Angola 3 News: Malik Rahim

Showing posts with label Malik Rahim. Show all posts

Tuesday, February 19, 2019

A3 Newsletter: So Much to Celebrate

(PHOTO: Guests of King and Kenyatta's home-warming last month. From left to right, General Rico, Deidre, Donna, Robert, Angela, Albert, Gwendolyn and Malik.)

A3 Newsletter: So Much to Celebrate

Happy Anniversary!

At long, long, long last...

From 1998 to 2016, we sent a newsletter annually commemorating another year that King, Herman and Albert remained in prison. It is such a great joy to be able to commemorate their freedom.

Today is the anniversary of Albert's 2016 release (shown in the photo above as he drove away from the prison gates). This is Albert's third year out here in the so called free world...the third year he can see the sky, go where he wants to go and do what he wants to do. After 44 years it seems like a miracle every time we talk on the phone or we book another trip to Europe or elsewhere for him to give a presentation. We're so excited to share the news of Albert's long awaited book, Solitary, which will be released on March 5 by Grove Atlantic Press. The book tour schedule is featured below and you can visit the Grove Atlantic website for more information.

The top of the publisher's website features links to several different booksellers from whom you can purchase Albert's book, including Indie Bound, Amazon, and Barnes & Noble.

This month also marked the 18th anniversary of Robert King's Feb. 8, 2001 release from Angola (shown in the photo above). True to his word when he was released, King has been free of Angola, but Angola and all prisons will never be free of his critical efforts. King and his partner Kenyatta presided over a rousing home-warming last month. See the photo at the top of the page!

To cap all this off, Malik Rahim's special awards evening occurred last month as well and we're happy to share some of the accolades and images from this memorable event that honored one of the founders of the Angola 3 effort.

--For more on the three year anniversary of Albert's release, visit the compilation of news articles from three years ago today, as well as the many interviews with Albert in the days that followed. If you have not yet done so, also be sure to watch our interview with Albert conducted in May, 2016, just a few months after his release.

A3 Newsletter: Why Are We Not Surprised?

Why are we not surprised that children are ripped from their immigrant parents' arms? Could it be because this has been happening for decades in U.S. jails and prisons - not to mention, with increasing frequency as the population of women prisoners grows?

Please read the article below from the July issue of the Coalition for Prisoners' Rights Newsletter, entitled "Cries of Children Echo Thru Years." The numbers cited by the newsletter, detailing the numbers of mothers and their children affected by mass incarceration, are truly staggering.

There are also cases like Veronza Bowers, Ed Poindexter of the Omaha 2 and Laverne Dejohnette, where it seems no amount of cruel and unusual treatment seems to satisfy our criminal injustice system's thirst for extreme punishment. We hope Angola 3 supporters will read these articles, sign petitions and re-commit to furthering their efforts to change the rotten systems that are in place.

One bright spot in the midst of so much bad news is the release of Debbie Africa of the Move 9. It was a joy to behold seeing Debbie with her son Mike Jr., who was torn from his mother following his birth in prison! We continue to push for the freedom for the remaining six of the Move 9, who have been repeatedly denied parole since they first became eligible in 2008. So much work left to be done!

For all of you who helped Malik Rahim raise funds for his taxes- here's a short video of the physical fundraiser in New Orleans.

Albert Woodfox Featured at Upcoming VOTE Workshops
--Events seeking participation from survivors of solitary confinement

A3 Newsletter: Angola 3 Spring Update

A3 Newsletter, March 28, 2018:
Where Common Ground Began
--Help Malik Save Lubertha's Home

Featured below is a fundraising appeal from longtime Angola 3 supporter and former Black Panther Malik Rahim, who is shown in the photo above, alongside Robert King and Albert Woodfox.

The Angola 3 have long been involved with and supported Malik in his efforts with Common Ground and multiple other projects. We hope that our supporters will do what they can to assist Malik in saving his motherʻs home, the very home that was the initial base for Common Ground. Please take a moment to watch the video Malik has put together and help if you can.

We also want to remind you that Albert and Robert will be speaking in Los Angeles, California on April 7 at The Main and on April 9 at the Mark Taper Auditorium - Central Library. The April 7 event, moderated by artist and longtime A3 supporter Rigo 23, will occur inside the exhibition 'Rigo 23: Ripples Become Waves,' which takes its title from a quote by Robert King: "You throw pebbles into a pond, you get ripples; ripples become waves; the waves can become a tsunami." A fitting metaphor for the decades-long A3 struggle.

A Message from Malik Rahim

(Watch Malik's video and donate here.)

Almost 13 years ago, days after Hurricane Katrina, Mary Ratcliff of the Bay View News Paper called me for an interview which later was entitled "This is Criminal." First, this article exposed the fact that over 150,000 people (the vast majority being Black) in the City of New Orleans were abandoned and offered no relief. Second, it launched the founding of one of this nation's greatest relief efforts, the Common Ground Collective. Through this collective, Common Ground Relief and Common Ground Health Clinic were organized. Together, we served over a 1/2 Million people in 19 affected parishes in Louisiana as well as counties in both Mississippi and Alabama. We provided outreach assistance to displaced residents in over 20 states.

All three organizations were founded at the home of my late Mother (Lubertha and step Father Irwin Johnson). I also housed over 200 of the early volunteers while serving as their first distribution center. Over 4,000 people received aid at my late mother's home. And it was from that home on Atlantic Ave, just weeks after Hurricane Katrina when we were hit by another hurricane, Rita. These early volunteers, working from my family home, cleaned hundreds of storm drains, preventing Algiers (which later became the community that the City of New Orleans was able to use to begin it's recovery efforts) from flooding. Never has the City of New Orleans, State of Louisiana nor this nation acknowledged the role and sacrifice those who volunteered with these organizations played in the aftermath of both hurricanes.

Now, in this New Orleans' 300th year anniversary, the city is attempting to sell my family home for back taxes. Taxes I will pay, for I truly believe there are enough grateful people in New Orleans to help me raise $ 31,000, to save a home if renovated would be valued over $200,000. But as these taxes are paid, I will be filing a civil right's law suit against the City of New Orleans, State of Louisiana and U.S. Federal Government, declaring our civil rights were violated, that I was targeted for being a member of the Black Panther Party and for the work I did to free the Angola 3 (three men who spent a combine total of 114 years in solitary confinement). But most of all, for exposing the injustice infected in my community in the aftermath of these hurricanes.

Please support my effort by not only making a contribution to save my home but calling for city, state, and congressional hearing on this civil action. Remember this can happen again if we fail to act.

Thanking you in advance for your support.
In the struggle for environmental Peace & Justice

Malik Rahim

Monday, April 14, 2014

Solitary Confinement Exhibition Plants Seed for Advocacy Among SULC Student Body

Solitary Confinement Exhibition Plants Seed for Advocacy Among SULC Student Body

Written for Angola 3 News by Arisa A. Banks

(3L Class Representative; Symposium Editor, Journal of Race, Gender, & Poverty)

The seed for advocacy was planted among the student body stirred by the Solitary Confinement Exhibition, during 2014 Law Week activities at the Southern University Law Center in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Angola 3 Basics

(Download a flyer version of this fact sheet here.)

In 1972, deep in rural Louisiana, three young black men were silenced for trying to expose continued segregation, systematic corruption, and horrific abuse in the biggest prison in the US, an 18,000 acre former slave plantation called Angola.

Peaceful, non-violent protest in the form of hunger and work strikes organized by inmates caught the attention of Louisiana’s elected leaders and local media in the early 1970s. They soon called for investigations into a host of unconstitutional and extraordinarily inhumane practices commonplace in what was then the “bloodiest prison in the South.” Eager to put an end to outside scrutiny, prison officials began punishing inmates they saw as troublemakers.

At the height of this unprecedented institutional chaos, Herman Wallace, Albert Woodfox, and Robert King were charged with murders they did not commit and thrown into 6x9 foot solitary cells where they remained for decades.

Their struggle for justice continued until Robert was released in 2001, Herman in 2013, and Albert in 2016.

Despite a number of reforms achieved in the mid-70s, many officials repeatedly ignored both evidence of misconduct, and of innocence.

The State’s case was riddled with inconsistencies, obfuscations, and missteps. A bloody print at the murder scene did not match Herman, Albert or anyone charged with the crime and was never compared with the limited number of other prisoners who had access to the dormitory on the day of the murder. In 2008, NPR asked Louisiana Attorney General Buddy Caldwell why the state refused to test the print. "A fingerprint can come from anywhere," Caldwell explained. "We're not going to be fooled by that."

Potentially exculpatory DNA evidence was “lost” by prison officials—including fingernail scrapings from the victim and barely visible “specks” of blood on clothing alleged to have been worn by Albert.

Both Herman and Albert had multiple alibi witnesses with nothing to gain who testified they were far away from the scene when the murder occurred.

In contrast, several State witnesses lied under oath about rewards for their testimony. The prosecution’s star witness Hezekiah Brown told the jury: “Nobody promised me nothing.” But new evidence showed Hezekiah, a convicted serial rapist serving life, agreed to testify only in exchange for a pardon, a weekly carton of cigarettes, TV, birthday cakes, and other luxuries.

“Hezekiah was one you could put words in his mouth,” the Warden reminisced chillingly in an interview about the case years later.

Notably, Teenie Rogers, the widow of the victim, prison guard Brent Miller, after reviewing the evidence believed Herman and Albert’s trials were unfair, expressed grave doubts about their guilt, and called upon officials to find the real killer. "“Each time I look at the evidence in this case, I remember there is no proof that the men charged with Brent’s death are the ones who actually killed him. It’s easy to get caught up in vengeance and anger, but when I look at the facts, they just do not add up,” said Rogers in 2013.

Herman’s conviction was finally overturned in October 2013 by a Federal Judge. Although his trial was riddled with evidence of prosecutorial misconduct and other constitutional violations, it was the systematic exclusion of women from his jury in violation of the 14th Amendment that freed him. Unfortunately he was released in the late stages of advanced liver cancer and only experienced 3 days of freedom. Sadly for Herman, justice delayed was justice denied.

Albert’s conviction was overturned three times by judges citing racial discrimination, prosecutorial misconduct, inadequate defense, and suppression of exculpatory evidence. While the case worked its way through endless appeals, Louisiana officials refused to release Albert from solitary, even when no longer convicted of the crime, because “there’s been no rehabilitation” from “practicing Black Pantherism.”4

In June 2015, a Federal Judge courageously ordered Albert's immediate release and barred a retrial stressing the “Court's lack of confidence in the State to provide a fair third trial." This extraordinary remedy was also frozen pending yet another series of appeals.

Finally, Albert was released in February of 2016, 43 years and 10 months after first being put in isolation for a crime he didn’t commit.

Louisiana today has the highest incarceration rate in the US—thus the highest in the world.

Three-fourths of the 5,000+ prisoners at Angola are African American. And due to some of the harshest sentencing practices in the nation, 97% will die there.

Reminiscent of a bygone era, inmates still harvest cotton, corn and wheat for 4 to 20 cents an hour under the watchful eye of armed guards on horseback.

We believe that only by openly examining the failures and inequities of the criminal justice system in America can we restore integrity to that system.

We must not wait.

We can make a difference.

As the A3 did years before, now is the time to challenge injustice and demand that the innocent and wrongfully incarcerated be freed.

Cruel and Unusual Punishment

In 2000, Herman, Albert and Robert filed a civil lawsuit challenging the inhumane and increasingly pervasive practice of long-term solitary confinement. Magistrate Judge Dalby described their decades of isolation as “so far beyond the pale” she could not find “anything even remotely comparable in the annals of American jurisprudence.” Over the course of 16 years, this seminal case detailed unconstitutionally cruel and unusual treatment and systematic due process violations at the hands of Louisiana officials and inspired worldwide action to end long term solitary.