CRIMINAL JUSTICE

PROGRAM
972 Broad Street, 6th Floor
Newark, New Jersey 07102
973-643-3079 FAX 972-643-8924

National Lawyers Guild

Boston, MA
November 3, 2000

Bonnie Kerness
Coordinator, Prison Watch, AFSC

I've been a human rights advocate on behalf of prisoners for the American Friends
Service Committee for over 25 years. Since the 1980's I've monitored the growing
use of extended isolation in United States prisons beginning at that time with control
units extending to current times monitoring what have become called "Security
Threat Group Management Units" or "gang units".

Many of us trace the development of control units to the tumultuous civil rights era
when many activists found themselves in US prisons. Sensory deprivation as a form
of behavior modification was used with imprisoned members of the Black Panther
Party, Puerto Rican Independentistas, members of the American Indian Movement,
white radicals and prisoners involved in the growing prisoners rights movement. In
later years, we found jail house lawyers, Islamic militants and ethnically based prison
gangs, many of whom were highly political. A number of these groups posed potent
challenges to the balance of power inside prisons. The concerns raised by all of these
groups about racism, brutality, overcrowding, and prison conditions garnered
considerable visibility and support. What we didn't know then, but do know now is
the role of the FBI Counterintelligence Program called COINTELPRO. Many of these
groups were specifically targeted via COINTELPRO because of their involvement in
activities which had a notable impact on broad segments of community opinion.

In New Jersey, prisoner Ojore Lutalo has been held in the Management Control Unit
in New Jersey State Prison since February 4,1986. Ruchell Magee has been living
under these conditions in California for more than 20 years. Russell Shoats has been
living in various Pennsylvania isolation units for over 17 years. It's no surprise that
Ojore, Ruchell and Russell are all connected in some way with either Panther or BLA
formations, each of which are considered gangs by various Departments of
Corrections.

In recent years, the evolution of control units has resulted in the proliferation of the
building of independent isolation prisons known by many names, most commonly
supermax prisons. As the AFSC monitored supermax prisons we found a high
percentage of the mentally ill, youth of color imprisoned as a result of the racist
crack cocaine laws, prisoner activists and people who are and aren't members of
gangs.

The US and its media would lead us to believe that there is one way to define "gang"
and "gang activity." They imply that a "gang" is a "band of anti-social adolescents"
which engages solely in illegal activity. A look at Webster's dictionary tells us,
however, that a "gang" is a group of people with close social relations that work
together. In essence, a gang is any group of people which has a common identity,
purpose and direction.

In 1997, the Department of Justice administered a national survey on prison Security

Threat Groups to Departments of Corrections throughout the country. The results of
this state-by-state survey are revealing. The State of Kentucky notes that the Aryan
Brotherhood is adversarial with all black groups, which is not true. I have known of
many instances of the Brotherhood working with black militant prisoners. Minnesota
and Oregon simply name all Asians as "gangs", which Minnesota further compounds
by adding all "Native Americans" as gangs. The State of New Jersey DOC lists the
Black Cat Collective as a gang. The Black Cat Collective is my free (not imprisoned)
foster son along with three of his friends who put on Afro-Centric programs in
libraries.

While many of the states responding name a number of the gangs with whom we are
more familiar, I find myself growing increasingly uncomfortable with who is and who
isn't a gang, and what is exactly wrong with being a gang. It seems to me that the
anti-crime hysteria and the anti-gang hysteria came along about the same time in
history. The criminalization of poverty certainly serves to undermine actual and
potential bases of contending power within oppressed communities. Many of the
activists I know in inner cities are currently in the process of assisting gangs as they
struggle to engage in a process of transformation into community groups that aim to
combat some of the very real problems they are facing.

Prison gang policies occur, of course, within the context of our larger society and the
wider criminal justice system. Certainly, in the criminal justice system, the politics of
the police, the politics of the courts, the politics of the prison system and the politics
of the death penalty are a manifestation of the racism and classism which governs so
much of the lives of all of us in this country. Prisons are one of the largest growth
industries and the criminalization of poverty has become a lucrative business. I've
heard many people note that the criminal justice system doesn't work. I've come to
believe exactly the opposite, that it works perfectly as a matter of both political and
economic policy. The growth of gang units (or STGMU's) is part of the landscape of
the use of extended isolation and is part of larger policy agendas in US prisons.

In New Jersey, the DOC recently built a 720 bed gang unit - supermax style. I have
been monitoring New Jersey prisons since 1976. Although New Jersey had prison
gangs, it has never had a gang problem. As I monitor nation-wide, this trend is being
repeated resulting in the increased building of supermax prisons. This is being
fostered by the federal government which is funding a percentage of the cost to
states which build supermax prisons. I've been told by Corrections' personnel that
the nation-wide move to expand the use of isolation, including STGMU's, is fostered
by guard unions. Guards report feeling that these types of units provide a safe
working environment. I believe that isolation units also provide them with a place in
which to engage in unwitnessed torture.

In one recent dialogue that I had with a Department of Corrections official, they
noted that from the perspective of administration gang units have been a huge
success as a management tool. They said that the number of prisoner to prisoner
assaults, and the number of prisoner to staff assaults had been cut by a large
percentage. They also acknowledged that these units held many people who were
simply assaultive and not members of any gangs or groups. As I pursued the
dialogue they noted that they don't really have the authority to say who is and who
isn't a gang member based on a tattoo or a photograph and that there were many in
the New Jersey STGMU unit who were peaceful people who didn't belong there. As I
further pushed the topic, I was finally told that the diminishment of assaults really
had more to do with the zero tolerance drug policy with both staff and prisoners, and
that most of the known prisoner drug dealers were now in STGMU.

I hear from people locked in gang units throughout the country and there are
similarities to their complaints and suffering. They talk of interference with regular as
well as legal mail. They talk of lack of access to the law library, typewriters or
copiers so necessary to their pro se legal work. They report feeling isolated with little
or no medical care or access to social workers. They feel unable to advocate for their
own human rights. Many of them freely acknowledge being part of associations or
groups, many say they are part of larger nations, formations, tribes or belief
systems.

I want to share with you just a couple of the voices coming out of the extended
isolation unit in the Northern State Prison in New Jersey known as Security Threat
Group Management Unit:

"A member of the NETA Association was very ill. Most of the wing had to kick the cell
doors to protest because he was always ignored. One night we protested so that he
may receive medical attention, but to no avail. He died the night that we kicked on
the cell doors...."

Another says, "a member of the NETA Association was being taken out of his cell to
be placed on detention. While coming out of his cell he was assaulted by an officer
and then four other officers joined in the beating. Two Latin Kings saw this and they
lit their bed mattresses on fire in order to distract the officers from further hurting a
fellow inmate. These fires started the biggest protest ever. Over 50 STGMU prisoners
lit their rooms on fire..."

In yet another letter, "They dragged two Latin Kings down metal steps and then
dragged them through a gauntlet of over 50 officers. Both prisoners were then
hospitalized and given false charges."

In one case an entire unit of prisoners was complaining about not being permitted to
shower. We received a report of one NETA brother starting to kick the door. The
administrator told the officers to "lock him up" meaning he'd be transported to the
Administrative Segregation Unit within the back of this prison. About 10 minutes
later a riot squad came suited up with sticks and helmets - about 20 of them. They
sprayed mace in the cells then opened the door to run down Latin brothers. Blood
was everywhere. Six prisoners went out in blankets or stretchers bleeding and
unconscious".

Article I of the United Nations Convention Against Torture prohibits "physical or

mental pain and suffering, inflicted to punish, coerce or discriminate for any reason".
Practices such as the administration of dangerous chemical agents or simply the use
of extended isolation puts the US in violation of UN Treaties and Covenants which it
has signed.
These past years for me have been full of hundreds of calls and complaints of an
increasingly disturbing nature. Most describe inhumane conditions including cold,
filth, callous medical care, use of devices of torture, harassment and brutality. I have
received vivid descriptions of four point restraints, restraint hoods, restraint chairs,
restraint beds, stun grenades, stun guns, stun belts, tethers, waist and leg chains.
Although not all of this is coming in from gang units, it is coming from isolation units.

In 1996, the World Organization Against Torture asked if I would contribute to their
report "Torture in the United States - the Status of Compliance by the US
Government with the International Convention Against Torture" and a second report
"The Status of Compliance with the International Convention on the Elimination of all
Forms of Racial Discrimination". As a result I had opportunity to read both
conventions and then I read my daily mail. There is no doubt that the US uses
devices of torture with impunity. There is also no doubt that racial profiling targets
people of color for harassment and arrest is part of a larger pattern and practice in
law enforcement. There is no doubt that the US uses extended isolation as a form of
torture. The construction of Security Threat Group Management Units and the
keeping of organized associations in isolation prisons, is part of that pattern.

According to Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the World Organization

Against Torture, and Prison Watch International, there is a persistent and widespread
pattern of human rights violations in the United States. The AFSC has contributed to
each of those reports. The wall of silence that has been built around prisons and
prisoners has got to be broken down. What is going on in prisons generally and in
supermax and STGMU's is a conscious attempt to physically, mentally and spiritually
break down people. For the most part it is going on unchallenged.

We all know that there are people in prisons who need to be kept separate. We also,
however, need to know very clearly what the implications are of Security Threat
Group Management units, who defines a gang and whose agenda is being promoted
by this kind of treatment.

When I asked two activist/lawyer friends of mine what I should be saying to you,
they said that we need lawyers to give more sufficient attention to the Torture and
Race Conventions, as well as other international law. Lawyers have been dealing with
racial, ethnic and gender discrimination using domestic remedies but have been
reluctant to recognize that international standards also apply. In terms of
immigration law, judges are already receptive. We have a Congress and a Supreme
Court that are cutting back on civil rights, people's rights, reproductive rights,
prisoners rights, and criminal justice reform. Our gains in these areas have been
under siege, and we now need to reach an understanding on how new sources of law
and new sources of advocacy based on international standards can help.

Because my own background stems from the Civil Rights Era, I am very mindful of
who is considered a "security threat" to this country. Many people of my generation
were either killed or imprisoned by government forces. I want to read you something
from a memorandum written by the Investigative Services Unit at Pelican Bay State
Prison, a control unit/gang unit prison in California. In it they are reviewing a
prisoners central file and they comment, "this memorandum refers to the subjects
correspondence with Bonnie Kerness who acts as a mail drop for prisoners and
militant organizations throughout the United States. The Prison News Service...
organized by Bonnie Kerness has been identified as the newsletter for the Black
Guerrilla Family..." That memo goes on for three pages with its distortions. I have
had a dozen other, similar intelligence memos about me from various government
entities. I have been followed, and have had men in dark suits sitting outside my
house on any number of occasions.

To me, oppression in the United States is a very real thing. The Counterintelligence
Program of the 60's was designed to disrupt or destroy groups, which the FBI
considers to be politically objectionable. I have been part of the struggle against
oppression in this country for the past 35 years. I have seen the horror and havoc
that US policies can create with people's lives. What is going on in prisons, what is
going on in Security Threat Group Management units is far wider than gangs being
threatening to prison authorities. The Department of Corrections isn't only a set of
institutions, it is also a state of mind.

This material may be copied, as long as credit is given.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE PROGRAM

AFSC New York Metropolitan Region (NYMRO)
972 Broad St., 6th Floor
Newark, NJ 07102
Phone: 973-643-3079
FAX: 973-643-8924