Pelican Bay SHU on hunger strike

June 17 rally in San Francisco. The speaker, former Pelican Bay prisoner Bato Talamantez, called for support of the hunger strike. Read his review of Voices from Within the Prison Walls.

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This is a call for all prisoners in SHUs, Administrative Segregation (Ad-Seg), and General Populations (GP), as well as the free oppressed and non-oppressed people to support the indefinite July 1, 2011 peaceful Hunger Strike in protest of the violation of our civil/human rights, here at Pelican Bay State Prison Security Housing Unit (PBSP-SHU).

It should be clear to everyone that none of the hunger strike participants want to die. The state of California has sentenced all of us on Indeterminate SHU program to a "civil death" merely on the word of a prison informer (snitch). Those subjected to indeterminate SHU programs are neglected and deprived of the basic human necessities while withering away in a very isolated and hostile environment.

The "code of silence" used by guards allows them the freedom to use everything at their disposal in order to break those prisoners who prison officials and correctional officers (C/O) believe cannot be broken.

A protracted attack on SHU prisoners cuts across every aspect of the prison's function: food, mail, visiting, medical, yard, hot/cold temperatures, privileges (canteen, packages, property, etc.), isolation, cell searches, family/friends, and socio-culture, economic, and political deprivation. The psychological/physical torture of SHU/Ad-Seg prisoners takes place day in and day out, without a break or rest.

The prison's gang intelligence unit was extremely angered that prisoners who had been held in SHU under inhuman conditions for anywhere from ten to 40 years had not been broken. So the gang intelligence unit created the "short corridor" and intensified the pressure of their attacks on the prisoners housed there. The object was to use blanket pressure to encourage these particular isolated prisoners to snitch in order to be released from SHU.

Continuous attacks are carried out against prisoners by all C/Os and administrative officials. They are deliberate and conscious acts against essentially defenseless prisoners. It is these ongoing attacks that have led the short corridor and overflow SHU prisoners to organize ourselves around an indefinite Hunger Strike in an effort to combat the dehumanizing treatment we prisoners of all races are subjected to on a daily basis.

Therefore, on July 1, 2011, we ask that all prisoners throughout the State of California who have been suffering injustices in General Population, Administrative Segregation and solitary confinement, etc. to join in our peaceful strike to put a stop to the blatant violations of prisoners' civil/human rights. As you know, prison gang investigators have used threats to get prisoners to engage in a protracted war against each other. If you cannot participate in the Hunger Strike then support it in principle by not eating for the first 24 hours of the strike.

I say that those of you who carry yourselves as principled human beings, no matter your housing status, must fight to right this and other egregious wrongs. Although it is "us" today (united New Afrikans, Whites, Northern and Southern Mexicans, and others) it will be you all tomorrow. It is in your interest to peacefully support us in this protest today, and to beware of agitators, provocateurs, and obstructionists, because they are the ones who put 90% of us back here because they could not remain principled even within themselves.

--Mutope Duguma (s/n James Crawford)

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