by Emily Harris, Californians United for a Responsible Budget

Sacramento – Tomorrow the Senate Rules Committee will hold a confirmation hearing for acting California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation Secretary Jeffery Beard. Advocates, experts and family members of prisoners plan to attend the hearing and raise their concerns about Beard’s track record.

The Chowchilla Freedom Rally on Jan. 26 drew people from all over California to demand, “Bring our loved ones home,” but Secretary Beard has apparently done nothing to resolve the overcrowding crisis that is costing women’s lives. – Photo: Bill Hackwell

Vanessa Nelson-Sloane, director of Life Support Alliance, noted that since his appointment in December, Beard has met with few, if any, community stakeholder groups. “What little governmental transparency and communication was in place at CDCR prior to Dr. Beard’s tenure seems to have largely disappeared since his appointment. His office is difficult to contact, slow to respond to queries and requests, and Dr. Beard himself is seldom seen or heard from, aside from a handful of press conferences to buttress Gov. Brown’s public claims that all is well within California prisons.”

Gov. Brown has argued that Beard is uniquely suited for the job and was selected as the new chief for California’s crisis-prone prison system because in 2008 he provided expert testimony in support of California prisoners who had challenged the substandard health care in the prisons due to overcrowding. “The very critic, namely the plaintiffs’ expert witness, is now running the system, so he’s very well aware of the issues that are at hand here,” Brown said of Beard.

“Mr. Beard’s sudden U-turn on questions of what needs to be done about ongoing inhumane conditions in California prisons does not speak well to either his authority or his intentions to clean up the mess in Corrections,” said Diana Zuñiga of Californians United for a Responsible Budget. “The Legislature should think twice before deciding to put CDCR under another secretary dedicated to expanding the system and covering up abuses.”

“I have never experienced the amount of violence as I have since being transferred to Central California Women’s Facility. There have been more attempted suicides here in the past six months than I’ve seen in my entire incarceration,” noted a board member of Justice Now who is currently imprisoned at CCWF. CCWF is currently housing people at 175 percent of design capacity. “This environment is inhumane. I’m shocked that Beard could support removing the court ordered population reduction cap. Something needs to be done about these deadly conditions.”

In the past few months two prisoners have died due to lack of access to medical care in the Central California Women’s Prison (CCWF) and hundreds of prisoners have been hospitalized due to an outbreak of the Valley Fever virus at Avernal and Pleasant Valley State Prisons. To date, 18 prisoners have died due to Valley Fever.

Emily Harris, statewide coordinator of Californians United for a Responsible Budget, can be reached at emily@curbprisonspending.org.

Seven years ago, late in the evening on June 9, 2006, three prisoners – Ali al-Salami, a Yemeni, and Mani al-Utaybi and Yasser al-Zahrani, both Saudis – died at Guantánamo, in what was described by the authorities as a triple suicide, although that explanation seemed to be extremely dubious at the time and has not become more convincing with the passage of time.

A former guard at Guantánamo told RT that “the instructions I was given were simple – don’t interact, don’t talk; they are not humans.” – Photo: Lincoln Else, NGT

I described the deaths in my book “The Guantánamo Files,” published in 2007, after a fourth death at the prison, of Abdul Rahman al-Amri, a Saudi, on May 30, 2007 (see here and here), and I wrote my first commemoration of the men’s deaths on the second anniversary of their supposed suicide, followed, in August 2008, with a skeptical analysis of the report of the deaths by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS), which took over two years to be made available.

The next year, 2009, the anniversary was overshadowed by the death of a fifth prisoner, Muhammad Salih, another Yemeni.

I call this the season of death because all five men died in a two-week period at the end of May and the start of June, and to this day none of the deaths have been adequately explained. It is also, I believe, significant that all five men had been long-term hunger strikers.

Although doubts had been expressed at the time about the deaths of the three men who died in June 2006, and doubts were also expressed about Muhammed Salih’s death, by his friend, the British resident Binyam Mohamed, who was released just four months before Salih died, it was not until January 2010 that the alleged suicide story was blown wide open when, in Harper’s Magazine, Scott Horton wrote a major feature, based on statements made by soldiers who had been at Guantánamo on the night that Ali al-Salami, Mani al-Utaybi and Yasser al-Zahrani died, who insisted that the triple suicide story had to be false.

The main witness was Army Staff Sgt. Joe Hickman, who had been stationed in one of the watchtowers close to the block where the men allegedly committed suicide. Hickman, a former Marine who had reenlisted in the Army National Guard after the 9/11 attacks, was deployed to Guantánamo in March 2006, with his friend, Specialist Tony Davila.

On arrival, Davila was briefed about the existence of what Horton described as “an unnamed and officially unacknowledged compound” outside the perimeter fence of the main prison, and he explained that one theory about it was that “it was being used by some of the non-uniformed government personnel who frequently showed up in the camps and were widely thought to be CIA agents.”

As I explained in my analysis of Horton’s article at the time:

“Hickman and Davila became fascinated by the compound – known to the soldiers as ‘Camp No’ (as in, ‘No, it doesn’t exist’) – and Hickman was on duty in a tower on the prison’s perimeter on the night the three men died, when he noticed that ‘a white van, dubbed the “paddy wagon,” that Navy guards used to transport heavily manacled prisoners, one at a time, into and out of Camp Delta, [which] had no rear windows and contained a dog cage large enough to hold a single prisoner,’ had called three times at Camp 1, where the men were held, and had then taken them out to ‘Camp No.’ All three were in ‘Camp No’ by 8 p.m.”

At 11:30, the van returned, apparently dropping something off at the clinic, and within half an hour the whole prison “lit up.” As Horton explained:

“Hickman headed to the clinic, which appeared to be the center of activity, to learn the reason for the commotion. He asked a distraught medical corpsman what had happened. She said three dead prisoners had been delivered to the clinic. Hickman recalled her saying that they had died because they had rags stuffed down their throats and that one of them was severely bruised. Davila told me he spoke to Navy guards who said the men had died as the result of having rags stuffed down their throats.”

I call this the season of death because all five men died in a two-week period at the end of May and the start of June, and to this day none of the deaths have been adequately explained.

Despite the compelling narrative of a cover-up – which was also backed up by “Death in Camp Delta,” a detailed report produced by researchers at the Seton Hall Law School in New Jersey – the U.S. government shut the door on an investigation.

On the fourth anniversary of the deaths, I wrote a follow-up article, “Murders at Guantánamo: The Cover-Up Continues,” and I have tried to publicize it ever since, as the families tried and failed to secure justice in the U.S. courts (see here and here) and when my friend, the Norwegian film director Erling Borgen, made a documentary about the deaths, also called “Death in Camp Delta,” which I reviewed here.

Since then, another friend, the psychologist Jeff Kaye, discovered the autopsy reports for Abdul Rahman al-Amri and Muhammad Salih, the prisoners who died in 2007 and 2009, and wrote a skeptical article about their alleged suicides for Truthout, and, last September, there was another disputed suicide – of Adnan Farhan Abdul Latif, a mentally troubled Yemeni who had reportedly hoarded medication, in order to kill himself by taking an overdose, even though this appears to have been impossible given the obsessive scrutiny to which the prisoners are subjected.

As a prison-wide hunger strike rages at Guantánamo, which is now in its fifth month, the anniversaries of the deaths of the long-term hunger strikers in 2006, 2007 and 2009 continue to provide a disturbing reminder of how troubling the U.S. authorities’ response to long-term hunger strikers has been in the past, and how the remaining prisoners at Guantánamo – 41 of whom are now being force-fed – must not be forgotten.

On May 23, President Obama promised to resume releasing prisoners from Guantánamo – a process that has largely been blocked by Congressional obstructions for the last two years. He needs to do so, and he needs to begin immediately, to address the despair felt by the hunger strikers (103 of the remaining 166 men, according to the U.S. authorities, and 130, according to the prisoners themselves), and to make sure that no more men die while deprived of justice in a prison that he described, in his May 23 speech, as “a facility that should never have been opened.”

Andy Worthington, investigative journalist, filmmaker, photographer and Guantanamo expert, is the author of “The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison.” This story first appeared in Eurasia Review, where he is a contributing correspondent. He blogs at http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/ and can be reached at andy@andyworthington.co.uk.

June 29 is one of the most exciting days for Black bookworms across the state of California. That is the date for the Leimert Park Book Fair, the only annual Black book fair in Cali. I attended this beautiful event two years ago and met boxing legend Sugar Ray Leonard, who was promoting his book at an event at Eso Won Black bookstore, one of the founding sponsors of the Leimert Park Book Fair.

The Leimert Park Book Fair returns June 29 to Los Angeles’ historic Black cultural mecca.

M.O.I. JR: Can you tell us how the Leimert Park Book Fair started? When?

Cynthia Exum: I founded the Leimert Park Village Book Fair in 2006 in partnership with the City of Los Angeles, County of Los Angeles, L.A. Department of Cultural Affairs and Eso Won Books, one of Los Angeles’ premier African American owned bookstores.

The book fair started from my desire to promote and encourage literacy, education and the love of reading in our community.

And I am proud that after six years the event gets bigger and better every year with the support we get from our sponsors, our community partners, our participants, our special invited celebrities and special guests and most importantly our community.

M.O.I. JR: What have some of the highlights been over the years?

Cynthia Exum: Our annual Leimert Park Village Book Fair has featured a stellar line up of past authors, celebrities and vendors – all encouraging reading, writing and literacy in the African American community. Past participants have included Oscar winner Louis Gossett Jr., Emmy-nominated music director Rickey Minor of “American Idol” and band leader of the Tonight Show, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Douglas Blackmon, prominent literary figure Ishmael Reed, New York Times best-selling author Eric Dickey Jerome, Advertising Hall of Famer Tom Burrell, reality star NeNe Leakes of the Real Housewives of ATL, playwright and author Donald Welch, screenwriter Rob Edwards (“Princess and the Frog”), art enthusiasts and philanthropists Shirley and Bernard Kinsey, award-winning poet Ruth Forman, spoken word tour-de-force-Talaam Acey and actress and children’s author Kim Wayans – just to name a few.

M.O.I. JR: Why are book fairs important?

Young people are authors too.

Illiteracy is almost a direct pathway to prison, criminal activity and/or unemployment. And the prison industrial complex houses a disproportionate number of African Americans, many of whom were left behind at the third grade and never caught up. This is a very unfortunate problem, but I think our event strives to be a part of the solution by promoting education, literacy and the love of reading in our community. We strive to educate, entertain and inspire!

M.O.I. JR: Who are some of the headliners who will be in attendance this year?

Cynthia Exum: Our growing 2013 lineup includes award-winning actress and author Victoria Rowell, television actor and author Eric LaSalle, mystery writer Gary Phillips, television personality and author Judge Mablean Ephraim, Freedom Riders and civil rights activists, Rev. James Lawson, former Councilmember Robert C. Farrell, and Dr. Robert and Helen Singleton.

M.O.I. JR: For those that don’t know, what kind of events does the Leimert Park Book Fair consist of?

Cynthia Exum: Festival components are

• five Literary Pavilions: Authors’ Tent, Publishers’ Row, Museum Row and Poets’ Salon
• Children’s Storytelling Stage featuring celebrity read alouds along with theatrical performances, educational exhibitors, and arts and crafts activities
• special tribute to the 1960s and America’s era of social change
• panel discussions, writing workshops, author signings, poetry recitals, film screenings – with special exhibits from the Stax Museum of American Soul Music, National Civil Rights Museum and Peterson Automobile Museum
• gourmet food trucks, entertainment and fun for the entire family!

M.O.I. JR: Can you tell people a little bit of the Black history of Leimert Park?

Kids have fun at the Leimert Park Book Fair.

In 1967, artists Alonzo and Dale Davis founded Brockman Gallery, and with this beginning, a new era of Leimert Park as an arts and cultural mecca for African Americans in Los Angeles dawned.

M.O.I. JR: How do people keep up with you?

Cynthia Exum: http://www.leimertparkbookfair.com/

The People’s Minister of Information JR is associate editor of the Bay View, author of “Block Reportin’” and filmmaker of “Operation Small Axe” and “Block Reportin’ 101,” available, along with many more interviews, at www.blockreportradio.com. He also hosts two weekly shows on KPFA 94.1 FM and kpfa.org: The Morning Mix every Wednesday, 8-9 a.m., and The Block Report every other Friday night-Saturday morning, midnight-2 a.m. He can be reached at blockreportradio@gmail.com.

Black people have largely been locked out of construction work in San Francisco since 1998. That’s a shame, because construction work is a solution to many of the ills in the Black community. Construction wages are high, and when Black contractors have work, they are generally eager to train Black workers regardless of their school, police or prison records.

And there’s plenty of construction work going on in San Francisco – $5 billion worth, with 38 cranes raised across the City’s skyline. The San Francisco African American Chamber of Commerce is holding a symposium on the state of Black construction-related business opportunities in San Francisco on Thursday, June 20, 6-8 p.m., at the Southeast Campus of City College, 1800 Oakdale Ave., in Bayview Hunters Point.

One of the largest construction projects currently underway in Bayview Hunters Point, San Francisco’s Black heartland, is the rehabilitation of Ridgeview Terrace, a large apartment complex headquartered at 140 Cashmere at the top of Hunters Point Hill. Few local Black residents can be seen at work there.

Claude Carpenter, retired contractor, journeyman painter and community leader, and his son DeBray Carpenter, better known as Fly Benzo, also a journeyman painter and a student at City College, accompanied by comrades with the Black Riders Liberation Party, paid a visit recently to the Ridgeview construction site demanding jobs for Hunters Point residents.

The contractor for the Ridgeview makeover is KCK Builders, a white-owned company based in San Rafael that completed construction on the new Bayview Library earlier this year. KCK Builders had been the second low bidder on the library and was awarded the contract after it was taken from Hunters Point-based Liberty Builders, owned by Willie Ratcliff, who is also the publisher of the San Francisco Bay View newspaper and had planned to build the library with local Black subcontractors and workers.

Records show that Black contractors and workers are master builders who consistently bring their work in on time and under budget.

KCK Builders ran up the cost of the library by $2 million over the price bid by Liberty Builders when KCK owner Mike Hannegan was pressed to use Black subcontractors, who didn’t trust him to treat them or pay them properly and, to compensate, raised their prices. Their suspicions were later confirmed when at least some of those subcontractors were not fully paid for their work.

Ironically, the increased cost of the library construction, caused by legitimate distrust of the white contractor who had in effect taken the project away from a Black contractor, was used in a June 13 article in the San Francisco Chronicle to argue that local hire policies like the one passed unanimously by the San Francisco School Board on Tuesday, June 11, “push up construction costs.”

Records show, however, that Black contractors and workers are master builders who consistently bring their work in on time and under budget. Prior to the 1998 lockout, Blacks successfully completed millions of dollars in construction work in San Francisco, and construction wages supported hundreds of Black families. The purpose of the lockout was to eliminate Black competition.

Many of these issues are addressed in the following video, taken by Earl Black as part of an upcoming documentary, showing the Carpenters and the Black Riders leading a protest and temporary shutdown of the Ridgeview Terrace construction project to hold KCK Builders accountable.

Partial transcript

Fly Benzo (in the KCK Builders jobsite office): You guys are running construction in our community and discriminating on the hires. And they say if we want 50 percent of the jobs, there’s going to be problems.

Why aren’t our people in the bungalow? You come to a worksite in the Black community, you expect to see some Black people in the bungalow controlling the construction.

Fly Benzo (speaking to a Black assistant manager in the management office): We want to work with you, not against you. I’m one of the only people taking a stand for our youth, making sure we get a chance and an opportunity to make a living in this community, ‘cause that’s the only thing that’s going to change our circumstances and what we’re going through, like the violence.

We wouldn’t have the violence if everybody had a job paying $30 an hour. So I just want you to work with us and not against us and we also want to set up a meeting with Mr. Hollingsworth …

Claude Carpenter (talking to workers): It ain’t over yet, if we can organize our people, if we can begin to circulate dollars to our people’s pockets and recirculate them back to our Black businesses on Third Street and then open up some more Black businesses on Third Street.

In order for us to make it work, our people have to have jobs. My attitude about it is that fair exchange is no robbery. If we’re going to develop this community, we need an opportunity to upgrade the economic standards while we’re circulating the dollars – to do the building, to do the streets, to take the wires underground so it’s a nice neighborhood where you don’t see wires everywhere.

‘Cause everything they’re doing, they’re not doing for us. We don’t stand up for ourselves. If we don’t stand up for our rights, then it’s nobody’s fault but ours. We have to assume responsibility for our own selves, our own women, our own children and don’t wait on somebody else with their false promises.

Black Riders: What do we want? Jobs! When do we want ‘em? Now. How many do we want? Fifty percent!

In this video, DeBray (Fly Benzo) and Claude Carpenter continue the discussion of critical issues for the Black community in San Francisco – leadership, false leadership, unemployment and mass incarceration – on the public access TV show San Francisco Weekly News for June 13, 2013.

Contact Bay Area Black Builders via Willie Ratcliff, its vice president, at publisher@sfbayview.com or (415) 571-1722.

The continuing campaign to gain compassionate release for Lynne Stewart – the grievously ill, imprisoned human rights attorney – is headed to Washington, D.C.

Despite being approved for compassionate release, Stewart continues to be held in Carswell Federal Prison in seriously deteriorating health.

Lynne Stewart’s spouse, the 79-year-old social justice activist Ralph Poynter, will lead a continuing vigil in front of the White House starting on Monday, June 17.

One of countless rallies to release Lynne Stewart led by her husband, Ralph Poynter, was this one at Foley Square in New York City on May 15. – Photo: © Julia C. Reinhart

Lynne Stewart, age 73, is suffering from stage 4 cancer in her lungs. The cancer has metastasized rapidly to her lymph nodes and shoulder. She has lost 60 pounds and her condition is deteriorating rapidly. Stewart’s condition is well known and medically documented.

As Poynter explains: “Lynne has passed all of the legalities of compassionate release and qualifies for release as the bill was written. The prison warden at Carswell in Fort Worth, Texas, has signed for her release, and so has the director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, Charles R. Samuels. Probation officers charged with inspecting Lynne’s future residence approved her housing.

“All that is required by the statute of compassionate release has been done. Yet Lynne is still in jail! Every day that her release is postponed makes treatment of her cancer more difficult.”

The national campaign for Stewart’s compassionate release started more than three months ago, in early March. Thousands of petitions were sent and thousands of phone calls made urging her release. The warden at Carswell Federal Prison recommended her immediate compassionate release six weeks ago.

As the Lynne Stewart Defense Committee has explained, Stewart is not guilty of any crimes. In representing a prisoner charged with terrorism, Sheik Omar Abdel Rahman, Stewart was unjustly convicted of delivering a simple press release for her client.

“All that is required by the statute of compassionate release has been done. Yet Lynne is still in jail! Every day that her release is postponed makes treatment of her cancer more difficult.”

All those who are concerned with Lynne’s health and unable to get to Washington, D.C., are urged to continue calling the White House, Attorney General Eric Holder and the Federal Bureau of Prisons and sending petitions.

Make these phone calls:

• White House, President Barack Obama: (202) 456-1414
• Attorney General Eric Holder: (202) 514-2001
• Federal Bureau of Prisons Director Charles Samuels: (202) 307-3250

Sign the petition at IACenter.org/LynneStewartPetition or at LynneStewart.org.

by Malaika H Kambon

Welcome to Marcus Book Store. Long may it live, at 1712 Fillmore St., San Francisco. – Photo: Malaika Kambon

Marcus Book Store, Garvey’s namesake, at 1712 Fillmore St., San Francisco, in the Fillmore District once known as Harlem of the West, is packed with that knowledge and has purveyed it since 1960, for 53 years. Housed in the landmark Bop City building that once hosted all the jazz greats, the oldest Black book store in the country has been ordered out – evicted – this coming Tuesday, June 18.

After a standing-room-only press conference at the store on June 10, a plan of action to save Marcus Books, conceived by Archbishop Franzo King, is set for tomorrow, Sunday, June 16. Supporters will attend a church service to pray that speculators who purchased the building will sell it to a non-profit investment group at a small profit so that the bookstore can remain open.

At 10:30 a.m., Marcus Books supporters will hold a press conference at the entrance to Christopher Playground at Diamond Heights Boulevard and Duncan Street in San Francisco and then proceed to St. Nicholas Church, 5200 Diamond Heights Blvd, where the recent buyer at a bankruptcy sale, Nishan Sweis, is a subdeacon. Nishan and his wife Suhaila are also real estate investors specializing in buying distressed properties and the owners of a taxicab company, according to the Examiner.

Archbishop King, who works with the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE) to stop foreclosures and evictions and who pastors the internationally acclaimed St. John Coltrane Church, declared: “This Afrikan-American community has been preyed upon by what we call ‘banksters.’ … If we do nothing, we will be nothing.

Archbishop Franzo King and other supporters of Marcus Books will hold a press conference Sunday morning, June 16, at 10:30, followed by attendance at the St. Nicholas church service to pray and inspire the buyer of the Marcus Books building, a subdeacon at the church, to allow the book store and its proprietors to stay in its home of 53 years. – Photo: Malaika Kambon

“There is an assault on this community,” Rev. Arnold Townsend of the Equal Opportunity Council of San Francisco told the press June 10. “All of everything that we’ve talked about today as it relates to the Afrikan American community – urban renewal, the foreclosure crisis – it’s just a question of the transfer of wealth. When you see this building taken out of the hands of Afrikan Americans and put in the hands of some others, once again, it’s a transfer of wealth.

“And the wealth that has been taken out of Afrikan Americans’ hands, no one is speaking out against it, outside of the Afrikan American community – and that means that you’re complicit!” he said to the general public, as news cameras rolled and reporters noted his words.

Backing up his charge of complicity, he quoted Albert Einstein, who served as president of the Anti-Lynching Society, decrying the “attitude of Whites toward their fellow citizens of darker complexion. … I can avoid the feeling of complicity in it only by speaking out.” “And so,” Rev. Townsend concluded, “it is time for the city to speak out against racism as it pertains to African Americans.”

Rev. Townsend concluded, “It is time for the city to speak out against racism as it pertains to African Americans.”

Julian Davis, attorney for the Johnson family, summed up the situation at the end of the press conference: “Where we stand right now is that Westside Community Services has made an offer to repurchase the property from the Sweis family that purchased it less than two months ago after a bankruptcy court proceeding (after Marcus Books missed) a court imposed deadline. Now they have the resources available, through Westside Community Services, to be able to purchase the property and remain here and continue to operate this fantastic institution that means so much to so many people in this community.

Rev. Arnold Townsend called the forced sale of Marcus Books “an assault on this community” and “a transfer of wealth” to “see this building taken out of the hands of Afrikan Americans and put in the hands of some others.” Those “outside of the Afrikan American community” who are not “speaking out against it,” “that means that you’re complicit,” he said. – Photo: Malaika Kambon

“So we’re appealing not only to the compassion of the Sweis family but to their business sense as well. This is a solution that makes them whole and then some, and keeps Marcus Books here at its historic site.

“The Sweis family has not responded to the offer of $1.64 million. As Dr. Mary Ann Jones, the chief executive officer of Westside said, they put out a number of $3.2 million, which she found to be unconscionable and which might not be in the best faith in terms of real negotiations. They’d asked us for a number and we’ve given them a very good number that we’re hoping that they will consider more seriously.

“June 18 is a deadline for the Johnson family to vacate the property. I know that the Johnsons are working with a number of people including the mayor’s office of redevelopment to find an alternate location for the book store in the neighborhood. There are some tenants upstairs who aren’t under the stipulation to vacate – for instance, some of the Johnson family members, such as their daughter who has a lease here.

“So I think you have a situation pending on the 18th that I think the Johnsons want to make clear does not spell the end of Marcus Book Stores. It may eventually mean that Marcus Book Store is no longer here at this great location at 1712 Fillmore St., but they will always be a part of the neighborhood, and they will be in the neighborhood at another location if that’s what it comes to. We’re all hoping it doesn’t.”

“There are a number of folks who plan to reach out to the Sweis family to request their cooperation,” attorney Davis concluded.

“We’re appealing not only to the compassion of the Sweis family but to their business sense as well. This is a solution that makes them whole and then some, and keeps Marcus Books here at its historic site,” said attorney Julian Davis.

“The Sweises might end up the heroes of the story,” the Examiner quoted Marcus Books proprietor Gregory Johnson saying at the press conference. Then “everyone wins,” said his wife Karen Johnson, daughter of Marcus Books founders Drs. Raye and Julian Richardson. “It sounds good to me.”

Dr. Mary Ann Jones, CEO of Westside Community Services, is offering $1.64 million for the building, giving the Sweises, who bought it in a bankruptcy sale, a modest profit. She “came from a family of activists,” she said. “My mother lay down in front of this building the first time they tried to bulldoze it. Our ancestors are looking down upon us and asking us to do something.” – Photo: Malaika Kambon

Freedom needs knowledge

In his book, “Christopher Columbus and the Afrikan Holocaust: Slavery and the Rise of European Capitalism,” Ancestor Dr. John Henrik Clarke states: “Before the breaking up of the social structure of the Afrikan states such as Ghana and Songhai, and the internal strife that made the slave trade possible, many Africans, especially West Africans, lived in a society in which university life was fairly common and scholars were held in reverence.

“In that period in African history, the University of Sankore at Timbuktu was flourishing and its great chancellor, the last of the monumental scholars of West Africa, Ahmed Baba, reigned over that university. A great African scholar, he wrote 47 books, each on a separate subject. He received all of his education within Africa; in fact he did not leave the Western Sudan until he was exiled to Morocco during the invasion in 1594.

“My point is this: There existed in Africa prior to the beginning of the slave trade a cultural way of life that in many ways was equal, if not superior, to many of the cultures then existing in Europe. And the slave trade destroyed these cultures and created a dilemma that the African has not been able to extract himself from to this day” (Page 82 in print, 42 online).

“We did not consider the fact that for most of the time Afrikan people have been on the Earth, they have been free people, determining their own destiny, and they have not been slaves,” said the late Dr. Clarke.

“(F)or most of the time Afrikan people have been on the Earth, they have been free people, determining their own destiny, and they have not been slaves,” said Dr. John Henrik Clarke.

During the enslavement of Afrikan people, every attempt was made to destroy the Afrikan memory of ever having been a part of a free and intelligent people.

Marcus Books, purveyor of knowledge and freedom

But Drs. Raye and the late Julian Richardson established a dynasty that in over half a century has gone a long way toward counteracting this dangerous misconception.

At age 15, Dr. Raye Gilbert Richardson graduated from high school. Forty-five years later, in 1960, four years prior to the year known as the Year of the Ballot or the Bullet, Drs. Raye and Julian Richardson co-founded in San Francisco the first of the internationally renowned Marcus Book Stores, named for Marcus Garvey. In 1976 a second store was founded in Oakland.

“I wish I could come up with the money to buy it myself,” said Supervisor London Breed, according to the Examiner. She’s a Fillmore native who grew up in public housing and spent “countless” afternoons in the book store as a child. “But unfortunately, it’s a capitalist society, and it doesn’t work like that.” – Photo: Malaika Kambon

Archbishop King captured the classlessness of Marcus Books when he said at the June 10 press conference: “We don’t want to lose this building and we don’t want to lose this fight. And we’re not just speaking for intellectuals; we’re speaking to the thugs too. Thugs need this place. Or else they will be thugs for the rest of their lives.”

Both stores have hosted televised interviews with jazz greats, outstanding entrepreneurs, scholars, political activists and former political prisoners. Black Panther Party meetings were held at Marcus Books as were the meetings when the Black students at San Francisco State University went on strike in 1968. The San Francisco 8 were interviewed there by Lance Burton in the midst of their fight for freedom.

And on June 17, 2013, Dr. Raye Richardson will celebrate her 93rd birthday.

Drs. Raye and Julian Richardson’s daughter Blanche Richardson said, when asked about the Marcus Book Stores’ intersection with the Civil Rights Movement: “Marcus Books was a part of the Civil Rights Movement. Marcus Books provided a forum for many Civil Rights and Black Power organizations. We also hosted many authors who were writing about the political scene at the time. When the Black students at San Francisco State University went on strike, our home was put up as collateral to get them out of jail. My parents were frequent speakers at various political events. Marcus Books initiated dozens of forums and seminars on race relationships and the politics of Blackness. Our family – sometimes just our family – picketed every place there was to picket: hotels, car dealerships, retail businesses, housing developments.”

And when asked about her favorite events that have taken place, she replied: “All events are great that happen at Marcus Books because they are instructive, informative, exciting and positive. (Nutritious too, if we serve food!)”

“Marcus Books was a part of the Civil Rights Movement. … When the Black students at San Francisco State University went on strike, our home was put up as collateral to get them out of jail. My parents were frequent speakers at various political events. Marcus Books initiated dozens of forums and seminars on race relationships and the politics of Blackness. Our family – sometimes just our family – picketed every place there was to picket: hotels, car dealerships, retail businesses, housing developments,” Blanche Richardson said.

When asked how Marcus Books survives among chain bookstores and online bookstores like Amazon, her response was, “Marginally! That we survived is a testament to some very dedicated customers who appreciate the value, the warmth, the camaraderie established by Marcus Book Stores. It has to be very rewarding for a Black person to walk into a business establishment and not be subjected to preconceived notions that he or she is a thief.”

The Marcus Book Store dynasty started as Success Printing in the Fillmore District when the Richardsons, avid readers, discovered that books by, for and about Black people everywhere were difficult to purchase and harder to find. They began to publish popular works by Black authors and poets, as well as out of print literature they deemed to be essential reading. When racism and redevelopment began pushing Afrikan people out of San Francisco and gutting the once vibrant Fillmore District, they opened their second book store in Oakland in 1976.

Through redevelopment, bulldozers, racism and a retail giant, Amazon, that undercut prices for small book stores by offering the same books for cheaper prices online, Marcus Book Stores have kept their doors open by providing what their Afrikan community needed most: a progressive avenue of information about ourselves, our own bookstore, a way of being FUBU – for us, by us.

Black businesses under attack, yesterday and today

And now, in 2013, the ugly monster of racism in San Francisco is coming again to try and steal what is ours – our land and our Marcus Books, in an effort to derail our historic place and pretend that we as Afrikan people do not exist in any way but that which is warped and underdeveloped in their colonized mentalities.

But why does this keep happening to us? The insights of El Hajj Malik El Shabazz, Malcolm X, provide some of the answers.

El Hajj Malik El Shabazz, Malcolm X

On April 12, 1964, Malcolm X delivered his famous “The Ballot or the Bullet” speech in Detroit, Michigan. He addressed brothers and sisters, moderators, religious and spiritual leaders – and friends and enemies. He stated, in fact, “We would be fooling ourselves if we had an audience this large and didn’t realize that there would be some enemies present.”

He pointed out several Christian ministers who came to be known more so for their political struggles on behalf of the Afrikan community: Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Rev. Adam Clayton Powell of Harlem’s Abyssinian Baptist Church and a longtime member of Congress, Rev. Milton Galamison, who fought against Brooklyn’s segregated school system, and Rev. Henry Cleage, from Detroit, Michigan, who headed the Freedom Now Party.

Malcolm was a Muslim minister who stressed that unity between different religions could be achieved when we “keep our religion between ourselves and our God. When we come out here, we have a fight that’s common to all of us against an enemy who is common to all of us.”

And he didn’t believe in fighting in any one front, but on all fronts. In fact, he described himself as a “Black Nationalist Freedom Fighter,” whose political, social and economic philosophy was Black Nationalism.

He stated: “The political philosophy of Black Nationalism means that Black people must control the politics and the politicians of their communities. We must know what politics are supposed to produce in our communities. We must know what part politics play in our lives. And until we become politically mature, we will always be misled, led astray or deceived or maneuvered into supporting someone politically who doesn’t have the good of our community at heart.”

A child rescuer in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on June 1, 1921 – with Whites out to kill them, Blacks could rely on no one but each other.

Echoing Malcolm’s words, from a deep well of Afrikan wisdom, the Ujamaa Network reminds us, “We must buy from ourselves in order to re-circulate Black dollars. If we want our dollars to return, we must spend them within our own community. (This) will be our year if we decide it will be. Make a commitment to yourself to do as much of your spending within our community as possible.”

But isn’t that what Marcus Book Stores do? Providing a means for the Afrikan community worldwide to buy from ourselves – including from behind the walls of the U.S. government’s 21st century slavocracy, the prison industrial complex? Isn’t that what Marcus Book Stores prove? What we could do not only in the present and in the future, but what we have done since the Afrikan origins of humanity?

And aren’t the attacks on the Afrikan community the same game with different rules? It seems so. The lynching rope just isn’t always made of hemp in the 21st century.

Malcolm stated: “The political philosophy of Black Nationalism means that Black people must control the politics and the politicians of their communities.”

It’s sometimes made of predatory lending, foreclosures, gentrification, balloon payments and court dates slanted in favor of those who would shift the Afrikan community’s wealth out of our hands into the hands of others. Malcolm was right. The Richardson-Johnson family is right. The philosophy of Marcus Book Stores is right.

And the history of Afrikan people having our land and our wealth and businesses stolen from us in spite of all that we can do is wrong.

This history becomes particularly important when one considers the reasons behind the chilling destruction of the prosperous, self-sufficient Afrikan towns of Rosewood, Florida, in January 1923 and Black Wall Street in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on June 1, 1921.

A cabin burns near Rosewood, Florida, on Jan. 4, 1923.

“Black Wall Street, the name fittingly given to one of the most affluent all-Black communities in America, was bombed from the air and burned to the ground by mobs of envious Whites. In a period spanning fewer than 12 hours, a once thriving Black business district in northern Tulsa lay smoldering – a model community destroyed and a major African-American economic movement resoundingly defused.

“The night’s carnage (on Black Wall Street) left some 3,000 Afrikan Americans dead and over 600 successful (Black-owned) businesses lost. Among these were 21 churches, 21 restaurants, 30 grocery stores and two movie theaters, plus a hospital, a bank, a post office, libraries, schools, law offices, a half dozen private airplanes and even a bus system.”

“The night’s carnage left some 3,000 Afrikan Americans dead and over 600 successful businesses lost. Among these were 21 churches, 21 restaurants, 30 grocery stores and two movie theaters, plus a hospital, a bank, a post office, libraries, schools, law offices, a half dozen private airplanes and even a bus system. As could have been expected, the impetus behind it all was the infamous Ku Klux Klan, working in consort with ranking city officials and many other sympathizers.”

Community leaders join effort to save Marcus Books

Now, in 2013, the Afrikan fight is against a different – but no less racist – assault upon the Black community, against its internationally famous Marcus Book Stores, most particularly the store located in the Fillmore District, one of the few remaining “Black Belt” communities in San Francisco.

The book stores are self-sufficient and provide a service to a global Afrikan community. They are being run by three generations of a well-known and well-respected Afrikan family.

Attorney Julian Davis, Rev. Arnold Townsend, Archbishop Franzo King, Gregory Johnson, Erinne Johnson, Archbishop King's goddaughter and KPOO radio host, Ed Donaldson, Karen Johnson and Rev. Dr. Amos Brown gather for a group photo after the June 10 press conference at Marcus Books. – Photo: Malaika Kambon

At the press conference June 10, the Rev. Dr. Amos Brown, San Francisco NAACP president, spoke of the importance of Afrikan people having a place in San Francisco and quoted Archimedes saying, “Give me a place to stand and I will move the world.” He stressed the importance of “putting the crisis at Marcus Books in historical perspective.”

He compared the complicity of those who would redevelop Afrikan people out of their rightful place in San Francisco to the Northern forces in the Civil War who “promoted, prolonged and profited from” the enslavement of Afrikan people.

“I stand in solidarity with my fellow speakers in asking the Sweis family to please sell the building back to us as a community, so that we can preserve it as a cultural institution,” said Ed Donaldson of the Home Defenders’ League. “When folks begin to attack our cultural institutions, they attack our very existence, and we cannot tolerate it. We have to stand up and fight.”

Framing the issue in the larger context of San Francisco, he explained: “There have been over 4,000 homes that have been foreclosed in San Francisco in the last five years, many in communities of color. There are no funds being allocated for single-family homes to be rescued. The city of San Francisco, on the heels of the passage of Proposition C, is now having a conversation around the allocation of $15 million, and the Afrikan community has not been at the table. I call upon the Mayor’s Office of Housing and the City of San Francisco to correct that.”

“When folks begin to attack our cultural institutions, they attack our very existence, and we cannot tolerate it. We have to stand up and fight,” said Ed Donaldson of the Home Defenders’ League.

The crowd hushed to hear Marcus Books proprietors Greg and Karen Johnson; even the traffic outside the door seemed to make less noise. Greg said: “We’d like to voice our appreciation for the entire group and the overwhelming support that we’ve received from every direction. This business is not based upon capitalism. It is based upon the importance of integrity and on the importance of betterment for the community at large. We’re not here to subsidize ourselves. We’re here to grow the community. We want that to be known. This is not a war. We are not at war with the Sweis family. There’s no intention. We are at peace. But we want social justice. And we won’t be denied social justice. That’s all we ask at this particular time.”

Karen was as usual very soft spoken. But her words – again as usual – carried power. She said: “Change has its own vitality and its own reality. So I think this represents change that has come, and we’re all affected and riding the wave of it and it looks really good.

Karen and her daughter, Tamiko Johnson, look hopefully to the future, counting on their own hard work and the support of the community to save Marcus Books. – Photo: Malaika Kambon

“So we’re here to nurture the Black part of all of us. I’ve been touched by this place. I’m just the little clerk in this bridge where people come in to dip from the lake of Black wisdom. I love being here, too and it’s nice to see other people who have sipped from the same well. Hopefully it’s going to grow from the sea, and there will be more of us. Thank you for your support.”

How you can help

Help save Marcus Book Store by

• attending the press conference and church service tomorrow, Sunday, June 16: Gather at Christopher Playground at Diamond Heights Boulevard and Duncan Street, San Francisco, at 10:30 a.m., then proceed to St. Nicholas Church, 5200 Diamond Heights Blvd; 
• signing the petition at Change.org; and
• joining hundreds of supporters for a meeting on Monday, June 17, 3 p.m., at Marcus Books, 1712 Fillmore St., San Francisco.

Fight back for what is ours.

A sampling of the countless cultural and community events held at Marcus Book Stores

Marcus Books – Bop City Moment, Earle Davis: Musician Earle Davis talks about his musical experiences and plays his “Funk for Monk.”

Marcus Books – SF 8 Visit Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4: Lance Burton interviews the San Francisco 8 at Marcus Book Store in San Francisco.

Marcus Books – Bob Livingstone, Healing: Kevin Washington, Ph.D., of the Africana Studies Department at San Francisco State University interviews Bob Livingstone about his book, “The Mind Body and Soul Solution: Healing Emotional Pain Through Exercise.”

Marcus Books – Ephren W. Taylor II – Part 1: Ephren W. Taylor II, CEO of City Capital Corp., is the youngest African-American CEO of any publicly traded company. He started his first business venture at age 12 and built a multi-million dollar national company by age 17. His concepts on empowering local communities with socially conscious investing and development earned him the distinguished 2002 Kansas Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award.

Marcus Books – Dr. Brenda Wade & company – Part 2: Authors discuss Black love at Marcus Books – healing in the light of the Maafa – with interviewer Kevin Washington, Ph.D.

Malaika H Kambon is a freelance photojournalist and the 2011 winner of the Bay Area Black Journalists Association Luci S. Williams Houston Scholarship in Photojournalism. She also won the AAU state and national championship in Tae Kwon Do from 2007-2010. She can be reached at kambonrb@pacbell.net.

“Audioform Live at Marcus Books, San Francisco, ’07,” a jazz festival right outside the doors of Marcus Books

Editor’s note: This letter from a friend of Michael Zaharibu Dorrough, a frequent contributor to the Bay View who is housed in the infamous Corcoran SHU, shows the positive influence he has had on the friend, who is now trying to visit him. Zaharibu has been in solitary confinement for more than 24 years.

Another friend of Zaharibu wrote: “We believe it is things of this nature which further prove the positive impact on people’s lives that NCTT (NARN Collective Think Tank) activists continue to have while simultaneously debunking the lie that Zaharibu and his NCTT comrades inside are ‘gang members’ or anything other than the progressive political activists which they are.”

Open letter to Corcoran State Prison Warden Connie Gipson from former prisoner Thomas Craig seeking approval to visit Michael Dorrough

I recently submitted a request to visit with an inmate under your jurisdiction and was denied for failing to obtain Warden’s approval as I was formerly incarcerated. I assure you that this oversight was not intentional in that it has been many years since my incarceration and I write now seeking approval to visit.

Michael Zaharibu Dorrough

Following the death of my mother in 1978, I spent most of my youth incarcerated and grew to develop a defiant attitude towards the world. It was easy for me to get caught up in the things I did because I didn’t care about anything but my sister and even that was not enough to quell my anger towards the world.

I tried to make it here and there but nothing really ever meant enough to give the outside world meaning. When I met Mr. Dorrough, I had no idea that life as I knew it was about to change forever. He taught me a lot of things about life, myself and my responsibility to my family and community.

It was through Mr. Dorrough and others like him that I learned the importance of study, its application in my life and how the pursuit of knowledge could change my life and the lives of those around me. I learned about self-respect, responsibility and accountability for my actions. It is because of Mr. Dorrough and men like him whose influence in my life has enabled me to be a good father to my children as well as a good husband and productive and contributing member of my community.

We have remained in contact over the years and he has been a constant source of inspiration and encouragement through correspondence for the past 20 years now. Mr. Dorrough is largely responsible for the transformation that I have and continue to make in my life.

My family, Rajenna, Shontia and Jahlil, have gotten to know Mr. Dorrough through our exchange of correspondence and my recounting of our friendship. He has become just as much a part of our lives as we hope we have become of his over the years; in fact, I know we have. We have put off trying to visit him for far too long as we have striven to get our lives and family situated and we have finally reached the stage where we have the ability to make this happen.

Your approval is respectfully requested.

For more information, email Ncttcorshu@gmail.com.

Since 1979, June has been designated as Black Music Month. The annual celebration was the result of a collaboration between songwriter and producer Kenneth Gamble of Gamble and Huff and broadcasters Ed Wright and Dyana Williams, who lobbied then-President Jimmy Carter for a month, like Country Music Month in October, that celebrated the business of African Americans in entertainment. Fortunately for the trio, they had friends in high places.

The Root spoke to Gamble about how Black Music Month was born, what the first celebration at the White House was like and whether the annual observance remains relevant.

Kenneth Gamble

Kenneth Gamble: The Black Music Association was a trade association at the time, and it was an educational forum for young producers and writers – African Americans in particular – where they could discuss the benefits of the music industry. History says that most African Americans in the industry were robbed of their songs and their property. The Black Music Association spoke to the marketing of Black music. The whole theme was “Black Music Is Green,” and it dealt with the economics of African-American music. It was very helpful not only to us but also the industry at large.

Then the Black Music Association created Black Music Month, which was another original, because October was Country Music Month. What happens when you have a music month? You get additional marketing dollars, and it helps to market and promote the artists. It’s still working, because right now we’re talking about something that started 34 years ago.

TR: Your BMA team petitioned for one year to push President Carter to institute Black Music Month. What was your convincing argument?

KG: There was a guy named Clarence Avant who was pretty close to the Democratic politicians like Carter. The administration had a country music night at the White House, so I called and asked, “Hey, Clarence, can you get us a Black music night at the White House?” Thank God he was successful, and it was a beautiful night on the White House lawn.

TR: What were some of the songs performed that night back in June 1979?

KG: Chuck Berry was there, so he did “Lucille,” playing his guitar. Little Richard was there, and Evelyn “Champagne” King was a young artist then, so she sang her first or second record. Billy Eckstine, who’s a legend, he sang, too. The whole atmosphere of the evening reflected an idea whose time had come, and it was good to see the whole music industry there and celebrating this original American music. When you talk about jazz, the blues and rhythm and blues, this is what America produced, and it has influenced many other types of music.

TR: Did President Carter have an awkward dance moment, like former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton?

KG: No, he was pretty cool. He just sat and enjoyed the music. It was a great night because it gave the country an opportunity to celebrate the music that so many people had stolen from the rightful creators, so we could give credit where it was due. I think it was a great move on Jimmy Carter’s behalf …

TR: You mentioned the marketing dollars allocated by companies in support of Black Music Month. Do you think those efforts are still needed, or is Black Music Month primarily a cultural celebration today?

KG: It’s absolutely still needed. Fortunately, so many institutions have created their own Black Music Month agenda, celebrating people like Miles Davis or Bessie Smith. It’s a time to remember the great African-American artists and the contributions that we’ve made to American music.

Hillary Crosley is the New York bureau chief at The Root. Follow her on Twitter @hillerycrosley. 

Long distance freedom fighters Donna Wallach and Kiilu Nyasha share their wisdom at the Rally for Yogi. – Photo: Scott Braley

Big thanks to all the speakers and performers, plus all those who gave so generously of their time and dollars. A especially big thank you goes to that single spark, Big Ern (Ernest Shepherd), who got this whole campaign off the ground he hit running – after 45 years behind enemy lines.

It was a full house and a gathering of family and comrades, youth and elders that was off the charts – as were the performances of the Troublemakers’ Union musicians and their two young rappers/singers who subbed for Kaylah Marin, who couldn’t make it due to dental surgery.

Our sister Phavia Kujichagulia sat down and whaled on the drum before standing up and giving one of her most dynamic, politically astute spoken-word performances ever – with an audience-response chant: W.A.R.! warriors and revolutionaries (repeated). Our speakers were all right on, the film shorts had no technical difficulties and the show flowed almost flawlessly.

Some of the brothers who play key roles in the struggle against solitary confinement and to free Hugo Pinell are, from left, Doug Norberg, Willie Sundiata Tate, Charlie Hinton, Keith Wattley, Manuel La Fontaine, Louis Bato Talamantez, Arthur League, Emory Douglas, Claude Marks and Terry Collins. – Photo: Scott Braley

One objective of the rally was to raise funds for Hugo’s legal defense. Attorney Keith Wattley of UnCommon Law, a nonprofit law firm that specializes in representing prisoners serving life sentences, is representing him at his Oct. 22 Parole Board hearing. I received a breakdown of the funds from Litika, Keith’s secretary, as follows: The rally raised $2,498; add to that $1,546 from other events – organized by Big Ern, et al, in Los Angeles – individuals and comrades.

Since Keith met his goal of $3,000 for the legal expenses leading up to the hearing, he has credited Hugo’s account with the balance. No doubt he’ll be needing those funds for future litigation.

Willie Sundiata Tate speaks with revolutionary love of his friend and San Quentin Six comrade Hugo Pinell. – Photo: Scott Braley

Thanks to Scott Braley for his incredible album of photos and the speedy turnover.

Below is devorah major’s incredibly moving poetic tribute to our Yogi Bear.

Kiilu Nyasha, Black Panther veteran and revolutionary journalist, hosts the TV talk show Freedom Is a Constant Struggle broadcast live on Thursdays at 5-5:52 p.m. on SF Commons, San Francisco Channel 76, and rebroadcast Wednesdays at 9:30 p.m. on Channel 29, and blogs at The Official Website of Kiilu Nyasha, where older episodes of Freedom Is a Constant Struggle, along with her essays, are posted. More recent episodes can be found at www.archive.org. She can be reached at Kiilu2@sbcglobal.net.

Birthday Bop for Yogi

by devorah major

To look at you is to see the first peoples of the western globe –

Your eyes shaped into Garifuna, Black Carib and Arawak scarifications

Ancestors who fierce and true warred for freedom against the invaders.

Africa spills from your bone marrow smoothly painting your skin

Spain is molded in the slant of your cheekbones.

You are half the world housed behind bars, boxed far from sun and wind

Although they try to hide you, we find you and sing your praise song

none of us are free, if one of us is chained

When I look at you I see a life you never imagined

in your deepest nightmares’ most bitter moments.

A life you could not conceive and yet a life you live

back straight, head clear, arms and heart open.

You are more than the archetypes dressing you for decades:

Freedom fighter, long time warrior for the people

Political prisoner isolated for decades because you dare to see, to speak truth.

You are a man yet full of the wonder of an unshackled spirit

none of us are free, if one of us is chained

To look at you is to see the meanings of your name

A name you grew into through a coarse gravelly life

Hugo the strong willed one

Hugo of mind, heart and spirit kept true

Yogi as mystic finding freedom inside concrete walls

Yogi as laughing bear loved by many

And they’re cryin across the land,

And they will till we all come to understand.

None of us are free.

None of us are free.

None of us are free, if one of us is chained.

Third Poet Laureate of San Francisco devorah major can be reached at devmajor@pacbell.net. The song lyrics for “None of Us Are Free” are by Solomon Burke.

How did Hugo Pinell become one of the longest held political prisoners?

Kiilu Nyasha writes in “Black August International (2003): A story of African freedom fighters”:

The two young rappers (in pink and blue, front and center) who performed at the Rally for Yogi won the hearts of the audience. – Photo: Scott Braley

“Six Black prisoners were put on trial – wearing 30 pounds of chains – in Marin County Courthouse charged with murder and assault. Fleeta Drumgo, David Johnson, Hugo L.A. Pinell (Yogi), Luis Talamantez, Johnny Spain and Willie Sundiata Tate. Only one was convicted of murder, Johnny Spain. The others were either acquitted or convicted of assault. Pinell is the only one remaining in prison; all the others were released years ago. But Yogi has suffered prolonged torture in lockups since 1969 and is currently enduring his 13th [now 23rd] year in Pelican Bay’s SHU. He remains amazingly strong and revolutionary.”

In “Hugo Pinell: Is 42 years in isolation about to end?” Kiilu summarized Yogi’s situation last year:

“Hugo Pinell is in Pelican Bay SHU – no windows or natural light, very restricted possessions, no phone calls, 24/7 lockup unless permitted to exercise alone for an hour in an outdoor enclosure, no-contact visits of less than an hour only on weekends or holidays.

“Pelican Bay is isolated in the northwest corner of California, a very long trip by car. His mother, in her 80s with health problems, has continued to make that long trip to visit her son, now 67 years old. Can you even imagine not being able to hug your own son for over four decades?

“Yogi has been in solitary confinement for at least 42 years, first in San Quentin, Folsom and Corcoran and the last 22 in the Pelican Bay SHU. He was 19 when incarcerated in 1964; in prison 48 years altogether, he’s been in solitary confinement at least 42, despite 32 years of clean time – no write-ups.

Legendary griot Phavia Kujichagulia stirs the audience of warriors and revolutionaries. – Photo: Scott Braley

“On Aug. 21, 1971, in what has been deemed a setup, Soledad Brother George Jackson was murdered on the yard of San Quentin by prison guards. During this orchestrated attempted escape, however, three guards were also killed, along with two inmate ‘trustees.’

“This set the prison officials on fire, and they’ve been exacting revenge ever since on Hugo Pinell, the only defendant in the San Quentin Six case still in prison. The only defendant convicted of murder in the case, Johnny Spain, was released in 1988.

“Clearly Yogi is a political prisoner, although the U.S. rarely if ever admits to holding any political prisoners. Our revolutionary hero is still strong of mind and body, has maintained his health with a strictly vegetarian diet and a grueling exercise program. His character and personality are evident in the following missive to Terry Collins of KPOO Radio 89.5FM:

“My Brother Terry,

Hugo Pinell in 1982

“For me, it begins with the new W.L. in San Quentin in March in 1967, because I remember the old W.L. in Soledad, in 1963-64, when he was consistently messing up, as were most of us youngsters. Therefore, when the new W.L. greeted me in San Quentin, and he was handing me some literature and telling me about the Black Consciousness studies, the Self Reliant Principles of living, the Black Liberation Movement and the building of the New Man, he became my principal example because I noticed the positive and significant changes in him. He used Malcolm as our primary example of self-transformation and he felt that all of us brothers could make that same transformation, and not talking about religion because that should be a conscientious personal choice.

“Yes, there was the objective of converting the criminal mentality into a revolutionary mentality, but that was only one phase of the self-transformation process, and that’s why Brother Malcolm played a big role in our mode of transformation. San Quentin was the best station in the CDC for Black prisoners to get socially and politically educated because we had some righteous brothers in the liberation movement paving the way for us to learn, grow and really transform.

Khatari Gaulden and Hugo Pinell in the San Quentin yard sometime during the ‘60s – Photo courtesy Kiilu Nyasha

“All of that literature was part of consciousness studies, our self-reliant principles of living and self-transformation process. Most of us were very young, doing short sentences (supposedly), had been through the gladiator stations, Tracy and Soledad, and the time and place was right for self-change. We had the teachers, examples, the literature, the means and the opportunities, so it was up to us, how seriously devoted we would be toward real self-change.

“This was a ‘wake up,’ ‘grow up,’ ‘self-transform,’ ‘liberate’ call and it was a voluntary thing, but to join the liberation movement we had to understand the meaning of liberate and, to embark on a commitment to freedom, we had to do away with old ways, old habits, f—d up mentality, the club, homeboy set mentality and attitude.

“It was in the self-transformation process, according to our teachers. The New Man (a lifetime building) represents constant growth. History teaches us how terribly we were damaged and left to try and figure out and fit in a social structure in which we would remain confined, controlled, limited and surviving in the revolving doors.

“Therefore, our best way to become free again but for good this time was and is the Malcolm self-evolvement way. Take as much control as possible of our minds, our senses, our energies, our emotional and spiritual powers and gradually create new selves.

“If we would have been self-transforming for the last 60, 50 years, there would not be millions of new slaves today and we would have the power to be making an impact and difference toward the building of the New World. Millions of us would be feeling so personally free, so new and strong and proud and rewarding of the constant evolvement work we put in over the years.

Hugo Pinell with his late wife Shirley

“I’m telling you how W.L. and the other great brothers were seeing things and realizing what we had to do to get out of prisons and become human builders and difference makers in the world. In the ‘50s, there weren’t many brothers in the CDC and they were getting victimized. Then, in the ‘60s, too many brothers were being sent to the CDC and the teachers felt we had to change, get out, become constructive and productive in society, while constantly transforming, and we wouldn’t have to occupy the cells in the CDC.

“Unfortunately, my brother, more prisons were built, more brothers sent to these prisons and hardly any new selves built? Something happened along the way. All I know is that our teachers kept saying: ‘No matter what, wherever we are, if we’re alive and able, we gotta keep pushing and growing. It’s the only personal way to continue our growth and become free.’

Political prisoners Hugo Pinell, Mumia Abu Jamal and the late Nuh Washington – Drawing: Kiilu Nyasha

“There is so much I can share with you, but I wanted to give you a little passage of what was going on in San Quentin when I was transferred there from Soledad in March of 1967 and the great impact all that activity and new changes had on me, especially meeting some dynamic brothers and teachers, and my best example in W.L.

“I went through some bumps and stagnation before I started putting it all together and pushing on, but my foundation for change and struggle for freedom began in San Quentin in 1967.

“Your brother,

“Hugo”

To learn more about Hugo “Yogi Bear” Pinell, go to www.hugopinell.org. And send our brother some love and light: Hugo Pinell, A-88401, D3-221, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95531.

Although Richard Pryor is perhaps the most celebrated comedian in the history of the United States, few people know anything significant about his life, particularly the time period that took him from Bill Cosby-type comic to the real Richard Pryor who taught us so much about the world and ourselves.

Richard Pryor in a rare photo from Cecil Brown’s book

Check out a preview of this book through this Q&A wit’ the author, Cecil Brown.

M.O.I. JR: How would you describe the role Richard Pryor played in the Black experience and Black revolution of the ‘60s and ‘70s?

Cecil Brown: In terms of the Black experience, he was a symbol of Black pride and fight against police brutality. Richard’s standup about the junkie and the wino symbolize the Black experience for millions of Black people in America.

M.O.I. JR: What makes your biography on Richard Pryor any different from the many other biographies on this legendary comedian?

Cecil Brown: My bio is different because it is based on my personal association with Richard.

M.O.I. JR: In your book you compare Pryor to a shaman. Why is that?

Cecil Brown: I call Richard a shaman in several chapters because he used African American traditions of story telling. In this tradition, the standup comic is like a shaman. The first thing the shaman does is clear the room of bad influences, and Richard does this with the hecklers. He treats the audiences like tribal members. He takes them on a journey of laughter. On the way, he makes their demons visible and public.

He makes the audience laugh together, a kind of communal laughter that unites them for a brief moment. He relieves them of their demons. It’s not enough perhaps, but it’s enough for them to go back out there and fight reality.

M.O.I. JR: In a more personal sense, what role did Richard Pryor play in your life?

Cecil Brown: Richard was a great believer in talent. If you had talent, he was your biggest fan. He never stopped bragging about his friends. Listen to “Black Hollywood” on the “Bicentennial Nigger” tape, where he introduces some of his friends, Natalie Cole and Minnie Rippleton.

He thought that talent was the one way to become successful. He admired me because I was a writer, and I admired him because he was an artist. We knew how hard it was to be an artist in this country, and even more so if you are a Black artist.

This was one of the strings that tied us together.

M.O.I. JR: How did this project come to be? What made you write a book on Richard Pryor now?

Cecil Brown: This project came about many years ago. Back in Berkeley days, we often talked about how we would resolve the dilemma of Black cinema. Since I was a writer, I mentioned that I would write about him one day. He would always say, “Put yourself in it too.” After the publication of his autobiography, “Pryor Convictions,” I saw how he only spent three pages on his Berkeley days.

This was unfair, because it was here in Berkeley and often under my tutelage that he began to broaden his targets. Our discussions of Black writers like Zora Neale Hurston had the effect of transforming his entire approach to comedy. It was here in Berkeley that he migrated from “clean humor” to the street poetry of urban and rural Black speech. It was the Black street poetry that made the difference.

It was not something that white people understood then – or even now.

Berkeley was full of squares in those days. So Richard had a lot to work with. Yet he was able to do it. And the fact that it happened in Berkeley should be pointed out. This event in history was unique, and it happened in the Bay Area, mostly Berkeley and Oakland, though he did perform often in San Francisco on Broadway.

M.O.I. JR: How do people keep up with you?

Cecil Brown: http://richardpryorinberkeley.wordpress.com/

The People’s Minister of Information JR is associate editor of the Bay View, author of “Block Reportin’” and filmmaker of “Operation Small Axe” and “Block Reportin’ 101,” available, along with many more interviews, atwww.blockreportradio.com. He also hosts two weekly shows on KPFA 94.1 FM and kpfa.org: The Morning Mix every Wednesday, 8-9 a.m., and The Block Report every other Friday night-Saturday morning, midnight-2 a.m. He can be reached at blockreportradio@gmail.com.

Celebrate Father’s Day with Richard Pryor in Berkeley

Professor Cecil Brown, Richard Pryor’s longtime friend, screenwriter and now biographer, will tell how Richard Pryor became Richard Pryor on Saturday, June 15, 6-8 p.m., at the Lungomare Restaurant (formerly Miss Pearl’s) at 1 Broadway, Jack London Square, Oakland. Cecil Brown is also featured in the new biopic “Richard Pryor: Omit the Logic” on Showtime and BBC in 2013.

Juneteenth, a day signifying freedom, has been celebrated in San Francisco for 63 years – the largest annual gathering of Blacks in Northern California. The late Wesley Johnson, owner of Johnson’s Pharmacy in the Fillmore, at Sutter and Webster, organized the first celebration in 1950 and many that followed, inspiring a commitment by the Black community to ensure the event a permanent place on the City’s calendar.

Juneteenth commemorates the day, June 19, 1865, when news of the end of slavery finally reached Texas – over two years after the 1863 Emancipation Proclamation. Meanwhile, a quarter million enslaved Africans in Texas had worked without pay for two seasons, not knowing they had been legally freed.

This year also marks the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, a strategic move to free slaves to join the Union army to help defeat the Confederacy. President Lincoln did not have a conscientious objection to enslaving Africans. His decision to emancipate them was a political move to win the Civil War.

At this year’s San Francisco Juneteenth, on June 15, 2013, Rev. Amos C. Brown, senior pastor of Third Baptist Church, will be speaking on the history of Juneteenth. We will also be reminded of some victorious and tragic moments in 1963 – 50 years ago. Those moments were:

1. March on Washington
2. Murder of Mississippi NAACP Field Secretary Medgar Evers by Byron De La Beckwith of the White Citizens Council
3. Letter from Birmingham Jail written by Rev. Martin Luther King
4. Church bombing in Birmingham, Alabama, murdering four little Black girls

The San Francisco Juneteenth Committee has revitalized itself with new members representing the City’s Black communities from Fillmore to Bayview Hunters Point. Unfortunately, few resources from City Hall or other sponsors were made available this year. But our love and respect for ourselves and our African roots and the commitment of committee chair Rev. Arnold Townsend and his daughter, coordinator Rachel Townsend, ensures the event will be a big success.

The 2013 San Francisco Juneteenth will be held Saturday, June 15, on Fillmore Street between Sutter and Turk from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. The event is free! There will be a parade, vendors, guest speakers and plenty of entertainment by talented performers of blues, R&B, jazz and gospel. Health information will also be available.

To learn more, go to www.sfjuneteenth.org. The Juneteenth Committee needs your help; individual donations and business sponsors will be appreciated.

Genevieve Bayan can be reached at genevieveb71@gmail.com.

by Abayomi Azikiwe

After more than two years of a full-fledged Pentagon and NATO-led war against the North African state of Libya, the installed General National Congress regime is now requesting assistance from their neo-colonial masters. In a press release issued by NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the chief of this military alliance of the imperialist world indicated that the Western-backed government in Tripoli had requested assistance on security matters.

In its quest to control Africa with a network of Africom bases throughout Africa, a U.S. trained and commanded elite force was created last fall as the nucleus for a “New Libyan” army. The 500 men of this first battalion must understand American English, the language in which they will be given their orders.

According to the statement issued by NATO on June 4, these principles would “include strong Libyan ownership, providing advice in areas where NATO has an expertise, such as building security institutions. And thirdly let me stress this is not about deploying troops to Libya. If we are to engage in training activities, such activities could take place outside Libya,” said the secretary general.

These statements are taking place within the context of a worsening security situation both inside Libya and throughout North and West Africa. The security and social stability of Libya and both regions of Africa are a direct result of Pentagon and NATO military actions beginning in February and March of 2011.

During the course of the imperialist war against Libya, some 26,000 sorties were flown by the U.S., the NATO countries and their allies in the region and 9,600 airstrikes hit the oil-rich state. An arms embargo was imposed by the United Nations Security Council against the Libyan government under Qaddafi, but the Western trained and supported rebels were armed to carry out attacks against supporters of the Jamahiriya, civilians and patriotic forces.

In addition to the U.S. and NATO’s military actions against this country of approximately 7 million people, $US160 billion in Libyan-owned foreign assets were seized by Western banks. Concerted mob violence was leveled against dark-skinned Libyans and Africans from other parts of the continent.

The entire foreign policy and public affairs apparatus of the Western states and their surrogates were mobilized to demonize Libya and its leadership. Corporate media outlets parroted the false claims by the imperialist governments in order to sway public opinion in favor of the war of regime-change against Col. Muammar Qaddafi and his supporters inside the country and internationally.

Consequences of U.S. and NATO’s war against Libya

At present in Libya thousands of Africans and dozens of foreign nationals from Eastern Europe remain in detention by the GNC regime. Seif al-Islam, the son of the martyred former leader Col. Muammar Qaddafi, is imprisoned by a militia group which is, along with the GNC leaders, refusing to turn him over to the International Criminal Court (ICC).

The ICC played a role in the isolation of Libya during 2011 as well. The Hague prosecutors at the time claimed, alongside the imperialists, that human rights violations were carried out by the Jamahiriya under Qaddafi. Consequently, indictments and warrants were issued by the ICC against Qaddafi, Seif al-Islam and other leading patriotic Libyan officials.

The Sept. 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. consulate in Bengazi revealed, according to numerous sources, that it was a cover for major CIA operations.

The NATO leaders, the ICC, as well as select putative “human rights groups” have refrained from commenting and analyzing the disastrous consequences of the imperialist war against Libya. A manifestation of this denial is reflective of the current efforts to extradite Seif al-Islam to The Hague to stand trial within a court system, the ICC, which has been condemned by the African Union (AU) as biased against the leaders and peoples of the continent.

Perhaps the most outrageous statement in regard to the situation in Libya was made by NATO Secretary General Rasmussen when he audaciously said concerning the delegation being sent to the North African state to establish a training program, “I believe this would be a fitting way to continue our cooperation with Libya, after we successfully took action to protect the Libyan people two years ago.”

The situation of the people in Libya is more precarious than it has ever been since the period of colonial war of conquest carried out by Italy between 1911 and 1931 when hundreds of thousands of people were slaughtered by the imperialists and the fascists, who after 1923 were led by Benito Mussolini. Even after the country gained nominal independence under a monarchy in 1951, it would take the Sept. 1 Revolution of 1969 that was led by Col. Qaddafi and the Revolutionary Command Council to unify the state and set it upon a path of development and national reconstruction.

Massacre in Benghazi reflects devolution of Libyan society

On June 8, militia members in Benghazi – which was the birthplace of the counter-revolution against the Jamahiriya in February 2011– massacred demonstrators who were demanding that armed groups terrorizing the population be either arrested or neutralized. There have been disputed reports over the number of people killed and wounded in this latest assault on the Libyan people, but it clearly demonstrates the degree of lawlessness prevailing inside the country.

An article published by the Associated Press reported: “Clashes between protesters and militias aligned with the military in Libya’s eastern city of Benghazi left 27 people killed and dozens wounded, a health official said Sunday. The violence broke out Saturday after protesters stormed a base belonging to Libya Shield, a grouping of militias with roots in the rebel groups that fought in the country’s 2011 civil war who are tasked with maintaining security.”

Libya’s South has never been brought under the control of the Pentagon and NATO-backed General National Congress.

Prior to the announcement by NATO that they would be sending a delegation to Libya, France – which is occupying Mali and spreading its war in West Africa into neighboring Niger – had called for military intervention into the south of Libya. France claims that Libya’s South, which has never been brought under the control of the rebel GNC, is the source of resistance to its military efforts in West Africa.

Developments in Libya and Mali indicate clearly that imperialist intervention in Africa and other geo-political regions of the world will only destabilize these areas and provide rationales for further military occupations. Despite efforts to contain and pacify the peoples of these regions, resistance will escalate and create even deeper crises within the industrialized states already suffering from escalating levels of unemployment, poverty, austerity and political repression.

Abayomi Azikiwe, editor of Pan-African News Wire, can be reached at panafnewswire@gmail.com. Pan-African News Wire, the world’s only international daily pan-African news source, is designed to foster intelligent discussion on the affairs of African people throughout the continent and the world.

The literary work of Robert Beck, aka Iceberg Slim, has captivated the imaginations of ghetto-dwellers for decades. Much different from the writings of Ralph Ellison, Toni Morrison and Richard Wright, who all hold up a piece of the American pantheon of legendary Black writers, the work of Iceberg Slim was a chronicle into what was going on in the underbelly of capitalism, America’s ghettos.

Without pulling punches, the street language and vivid imagery of Beck, like that of Donald Goines and others provided a window into a world that most people were only barely aware of. Before there was gangsta reality rap to talk unapologetically about the ghetto Black experience, there was Robert Beck writing under the pseudonym of Iceberg Slim.

Finally, there is a documentary, by Ice-T and Jorge Hinojosa, to talk about the life and lessons of this literary giant as well as talk to some of the many people we see as greats who were influenced by Beck’s work. You could see the captivating “Iceberg Slim: Portrait of a Pimp” at the San Francisco Black Film Fest this year. It screens Friday, June 14, 4 p.m., at the African American Arts and Culture Complex, 762 Fulton, San Francisco. Here is director Jorge Hinojosa in his own words.

M.O.I. JR: What prompted you to do a documentary about the prolific writer Iceberg Slim? Did you grow up reading his work?

Jorge Hinojosa: I was introduced to Iceberg Slim’s book by Ice-T almost 30 years ago just when I started managing Ice. He told me he got his name as a result of reading Iceberg Slim. The idea came up because I thought there was going to be a SAG strike and wanted to figure out something Ice could do if that happened. As it goes, SAG made a deal the next week and Ice said I should direct it. I also financed it 100 percent.

M.O.I. JR: After completing the film, why do you think that Iceberg Slim aka Robert Beck had such a profound impact on America’s Black communities?

Jorge Hinojosa: Because he gave a voice to the voiceless – Black inner city men and women. It’s the same reason rap became so huge. Because it spoke of a world, in an authentic way, that many people knew about but had never creatively been expressed. He was able to articulate in a profound way what was happening in the Black inner city. The politics, pain, conflicts and contradictions were eloquently laid out in a transcendent way.

M.O.I. JR: How long did it take for you to complete this film? How did you get Beck’s whole family in the film, including two wives and four children, as well as comedian Chris Rock to be interviewed?

Jorge Hinojosa: Three years, because my work schedule managing Ice-T and his projects keep me very busy. I originally reached out to the publisher, who put me in touch with Misty, who then introduced me to the family. The family knew Ice-T was the exec producer and a massive fan, so that gave me a lot of credibility to get them to say yes as well as the rest of the whole cast. Ice is such a power house in the hood that his name is like a skeleton key to getting people to say yes.

M.O.I. JR: What contribution did Robert Beck make to American literature? How do you believe Beck sizes up to other legendary Black writers in America, including James Baldwin, Toni Morrison, Donald Goines, Alice Walker, Richard Wright, Maya Angelou and others?

Jorge Hinojosa: He was the first to tell stories from the Black underworld that no one had done before. His books told stories that had huge range that were the first of their kind, like being a pimp (“Pimp”), Black homosexuality (“Mama Black Widow”) and being interracial (“Trick Baby”) etc. His writing was also extremely poetic, lyrical, and vivid when describing scenes that are abominable. He also has an emotional transparence that is magnetic.

Iceberg Slim

M.O.I. JR: Will this film have a theatrical release in the U.S.? When?

Jorge Hinojosa: Yes, July 12 in theaters and VOD!

M.O.I. JR: Do you think that the literature of Robert Beck contributed to the beginnings of gangsta reality rap? How?

Jorge Hinojosa: Absolutely, Ice-T is recognized as the father of gansta rap and has said he emulated what Iceberg did in his books. Ice-T’s music spawned many followers, so there is no doubt that Iceberg had a massive influence. Even still today, Jay-Z calls himself Iceberg Slim.

M.O.I. JR: How can people keep up with what is going on with this monumental documentary?

Jorge Hinojosa: Follow me and Ice on Twitter @FinalLevel @JorgeHinojosaLA and go to http://icebergslimmovie.com.

The People’s Minister of Information JR is associate editor of the Bay View, author of “Block Reportin’” and filmmaker of “Operation Small Axe” and “Block Reportin’ 101,” available, along with many more interviews, at www.blockreportradio.com. He also hosts two weekly shows on KPFA 94.1 FM and kpfa.org: The Morning Mix every Wednesday, 8-9 a.m., and The Block Report every other Friday night-Saturday morning, midnight-2 a.m. He can be reached at blockreportradio@gmail.com.

“Privatization has always been a sign of increasing poverty among minorities,” so relates Mesha Irizarry, administrative director of the Idriss Stelley Foundation. Irizarry goes on to warn that “this type of fee will be applied to other places in the city. It will lead to increased fees in other areas, such as swimming pools, or expanded to implement entirely new fees – such as at the libraries. The authorities always start with something that will provoke less outrage.” Mesha goes on to maintain that the “fees are elitist and exclusionary and will contribute to environmental classism.”

John Rizzo, president of the Board of City College, maintains: “This contract would permanently privatize the park in a way that we haven’t seen before, at taxpayers’ expense. Billboards, admissions fees and backroom-deal-style management techniques don’t belong in a publicly funded park.”

What’s this all about? Ask any San Franciscans of a certain age about Golden Gate Park, and they will wax on about the days when every museum in the park was free and they could spend a day visiting all of them. Over the years, while still receiving public subsidies, every institution has been privatized and the entry fees raised to ludicrous levels. The latest being the semi-privatized Conservatory of Flowers, which is now employed as a cash cow for the Parks Alliance, an organization funded and controlled by wealthy elites.

The last bloom in the park is the San Francisco Botanical Garden at Strybing Arboretum. The San Francisco Botanical Garden Society has long plotted to implement fees, spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on lobbyists over the decades. Several years ago a $7 “nonresident” fee was imposed and, despite a weak effort to repeal it the following year, it was extended for two more years. Sophie Maxwell voted in favor of the initial one-year “trial” fees, and Malia Cohen voted for the two-year extension of what is really a new tax on working people.

The Recreation and Park Department is planning to have the board make these fees permanent as well as request ratification of a 30-year sweetheart contract with the San Francisco Botanical Garden Society, one which would effectively privatize the facility and hand off total control over these 55 acres to this “nonprofit.”

The City gave the San Francisco Botanical Garden Society a $725,000 grant in 2012 and one for $400,000 in 2011. Unless you can prove San Francisco residency, you must pay the $7, and plenty of people expatriated to the East Bay and elsewhere, who have returned to visit, have turned back at the gates. The Society’s long term plans are to have everyone pay.

Let’s be clear. These fees are not about revenue, because the revenues (after expenses) are paltry. This is about excluding people, especially people who may be undocumented or who find paying $7 to visit a public park to be an economic hardship. The Society plans to be ensconced in a walled $15 million new building set smack in the middle of prize parkland, so money is not the issue here. Control is!

The Budget and Finance Committee will hear testimony on this when they consider the full park budget on June 20, and they need to hear from you. So take a stand! Call Malia Cohen, 554-7670, London Breed, 554-7630, and other supervisors or email them at Board.of.Supervisors@sfgov.org. Tell them to separate the legislation for permanent fees and the contract from the Recreation and Parks budget and to vote to defeat both of these. Failure to act will be a disaster for Golden Gate Park.

Harry S. Pariser can be reached on Facebook.

Oakland— Less than a month before statewide hunger strikes are set to resume, the California Department of Corrections has instituted a new policy at Pelican Bay State Prison which has resulted in chronic sleep deprivation for prisoners in solitary confinement.

The light in every SHU cell is never off, so a good night’s sleep is never an option. To add being awakened every 30 minutes is unspeakably cruel. – Photo: Rina Palta, KPCC

“Sleep deprivation has many significant psychological consequences, including irritability and impairment of the ability to make rational decisions,” says Dr. Terry Kupers, a clinical psychiatrist and an expert on forensic mental health. “Because of the harm it causes, sleep deprivation has been described as torture by organizations such as Amnesty International.”

The new policy has been ordered by Jeffrey Beard, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation’s (CDCR) newly appointed secretary whose Senate confirmation hearing is scheduled for June 19, 2013. The directive applies to over 1,100 prisoners who are in solitary confinement in Pelican Bay.

“Tensions were very high at Pelican Bay last week,” says Anne Weills, an attorney who is representing SHU prisoners at Pelican Bay. “The guards are on edge and upset about this new policy. Obviously the prisoners are on edge and suffering because of the sleep deprivation. But they remain resilient and deeply committed to peaceful actions to make necessary changes.”

In January, prisoners at Pelican Bay announced in an open letter to Gov. Brown that they would resume hunger strikes and include work actions to protest the conditions of their confinement. In 2011 over 12,000 prisoners in over a third of California’s 33 prisons participated in two waves of hunger strikes. The 2011 strike was called off when the CDCR promised new policies and other improvements that addressed five demands outlined by prisoners. Almost two years later, prisoners and advocates claim the CDCR’s promises have been empty, and prison conditions have worsened.

Less than a month before statewide hunger strikes are set to resume, the California Department of Corrections has instituted a new policy at Pelican Bay State Prison which has resulted in chronic sleep deprivation for prisoners in solitary confinement.

“This is torture,” says Azadeh Zohrabi of the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition. “This intensified sleep deprivation adds to the long list of human rights violations endured by thousands of prisoners held in solitary for prolonged and indefinite terms, some for decades.”

Lawyers and advocates have also received demands from prisoners who plan to go on strike in San Quentin, High Desert and Corcoran State Prisons. Prisoners have been clear that the strike could be called off if Gov. Brown engaged in good faith negotiations. Brown’s office has not responded to their request.

Isaac Ontiveros of Critical Resistance, a national grassroots organization working to abolish the prison industrial complex, is a spokesperson for the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition. He can be reached at (510) 444-0484 or isaac@criticalresistance.org.

The trial of George Zimmerman begins today with jury selection. Zimmerman, former neighborhood watch captain, has been free on $1 million bail after being charged with the killing of Trayvon Martin on Feb. 26, 2012. During that time Zimmerman’s attorneys have launched an all-out war on Trayvon Martin’s credibility as if the deceased teenager were on trial.

No matter how they scrutinized Trayvon Martin’s much-too-short life, George Zimmerman’s lawyers could come up with nothing more than the minor misdeeds committed by nearly all teenagers – nothing that remotely deserved murder.

The defense’s rationale is that the insinuation of Martin as an angry weed smoking Black teenager will influence the jury and the judge about his actions the night he was killed. It is the same tired stereotype that society attaches to every Black man, young and old. They are a menace and a threat to society.

In an interview with the Huffington Post, Martin family attorney, Jasmine Rand of Park’s and Crumps law firm, stated: “This case doesn’t occur in a vacuum, and the manner in which we conduct ourselves as legal professionals has an impact that lasts beyond the Trayvon Martin case itself and has larger societal implications. A lot of the evidence that [Zimmerman’s defense attorneys] brought forward is completely irrelevant, and it’s a very clear attempt to assassinate Trayvon Martin’s character publicly in the media by mischaracterizing certain evidence [cell phone text messages, drug use of the teen and school suspension history and a video].”

The legal team recently released a video, which went viral online, claiming that it showed two friends of Martin beating a homeless man up. In reality it was a video of two homeless people fighting each other over a bicycle – a purposeful and blatant lie designed to discredit Martin and paint him as a Black teenage thug.

People around the country rose up in outrage at the inexcusable murder of Trayvon Martin. It is this demonstration of the power of the people that has led to the trial of his killer. – Photo: Julie Fletcher, AP

And yes, Zimmerman is rightly being categorized as white. His father is white and he is given all the luxuries of white privilege when people see him in person and on paper.

Federal court Judge Debra Nelson has restricted mention of text messaging history, drug history and school records from being mentioned during opening statements. This doesn’t go far enough because it leaves open the possibility of them being entered as evidence later in the trial.

Clearly, O’Mara and West are willing to fabricate and tamper with evidence to cast a better light on their client, and allowing circumstantial evidence that doesn’t pertain to the case to be admissible at any time during the trial is an outrage.

O’Mara and West claim that they will only use the evidence if the prosecution attempts to attack Zimmerman’s character. More bullying! Are they threatening to throw salt in the wounds of the teenager and his family if the prosecution does its job by highlighting the kind of man Zimmerman is?

It is so rare that killings by law enforcement – in this case vigilante George Zimmerman – are prosecuted that the second-degree murder charge against the killer of Trayvon Martin made headlines nationwide.

He followed Trayvon Martin because he “looked suspicious.” He didn’t question what Martin was doing in the complex to clarify whether he belonged. No, he jumped to conclusions as many people do when it involves a Black male. They are automatically suspect.

So, if the prosecution dares to remind the jury of Zimmerman’s history of over-reacting to people he doesn’t know or mentions his numerous calls to police or the comments made by fellow complex residents about his obsessive and disturbing behavior – all of which are relevant because Zimmerman followed Trayvon Martin, not the other way around – then they will attempt to legally discredit Trayvon Martin to the jury. Hmm … that does appear to be a threat.

It’s a threat that needs to be blown out of court by the prosecution. Trayvon Martin is already gone and his life was taken by George Zimmerman. There need not be any second guessing about reputation because the defense has already attacked it publicly.

Laura Savage is a Bay Area-based freelance writer. She can be reached at lsavage26@gmail.com.

Chokwe Lumumba – a founder and leader of the Republic of New Afrika, the New Afrikan People’s Organization and Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, defense attorney for Tupac Shakur and others, and a first term city councilman – is the new mayor of Jackson, Miss.

His June 4 victory is a stirring tribute to the courageous Mississippi civil rights leader Medgar Evers, who, 50 years ago on June 12, 1963, was gunned down at his Jackson home.

In a stunning turn of events, Chokwe defeated Jackson’s three-term incumbent and first African American mayor, Harvey Johnson, the white Republican-financed young Black businessman Jonathan Lee, and others to win leadership of the city with the second highest percentage of Black people in the United States.

Chokwe Lumumba – a founder and leader of the Republic of New Afrika, the New Afrikan People’s Organization and Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, defense attorney for Tupac Shakur and others, and a first term city councilman – is the new mayor of Jackson, Miss.

I was privileged to briefly participate in the victory of one of the most radical mayors in U.S. history, right in the heart of Dixie, and to glimpse a new Black-led progressive coalition that intends to fight for the state.

Nina Simone famously cussed Mississippi white supremacy in her 1964 civil rights anthem “Mississippi Goddam.” The election of Chokwe Lumumba is now an occasion to say “Jackson Hell Yes!”

‘Impressed with the people’

Jackson has a partisan mayoral electoral system that allows all voters regardless of party affiliation to cast ballots in any party’s primary election. With their deep pockets and high turnout bloc voting, this so-called “crossover primary” often enables Mississippi’s ultra-conservative white voters and businessmen to influence the candidates of both parties.

Not this time. In a reversal, the near unanimous financial and political support that whites gave Jonathan Lee backfired.

By depriving incumbent Johnson of their support, whites inadvertently helped Lumumba upset Johnson in the primary. And in the Lee-Lumumba runoff, the full throated white backing of Lee helped most Black voters come crystal clear who he really represented in stark contrast to the powerful progressive grassroots candidacy of Chokwe Lumumba.

Lee flaunted his deep pockets by filling the airwaves with dire warnings of Lumumba’s “militancy,” “divisiveness” and “anti-Christianity,” but a large Black majority went for Lumumba in huge percentages.

Lumumba told the Clarion Ledger, “I was even more impressed with the people and … their ability to, I think, take on the issues and to see through what I think in many instances was misdirection. They [voters] had a lot of distractions, and they saw through them.”

21st Century ‘Mississippi Goddam’

“Mississippi Goddam” persists: about 90 percent of the state’s whites regularly cast their ballots for Republicans, thereby continuing the historic dominance of white supremacy in the state. Blacks became the majority in Jackson in the 1980s but were unable to elect the first African American mayor until 1997.

Jackson is the capital of the poorest state in the union. Eighty percent of its 188,000 residents are African American, a percentage surpassed only by Detroit. Despite the growing “reverse Black migration” from the North to the South in recent decades that has lifted the percentage of Blacks living in that region to its highest rate since the 1950s, Jackson is losing population and resources.

Chokwe Lumumba, his daughter, Rukia Lumumba, his son, Chokwe Antar Lumumba, and supporters celebrate his mayoral victory on June 4. Jackson, Miss., Mayor Lumumba won by a landslide.

But it would be a big mistake to write off Mississippi as redneck Tea Party territory. Mississippi is also the state with the highest percentage of Black voters in the nation, about 35 percent. Black Mississippians have one of the proudest and most courageous histories of freedom struggle in the country.

Mississippi also has a growing Latino population. Members of the Mississippi Immigrant Rights Coalition, acting as individuals, played a strong role in Lumumba’s election.

In fact, the Republicans have a mere three-seat majority in the Mississippi House of Representatives. And, shocking all “common sense” about Mississippi politics, a proposed state constitutional amendment defining “personhood” as beginning at conception and prohibiting abortion “from the moment of fertilization” was defeated by 55 percent of voters in November 2011.

Derrick Johnson, state president of the Mississippi NAACP and executive director of One Voice, which played a key role in defeating the amendment, told me: “Politics in the state are often defined by race or religion. But many people, especially white women, felt that the personhood ballot initiative went too far and voted against it based on their personal interests. This is promising for the future of Mississippi politics.”

The stars align in the primary

Jackson is 80 percent Black, so the Democratic primary is where the main electoral action takes place. However, the wild card is Jackson’s crossover primary system that allows any voter to participate in any party primary or runoff. In fact, Mississippi does not require political party registration.

There were numerous candidates on the May 7 Democratic primary ballot for mayor, but four Blacks led the way. Going in, the favorites were incumbent Mayor Harvey Johnson and 35-year-old businessman Jonathan Lee, who billed himself as representing a new generation of Black leadership.

Councilperson Chokwe Lumumba and attorney Regina Quinn were considered long shots.

As mentioned, white business interests shunned Johnson and white voters came in big behind Lee by about 90 percent. The Jackson Free Press reported that Lee contributors had previously given more than $1.25 million to Republicans such as Mitt Romney.

Lumumba and Johnson each took about 30 percent of the Black vote with Lee and Quinn garnering about 15 percent of African Americans.

In an upset, Lumumba managed to narrowly edge out Johnson to make the runoff due to the white racial block vote for Lee, the splintering of African American middle class voters among all four main candidates, and a big turnout for Lumumba by Black voters, especially in his City Council district, the largely affluent Second Ward.

Upon his election as city councilman four years ago, Lumumba had organized a People’s Assembly in the Second Ward to educate and activate his constituents. Four years later that People’s Assembly urged Lumumba to run for mayor and helped draft his program, the Jackson Plan. The big turnout was the fruit of that bottom up nomination process.

Overall, 30.7 percent (34,652) of Jackson’s 110,000 voters cast ballots, slightly higher than the previous mayoral race. Lee took 34.2 percent (11,929); Lumumba won 24.7 percent (8,290); Johnson 21 percent; and Quinn 11 percent.

Lumumba defeated Lee in 56 of Jackson’s 89 precincts, but white voter turnout was more than twice that of Blacks. In the four highest-percentage voting precincts in the predominantly white Wards 1 and 7, Lee crushed Lumumba 2,087 votes to 20.

Jackson voters signaled that they wanted new leadership, but the question was, who would turn out to vote and what kind of new leadership did they want: the activist veteran Lumumba or the business candidate Lee?

Down and dirty runoff

The challenge facing Lumumba in the runoff was daunting. Overall he was outspent by Lee $410,109 to $100,710. And to win, he had to turn out and carry virtually all of the Black voters who had supported incumbent Johnson and attorney Quinn in the primary.

Surprisingly, he accomplished both, winning the Democratic runoff by 54 to 46 percent (3,000 votes) despite an enormous white turnout for Lee.

It was in 1964, nearly 50 years ago, that Fannie Lou Hamer fought for the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party to be credentialed as the rightful representative of Mississippi Democrats, replacing the all-white delegation to the Democratic National Convention. Now, Chokwe Lumumba steps into the office of mayor of Jackson, Miss., as a Freedom Democrat, honoring the great Fannie Lou Hamer.

Why didn’t Lee’s charges resonate with more Black voters?

Lumumba was a brilliant candidate whose personality and record undercut Lee’s charges. He is remarkably articulate, cool and inspirational. At 6 feet 4 inches and a salt-and-pepper 65 years of age, he cuts a distinguished, athletic figure.

Lumumba has a documented and well known lifetime record of achievement as an attorney and activist as well as city councilman. His high energy, all-volunteer campaign was untraditional, but it did the most important thing: It connected with Black voters.

Barack Obama long ago disabused African Americans (though not white Republicans) of the notion that an African name means that a person is a Muslim. Soft spoken and elegant, Lumumba belied the scary militant Muslim label that Lee broadcast and inspired confidence among Black voters.

With only two weeks separating the primary from the runoff, the media news drumbeat helped Lumumba offset Lee’s huge advertising advantage.

Lumumba coolly suggested to the Clarion Ledger that race had been “used as a weapon to muster up troops” against his candidacy, because he wants to promote prosperity for all, instead of protecting the business interests of a privileged few. “The real issue shouldn’t be defined that way (in racial terms),” he said. “It should be defined as trying to improve the overall economic health of the entire community.

Lumumba and the People’s Assembly had crafted a program called the Jackson Plan to do just that, but Lee studiously ignored it in favor of slander.

Chickens come home to roost

Indeed Chokwe and the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement in Jackson put the lie to the stereotype of the divisive, revolutionary Black militant that is too often shared by progressives, even progressive people of color, as well as conservatives.

At the same time Lumumba’s charge that Lee was primarily backed and paid for by white business and white Republican voters struck a chord with Black voters of all classes as well as politicians. Although it endorsed incumbent Johnson in the primary and was neutral in the runoff, the Jackson Free Press meticulously documented Lee’s Republican business ties, his white voter support and the numerous lawsuits against his business.

Significantly, the legendary grassroots organizer Hollis Watkins worked for Chokwe from the beginning, and Congressman Bennie Thompson, the most powerful Black politician in the state, rallied to Lumumba’s support in the runoff. Thompson, the only Democratic congressperson from Mississippi, and Watkins, who has earned tremendous moral authority for his non-stop, courageous organizing from the Student Non Violent Coordinating Committee in the early ‘60s up to today, gave Lumumba a crucial imprimatur of approval and confidence and mobilized substantial resources to his side.

In short Lumumba was able to build a powerful campaign that united the city’s multi-class Black voters.

It is important to note, however, that the small percentage of white voters Lumumba won was also crucial to his slim 3,000-vote margin of victory. A determined band of white campaigners flanked Lumumba and fought hard to achieve this important result.

Having put all its eggs in the Lee basket, the Republicans did not muster a candidate of their own in the general election of June 4. And they were too demoralized to re-mobilize behind one of the three unknown independents. Lumumba was officially elected mayor in a landslide.

His election is a lightning bolt: Has anyone with Lumumba’s deep radical political history and who still leads a radical Black organization ever been elected mayor of a significant U.S. city?

Final thoughts

Chokwe Lumumba and his allies now face the formidable task of governing a very poor city in the heart of Dixie. They will need all the support we can give them. Lumumba’s victory should give impetus for progressives throughout the country to rededicate to the crucial importance of the battle for the South.

Indeed the fight for peace, racial and economic justice is vacuous without a commitment to fight for the South. The South is the historic home of racism, poverty and militarism and the base of the reactionary rightwing. But it is also home to a growing majority of African Americans and rapid demographic and social change that, despite outward appearances, is undermining white solidarity state by state at different paces.

The right wing’s Southern strategy can only be defeated by a progressive Southern strategy.

Lumumba’s victory should give impetus for progressives throughout the country to rededicate to the crucial importance of the battle for the South.

Mississippi’s progressives are determined to enhance the power of Blacks, win back the House and transform Mississippi into a battleground state in the years to come. The defeat of the personhood amendment and the election of Chokwe Lumumba are hallmarks of this process and give renewed impulse and energy to recent motion of social justice forces throughout the country to make electoral work a key part of our struggle for freedom.

Bob Wing has been an organizer and writer since 1968 and was the founding editor of ColorLines magazine and War Times/Tiempo de Guerras newspaper. He travelled from his home in Durham to spend eight days working to elect Chokwe Lumumba during the runoff election. The author thanks Ajamu Dillahunt, Makani Themba and Derrick Johnson for their editorial suggestions.

San Quentin top officials have concocted and enacted an exclusive code of regulations called the IP 608 Condemned Manual, which mandates that Death Row prisoners are under the control of the warden of San Quentin Prison. Therefore, after years of the abuse of authority by Adjustment Center (A/C) committee members and unit staff and after years of filing 602s that fall on deaf ears here in the A/C, all the way up the chain of command to Sacramento, a collective group of Death Row prisoners in the A/C will be joining in the statewide non-violent, peaceful hunger strike in July 2013 to demand that the warden of San Quentin use his power of authority to bring about positive change to prisoners housed in the A/C SHU.

For years, Grade B A/C prisoners have been told Grade B is not a punishment; it’s just a “program” different from Grade A. So the warden should be able to use his power of authority to order the following immediate changes without delay:

1. The warden should immediately implement a “behavior based program” that amends the current criteria that permit a condemned prisoner to be eligible for Grade A privileges and be removed from the punitive punishment of Grade B status, basing this program on a condemned prisoner’s current good behavior and disciplinary free conduct regardless of a prisoner’s alleged gang status or validation and eliminating the under-the-table and vague indeterminate status in the A/C. The warden must order the immediate release of A/C prisoners who are not validated as alleged gang members and associates and have remained disciplinary free for years.
2. The warden must order the A/C committee to stop the controversial and unfair classification practices of using illegal inmate informants and anonymous informants and the so-called roster list of names to label prisoners gang members and associates and to stop the illegal and vague “mandatory debriefing” and vague validation process. San Quentin officials must put in place a set of standards and safeguards to protect a prisoner’s right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment
   • Any information used in A/C committee decisions must be first-hand information and must be corroborated by three different independent sources;
   • A/C committee must state on the record why such information is indicative of gang activity and state on the record what California laws are being broken;
   • Any information used against a prisoner must be provided to the prisoner and all copies of documents, such as 1030s and 128s, and debriefing reports placed in a prisoner’s C-file must be immediately disclosed to the prisoner so he will have ample time and opportunity to contest and challenge any allegations in writing through administrative 602s and legal redress to confront his accuser or confidential source.
3. The warden must (a) order the end of the administrative segregation of condemned prisoners to segregated yards that have been designed to label a condemned prisoner unjustly, (b) order an end to the constant use of bogus confidential inmate informants and bogus 1030 disclosure forms to deny A/C prisoners access to Grade A status and access to the A/C group yards, and (c) order that all four group yards in the A/C be labeled “re-integrated yard 1, 2, 3 and 4” and remove the racist yard labels of “Southern/White and Northern/Black” that A/C staff and committee have used for decades to instigate racial division and segregation among prisoners of different races who would like to program and co-exist on a group yard together. Every A/C prisoner should be given group yard unless the prisoner chooses to stay in a walk-alone cage. The warden must order that all walk-alone cages have roof coverings like the cages in East Block and Carson Sections, and add a dip bar in each cage for exercise.
4. The warden should cease all group punishment tactics. Group punishments and lockdowns were designed for large-scale riots, not for alleged isolated incidents. The warden should cease the unlawful use of the interview/interrogation process and never allow the vicious attack and assault on prisoners by A/C staff just because a prisoner invokes his Fifth Amendment right to remain silent and refuses to answer questions during an interview/interrogation. This illegal policy of forced interrogations makes no sense because if staff utilize chemical agents on a prisoner, which have proven to be lethal, and attack him and then drag the prisoner into an interview/interrogation room, he will say, “I have nothing to say,” and take the Fifth. Or the prisoner might give a statement based on his fear and the fact he was brutally attacked, in which case the information would be deemed “given under duress and torture, therefore unreliable.” So the use of violence on prisoners, particularly on prisoners of color, is just an excuse and a blatant act of the worst kind of torture and racially motivated retaliation. Also, the administration should cease passing out “interview questionnaires” to prisoners after an alleged isolated incident because the informants read these questionnaires and re-word them and use them as first-hand information when the informants did not get the information from a prisoner but directly from a prison official. Simply put, these forms describing the incident are only done so rat inmates can exploit these incidents for gain by giving staff bogus and false statements to be used on 1030 disclosure forms and be rewarded by obtaining Grade A and other privileges and favors.
5. The warden should order the end to the degrading policy of stripping out A/C prisoners outside during yard recall, violating Title 15, Section 3287(4)(8), which partly states that “all such inspections shall be conducted in a professional manner which avoids embarrassment or indignity to the inmate. Whenever possible, unclothed body inspections of inmates shall be conducted outside the view of others.” Stripping out in the cold and rain is inhumane, and it’s time for this policy to stop. The warden should allow A/C prisoners to wear tennis shoes or state shoes on all escorts, especially in the rain, to visits and medical escorts, and put an end to the “shower shoes only” policy and allow A/C prisoners to be fully dressed in state blues when going to the law library.
6. The warden should order that the third watch sergeant return the scheduling of A/C prisoners for SHU law library to the SHU law librarian clerk and start utilizing all available SHU law holding cells so Death Row prisoners can do important research at least three to four times a month. A lot of prisoners are being denied access to SHU law library on a regular basis. The third watch sergeant should be ordered by the warden to end the practice of putting dinner food on paper trays to sit on the bed in the cell while prisoners are at law library as this practice is unsanitary and eating cold food is unhealthy.
7. The warden should order the end of excessive use of property restrictions. No other CDCR prison in the state of California uses property restriction as a punishment and it’s only done in extreme cases. Title 15 mandates no longer than 90 days. The excessive use of property restriction punishment in the A/C is based on nothing more than A/C committee members’ abuse of power and authority and is never based on a prisoner’s behavior.
8. The warden of San Quentin should use the power of his authority to expand A/C Grade B privileges for prisoners housed in the A/C through no fault of their own and who have remained disciplinary free for years.
   • Allow contact visits with family, friends and attorneys, or allow 2½-hour non-contact visits in Booths A-l, A-2 and A-3 in the visiting room.
   • Allow two phone calls per month.
   • Allow hobby and educational programs for the A/C.
   • Allow more educational channels like the Discovery Channel, the History Channel and National Geographic.
   • Allow $110.00 canteen draw a month.
   • Allow four food packages a year or two food packages and two nutritional packages of vitamin supplements and protein meal supplements from approved vendors.
   • Allow A/C prisoners to participate in the food charity drives.
   • Allow 10-book limit in cell, not to include any legal or religious books.
   • Allow A/C prisoners to purchase white boxer underwear, T-shirts, socks and thermals from approved vendors at least four times a year (each quarter).
   • Allow clear headphones, non-clear earbuds and headphone extension for TVs and radios or leave speakers connected in TVs and radios.
   • Order the return of exercise equipment on the group yards, return the basketball court and the pull up bars, and add dip bars and a table and provide group yard activity items such as basketballs, handballs, board games and cards.
9. The warden should order that all medical chronos issued and approved by the chief medical doctor be honored and order all A/C staff not to interfere with the medical needs of prisoners. Custody staff should have no say-so in medical needs of prisoners. If the medical needs of a prisoner cannot be met in the A/C, then the prisoner should be housed in a unit where his medical needs can be accommodated. The A/C unit staff must not be permitted to impose unjust punishments upon prisoners who have a proven need for medical appliances. When it is deemed medically imperative for modified cuffs, staff puts the prisoner on leg restraints claiming “safety and security,” when in fact it is an attempt to discourage prisoners from seeking medical appliances by punishing them with unnecessary, painful, degrading and excessive mechanical restraints.
10. Order the Institutional Gang Investigation (IGI) unit to stop the harassment of interfering with A/C prisoners’ mail. Incoming mail has been denied and held by IGI under the excuse of “promoting gang activity” with no further explanation of exactly what constitutes “promoting gang activity”! Many times incoming mail takes anywhere from 20 to 40 days from the postmarked date on the letter to reach prisoners in the A/C. Legal mail has been taking far too long to reach A/C prisoners, and it should be passed out with regular mail call at 3 p.m. so that prisoners can have plenty of time to respond to their attorneys by the 9 p.m. mail pick-up.

All of these issues are fair and reasonable and create no serious threats to the safety and security of the A/C but can only create a more positive and productive environment in the A/C for prisoners who have been put in a punishment situation with no disciplinary write-ups for years. We ask that the warden of San Quentin and the captain of the A/C look into these issues as soon as possible.

Thank you.

Main A/C Representatives: Smokey Fuiava, E-35592, 2AC56; Richard Penunuri, T-06637, 3AC55; Billy Johnson, F-35047, 2AC51; Todd Givens, V-42482, 3AC52; Marco Antonio Topete, AK-7990, 1AC12; Cuitlatuac Rivera, T-35975, 2AC67

Body of Representatives: Bobby Lopez, K-76100,1AC16; Reynaldo Ayala, E-10000, 2AC59; James Trujeque, K-76701, 3AC13; Mike Lamb, G-30969, 2AC1; Hector Ayala, E-38703, 3AC4; Marty Drews, C-88058, 3AC2

“Menthol in cigarettes is a public health hazard; it makes it easier for our youth to start smoking, it keeps people smoking, and often prevents them from quitting,” said Carol McGruder, co-chair of the African American Tobacco Control Leadership Council (AATCLC). “It’s time for the FDA and the new head of the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products, Mitch Zeller, to take a stand once and for all against menthol in cigarettes.”

The AATCLC joins a growing number of researchers, advocates, academics and health groups calling on the FDA in recent months to add menthol to the list of prohibited flavorings in cigarettes. In 2009, under the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act, the FDA banned 13 specific flavorings in cigarettes, including strawberry, grape, orange, cinnamon, vanilla and coffee. The flavor prohibition was especially intended to prevent young people from being lured by a lethal product. However, menthol was exempt from the ban.

Despite the exemption, Congress gave the FDA the authority to prohibit menthol if “appropriate for public health.” The law specifically made the issue of menthol in cigarettes a priority for FDA consideration. In 2011, a report submitted to the FDA by the Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee found that menthol cigarettes had an adverse impact on public health in the U.S.

In April 2013, the AATCLC joined the Tobacco Control Legal Consortium in filing the citizen’s petition with the FDA. Following the filing of this citizen petition, the FDA is now required to begin a formal consideration process that could include accepting public testimony and will result in a formal FDA ruling on the matter. This is one of the biggest health issues of our time, and it might be the last opportunity for the voices of the American public to be heard.

“The evidence is clear; banning menthol in cigarettes will save lives,” said Dr. Philip Gardiner, co-chair of the AATCLC. “We must protect the health of our communities, especially African American and Latino communities, which are the hardest hit by this poison. It’s shameful for our government to ban all cigarette flavorings, while it has yet to act on the one that addicts our youth and is ultimately one of the deadliest for communities of color.”

A highly aromatic compound derived from mint oils, menthol creates a pleasant taste and a cooling sensation that is powerful enough to mask the harshness of tobacco products, enhancing the popularity of menthol cigarettes, especially among young and beginner smokers.

Over 80 percent of African American smokers use menthol cigarettes, compared to 24 percent of white smokers. In addition, 88 percent of African American middle-school smokers and 87 percent of African American high-school smokers smoke menthols. Menthol cigarettes are cheaper to purchase in African American communities and low-income communities. In California, the smoking rate among African American adults has consistently been greater than that of the general population.

A leading model of smoking in the United States predicts that a 10 percent quit rate among menthol smokers would save thousands of lives, preventing over 4,000 smoking attributable deaths in the first 10 years and that 300,000 lives would be saved over 40 years. Approximately 100,000 – a full one third – of those whose lives would be saved would be African American.

The African American Tobacco Control Leadership Council educates the African American community about tobacco prevention and cessation. AATCLC also partners with community stakeholders and public health agencies to inform and impact the direction of tobacco policy, practices, and priorities, as it affects the lives of African-Americans. For more information, SavingBlackLives.org.

On April 4, 2013, the Oakland Film Festival premiered the long anticipated documentary “Crimes of Police,” directed by Ansar El Muhammad and produced by Derrick Bowman. Now the documentary has been chosen for the San Francisco Black Film Festival as well, screening Saturday, June 15, 5:45 p.m., at the Jazz Heritage Center, 1320 Fillmore St., San Francisco.

Ansar chose to spotlight a few of the families who had experienced police brutality first hand. This documentary really exposes the crimes of the police.

Between 2010 and 2012, four unarmed Black males were killed by police in San Joaquin County. Within that same time period several more unarmed Black males were also killed by police in the Northern California cities of Oakland and San Francisco.

The “Crimes of Police” documentary hinges on these cases and paints a vivid picture of the reality of police brutality in America. This documentary is presented from the point of view of the victims and their families. It delves deep into these cases while also looking at police brutality and corruption from a historical standpoint.

Interviews with family members of victims are featured along with graphic images of some of the incidents that were video recorded as the murders were occurring. The film also consists of interviews with attorney Adante Pointer from the law office of John Burris, who handles many of these cases, and former Black Panther Party Chairperson Elaine Brown. By the end of this film, one is left to wonder how after all of these fatalities of unarmed men, only one officer in California history has been charged with murder for killing an unarmed suspect in the line of duty.

Derrick Bowman and Ansar El Muhammad, Zar the Dip

I had the pleasure of interviewing Ansar El Muhammad, and here’s what he had to say about the documentary.

Denika Chatman: I’d like to start by saying congratulations on your new documentary titled “C.O.P. Crimes of Police.”

Ansar Muhammad: Thanks a lot. This is a huge victory for everyone involved.

DC: Why did you choose this title?

AM: When I first thought about doing this film, I wanted the name to make the first statement. And I knew I wanted to make an acronym out of the word cop, so after toiling for many days, I had the “Of Police” part and after help from my wife, we finally came up with “Crimes” being a great fit, so I settled for “Crimes of Police.” I felt that made a huge statement.

DC: What inspired you to do this?

AM: My inspiration came from filming the funerals of two of the victims featured in the film. And as I watched the horror those families suffered, I felt compelled to lend my talents to them and more families to help bring attention to what happened to their loved ones.

Denika and her daughter, Mi’Neika Chatman, in “C.O.P. Crimes of Police”

AM: From start to finish, I completed this project in about nine months.

DC: Is this your first premiere at a film festival?

AM: This is not only my first time having a film premiered at a film festival, it’s my first film in itself. Up ‘til now I have only done music videos.

DC: How long have you been directing and producing?

AM: I have been doing film seriously for about three or four years.

DC: How difficult was it to listen to the different stories from the victim’s families?

AM: It was an emotional roller coaster for me to have these families relive these events that resulted in their loved ones’ deaths. I had nightmares, as well as these victims would come to me in my dreams.

DC: Has your life run parallel to any of the families’ stories?

AM: I had an older friend named Patrick Lewis who was killed by police in 1985. He was on the ground, a police officer was on his back and shot him in the back of the head, saying his gun went off on accident. And though it happened when I was 13 years old, I think it subconsciously stuck with me up until now. I remember it like it was yesterday. I actually dedicated the film to him and his family and talked to his mother recently.

Duenez family in “C.O.P. Crimes of Police”

AM: I want people to take away from this film that after the news stations and newspapers stop covering these stories, after the district attorneys rule that these shootings are justifiable, these families are still here demanding justice and dealing with the loss of their loved ones.

And they have to fight a proverbial giant to try and receive justice. The odds are stacked against them with only one officer in the history of California being convicted for the death of a suspect. Their family member was killed violently, yet they carry on nonviolently pursuing justice.

My message is “Something has to change,” and it has to come from above.

DC: Do you feel as if young Black and Brown men are targets?

AM: I don’t even have to think the statistics show they are targets. They are a walking perceived threat every day to the police that roam their neighborhoods.

DC: What’s next for Ansar Muhammad?

Cephus Johnson, Oscar Grant’s “Uncle Bobby,” in “C.O.P. Crimes of Police”

DC: When can we expect the Kenneth Harding Jr. movie?

AM: The Kenneth Harding movie is such a huge undertaking and it’s so important to me that it’s done right, but I think we will be ready to begin filming in the fall.

DC: How do you feel about racial profiling and stop and frisk?

AM: I think it’s wrong. I think it opens the doors up for more police brutality and police killings, not to mention it violates civil rights.

DC: How can people contact you?

AM: Email zarthedip@gmail.com or call me at (650) 276-0232.

Bay Area-based journalist Denika Chatman can be reached on Facebook.