Solitary Confinement

Hunger Strike logo2

On December 28, AFSC Regional Director Laura Magnani and another member of the “mediation team” met with California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) Undersecretary Terri McDonald to discuss CDCR progress on changing policies and procedures for gang validation into the SHUs (security housing units).  In that meeting, Undersecretary McDonald stated the following points.

Hunger Striker Logo

This logo was developed by the hunger strikers in Pelican Bay State Penitentiary.

[Updated] On September 26, thousands of California prisoners inside and outside the state resumed their hunger strike to protest the conditions of solitary confinement.   The strike was suspended after three weeks in July to give officials time they said they needed to respond to prisoner demands. 

Talamantez June2011

Prison activist Luis Talamantez at SF City Hall rally

AFSC Healing Justice Program is supporting a hunger strike, commencing July 1, called by prisoners at California's infamous Pelican Bay State Prison.  Their five demands: 

(1) End "group punishment" -- lock-downs, most typically -- of entire yards or of all prisoners of an ethnic category -- for violations of prison rules by one prisoner, or a few

(2) End State-imposed gang labels, from which a labeled prisoner can escape only by "debriefing," i.e., testifying against others in the alleged gang