Richard Williams
Anti-imperialist Political Prisoner
Nov. 4, 1947 – Dec. 7, 2005
prisons -- issues -- political prisoner home page --political prisoner listing -- Richard Williams
Richard WilliamsAnti-imperialist Political Prisoner
|
|
I am a single father and grandfather. I was born on November 4, 1947, in Beverly, Massachusetts, which is a small coastal city 25 miles north of Boston. My mother was a factory worker and seamstress and my father was a machine operator. I have one sister younger than me by six years. Just when the draft was getting heavy for Vietnam I turned 18 years old and promptly received my notice. Like most working class kids, white or Black, there was no easy way out of it. Either get drafted, join, or hide. I chose not to go. At 20 years old I was arrested for having marijuana, which in Massachusetts was a felony. Given the choice of six months in jail or joining the army, I went to jail in 1967 and became ineligible for the draft.
I continued to have brushes with the law when in 1971 I was arrested for robbery in New Hampshire and received a seven-to-15-year sentence. I was 23 and faced five solid years in jail, at the least. I ealized at that time that I was going nowhere fast, that I needed to change something—so I started with myself. I became involved with trying to better the prison conditions I was in, which were deplorable. It was 1971, the year George Jackson was murdered, the year of the Attica Rebellion. There was unrest in most prisons, because overall the prisons were brutal and inhumane. I was elected chairperson of the New England Prisoner Association. Inside, I met with legislators, and participated in food and work strikes and protests for better conditions. I read a lot of history and worked in political study groups. I was locked up, beaten, and shipped out for my activities. I learned through study and my efforts that the struggle was much larger than my then surroundings. I became a communist.
Upon my release I worked briefly with the Prairie Fire Organizing Committee. I went to work for the New England Free Press—a radical, collective print shop—for almost 2 years. Along with Barbara, Jaan, and Kazi, I was part of The Amandla Concert in Harvard Stadium in 1979. Featuring Bob Marley, Amandla was a benefit concert to provide aid to liberation forces in Southern Africa. My role was as part of a People’s Security Force which provided security for the concert. We also did security work for the community—such as house sitting with people who were under attack by racists. We went to Greensboro, North Carolina in 1979 to protest the killings of SWP (Socialist Workers Party) members by the KKK.
I went underground to join the armed clandestine movement in 1981 and was captured in Cleveland on November 4th, 1984, my 37th birthday.
I was convicted for five of the United Freedom Front (UFF) bombings in 1986 in Brooklyn Federal Court. In 1987 I got a hung jury at the Somerville, N.J. trial in the death of a state trooper during a shoot-out with Tom Manning. Next I went through a two-year long trial in Springfield, Mass., along with Pat and Ray Levasseur, in 1988 and 1989 for seditious conspiracy and RICO. The jury refused to convict us. In December 1991, I was convicted of killing state trooper Lomonco in 1981 after my second trial on these charges in Somerville, N.J. I am to serve 45 years for the UFF actions when I finish serving my N.J. sentence of 35 years to life. As with all dedicated revolutionaries the government has caught they have tried to bury my body away in prison, while being unable to crush my spirit.
Long Live Revolutionary Resistance to Imperialism and Capitalism!
(From Can't Jail the Spirit, 4th edition)
We are so saddened by Richard's death and what we believe were a whole host of health problems caused by being put in isolation for 15 months following 9/11 without any cause and by poor health care (even as the health care and humanity in Butner, North Carolina, prison medical facility were substantively better than in Lompoc). Richard was only 58 when he died on the night of Wed, Dec. 7 (2005). ... he is now liberated from prison and from the pain of his illness. Richard wanted people to celebrate his life, so mixed in with grief, his family and friends are doing th at just that.
Richard retained his humanity, his integrity, and his sense of justice, despite the long years of incarceration. He deeply changed our lives and brought us together with so many wonderful people. He had an amazingly loving and supportive family and was able to be a fairly involved father, despite the distance and the walls. ... the Interfaith Prisoners of Conscience Project is creating a web-based tribute book. ...
– Diane F. and Matef H.
| It was 1971, the year George Jackson was murdered, the year of the Attica Rebellion. There was unrest in most prisons, because overall the prisons were brutal and inhumane. |
prisons -- issues -- political prisoner home page -- political prisoner listing
This page is maintained by the Prison Activist Resource Center.
December 14, 2005