6 Prisoners Assaulted in the Camp Hill SMU on Inauguration Day
On January 20, 2009 guards in the Special Management Unit (SMU) at the
State Correctional Institution (SCI) in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania
assaulted six prisoners, reportedly citing as reasons that these men
file grievances against guard misconduct and are engaged in civil
litigation against DOC officials; contact outside organizations
(HRC/Fed Up! and www.prisoners.com
in particular) to expose conditions of torture; also to send a
message-in their words: "fuck a historical day, y'all always going to
be niggers."
Seven men inside the state's premier torture unit
have testified to the following events in reports to HRC/Fed Up!,
including six men who submitted Declarations of Truth pursuant to 28
U.S.C. 1746 and subject to the penalty of perjury, adding to the
hundreds of pages of prisoner
Inauguration Day
David Smith #FZ5176: On 1/20/09 C/O Liddick, C/O Zeigler, and Lt. Kuzar approached
Gary Tucker's cell upon the pretext of wanting to conduct a search,
despite having conducted one on 1/15/09. When Tucker came to the door,
Liddick said, "Since this guy likes filing grievances,
let's make an example out of him." Tucker refused to leave his cell
after Kuzar denied his request to have a Captain or Unit Manager
present. Willie Robinson then refused to leave his cell out of fear
for his safety. David Smith then consented to a cell search, and was
promptly assaulted by the above named staff and thrown in another cell,
separated from his property. Mr. Smith reportedly suffered undisclosed
injuries.
Damont Hagan #DS9488:
In his own words: "I was approached by C/O Brant who threatened me,
informing me that I had to come out for a search, stating 'the camera
can be manipulated Hagan, remember that.' He also called me a
'nigger.' . . . After a while, I told Unit Manager Chris Chambers
[about the threats] . . ., and informed him that 'I fear for my life.'
He retorted, "Hagan, I'm tired of this complaining to HRC and www.prisoners.com
and preliminary injunctions. Y'all did this to y'all selves, now y'all
scared. You're coming out regardless, so write HRC [which he did-let's
be there for him] or have .com write the Attorney General again, who
cares.' . . . A cell extraction team came and the same SMU staff
(Brant, Kuzar) were in suit. I also witnessed them abuse Gary Tucker.
They told me to cuff-up and I told them I feared for my life (on
camera). Sgt. Maxwell then sprayed me with OC which got in my lungs
and eyes, forcing me to cuff up." After being cuffed Hagan was taken
to a cell where his clothes were cut off of him and Sgt. Maxwell
whispered sexually lewd comments to Hagan regarding Lt. Flowers (a
female) being present. Mr. Hagan was denied water for two days, his
food was tampered with when it wasn't denied altogether, and he was
left naked in a freezing cell, which caused him to become sick. He was
transferred on 1/27/09 to SCI Pittsburgh.
Jamar Perry #DQ4432:
Mr. Perry was also attacked with mace and cell extracted on this day.
According to Michael Edwards, in a Declaration subject to the penalty
of perjury, Mr. Perry is severely mentally retarded, constantly covers
his cell and his person with bodily waste-which he also ingests-and
suffers from suicidal tendencies. Staff, including C/O Flynn, Sgt.
Jones, and Lt. Kuzar, frequently call him names such as "retarded
nigger," and encourage him to kill himself. Mr. Perry has been
constrained in a "restraint chair" on several occasions, including the
first three days of February. These devices are widely recognized as
implements of torture. He reportedly wants to die, and ranking
officials, including Regional Deputy Secretary Shirley Moore-Smeal have
witnessed his fetid condition and taken no remedial action, despite
policy provisions against housing severely mentally ill and
developmentally disabled inmates in the SMU.
White Supremacy and Repression
In another Declaration from Michael Edwards, Unit Manager Chris Chambers
is again alleged to have threatened Mr. Edwards for his correspondence
with HRC/Fed Up! Chambers and Huber and others have repeatedly
threatened Damont Hagan and Gary Tucker about their involvement with
HRC and www.prisoners.com, along with other efforts to expose torture and officially-sanctioned sadism inside the SMU at Camp Hill.
An all white staff in the SMU is holding hostage and waging a one-sided
war against a captive, defenseless population that is "99.9% blacks and
latinos," according to Mr. Edwards.
A small sampling of racist remarks made by SMU staff, according to Declarations submitted by Michael Edwards, are as follows:
*1/19/09:
C/O Brant stated over the PA system, "I have a dream that one day all
of you niggers will be dead," after which he laughed, clapped his
hands, and lit a smoke; *1/20/09: Lt. Kuzar stated, "He [Obama] may
have won, in my eyes he's still a nigger." Brant and C/O Flynn started
laughing at this, and Kuzar continued, "There will be no showers or
yard today. We are going to show you niggers who run this SMU."
*1/20/09:
When told Tucker has a medical condition and is not to be housed
upstairs, Chambers replied, "I don't give a fuck what medical says, I
want that nigger upstairs now."
*1/30/09: After
Chambers told Mr. Edwards he would not be receiving any law books or
property in retaliation for his working with HRC/Fed Up!, Huber told
the inmate, "Hey listen up nigger, I have the green light to kill your
black ass," before walking away from the cell laughing.
*2/1/09:
Lt. Kuzar stated to Mr. Edwards, "Nigger do you honestly believe we are
going to let you, or any of these other niggers get away with what you
are doing?"
Hagan, Jackson, Tucker, Robinson, Smith, Edwards,
Terry Brooks, and others in the SMU are being targeted for their
refusal to be silenced and submit to a regime of white supremacist
torture. These men continue to file grievances, pursue civil
litigation, and write family, friends, and other allies on the outside
to expose the illegal and degrading conditions they are being subjected
to.
Despite being starved, gassed, electrocuted, beaten,
sickened, and subjected to racist death threats on a daily basis, these
men refuse to submit, they continue to resist, and they are calling on
us to take action again.
This action alert is more
comprehensive and far ranging in the targets it lists than the ones in
November and September (provide links). We have watched the Emergency
Response Network grow considerably over the last 12 months, especially
during the last 4, and countless people have answered the call to
defend the rights and lives of prisoners. This is why we are asking
even more from our allies this time, because we trust you will continue
to intensify your efforts, channeling your outrage into action and
building this movement against torture and racism and for human rights.
As Michael Edwards recently wrote from the SMU: "Keep doing what you are
doing, because it surely is working. Some of these guards are just
walking around here banging on any and everything, and using racial
slurs. This means we are winning the war." I take this to mean that
this latest outburst of hate and violence by SMU guards is a desperate
reaction to growing outside pressure. They are trying to silence the
men in the SMU through daily acts of terror, but it is not working.
Resistance continues, and the outside pressure is growing. . . .
Action Alert Targets and Talking points
DOC Targets
DOC Secretary Jeffrey Beard-717-975-4918
2520 Lisburn Road
Camp Hill, PA 17001
Superintendent John Palakovich
SCI Camp Hill
P.O. Box 200
Camp Hill, PA 17001
Office of Professional Repsonsibility
Director
James Barnacle (formerly with the FBI (i.e. u.s. political police) for
30 years-see the book Agents of Reprssion by Churchill and Vander Wall
for more on the criminal nature of the FBI)
717-214-8473
2520 Lisburn Road
Camp Hill, PA 17001
1)-Report the truth of the Inauguration Day atrocity:
six men were targeted for assault with chemical and electrocution
weapons by guards calling them "niggers" in retaliation for these
prisoners continuing to file grievances, pursue civil litigation,
expose prison conditions to the public, and otherwise seek justice. Be
specific, name the names of the prisoners, guards, the threats made and
injuries suffered. Tell them that you are sickened by the endless
reports of flagrant racism on the part of guards and the obvious
approval of such by top officials in Camp Hill and the DOC. Grievances
and civil suits reach Supt. Palakovich and Secretary Beard by the
thousands regarding the racist attitudes and actions of staff under
their command, and they refuse to take action
2)-Emphasize the role of Unit Manager Chris Chambers-demand he be fired: As our abuse logs indicate (http://www.thomasmertoncenter.org/fedup/abusereports.htm),
Unit Manager Chris Chambers, who oversees the SMU, bears command
responsibility for the actions of Jones, Kuzar, Sabalsky, Banks, Flynn,
Brant, and the rest. We want to build his infamy and make him a
liability to the PA DOC and SCI Camp Hill. If his superiors lean on
him because of the heat they feel from the people, then he will lean on
SMU staff to end the torture in order to protect himself. Tell Beard
that you have reviewed the accumulated evidence from the 20th and the
preceding months, and that Chambers needs to be held accountable for
his crimes. Failure to do so will be understood as complicity in
torture. Emphasize that several prisoners consistently report that
Chambers has personally told them on multiple occasions that he is
punishing them for filing lawsuits and contacting HRC/Fed Up! and www.prisoners.com.
3)-Transfers for Tucker, Jamar Perry, Michael Edwards, Terry Brooks, Ronald Jackson:
These men need transferred immediately. When speaking of Gary Tucker
tell them that his continued confinement in the SMU is a violation of
DOC Policy 6.5.1 (which is top secret-forbidden to the public-and has
been provided to HRC via clandestine means) which states that an inmate
who does not show progress in the initial 12 to 18 months should be
deemed a failure and transferred. Mr. Tucker has been in the SMU for
28 months. Furthermore, Jamar Perry suffers from severe developmental
disability (i.e. reportedly mentally retarded) and needs an immediate
transfer. Edwards, Brooks, and Jackson continue to face retaliation
for filing grievances and lawsuits.
4)-Speak your own truths, make your own demands:
If you have ideas of who to contact (press, lawyers, the Justice
Department, law enforcement, United Nations, Amnesty International,
Human Rights Watch, NAACP, ACLU) then tell the authorities of your
intention and then get a hold of these organizations and have them
contact us to learn more. Each one needs to conduct their own
investigations to verify these truths. Also, be encouraged to tell
them that they need to close down the SMU for good-it is a failed
program that does nothing but torture vulnerable prisoners, and it is
irredeemably racist. Please inform HRC/Fed Up! of your efforts so we
can keep track of where this alert and the supporting evidence are sent
and the various responses it receives. Be encouraged to become a point
person for reaching out to Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International,
the NAACP, or whoever. Just make sure you are familiar enough with the
talking points and the evidence that supports them and stay in touch
with us.
5)-Prior Notice: Beard and Palakovich
have been notified of the criminal acts of retaliation, racist hate
crimes, denial of access to the courts, assault, medical neglect, etc.
months ago. There is a paper trail leading to their office and their
adamant refusal to accept accountability for the actions of staff under
the command of Unit Manager Chris Chambers amounts to complicity in
torture.
6)-Accountability: Let it be known,
finally, that we intend to see criminals held accountable, and that
each denial, evasion, and deception on the part of prison officials
will only strengthen our resolve to pursue justice by every means
possible. We want accountability now.
7)-Special for OPR:
The Office of Professional Responsibility (which is neither
professional nor responsible, but is-supposedly-an office), the DOC's
own internal "investigation" unit assured an HRC/Fed Up! investigator
in early January that they were in fact conducting an investigation
into documented human rights violations inside the SMU at Camp Hill.
After declaring that they always talk to the inmates, OPR Director
James Barnacle went on to directly contradict himself by admitting that
their "investigation" consisted of cross-checking our documentation
with the prison's own records. Given that the prison records will
report only what guards say, since the word of prisoners is deemed
prima facie untrue according to their totalitarian (and, yes, racist)
ideology, Barnacle more or less admitted that his investigation was in
fact not an investigation at all. Furthermore, we have specifically
asked several of the men in the SMU if OPR has interviewed them, and
with one exception (Brooks was interviewed two or three months ago
about an assault he suffered in 2007), nobody had seen OPR-despite
several having contacted them-by the end of January. Tell OPR that we
know they are not engaged in transparent and good faith investigations,
because if they were SMU staff under the command of Unit Manager Chris
Chambers would not dare perpetrate such atrocities. Demand
responsibility and professionalism from Barnacle.
Political Targets
Governor Ed Rendell
See numbers 1-6 above. Rendell was informed at the end of November, with considerable documentation. He sent it to OPR.
Senator Stewart Greenleaf
Inquire
into the appropriate process for requesting hearings in front of the PA
General Assembly, and then request a hearing-to be organized by HRC/Fed
Up! and our allies-regarding torture in PA prisons. Provide him our
contact information and ask that his staff get in contact with us.
Tell staff what is going on in the SMU at Camp Hill.
Local PA Representatives
Hammer
away at them, make these lazy, incompetent, and corrupt parasites take
a stand. Demand they petition Greenleaf for a hearing. Who are these
fools anyway?
Reminders about demeanor, temperament, manners, composure, etc.
Just
a reminder, it is acceptable and appropriate to express anger, be firm
in our demands, and not tolerate deceptions and diversions. That said,
it is critical that we control our anger and not vice versa, and
maintain composure and dignity in our demeanor. We want the
functionaries manning the phones and reading the mail to be impressed
by our command of the facts and message consistency.
Mary
Ann Kushner at SCI Fayette apparently told one of our allies that HRC
people had been "nasty" to her. Given Mary Ann's less than sterling
reputation as a truth-teller, I assume that means you were all doing
your job and holding firm to our shared principles in defense of
prisoners' rights and lives, which no doubt upset Mary Ann. So, keep
the cursing to the minimum amount necessary and get at them day after
day after day.
And pace yourself. Make a call today, two
tomorrow, another the next day, and keep at it for weeks on end. This
is a long struggle and we're in it for life. Invite others to join,
today. Thank you.
We need lawyers! Please help us find lawyers with grit, intelligence, and integrity who are willing to go to war with the DOC.
PS-Taking it to the Streets
Phone
calls and letter writing are important, very important for providing
some measure of oversight and security to the men in Camp Hill and
other torture chambers in PA and the U.S. But it is but one tactic
amongst many. We need to take this to the streets and get on a move.
Be on the lookout for an invitation in the near future, when the
entirety of the country-and beyond-will be welcomed into the state to
voice their collective outrage over the dehumanizing white supremacist
torture of the PA prison system.
HRC/Fed Up! has accumulated
over 100 pages of documentation of human rights violations in PA
prisons in the last 16 months alone, supported by thousands of pages of
prisoner reports, affidavits, declarations, grievances, requests to
staff, and civil litigation documents, and further corroborated by
hundreds of hours of interviews/conversations with prisoners and their
loved ones on the outside. We can assert with absolute confidence and
substantial-in fact, incontrovertible-evidence that torture is a
widespread, systemic feature of the prison system that deliberately
sabotages parole and increases recidivism, hence creating the
conditions for continued market growth for the prison-industrial
complex.
PPS-Call and/or write us!
Who
are you? Have you taken action? Can we know one another and work
together to beat back this insufferable brutality? Call, email, write
whenever.
Please provide feedback as to your conversations
with the peoples above and other efforts undertaken to protect the men
in Camp Hill's SMU.
Thank you.
Solidarity, Health, Respect,
Trust, and Struggle
for original article for to phillyimc.org page
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
HRC/FedUp!
5125 Penn Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15224
hrcfedup@gmail.com
412-361-3022x4