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Anarchist Black Cross
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"You’re in there for us, we’re out here for you."
News about incarcerated anarchists. Resources for prisoner support.
Prisoner Support and Solidarity
Post news about individual incarcerated people by including an all-caps tag of the [three-letter country code] at the start of the post and the person's name in bold somewhere in the title to make searching the community easier.
Its a good idea to include information about what organizations are sponsoring them, what forms of solidarity they've requested, and how to send them mail.
There's a prisoner database at Prisoner Solidarity and a list from Solidarity International that are useful for looking up people to correspond with.
Zines
Posts about zines and prison literature to share with friends or mail to prisoners should begin with the tag [Zine], and should link to a page with literature in printable document format or the PDF file itself.
Posts using the tag [Info] are reserved for moderators.
Also on Lemmy
News about prisoner support groups should be posted in [email protected]
For non-prisoner specific organizing and abolition see [email protected]
Polish anarchist prisoner solidarity news: [email protected]
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
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From Federation of Anarchism Era:
The situation for Warisheh Moradi, a Woman Rights Activist in Kurdistan, is dangerous. She has been subjected to forced disappearance since August 1, 2023, near the Kurdish city of Sanandaj in the northwest of the country by the security forces of the ruling fascist Shia Islamic state in Iran. And so far there is no news of her hiding place.
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Our companion Benni has been in custody in the Leipzig JVA since January 5th. He is accused of having thrown an incendiary device at the USK Dachau thugs on Day X in Leipzig, during the protests in response to the verdict in the Antifa-Ost trial. In addition to the accusation, which has been spread thousands of times, of a particularly serious case of breach of the peace for simply taking part in the demonstration, he is accused of attempted murder.
The investigation and the arrest warrant became known on November 23rd, 2023, when the cops once again carried out a large-scale raid against the autonomous scene in Leipzig and tried in vain to kidnap him from a court case regarding the LuWi-71 occupation using a masked MEK. Benni, the comrade condemned to pre-trial detention, did not appear in court that day, which turned out to be a great stroke of luck. He turned himself in on January 5, 2024. But we can't talk about voluntary behavior here, but rather about the bitter realization that freedom ends as soon as your name appears on the detention order. Money is needed for legal fees, life behind bars and solidarity work!
Donation account:
Account holder: Rote Hilfe Leipzig
IBAN: DE88 4306 0967 4007 2383 05
Keyword: Free Benni
Donations can also be dropped off every Tuesday at 7 p.m. at the Open Anarchist Network Leipzig on E125 (https://offeneanarchistischevernetzungleipzig.blackblogs.org/uber-uns/).
You can reach the solidarity group at: free_benni(at)riseup.net.
Freedom, happiness and strength for those in hiding! Love and trust to all antifascists!
Freedom for Benni!
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[MEX] We celebrate the freedom of comrade Manuel Gómez Vázquez, EZLN Support Base
(www.frayba.org.mx)
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Kristina Cherenkova, born on 23 April 1990, graduated from the University of Francisk Skaryna in Gomel as an English language teacher. She was teaching English at a school in Rechitsa and at this time she met her future husband.
After marriage, she moved from Rechitsa to Mozyr, where she decided to open her own business. She started decorating weddings and gave people joy and good mood. Together with her husband, she travelled extensively in Belarus and Ukraine.
Kristina was also the vocalist of the punk rock band VIKT(A)R xOi, which managed to record several tracks, but when she was detained, the police searched all the members of the band and took away their equipment. Nevertheless, the recording of Kristina’s vocals survived; the other instruments had to be re-recorded.
Political views
Kristina has always been an advocate of equality, she is a well-known activist in the anti-fascist milieu of Mozyr and attributes herself to the “Skinheads Against Racial Superstition” movement.
She has also actively spoken out against the actions of the Belarusian state, repression, and police violence. She had a popular Instagram profile, where she wrote about current political events (the posts on her profile were later recognized as “extremist materials”).
After the protests began and political repression intensified, her parents persuaded Kristina and her husband to leave the country, but they refused. They said that “someone has to stay”, that “we are in our own country”.
The story of the detention and the case
Back in August 2020, Kristina and her husband were detained in the street. The police stopped their car but eventually Kristina was released without trial.
On 22 March 2022, a dozen anti-fascists, members of various counter-culture music groups, were searched and detained in Mozyr. Five people ended up serving short time in jail, while criminal proceedings were initiated against Kristina and her friend Anna Pyshnik.
Kristina was detained together with her husband. Early in the morning the law enforcers started breaking down the doors, and as soon as Kristina’s husband opened the door they started beating him.
Some of the law enforcers ran into the room of Kristina, who did not understand what was happening. They started beating her before she could even get out of bed. The whole thing was filmed on video.
Later, when she was transferred to the pre-trial detention facility, a doctor examined her and documented the bruises from the beatings.
Three days later, Kristina’s husband was released and she was charged for her anti-military and anti-police posts on Instagram.
During the investigation, Kristina Cherenkova’s Instagram page was found to be “extremist materials” – the trial was initiated in court by the police. “I don’t expect anything good,” Christina conveyed on this occasion in her letter.
Verdict
On 10 November Gomel Regional Court started the hearing of the criminal case against Kristina. According to the results of the examination, announced in court, her posts contain no calls to violent actions, but they contain a negative assessment of the police officers. On November 16, 2022 Judge Aleksei Glyshchankov found the young woman guilty and sentenced her to two and a half years of imprisonment.
Conditions of detention
In prison, Kristina was registered as “prone to extremism”.
Kristina, like many other political prisoners, has difficulties with correspondence. While letters from relatives somehow get through, news from friends and acquaintances hardly ever arrives.
From time to time Kristina is transferred from cell to cell. She jokes that she has managed to get acquainted with all the political prisoners who are women during her detention.
Relatives
Kristina’s mother, her husband, her father-in-law and mother-in-law who had to leave Belarus, and her relatives are waiting for her outside. Her friends have launched a solidarity campaign with Kristina on Instagram, talking about how she is doing in prison and sending messages and pictures from her.
Here’s what Kristina’s mother-in-law has to say:
The first days were very difficult. I stayed in touch with Kristina’s mum all the time – she was all alone, she couldn’t sleep, she needed support. It helped a lot that my son was stoic, maybe his state passed on to us. It also helped us to be strong because there are many people like Kristina. There are smart, talented people and mothers of many children, young and old.
In one of her letters Kristina writes:
Keep your fingers crossed for me! Your support is much needed right now! Hugs to all.
Sponsored by ABC Belarus - RU
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Mumia is an award-winning journalist and was one of the founders of the Black Panther Party chapter in Philadelphia, PA. He was a vocal supporter of the MOVE organization and has struggled for justice and human rights for people of color since he was at least 14 years old- the age when he joined the Party. He left the party to become a radio journalist where he made waves defending the rights of black and brown people. In 1981, he was elected president of the Association of Black Journalists Philadelphia Chapter.
Arrest
On December 9, 1981, Mumia, who moonlighted by driving a taxi, happened upon police who were beating his brother. During the melee, a police officer was shot and killed.
Trial
The prosecutor, Joseph McGill, presented a story that has Mumia running behind the officer and shooting him in the back. He then claimed that the officer turned around and pulled his weapon shooting Mumia in the chest. McGill ends the story by saying the officer fell to the ground where Mumia stood over him and unloaded on him, missing with four shots but hitting him once between the eyes. McGill also claimed that Mumia confessed to the shooting later on in police custody.
Conflicting Evidence
None of the physical evidence supports the prosecution's case. Mumia did legally own a gun, not uncommon for anyone driving a cab in Philadelphia during that time. However, the police never tested his gun to see if it had been fired nor tested his hands to see if they had recently fired a gun. They bullet taken from Faulkner could not be matched to Mumia's gun. There were no divots in the sidewalk around the officer's head as there would have been if the shooter had stood above him. The only bullets that were found were approximately eight feet west to where Faulkner was laying and were from an angle that would not have been possible from the trajectory where Mumia entered the scene. The bullet wound that hit Mumia also debunks the prosecution's scenario. The bullet was traveling at a hard downward trajectory suggesting that his body was learning forward while still running to the scene when he was shot, and that the officer was elevated, likely standing on the sidewalk.
The prosecution witnesses told different stories in their original statements than they did at trial. One, a prostitute named Cynthia White, changed her story five times by the time she reached trial. Another, a cab driver named Robert Chobert, who was driving with a suspended license while on probation for arson, first told arriving officers, "the shooter ran away." He then said the shooter ran thirty feet and fell despite the fact that Mumia was laying less than three feet from Faulkner. Crime scene photographs that were never disclosed to the defense until 2007 show that Chobert was not parked where he said he was. They also confirm that there were no bullet divots around Faulkner's head, that police collected evidence incorrectly - damaging its integrity, and that the officer's hat had been moved from its original place on the roof of a car suggesting that Faulkner was talking to a passenger. Four different witnesses claimed that they saw someone running from the scene.
Perjured Evidence
There were three different police officers who claimed that Mumia confessed. The only officer who testified at trial, Gary Bell, claimed that after Mumia was brought into Jefferson hospital for his gunshot wound that he yelled, "I shot the motherfucker and I hope the motherfucker dies." However, the officer never made a report of the incident and claimed to have forgotten this crucial information for over sixty days. He had no recollection until after Mumia's defense attorney file police brutality charges due to the fact that the officers beat him when they arrived on the scene. After that filing all three officers came forward in the subsequent weeks with stories of a confession. The two other officers, Gary Wakshul and Thomas Bray came forward and neither of them had made a report on the night of the shooting. Wakshul even went as far in his original report to say, "The male negro made no statements." He made a second report a week later where he offered recollections of tiny details even so far as to remember the make and model of a camera found in Faulkner's car but made no mention of a confession. He later claimed that he just forgot. The doctor who operated on both Mumia and Faulkner heard no confession and neither did any of the hospital staff. None of the officers corroborated each others stories.
After the police officers came forward with a confession story a hospital guard named Priscilla Durham came forward and claimed she heard a confession as well, but never alerted the police. She was interviewed by the prosecution and brought to trial. During the trial she claimed, for the first time, that she made a handwritten report about the confession the day after the shooting but only gave it to her superior officer. She somehow never mentioned this to the prosecution or the police despite being interviewed by both. During the trial the judge sent a police officer to the hospital who returned with a piece of paper that was not on hospital letterhead, was typed, and was not signed. This document was allowed to be submitted as evidence over the objections of the defense.
Mumia had a court-appointed lawyer who did not have the funds to investigate witnesses or do any ballistics investigations whatsoever. The judge who presided over the case was Albert Sabo, a former Sheriff and member of the Fraternal Order of Police who presided over more trials ending in death sentences than any other judge in the US. A third of all lawyers surveyed by the American Bar Association in Philadelphia said that he was unfit to be on the bench.
Despite all this, Mumia was convicted and sentenced to death in a trial that was rife with perjured testimony and manufactured evidence that Amnesty International found, "did not meet the minimum international standards for a fair trial."
Appeals
During Mumia's Post Conviction Relief Act Hearings Judge Sabo was brought out of retirement to preside. He sustained every single prosecution objection and quashed most of the subpoenas brought forth by the defense. He did not find that Mumia deserved a new trial and said so in a finding of fact that was a carbon copy of the prosecution's closing brief.
During the summer of 1995, a death warrant was signed by Governor Tom Ridge, which sparked one of the most effective organizing efforts in defense of a political prisoner ever. Since that time, Mumia has had his death sentence overturned but still has a life sentence with no opportunity for parole.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has a long and openly biased history when it comes to justice for political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal, having denied all his appeals over the 37-year ordeal to win his freedom. True to form, on Feb. 24, four justices on the state’s highest court granted an extremely rare King’s Bench Petition backed by the Fraternal Order of Police to move jurisdiction over Abu-Jamal’s current appeal away from Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner’s office.
While King’s Bench was not intended for use by an individual or group simply displeased with a government action, it appears that the Pennsylvania Supreme Court continues to make exceptions when it comes to the police. Many justices on this court, including two on the panel that ruled in favor of the petition, receive FOP funding.
This court’s actions delay Abu-Jamal’s pending appeal, which just happens to involve charges of misconduct by a former member of the same court, retired Justice Ronald Castille. His well-established alliance with the FOP and bias against Abu-Jamal is central to this case. Now the FOP and Faulkner want to replace DA Krasner with Attorney General Shapiro, who has established a reputation of bias against prisoners seeking justice. When Krasner took office in January 2018, he fired several old guard prosecutors, including some who had been part of prior DA’s prosecution of Abu-Jamal. Many were subsequently hired by Shapiro. In a 1997 decision, Commonwealth v. Mulholland, the higher court ruled against a King’s Bench petition that sought to replace a prosecutor with one thought to be more favorable. The court called this request “prosecutor shopping.”
Media
While imprisoned he has published multiple works of literature and recorded several video interviews making social commentary on today's conditions. He has remained a regular on the prison broadcasted radio shows as well as teaching class on Georgist economics to fellow prisoners around the globe. HBO also created a documentary about the life, arrest, and struggles with the law of the activist called "Mumia Abu- Jamal: A Case for Reasonable Doubt."
Mail Regulations
In 2018, the PA Dept of Corrections instituted a restrictive mail policy where all mail to prisoners must be sent through a mail processing facility in Florida where all correspondence is scanned, copied and then the copy is mailed to the prisoner. There is an active campaign to get Gov. Wolf to repeal the restrictive policy so that friends and family members can send mail such as greeting cards again.
Smart Communications/PADOC - Mumia Abu-Jamal AM-8335
SCI Mahanoy
P.O. Box 33028
St. Petersburg, FL 33733
United States
