Prison Movement: Suicide- the new death sentence

I urge everyone to read and take much needed action...

C. AREY
P.O Box 660
Binghamton, NY 13905-0660
cfareyx3@aol.com

October 25, 2006

After numerous letters to media, state officials and civil rights organizations, I have yet to get a response indicating that any action has been taken to investigate or publicize the daily abuse and torture occurring the Polunksy Unit in Livingston, Texas. A time has come that we, the family and friends of inmates, anti-death penalty groups and inmates housed at this unit, are crying out for your help. This issue gone ignored, swept under the rug for too long.
Recently I sent a letter to the Texas Dept. of Criminal Justice indicating what inmates at this unit describe as dehumanizing acts of excessive force. Gabriel Gonzalez, an inmate at Polunksy says, “The prisoners here release bouts of displeasure through shouts, screams, gnashing of teeth, and sounds so foreign one wonders if it’s a sign of masculinity or insanity? “ Excessive gassings, beatings, isolation, sensory deprivation, deplorable living conditions and invasion of mail privileges are just a few of the cruel and inhumane actions occurring at Polunsky. We urge you to PLEASE, take action, PLEASE expose this hidden world of that exists behind prison walls. The Texas Dept. of Criminal Justice replies to my letter stating how well they do their job, only hiring competent staff, and taking every measure to ensure safety for inmates and staff. The next day an inmate on death row, killed himself hours away from his state funded execution. Writing on the wall, “I didn’t do it” with his own blood“. The inmate was on death watch, being monitored every 15 minutes. How could this happen if the Texas DOC was doing their job as well as they claim? I will include the previous letter I have sent to media and officials, only to be ignored. Several inmates on death row at Polunksy are participating in a hunger strike to protest the conditions and abuse. The hunger strikers’ demands include better meals, cell maintenance, adequate health care and proper hygienic and laundry necessities. They are also calling for a halt to the excessive punitive measures used against death row prisoners, especially those making protests. Inmates on hunger strike are: Gabriel Gonzalez, Kenneth Foster, Steve Woods, Rob Will, Reginald Blanton and Da’mon Simpson.
As I mentioned this is yet another attempt to seek the help of the media, we desperately need your help. In 1980 Dan Rather from CBS 60 Minutes, interviewed Johnny Fort, an inmate at Union Correction facility, otherwise known as the “The Rock”. This interview led to a 3 year investigation into the lies, deception and corruption of the Florida DOC. This interview also led to the murder trial and the ultimate destruction of “The Rock” This one interview sent the employees of the Florida DOC running to cover their blood trail. The same can be done now with Texas DOC. To learn more about the conditions, the inmates involved, and what these inmates are saying go to www.drive.org, or email me at cfaeyx3@aol.com

Thank you.

Carmen Arey

Previous letter sent to media and officials:
C. AREY
P.O Box 660
Binghamton, NY 13905-0660
cfareyx3@aol.com

Dear Media:

One of the biggest denials of human rights is occurring on a daily basis in the United States. This denial of human rights is causing individuals to lose touch with their own humanity and killing them mentally and physically, isolated in tiny cages and subjected to constant acts of violence that have become as routine as breathing. Suicides, depression, gassing (sometimes to the point of suffocation), physical beatings that can cause such unbearable pain on levels one cannot imagine, and shouting that becomes piercing screams.
Imagine … being isolated 23 hours a day, no physical contact even for visits, random and unnecessary degrading strip searches where guards mock and ridicule, cell temperatures that are freezing in the winter, scorching in the summer and living in cages that leak badly when it rains.
Imagine …lack of medical care resulting in deaths of those who desperately needed it and countless inhumane and sub-human conditions.
Imagine … complete isolation resulting in Sensory Deprivation, the break down and loss of one’s senses (touch, taste, hearing, sight, and smell), resulting in hallucinations, depression, anxiety, bizarre thoughts and antisocial behavior. Sensory Deprivation has been used for psychological experiments, torture or punishment.
The Irish Government on behalf of men who had been subjected to Sensory Deprivation took a case to the European Commission on Human Rights (Ireland v. United Kingdom, 1976 Y.B. Eur. Conv. on Hum. Rts. 512, 748, 788-94 (Eur. Comm’n of Hum. Rts.)). The Commission stated that it "considered the combined use of the five methods to amount to torture"#. This consideration was overturned on appeal. In 1978 in the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) trial "Ireland v. the United Kingdom" ruled that the five techniques "did not occasion suffering of the particular intensity and cruelty implied by the word torture ... [but] amounted to a practice of inhuman and degrading treatment", in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights.
In 1986 United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture listed "sensory deprivation" among the techniques constituting torture. Another group, such as the Boston Center for Refugee Health and Human Rights, for example, lists sensory deprivation as a type of "mental torture"#.
This sounds like treatment that we have had of which occurred at Guantanamo Bay and other housing units for terrorist suspects. But this, of which I speak, is occurring now in the United States, in Livingston, Texas..
From the words of an inmate at the Polunsky Unit in Livingston, Texas, whom I will not name to protect him from retaliation, “ I cannot describe what goes on here except that the souls of many men here are gone; though physically alive, they are not living. Some men sink into a depression and never recover. Others become more aggressive like a tortured, beaten and starved lion. What will happen when that lion is released from his cage?”
He goes further to say, “Not long ago another man was gassed and beaten beyond recognition, all while handcuffed and shackled. The administering guards laughed as they bragged about who did the most damage. All of this “excessive force” inflicted on a man who was helpless and otherwise harmless. THIS IS BARBARIC AND MUST BE STOPPED.” The inmates on death row at the Polunsky Unit in Texas have tried to reach out for help by writing to friends and family with desperate hopes that this will get the attention of someone, anyone with the authority to stop this abuse of power.
“The prisoners here release bouts of displeasure through shouts, screams, gnashing of teeth, and sounds so foreign one wonders if it’s a sign of masculinity or insanity? “ In attempts to combat these issues of abuse and deplorable living conditions, some inmates at the Polunsky Unit along with a little help from outsiders have organized a vanguard. “Death Row Inner Communalist Vanguard Engagement” (DRIVE). The objective of “DRIVE” is to unite the Death Row community to stand in solidarity against inhumane and atrocious conditions that brutally rape our Human Rights, as well as protesting the gross ritual of human sacrifice called the Death Penalty. The inmates who have been active with this vanguard have been subjected to beatings, excessive gassings with riot control gas, stripped and left naked in freezing cells for 72 hours at a time, given less food rations, visitation denials (legal, media and personal visits), retaliatory shakedowns, property seizures, denied meals, showers, recreation and mail has been maliciously scrutinized or thrown away. One inmate says, “What goes on here is like a sick experiment to see if the will and spirits of men can be broken, which is why the system is so bent on trying to quiet and suppress our movement. We’re exposing the truth about this oppressive/ repressive system”
We do not wish to bring attention to this matter to endanger these inmates any further. Our wish and desperate plea is to bring attention to the issues of violation of human rights, physical and mental abuse, abuse of power, and unnecessary occurrences of strip searches and degrading of inmates. We urge you to investigate this matter, investigate the living conditions and disciplinary actions of inmates of the Polunsky Unit in Livingston Texas. Interview the inmates, judge for yourself what is morally right and wrong. Please help put a stop to the abusive actions of correctional officers and staff at this unit.

Sincerely,

Concerned Citizens