it is in reference to my quiet nature. Others have written it “Steal Will” in compliment to my patience. Family members, and some friends have called me “Pretty Boy” or “Baby Boy” (youthful appearances run in my family). Latinos sometimes call me “Negro Bonito”, which is a compliment. In my youth I was called “Crazy D” due to my daring spirit. My dad used to call me “Dort” which is short for Dortell, my middle name. I hated when he called me that. It made me hate my entire middle name. However, in my maturity, I have come to appreciate the name Dortell, which I am told is French. I now go by my middle name because it is so much more unique than my very common first and last names abound.

I love the old Sinbad the Sailor movies, as well as Phillis Diller and Lucy. I like the black and white movie era and how those of that period focused on talented, captivating writing rather than gratuitous sex, violence, and special effects. I am deeply entertained by Laurel and Hardy and antics of the Little Rascals. I think television is too graphic these days and artistic and creative value, in many value, in many ways, has been diluted. I have a real problem with vain and empty promises. I believe most of us need to learn to be more responsible for what we say to others; mean what you say and say what you mean, advise the sages. I hate stereotyping and generalizing others. I think it is…well, ignorant.

People and especially our trusted friends are one of the three mirrors in life. The other two are the Bible, which tells and shows our nature. The last is the physical mirror, which reflects our appearance.

Jah, is my strength and victory and I am happy that He is in my life. With that I will I conclude, though there is so much more I could add. I have written this verbal introspection over a sporadic span of five months. Every time I would think of something new to add I’d just jot it down until finally I had this compilation. Any comments or feedback is welcome. O value the ideas, views, and opinions of others.

1996/1997

Note: Though this entry is over ten years old, I am pretty much the same person, only matured.

2006-11-12T18:12:00.000-08:00

AMERICA'S SECRET TERROR INCUBATORS
by
Dortell Williams
(approx. 500 words non-fiction)

Imagine... sitting beside a tall, disheveled, long-haired and bespectacled man on a plane - who has a bomb in his shoe! Prosecutors say Richard Reid, also known as The Shoe Bomber, was not only sporting such improvised exploding kicks, but he was also attempting to ignite them when he was arrested in 2001. His failed attempt to kill hundreds of other, by making as animated bomb of himself, earned his an eternal sentence of life without the possibility of parole in prison; the same place - only in Britain - where he allegedly was converted to such radicalism.

Security experts now fear that US prisons are potential perspectives like those convicted terrorist Reid adopted.
In spite of the fact that five years have passed since Reid's arrest, and there has only been one alleged incident of attempted in - custody recruiting (where a California prisoner allegedly tried to convert others to a radical and murderous line of thinking), the possibilities are endless.

Prisons have long been concrete and steel incubators for radical and subversive thought, fueled and nourished by rampant idleness, acute boredom and neglect in our nation's prisons.
California, which has virtually no rehabilitation or treatment programs for the majority of its prisoners, is a good example of bad policy. For three decades, California prisons have birthed or cultivated some of the most notorious gangs in US history - and then spread (or deported) them to other states and countries.

Now, in the menacing face of terrorism, experts propose initiating preventive measures to impede the odorous waft of potential radicalism in US prisons across the board.
Meanwhile, California incarcerates more people then any other state, many for non-violent offenses; needlessly exposing its non-violent citizens to such latent radicalism. California has already failed us dismally with its unbridled gang problem. Kids are killing kids in unprecedented numbers, spawned by gang violence. The failure lies in the state's backward and failed attempt to arrest its way out of the growing crisis, instead of focusing on prevention programs.

Likewise, the US as a whole incarcerates more people than any other modern nation, many, also for non-violent offenses. If California is a prelude (or omen) to the future of US prison policy, then without real and meaningful education, drug treatment, job training, pre-release and other reforming programs, this country is in for an extended and punctuated bloody fight like never seen before.

The US government and its individual states must develop programs for those who've made mistakes. There are scores of prisoners who desperately want to change their lives, but don't know how. These prisoners are offered little or no opportunity, or guidance from penal institutions although these facilities have almost complete control over their in-custody lives. If security experts really want to prevent radicalism in US prisons then they must push to proactively change the hearts and minds of its prisoners right here at home - before the radicals do.

Sources:
Alexandra Marks, " Islamic Radicals in Prison: How many?" Christian Science Monitor, September 20, 2006: p.3

2006-11-10T10:24:00.000-08:00

MAKING MATTERS WORSE: WADDLING IN THE MESS

Dortell Williams

400 words ( non-fiction)

It reminds me of when petro-rich G. W. Bush announced "America is addicted to oil," yet he - the Supreme a

(and extreme) Commander-in-Chief - failed to effectively push for or provide adequate funding for alternatives.

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, /Bush's political- party mate in California, seems to be of the same political inclination: Got a mess? Wade and waddle in it, instead of cleaning it up.

As a long-term prisoner in California's chaos-saddled clink, I was especially attentive to the then campaigning actor's 2003 promise to clean up California's troubled prison system. The subject was hoisted as a prominent theme in his Gray Davis recall election campaign.

California is host to the biggest penal and jail systems, respectively, in the nation. Primarily because of misdirected and ignominious state policies like the Three Strikes law, which calls for the indefinite lock-up of misdemeanor shoplifters, and worse: mentally ill and drug addicted people who should be patients instead of prisoners.

When Schwarzenegger had the opportunity to reduce the overcrowding - he belatedly acknowledged after threats of a federal takeover - he misrepresented the facts of Proposition 66 which would have amended the Three Strikes law. No, instead of heading off predictable overflow problem, he hyper-inflated the amount of non-violent prisoners who would have been re-sentenced and screened for release under the amendment.

Meanwhile, California's 70 percent recidivism rate is the highest in the U.S., coupled with a repressive Board of Parole Hearing panel who releases only an annual 2 percent trickle of thousands of reformed lifers - lending absolutely no hope despite our accomplishments and demonstrations of personal rehabilitation that would be praised in other states. And as the governor silently and idly watched on, U.S. District Judge Thelton Henderson seized control of the medical wing of the prison system in and emergency response to frequent preventable inmate deaths.

As before, now that political season is in full swing, prison reform is suddenly important again.

It was under Schwarzenegger's watch that the first correctional officer was murdered in over twenty years due to the inappropriate housing of a mentally ill prisoner. The prison budget also swelled from $6 billion annually to 8 billion in the unprecedented span of 12 months with Schwarzenegger in command. Experts assign blame on rampant overtime by the prison guards, mismanagement and a generous contract give away for the prison guards that included a 37 percent pay raise, over 5 years ( whiled other state employees only saw a 3 percent raise for the same period), along with frequent cost overruns - all while the state was experiencing a financial meltdown.

The problems within the juvenile and adult penal systems are so pervasive, not one, but two prison head bureaucrats have consecutively resigned within the last few months citing a lack of will by the governor to go beyond adding the euphonious title of rehabilitation to the California Department of Corrections.

Could his own tailored phrase "girlie men" apply here?

Recently the non-partisan Corrections Independent Review panel recommended releasing the the inevitable pressure from the bulging penal Crock Pot, stating: " The key to reforming the [prison] system lies in reducing the numbers"; common sense to you and I , but Schwarzenegger's response to this mess? Build two more prisons with money we don't have (using bonds and unnecessarily putting the state back in debt) so we can all be further financially and immorally drowned in this ever increasing cesspool of failure.

Sources:

Vikki Vargas, KNBC 4 News June 26, 2006 (Governor Calls Special Legislative Session for Prison Reform).

Adriene Alpert, News Conference, KNBC 4 June 25, 2006 (Federal special master John Hagar releases scathing report on prisons).

Jennifer Warren, "Prison Guard Turned Boss Presses for Reform, " Los Angeles Times, March 18, 2004: Al, A22

Dan Morain, "Doubt Cast on Guards' Contract, " Los Angeles Times, March 5, 2004: B1 B10.

Don Thompson, " Federal Judge Pans prison Guards' Contract, " Antelope Valley Press, July 21, 2004: A2

Senator Gloria Romero, Senate Bill 1547, February 2006, (Quote from Correction's Independent Review Panel).

2006-11-09T18:35:00.000-08:00

THREE STRIKES: AMERICA'S NEXT TABOO?

Dortell Williams

300 words Non-fiction

America has a lot of taboo subjects. Religion and politics top the lists. These are subjects "you just don't talk about."

However, there are still other topics at which the mere mention evokes an acute cringe. Race relations, for example, is a subject many would rather avoid, especially when it leads to that of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.

The slave trade involved the systematic kidnapping of millions of Africans, for the purpose of work exploitation in this country. Families were separated; never to see one another again. The women were maliciously mistreated and viciously raped. The children in worked in such gruesome conditions, it would make today's child labor complaints trivial. The men savagely beaten, over worked and killed. Slavery is a repulsive American tragedy that we really don't like to discuss. The nauseating subject indeed a American taboo.

Jim Crow laws followed: separate but equal was the rule on paper, but in reality, the Negroes, as we were called, got the literal and the metaphorical pig scraps that the ruling class rejected. In education, health care, housing and in courts of law, Negroes were served the intestines of social services. That is how the rules and laws were written, and to the majority of White America these unfair and unequal edicts were perfectly fine.

Americans also shy away from the troubled conditions of today's Native American. High unemployment, rampant alcoholism and pervasive poverty plague the Native American. To most modern day Americans it is no secret that the Natives were here first. These remarkable people lived here for centuries without prisons or mass human killing devices. The Natives American was a family oriented soul - knit as one in community. These people were the epitome of environmentalists. They lived with the land; as part of the land, and were gracious servant stewards of the land.

Then came the colonialist; bringing with them destructive disease, cold-blooded murder and the cruelest of rape. They trampled over everything that came before them- respecting nothing- not even life.

These are the subjects that Americans does not like to talk about. We'd rather ignore this history; this giant in the room; this factual elephant that reveals a glimpse of why these and other minorities rate so dismally in the aftermath of such atrocities. The patterns of unique struggles of the formally ravished are unequivocally consistent. Meanwhile, most Americans wish this shameful history would simply and quietly go away.

Yet, how can it go away when we have so many current reminders of the past? As history repeats itself, over and over again, the one thing we can glean from it is a guide into the future.

California's Three Strike law is a reminder of a capricious yesterday. Come twenty-five years from now will Three Strikes be another of our unmentionables? A taboo subject desperately hid behind the shame of a law that has been statistically and numerically proven to be minority inclined? As an example, Blacks make up just seven percent of Californians population, yet, represent a devastating forty percent of the three-striker population.

Three Strikes is an unforgiving law that goes back in time and penalizes - for life - old offenses that occurred twenty, forty and fifty years age. Three Strikes is a law that incarcerates eternally, for petty and non-violent offenses.

Three Strides unnecessarily separates families - en mass - as did slavery. The onerous law is likened to the furtherance of colonialism. Three Strikes is horrendously unconscionable.

Three Strikes is a vicious and wicked law that I'm afraid will, if not reformed be America's next taboo.

Sources:

www.factsl.org

www.cdcr.ca.gov

2006-10-20T19:56:00.000-07:00

A Time to Subtract, Not Add
By: Dortell Williams
As a California prisoner for the past 17 consecutive years, I agree with our Legislature when they use terms like short- sighted, hastily and half- hazard to define Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's $6 billion prison reform proposal. Just as asinine as it would be to add more buckets to solve plumbing leak, likewise would it be to build more prisons, or addictions to existing sites. The best solution is to stop the leak at its source.
Sen. Gloria Romero (D- Los Angeles) and others are absolutely right in their call for sentencing and parole reform- the origin of the leak. The Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation releases an average of 300 prisoners a day, the majority of which have had no access to meaningful rehabilitation, while the CDCR takes in approximately 310 prisoners a day; 7 percent of which are recidivists. Is it any wonder that the problem has steadily grown worse? It's as simple as mathematics.
Meanwhile, the legislature annually criminalizes about a half dozen kinds of behavior that was perfectly legal the year before.
Moreover, the average modern state prison is designed to hold 2100 prisoners. Each one is currently at near double its designed capacity- a simmering hot pot ready to explode. According to the California Inspector General, Families to Amend Three Strikes and the Legislative Analyst Office, there are an estimated 18,000 parolees in for technical violations (not new crimes), 3,000 geriatric prisoners, 7,000 lifers who have fulfilled their parole board requirements and are long overdue for parole. (California only releases 2 percent of this eligible group), 4,500 non-violent three- strikers, 4,500 non- violent low custody women and thousands of mentally ill patients who belong in hospitals, not prison. Corrections should correct these injustices and the state could actually close about a third of its costly and budget-draining $8.7 billion a year penal institutions for good. Again, its all about the mathematics- Subtraction, not addition.
California tax payers would do good to follow the prudent, non- partisan recommendations of criminologists and penologists, as opposed to self- serving politicians- especially in an ulterior motives- filled election year.

Sources:
Jennifer Warren and Jordan Rau, "Prison Reform Plan Falls Short, "Los Angeles Times, August 30, 2006: B1, B7
Don Thompson (AP) "Special Session to Address Prison Reform," Antelope Valley Press, August 6, 2006
Office of Inspector General, "Accountability Audit: Review of BPT, 2002- 2003, (Also Prison Legal News, "2005 Audit of California Parole Board Reveals Ongoing Deficiencies," pp. 16, 17
Ben Pesta, "With Courage State Budget Could Be Balanced," Daily News, October 19, 2003, pp. 1, 4
Legislative Analyst Office, October 2005

2006-10-20T17:46:00.000-07:00

Things You Should Know: hundreds of people are doing life without the possibility of parole for murder, when they didn't kill anyone. (Knowledge, transportaion, being present during the crime.) Our kids are racing their car and someone dies, they are going to prison for as long as possible for manslaughter. Their kids brutally rape a girl on video tape and get 6 years with half time. They try to commit murder and get caught, they get charged with attempted involuntary manslaughter. In California One man hit another with a bat, its an assault with a weapon. They will be charged with attempted murder and end up getting one hundred years in prison. I was busted with a gram of speed in my pocket and they charged me with posession for sale, transportation of a controlled substance, and possession. Always trying for a longer sentence. Why are our prisons overcrowded? You tell me.

2006-10-20T17:20:00.000-07:00

A letter to congress as told to Dortell Williams:
The following is a copy of a letter from a man convicted under the notorious Three Strikes Law. His gripping words and experiences represent thousands of others in like circumstances and highlight- in human terms- the injustice of a government turned on its own citizens in the endless and ruinous tragedy called "The War on Drugs".
To Whom It May Concern:
My name is Ronald Emmal and I am a prisoner in the California prison system. During this crisis of prison overcrowding, everyone is wondering why and how.
I am doing 28 years to life for the non- violent offense of possession of a gram of speed. (Meth)
As such, my cell partner and I live in a tiny cell meant for one. That means 200 people in a building meant for only 100. A yard meant for 500 people now holds a crowded 1000. It would seem like cruel and unusual punishment to house a non-violent person in the same cell as a convicted murderer. Its not uncommon to have four or five men shower in facilities made for only two.
High security prisons used to be restricted for violent criminals, but now anyone could end up here doing a life sentence for almost nothing at all. Of course, this ensures that violence continues and spreads. It's like a set-up to fail.
Does the California legislature and the California Correctional Peace Officer's Association have it right and the rest of the world have it wrong? The CCPOA, the prison guards' union has manipulated the system and the people of California for so long that it will take the federal government to now come in and clean it up. The legislature has had over 15 years to fix the problem and it has only grown worse. The Feds have already take over the medical department of the prison. People's rights are being violated.
It's such a mess; I wouldn't even know where to start. I know a lot of lives are being ruined in the foul process. I've been locked up ten years for a small amount of drugs. Instead of the state helping with my problem, they locked me up. Life is now passing me by. My wife has left; my young daughter is now a young lady. It hurts. It hurts my family as much as myself. It should be criminal to manipulate the people of California the way the CCPOA has. It certainly is immoral for all the parties involved. If it were me, the average citizen, doing the manipulating, someone would surely say I was acting criminally.
We need a change and we need it badly.
Sincerely, Ron Emmal. j03367 (CDCR #)
End Note: Mr. Emmal has never received any drug treatment, although ordered by the court, while in custody, and though in for a non- violent crime, he is being housed in a maximum security setting: said to be reserved for the "worst of the worst," according to prison officials. While at Pelican Bay in 1998, where a federal court had to intervene to halt a vicious pattern of abuse of prisoners by guards, he was approached and asked to commit a racist- motivated assault on another prisoner. Risking his very life, Mr. Emmal refused and stood his ground. In 2004, while housed in a state prison in Los Angeles County, he was the victim of a racial riot that left him wounded with thirteen stabbing/ slashing injuries.

2006-10-07T09:56:00.000-07:00

AN EDUCATIONAL PLEA FROM THE PRISONERS

Dortell Williams

(400 words - non fiction)

As prisoners we are tired. As confined citizens we are wearied. We are absolutely worn-out by non-productive incarceration. We are tired of sharing these cramped cells with our children; heck, we were tired of prison when we were young and had to write our incarcerated fathers.

Now the game is up. Our consistent and past accusations have finally been proven. The claims of our parents and grandparents are at last validated:

According to a study by the Center for the Future of Teachers, called "The Status of the Teaching Profession - 2005," some 91 percent of California's poor and minority students receive inadequate or unequal educational opportunities; comparable to the resulting prison population.

The two year study revealed inadequacies in funding, materials and the quality of teachers. According to the study, only three-in-ten teachers were adequately qualified and only one- in-fifty were above qualifications.

Common sense and the department of correction's own website shows the indisputable nexus between deprivations in education and how such deprivations intrinsically lead to poverty and prison. We needed equal and meaningful education prior to prison and we need it now, while incarcerated, more than ever for successful parole.

Haven't enough politicians, prosecutors and police officers advanced on this transparent and inhumane game of locking up the poor under the guise of "tough on crime" political platform?

There is no question that education is the pathway toward advancement. So why are w being deprived of it? And more importantly, why isn't society insisting on it? If for no other reason but to be safe from desperate, undeducated, and optionless ex-felons.

To the elite who just can't seem to relate because their children have all the resources they need delivered on a silver platter; please, in the name of humanity, look at the evidence yourself. It's quite evident. Isn't it about time we start holding those responsible who manipulate these predictable travesties?

And to the many victims: Most of us fervently lament our past mistakes. A lot of us are civilly dead now, so you don't have to worry about us anymore - life sentences hold us quite securely. But if you're still indifferent about the future of our children, then it might serve well to consider your own safety. It doesn't take a wizard to realize that educated people are the least likely to commit crimes. They are also the most likely to be productive taxpaying members of society.

If society wants to be tough on crime, and truly diminish criminal behavior, then it seems obvious that an unwavering push for education inside these oppressive walls is the most sensible way to go.

Finally, our message to society from behind these crushing concrete confinements is: Focus on education, not incarceration. Let's stop this practice of neglecting our children until they become convicts and then spending upwards of $35,000 a year to just warehouse then in prison. Invest in them now and let them marvel you with their colorful show of human, financial and social returns.

C'mon, let 's face it, it's plain ludicrous to be wasting close to $7 billion a year locking up primarily non-violent offenders. Even the undereducated know that.

Source list:

California Teacher's Association

First-5 California (powerofschools.com)

Lynn Tafoya, Principal of Hiram Johnson High School, Sacramento, CA (hosted commercial for First-5 California campaign, KABC, Channel 7 December 12, 2005)

California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (www. cdcr.ca.gov)

December 2005

2006-10-07T08:59:00.000-07:00

TWO TYPES OF POLITICIANS

Dortell Williams

(350 words- non fiction)

There are basically two types of politicians: Those who lead with innovative and novel ideas; resolute in honoring the oath they swore to, while protecting the Constitution and equally serving every soul under it. Then there are those who are spineless, subverting and even circumventing the Constitution.

They will do or say anything to stay in office.

As an example, prisoners are frequently viewed by an offended community as society's trash. The general lay population often rules in the heat of passion, failing to distinguish between violent and non-violent prisoners, and has only a TV-land concept of what prison is really like. Some people are so confused they actually think prisoners lose their citizenship once imprisoned.

Conversely, politicians, fortified by our tax money, are supplied with a myriad of studies, experts and a useful log of history to aid them in prudent law making. Unlike the layman, legislators are expected to tempter their passions, rest their biases and wear the hat of a professional for the benefit of high office.

It was this myriad of political tools, along with the professional of public office that motivated Democratic Senator of Pennsylvania, John Murtha, and Republican Senator of Arizona, John McCain, to reach across the political isle to successfully outlaw the torture of suspected terrorist detainees.

This dual stance for justice was hailed as laudable. There wre no accusations of molly coddling prisoners or being at all soft. No, their concerns were larger than partisan politics. They were concerned with the country's national interest, as Senator McCain revealed when he said: "Our image in the world is suffering very badly... due to this perception of torture." McCain's comments echoed that of Illinois' Democratic Senator Dick Durban, who told CBS' "Face the Nation," cruel and inhumane treatment of prisoners "is not what American is all about...."

These examples of noble political courage stand in bright contrast to the immoral and inhumane statements of Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, in February 2006. In Los Angeles Times article titled: "Cycle of Jail Woes Generates Few Fixes," he was asked why he hadn't done more to prevent the re-occurring riots at the jails; which led to the death of two prisoners and the injury of countless others. Yaroslavsky's self-serving and callous response: "When you go on the campaign (trail) and give a stomp speech, protecting prisoners is not an applause line."

Apparently ole Zev is a bit out of touch with the values and mores of the American people.

Sources:

Megan Garvey and Sharon Bernstein, "Cycle of Jail Woes Generates Few Fixes," Los Angeles Times, February 21, 2006: Al.

Kathy Kiely and John Diamond, "Fight Over Abuse Puts Bush Against Party Allies, " USA Today, November 10, 2005: 11A.

Douglas K. Daniel (AP) San Diego Union Tribune, November 7, 2005: A7 (McCain and Durban quotes).

June 2006

2006-10-01T19:20:00.000-07:00

A MODERN DAY SAINT

Dortell Williams
(approx. 415 words - non-fiction)

In a way you could liken this to the bibical saint Job: An upright man of integrity and discipline - even when no one is looking. That's how I would characterize Mr. Robert Franklin (not his real name), A middle-aged unemployed California roofer. Like Job in the good book, Mr. Franklin resides in a world where honesty and fidelity are becoming played out, meaningless relics of the past. A world where presidents lie to fellow citizens, and the world at large. Politicians sell us verbal malarkey by the truckload and law enforcement officials go down for such despicable crimes as pedophilia and rape.

The story of Mr. Franklin is a simple one. Like 70 percent of Americans who live from pay check to pay check, Mr. Franklin was working hard to make ends meet in a pro-corporate climate and ultra-capitalistic society that increasingly rewards its employees less, yet turns up ever present financial demands at an increasingly staggering rate. Despite his best efforts to swim upstream, like so many others, Mr. Franklin found himself suddenly unemployed. He was in such a destitute state that he resorted to combing through trash cans to get by. Yet, in spite of his personal dearth and vanting, he returned $21,000 in savings bonds he found that had been apparently been discards by mistake. Mr. Franklin was rewarded a meager $100.00 upon his return from whom some regarded as an ungrateful owner.

In today's self-centered me society, it was, indeed, unique for a man hurried in such a desperate predicament to return this valuable find while his very mid-section grumbled in hunger pains. What was not unique was the fact that a healthy, able and willing Black man was out of work. Sadly many others like Mr. Franklin mirror his indigence with up to double the unemployment rate of mainstream America. (9.4 percent according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics).

Still, Mr. Franklin came out alright. After Fox 11 News aired his story, offers of support came pouring in. Financial assistance was given as well as job offers, which translate for many of us as a main source of pride and self-worth. It's a pity that in the richest and most productive nation in the world there is so little to give. Mr. Franklin unique experience made for an uplifting story however the fact that a remaining 9-plus percent of Blacks are out of work - double that of the national average - tells another story that is very disturbing.

Sources:

Mr. Charles Morris, the unemployed roofer (confidential)

Mia Lee, "Homeless Man Finds Big", KCAL-9 July 26, 2006

Christine Devine, Good Deed Deserve Rewards, Fox 11 News, July 26, 2006

Chuck Herny, "George Stan, LAPD Officer Arrested for Child Molestation", NBC 4 News, July 8, 2005

Bill Blanchford, "Gabriel Gonzales, Former Compton Sheriff Convicted of Rape", Fox 11 News, August 3, 2006

Phillip Palmer, "Micheal James Fisher, Al Hambra Officer Arrested for Molestation of a Minor", ABC

Eyewitness News, August 15 2006

2006-09-25T11:42:00.000-07:00

PRISONERS DON’T GAMBLE ‘CAUSE ITS ILLEGAL
by
Dortell Williams

(Approx. 490 words non-fiction)

Although prison libraries are seldom quiet, today the library was a bit nosier than usual. The small crowded room full of books and people was a-buzz with disgruntled gamblers owed by Boxer: a habitual gambler who knows no limitsm owns no discipline and is terribly sick with wager fever.

“That fool owes me $22.00!” rose a forceful voice from behind the librarian’s counter. “He owes me $12.50,” retorted another, and so on it went.
From one sports season to the next, Boxer is always in hot water with someone, somewhere. Basketball season was particularly sour for Boxer and the frustration within the ranks of those he owes brewed an ominous threat of violence.

Like free society, prisons have their share of gamblers. For some it’s a pastime. For others it’s a hobby, and for yet others it’s their livelihood. However, the worst of them all is the addicted gambler; the compulsive who just can’t seem to get enough.

Those who make it a livelihood are well understood and respected. “It’s his hustle,” as its often described – the way one earns his money. For them betting is a way to counter the institution’s neglect in assigning them to a job or educational placement. Others are fortunate enough to have a job with a pay number, which range form $.08 to $.32 an hour (or even $.95 if the employer is a corporation from free society) a day. But for those with no outside support or a paying job assignment, for those who otherwise couldn’t buy necessities like deodorant or toothpaste, a $12.50 debt owed can be quite a big deal. And for some, a big enough deal to get impatient and even violent about.

It was the violent bloody episodes that initiated bans on gambling in the penitentiary decades ago. Yet the practice on the inside, proportionally, is as prolific as it is on the outside, only wagers are a lot smaller. According to Christiansen Capital Advisors, online betting is expecting to hit $24.5 billion by 2010, nit counting on the other sectors, like casinos, horse racing, and other forms of gambling.

Boxer, a tall, well built athletic brother, said to have had his day in the ring has yet to be pushed into a defensive corner. Still, at the rate he’s going- following un the victimization path of so many of his ilk in the past – we all know it’s just a matter of time. We know it, the guards know it and the administration knows it.
Yet for Boxer, and perhaps thousands of others like him locked within these confining walls, they’re locked out from the desperate help they needed. For Boxer and others, the reality of their addiction is ignored by the state because gambling is illegal in prison and therefore should not exist.

The main problem with that approach is that violence is also illegal, but the threat of it, for some more than others, is every bit as real as their addictions.

Sources:

Jon Swartz,” Arrest Bill Won’t Deter Online Gambling,” USA Today, August21, 2006: B1.

California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation: Director’s Rules (Title 15), section 3009:”Inmates may not participate in any form of gambling or bookmaking.”

SEPT 2006

2006-09-25T11:40:00.000-07:00

WINNING THE RACE TO INCARCERATE
By
DORTELL WILLIAMS

(Approx. 310 words non-fiction)

According to the colorful Western European flavored magazine “the Economist” (August 12, 2006, p.23) California’s colossal prison population, under Republican Arnold Schwarzenegger, exceeds that of Japan, Germany, England & Wales, and France, respectively.

California has pressed and packed within it’s repressive citadels 172,000 stress-tainted prisoners, all behind the massive walls of 33 prisons and 12 “community correctional facilitites,” designed to hold about half its current number.

One major problem, among many, is that the beleaguered state has bedeviled itself with a policy of perpetually locking up people for trivial offenses under 1994 Three Strikes law.

Thousands of non-violent vexation is the state’s approach to released parolees. California supervises its parolees for far longer than most states and sends them back to prison for relatively minor mis-steps such as reporting late to a parole officer or missing a drug test. The combination of a 3-year parole tail and myopic zero tolerance policy for ex-offenders struggling to reintegrate into free society without pre-release rehabilitation or drug treatment almost ensures a return to the inside. The sad and expensive fact is that 11 percent of California’s prisoners are parole violators and 70 percent of California’s parolees are recidivists. Critics call it a set-up to fail.

California is on the fast track to becoming a literal prison state. With such policies, along with an obstinate refusal to release reformed lifers, California’s prison population is expected to grow by 21,000 within the next 5 years. The Democratic-controlled Congress has been pushing for prudent sentencing and parole reform, but Schwarzenegger has vehemently rebuffed such efforts; instead pushing to pour another $6 billion to expand the already $9 billion a year debacle.

Oddly enough, Schwarzenegger defeated Davis in the 2003 recall by promising badly needed education and prison reform. We certainly got that; only now it seems we’re winning the race to incarcerate and losing the battle to educate. It’s as backwards as backwards can get.

Sources:

Don Thompson (AP) “Prison watchdog Rips Governor,” Antelope Valley Press, June 22, 2006: A10

Don Thompson (AP) “Prison Problems Prompt Special Session,” Antelope Valley Press, August 2006: A1, A6

Jennifer Warren and Jordan Rau, “Prison Reform Plan Falls Short,” Los Angeles Times, August 30, 2006: B1, B7

Valdiva v. Schwarzenegger, 2004, also Steven Fama, The Prison Law Office

SEPT 2006

2006-09-18T16:00:00.000-07:00

A BLACK MOVEMENT IN CHRISTIANITY?

Dortell williams

(Approx. 950 words non-fiction)

Prison yards are shut-in societies that challenge its wards to balance overcrowded, shoulder-to-shoulder conditions leaving the often-desperate individual groping for a little hard to find privacy. Everything is done under the watchful eye of others, be it nosey fellow prisoners or binocular wielding, suspicious-of-everything officers. There is no privacy. And with all that watching come words eavesdropped and misunderstood, distant gestures misinterpreted and intentions read upside down.
All of these realities of my enclosed world of confinement weighed me down as I sat in our circle on the yard during Black August, a month to commemorate for all of those who stood before us as African Americans in the struggle for equality and dignified treatment in this country; a time to reflect on those movements where resistance was a primary avenue for the advancement of social and mental liberation. A month of fasting, studying the past, for the benefit of the future, and unity; all while focusing on self-discipline and collective betterment.
As a Christian and lover of humanity, I concern myself with the thoughts of the multicolored mix of people that I intimately fellowship with in daily worship. Of course, a founding principle to the pinnacle of our faith is to not sin; which means to refrain from offending – either God or man.
When I see brothers in the faith, especially of other ethnic backgrounds, observing me from the distance in congregation primarily with Blacks, I don’t want them to think that because I ‘m pro-Black, that I’m anti-everyone else. Nothing could be further from the truth. But the reality is that Black people in this country are unique group that is wholly oppressed, marginalized and suffering at near unparalleled levels. Other than Native Americans and Latinos, no other social collective consistently tops almost every negative statistic like that of Blacks. Despite our relatively few numbers (38.9 million compared to 197.3 million Whites), Blacks in the U.S. are incarcerated at a rate nearly five times higher that Whites, though according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics Whites are arrested at a rate 5 times that of Blacks. When it come to disfranchisement, again, Blacks lead, while falling woefully behind in political progress. And while it is regularly reported that Blacks have been, and continue to be subjects of racial profiling, police abuse and coerced confessions of crimes – as subsequent DNA test are not only confirming, but reversing – America at large turns its back.
Blacks continue to have the highest infant mortality rate at 15.5 percent, compared to Whites at 6.2 percent. And as if that weren’t enough, Blacks also have the highest premature births, at 17.8 percent, compared to Latinos at 11.9 percent and 11.5 percent for Whites.
For decades Blacks have had the highest rate of internecine violence. And while the numbers fluctuate, according to the annual FBI Uniform Crime Data Reports, Blacks are also the most consistently victimized social group in all of America.
Concerning public education, Blacks again hit the crest with one of the highest high school dropout rates, nearing a national average of 50 percent; which perpetuates Black ownership of one of the lowest literacy rates, at 30 percent. In 2004, half of the nation’s Black men in their 20s were without work and made up 72 percent of those who dropped out of high school, which severely limits their potential earnings in an increasingly competitive climate. Further disappointing is that an astounding 70 percent of Black babies are born out of wedlock, essentially guaranteeing for them a future world of limited options and putting them at greater risk for social failure. From there the discordant tune plays on from generation to generation. It is a cycle that plagues us into a perpetual swirl of failure, poverty and premature death.
Moreover, Whites own homes at a 20 percent higher rate than Blacks. The average net worth of Blacks compared to Whites is just $5,988 while Whites stand strong with an average of $88,651 – approximately 15 times higher than Blacks.
The unemployment rate among Blacks is nearly 10 percent, compared to 4 percent for Whites (almost 2 ½ times greater by comparison).
Clearly Blacks are in desperate need of help, from within and without. Therefore I believe that even if I were of any other ethnicity, as a Christian I would still be obligated to assist Blacks, Latinos and Native American first because they are the most marginalized and neglected ethnic groups in this country. Giving to the rich and contributing to the opulent causes of the elite is a socialite tradition. Helping the poor and needy is a Christian responsibility.
It was Jesus the Christ who said “give to the poor.” He also admonished that the two primary commandments are to “love God with all your heart, mind and soul,” and also “to love your neighbor as you love yourself.” These are fulfilled by obeying God and aiding the less fortunate. “ Blessed is he who considers the poor,” said the Psalmist, David, who was, according to the bible, “a man after God’s own heart.” So this is why I must carter to not only Blacks, but all oppressed people and groups, suck as women, immigrants, the so-called handicapped and others who are socially neglected. For me, when it comes to Blacks, race is just a coincidental factor, while our collective station in life, downtrodden and suffering, as statistics confirm, is my primary motivation.
I don’t know, perhaps I wrote this for my own sake more than anything else. But now if my brothers in the faith look at me with a silent question in their eye I can spread with a true and sincere reply. The book of Deuteronomy plainly spells God’s commission to us: “…Help the poor, the stranger, the fatherless and the widow’; so these things I do, as every Christian, Muslim and Jew should.

Sources:

World Almanac and Book of Facts: 2005 (World Almanac Education Group, Inc., Mahwah, New Jersey, 2005) p. 624 (Population figures)

World Almanac and Book of Facts; 2005 (World Almanac Education Group, Inc., Mahwah, New Jersey, 2005) p. 76 (Infant mortality rates)

National Endowment for the Arts – 2004 (re: literacy rates)

Editorial, “Young Black Men at Risk,” Christian Science Monitor, April 17, 2006: 8

Susan Porter & Victoria Kusher (AmeriCorps) Judicial Process Commission, Inc., (Justicia) March- April 2006 (re: Blacks five times more likely than Whites to be imprisoned)

Matthew 19:21 (“Jesus said “give to the poor”)

Matthew 19:19 (“ Love your neighbor as you love yourself”)

Deuteronomy 10:17, 19 (“Give to the fatherless, widows and love the stranger’)

I Samuel 13:14 (“David was a man after God’s own heart.”)

Blacks Rank First in Premature Births,” The Final Call, August 1, 2006: 8 (Primary source: The Institute of Medicine)

Pew Hispanic Center (Net worth of Blacks compared to Whites, figures from 1999 – 2002)

September 18, 2006

2006-08-28T21:10:00.000-07:00

I AM A STATISTIC

By

Dortell Williams

(Approx. 310 words non-fiction)

I am a statistic in many ways. I am Black. I am a prisoner, and have been for the last 17 years. I am part of that astronomical count of 1-in-4 African American male youth seemingly magnetized to America’s penal bars.
Like too many youths of the inner city, my role models shined in an illusory sub-culture of drug dealing, womanizing, substance abuse, gang-banging, underachievement and miseducation. The array of potential trouble offered in the dark world of the marginalized, along with self-entrapment is endless. Now I am one of the 5 percent of California prisoners who may never – ever see freedom ahead.
Today I am one of many finally handed some guidance by an elder, an elder prisoner, but an elder nonetheless. Others along the prison path have advised me to read, and read critically, I was admonished. It was a first, a new beginning into a fresh new world of words and ideas. Others challenged me to augment my vocabulary, study the financial markets, learn to type and operate office equipment – even learn to communicate in Spanish; all of which I’ve done and so much more, in spite of the oppressive nature of prison. “Learn all the things they didn’t teach you in school,” I was told. “Remember, if they can do it, so can you,” Reggie told me. I have been slowly introduced to my own potential. He’s a great friend and ally.
It’s absolutely amazing what a little guidance and mentoring can do for a willing youth uneducated with a dead-end mindset. A once hope-forlorn and misguided kid can be transformed into an incessant reservoir of self-confidence and positive ability.
I am only one statistic who’s already met the merciless countenance of doom, but there are many, many more who, if just reached out to, could be saved from the piercing eyes of life’s end while yet still living.

August 2006

2006-08-28T15:29:00.000-07:00

THE POSSIBILITY OF CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR

By

Dortell Williams

(Approx. 450 words non-fiction)

Okay, so this is the twenty-first century and we’ve come a long way in our various contemporary gains, but it seems the law enforcement community wants to leap backwards, behind even our most modern advances by arresting, jailing and trying citizens for offenses they might commit, as opposed to crimes they’ve already done.
I’m not talking about the discovery of a newly identified criminal gene lurking in, well, probably everyone who’s ever been tempted to break the law.
I’m talking old witch-hunt-style, McCarthy-like speculation, conjecture and guesswork.
At least that’s how it sounded to me when some Los Angeles district attorneys announced that the non-violent crime of burglary would be excluded from the list of offenses now being considered for repeal under the Three Strikes law.
Their characterization of burglars transcends into another type of crime all together, quote: “A burglar is a rapist in the making,” end quote. In other words, non-violent burglars who broke into unoccupied, even vacant dwellings and open underground garages will not be eligible to have their current life terms reduced to sentences that fit the crime should this disreputable law be amended; leaving a significant number of non-violent people behind bars; in many ways defeating the very purpose of the people’s call for an amendment.
Such an adverse approach opens the door for a widespread policy of prejudgment, or punishment, for the mere possibility of criminal behavior.
Recent protests in Texas overturned such a policy when the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission voted to arrest potential drunks in bars. Undercover agents would infiltrate public bars and arrest suspected drunks because, as spokeswoman Carolyn Beck put it, they, quote: “might have tried to drive,” end quote.
Ha, so much for designated drivers!
So why stop there? Since the uniformed blame rape victims based on their attire, why not ban all tight, transparent or short apparel? Or, how about prohibiting all exotic dance and escort services? Why not even go as far as banning all athletic games due to their potential for player-on-player assaults? Of course, I am being facetious here, but this potential rapist assertion takes prevention to an absolutely ridiculous level.
It is yet another pathway toward this recent pattern of mass arrests based on labeling, grouping and presumption.
Believe me, I know the invaded-upon feeling of being burglarized and I empathize with like victims, but life sentences for drug addicted and otherwise afflicted burglars is just down right inhumane.
On the other hand, I’ve got to give the Texas citizenry credit, like the colorful and solidified immigrants now in protests, for refusing to sit silently by in the face of various repeated attempts as mass injustice.

Thank you for reading this segment of “A Prisoner’s Perspective.”

Resource list:

Paul Leavitt, “Texas Drops Bar-Arrest Sting,” USA Today, April 14, 2006: 3A

These commentaries are produced by Noelle Hanrahan at prisonradio.org and KPFK’s Sonali Kolhatkar at uprisingradio.org

May 2006

2006-08-28T15:21:00.000-07:00

WHY DON’T WE CALL IT:
THE BLACK PENALTY?

(Approx. 530 words non-fiction)

Eric Rudolph is the latest in a string of the worst, White, domestic terrorists, and serial killers the country has allowed to escape from the death penalty.
Rudolph pled guilty, in early April for four interstate bombings that included the 1996 Atlanta incident that occurred during that year’s Olympics. His unrepentant terrorism killed two, and injured 120. He was mercifully sentenced to life in prison.
Terry Nichols, the admitted co-laborer of Timothy McVeigh, was apparently forgiven by two juries who failed to give him the death penalty for his role in what authorities call, “The worst act of domestic terrorism in U.S. history.” The two multiple murderers were proven to have killed 168 innocent people, women and children included, in the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, in Oklahoma City. He was also sentenced to life.
Then there’s Gary Ridgeway, better known as the Greenriver Killer. After eluding police for over twenty years, while he raped and murdered at least, and admitted 48 women; he, too, was given life.
The list is long. Horrific serial killers, that raped, tortured and maimed their victims for the thrill, or fun of it, or perhaps to make some obscure point. They’re all White, and they all got life.
For whatever reason, there’s always an excuse or circumstance to appease the injustice; Whites are historically forgiven for the most egregious of crimes.
One need only to look at the haunting history: there’s a long chronicle of Klu Klux Klan trials, and the few accused were almost always acquitted by suburban juries – not unlike the police today – while in comparison, there were thousands of Black lynchings; for the smallest of infractions. The deathly condemnation almost always came from all-white jurors – if there was even a trial. The history is: Blacks get death, and Whites get life.
Though a staunch opponent of the death penalty, I question and confront this nation’s discriminatory history of killing.
For further, but disturbing example, there’s Charles Cullen, the Pennsylvania nurse who admitted to six so-called hospital mercy killings, in late 2004, and though he arrogantly claimed it was more like 40 – he got life. Then there’s Maryland’s Charles Davis, and New York’s David Berkowitz, also known as the Son of Sam (both vicious White serial killers who got life). The list goes on ad-nausea.
The U.S. Supreme Court, and its subordinates have verified this horrid history again, and again. The nation’s highest court overturned the death penalty in 1972, because Blacks were far more likely to get that ultimate of sanctions than Whites.
Despite this fact, America, the bloodthirsty, eagerly reinstated the death penalty, and just ten short years later the same court found the same think in McClesky v. Kemp. Since then the pattern has continued, from racial profiling, to gang labeling, to arrests – and ultimately the death penalty. America is committing a slow, but effective, genocide on its Black population.
During this newly claimed compassionate conservatism, and supposed culture of life, we must ask today, not tomorrow, why America is so bent on killing Blacks…any way it can.
Until all Americans are ready to seriously confront this deathly discrimination, let’s just be real about it and call it what it is: The Black penalty.

Source list:

John Bacon, "Rudolph to Plead Guilty to 4 Bombings", USA Today, Aprill 11, 2005; 3A
AP, "Nichols Admits Part in Oklahoma Bombing", USA Today, Nov. 28, 2004; 2A
Stone Phillips, "Chasing the Devil": Dateline with Stone Phillips, Jan. 29, 2005 (re: Greenriver Killer).
John Douglass and Mark Olshaker, "The Mind of a Hunter: Inside the FBI's Elite Serial Crime Unit (New York, Pocket Books, 1996)
Ibid, 14, 15 (re: Charles Davis)
Ibid, 138-144 (re: David Berkowitz)
Nurse Murderer Pleads Guilty, USA Today, approx. week of Nov. 28, 2004 (re: Charles Cullen)
Joan Biskupic, "Court Unlikely to Make Historic Moves", USA Today, March 2, 2005; 4A

May 2005

2006-08-28T14:48:00.000-07:00

KATRINA:
A CALL FOR ACCOUNTABILITY

Dear Editor,

President Bush and his spin team seem to have more defense strategies than the National Football League. The real shame is that they continuously find themselves on the defense for a consistent series of malignant decisions that injure, wrong or otherwise offend the nation, or world at large.
After an array of bipartisan criticism for the disastrous, inadequate and deadly response to Hurricane Katrina’s strike on American citizens, it appears the bush team has a new plot: label the call for accountability “finger pointing”.
While aimless finger pointing and unsupported blame is, indeed, detrimental, nothing could be more healthy and nutritious for the nation than a return to holding those accountable.
As a group, we are incessantly stereotyped. Not surprisingly, this fact of Black life in America held true during the media coverage of the hurricane’s aftermath. One of the prevailing verbal caricatures of us is that we are a loud and vociferous people. This time let it be so- let the entire world hear our collective, tireless and unified demand for unfiltered accountability.

Dortell Williams
Lancaster, CA

The Los Angeles Sentinel, September 29, 2006: A6

2006-08-28T14:47:00.000-07:00

PEEPING CAMS INTRUSIVE IN HIGH SOCIETY:
SAVE DISENFRANCHISED FROM POLICE

by

Dortell Williams

(Approx. 280 words non-fiction)

Sometimes the contrast of our two Americans is undeniable it’s almost surreal. I say this after watching broadcast news reports of a recent unpopular proposal to lace the pristine streets of Beverly Hills, California, with high-tech cameras programmed to detect and then capture speeders on film.
The uniformed high society outcry was unmistakable: the upper-class and high-rollers don’t want cameras invading their privacy. That was the most prolific message throughout the televised sound bites.
On the other hand, some thirty minutes rides across town, in South LA, privacy rolled out of the city in the 60’s with the White flight. Since then, the working class and disenfranchised residents have endured systematic profiling, harassment and abuse by an occupying police department that could care less about privacy. The shameful history of the LAPD in South LA speaks for itself.
It is for this reason that many of us behind these incarcerating walls –a great many victims of the LAPD- are relieved to hear that the notorious department’s probationary period (or what is euphemistically called the federal consent decree) has been extended three years. The extension was needed until their penchant for profiling and other sins harnessed.
And while we’re not particularly fond of cameras either, it was a camera witnesses of Rodney King, Stanley Miller, and most recently Emilio Carrion (in San Bernardino) that actually exposed the truth of abuse we’re been trying to tell for decades but were ignored.
Invading cameras in and about the city might not be the best thing for a nation that prides itself on civil liberties, but for the disenfranchised cameras sure do a life-saving job on exposing the trespasses of the elite when no one will hear us.

Resource List:

Jamie Garcia, KCBS News, May16, 2006 (re: Camera proposal in Beverly Hills)

Larry Aubry, “LAPD Must Fully Comply with Extended Consent Decree: Urban Perspective (Opinion), Los Angeles, Sentinel, April 27, 2006:A7

Stephen Clark, “Bail is Set for Videographer of [S.B.] Police Shooting Los Angeles Times, February 8, 2006:B6

John Bacon, “No Charges Filed in Videotaped Beating” USA Today, April 4, 2005: 3A

2006-08-28T14:43:00.000-07:00

QUESTIONING THE SHERRIFF’S PROPOSAL
FOR A $325 MILLION GANG TASK FORCE

By

DORTELL WILLIAMS

(Approx. 490 words non-fiction)

Recently Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca proposed a half-cent tax hike to fund a $325 million anti-gang task force. If approved by the Los Angeles City Council, the proposal is expected to be among a myriad of other initiatives on the November ballot.
As with any initiative, these proposals must be met with scrutiny and confronted by an alert and questioning public. All too often, once the deal is done- it’s done. So oversight is imperative. The days being duped by misleading legislatives are over.
According to the Los Angeles Police Department, we are nearing a gang population of 100,000 in just L.A. William Bratton, Chief of the LAPD has already conceded that: “We can’t arrest our way out of [the gang problem]this.” And reluctance to do so should be our attitude considering our proclaimed “culture of life,” as President Bush terms it.
The California Department of (so-called) Corrections and Rehabilitation is already brimming with 174,000 adult and juvenile inmates and wards, and is responsible for 115,000 parolees at large.
A quick note of the recent barrage of criticisms the department has weathered by broadcast media regarding their mismanagement of released child predators should be enough to make the public think twice about relying solely on incarceration.
The department’s performance in rehabilitating wayward youth has been just as dismal. The department’s own website reveals a near 80 percent recidivism rate, as compared to a 70 percent success record for youth camps.
L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has expressed concerns about a strictly punitive approach toward delinquency in the past. He has cited the effectiveness of after school programs and other intervention techniques used as he was growing up. Today, we just throw kids away.
However, what we should asking us how we got here in the first place. And why do so many of our youth express such hopelessness for the future, or such a blatant disregard for life.
Could it be the example we’ve shown them? We take their parents away to be prison wards for life. We disrespect the disenfranchised in terms of school funding. We eagerly omit them from society for the slightest offense, while society itself shows a blatant disregard for life.
Gangs have been around for at least forty years. Since that time they have predictably grown unchallenged. Not only have we failed to protect these children from gangs that inevitably swallow them up, but we have also shown a shameful dereliction in shielding them from the many ills associated with gang life: Drugs and guns to start with. Both are as readily available as the cell phones they possess.
Yet, we’re ready to wage an urban war on them.

Little emphasis is placed on prevention, intervention or rehabilitation. In these areas the government, the law enforcement community and the corporations that exploit them are largely silent.
Given society’s grand failures, the biggest question should be: Do we need protection from them, or do we need protection from us?

Resource List:

Antonio Villaraigosa, interviewed by Sonali Kolhatkar of (KPFK), uprsingradio.org, May 16, 2005 (also youth camp statistics)

Jennifer Warren, “State Prisons’ Chief Resigns After Two Months on the Job,” Los Angeles Times, April 20, 2006: A1

www.cdr.ca.gov (California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation)

www.lacounty.info (Statistics on Child Predators)

Mia Lee, KCAL-9 News, May 15, 2006 (Criticizing CDCR on mishandling of released child predators)

KTLA Chief Bratton quote,“We can’t arrest our way out of this,” June 3, 2004

2006-06-26T22:09:00.000-07:00

AN URGENT PLEA FOR SUDAN

I applaud the efforts of CBS' (Up to the Minute) recent reports, by Lara Lawson. Lawson's regular, courageous, in-the-mud and nitty-gritty coverage on and from war-torn Sudan were important, educational and moving; in contrast to other broadcast media who focus on the irrelevant gossip topics of celebrities while precious life is being snuffed away.

During these graphic reports, Lawson withheld nothing and told all. She explained the naked truth about the horrible plight of the Sudanese; from their lack of food and medicine to the sordid attacks they are suffering as they are attacked by ethnic militias backed by their traitorous government. US officials, including Colin Powell, have described the horrific situation as genocide.

To make matters worse, financial contributions have waned, in part, because of a decrease of updates on the neglected milieu. Lawson emphatically reminded her viewers not to forget the Sudanese region; which is the poorest venue in the world.

Lawson, a noticeably curvaceous, bleach blonde, with clear fair skin and neatly, but casually dressed for her report, stood in stark contrast to the dark skinned, malnourished, rag-wearing inhabitants of the desolate desert.

During Lawson's short and engaging reports, she told jeering stories of personal loss by the villagers, as malicious, marauding armies killed, maimed and displaced tens of thousands of the innocent. She broke our hearts with the sheer number of people left suffering, hungry and homeless as the sum of four million rolled from her tongue. Yet, the people had hope. Hope that the peace process, among the Janjaweed (the holocaust-exacting group), the local counter forces and the inadequately deployed African Union peace-keeping force had begun a forward mobilization.

She ended her report by reminding us that though hope there is tangible, it is also extremely fragile. The residual of survivors who nightmarishly endured decades of terror and war, and have thus far stood solid in the face of world neglect, unrelenting elements, famine and genocide, still confront disastrous peril if a new influx of financial aid doesn't pour in soon. Every hour is critical for survival.

So while we eat for pleasure here, and then waste obscene amounts of food, I hope to touch upon the hearts of the compassionate to go to any of the following sites (linked to cbs.com) and give alms and charity with a humanitarian spirit.

You Can Help Refugees in Sudan and Chad
Goodwill Ambassador Angelina Jolie wants you to join her and the UN Refugee Agency to help Sudanese refugees in Africa. Read about her visit to the refugee camps there.
www.unrefugees.org

Crisis in Sudan - Please Help
You can help save lives in Sudan. Please donate to CARE now.
www.care.org

Feed a Child in Sudan - Help Many
Feed starving children in East Africa. $30 provides $240 worth of food.
www.worldvision.org

2006-05-26T09:00:00.000-07:00

Welcome to
"A Prisoner's Perspective"

Sponsored by K. Williams and written by Dortell Williams; a California prisoner for the past seventeen years. With this blog Dortell will share some of his commentaries that have been aired on Pacifica Radio's KPFK (90.7 FM uprising.org) and prisonradio.org.

Dortell believes that the public deserves to know what is going on in our prisons, and he is eager to publish a critical perspective on how tax payer's money is being spent (or wasted depending on the revelations); what prisoners do to spend their time and give a more transparent view of life behind the wall. This perspective is more important now than ever.

A succession of state governors have denied the media open access to interview prisoners (except those hand picked), and law enforcement is rarely ever challenged in their one-sided and self-serving reports about how or why prisoners are often the topic of rioting, recidivism or other nefarious activities. And considering the many reports of abuse in other countries here of late - by our government - the public has shown a consistent interest in prisoners here at home. Yet that interest has been largely unfulfilled due to a lack of avenues by which to reach those locked away, but ready to spill the beans.

While incarcerated, Dortell has worked hard to educate himself and others he is confined with along the way. He believes fervently in education. In spite of the inherent restrictions and limitations of prison, he has become a paralegal, freelance writer and social activist from his cell. He aspires to write several books to empower the powerless and share glimpses of prison life with the public. Dortell believes that if the public were aware of the unnecessary waste and abuse common with California prisons, and elsewhere, the people would be screaming for reform.

Dortell focuses on solutions and positive approaches to our multitude of social ills, while he focuses primarily on educating the public about the negative and positive of prison. He also writes on themes ranging from, but not limited to, discrimination of minorities; including women, immigrants and the so-called disabled. In his prison related writings he pushes rehabilitation, higher education and drug intervention as ways to reduce repeat offending and protect the public from being further victimized. He believes our current policies, which have been expensively failing us for the last thirty years, actually increase the likelihood of criminal behavior by exacerbating the desperation of already hopeless and optionless ex-felons. He likes to say: "The ignorant can't teach the ignorant" and that is why he believes educating prisoners while in custody is the most sensible approach there is. He also believes strongly in a democracy that holds elected officials accountable for their misdeeds and failings.

This blog opens the door for the public to put forth questions, extend curiosities and express comments - pro or con - regarding the prisoner perspective.

Dortell will attempt to post new entries bi-weekly, but due to the inconsistent, often interrupted program of prison life, he asks that readers be patient and bear with him if such postings are in anyway derailed.

Readers are also invited to e-mail him (listed below). However, please know that he is not allowed access to the internet at his institution he is assigned to (emails are forwarded to him and are solely for the convenience of the reader). You may also write him directly at:

Dortell Williams
H-45771 / A2-103
P.O. Box 4430
Lancaster, CA 93539
dortellwilliams@yahoo.com

If you would like to contribute to his aspirations or work please note below:

* RESEARCH: People who can periodically download info. from the internet for his writings.

* STAMPS: Any amount under the limit of forty would be an immense help.

* BOOKS: Please write for details.

Thank you for visiting "A Prisoner's Perspective". Dortell looks forward to sharing with you and revealing who's in here, what prisoner's are fed, where we play, sleep, and their surprising hunger to be educated and reformed.