Seven Days in Solitary [4.27.13]

April 27, 2013 By 1 Comment

solitaryThe following roundup features noteworthy news, reports, and opinions on solitary confinement from the past week that have not been covered in other Solitary Watch posts.

•  The Queens Chronicle reports on efforts by activists and New York City Council Members to increase transparency and and place stricter limits on the use of solitary confinement in New York City’s jails.

•  Susan Greene, in the Colorado Independent, continues her reporting on how years of solitary confinement may have affected Evan Ebel, prime suspect in the killing of Colorado prisons chief Tom Clements.

•  Albany Times Union reports on the widespread use of solitary confinement on people with mental illness in New York State. The damage caused by solitary is illustrated in the story of the formerly incarcerated Jeff Rockefeller, who to this day struggles with uncontrollable crying, difficulty sleeping and nightmares.

•  Human Rights Watch reports  that 93 of the 166 detainees have joined the hunger strike at Guantanamo.

•  The Houston Chronicle reports on two bills currently under consideration by the Texas Legislature (House Bill 1266 and Senate Bill 1003) that would call for an examination of the state’s use of solitary confinement in order to identify feasible alternatives the practice. In the article, Texas death row exonoree Anthony Graves provides a powerful account of the tortuous conditions to which he was subjected in his over 18 years of administrative segregation.

•  The Sidney Hillman Foundation announces Shane Bauer as a a 2013 Hillman Prizes recipient for his article “No Way Out: A Special Report on Solitary Confinement from Former Hostage Shane Bauer.” The prize is awarded to “journalists whose work highlights important social and economic issues and helps bring about change for the better.”

•  The ACLU reports on a series of proposed bills that would restrict the use solitary confinement on youth in Texas. The story also details the state’s “failure  to take into account age when determining if a kid should be placed in solitary and a disregard for the mental-health of children held in isolation.”

•  KUT News reports on the abusive use of solitary confinement on youth in Texas, stating “juvenile offenders in Texas were placed in solitary confinement 36,820 times last year.”

•  Rabbi Shmuly Yanklowitz speaks out against the use of solitary confinement on youth, calling for support of a proposed bill in California (SB 61) that would “lead the way nationally in increasing access to rehabilitation and reducing harm for our young people.”

•  Prisoners rights group NCTT-Cor-SHU alleges that, in a blatant disregard of California state policies, administrators at Corcoron SHU instructed staff to cease all medical treatment of hunger strikers at the facility.

• Angola 3 News features an interview with Teresa Shoats, daughter of Russell Maroon Shoats, who has spent 28 of the last 30 years in solitary confinement in Pennsylvania prisons, and is now the subject of an activist campaign to win his release from isolation.

Filed Under: mental illness, psychological effects, solitary confinement, supermax prisons, torture Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Voices from Solitary: Parts of My Mind Did Not Survive

April 3, 2013 By 6 Comments

CorcoranPrisonThe following was written by Chris Yingling, reflecting upon the  three years he spent in California State Prison, Corcoran’s Security Housing unit from 1994 to 1996. He was subsequently transferred to Pelican Bay State Prison “when the Feds set up shop at Corcoran because of the gladiator fights.” The “gladiator fights” were the subject of federal investigation following widespread reports of prison guards setting up fights between rival prisoners, fights that Yingling reports he was a part of. He reports lingering psychological difficulties resulting from his time in the California prison system. “I suffer depression, and harbor some serious resentments toward our corrections system. I have rage. Every once in awhile ill come to tears over the way humans treat each other,” he says. 

Yingling contacted Solitary Watch after reading an article about the 2011 suicide of Pelican Bay administrative segregation inmate Alex Machado. Yingling and Machado had met each other in the California Youth Authority in the late 1980s. He told Solitary Watch, “I read this article just prior to reading my kids a bedtime story and it brought it all back. I know more stuff about Alex that I saw that no human should have to endure much less a 15 year old kid. He did not have an easy life. May god rest his soul. I will remember Alex. I am no longer in chains.” –Sal Rodriguez

Corcoran

In white jumpsuits chained in groups of four

they pulled our bus onto the yard

made to face a concrete wall

two gunners and many a guard

 

10 toes, your chin and chest

keep upon that wall

unlock your knees it’s a 105 degrees

if one goes down you all fall

 

welcome to the SHU this is hell

you committed a crime in CDC

don’t fuck around we’ll put a bullet in you

In a very short time you will see.

 

What is your name? Why are you in the shu?

I caused Great bodily injury in a riot.

He slammed my face against the wall

The rest of the line still and quiet.

 

One man was pulled right off the chain

He was surrounded and beaten a long time

Great bodily injury caused by the cops

Apparently isn’t a crime

 

they removed the waist chain choking me with a stick

the cuffs bit into my hand

they pulled my jumpsuit around my knees

“now do you think you’re a man?”

 

What I experienced for the next 3 years

Made me wish I could die

Although physically I left in one piece

Parts of my mind did not survive.

 

Men were shot, men were stabbed

Some guys lost their minds

We had to fight while they shot at us

Hit with baton rounds eleven times.

 

I’m not trying to whine not trying to cry

Because my life is so much different today

I was 21 years old when I stood on that wall

It seems like a lifetime away

 

Not trying to act tough or exaggerate the facts

Just wanna get out what’s inside

I was only a kid trying to get through

They made me hate and hurt my pride

 

There’s a huge system right in societies face

That is just another criminal enterprise

I understand these people did bad things

My own part I now see and realize.

 

These are our brothers and these are our sons

prejudice and mistreatment is not an answer

our society doesn’t just doesn’t have a cold

we got mother fuckin cancer!

 

So I lean toward the left in my political views

Because I saw too damn much of “the right”

Biases interfere with things of this nature

If you think that I’m biased you’re right.

Filed Under: California, politics of punishment, psychological effects, solitary confinement, supermax prisons, Voices from Solitary Tagged With: , , , ,

Corcoran State Prison Inmate Commits Suicide in Solitary

October 19, 2012 By 24 Comments

Solitary Watch has recently confirmed that on August 28th,  prisoner Armando Morales (CDCR number-P80673) committed suicide by hanging in his cell at California State Prison, Corcoran. The Kings County Coroner’s office confirmed that Mr. Morales was found unresponsive at 4:41 PM in his cell by prison staff. He was found on his cell floor with a shoelace and a blue blanket wrapped around his neck. Morales was being housed alone in his cell.

According to a pen-pal ad posted when he was 23, Morales, a Watts, California native, had been incarcerated since he was 16 years old. The post also indicates that he was being held in the Security Housing Unit (SHU) as of six years ago. His admission date at Corcoran is listed as 06/01/2000. Inmates in the SHU are generally housed in solitary confinement for periods of time ranging from 22 1/2 to 24 hours a day. Cells are generally no bigger than 8×10 feet.

According to the reports of Special Master to the US District Court for the Eastern District of California, between 2006 and 2010 suicides in the California prison system averaged 34 per year. Approximately 42% were committed by inmates in the SHU or ASU (Administrative Segregation Unit).

According to California Prison Focus, Mr. Morales was being held in the 4B facility, which houses hundreds of validated gang members in solitary confinement, at the time of his death.

The Corcoran State Prison Public Information Office confirmed that Mr. Morales was being held in the Security Housing Unit at the time of his death, though no other information was made available.

In a letter to California Prison Focus, an inmate housed in the same unit as Morales reported that Morales was being pressured to debrief at the time of Morales’ suicide by Institutional Gang Investigators (IGIs). Debriefing is a process in which inmates inform against their gang, and are transitioning out of the prison gang they belong to. For inmates in the SHU, it is one of the only ways they can be released from the SHU, aside from maxing out of their original sentence. The decision to debrief can be particularly stressful, as leaving prison gangs can result in becoming a target for retribution.

Corcoran State Prison houses 1,426 inmates in the SHU or Protective Housing Unit, the latter of which houses inmates who are in the process of debriefing.

Solitary Watch will provide updates as more information becomes available. Anyone with information about Mr. Morales, particularly his family, can contact the writer at: sal_solitaryw@yahoo.com.

Filed Under: California, psychological effects, solitary confinement, suicide, supermax prisons Tagged With: , , , ,

Solitary Confinement Policies in California Revised Again, As Inmate Leaders Promote End to Racial Hostilities

September 24, 2012 By 1 Comment

The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has recently circulated a memo regarding the most recent revised edition of its Step Down Program (SDP) and Security Threat Group (STG) Program proposal. The revised policies come one year after a series of statewide hunger strikes by inmates in the Security Housing Units (SHU) in Pelican Bay and other California state prisons.

In California, one is placed in the SHU most commonly for being deemed a member of an STG–or, one of seven gangs known to be involved in criminal activity. These gangs are the Aryan Brotherhood, Black Guerilla Family, Nuestra Familia, the Mexican Mafia, Northern Structure, Nazi Low Riders and the Texas Syndicate. Currently, inmates deemed to be member of these gangs are sentenced to an indeterminate SHU term, which usually entails years of solitary confinement in either a SHU unit at one of three California prisons (Pelican Bay, Corcoran, and Tehachapi) or any of California’s Administrative Segregation Units (ASUs) until a SHU cell opens up.

The process of being labeled a member of the STGs, however, has been controversial. Inmates have reportedly been validated as members of STGs for, among other things, possessing calendars with certain artwork or making references to George Jackson (an African-American inmate who co-founded the Black Guerilla Family). The revised policies purportedly aim to strengthen the criterion for gang validation. However, critics such as attorney Charles Carbone counter that the proposed policies are more of the same. It has been noted that the revised policies include consideration of tattoos and artwork as contributing factors to a SHU term.

“Us in AdSeg arrived from county jails and are going through process to get transferred out of here to a SHU,” writes T., a SHU-bound inmate at North Kern State Prison, “my validation is just like everybody else falsely accused. Anytime you do certain things like speak Swahili or read and study our history as New Afrikkkan’s we get validated.” T. has been in the ASU for four years pending an opening of a SHU cell. “Our program is simple. Handcuffed everywhere, yard and shower three times a week, in waist and leg chains,” he writes.

Further, the revised policy plans to implement a Step Down Program in which inmates could hypothetically transition out of the SHU and back into general population in four years. This policy would be based on a series of steps with increasing numbers of privileges and ultimately involving greater social interaction. Currently, inmates sent to the SHU for STG membership must prove that they have been inactive in any gang for six years. Due to this standard, over 500 SHU inmates have been in solitary confinement for more than 10 years and nearly 80 for over 20 years.

This is the seventh time the policies have been revised since March. The memo provides highlights of CDCR’s policy proposals, including the following:

[Read more...]

Filed Under: California, due process, psychological effects, solitary confinement, supermax prisons Tagged With: , , , ,

Political or Gang Activity? “New Afrikan” Inmates in Solitary Confinement

August 7, 2012 By 28 Comments

Three “New Afrikan”  inmates in California Security Housing Unit’s (Pelican Bay and Corcoran State Prison’s) have recently written to Solitary Watch criticizing their continued isolation for being members of the Black Guerilla Family, the only black prison gang in California that will lead to placement in the SHU.

According to Mutope Duguma (legal name James Crawford) at Pelican Bay, it’s his political views “that got me placed in solitary confinement and labeled a BGF member, which I am not, but in order to place you in solitary confinement IGI/ISU/OCS have to label you a BGF if you’re a New Afrikan.”

He has been in solitary for over a decade. “My cell has a concrete slab bed, the cell is white with a concrete brick slab for TV holding. Toilet and sink connected all in one and the steel front panel door and a white painted wall in front. No trees. No animals. No sun. No life. Just prisoners isolated from the world,” he writes.

Life for men in the SHU is bleak, reports Duguma., “I get up at 5:30 AM, go to the yard when my rotation comes around for 90 minutes, then I am back in my cell for the rest of the day.”

Inmates labeled BGF are routinely validated on the basis of their political views. In a June 2012 ruling, the California Court of Appeals found that Duguma’s political writings were wrongly used to prevent outgoing mail to the San Francisco Bay View newspaper.  Duguma referred to himself as a “New Afrikan Nationalist Revolutionary Man.”

[Read more...]

Filed Under: California, due process, lawsuits/litigation, race, solitary confinement, supermax prisons Tagged With: , , , , ,

Inmates in Solitary Confinement in California Respond to Prison Policy Reforms

May 1, 2012 By 11 Comments

Prisoners in California’s Security Housing Unit (SHU) have offered their opinions of the recent reforms of the California prison system’s controversial gang validation policies. In correspondences with Solitary Watch, SHU inmates in Pelican Bay and Corcoran prisons have consistently been critical of the reforms, which among other things reform the gang validation point system and introduce a step-down program in which inmates can  transition out of the SHU. Last month a group of SHU inmates, all of whom are labeled as either members or leaders of prison gangs (Aryan Brotherhood, Mexican Mafia, Black Guerilla Family), released a counter proposal in response.

The following are excerpts from letters written by prisoners currently in California’s SHUs.

From Kijana Askari (self-portrait above), who has been in the SHU since 1994 after being validated as a member of the Black Guerilla Family:

With regards to the revisions that were done to SHU management gang policies, well, that is exactly what has taken place—”revisions” (e.g. “reform”). Hence, more of the same in that, the revisions have only strengthened CDCR officials power and ability to label and validate every prisoner in CDCR as belonging to a Security Threat Group–e.g. “prison gang.”At the crux of the revisions is a lack of a definitive and “behavioral-based” criteria, as to what actually constitute as being gang activity. Meaning, any and everything can and will still be considered as gang activity, in spite of how innocuous the activity may be.

In addition to this, we still have untrained and unqualified CDCR officers/officials determining and assessing what is “gang activity.” And this point is critical for two very important reasons: 1) There are no qualitative oversight mechanisms in place, meaning there is absolutely nothing to prevent CDCR’s prison guards, gang unit, etc., from being vindictive, retaliatory, punitive, etc., via the application of these “revised” gang management policies; and 2) it has been proven that CDCR’s prison guards and their IGI gang unit staff do not properly investigate the evidence used in each prisoners gang validation–see Lira v. Cate.

And the new revisions do not do anything to correct this.

Kijana Tashiri Askari (Marcus Harrison) #H54077, Pelican Bay State Prison  D3 122 SHU, PO Box 7500, Crescent City, CA 95531

From a Pelican Bay SHU inmate who has been in solitary confinement for five years and is currently appealing the gang validation that placed him there:

“We were recently afforded a copy of this proposal. Many of us are getting the chance now to read through and evaluate it. I read through it once and will go through it again. There are many aspects of the step down program that at face value seem to provide far better alternatives to the over 20 year long policy of implementing indeterminate SHU programs. Many of the program objectives and privileges outlined in the proposal at first glance look to be very good and beneficial to a lot of SHU prisoners. However, the gang validation/identification aspect of the proposal continues to present an ongoing issue and problem for many individuals who have been validated and will be validated. Under the criteria that is set forth, it continues to target and identify individuals for long-term SHU placement based on gang affiliation rather than actual gang activity or criminal/illegal conduct.”Which is, has been, and under this proposal will continue to be a significant hardship for many who the CDCR looks to place and keep locked away in the SHU for little to no reason.” [Read more...]

Filed Under: California, due process, politics of punishment, solitary confinement, supermax prisons Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Families of California Prisoners Respond to Controversial Reforms of Solitary Confinement

April 20, 2012 By 1 Comment
The following is a response by  California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement (CFASC), an organization dedicated to raising awareness of the use of solitary confinement in California prisons, to the recent revision of gang validation policies. Gang validation is the primary means by which the over three thousand inmates in Security Housing Units (SHU) are placed in solitary confinement, most for years and many for decades. Pelican Bay SHU inmates responded to the reforms, which include the implementation of a step-down program and a transformation in the security point system, with a counter proposal three weeks ago.

LOS ANGELES (April 16, 2012) — We live in a state whose citizens are more morally outraged about the confinement of chickens and dogs than of human beings. We are the families of thousands of loved ones who have been incarcerated indefinitely—some for decades—in California’s “supermax” segregated and administrative housing units. Solitary confinement, even for short periods, has been known for centuries to cause irreparable physical and psychological damage: torture. Yet California continues to condone this practice in violation of both Constitutional and international law against the use of this and other inhuman and degrading treatment.

In March 2012 the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) came out with its long-awaited proposal to overhaul its use of prolonged solitary confinement to manage gangs and violent prisoners. Families, lawyers, prisoners and activists had hoped that after two peaceful hunger strikes in 2011 engaging 12,000 prisoners protesting CDCR’s illegal practices, the Department would follow several other states that have successfully and significantly reduced their use of solitary confinement and instituted effective rehabilitation and re-entry programs—and at great savings to overstressed state budgets.

By definition “torture” is the intentional infliction of severe mental or physical pain or suffering by or with the consent of state authorities for a specific purpose: With CDCR, this purpose is to extract information about gang activities, real or fabricated. There is nothing in these new proposals that leads any of us to believe that a sincere reform of CDCR’s extremist policies is at hand; in fact, the language is more obscure, the policies more layered, and the prisoners’ demands for decency and rehabilitation virtually ignored. Amnesty International and the National Religious Campaign Against Torture among others issued immediate statements repudiating this document as not going far enough to address the inhumane conditions that have persisted in California prisons for decades. If anything, much of the new document appears even more Draconian. We are very concerned for our loved ones inside this prison within the prison.

Prisons are by nature closed systems, yet they are funded by taxpayers and are public institutions whose function is to oversee the deprivation of liberty, an extreme use of power against an individual. Our loved ones are human beings first and prisoners second. Too many have endured retaliation, arbitrary interpretations of CDCR’s regulations code, poor food, medical negligence, and an inability to program out of solitary unless they self-incriminate, snitch, or die. This is not to ignore crime and punishment, but we believe the public interest in law and order can best be served through standards of morality and human decency.

All California communities are stakeholders in what happens in our prisons because many of these inmates will eventually return to society. Even if our state’s citizens may not generally be sympathetic to prisoners, we must hold our public institutions to high ethical standards, including assuring that both prisons and communities are safe.

Gov. Jerry Brown and Secretary of Operations Matthew Cate recently applauded CDCR for removing the last “bad beds” in prison overcrowding—a move to eliminate degrading and inhuman conditions, creating a more effective penal regime that honors dignity and human rights. This thinking must now be transferred to prisoners in solitary. California’s version of supermax is extreme on every level, involving more prisoners for more of their sentences under worse conditions. Many states are revisiting their use of solitary confinement, but given California’s documented tendency to create torturous conditions under the justification of security, large-scale use of solitary confinement in this state should end.

Substantial, meaningful and ethical revision of the CDCR proposals will be a large step toward restoring basic justice in California, with no less concern for the real issue of public safety. We believe California’s faith communities have a considerable stake in this humanitarian reform and we ask your participation in our efforts to raise awareness and end torture in California prisons.

Contact information: California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement (CFASC), 8018 E. Santa Ana Canyon Rd. Suite 100 #213, Anaheim, CA 92808-1102; 714.290.9077

Filed Under: California, physical effects, psychological effects, retaliation, solitary confinement, supermax prisons, torture Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,

Family of California Prisoner Who Died on Hunger Strike Speaks Out

February 23, 2012 By 18 Comments

The family of Christian Gomez, the 27-year-old prisoner who died while on hunger strike at California’s Corcoran State Prison, is speaking out about the loss of their family member in the hope that similar incidents in the future are avoided.

In a phone call with Solitary Watch, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation spokesperson Terry Thornton confirmed that Gomez had been placed in solitary confinement in the Administrative Segregation Unit (ASU) pending investigation of assault on another inmate with a weapon on January 14, 2012. Thornton would not confirm the status of this investigation. Gomez was serving a life sentence for first degree murder and attempted murder.

Christian Gomez had not told his family members of his intentions to participate in the January 27-February 13 hunger strike held by ASU inmates in protest of their conditions. According to an interview with Gomez’s sister, Y.L., she “found out when the coroner Tom [Edmonds] implied that there was a possibility of a chemical imbalance due to a hunger strike he was participating in. That’s the first I heard of this. Back in [September or October] when he first was transferred there he did tell me that they were having a hunger strike to fight for their rights but he was in general population.”

Contrary to earlier reports that he had only been on a hunger strike for four days when he died, Terry Thornton confirmed to Solitary Watch that Gomez joined the strike on January 27 with 31 other inmates. This means that he had been on hunger strike for a week at the time of his death.

The family says that Gomez had high blood pressure, thyroid and kidney problems.  According to Y.L., before being sent to Corcoran he had been incarcerated at High Desert State Prison for four years. “He told me things were a lot different at this prison and that he didn’t receive the same medical attention he received over at high desert,” said Y.L.

Gomez was found unresponsive in his cell at an unconfirmed time on February 2. Reports from other inmates indicate that they had pounded on their cell doors and screamed to get the attention of the correctional officers. He was declared dead at Corcoran District Hospital at 12:22 PM.

According to Y.L., “My mother received the call of my brother’s death on Thursday February 2, 2012 at approximately  1pm. She then called me hysterically and that’s when I went over to her house. When I got there I asked her who called and she said someone from the prison. [I] asked her if they gave her a number were we could call to obtain more info and she said no. They told her that she would receive a letter in the mail explaining everything and where we could claim the body… I was so upset that things were being handled this way, for God sake we were talking about a human being not an animal.”

Asked how she would like people to remember her brother, Y.L. responded,”he was a genuine person that had not lost hope in the system. He knew that he would eventually get out. Although he had made bad choices in who he hung around with he didn’t murder anyone. The witnesses in his case never identified him on the contrary, but yet he was still convicted. Unfortunately we couldn’t afford a good attorney and he got screwed. He was very caring with his family and friends and therefore he will be greatly missed by those who knew him. He had matured a lot in prison and can be remembered by those who knew him as a prankster. There was never a dull moment with him. He always had a big smile when we visited him and never discussed how bad things were in there to not worry us. He always said he was fine. Even in the last letter he wrote on Jan 30th which my mom received on Feb 3rd he wrote that he was fine.”

Update, February 24: Yajaira Lopez (Y.L.), sister of Christian Gomez, appeared on Democracy Now! this morning to talk about her brother’s life and death. Democracy Now! also interviewed Carol Strickland of the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition and Prisoners With Children, as well as Terry Thornton of the CDCR.

Filed Under: California, physical effects, prison health care, solitary confinement, supermax prisons Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Conflicting Reports on Hunger Strike at California’s Corcoran State Prison

February 17, 2012 By 3 Comments

A week after Solitary Watch first reported the death of 27-year-old hunger striker Christian Gomez, information about the recent strike in the Administrative Segregation Unit (ASU) at Corcoran State Prison remains hard to come by.

Officially, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has given varying accounts about the hunger strike. CDCR Spokesperson Terry Thornton, in an email to Solitary Watch, stated that the hunger strike officially began on January 27 and that on Thursday, February 9, “all inmates in the ASU except one resumed eating state-issued food.” This was followed up by Nancy Kincaid, Director of Communications with California Correctional Health Care Services, who stated to Solitary Watch that “all accepted food trays last Thursday [February 9].”

This information has been contradicted by a relative of one hunger striker, who told Solitary Watch that the strike was still ongoing on February 10th, when at least two inmates fainted and had to receive medical attention. Medical problems seemed to have plagued many strikers, as noted in a letter to activist Kendra Castaneda dated February 5, in which one of the strikers writes that “inmates are passing out and having other medical problems and it seems that this is not being taken seriously.” The relative reported that the striker appeared to have lost a significant amount of weight during a recent visit, and that he had been very dizzy during the visit.

The striker, who had only recently been placed in the ASU for an indeterminate amount of time, reportedly knew Christian Gomez and described the day of his death. He told his relative that several inmates were screaming and pounding their fists on their cell doors trying to get the attention of the correctional officers. His knuckles were noticeably battered during the visit. CDCR officials continue to assert that autopsy results show Gomez did not die of starvation, although the cause of death has not been made public.

Affirming the statements of one of the December ASU strike petitioners, who asserted that the strike “has no ending date unless some or all demands are met,” the striker hinted that there will be future strikes if the CDCR doesn’t reform conditions in the ASU at Corcoran. It is currently unclear why the hunger strike ended when it did. A January 31st letter from one of the petitioners indicated that prison officials may have entered into talks with the strikers, but this remains unconfirmed.

Currently, there are over 350 inmates in the ASU at Corcoran. According to a 2009 Office of the Inspector General report, there are over 8,000 administrative segregation beds in CA. The report examined a number of ASUs, not including Corcoran, but indicated that several ASUs involved unjustifiably delayed classification hearings, holding inmates with expired SHU terms, and transfer delays. Such issues were noted by the Corcoran petition in December. The prisoners third demand is “That inmates not be further punished upon completion of their SHU terms,” and reads in part:

Inmates are being placed in the ASU after the completion of their SHU terms supposedly “pending transfer.” These inmates are then stuck here for four, five months, in many instances even longer, before finally being transferred to general population. This practice of illegally placing inmates in ASU upon the completion of their SHU terms for long periods of time without proper procedure and with excessive delays on their transfers is resulting in unjustified punishment for these inmates.

Furthermore, inmates undergoing the DRB (Departmental Review Board) process after the completion of their SHU terms are being held in ASU for months and even years while the counselors and committee ignore their repeated requests for a timely hearing on their case. This is in blatant violation of their procedural due process rights.

Time will tell whether or not reform of such practices comes at Corcoran any time soon. However, KALW News reported on February 15 that “Thornton said revisions to its policies regarding security threat group management and changes to the gang validation process is nearly complete. [She] anticipates the revision will go out for legislators and inmate advocacy groups to review near the end of this month.”

For more on the potential reforms, read this January Solitary Watch post on the matter. Solitary Watch will continue to publish updates on the Corcoran hunger strike as information becomes available.

Filed Under: California, physical effects, solitary confinement, supermax prisons Tagged With: , , , , ,

Update: Inmate Dies During Hunger Strike at California’s Corcoran State Prison

February 10, 2012 By 6 Comments

Update (February 13): Theresa Cisneros, Public Information Officer at Corcoran, confirmed to Solitary Watch that Christian Gomez, 27, was hunger striking at the time of his death in the Administrative Segregation Unit. Official autopsy results still pending. Nancy Kincaid of California Correctional Health Care Services told Solitary Watch that Gomez had been “medically monitored for hunger strike activity and had been on strike for four days” at the time of his death on February 2nd. She further said that “the preliminary autopsy report does not indicate hunger strike activity contributed to his death.”

News of a death in Corcoran State Prison’s Administrative Segregation Unit is emerging as an underreported hunger strike in the prison’s ASU comes to a close. Inmates in the ASU are held in 23-hour-a-day solitary confinement. Many have been in isolation for years and even decades.

California State Prison, Corcoran, which houses over 1400 in Security Housing Units and an additional 350 in ASUs, has been the site of two waves of hunger strikes since late December 2011. Unlike the highly publicized hunger strikes last year that originated in Pelican Bay State Prison’s SHU, the Corcoran strikes have remained relatively small and have received little press attention.

On December 19, 2011, three inmates at Corcoran announced a hunger strike protesting the conditions of the ASU. They listed eleven demands  ranging from educational and rehabilitative programming to timely medical care. According to California Department of Corrections spokesperson Terry Thornton:

On Dec. 28, 59 inmates housed in the Administrative Segregation Unit at Corcoran State Prison refused their state-issued meals. On Dec. 29, that number dropped to 54. On Dec. 30, 49 inmates refused state-issued meals. By Dec. 31, all inmates resumed eating state-issued food.

According to Pyung Hwa Ryoo, one of the main petitioners of the December 2011 hunger strike:

Three days after the strike began, prison officials came to the ASU and let the strikers know that the petition, and demands of the strike, would be granted. They requested three weeks to make the changes happen; and to give them the benefit of the doubt, the request was granted and the strike was put on hold.

It has been a little more than 2 weeks since the strike stopped. So far, there has been some improvements in this ASU, but the majority of the promised changes have not yet occurred.

According to a letter from strike petitioner Juan Jaimes dated January 31st:

…this hunger strike commenced on December 28, 2011 and it has no ending date unless some or all demands are met…

He also indicated (as confirmed by CDCR’s inmate locator) that he was transferred from Corcoran to Kern Valley State Prison. Though unconfirmed, he has also indicated that the two other strike petitioners were also transferred away from each other.

There is conflicting information suggesting that some inmates continued to strike during the period between the “official” strikes. The following, however, has been confirmed by Thornton:

 On Jan. 27, 32 inmates in Corcoran State Prison’s Administrative Segregation Unit (ASU) refused to eat breakfast and started a hunger strike. As of Feb. 9, all inmates in the ASU except one resumed eating state-issued food.

In an email to Solitary Watch from Nancy Kincaid, Director of Communications for California Correctional Health Care Services, stated that all strikers resumed eating February 9th.

A letter to California activist Kendra Castaneda from a Corcoran ASU striker, however, indicated that “on or about Feb 2nd or 3rd 2012 an inmate has passed away due to not eating.”

While the cause of death and its possible relationship to the hunger strike remains unconfirmed, Thornton responded to questions from Solitary Watch with an apparent affirmation that an inmate death had taken place, and the statement: ”I do not know the results of the autopsy.”

In response to a phone call, Tom Edmonds, Chief Deputy Coroner in Kings County confirmed that inmate Christian Gomez died on February 2nd at Corcoran, but also did not share the cause of death.

Solitary Watch will provide updates as information becomes available.

Filed Under: California, solitary confinement, supermax prisons Tagged With: , , ,
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