Nothing Is Finished.

         A new year message from Act For Freedom Now:

 NOTHING IS FINISHED EVERYTHING CONTINUES

        These are tough times. Disgusted by imposed social behaviour and the models it reproduces, against every form of authority and exploitation, we aim at the destruction of this rotten system, whether it’s in “crisis” or is “prospering”.
As the State and system continue to assert their proven role against anarchists, anti-authoritarians, fighting people, self-managed spaces and various parts of society, we consider multiform action an integral part of the revolutionary process. From the distribution of leaflets in the squares, the occupation of spaces, self-organization in workplaces and neighbourhoods, to militant protests, night-time raids and re-appropriations.
       The words of our brothers and sisters in captivity give us the strength to continue. Nothing is forgotten, nothing is left behind, the social war will continue as long as the enemy persists.
       The multiform actions of the many groups and individual comrades in Greece and around the world have always raised our spirits and strengthened us. In the struggle there are also losses but the journey continues. With its losses and its joys, its hardships and also its pleasant surprises.
Solidarity and respect to all those around the world fighting in every way, inside and outside the walls, against this rotten system.
NOTHING IS FINISHED, EVERYTHING CONTINUES.
Comrades from the anarchist project Act for freedom now! 

January 2021

 

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40 Years!!

         I believe it is true to say that the American establishment is the most brutal, savage institution on the planet. It has invaded more countries than any other country on the planet, and it runs its own country with the same ruthless brutality. In doing so it has incarcerated a greater percentage of its population than any other country, and it runs that prison system with the same brutal inhumanity and savagery, and runs the prisons as one massive slave labour camp for the profit of its corporate moguls. 

The American criminal justice system holds almost 2.3 million people in 1,833 state prisons, 110 federal prisons, 1,772 juvenile correctional facilities, 3,134 local jails, 218 immigration detention facilities, and 80 Indian Country jails as well as in military prisons, civil commitment centers, state psychiatric hospitals, and prisons in the U.S. territories.

        Yet it sits at the head of the table of those nations that go by the name of the most developed and peaceful nations. The greatest illusion ever perpetrated on the human race.

The following is from Salon: 

40 Years A Prisoner.

       Eight-year-old me couldn't imagine not seeing my dad's smiling face on Christmas morning, or drawing my mom a cartoon-filled card covered in thank yous for Mother's Day, or the thousands of other memories small kids get to share with their parents. These types of memories make up the foundation of our traditions and are the things that we pass down to our kids. Mike Africa Jr., who was born in prison, was robbed of the chance of creating those in-person memories with his parents. The Philadelphia police department forced him to figure out life on his own.
        Africa Jr.'s journey is brilliantly related in the new HBO documentary film, "40 Years a Prisoner," directed by Tommy Oliver and available now on HBO Max. Featuring an all-star ensemble of producers including The Roots, Common and John Legend, "40 Years A Prisoner" is a compelling film about the horrors of America's criminal justice system. The story begins in 1978 when Philadelphia police raided MOVE, a back to nature organization based on love, among other peaceful principles. Africa's parents, two MOVE members, were arrested during that raid on trumped up charges and convicted before he was born. In the film, Oliver documents Africa Jr.'s life pursuit of freeing his parents, along with other MOVE members, and a decades-long battle with the Philadelphia police department. I recently got a chance to talk with Africa Jr. and Oliver about the film on an episode of "Salon Talks." 

Read the full article HERE:

 

"40 Years a Prisoner" is streaming on HBO Max.

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The Justice Illusion.

        Prisons, the not too subtle procedure of the state to protect the wealth and privileges of the rich and powerful. Hellholes of brutality, injustice, overcrowding slave labour and inadequate medical facilities. We have them in every country from so called democracies to dictatorships, it makes no difference, the state, no matter what shape or style, will have its array of prisons, backed up by a loaded, in favour of the powerful, judicial system and a brutal police force.

 

         A civilised society can't exist as long as we have the prison system, the two are incompatible. Prison are a barbaric way of keeping the status-quo, they have nothing to do with protecting the public, communities are well able to look after themselves in the interests of the community. In the vast majority of "crimes" the root cause in inequality and injustice, the very things that the prisons are their to perpetuate by keeping society structured the way its and to suit the rich and powerful.

 

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26 Years A Slave.

       It is impossible to imagine how you would feel if at the age of twenty you were incarcerated in a hellhole of a prison for a crime you did not commit and then spend the next 26 years locked away from public view, proclaiming your innocence, lots of that time in solitary confinement. However, in this state controlled world we live in, these things do happen, sometimes the person never manages to prove their innocence serves their full term, or worse ends their days under the shackles of state incarceration.
       Lots of individuals who do leave prison, are often broken and damaged after their experience, some with that wonderful human resolve, fight to maintain their humanity and succeed, we should honour them and support them all. One day, when we become a civilised species, prisons will be a horrible memory from the distant past.

FROM LACINO HAMILTON:

         My life changed in an instant on September 30, 2020 when a Wayne County circuit court judge apologized for 26 years of wrongful incarceration, and then released me from prison.
         I walked out of the Michigan prison and into a crowd that worked years to prove my innocence. But that was a beginning of sorts. The challenges have been both small and big.
       The small challenges have been things like never having used a cellphone and not knowing what I’m doing. The bigger ones have been things such as re-entry during COVID-19 – with so much shut down or slow or not working.
       While incarcerated, I painfully self-educated and became a social justice activist, organizer and critical thinker. And in between starting life completely over at 46, I’m searching for ways to do the same on this side of the wall.
       I want to continue to be an advocate for justice.
       I’ve come a long way in less than two months due to the assistance of RootsAction and others. But I have so far to go, and counting on the support of the broader community.

Thank you,
Lacino Hamilton

P.S. from the RootsAction Education Fund:

     Through all those years in prison, many of them in solitary, Lacino never gave up or gave in. Now that he’s freed, we need to help amplify his voice so he can educate his fellow citizens about the evils of mass incarceration.
     You can help make that happen with a U.S.-tax-deductible donation of any amount. Please do what you can to support Lacino Hamilton’s advocacy.

Donate Button

Background:
  Truthout columns by Lacino Hamilton

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Twins.

       It is sometimes difficult when you see our so called "political representatives", in their fine clothes and polite civilised manner, that they oversee and manage the cruel, vicious and barbaric prison system. A system deeply rooted in violence and inhumanity, a relic from our more barbaric past, but which our well manicured "political representatives" deem necessary to keep them in their privileged position of wealth and power. Prisons are institutions of violence, repression and  intimidation, and are intended to be so, as a deterrent to those who would dare to challenge the status-quo. As long as the state survives, the savagery and barbarity that is the prison system will persist, they are inseparably linked like Siamese-twins.  

The following from Act For Freedom Now: (Translation is not perfect, but you grasp the viciousness) 

 Rotative Hunger strike in spanish prisons

        From last 1st of September on at least 14 prisoners, mostly anarchists, take actually part of a new rotative hunger strike against the precarious health conditions in the spanish prisons. They reinvicate also a 14 point program against isolation custody (FIES/DERT), tortures and physical and psychical violence from the prison guards, dispersion of prisoners far from their home, etc. Every comrade is doing a 10-days-hunger strike, one following other, every month 3 prisoners.
      Violence in spanish prisons is very common, every year 200 prisoners die inside spanish prisons violently or from drugs, no medical attention or diseases. Actually in corona times, the conditions in jail are mostly insupportable (bad food, no activities, no visits…).
        Last month of August our comrade Carmen Badía Lachos was violated from a prison guard inside the ‘hospital’ part of the Zuera-prision (Zaragoza).
      She suffers cancer and use a wheelchair to move, so this psychopath had an ‘easy game’ to act like a coward. Carmen did a public communicate about this machist crime. Last year Carmen did a very long hunger strike (more than 2 month) to denounce her health conditions to get released from prison because of her incurable cancer. The prison-administration denied her petition… The violator got threats to kill from an anonymous prisoner.
       Long term prisoner Claudio Lavazza in August was brought back to Spain after being judged in Paris for a big bank-robbery (in 1978) and he got sentenced 41 years later to ten years of prison in France! Claudio was arrested in 1996 after a bank-robbery in Cordoba where died 2 cops in a battle of gun-fire.
        Also still in prison our anarchist comrade Gabriel Pombo da Silva, actually in the jail of Leon. He got transferred from Aachen/Germany in 2013 to Spain with the special condition that he had to finish just his sentence from Germany in spanish prisons and then he’d be free from all anterior sentences. So in 2016 he became free. But his freedom in Spain didn’t have a long stand… just because one judge from Girona opinion that Gabriel should finish his 30-years-sentence from 1990… that would be 16 years more behind bars! But his friends and comrades try to bring the case to the superior tribunal of justice, so the last word is still not spoken.

Solidarity with the anarchist/revolutionary prisoners all around the world!

Down all prison walls!

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Survival.

        It is accepted that prisons are places of violence, brutality and arbitrary justice, state institutions of repression and intimidation. However during this pandemic, prisons have become places of death sentences through the covid19 virus. Over crowded, insanitary conditions, poor or non-existent health care, is the perfect mixture for the spread of the virus, with the inmates having no possibility of self isolating. Cold blooded inhumanity, upheld by laws and regulations administered by the state. Like all repression, there comes a time when the only road to survival is rebellion. 

The following from AMW English: 

        219 prisoners escaped from Moroto Prison on Wednesday after prisoners were exposed to coronavirus. One soldier was killed by prison rebels, who stormed an armory and seized over 15 weapons and ammunition.
       Only seven out of 219 prisoners who escaped from the prison in north-eastern Uganda have been recaptured.
        Two prisoners have also been murdered during their escape attempt.
       The prison, which usually imprisons 600 people, is on the foothills of Mount Moroto, on the edge of the town.
       The escape was triggered by the transfer of 60 other prisoners to Jinja Referral Hospital for treatment after they tested positive for COVID-19.
     There was exchange of fire between security and the prison rebels who were scaling up mountain Moroto.
     The prisoners who escaped had been tested, but their results were withheld, leading to their decision to escape.
     As prisons around the world are turned into death traps by guards who infect prisoners with the deadly coronavirus, prison rebels will increasingly be forced to escape and fight back in order to survive.

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Libertad.

      Prisons are state institutions that are meant to subdue dissent, create subservience, breed submission. History has proved that these institution have, very often failed in their purpose. The human spirit so often overcomes attempts to shackle its desire for freedom and justice. I have no doubt that this desire will eventually win, and we will pull down the walls of these symbols of state control and cruelty, along with the system that requires them for its very existence. There is no place for prisons in any civilised society, they are there to protect the status-quo, to keep wealth and power where it is, clasped in the greedy hands of the pampered, privileged, parasite class. 

The following from Anarchists Worldwide:

Santiago, Chile: Letter from Anarchist Prisoner Mónica Caballero
Palabras de la compañera Monica Caballero desde la cárcel de San Miguel ($hile)
       For those opposed to this system of terror, prison is always a bitter pill and it always hurts.
      Prison and I are old acquaintances, on more than one occasion I have sat at his table, over the years we have changed and we have both learned from one another… but no matter how much time I spend in prison, I remain the same. Prison is still the monstrous phagocyte of power that grows with submission and repentance, and I continue with the same seditious desires of yesteryear.
     The powerful succeeded in locking up my restless body, they tried to guard it for many years, but even though it is caged, my heart is still out there far from fences, high walls and watchful eyes… the grey of this place only touches me superficially.
      The prison is another place of struggle on the road to confrontation, the anti-authoritarian confrontation for me has not finished, it has only changed shape.
Dear Juan Aliste, Joaquín García, Marcelo Villarroel and Dinos Giagtzoglou‘s words are a breath of fresh air in this cell.
       There is still much to build and to destroy!
Active solidarity with the Mapuche political prisoners on hunger strike

Long live Anarchy!

Monica Caballero S.
Anarchist prisoner.
Santiago Chile
September 2020.

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Solidarity.

       We are controlled mainly by our national police, but the day is not far off when that control will be in the hands of an international police force, European states are welding together an efficient police force that knows no borders. Borders are there for control of us, the populations, hemming us in as more easily controlled groups, for the state's own power. The international police will be there to control those who would dare to cross their designated border lines, without their masters permission. The framework is already there and functioning well. the following from Act For Freedom Now:

 France / Italy: Letter from Imprisoned Anarchist Comrade Carla

Fresnes, 19.08.2020
Salut!
      After 536 days on the run, I was arrested on July 26th near Saint-Etienne. I experienced the arrest as the first performance of a scene repeated a thousand times in my head, or rather 536 times? Everything seemed to happen in slow motion: the hooded cops pointing their rifles at me, put me down and ask me the name that I’ve so often been called lately. It felt strange to pronounce it.
    I was then brought to Paris by the SDAT [Anti-Terrorist Sub-Directorate], four hours of travel handcuffed behind my back in the company of their balaclavas. They blindfolded me for the last few kilometers that separated us from their premises in Levallois-Perret. They were the ones who took me to court two days after the arrest, then to Fresnes prison.
      At the hearing, I accepted the extradition without hesitation. I had followed the events surrounding the arrest of Vincenzo Vecchi (whom I greet in passing) closely, but he had refused, offering himself a chance to remain free in France. For me, the choice was between waiting for the trial in France or in Italy, where the other defendants in Operation Scintilla are, all of them free except Silvia, who is still under judicial supervision.
      It seems that in recent times, arrest by means of a European arrest warrant and subsequent extradition have become mere formalities for the European justice system. We have seen this recently in Italy on several occasions, but also in the repression that followed the Hamburg riots or in Greece and Spain. European police forces are refining their weapons and their collaboration seems to be getting closer, exchanging tips and services. So it seems to me that it is up to us to look into the matter and study the mechanisms.
    I discovered the prison at the time of the coronavirus, the regulation fortnight in the new arrivals’ quarter, the mask during all movements, including the walk for that length of time, the suspension of all activities, the cell 22 hours a day.
     At the end of my fortnight, and on the eve of the scheduled date of my extradition, the other arrivals and I were placed in sanitary isolation on the grounds that we had shared a walk with a new arrival who turned out to be infected. Tests were only offered to us once this case was confirmed and have been the rule for all new arrivals ever since. We were initially told that they couldn’t test everyone. Unsurprisingly, it seems that the prison administration (PA) is behind schedule.
      In the spring, the measures taken by the PA in response to the arrival of the coronavirus led to situations of mutinies, revolts and solidarity. Unfortunately, here at least, it seems that living with the virus has become the norm, and the fear that a newcomer could bring the virus with her is coupled with the fear of being suspended from the visiting rooms, as was the case with us this week. The meagre compensation that the PA gave in the form of telephone credit in the spring is no longer relevant, as a group of isolated newcomers is so small compared to the strong mobilisations of last March.
     I’m expecting extradition again any day now and I know that a third isolation ward will probably be reserved for me when I arrive in Italy. I take advantage of the expressions of solidarity that join me today after so much silence. In spite of the publications on the subject, which are precious, the escape is still too often considered a romantic adventure and the companions concerned are often thought of as free. During this year and a half, I have never lacked solidarity and warm support, I have never lacked anything, but one is not free when one is deprived of one’s life.
      I would have liked to have been on the street with my comrades during the demonstrations in reaction to the eviction of Asilo, I accompanied the hunger strike of Silvia, Anna and Natascia with my thoughts, I thought every day of the comrades arrested in successive waves. I would have liked to have been by my family’s side when they went through difficult times and to have heard from them when we were all confined. Today I am ready and determined to face the next few months, but my thoughts are with those who are still on the run, often far from their loved ones. I hope that their journey will be as long as they want it to be, and that the encounters they make will give them the warmth they deserve and the energy to continue to fight.
     Carla
 

      On Tuesday 25 August 2020, Carla, arrested on 26 July, was finally extradited to Italy. She is now incarcerated in Vigevano prison, near Milan, in the AS3 module (alta sicurezza 3).
This high-security isolation section is initially reserved for prisoners accused of belonging to the mafia. Since the closure of the aquila, the AS2 sections, reserved for detainees considered political by the state, hardly exist for women, with the exception of Rebbibia (Rome) where Flavia and Anna are. Anna is only there for a few weeks because the Italian state has chosen to dispatch the companions, which is why most of them, including Carla, end up in AS3.
Carla wrote a letter from Fresnes prison which we reproduce below.
Let us continue to write to her and express our solidarity!
To write to her :
Carla Tubeuf
casa circondariale di Vigevano Centralino
via Gravellona 240
27029 Vigevano (PV), Italy

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Solidarity.

 

     August 25th. to August 30th. a week of international support for all anarchist prisoners. Across the planet there are uncountable thousands of these state institutions of repression. Institutions of arbitrary violence, devoid of justice, sparse on medical care, dark dungeons where the state incarcerates those who would dare to challenge its vice like authority. Prisons are just one of the states many tools to create a submissive population, to repress dissent, to silence opposition to its plunder of the the poor in favour of the wealthy few. Just one of its lines of defence of the parasite class that hold the levers of power in this economic system of exploitation, poverty, war and plunder. Those who make a stand against this gross injustice, who stand up and defy the state's manufactured monopoly of control over our lives, deserve all the support and solidarity that we can muster, their struggle is our struggle, we must show which side we are on.   

The following from Anarchists Worldwide:

 

     Chile: Letter from Anarchist Comrade Juan Flores Riquelme about the Arrest of Mónica and Francisco

        We knew that by choosing the path of struggle against capital, our lives would develop against all odds, and it was not unknown to us that prison could be a possible destination.
      We questioned this humiliating reality and its so-called “social peace”, we severely questioned the enrichment of the bourgeoisie and their power. There are really too many questions to take a stand against the prevailing order. Countless have been the assassinations by the repressive forces of the power, countless those insurgents who have given their lives looking for the sharpening of the conflict against the states.
     Did the elite of this country believe that we would stand idly by after all their years of misery, alienation and neoliberal exploitation? How could we not try to be the stumbling block against the uninterrupted advance of capitalism and the states?
     A constant attack against the enemy we have made of our lives, which extend infinite complicities of an idea that lives in a multitude of hearts, a consequence of the reality of positioning against the enemy. This is how our lives are, this is how we chose it, against all odds we will advance without restraint along the path of subversion, beyond its borders, beyond its criminalization and Hollywood investigations, beyond its convictions and prisons, reality demands action from us. Our only option is to maintain the struggle for total liberation, facing with dignity the consequences that this may generate in our lives.
       These words are addressed to those daredevils who, without looking back, have defended anarchic and anti-authoritarian ideas with their teeth and claws. Monica Caballero and Francisco Solar are hermanxs [brothers & sisters] with deep convictions and critiques that are impossible to break with this new blow of power to their lives.
      To the comrades of the Conspiracy of Cells of Fire and Revolutionary Struggle, imprisoned in the prisons of Korydallos Greece. To the anarchist brothers and sisters imprisoned in Ferrada Prison, Italy. To all the prisoners who were filled with anger and faced off against the police during the recent revolt in October.
     Warmly greeting the initiative of the International Week for Anarchist Prisoners, which is being carried out from the 25th to the 30th of August, I say goodbye for now.

Juan Alexis Flores Riquelme
High security prison.

(via Contra Info, translated into English by Anarchists Worldwide)

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Psychopaths Rule.

       It's common knowledge, or should be, that prisons are institutions of brutality, where violence is arbitrary, justice is varied on a whim, human rights are removed at the will of an individual, physical and psychological health is of little concern to the authorities, control and authority is all that matters. It is the control and authority of individuals who interpret these in their own manner according to their own particular mood or disposition. All this goes on in our towns and cities and we calmly go about our daily business.

    Some prison have a more brutal reputation than others, but a recent report from America, puts Alabama prison system right there at the top of the festering heap of callous brutal savagery that stinks of psychopaths give free rein.

The Alabama Report:

 

      Alabama prisons have used ”cruel and unusual punishment” on inmates by allowing correctional officers to perform routine beatings, the Department of Justice (DOJ) said following an investigation.
      “Our investigation found reasonable cause to believe that there is a pattern or practice of using excessive force against prisoners in Alabama’s prisons for men,” Assistant Attorney General Eric Dreiband for the department’s Civil Rights Division said.
     An investigation of 13 Alabama prisons found that 12 of them had correctional officers using excessive, and sometimes deadly, force on inmates that violated their Constitutional rights.
       Excessive force by corrections officers included the use of batons, chemical spray, and physical beatings involving kicking prisoners, which often resulted in serious injuries. Two Alabama prisoners died from excessive force incidents in the last months of 2019 alone.
       In one fatal incident in October 2019, “the level of force used caused the prisoner to sustain multiple fractures to his skull, including near his nose, both eye sockets, left ear, left cheekbone, and the base of his skull, many of which caused extensive bleeding in multiple parts of his brain,” according to the DOJ.
       The 28-page report released on Thursday highlighted multiple instances of officers using excessive force on inmates, with some of those times including when there was no physical threat to the employees' safety. The report also found officers would “use force as a form of retribution and for the sole purpose of inflicting pain".
     One instance stated how an officer “brutally hit, kicked and struck a handcuffed prisoner” in a medical unit while calling himself the “reaper of death”. The prisoner reportedly “begged for the officer to kill him”, according to four nurses who witnessed the incident.
      Low staffing and overcrowding in Alabama prisons was credited in the report as a trigger for officers to become “tired, stressed, overworked and angry”.
     “After carefully reviewing the evidence, we conclude that there is reasonable cause to believe that conditions in Alabama’s prisons violate the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution and that these violations are pursuant to a pattern or practice of resistance to the full enjoyment of rights protected by the Eighth Amendment. Specifically, we have reasonable cause to believe that the correctional officers within the Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC) frequently use excessive force on prisoners housed in Alabama’s prisons for men. Such violations are pursuant to a pattern or practice of resistance to the full enjoyment of rights secured by the Eighth Amendment,” the DOJ said Thursday in a letter to Alabama Governor Kay Ivey.
       This report comes as the DOJ first started looking into the Alabama prison system starting in 2016. The department already found that the prison system was “deliberately indifferent” to prisoner-on-prisoner attacks on sexual abuse. Investigations also found officials failed to maintain facilities that were “sanitary, safe, or secure”.
    “Ultimately, Alabama does not properly prevent and address unconstitutional uses of force in its prisons, fostering a culture where unlawful uses of force are common,” the most recent report stated.
     Ms Ivey said in a statement that her administration was hopeful they could reach a resolution to all the department’s allegations.
      “I am as committed as ever to improving prison safety through necessary infrastructure investment, increased correctional staffing, comprehensive mental-health care services, and effective rehabilitation programs, among other items,” the governor said.

      So the governor said, and we heard Bla bla bla bla! Prisons must crumble to dust for freedom and justice to flower.

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Arbitary "Justice"!

       The state will always show retribution when an act it sees as an attack on its power and control. Though that retribution will not necessarily be heaped on the "guilty" person, that matters little to the state, what matters is that it is seen to be in control, in a attempt to intimidate others from doing similar acts. The judicial system and its attendant hell-hole prisons, are not there to dispense justice, but to protect the power of the state, and the wealth and privileges of its parasite class, to hold the system together and keep the status-quo. To those who desire freedom and justice, prisons are an obvious target, but to be free of prisons we have to demolish the institution that deems them necessary, the state.

      It is not unusual for an individual to find themselves being sentenced to a term in prison with no direct evidence  linking them to the event in question. It happens day and daily in country after country, it is just the state apparatus defending its power over the population.

The following from AMW:

On July 15, 2020, anarchist Marco Bolognino was sentenced to four years for the fire that broke out at the Vallette prison in Turin on February 11, 2019, following a greeting to the many comrades detained following the eviction of the Asilo Occupato.

Aggravated fire and dangerous ignitions and explosions: these are the crimes alleged against Marco Bolognino, anarcho-insurrectionist arrested in Turin by Digos [General Investigations and Special Operations Division, anti-terrorism law enforcement in Italy]. The disputed facts date back to February 10, when anarchists organized a procession against the eviction of the Asilo Occupato in via Alessandria and the arrest of six anarchists who ended up in the Vallette prison. On that occasion, paper bombs and fireworks exploded. A nautical signal rocket ended up on the roof of a prison shed, where there was a kitchen workshop, causing a fire and the explosion of some gas cylinders. The laboratory was completely destroyed.

Once again the tribunal rite was an end in itself, deaf to the evidence of the facts, which not only questioned the disputed facts, but also the identification of a responsible person: the sentence is typical, 4 years for arson .

A warning to all those in solidarity that often find themselves outside those damned walls, an attack on solidarity!

Fire to all the prisons

Freedom for all

Western Alps antirepression

From: https://ilrovescio.info/2020/07/15/condanna-per-lincendio-alle-vallette-nel-febbraio-2019/

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Another Pandemic.

        All the talk at the moment is about the covid19 pandemic and its various stages, with a hope that it will all end well. However there is another pandemic that is rife throughout the world and its virus is called "inhumanity in prisons", but there is no massive and determined drive to eradicate it, it goes unchecked and ignored by the various states. There is an unending litany of cases of barbarity within the prison system and stands as testament to how the state treats those who would dare to break its rules and regulations, no matter how unjust these may be.

     This is just another case from the many thousands that happen day and daily across the planet. Another symptom of the inhumane and barbaric nature of the state system and its thirst for authority and control. 

     This case just happens to be in Italy, but no state is immune from this type of savagery.  

The following is from Act For Freedom Now:

        Italy: Letter of Beppe from Pavia prison, July 4th, 2020

       July 17, 2020
       The following text is a letter from the anarchist Giuseppe Bruna, imprisoned since May 21st, 2019, for the «Prometeo» repressive operation, currently imprisoned in Pavia prison. To write to him: Giuseppe Bruna, C. C. di Pavia, via Vigentina 85, 27100 Pavia, Italy.
     Dearly beloved,
     I hope this one of mine finds you well!
    I am writing to report a serious situation (yet another!) that I found myself facing between the afternoon of July 3rd and midnight of July 4th! As you will be aware, I have been locked up since about a year in a cell alone in the «protected» section [a section where are held ex-cops, infamous, pedophiles, rapists, ecc.] of Pavia’s jail!, I have always refused such placement by putting in place various forms of struggle (hunger strike, air strike, etc.).
    The [incomprehensible word, probably could be «direction»] health care of the Pavia jail, even though I was never underwent any medical examination (even if there was a specific request of the judge for the preliminary investigations, Basilone), stated that I am under treatment (with what?) for my thyroid lymph node (which has never been checked here) and that I had a serious form of bronchopneumonia and in case of need they would have provided to help me!
     On Friday (July 3rd), in the afternoon, a big storm arrived on Pavia with gusts of wind, not making time to close the window, the wind closed the blindo [armored door] of my cell, here it often happens when there is a lot of wind… I must point out that the bells to call the guards do not work, you just have to scream! In this case the working prisoner warned the guard on duty, telling him that I was «closed», I heard it from my cell… I haven’t called a guard since I’ve been locked in this sewer, their presence irritates me… Waiting that they would have deigned to reopen the armored door as for everyone in the section, I take care of something else in the cell, knowing that around 9:00 p.m. they would have passed by anyway with the nurse who distributes psycho-pharmaceuticals… at about 8:30 p.m. the zealous guard opens the spyhole of the armored door and I immediately tell him to open the door like all the others, that I am very agitated and I can’t breathe! He answers with a «Yes» and then disappears! Around midnight, when the guards make the count and changed shifts… I don’t know what happened, I don’t remember anything, I found myself on the floor full of slime with 4-5 guards who kept calling me, someone said that maybe I was dead!
     They never called the doctor, nor the nurse, I have never been examined even under these circumstances… I have long ago understood why I was placed in this section of this prison! At about 10:30 a.m. (July 4th, 2020) I was called to the infirmary, after having informed the nurse of my illness and about losing consciousness during the night. In front of the doctor on duty I say what happened during the night: there is the nurse and a «graduated» guard who attends the conversation; while he take the parameters I manifest to the doctor a strong pain in my forehead for the blow taken with the fall, the nurse tells me that there’s nothing visible, and in explaining that the guards would come at midnight, when I was lying on the floor, that is how I was when they found me the guards on duty, maybe now they could have made sure of my health! At this point the guard present intervenes and with a threatening tone he tells me that «I talk too much» and that I have to talk only about medicines!, the doctor on duty and the nurse (who seems to be the wife of a guard) are present, they remain impassive! I asked for the medical records, let’s see if they bring them to me! I hope this letter gets to you and doesn’t disappear!
       I ask you to be involved with me against the placement in this section and in this jail!
      Send this letter as many people and websites as possible!
     Prison kills!
      I rise with my head up high, vomiting all my hatred against the placement in this section!
      Freedom for the comrades of Rome!

Beppe

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Destroy The Prisons.

       A little time ago I posted two articles about the Turkish state looking the other way while two prisoners died from the effects of hunger strike. I said at the time that the Turkish state is not alone in this barbaric inhumanity of looking the other way while a prisoner in their cages dies.

     This report is of another callous indifference to another human's suffering and their unmoved inhumanity as that human dies. This time the murder is in Naples, but the name or location makes no difference,  these barbaric acts are part and parcel of the states toolkit for repression and control of the population. Freedom can never flower in a society that has prisons as part of its control mechanism. The following is from Anarchists Worldwide.

      Our friend Andreas is dying… (July 2, 2020)
        … and everyone is watching. What has been happening to Andreas in jail in Naples for at least a year is a result that both the German and the Italian state are responsible for. In spite of his poor health, Andreas is denied adequate medical care despite promises to the contrary by the hospital management. He is brought to a hospital every hour for questionable or senseless examinations and then back to prison.
        Andreas was diagnosed with cancer at least a year ago, it spread all over his body and he had unspeakable pain. He can hardly walk anymore, just eat more baby food, he loses blood and is often unconscious for days. His Italian lawyer is fighting at all levels, but transfer to house arrest has now been refused.
         Andreas is doing very badly, suicide seems to be the only way out for him in the current situation.
       Both the Italian and the German state know Andreas’ state of health. Nobody lifts a finger, fundamental human rights do not seem to apply to prisoners. What happens here is murder. And every suicide in jail is nothing else, because behind bars there are no free decisions.

We cannot stand by, although we are infinitely sad and angry and have no ideas what to do.

Continue reading →

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Migrants & Solidarity.

      Migrant centres, camps or call them what you will, prisons would probably be a more accurate name, go hand in hand with violence, intimidation, humiliation and denial of human rights. This is easily verified by a little research into reports from those detained. Since these degrading institutions are ordered, created and organised by the state, what this highlights is another strand of the states vindictive, callous, psychopathic,  violent, racist structure. As another display of the state's callous brutality, in most cases it hands these institutions over to private corporations to run them at a profit, making money from human degradation and misery, operated by the low life that calls this "a job". It is an inhumane society that treats those fleeing war, famine, deprivation and death in such a threatening and vicious manner. A society that doesn't have compassion for all human life is a flawed and failed society. Police brutality on the outside, state violence on the inside, two sides of the same coin, are the pillars of a this society, built on plunder, privilege, exploitation, intimidation and control.

The following from Anarchists Worldwide:

        Recently it became publicly known that systematic violence is perpetrated against refugees in the federal asylum camp in Basel (Switzerland). Obviously this violence is neither an isolated case nor is it limited to the asylum camps in Switzerland.

       This violence is systematic and the system has names. Those responsible are internationally represented and operate in many different places. Let’s name them and show them that their actions bear consequences.

The spread of the coronavirus has highlighted the violence of the European migration regime – both at the EU external border as well as in local asylum camps and prisons.

        This call wants to continue the intensified struggles against it.

What are federal asylum camps?

     Since the spring of 2019, asylum seekers in Switzerland are being administered in so-called federal asylum centres. The accelerated asylum procedures related to the erection of these new structures do not result in fairer procedures for most of the persons affected, but in faster deportation. The federal asylum camps are often geographically isolated. The type of construction, the location, as well as the rules imposed are reminding of prisons and other institutions that deprive people of their freedom. They are contributing to the racist constructs of the nation state and borders.

Whether the Swiss federal asylum centres, the German anchor centres, the CIE (Centro di Identificazione ed Espulsione/ Centro de Internamiento de Extranjeros) or the French CPA (Centre de Premier Accueil): they are all part of the European migration regime, which categorises, isolates and deports people by force and coercion.

      For the maintenance of these camp structures, various sectors must be covered. The include, for example, construction, administration, delivery of food, transportation, servicing, surveillance and security services.

All these tasks are entrusted to companies that profit financially from the precarious situation of people in search of asylum.

What is happening is Basel?

      Reports from witnesses show that in the federal asylum camp in Basel people from the Maghreb are deliberately harassed, abused, beaten and in some cases seriously injured by employees of the Security AG. The disciplinary measures referred to by Securitas as “self-defence” often end in hospital for those persons affected.

        Securitas is mandated and gets covered by the camp operator ORS and the SEM (State Secretariat for Migration): Those persons affected by the mistreatment are being blamed for any incidents. The injuries inflicted by Securitas employees are racist portrayed in the official reports as self-inflicted injuries by “aggressive North Africans”.

     The federal asylum camp in Basel is located directly next to the (deportation-) prison “Bässlergut”. Both in the prison and in the camp, there was and still is resistance from detainees. Actions and attacks against these institutions also take place outside the walls.

Further info:

        Documentation brochure of the Securitas violence in Basel (in German): https://3rgg.ch/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/3RGG_Immer-ein-Grund-uns-zu-schlagen_2020-1.pdf

   Information and past actions concerning the Bässlergut (in German): https://barrikade.info/tag/74

On the security business

       In Switzerland, Securitas AG is mainly responsible for “security and order services” in the federal asylum camps. Protectas is also deployed in the camps. Protectas is the Swiss version of the internationally active Securitas Group (logo with the three red dots), which has nothing to do with Securitas AG in Switzerland (eye logo).

There are many other companies that offer these services and thus carry out the direct oppression and control of people through psychological and physical violence.

On the “Organization for Regie and Special Projects (ORS)”

       In Switzerland, ORS has a near monopoly in the management of asylum camps. It operates internationally in Italy, Germany, Austria and Spain (under development) and has an EU office in Belgium.

ORS Service GmbH
Muthgasse 36
AT-1190 Wien
+43 (0)1 8906666-808
info@orsservice.at www.orsservice.at
www.orsintegration.at

ORS Deutschland GmbH
Albert-Schweitzer-Str. 16
D-78052 Villingen-Schwenningen
+49 (0)7721 697 18 40
info@orsdeutschland.de

ORS Deutschland GmbH
Güterhallenstrasse 4
D-79106 Freiburg
Tel. +49 (0)761 769 931 20
info@orsdeutschland.de

ORS S.r.l.
Piazza Annibaliano 18
I-00198 Roma
Italia
info@ors-italia.com www.ors-italia.com

ORS Group
14b Rue de la Science
1040 Bruxelles
Belgium
info@ors-group.eu www.ors-group.eu

Further addresses (in Switzerland) of responsible companies can be found in the call at https://barrikade.info/article/3517

++++ This is a call! ++++

For solidarity beyond national borders. Let’s fight together against the Fortress Europe and all its pillars!

 Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk

Quiet Cruelty.

       Some people might say that I go on about prisons, but I probably do. They are massive institutions of human torture, cruelty and violence, sitting quietly in every city in the world and most people pass them by without much of a thought of what goes on behind those walls, a stain of our humanity. "Man's inhumanity to man" no sexism intend, it is a well know saying to highlight how some of us treat our fellow beings, is no better portrayed than in the state's prison system. Institutions where vindictive and arbitrary actions are the norm, and rules and laws are broken on a whim, all in an attempt to break the incarcerated into a submissive, member of their system.
     All of this is carried out by people in structures that they try to make you believe that they are doing it to protect you and I. However it is a strange human who accepts that locking up other humans under these conditions is something to be done voluntarily and for money.
    We could fill a large library with pages of this type of inhumane treatment handed out in these institutions, in country after country, on a daily basis. No matter the arguments put forward, their is no rational justification in a civilised society for these institutions to exist. They are simply institutions for the repression of dissent, a place where all means are used to bring to submission those who would dare oppose this system of inequality, injustice and greed. Even although, no matter where you look, they are over crowded, unhygienic and lacking in decent health care facilities, but thanks to the human spirit and desire for freedom and justice this doesn't always work.
      This is just another incident from one country, but it could be anywhere you care to drop a pin on a map.

      The following from 325: 

From the South isolation section of the Pagliarelli prison in Palermo
        We are two prisoners who have been thrown into the isolation section “South” of the Pagliarelli prison (in Palermo) without any judicial measure to justify it. We are Carmine Lanzetta (AS3 [detained in “High Surveillance 3” circuit]) from January in total continuous isolation started with the disciplinary isolation for 10 days that still continues, and Davide Delogu, Sardinian anarchist, from February in continuous isolation for reasons of order and security for which we should not do more than 15 days, held hostage with the revenge of total isolation.
       Both of us do not bow to the annihilation in which our torturers would have us and fight against the hellish misery of this infamous section to be closed, with the consequent transfer. In half of the section there are the two of us in cells with nothing inside, far from each other. In the other half they put the prisoners in precautionary quarantine and we all use the same shower and the same phone. So we became their guinea pigs. Someone even before us tried to make a complaint to the prosecutor and complain to the magistrate, but these instances are blocked or made to disappear. There is no response to our lawyers’ complaint send via PEC e-mail either; prison administration taking advantage of the emergency of Covid-19 so the lawyers can’t enter the prison to visit us. We are in a section of isolation that had been abolished since 2000 because of the inhumanity embodied there and which is still being put in place. The cells have nothing inside, are deprived of everything: TV, radio, bathroom door, window, rags, brooms and cleaning sticks, hot water with a mini sink always plugged, a walking space that is a cubicle without a bathroom, but there’s no shortage of excrement of any kind, something we don’t dwell on. They inflict all kinds of abuse without being able to subjugate us, however, does not change the antiphon. Those who hold power in this prison are dangerous people, starting with commander Rizzo who feels omnipotent and all the hierarchs who continue with their harassment, like the deputy director who inflicts disciplinary isolation with natural ease, even though he knows in what non-human conditions he leads people. And the director Francesca Vezzana is co-responsible for all this. All this must end and we demand the closure of this section of isolation “South” and our transfer to another prison.
      Therefore, from today, May 14th, 2020, we begin the food strike, refusing to go to the cubicles and unworthy walking spaces, trying to beat the bars every day for 20-30 minutes.
      Let’s start the strike permanently, for now let’s avoid the hunger and thirst strike in order to keep us strong for when we will lead more incisive forms of struggle, since by limiting ourselves to these we won’t go very far, so that we can face the squadrette [groups of guards specialized in beating and massacre prisoners] that abound here, to get what we want until the end.

 Updates will follow.

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk