It Used to Be a Notoriously Violent Prison. Now It’s Home to a First-of-Its Kind Education Program
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Pelican Bay, Today and Yesterday
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"content": "\u003cp>CRESCENT CITY, Calif. — In less than 15 minutes, Michael Mariscal validated why a team of officials at Cal Poly Humboldt has spent more than three years trying to set up the first bachelor’s degree program at a maximum-security prison in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the end of a class in persuasive speaking, Mariscal was tasked with giving a presentation to highlight his personal growth. His 22 classmates inside B Facility at Pelican Bay State Prison were skeptical: Just two weeks earlier, Mariscal had used his presentation time to give step-by-step directions on how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But today was different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve never told this to anyone before,” the 32-year-old Mariscal said, holding back tears as he explained his feelings when he learned at his trial that the state was requesting he be put to death. “I said, ‘That’s OK, that’s cool,’” showing no outward emotion at the time, he told the class. But inside, his mind was reeling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m not innocent; I did everything I was convicted for,” he quickly added, referring to a gang shooting that left two people dead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12014138\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12014138\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Incarcerated college students applaud Michael Anthony Mariscal, 32, after he gave a presentation about his own journey to turn his life around during a CalPoly Humboldt class on persuasive speaking at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City, on Sept. 17, 2024. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for Hechinger Report)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Mariscal went on to say that his brother had received a life sentence and been murdered while in prison. Mariscal himself was given five life sentences. He declared that he did not expect ever to be released but finished by saying, “I can still live a meaningful life in here. Freedom is different for everybody.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A shocked silence filled the room before classmate Darryl Baca spoke up. “That’s some raw stuff right here. I recognize the potential in you.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not the first time I’ve cried after class,” the professor, Romi Hitchcock-Tinseth, said later, although she was teaching only her fourth session at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12014139\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12014139\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1046\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Incarcerated college student Michael Anthony Mariscal, 32, center, leaves the education hallway with fellow classmates after school at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City, Calif, on Sept. 17, 2024. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for Hechinger Report)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Mariscal’s speech exemplified everything officials at Cal Poly Humboldt hoped to accomplish when they set out to create a satellite campus at one of the most notorious prisons in the country. They knew that earning a degree could help some men shorten their sentences and possibly land well-paying jobs once released. But they also hoped that the classes, and the camaraderie fostered there, would pay immediate dividends, lessening violence at the prison and improving students’ daily behaviors. Seeing Mariscal address his past while both sharing his feelings and mapping out a hopeful path forward just four weeks into the semester was validating, officials said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California has been a leader in \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/education/higher-education/college-beat/2021/10/prison-bachelors-degree-california-inside-out/\">prison education\u003c/a> programs, starting with a \u003ca href=\"https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4913#:~:text=In%202014%2C%20the%20state%20approved,closed%20to%20the%20general%20public).\">2014 rule\u003c/a> authorizing state funding for community colleges to set up programs for students who are incarcerated. Since then, some 25 community colleges and eight universities have established degree-granting programs that now cover every facility in the state. Humboldt’s Pelican Bay program is not only the state’s first bachelor’s initiative at a max-security prison; earlier this year, it became the first program in the country approved under new federal Department of Education rules to let incarcerated individuals access \u003ca href=\"https://now.humboldt.edu/news/prison-education-program-first-nation-receive-pell-grant-eligibility-under-new-federal-policy\">Pell Grant funds\u003c/a> to pay for college.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For about 29 years, Pell money had been largely prohibited for individuals who are incarcerated, with the exception of a small federal pilot program \u003ca href=\"https://www.vera.org/publications/second-chance-pell-six-years-of-expanding-access-to-education-in-prison\">that debuted in 2015\u003c/a>. The new Pell rules made 767,000 people at state prisons nationwide eligible to pay for college with federal funds — starting with a handful of those at Pelican Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re setting an example,” said Tony Wallin-Sato, a former Humboldt official who helped create the program. “If we can be successful at Pelican Bay, it can work anywhere.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pelican Bay is one of the most infamous prisons in the country. Built in 1989 in the extreme northwest corner of California, the facility was created to isolate its occupants in two ways. Many of the men who are incarcerated there hail from the Los Angeles area, nearly 700 miles south. And nearly half of the facility’s units were \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/04/health/solitary-confinement-mental-illness.html\">built for solitary confinement\u003c/a>, with some occupants stuck inside these 7-by-11-foot cells for decades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A “60 Minutes” report in 1993 highlighted excessive force by guards, and a 1995 lawsuit exposed inadequate medical care. In 2013, people incarcerated there staged a two-month hunger strike that spread throughout the state’s prisons to protest the excessive use of \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/justice/2022/09/california-solitary-confinement-bill/\">solitary confinement\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But program staffers and people incarcerated at the facility say day-to-day life there now bears little resemblance to those days. About 400 of the prison’s 2,200 incarcerated men currently take classes that include GED preparation, courses from four community colleges and, now, Humboldt’s new bachelor’s program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pelican Bay “used to be one of the most violent prisons in the country. Now it’s not,” said Mark Taylor, a Humboldt official who spent more than 21 years incarcerated before helping to create this program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, incarcerated students openly drop hints around Kari Telaro Rexford, the prison’s supervisor of academic instruction, telling her they hope she’ll soon bring in a master’s degree program. “I’m trying,” she tells them.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Humboldt prison program ‘makes people safer’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Rebecca Silbert, the deputy superintendent of higher education for the state’s Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, has watched every program that has started in the eight years since bachelor’s degree programs began in state prisons. “Because of the involvement of senior leadership,” she said, “Cal Poly Humboldt’s was the easiest by far.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet Silbert admitted she first tried to talk officials out of creating this program. “Are you sure?” she said she asked them. “It’s easy to be starry-eyed in the beginning, but it’s an endeavor.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Humboldt’s provost, Jenn Capps, said she agreed with that assessment but pushed on because the program “makes people safer.” Offering bachelor’s degree classes helps “disrupt the narrative” of violence in these men’s lives, making life safer for them, their families, guards at Pelican Bay, and ultimately the public, she argued.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are lots of myths out there about people who are incarcerated,” Capps said. “But everybody wants community safety. Offering prison education programs is key to community safety.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A team of Cal Poly Humboldt officials worked for more than two years before beginning the program in January. The university’s communications department chair, Maxwell Schnurer, taught a class at the prison through the College of the Redwoods to understand why that community college’s program had been so successful. Redwoods began with one course at the prison in 2015, and its program has since mushroomed to 43 courses serving 390 students, said Tory Eagles, the college’s Pelican Bay Scholars program manager.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12014137\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12014137\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">CalPoly Humboldt communications lecturer Romi Hitchcock-Tinseth discusses a presentation assignment with inmates during her persuasive speaking class at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City on Sept. 17, 2024. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for Hechinger Report)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>As of this semester, the university has ramped up to four classes, each of which are taken by all of the school’s 23 students. Each student had already earned associate degrees and all are now communications majors. Humboldt’s five-year plan is to add other majors and expand to two more of the prison’s four yards, said Steve Ladwig, the director of the university’s Transformative and Restorative Education Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Being the first program the federal government authorized to use Pell Grants for incarcerated men put a spotlight on Humboldt’s work. However, actually getting those funds has proven to be hard, largely because of the federal Department of Education’s botched rollout of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Although all of Humboldt’s students are eligible for Pell, only about half of the 23 have had their applications reviewed by the Department of Education so far, said Ladwig. While the university waits for approval of its students’ Pell Grants, it is covering tuition for each student, he added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Humboldt staged a ceremony to hand incarcerated individuals their college acceptance letters, Ladwig had to venture to the prison’s solitary confinement wing to deliver Mariscal’s letter because he was being punished for getting into a fight.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Decades in solitary confinement\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Darryl Baca — the student who praised Mariscal after his classroom speech — epitomizes the entire history of Pelican Bay. He came to the prison in 1990, only months after it opened. He spent his first 25 years in solitary confinement, where many incarcerated individuals with gang backgrounds were placed. He was part of the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101905589/how-a-massive-california-prison-hunger-strike-overhauled-solitary-confinement\">2013 hunger strike \u003c/a>that led to changes in how the prison uses solitary. Now, he’s not only a straight-A student but someone both staff and fellow students look to for guidance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Mariscal unspooled his revelation, Baca noticed the seven-minute timer the instructor had set was about to go off and interrupt his speech. From his seat at the front of the class, Baca reached over and deftly paused the timer while handing Mariscal a tissue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Baca said it took him three tries to earn his GED. Later, he used correspondence courses to secure an associate degree. He continued his education with College of the Redwood’s courses and said he recently passed up a chance to transfer to a lower-security prison because of his Humboldt classes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s the opportunity of a lifetime,” he said. The college classes have erased the barriers that typically exist among prisoners of different backgrounds, he explained. While classmates support each other, many people at the prison “are making better choices now. The culture has evolved. We’re like a campus now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Baca isn’t the only person incarcerated at Pelican Bay who has rejected possible transfers to other prisons. Others said they made the difficult decision to pass up the chance to be moved closer to home and earn a lower-security designation because they wanted to continue in Humboldt’s classes. “I told my family, ‘I want to see you and get closer, but I can’t transfer,’” said Davion Holman, 35, who is originally from the Los Angeles area. Holman, sentenced to 31 years in 2013, told his classmates that before being arrested, he liked school. “I knew I was smart, but I was content being stupid,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We take it serious because it is serious,” he added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Humboldt Professor Roberto Mónico, who teaches a course called multiethnic resistance in the U.S., says at times, it feels more like a graduate-level seminar than an undergraduate class. Students are well prepared, he said, with “all the readings marked up,” and they drop in references to the theories of Plato and Aristotle. Yet they can be sensitive about not knowing how to create a PowerPoint presentation or other computer skills because of their lack of formal education.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If I tell them to read two out of five essays, they read all five,” said Hitchcock-Tinseth. Added Ladwig: “They are phenomenally well prepared to take on a bachelor’s degree.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Being in a college classroom and able to debate ideas freely is “not mirrored in a lot of other prison experiences,” said Ruth Delaney, who directs the Vera Institute of Justice’s Unlocking Potential initiative, which helps colleges develop prison programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12014136\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12014136\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1960\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy-800x1000.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy-1020x1275.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy-160x200.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy-1229x1536.jpg 1229w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Francisco Vallejo, an incarcerated college student with a passion for multicultural resistance courses, poses in front of a mural painted by inmates at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City on Sept. 17, 2024. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for Hechinger Report)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Francisco Vallejo admitted he struggled when he first began taking community college classes, dropping some before trying again the next semester. But now he hopes his academic progress will bolster his case for parole in 2026. “I had to train to be a student,” he said. “Redwoods gives you the tools, but you use them at Humboldt.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Student Dom Congiardo said the prison environment teaches people to guard their feelings. But taking college classes shows them “you don’t have to be afraid to open up,” he said. “You won’t be judged for it. It’s all new territory for us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carlson Bryant is another student who declined a transfer to stay in Humboldt’s program. At 41 years old, he’s been at Pelican Bay since 2003, more than half his life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bryant said he was scared of the prison’s reputation when he came to Pelican Bay at age 19. “In the beginning, I would have left so fast,” he said. “But there’s too much positive stuff here. It changes you all the way around.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Contact editor Lawrie Mifflin at 212-678-4078 or mifflin@hechingerreport.org.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was produced with support from the Education Writers Association Reporting Fellowship program.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story about prison education was produced by \u003ca href=\"https://hechingerreport.org/\">The Hechinger Report\u003c/a>, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the \u003ca href=\"https://hechingerreport.org/highereducation/\">Hechinger higher education newsletter\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "Cal Poly Humboldt’s bachelor’s program offers new opportunity to people incarcerated at maximum-security Pelican Bay State Prison",
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"title": "It Used to Be a Notoriously Violent Prison. Now It’s Home to a First-of-Its Kind Education Program | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>CRESCENT CITY, Calif. — In less than 15 minutes, Michael Mariscal validated why a team of officials at Cal Poly Humboldt has spent more than three years trying to set up the first bachelor’s degree program at a maximum-security prison in California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the end of a class in persuasive speaking, Mariscal was tasked with giving a presentation to highlight his personal growth. His 22 classmates inside B Facility at Pelican Bay State Prison were skeptical: Just two weeks earlier, Mariscal had used his presentation time to give step-by-step directions on how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But today was different.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve never told this to anyone before,” the 32-year-old Mariscal said, holding back tears as he explained his feelings when he learned at his trial that the state was requesting he be put to death. “I said, ‘That’s OK, that’s cool,’” showing no outward emotion at the time, he told the class. But inside, his mind was reeling.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m not innocent; I did everything I was convicted for,” he quickly added, referring to a gang shooting that left two people dead.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12014138\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12014138\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-11-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Incarcerated college students applaud Michael Anthony Mariscal, 32, after he gave a presentation about his own journey to turn his life around during a CalPoly Humboldt class on persuasive speaking at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City, on Sept. 17, 2024. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for Hechinger Report)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Mariscal went on to say that his brother had received a life sentence and been murdered while in prison. Mariscal himself was given five life sentences. He declared that he did not expect ever to be released but finished by saying, “I can still live a meaningful life in here. Freedom is different for everybody.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A shocked silence filled the room before classmate Darryl Baca spoke up. “That’s some raw stuff right here. I recognize the potential in you.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s not the first time I’ve cried after class,” the professor, Romi Hitchcock-Tinseth, said later, although she was teaching only her fourth session at the prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12014139\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12014139\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1046\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy-800x534.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-13-copy-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Incarcerated college student Michael Anthony Mariscal, 32, center, leaves the education hallway with fellow classmates after school at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City, Calif, on Sept. 17, 2024. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for Hechinger Report)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Mariscal’s speech exemplified everything officials at Cal Poly Humboldt hoped to accomplish when they set out to create a satellite campus at one of the most notorious prisons in the country. They knew that earning a degree could help some men shorten their sentences and possibly land well-paying jobs once released. But they also hoped that the classes, and the camaraderie fostered there, would pay immediate dividends, lessening violence at the prison and improving students’ daily behaviors. Seeing Mariscal address his past while both sharing his feelings and mapping out a hopeful path forward just four weeks into the semester was validating, officials said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>California has been a leader in \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/education/higher-education/college-beat/2021/10/prison-bachelors-degree-california-inside-out/\">prison education\u003c/a> programs, starting with a \u003ca href=\"https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4913#:~:text=In%202014%2C%20the%20state%20approved,closed%20to%20the%20general%20public).\">2014 rule\u003c/a> authorizing state funding for community colleges to set up programs for students who are incarcerated. Since then, some 25 community colleges and eight universities have established degree-granting programs that now cover every facility in the state. Humboldt’s Pelican Bay program is not only the state’s first bachelor’s initiative at a max-security prison; earlier this year, it became the first program in the country approved under new federal Department of Education rules to let incarcerated individuals access \u003ca href=\"https://now.humboldt.edu/news/prison-education-program-first-nation-receive-pell-grant-eligibility-under-new-federal-policy\">Pell Grant funds\u003c/a> to pay for college.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For about 29 years, Pell money had been largely prohibited for individuals who are incarcerated, with the exception of a small federal pilot program \u003ca href=\"https://www.vera.org/publications/second-chance-pell-six-years-of-expanding-access-to-education-in-prison\">that debuted in 2015\u003c/a>. The new Pell rules made 767,000 people at state prisons nationwide eligible to pay for college with federal funds — starting with a handful of those at Pelican Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re setting an example,” said Tony Wallin-Sato, a former Humboldt official who helped create the program. “If we can be successful at Pelican Bay, it can work anywhere.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pelican Bay is one of the most infamous prisons in the country. Built in 1989 in the extreme northwest corner of California, the facility was created to isolate its occupants in two ways. Many of the men who are incarcerated there hail from the Los Angeles area, nearly 700 miles south. And nearly half of the facility’s units were \u003ca href=\"https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/04/health/solitary-confinement-mental-illness.html\">built for solitary confinement\u003c/a>, with some occupants stuck inside these 7-by-11-foot cells for decades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A “60 Minutes” report in 1993 highlighted excessive force by guards, and a 1995 lawsuit exposed inadequate medical care. In 2013, people incarcerated there staged a two-month hunger strike that spread throughout the state’s prisons to protest the excessive use of \u003ca href=\"https://calmatters.org/justice/2022/09/california-solitary-confinement-bill/\">solitary confinement\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But program staffers and people incarcerated at the facility say day-to-day life there now bears little resemblance to those days. About 400 of the prison’s 2,200 incarcerated men currently take classes that include GED preparation, courses from four community colleges and, now, Humboldt’s new bachelor’s program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pelican Bay “used to be one of the most violent prisons in the country. Now it’s not,” said Mark Taylor, a Humboldt official who spent more than 21 years incarcerated before helping to create this program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In fact, incarcerated students openly drop hints around Kari Telaro Rexford, the prison’s supervisor of academic instruction, telling her they hope she’ll soon bring in a master’s degree program. “I’m trying,” she tells them.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Humboldt prison program ‘makes people safer’\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Rebecca Silbert, the deputy superintendent of higher education for the state’s Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, has watched every program that has started in the eight years since bachelor’s degree programs began in state prisons. “Because of the involvement of senior leadership,” she said, “Cal Poly Humboldt’s was the easiest by far.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yet Silbert admitted she first tried to talk officials out of creating this program. “Are you sure?” she said she asked them. “It’s easy to be starry-eyed in the beginning, but it’s an endeavor.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Humboldt’s provost, Jenn Capps, said she agreed with that assessment but pushed on because the program “makes people safer.” Offering bachelor’s degree classes helps “disrupt the narrative” of violence in these men’s lives, making life safer for them, their families, guards at Pelican Bay, and ultimately the public, she argued.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There are lots of myths out there about people who are incarcerated,” Capps said. “But everybody wants community safety. Offering prison education programs is key to community safety.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A team of Cal Poly Humboldt officials worked for more than two years before beginning the program in January. The university’s communications department chair, Maxwell Schnurer, taught a class at the prison through the College of the Redwoods to understand why that community college’s program had been so successful. Redwoods began with one course at the prison in 2015, and its program has since mushroomed to 43 courses serving 390 students, said Tory Eagles, the college’s Pelican Bay Scholars program manager.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12014137\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12014137\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1045\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy-800x533.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy-1020x680.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-03-copy-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">CalPoly Humboldt communications lecturer Romi Hitchcock-Tinseth discusses a presentation assignment with inmates during her persuasive speaking class at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City on Sept. 17, 2024. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for Hechinger Report)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>As of this semester, the university has ramped up to four classes, each of which are taken by all of the school’s 23 students. Each student had already earned associate degrees and all are now communications majors. Humboldt’s five-year plan is to add other majors and expand to two more of the prison’s four yards, said Steve Ladwig, the director of the university’s Transformative and Restorative Education Center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Being the first program the federal government authorized to use Pell Grants for incarcerated men put a spotlight on Humboldt’s work. However, actually getting those funds has proven to be hard, largely because of the federal Department of Education’s botched rollout of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, last year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Although all of Humboldt’s students are eligible for Pell, only about half of the 23 have had their applications reviewed by the Department of Education so far, said Ladwig. While the university waits for approval of its students’ Pell Grants, it is covering tuition for each student, he added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Humboldt staged a ceremony to hand incarcerated individuals their college acceptance letters, Ladwig had to venture to the prison’s solitary confinement wing to deliver Mariscal’s letter because he was being punished for getting into a fight.\u003c/p>\n\u003ch2>Decades in solitary confinement\u003c/h2>\n\u003cp>Darryl Baca — the student who praised Mariscal after his classroom speech — epitomizes the entire history of Pelican Bay. He came to the prison in 1990, only months after it opened. He spent his first 25 years in solitary confinement, where many incarcerated individuals with gang backgrounds were placed. He was part of the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101905589/how-a-massive-california-prison-hunger-strike-overhauled-solitary-confinement\">2013 hunger strike \u003c/a>that led to changes in how the prison uses solitary. Now, he’s not only a straight-A student but someone both staff and fellow students look to for guidance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As Mariscal unspooled his revelation, Baca noticed the seven-minute timer the instructor had set was about to go off and interrupt his speech. From his seat at the front of the class, Baca reached over and deftly paused the timer while handing Mariscal a tissue.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Baca said it took him three tries to earn his GED. Later, he used correspondence courses to secure an associate degree. He continued his education with College of the Redwood’s courses and said he recently passed up a chance to transfer to a lower-security prison because of his Humboldt classes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s the opportunity of a lifetime,” he said. The college classes have erased the barriers that typically exist among prisoners of different backgrounds, he explained. While classmates support each other, many people at the prison “are making better choices now. The culture has evolved. We’re like a campus now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Baca isn’t the only person incarcerated at Pelican Bay who has rejected possible transfers to other prisons. Others said they made the difficult decision to pass up the chance to be moved closer to home and earn a lower-security designation because they wanted to continue in Humboldt’s classes. “I told my family, ‘I want to see you and get closer, but I can’t transfer,’” said Davion Holman, 35, who is originally from the Los Angeles area. Holman, sentenced to 31 years in 2013, told his classmates that before being arrested, he liked school. “I knew I was smart, but I was content being stupid,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We take it serious because it is serious,” he added.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Humboldt Professor Roberto Mónico, who teaches a course called multiethnic resistance in the U.S., says at times, it feels more like a graduate-level seminar than an undergraduate class. Students are well prepared, he said, with “all the readings marked up,” and they drop in references to the theories of Plato and Aristotle. Yet they can be sensitive about not knowing how to create a PowerPoint presentation or other computer skills because of their lack of formal education.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If I tell them to read two out of five essays, they read all five,” said Hitchcock-Tinseth. Added Ladwig: “They are phenomenally well prepared to take on a bachelor’s degree.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Being in a college classroom and able to debate ideas freely is “not mirrored in a lot of other prison experiences,” said Ruth Delaney, who directs the Vera Institute of Justice’s Unlocking Potential initiative, which helps colleges develop prison programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12014136\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 1568px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12014136\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1568\" height=\"1960\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy.jpg 1568w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy-800x1000.jpg 800w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy-1020x1275.jpg 1020w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy-160x200.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/11/101724-HECHINGER-Pelican-MO-CM-04-copy-1229x1536.jpg 1229w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1568px) 100vw, 1568px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Francisco Vallejo, an incarcerated college student with a passion for multicultural resistance courses, poses in front of a mural painted by inmates at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City on Sept. 17, 2024. \u003ccite>(Manuel Orbegozo for Hechinger Report)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Francisco Vallejo admitted he struggled when he first began taking community college classes, dropping some before trying again the next semester. But now he hopes his academic progress will bolster his case for parole in 2026. “I had to train to be a student,” he said. “Redwoods gives you the tools, but you use them at Humboldt.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Student Dom Congiardo said the prison environment teaches people to guard their feelings. But taking college classes shows them “you don’t have to be afraid to open up,” he said. “You won’t be judged for it. It’s all new territory for us.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carlson Bryant is another student who declined a transfer to stay in Humboldt’s program. At 41 years old, he’s been at Pelican Bay since 2003, more than half his life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bryant said he was scared of the prison’s reputation when he came to Pelican Bay at age 19. “In the beginning, I would have left so fast,” he said. “But there’s too much positive stuff here. It changes you all the way around.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Contact editor Lawrie Mifflin at 212-678-4078 or mifflin@hechingerreport.org.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was produced with support from the Education Writers Association Reporting Fellowship program.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story about prison education was produced by \u003ca href=\"https://hechingerreport.org/\">The Hechinger Report\u003c/a>, a nonprofit, independent news organization focused on inequality and innovation in education. Sign up for the \u003ca href=\"https://hechingerreport.org/highereducation/\">Hechinger higher education newsletter\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"disqusTitle": "A Year After Settlement, Hundreds of State Prison Isolation Cells Empty",
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"content": "\u003cp>\"I didn’t know that he could ever be touched.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That's how 20-year-old Joseph Carranza described his relationship with his father, who is housed at Pelican Bay State Prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"This will be my first time actually giving him a hug since like ever, in my whole life,\" added Carranza, who until now has only interacted with his dad through a glass wall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carranza was with about 60 inmates' loved ones making a 14-hour bus trip from Los Angeles to Pelican Bay State Prison on California's northern border on Aug. 26.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said his dad was one of the 1,226 inmates moved out of the maximum-security prison's Security Housing Unit in the last year following a landmark legal settlement that changed the way California prisons use their most restrictive form of custody -- commonly known as the SHU.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignright\">'People are being released from the SHU practically every day. We have over a thousand empty SHU beds statewide, a thousand. Nobody’s living in those cells.'\u003ccite>Terry Thornton,\u003cbr>\nCDCR Deputy Press Secretary\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>In that year, the number of male inmates in Security Housing Units has been cut by about two-thirds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The lawsuit followed California prison hunger strikes in 2011 and 2013 that protested indefinite isolation in SHU facilities based solely on prison authorities' determination that an inmate was affiliated with a gang, called gang validation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A stint in the SHU means isolation from other inmates. It means up to 22½ hours a day in a windowless cell if the inmate does not participate in prison programs, like education. It also means no-contact visits with loved ones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the settlement, proposed on Sept. 1, 2015, and accepted by the federal judge in the case a month later, all SHU terms became behavior-based.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[soundcloud url=\"https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/280945696\" params=\"color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false\" width=\"100%\" height=\"166\" iframe=\"true\" /]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CDCR spokeswoman Terry Thornton said more than 3,000 inmates were housed in the SHU at the time of the hunger strikes, but the department began to trim that population years before the settlement. By the time it happened, 1,478 SHU inmates had been evaluated, and 1,110 had been moved to the general population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the past year, another 1,530 were reviewed, and another 1,226 made it back to the general population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From the SHU, inmates can go a number of places other than the general population. They may end up in a special-needs yard or new \"general population-like\" housing for inmates with safety concerns, to name a few.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There were just over 1,060 male inmates and 16 female inmates in all California Security Housing Units as of early July, according to CDCR data, and 419 in Pelican Bay's SHU as of late August.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"People are being released from the SHU practically every day,\" Thornton said. \"We have over a thousand empty SHU beds statewide, a thousand. Nobody’s living in those cells. I don’t know if you’re understanding what has changed in the past years. It’s enormous.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"alignright\">\n\u003ch3>\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/prison+isolation+video/\" target=\"_blank\">Does 22 1/2 Hours Alone in an 8 x 10 Cell Every Day Amount to Torture?\u003c/a>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cfigure>\u003cimg class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-11070393\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"SHUPrisoner\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner-800x450.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner-400x225.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner-1180x664.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner-960x540.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/figure>\n\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>The population fluctuates, though, because inmates can still be given fixed terms of up to five years if they're found guilty of a criminal offense.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"The department’s longest SHU term is 60 months, and that’s for the offense of murder,\" said Sandra Alfaro, an associate director in CDCR’s Division of Adult Institutions. \"With good conduct, that SHU term can be reduced by 50 percent.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Thornton said CDCR would not provide the length of time that those still in the SHU had been there. She said no one had been in isolation for longer than 10 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"We're down to just a handful, a little more than a handful of reviews left to do, so honestly the question is moot,\" she said. \"From our point of view, it's not a relevant question.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The number of inmates who remain in the SHU based solely on gang validation is down to 25, Thornton said, plus 45 others whose cases have been reviewed. But safety or other considerations have complicated their relocation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CDCR also still puts inmates in Security Housing Units indefinitely, but never based solely on gang affiliation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A small population, described as a \"handful\" and not further specified by CDCR, is in the most restricted type of housing indefinitely for three SHU-level offenses in a five-year period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That's the situation Robin Anderson says her son Eric is in. He's serving a life sentence for murder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"That's been hell for him,\" she said, as she got ready for her seven-hour trip from Stockton to Pelican Bay for a recent visit. \"It's hard for both of us. I don't get to hug him or kiss him or touch him, so that's hard.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She disputes CDCR's characterization that the small population still serving indefinite SHU terms are repeat problem offenders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"He wrote a letter against the excessive lockdowns,\" she said, \"and then he was validated on confidential informants,\" meaning he was identified as a gang member, but never learned who identified him. His third offense, she said, was having his name on a document circulated by a gang.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"That’s how they got him for three write-ups, which were all bogus,\" she said. \"Those aren’t valid reasons. Even if they were, that’s still not a violent crime.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CDCR representatives interviewed for this report declined to discuss the use of confidential information to land inmates in the SHU because that part of the lawsuit is still being litigated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"One key problem historically has been that they put people in the SHU not based on strong evidence that they do anything, but based on confidential information,\" said plaintiff's attorney Jules Lobel. \"'We have a confidential informant who says this about you,' and they start putting a lot of people back in the SHU for that reason.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Maria Rodriguez didn't like the six months her son spent in the highly restrictive custody back in 2013. It interrupted her monthly visits from Los Angeles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Angel Rodriguez was convicted on a conspiracy charge, but she says someone else is responsible for the murder that led to his incarceration. He told her he had to join the hunger strike to help his fellow inmates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"He was punished because he went on a hunger strike,\" she said. \"People become sick because they don’t feed them, they don’t take them to the yard, everything. That’s why he went to hunger strike.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said when he emerged, he was skinny and looked terrible, but he was proud he'd fought for the rights of his fellow inmates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"They got it. They got it,\" she said. \"No more SHU anymore. He said, 'Look, Ma, all these people, they are happy because they’re not in the SHU.' He said they are happy.\"\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\"I didn’t know that he could ever be touched.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That's how 20-year-old Joseph Carranza described his relationship with his father, who is housed at Pelican Bay State Prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"This will be my first time actually giving him a hug since like ever, in my whole life,\" added Carranza, who until now has only interacted with his dad through a glass wall.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Carranza was with about 60 inmates' loved ones making a 14-hour bus trip from Los Angeles to Pelican Bay State Prison on California's northern border on Aug. 26.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said his dad was one of the 1,226 inmates moved out of the maximum-security prison's Security Housing Unit in the last year following a landmark legal settlement that changed the way California prisons use their most restrictive form of custody -- commonly known as the SHU.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignright\">'People are being released from the SHU practically every day. We have over a thousand empty SHU beds statewide, a thousand. Nobody’s living in those cells.'\u003ccite>Terry Thornton,\u003cbr>\nCDCR Deputy Press Secretary\u003c/cite>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>In that year, the number of male inmates in Security Housing Units has been cut by about two-thirds.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The lawsuit followed California prison hunger strikes in 2011 and 2013 that protested indefinite isolation in SHU facilities based solely on prison authorities' determination that an inmate was affiliated with a gang, called gang validation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A stint in the SHU means isolation from other inmates. It means up to 22½ hours a day in a windowless cell if the inmate does not participate in prison programs, like education. It also means no-contact visits with loved ones.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After the settlement, proposed on Sept. 1, 2015, and accepted by the federal judge in the case a month later, all SHU terms became behavior-based.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cdiv class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__shortcodes__shortcodeWrapper'>\n \u003ciframe width='100%' height='166'\n scrolling='no' frameborder='no'\n src='https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/280945696&visual=true&color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false'\n title='https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/280945696'>\n \u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/div>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CDCR spokeswoman Terry Thornton said more than 3,000 inmates were housed in the SHU at the time of the hunger strikes, but the department began to trim that population years before the settlement. By the time it happened, 1,478 SHU inmates had been evaluated, and 1,110 had been moved to the general population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In the past year, another 1,530 were reviewed, and another 1,226 made it back to the general population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>From the SHU, inmates can go a number of places other than the general population. They may end up in a special-needs yard or new \"general population-like\" housing for inmates with safety concerns, to name a few.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>There were just over 1,060 male inmates and 16 female inmates in all California Security Housing Units as of early July, according to CDCR data, and 419 in Pelican Bay's SHU as of late August.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"People are being released from the SHU practically every day,\" Thornton said. \"We have over a thousand empty SHU beds statewide, a thousand. Nobody’s living in those cells. I don’t know if you’re understanding what has changed in the past years. It’s enormous.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"alignright\">\n\u003ch3>\u003ca href=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/news/prison+isolation+video/\" target=\"_blank\">Does 22 1/2 Hours Alone in an 8 x 10 Cell Every Day Amount to Torture?\u003c/a>\u003c/h3>\n\u003cfigure>\u003cimg class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-11070393\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner-800x450.jpg\" alt=\"SHUPrisoner\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner-800x450.jpg 800w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner-400x225.jpg 400w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner.jpg 1920w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner-1180x664.jpg 1180w, https://ww2.kqed.org/app/uploads/sites/10/2016/09/SHUPrisoner-960x540.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\">\u003c/figure>\n\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>The population fluctuates, though, because inmates can still be given fixed terms of up to five years if they're found guilty of a criminal offense.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"The department’s longest SHU term is 60 months, and that’s for the offense of murder,\" said Sandra Alfaro, an associate director in CDCR’s Division of Adult Institutions. \"With good conduct, that SHU term can be reduced by 50 percent.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Thornton said CDCR would not provide the length of time that those still in the SHU had been there. She said no one had been in isolation for longer than 10 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"We're down to just a handful, a little more than a handful of reviews left to do, so honestly the question is moot,\" she said. \"From our point of view, it's not a relevant question.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The number of inmates who remain in the SHU based solely on gang validation is down to 25, Thornton said, plus 45 others whose cases have been reviewed. But safety or other considerations have complicated their relocation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CDCR also still puts inmates in Security Housing Units indefinitely, but never based solely on gang affiliation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A small population, described as a \"handful\" and not further specified by CDCR, is in the most restricted type of housing indefinitely for three SHU-level offenses in a five-year period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That's the situation Robin Anderson says her son Eric is in. He's serving a life sentence for murder.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"That's been hell for him,\" she said, as she got ready for her seven-hour trip from Stockton to Pelican Bay for a recent visit. \"It's hard for both of us. I don't get to hug him or kiss him or touch him, so that's hard.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She disputes CDCR's characterization that the small population still serving indefinite SHU terms are repeat problem offenders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"He wrote a letter against the excessive lockdowns,\" she said, \"and then he was validated on confidential informants,\" meaning he was identified as a gang member, but never learned who identified him. His third offense, she said, was having his name on a document circulated by a gang.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"That’s how they got him for three write-ups, which were all bogus,\" she said. \"Those aren’t valid reasons. Even if they were, that’s still not a violent crime.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>CDCR representatives interviewed for this report declined to discuss the use of confidential information to land inmates in the SHU because that part of the lawsuit is still being litigated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"One key problem historically has been that they put people in the SHU not based on strong evidence that they do anything, but based on confidential information,\" said plaintiff's attorney Jules Lobel. \"'We have a confidential informant who says this about you,' and they start putting a lot of people back in the SHU for that reason.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Maria Rodriguez didn't like the six months her son spent in the highly restrictive custody back in 2013. It interrupted her monthly visits from Los Angeles.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Angel Rodriguez was convicted on a conspiracy charge, but she says someone else is responsible for the murder that led to his incarceration. 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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"They got it. They got it,\" she said. \"No more SHU anymore. He said, 'Look, Ma, all these people, they are happy because they’re not in the SHU.' He said they are happy.\"\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>“I haven’t seen the moon since 1998.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s inmate Jeremy Beasley, talking to me while sitting–shackled–in an interview room at Pelican Bay State Prison, California’s highest security lockup.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Beasley, a convicted murderer, was clearly surprised by my presence—he told me he hadn’t met with a visitor since 1994, when he was incarcerated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not just the moon Beasley hadn’t seen in 15 years. During that time, in fact, Beasley rarely glimpsed the outside world. Before being transferred to another prison, he was held in Pelican Bay’s Security Housing Unit, a windowless, bunker-like facility that houses more than 1,000 California inmates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For 22-and-a-half hours a day, each inmate here is locked, usually alone, in an 8-by-10 feet cell. For 90 minutes the inmate is allowed to exercise in an adjacent room with 25-30 feet high walls. And that’s their entire day — every day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve seen guys lose their minds back here,” Beasley tells me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRO9BHbF9GA&w=800&h=450]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Isolation Unit Conditions: Torture?\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Monday in Sacramento lawmakers are delving into a growing national controversy over special security units like Pelican Bay’s that are used to isolate thousands of inmates from the regular prison population. Civil rights groups say long-term isolation amounts to torture, while state corrections officials say the units are necessary and the conditions are humane.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around the state there are four of these Security Housing Unit facilities. Pelican Bay’s is the most controversial.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">\u003cstrong>For 22-and-a-half hours a day, each inmate is locked, usually alone, in an 8-by-10 feet cell. They get 90 minutes of exercise in an adjacent room. That’s their entire day — every day\u003c/strong>.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Conditions in the units are one part of the debate. Many inmates are held in windowless cells and have been denied everything from calendars and sweatpants to phone calls. Also at issue: criteria that determine which prisoners are placed there and how they can get back into the regular population again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then there is the long amount of time some inmates spend in the facilities. More than 500 California prisoners have been locked in the special units for 10 years or longer, according to state data. Of those, 78 prisoners have been held inside for more than 20 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the years, authorities have allowed media into Pelican Bay’s Security Housing Unit, but access has been limited and the inmates carefully selected by the prison staff.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, top corrections officials granted unusual access to a team of reporters and videographers from the Center for Investigative Reporting and KQED. We visited all areas of Pelican Bay’s Security Housing Unit except for a section that houses leaders of a 2011 hunger strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Using a small camera mounted to a wall, our team recorded Beasley exercising with a rubber handball in the small concrete pen (prison staff began allowing the balls last year). At all other times–day and night—he was held in his cell, alone. While skylights allow filtered sunlight into the units, there are no windows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"http://www.scribd.com/doc/127065819/Ruiz-Amended-Complaint-May-31-2012\" target=\"_blank\">class action lawsuit\u003c/a> filed last year by a coalition of civil rights groups states:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>California’s uniquely harsh regime of prolonged solitary confinement at Pelican Bay is inhumane and debilitating. Plaintiffs and class members languish, typically alone, in a cramped, concrete, windowless cell, for 22 and one-half to 24 hours a day. They are denied telephone calls, contact visits, and vocational, recreational or educational programming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Defendants persistently deny these men the normal human contact necessary for a person’s mental and physical wellbeing. These tormenting and prolonged conditions of confinement have produced harmful and predictable psychological deterioration among Plaintiffs and class members.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The solitary confinement regime at Pelican Bay, which renders California an outlier in this country and in the civilized world, violates the United States Constitution’s requirement of due process and prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment, as well as the most basic human rights prohibitions against cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. Indeed, the prolonged conditions of brutal confinement and isolation at Pelican Bay cross over from having any valid penological purpose into a system rightly condemned as torture by the international community.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>But state corrections officials maintain that conditions in the special units are humane; that they do not practice solitary confinement; that inmates are “segregated” but not “isolated”; and that there is a valid purpose for keeping prisoners in the units—protecting other inmates, staff and the public from men who have been linked to violent prison gangs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These are the men who are propagating the violence, the drug trafficking, the extortions and the murders throughout the larger communities of our state,” said Pelican Bay warden Greg Lewis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>New prison policy\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_90081\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/prison+isolation+video/_mg_0800/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-90081\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-90081\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2013/02/MG_0800-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"Units at Pelican Bay's Security Housing Units have no windows, so inmates' only regular view of the outside world is through the top of the exercise pens. (Monica Lam/CIR)\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Units at Pelican Bay’s Security Housing Units have no windows so inmates’ only regular view of the outside world is through the top of the exercise pens. (Monica Lam/CIR)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Without conceding any shortcomings, however, corrections officials are embarking on a new policy to bring in more educational and self-help programs, and to reduce the amount of time some inmates spend in the units.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since last October, officials have reviewed the cases of 144 inmates and determined that 75 should be transferred immediately to regular prisons because they were not active in gangs. Some of the inmates have been held in the special units for more than 20 years, according to Kelly Harrington, an associate corrections director.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pelican Bay inmates who led the 2011 hunger strike, as well as some prisoner rights groups, have denounced the new policy and are threatening more protests this summer. Amid a long list of demands, they are seeking shorter, fixed terms for inmates in the special units (currently, most are held there on “indeterminate” terms), more programs and more frequent visits with family members.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">\u003cstrong>I believe that some people should be isolated. If they were to cut me loose before I debriefed and I went back to the mainline, I would have killed somebody…”\u003c/strong>\n\u003cp>–Convicted murderer Jeremy Beasley\u003c/p>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>For his part, Jeremy Beasley said that while the conditions at Pelican Bay are awful, he doesn’t think they amount to solitary confinement. Although he can’t see other inmates from his cell (doors are made of perforated steel and face a wall), Beasley says he can carry on conversations with them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Don’t get me wrong,” he said. “It sucks in here. I hate it. But some prisoners have found that they can get a lot of attention by exaggerating how bad it is.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Beasley said he was an active member of the Aryan Brotherhood, a white-power gang, and committed assaults on behalf of the group. He agreed to drop out and provide authorities with incriminating information about other members, a process known as “debriefing.” In exchange, officials recently transferred Beasley to a different prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I believe that some people should be isolated. If they were to cut me loose before I debriefed and I went back to the mainline,” he said, using the term for the general prison population, “I would have killed somebody or at the very least I would have stabbed somebody else.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other Pelican Bay inmates see it differently.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There is only one option to get out of here and that is to make up lies about other people,” said 39-year-old Henry Albanez, who is serving a 27-year sentence for kidnapping. Albanez said he expected the department’s new policies would fail.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_90082\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/prison+isolation+video/_mg_0830/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-90082\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-90082\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2013/02/MG_0830-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"Pelican Bay's Security Housing Unit is organized into small pods housing eight cells set side-by-side on two tiers. Through the perforated steel doors inmates can only see a blank wall. (Monica Lam/CIR)\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Pelican Bay’s Security Housing Unit is organized into small pods housing eight cells set side-by-side on two tiers. Through the perforated steel doors inmates can only see a blank wall. (Monica Lam/CIR)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“How do you expect to take all of these guys out of the SHU (Security Housing Unit) and throw them in the same yard and expect them to get along when you have all this sensory deprivation,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, Albanez said he probably would take part in a new step-down program that begins later this year. Corrections officials have said the program allows inmates to earn their way out of the special units in 2-4 years without being required to renounce the gangs they have been affiliated with. Instead, they must declare that they won’t participate in gang activity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, who visited Pelican Bay early this month, said he found the prison clean and professionally staffed but was troubled thinking that some inmates are locked up for decades in small cells with little or no regular human contact. Inmates must also be shackled whenever they are outside their cells and in the presence of another individual.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I do think it’s psychologically devastating to be in such a tight space for so long,” Ammiano said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What, then, about the question of torture?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ammiano said the strangest thing he saw at the prison was a group therapy room where inmates are locked in small cages during sessions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Could I say that’s torture? Perhaps I could,” he said. “But did we witness any torture? No.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>You can listen to Michael Montgomery report from California’s most controversial, highest security lockup on Monday morning on The California Report, on the \u003ca href=\"http://www.californiareport.org/tunein/\" target=\"_blank\">following stations\u003c/a> around the state. The report will also be \u003ca href=\"http://www.californiareport.org/\" target=\"_blank\">archived at the show’s web site\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>This story was produced in collaboration with the Center for Investigative Reporting\u003c/em>.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"title": "Does 22 1/2 Hours Alone in an 8 x 10 Cell Every Day Amount to Torture? Video From Inside Pelican Bay Prison | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>“I haven’t seen the moon since 1998.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That’s inmate Jeremy Beasley, talking to me while sitting–shackled–in an interview room at Pelican Bay State Prison, California’s highest security lockup.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Beasley, a convicted murderer, was clearly surprised by my presence—he told me he hadn’t met with a visitor since 1994, when he was incarcerated.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s not just the moon Beasley hadn’t seen in 15 years. During that time, in fact, Beasley rarely glimpsed the outside world. Before being transferred to another prison, he was held in Pelican Bay’s Security Housing Unit, a windowless, bunker-like facility that houses more than 1,000 California inmates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For 22-and-a-half hours a day, each inmate here is locked, usually alone, in an 8-by-10 feet cell. For 90 minutes the inmate is allowed to exercise in an adjacent room with 25-30 feet high walls. And that’s their entire day — every day.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve seen guys lose their minds back here,” Beasley tells me.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube'>\n \u003cspan class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside'>\n \u003ciframe\n loading='lazy'\n class='utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__youtubePlayer'\n type='text/html'\n src='//www.youtube.com/embed/wRO9BHbF9GA'\n title='//www.youtube.com/embed/wRO9BHbF9GA'\n allowfullscreen='true'\n style='border:0;'>\u003c/iframe>\n \u003c/span>\n \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Isolation Unit Conditions: Torture?\u003cbr>\n\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Monday in Sacramento lawmakers are delving into a growing national controversy over special security units like Pelican Bay’s that are used to isolate thousands of inmates from the regular prison population. Civil rights groups say long-term isolation amounts to torture, while state corrections officials say the units are necessary and the conditions are humane.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Around the state there are four of these Security Housing Unit facilities. Pelican Bay’s is the most controversial.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">\u003cstrong>For 22-and-a-half hours a day, each inmate is locked, usually alone, in an 8-by-10 feet cell. They get 90 minutes of exercise in an adjacent room. That’s their entire day — every day\u003c/strong>.\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Conditions in the units are one part of the debate. Many inmates are held in windowless cells and have been denied everything from calendars and sweatpants to phone calls. Also at issue: criteria that determine which prisoners are placed there and how they can get back into the regular population again.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Then there is the long amount of time some inmates spend in the facilities. More than 500 California prisoners have been locked in the special units for 10 years or longer, according to state data. Of those, 78 prisoners have been held inside for more than 20 years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the years, authorities have allowed media into Pelican Bay’s Security Housing Unit, but access has been limited and the inmates carefully selected by the prison staff.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, top corrections officials granted unusual access to a team of reporters and videographers from the Center for Investigative Reporting and KQED. We visited all areas of Pelican Bay’s Security Housing Unit except for a section that houses leaders of a 2011 hunger strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Using a small camera mounted to a wall, our team recorded Beasley exercising with a rubber handball in the small concrete pen (prison staff began allowing the balls last year). At all other times–day and night—he was held in his cell, alone. While skylights allow filtered sunlight into the units, there are no windows.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"http://www.scribd.com/doc/127065819/Ruiz-Amended-Complaint-May-31-2012\" target=\"_blank\">class action lawsuit\u003c/a> filed last year by a coalition of civil rights groups states:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>California’s uniquely harsh regime of prolonged solitary confinement at Pelican Bay is inhumane and debilitating. Plaintiffs and class members languish, typically alone, in a cramped, concrete, windowless cell, for 22 and one-half to 24 hours a day. They are denied telephone calls, contact visits, and vocational, recreational or educational programming.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Defendants persistently deny these men the normal human contact necessary for a person’s mental and physical wellbeing. These tormenting and prolonged conditions of confinement have produced harmful and predictable psychological deterioration among Plaintiffs and class members.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The solitary confinement regime at Pelican Bay, which renders California an outlier in this country and in the civilized world, violates the United States Constitution’s requirement of due process and prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment, as well as the most basic human rights prohibitions against cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. Indeed, the prolonged conditions of brutal confinement and isolation at Pelican Bay cross over from having any valid penological purpose into a system rightly condemned as torture by the international community.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>But state corrections officials maintain that conditions in the special units are humane; that they do not practice solitary confinement; that inmates are “segregated” but not “isolated”; and that there is a valid purpose for keeping prisoners in the units—protecting other inmates, staff and the public from men who have been linked to violent prison gangs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These are the men who are propagating the violence, the drug trafficking, the extortions and the murders throughout the larger communities of our state,” said Pelican Bay warden Greg Lewis.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>New prison policy\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_90081\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/prison+isolation+video/_mg_0800/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-90081\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-90081\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2013/02/MG_0800-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"Units at Pelican Bay's Security Housing Units have no windows, so inmates' only regular view of the outside world is through the top of the exercise pens. (Monica Lam/CIR)\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Units at Pelican Bay’s Security Housing Units have no windows so inmates’ only regular view of the outside world is through the top of the exercise pens. (Monica Lam/CIR)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Without conceding any shortcomings, however, corrections officials are embarking on a new policy to bring in more educational and self-help programs, and to reduce the amount of time some inmates spend in the units.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since last October, officials have reviewed the cases of 144 inmates and determined that 75 should be transferred immediately to regular prisons because they were not active in gangs. Some of the inmates have been held in the special units for more than 20 years, according to Kelly Harrington, an associate corrections director.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pelican Bay inmates who led the 2011 hunger strike, as well as some prisoner rights groups, have denounced the new policy and are threatening more protests this summer. Amid a long list of demands, they are seeking shorter, fixed terms for inmates in the special units (currently, most are held there on “indeterminate” terms), more programs and more frequent visits with family members.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">\u003cstrong>I believe that some people should be isolated. If they were to cut me loose before I debriefed and I went back to the mainline, I would have killed somebody…”\u003c/strong>\n\u003cp>–Convicted murderer Jeremy Beasley\u003c/p>\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>For his part, Jeremy Beasley said that while the conditions at Pelican Bay are awful, he doesn’t think they amount to solitary confinement. Although he can’t see other inmates from his cell (doors are made of perforated steel and face a wall), Beasley says he can carry on conversations with them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Don’t get me wrong,” he said. “It sucks in here. I hate it. But some prisoners have found that they can get a lot of attention by exaggerating how bad it is.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Beasley said he was an active member of the Aryan Brotherhood, a white-power gang, and committed assaults on behalf of the group. He agreed to drop out and provide authorities with incriminating information about other members, a process known as “debriefing.” In exchange, officials recently transferred Beasley to a different prison.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I believe that some people should be isolated. If they were to cut me loose before I debriefed and I went back to the mainline,” he said, using the term for the general prison population, “I would have killed somebody or at the very least I would have stabbed somebody else.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other Pelican Bay inmates see it differently.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There is only one option to get out of here and that is to make up lies about other people,” said 39-year-old Henry Albanez, who is serving a 27-year sentence for kidnapping. Albanez said he expected the department’s new policies would fail.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_90082\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/prison+isolation+video/_mg_0830/\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-90082\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-90082\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2013/02/MG_0830-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"Pelican Bay's Security Housing Unit is organized into small pods housing eight cells set side-by-side on two tiers. Through the perforated steel doors inmates can only see a blank wall. (Monica Lam/CIR)\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Pelican Bay’s Security Housing Unit is organized into small pods housing eight cells set side-by-side on two tiers. Through the perforated steel doors inmates can only see a blank wall. (Monica Lam/CIR)\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“How do you expect to take all of these guys out of the SHU (Security Housing Unit) and throw them in the same yard and expect them to get along when you have all this sensory deprivation,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Still, Albanez said he probably would take part in a new step-down program that begins later this year. Corrections officials have said the program allows inmates to earn their way out of the special units in 2-4 years without being required to renounce the gangs they have been affiliated with. Instead, they must declare that they won’t participate in gang activity.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>State Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, who visited Pelican Bay early this month, said he found the prison clean and professionally staffed but was troubled thinking that some inmates are locked up for decades in small cells with little or no regular human contact. Inmates must also be shackled whenever they are outside their cells and in the presence of another individual.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I do think it’s psychologically devastating to be in such a tight space for so long,” Ammiano said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>What, then, about the question of torture?\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ammiano said the strangest thing he saw at the prison was a group therapy room where inmates are locked in small cages during sessions.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Could I say that’s torture? Perhaps I could,” he said. “But did we witness any torture? No.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>You can listen to Michael Montgomery report from California’s most controversial, highest security lockup on Monday morning on The California Report, on the \u003ca href=\"http://www.californiareport.org/tunein/\" target=\"_blank\">following stations\u003c/a> around the state. The report will also be \u003ca href=\"http://www.californiareport.org/\" target=\"_blank\">archived at the show’s web site\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_59316\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2012/03/pelicanbay1.jpg\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2012/03/pelicanbay1.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"pelicanbay1\" width=\"300\" height=\"257\" class=\"size-full wp-image-59316\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Pelican Bay Prison\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Last year hundreds of inmates staged two \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/tag/prison-hunger-strike/\">hunger strikes\u003c/a> that spread to 13 prisons in California. The prisoners were protesting conditions in super-maximum security units known as SHUs, where a majority of state prisoners are held in extreme isolation for alleged ties to prison gangs. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last week, the State Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation issued a new set of policies aimed at overhauling how these units are managed, what prisoners are sent there, and how long they're held in isolation. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The changes were spelled out in a Dept of Corrections document, \u003ca href=\"http://www.scribd.com/doc/85362385/Security-Threat-Group-Prevention-Identification-and-Management-Model-V5-5-03-01-2012\">embedded here\u003c/a> and below. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We asked KQED's Michael Montgomery, a longtime reporter of California prison issues, to annotate a key section of the document, cracking open some of the bureaucratic language to reveal the harsh isolation and deprivation in which some prisoners have been housed, as well as the rewards they are now being offered to toe the line and potentially exit these most restrictive of conditions. Rewards that, to a person at liberty, may seem poignantly meager or even absurd, but ones that the California Department of Corrections & Rehabiliation thinks will be incentive enough to coax good behavior.\u003c!--more-->\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here is the crux of the policy. \u003cstrong>Click on the \"view explanation\" link to be taken to Montgomery's analysis\u003c/strong>: \u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>The SDP will establish an incentive based multi-step process for the management of STG offenders. This program will assign, transition, and monitor offenders who by their behavior have demonstrated the need for CDCR’s utilization of special strategies for their management. This program is designed for STG offenders who require structured activities and programming, who choose to discontinue criminal activity. Additionally, it affords offenders the opportunity to earn enhanced privileges proportionate to their ability to reintegrate and effectively interact with others. As an alternative to the SDP, offenders may choose to participate in the debriefing process at any time. As part of the program development, an assessment will be conducted to determine additional resource needs. CDCR will seek resources where available, to assist with this effort. \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2012/03/14/anatomy-of-a-prison-policy-document-on-new-isolation-rules-annotated/#par1\">\u003cstrong>View explanation\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The STG SDP shall be normally completed in five steps and provides a process for offenders engaged in STG behavior to demonstrate their ability to refrain from criminal gang behavior, preparing them for return to a general population, or SNY program setting. The initial four steps are generally designed to be completed within 48 months. The fifth step which consists of observation and monitoring of behavior within the general population or SNY will normally be completed within the 12 months following Step 4. Each step will consist of programs and privileges that increase as the offender progresses through the SDP... \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2012/03/14/anatomy-of-a-prison-policy-document-on-new-isolation-rules-annotated/#par2\">\u003cstrong>View explanation\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Participants in Steps 1, 2 and 3 will be reviewed by ICC at least every 180 days for evaluation of program participation. If, during the ICC review, it is determined that the offender has participated in the required programs for successful step completion, the offender may be considered for placement into the next successive step. Participants in Step 4 shall be reviewed by ICC at least every 90 days. The successful completion of each step will require a minimum of 12 months program participation. \u003ca href=\"//ww2.kqed.org/news/2012/03/14/anatomy-of-a-prison-policy-document-on-new-isolation-rules-annotated/#par3\">\u003cstrong>View explanation\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>\u003ca name=\"par1\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Paragraph 1\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>SDP is the \"Step-Down Program,\" the type of carrot-and-stick system that has been used in other states to encourage inmates to change negative behavior, including violent conflicts with members of other races or prison groups. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The program would be set up to gradually give prisoners more \"privileges\" in exchange for following the rules. In addition to refraining from participating in gang activity and, presumably, committing racially motivated offenses, they will be be expected to take part in educational, self-help or anger management classes of the type offered to prisoners in the mainstream population, most likely alone in their cells. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The rewards component consists of things like phone calls, exercise equipment (currently prohibited), freedom from physical restraints, and the ability to participate in group activities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Currently SHU inmates are almost always shackled when outside their cells, and inmates who successfully work their way through to the 3rd year of the new Step-Down Program will be afforded the privilege of being unshackled around other inmates. By the 4th year, they would be able to eat meals with other inmates \"unrestrained.\" \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other rewards: By the end of the 1st year, an inmate would be allowed one phone call home; that number increases to two by the second year. At the end of the 1st year, an inmate would also be allowed to send one photograph home. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \"STG\" that is mentioned stands for \"Security Threat Group,\" made up of prison gangs and other prohibited groups. The number of groups whose members could face enhanced SHU terms is being widened under the new plan to include street gangs like the Crips and Bloods. This expansion of red-flagged groups is one reason prison advocates are worried that the new policy may actually result in an increase in the SHU population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \"debriefing process\" cited in the document refers to what is commonly called snitching. Inmates have felt that once you're in the SHU as a gang member, the only way you can exit is to inform on other inmates. The corrections department says currently there is another way out of the SHU -- refraining from any gang-related activity for six years. Under the new regulations, inmates will be able to work their way out of the SHU without explicitly renouncing any gang, though they will have to prove that they no longer take part in gang-related activities, can mix with inmates from other racial and ethnic groups, etc. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca name=\"par2\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Paragraph 2\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The SNY program cited here refers to \"Sensitive Needs Yard.\" The term refers to housing for prisoners who are vulnerable to assault, including gang dropouts and convicted pedophiles, child murderers and rapists. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The timeline laid out indicates that the minimum amount of time a prisoner can spend in a SHU is four years, unless he agrees to inform. That's down from a six-year minimum. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, Michael Montgomery says, a close reading of the proposal indicates that prisoners who are in the SHU facility at Pelican Bay, home of the notorious windowless isolation cells where last year's prisoner strike started, would have to be transferred out of those units in two years, as they don't include areas where inmates could participate in group activities unrestrained. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many penal experts say two years should be the limit for solitary confinement. It may be that the department is seeking to reduce the time that inmates who are participating in the program spend in the SHU due to legal concerns associated with long-term isolation. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new policy refers to refraining from \"criminal gang behavior\" as a prerequisite to reentering the mainstream prison population. This is a move toward the national norm within penitentiaries, in which isolation is restricted to those who have committed criminal offenses, as opposed to the loosely defined \"gang affiliation\" that has landed many inmates in California SHUs. Out of 3,100 inmates in isolation units, 2,000 have been labeled as gang \"associates.\" The department says it will do a case-by-case review of these so-designated prisoners, in consideration for transfer to less isolated units. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new criteria may prevent inmates like Ernesto Lira from winding up in isolation. As \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2011/09/15/a-tale-of-2-maximum-security-inmates-gang-lord-petty-thief-both-wind-up-in-windowless-isolation-units/\">reported by Montgomery last year\u003c/a>, Lira was serving a sentence for drug possession in a low-security prison when he was sent to Pelican Bay for an “indeterminate” term because authorities contended he was an associate of a violent Latino group known as Nuestra Raza. Lira was never accused of doing anything tangible for the group, and the key piece of evidence against him was a drawing found in his locker that allegedly contained gang symbols. He eventually won a judgment in U.S. District Court against the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, in part for psychological damage he suffered while locked in isolation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca name=\"par3\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Paragraph 3\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Step Down Program requires that an \"Institutional Classification Committee\" (ICC) evaluate a prisoner's progress every 180 days in the first three years of the program in order to make a determination as to whether the prisoner can advance to the next step. Prisoner rights advocates have long argued these committees are rubber stamps for prison authorities and that prisoners do not receive a legitimate review. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>So a big question for prisoner advocates around the new policy is whether these committees will be redirected to consider more information favorable to a prisoner's case.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca title=\"View Security Threat Group Prevention Identification and Management Model V5 5 03-01-2012 on Scribd\" href=\"http://www.scribd.com/doc/85362385/Security-Threat-Group-Prevention-Identification-and-Management-Model-V5-5-03-01-2012\">Security Threat Group Prevention Identification and Management Model V5 5 03-01-2012\u003c/a>\u003ciframe src=\"http://www.scribd.com/embeds/85362385/content?start_page=1&view_mode=list&access_key=key-2i7hndyqloahwotvqvlv\" scrolling=\"no\" width=\"100%\" height=\"600\" frameborder=\"0\">\u003c/iframe>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_59316\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2012/03/pelicanbay1.jpg\">\u003cimg src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2012/03/pelicanbay1.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"pelicanbay1\" width=\"300\" height=\"257\" class=\"size-full wp-image-59316\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Pelican Bay Prison\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Last year hundreds of inmates staged two \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/tag/prison-hunger-strike/\">hunger strikes\u003c/a> that spread to 13 prisons in California. The prisoners were protesting conditions in super-maximum security units known as SHUs, where a majority of state prisoners are held in extreme isolation for alleged ties to prison gangs. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last week, the State Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation issued a new set of policies aimed at overhauling how these units are managed, what prisoners are sent there, and how long they're held in isolation. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The changes were spelled out in a Dept of Corrections document, \u003ca href=\"http://www.scribd.com/doc/85362385/Security-Threat-Group-Prevention-Identification-and-Management-Model-V5-5-03-01-2012\">embedded here\u003c/a> and below. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>We asked KQED's Michael Montgomery, a longtime reporter of California prison issues, to annotate a key section of the document, cracking open some of the bureaucratic language to reveal the harsh isolation and deprivation in which some prisoners have been housed, as well as the rewards they are now being offered to toe the line and potentially exit these most restrictive of conditions. Rewards that, to a person at liberty, may seem poignantly meager or even absurd, but ones that the California Department of Corrections & Rehabiliation thinks will be incentive enough to coax good behavior.\u003c!--more-->\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Here is the crux of the policy. \u003cstrong>Click on the \"view explanation\" link to be taken to Montgomery's analysis\u003c/strong>: \u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>The SDP will establish an incentive based multi-step process for the management of STG offenders. This program will assign, transition, and monitor offenders who by their behavior have demonstrated the need for CDCR’s utilization of special strategies for their management. This program is designed for STG offenders who require structured activities and programming, who choose to discontinue criminal activity. Additionally, it affords offenders the opportunity to earn enhanced privileges proportionate to their ability to reintegrate and effectively interact with others. As an alternative to the SDP, offenders may choose to participate in the debriefing process at any time. As part of the program development, an assessment will be conducted to determine additional resource needs. CDCR will seek resources where available, to assist with this effort. \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2012/03/14/anatomy-of-a-prison-policy-document-on-new-isolation-rules-annotated/#par1\">\u003cstrong>View explanation\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The STG SDP shall be normally completed in five steps and provides a process for offenders engaged in STG behavior to demonstrate their ability to refrain from criminal gang behavior, preparing them for return to a general population, or SNY program setting. The initial four steps are generally designed to be completed within 48 months. The fifth step which consists of observation and monitoring of behavior within the general population or SNY will normally be completed within the 12 months following Step 4. Each step will consist of programs and privileges that increase as the offender progresses through the SDP... \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2012/03/14/anatomy-of-a-prison-policy-document-on-new-isolation-rules-annotated/#par2\">\u003cstrong>View explanation\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Participants in Steps 1, 2 and 3 will be reviewed by ICC at least every 180 days for evaluation of program participation. If, during the ICC review, it is determined that the offender has participated in the required programs for successful step completion, the offender may be considered for placement into the next successive step. Participants in Step 4 shall be reviewed by ICC at least every 90 days. The successful completion of each step will require a minimum of 12 months program participation. \u003ca href=\"//ww2.kqed.org/news/2012/03/14/anatomy-of-a-prison-policy-document-on-new-isolation-rules-annotated/#par3\">\u003cstrong>View explanation\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>\u003ca name=\"par1\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Paragraph 1\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>SDP is the \"Step-Down Program,\" the type of carrot-and-stick system that has been used in other states to encourage inmates to change negative behavior, including violent conflicts with members of other races or prison groups. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The program would be set up to gradually give prisoners more \"privileges\" in exchange for following the rules. In addition to refraining from participating in gang activity and, presumably, committing racially motivated offenses, they will be be expected to take part in educational, self-help or anger management classes of the type offered to prisoners in the mainstream population, most likely alone in their cells. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The rewards component consists of things like phone calls, exercise equipment (currently prohibited), freedom from physical restraints, and the ability to participate in group activities.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Currently SHU inmates are almost always shackled when outside their cells, and inmates who successfully work their way through to the 3rd year of the new Step-Down Program will be afforded the privilege of being unshackled around other inmates. By the 4th year, they would be able to eat meals with other inmates \"unrestrained.\" \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other rewards: By the end of the 1st year, an inmate would be allowed one phone call home; that number increases to two by the second year. At the end of the 1st year, an inmate would also be allowed to send one photograph home. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \"STG\" that is mentioned stands for \"Security Threat Group,\" made up of prison gangs and other prohibited groups. The number of groups whose members could face enhanced SHU terms is being widened under the new plan to include street gangs like the Crips and Bloods. This expansion of red-flagged groups is one reason prison advocates are worried that the new policy may actually result in an increase in the SHU population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \"debriefing process\" cited in the document refers to what is commonly called snitching. Inmates have felt that once you're in the SHU as a gang member, the only way you can exit is to inform on other inmates. The corrections department says currently there is another way out of the SHU -- refraining from any gang-related activity for six years. Under the new regulations, inmates will be able to work their way out of the SHU without explicitly renouncing any gang, though they will have to prove that they no longer take part in gang-related activities, can mix with inmates from other racial and ethnic groups, etc. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca name=\"par2\">\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>Paragraph 2\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The SNY program cited here refers to \"Sensitive Needs Yard.\" The term refers to housing for prisoners who are vulnerable to assault, including gang dropouts and convicted pedophiles, child murderers and rapists. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The timeline laid out indicates that the minimum amount of time a prisoner can spend in a SHU is four years, unless he agrees to inform. That's down from a six-year minimum. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, Michael Montgomery says, a close reading of the proposal indicates that prisoners who are in the SHU facility at Pelican Bay, home of the notorious windowless isolation cells where last year's prisoner strike started, would have to be transferred out of those units in two years, as they don't include areas where inmates could participate in group activities unrestrained. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Many penal experts say two years should be the limit for solitary confinement. It may be that the department is seeking to reduce the time that inmates who are participating in the program spend in the SHU due to legal concerns associated with long-term isolation. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new policy refers to refraining from \"criminal gang behavior\" as a prerequisite to reentering the mainstream prison population. This is a move toward the national norm within penitentiaries, in which isolation is restricted to those who have committed criminal offenses, as opposed to the loosely defined \"gang affiliation\" that has landed many inmates in California SHUs. Out of 3,100 inmates in isolation units, 2,000 have been labeled as gang \"associates.\" The department says it will do a case-by-case review of these so-designated prisoners, in consideration for transfer to less isolated units. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new criteria may prevent inmates like Ernesto Lira from winding up in isolation. As \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2011/09/15/a-tale-of-2-maximum-security-inmates-gang-lord-petty-thief-both-wind-up-in-windowless-isolation-units/\">reported by Montgomery last year\u003c/a>, Lira was serving a sentence for drug possession in a low-security prison when he was sent to Pelican Bay for an “indeterminate” term because authorities contended he was an associate of a violent Latino group known as Nuestra Raza. Lira was never accused of doing anything tangible for the group, and the key piece of evidence against him was a drawing found in his locker that allegedly contained gang symbols. 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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>Originally published on \u003ca href=\"http://californiawatch.org/dailyreport/new-hunger-strike-begins-prison-officials-investigate-advocates-12885\" target=\"_blank\">Californiawatch.org\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_41604\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/10/PelicanBayExerciseYd.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-41604\" title=\"PelicanBayExerciseYd\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/10/PelicanBayExerciseYd-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"An exercise yard inside Pelican Bay State Prison.\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo: Michael Montgomery/KQED\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Just days after thousands of California inmates renewed a hunger strike, two Bay Area attorneys closely involved in mediation efforts got a surprise: They were under investigation by the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation for allegations of misconduct and unspecified security threats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The attorneys – Marilyn McMahon, executive director of California Prison Focus, and Carol Strickman of Legal Services for Prisoners With Children – have been banned from state institutions until the investigation is resolved, according to temporary exclusion orders signed by Corrections Undersecretary Scott Kernan on Sept. 29.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The investigation will determine whether the attorneys “violated the laws and policies governing the safe operations of institutions within the CDCR,” the order states.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The document does not provide details about the allegations. It cites a section from the California Code of Regulations that reads:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Committing an act that jeopardizes the life of a person, violates the security of the facility, constitutes a misdemeanor or a felony, or is a reoccurrence of previous violations shall result in a one-year to lifetime exclusion depending on the severity of the offense in question.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corrections spokeswoman Terry Thornton confirmed the department had banned \"some specific attorneys\" from one facility for alleged misconduct. She declined further comment, citing an ongoing investigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!--more-->The move is another indication that the corrections department intends to handle the current protest differently from an earlier hunger strike, which ended July 20 after officials agreed to some concessions, including a review of policies governing the state’s controversial Security Housing Units, where some inmates have spent decades housed alone in windowless cells.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since then, strike leaders have accused corrections officials of failing to carry out their promises.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“CDCR has responded with more propaganda, lies and vague double-talk of promises of change in time,\" reads a statement from the leaders posted on an advocacy website. The inmates vowed to continue the protest indefinitely, “until actual changes are implemented.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But corrections officials say they’ve kept their commitments and claim the protests are the work of dangerous gang leaders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Unlike in the first instance where we certainly evaluated their concerns and thought there was some merit to it, this instance appears to be more manipulative, and it certainly has the possibility of being a real disruption to the Department of Corrections and the security of its staff and inmates,” Kernan said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A memo signed by Kernan and distributed to inmates Sept. 29 warned the department was treating the new hunger strike as a “mass disturbance” and said any prisoner who joined the protest would be subject to disciplinary action.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>General-population inmates identified as strike leaders will be locked in special segregation units normally used as punishment for major rules violations, according to the memo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Strickman and McMahon have been involved in extensive discussions with corrections officials, including Kernan, and leaders of the strike, who are housed in Pelican Bay State Prison’s Security Housing Unit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Neither attorney was available for comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dorsey Nunn, executive director of Legal Services for Prisoners With Children, condemned the sanctions against the attorneys and said he expected the department would place similar restrictions on other advocates in order to further isolate leaders of the hunger strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They’re trying to move us out of the way,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nearly 3,400 inmates at six prisons have refused state-issued meals for three consecutive days, according to the most recent data from the corrections department.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"description": "Originally published on Californiawatch.org Just days after thousands of California inmates renewed a hunger strike, two Bay Area attorneys closely involved in mediation efforts got a surprise: They were under investigation by the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation for allegations of misconduct and unspecified security threats. The attorneys – Marilyn McMahon, executive director of California",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>Originally published on \u003ca href=\"http://californiawatch.org/dailyreport/new-hunger-strike-begins-prison-officials-investigate-advocates-12885\" target=\"_blank\">Californiawatch.org\u003c/a>\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_41604\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/10/PelicanBayExerciseYd.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-41604\" title=\"PelicanBayExerciseYd\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/10/PelicanBayExerciseYd-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"An exercise yard inside Pelican Bay State Prison.\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo: Michael Montgomery/KQED\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Just days after thousands of California inmates renewed a hunger strike, two Bay Area attorneys closely involved in mediation efforts got a surprise: They were under investigation by the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation for allegations of misconduct and unspecified security threats.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The attorneys – Marilyn McMahon, executive director of California Prison Focus, and Carol Strickman of Legal Services for Prisoners With Children – have been banned from state institutions until the investigation is resolved, according to temporary exclusion orders signed by Corrections Undersecretary Scott Kernan on Sept. 29.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The investigation will determine whether the attorneys “violated the laws and policies governing the safe operations of institutions within the CDCR,” the order states.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The document does not provide details about the allegations. It cites a section from the California Code of Regulations that reads:\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Committing an act that jeopardizes the life of a person, violates the security of the facility, constitutes a misdemeanor or a felony, or is a reoccurrence of previous violations shall result in a one-year to lifetime exclusion depending on the severity of the offense in question.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corrections spokeswoman Terry Thornton confirmed the department had banned \"some specific attorneys\" from one facility for alleged misconduct. She declined further comment, citing an ongoing investigation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c!--more-->The move is another indication that the corrections department intends to handle the current protest differently from an earlier hunger strike, which ended July 20 after officials agreed to some concessions, including a review of policies governing the state’s controversial Security Housing Units, where some inmates have spent decades housed alone in windowless cells.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Since then, strike leaders have accused corrections officials of failing to carry out their promises.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“CDCR has responded with more propaganda, lies and vague double-talk of promises of change in time,\" reads a statement from the leaders posted on an advocacy website. The inmates vowed to continue the protest indefinitely, “until actual changes are implemented.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But corrections officials say they’ve kept their commitments and claim the protests are the work of dangerous gang leaders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Unlike in the first instance where we certainly evaluated their concerns and thought there was some merit to it, this instance appears to be more manipulative, and it certainly has the possibility of being a real disruption to the Department of Corrections and the security of its staff and inmates,” Kernan said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A memo signed by Kernan and distributed to inmates Sept. 29 warned the department was treating the new hunger strike as a “mass disturbance” and said any prisoner who joined the protest would be subject to disciplinary action.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>General-population inmates identified as strike leaders will be locked in special segregation units normally used as punishment for major rules violations, according to the memo.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Strickman and McMahon have been involved in extensive discussions with corrections officials, including Kernan, and leaders of the strike, who are housed in Pelican Bay State Prison’s Security Housing Unit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Neither attorney was available for comment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Dorsey Nunn, executive director of Legal Services for Prisoners With Children, condemned the sanctions against the attorneys and said he expected the department would place similar restrictions on other advocates in order to further isolate leaders of the hunger strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They’re trying to move us out of the way,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Nearly 3,400 inmates at six prisons have refused state-issued meals for three consecutive days, according to the most recent data from the corrections department.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>State corrections officials yesterday threatened to discipline thousands of inmates who have resumed a hunger strike over conditions at California’s highest-security lockups.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_41320\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/09/prisoninmates.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-41320\" title=\"prisoninmates\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/09/prisoninmates-300x199.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"199\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo: CDCR\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/09/prisonstrikememo.pdf\">state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation memo distributed to all state inmates\u003c/a>(pdf) said any prisoner participating in the strike would receive disciplinary action “in accordance with the California Code of Regulations.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The memo warned that inmates “identified as leading the disturbance will be subject to removal from general population and placed in an Administrative Segregation Unit.” The department also said it would consider removing canteen items from inmates' cells, including any food.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The memo did not explain what action the department would take against the main strike leaders, all of whom are already locked in a special section of Pelican Bay State Prison’s Security Housing Unit, which is at the heart of the protest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As many as 5,000 inmates in California prisons, including Calipatria and Pelican Bay, have refused state-issued meals since Monday, according to advocacy groups and internal corrections department reporting. That followed an appeal from strike leaders that was posted on an advocacy website earlier this month. \u003c!--more-->\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corrections spokeswoman Terry Thornton declined to offer specific numbers or locations, saying “thousands” of inmates had refused meals at “several” institutions. Thornton said the department will not formally treat the action as a hunger strike until inmates have refused nine consecutive meals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The strikers are accusing officials of not following through on earlier promises to overhaul policies governing the Security Housing Units, where some prisoners, including several strike leaders, have spent decades locked in windowless cells.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corrections officials say prisoners housed in the units are dangerous gang leaders who need to be segregated from the general prison population for security reasons. Officials also say they are moving forward with significant policy changes that were discussed with Pelican Bay inmates during the last hunger strike, which ended July 20.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A separate department memo also distributed to inmates yesterday outlined the new policies being developed by senior corrections staff, including “increased privileges based upon disciplinary free behavior, a step down process for SHU (Security Housing Unit) inmates, and a system that better defines and weighs necessary points in the (gang) validation process.” The memo warned that work on the new policies “may be delayed by large-scale inmate disturbances or other emergency circumstances.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prisoner-rights advocates expressed concern that the situation could escalate dramatically, as neither side appears open to compromise.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There doesn’t seem to be any endgame,” said Donald Specter, director of the Berkeley-based Prison Law Office. “The prisoners distrust the Department of Corrections. And the Department of Corrections has no intention of doing more than they’ve previously announced.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m very concerned that prisoners may die or be seriously injured,\" Specter said. \"I don’t see any way to come to a resolution, short of prisoners stopping the hunger strike or the department taking extraordinary measures to force-feed them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Medical staff are on alert and expected to begin monitoring the inmates' health conditions tomorrow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, some lawmakers are asking the Office of the Inspector General to take action.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A Sept. 22 letter from state Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, to Inspector General Robert Barton requested a review of the corrections department’s “response to the issues raised by the inmate hunger strike that ended in July of this year.\" The letter – formally issued by the Senate Rules Committee – asked that the review be completed within 30 days.\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>State corrections officials yesterday threatened to discipline thousands of inmates who have resumed a hunger strike over conditions at California’s highest-security lockups.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_41320\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 300px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/09/prisoninmates.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-medium wp-image-41320\" title=\"prisoninmates\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/09/prisoninmates-300x199.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"199\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo: CDCR\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>A \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/09/prisonstrikememo.pdf\">state Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation memo distributed to all state inmates\u003c/a>(pdf) said any prisoner participating in the strike would receive disciplinary action “in accordance with the California Code of Regulations.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The memo warned that inmates “identified as leading the disturbance will be subject to removal from general population and placed in an Administrative Segregation Unit.” The department also said it would consider removing canteen items from inmates' cells, including any food.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The memo did not explain what action the department would take against the main strike leaders, all of whom are already locked in a special section of Pelican Bay State Prison’s Security Housing Unit, which is at the heart of the protest.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As many as 5,000 inmates in California prisons, including Calipatria and Pelican Bay, have refused state-issued meals since Monday, according to advocacy groups and internal corrections department reporting. That followed an appeal from strike leaders that was posted on an advocacy website earlier this month. \u003c!--more-->\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corrections spokeswoman Terry Thornton declined to offer specific numbers or locations, saying “thousands” of inmates had refused meals at “several” institutions. Thornton said the department will not formally treat the action as a hunger strike until inmates have refused nine consecutive meals.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The strikers are accusing officials of not following through on earlier promises to overhaul policies governing the Security Housing Units, where some prisoners, including several strike leaders, have spent decades locked in windowless cells.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corrections officials say prisoners housed in the units are dangerous gang leaders who need to be segregated from the general prison population for security reasons. Officials also say they are moving forward with significant policy changes that were discussed with Pelican Bay inmates during the last hunger strike, which ended July 20.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A separate department memo also distributed to inmates yesterday outlined the new policies being developed by senior corrections staff, including “increased privileges based upon disciplinary free behavior, a step down process for SHU (Security Housing Unit) inmates, and a system that better defines and weighs necessary points in the (gang) validation process.” The memo warned that work on the new policies “may be delayed by large-scale inmate disturbances or other emergency circumstances.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Prisoner-rights advocates expressed concern that the situation could escalate dramatically, as neither side appears open to compromise.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There doesn’t seem to be any endgame,” said Donald Specter, director of the Berkeley-based Prison Law Office. “The prisoners distrust the Department of Corrections. And the Department of Corrections has no intention of doing more than they’ve previously announced.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m very concerned that prisoners may die or be seriously injured,\" Specter said. \"I don’t see any way to come to a resolution, short of prisoners stopping the hunger strike or the department taking extraordinary measures to force-feed them.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Medical staff are on alert and expected to begin monitoring the inmates' health conditions tomorrow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Meanwhile, some lawmakers are asking the Office of the Inspector General to take action.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A Sept. 22 letter from state Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, to Inspector General Robert Barton requested a review of the corrections department’s “response to the issues raised by the inmate hunger strike that ended in July of this year.\" The letter – formally issued by the Senate Rules Committee – asked that the review be completed within 30 days.\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>from \u003ca href=\"http://californiawatch.org/dailyreport/inmates-vow-resume-hunger-strike-12739\">\u003cstrong>California Watch\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corrections officials are taking security precautions and gearing up medical staff in response to growing indications that inmates at Pelican Bay State Prison will resume a hunger strike that was suspended July 20.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_40811\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 250px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/09/pelicanbay1.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-40811\" title=\"pelicanbay\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/09/pelicanbay1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"214\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Pelican Bay Prison\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Strike leaders are calling on state inmates to begin refusing state-issued food Monday to protest conditions in controversial Security Housing Units, according to handwritten letters, Internet postings, and communications with lawyers and advocates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Formal and informal sources say they’re going to start the strike again,\" said Dorsey Nunn, executive director of Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, an advocacy group that was involved in mediation efforts during the last hunger strike. \"They’re tired of being tortured.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement posted on an advocacy website, strike leaders accused officials from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation of reneging on promises for major changes in how they manage the state’s four Security Housing Units, the isolation cells that were at the center of the previous strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“CDCR has responded with more propaganda, lies and vague double-talk of promises of change in time,\" the statement reads. \"SHU prisoners are dissatisfied with CDCR’s response to their formal complaint and … core demands and therefore will continue to resist via peaceful protest indefinitely, until actual changes are implemented.” \u003c!--more-->\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Department officials have agreed to allow personal items for Security Housing Unit inmates that were previously banned, such as sweats, wall calendars and art supplies. And they say new policy guidelines governing the special units will be ready for stakeholder review next month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An internal memo dated Aug. 25 \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/251731-gang-management-policy-proposa-8-25-11l.html\">outlines key elements of the policy overhaul\u003c/a>, including changes in how inmates are identified, or validated, as gang members and associates; changes in the criteria used to determine how inmates are assigned to a Security Housing Unit; and the creation of a “step-down” program that would allow an inmate transfer to a general population yard without having to “debrief,” something many inmates consider snitching.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">\n\u003cp>Kernan said officials will treat any new hunger strike as a “mass disturbance” and will take disciplinary action against anyone who takes part.\u003c/p>\n\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Corrections Undersecretary Scott Kernan said the department has kept its word and will continue the policy makeover even if the inmates launch a new hunger strike. Kernan had sharp words for many of the strike leaders, whom he accused of being \"manipulative\" gang leaders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Unlike in the first instance where we certainly evaluated their concerns and thought there was some merit to it, this instance appears to be more manipulative, and it certainly has the possibility of being a real disruption to the Department of Corrections and the security of its staff and inmates,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kernan said officials will treat any new hunger strike as a “mass disturbance” and will take disciplinary action against anyone who takes part. That could include ending commissary privileges and imposing six-month terms in the Security Housing Units for general population inmates who join the action.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Advocacy groups pledged to continue to support the inmates in their demands for change. But some prominent advocates say strike leaders should hold off on another action until the department releases more details on its policy changes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If I were the prisoners … I would wait,” said Charles Carbone, an inmate rights attorney who has handled dozens of lawsuits against the corrections department. “But we have to understand these guys have been waiting for decades. Their patience has understandably run out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can also \u003ca href=\"http://www.californiareport.org/archive/R201109230850/b\">listen to this report\u003c/a> on today's California Report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Michael Montgomery is an investigative reporter with KQED News and California Watch. Read more from California Watch \u003ca href=\"http://californiawatch.org/\">here\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"description": "from California Watch Corrections officials are taking security precautions and gearing up medical staff in response to growing indications that inmates at Pelican Bay State Prison will resume a hunger strike that was suspended July 20. Strike leaders are calling on state inmates to begin refusing state-issued food Monday to protest conditions in controversial Security",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>from \u003ca href=\"http://californiawatch.org/dailyreport/inmates-vow-resume-hunger-strike-12739\">\u003cstrong>California Watch\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Corrections officials are taking security precautions and gearing up medical staff in response to growing indications that inmates at Pelican Bay State Prison will resume a hunger strike that was suspended July 20.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_40811\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 250px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/09/pelicanbay1.jpg\">\u003cimg class=\"size-full wp-image-40811\" title=\"pelicanbay\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/09/pelicanbay1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"214\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Pelican Bay Prison\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Strike leaders are calling on state inmates to begin refusing state-issued food Monday to protest conditions in controversial Security Housing Units, according to handwritten letters, Internet postings, and communications with lawyers and advocates.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Formal and informal sources say they’re going to start the strike again,\" said Dorsey Nunn, executive director of Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, an advocacy group that was involved in mediation efforts during the last hunger strike. \"They’re tired of being tortured.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In a statement posted on an advocacy website, strike leaders accused officials from the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation of reneging on promises for major changes in how they manage the state’s four Security Housing Units, the isolation cells that were at the center of the previous strike.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“CDCR has responded with more propaganda, lies and vague double-talk of promises of change in time,\" the statement reads. \"SHU prisoners are dissatisfied with CDCR’s response to their formal complaint and … core demands and therefore will continue to resist via peaceful protest indefinitely, until actual changes are implemented.” \u003c!--more-->\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Department officials have agreed to allow personal items for Security Housing Unit inmates that were previously banned, such as sweats, wall calendars and art supplies. And they say new policy guidelines governing the special units will be ready for stakeholder review next month.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An internal memo dated Aug. 25 \u003ca href=\"https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/251731-gang-management-policy-proposa-8-25-11l.html\">outlines key elements of the policy overhaul\u003c/a>, including changes in how inmates are identified, or validated, as gang members and associates; changes in the criteria used to determine how inmates are assigned to a Security Housing Unit; and the creation of a “step-down” program that would allow an inmate transfer to a general population yard without having to “debrief,” something many inmates consider snitching.\u003c/p>\n\u003caside class=\"pullquote alignleft\">\n\u003cp>Kernan said officials will treat any new hunger strike as a “mass disturbance” and will take disciplinary action against anyone who takes part.\u003c/p>\n\u003c/aside>\n\u003cp>Corrections Undersecretary Scott Kernan said the department has kept its word and will continue the policy makeover even if the inmates launch a new hunger strike. Kernan had sharp words for many of the strike leaders, whom he accused of being \"manipulative\" gang leaders.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Unlike in the first instance where we certainly evaluated their concerns and thought there was some merit to it, this instance appears to be more manipulative, and it certainly has the possibility of being a real disruption to the Department of Corrections and the security of its staff and inmates,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Kernan said officials will treat any new hunger strike as a “mass disturbance” and will take disciplinary action against anyone who takes part. That could include ending commissary privileges and imposing six-month terms in the Security Housing Units for general population inmates who join the action.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Advocacy groups pledged to continue to support the inmates in their demands for change. But some prominent advocates say strike leaders should hold off on another action until the department releases more details on its policy changes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If I were the prisoners … I would wait,” said Charles Carbone, an inmate rights attorney who has handled dozens of lawsuits against the corrections department. “But we have to understand these guys have been waiting for decades. Their patience has understandably run out.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can also \u003ca href=\"http://www.californiareport.org/archive/R201109230850/b\">listen to this report\u003c/a> on today's California Report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>Michael Montgomery is an investigative reporter with KQED News and California Watch. Read more from California Watch \u003ca href=\"http://californiawatch.org/\">here\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Corrections officials told state lawmakers today they’re \u003ca href=\"http://www.kqed.org/a/kqednews/RN201108231704\">committed\u003c/a> to changing the state’s controversial use of isolation units at four prisons, including Pelican Bay. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At an Assembly Public Safety Committee hearing, Michael Montgomery reports, legislators pressed prison officials on three main issues: how an inmate is put inside an isolation unit, how long they stay there and how they can get out. (The California Channel webcast the hearing live; check back here for an \u003ca href=\"http://www.calchannel.com/channel/videos/\">archive\u003c/a>.)\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Earlier today on The California Report, Montgomery \u003ca href=\"http://www.californiareport.org/archive/R201108230850/a\">\u003cstrong>delved into the issue \u003c/strong>\u003c/a> of these prison quarters, called Security Housing Units (SHUs), where state prisoners are held in extreme isolation because of their affiliation with prison gangs — affiliation, at least, according to prison authorities. \u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_37935\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 199px\">\u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/08/CastellanosPelicanBay01.jpg\">\u003cimg decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2011/08/CastellanosPelicanBay01.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"CastellanosPelicanBay0\" width=\"199\" height=\"114\" class=\"size-full wp-image-37935\">\u003c/a>\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo: Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The criteria for sending inmates into such prisons within a prison, as well as the conditions under which they are housed, were at the \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2011/07/20/interview-what-is-the-hunger-strike-by-california-prisoners-about/\">heart\u003c/a> of last month’s \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2011/07/01/pelican-bay-prisoners-go-on-hunger-strike/\">prisoner hunger strike\u003c/a>, which at its peak was participated in by hundreds of inmates in at least four prisons. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Inmates ended the strike when the Department of Corrections agreed to review SHU procedures and conditions, and granted some smaller \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2011/07/25/prison-hunger-strike-update/\">concessions\u003c/a>, such as providing more TV channels and art supplies, allowing different types of clothing, and allowing prisoners to receive one photo per year. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A previous review of SHUs resulted in few if any changes, but Michael Montgomery has reported that corrections officials are \u003ca href=\"http://ww2.kqed.org/news/2011/08/18/officials-prison-isolation-units-focus-of-reform/\">moving ahead\u003c/a> this time — amid threats of another hunger strike by inmates who spearheaded the action at Pelican Bay — with reforms recommended in 2007 by a panel of experts appointed by the corrections department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Listen to or read the \u003ca href=\"http://www.californiareport.org/archive/R201108230850/a\">\u003cstrong>latest report\u003c/strong>\u003c/a> on the Security Housing Units issue\u003c/p>\n\n",
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"content": "\u003cp>Somewhere far up the North Coast—well out of sight and out of mind for virtually all of us—is California's \u003ca href=\"http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/Facilities_Locator/PBSP.html\" target=\"_blank\">Pelican Bay State Prison\u003c/a>. It's a facility built for the most violent, dangerous inmates in the state prison system. Many of the 3,300 prisoners there are in indefinite isolation. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pelican Bay's in the news today because of a prisoner attack on three guards. From the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>The attack occurred about 9:25 a.m. when two inmates rushed the officers with prison-made weapons while being released into the exercise yard. Custody staff in the immediate area responded and stopped the attack with physical force and batons. Two weapons were recovered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At least two inmates have been identified as suspects. One inmate, age 20, is serving a 50-year sentence from Los Angeles County for first-degree murder. He has been in prison since Oct. 26, 2009. The second suspect, age 36, is serving 60 years for carjacking and making terrorist threats. He also was convicted in Los Angeles County and has been in prison since Feb. 7, 1997.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>One of the newsroom veterans here reminded us of a series reported by NPR's Laura Sullivan in 2006. This is how she set the scene inside Pelican Bay's Security Housing Unit: \u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>Associate Warden Larry Williams is standing inside a small, cement prison cell. Everything is gray concrete: the bed, the walls, the unmovable stool. Everything except the combination stainless-steel sink and toilet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can't move more than eight feet in one direction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Prison is a deterrent,\" Williams says. \"We don't want them to like being in prison.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The cell is one of eight in a long hallway. From inside, you can't see anyone or any of the other cells. This is where the inmate eats, sleeps and exists for 22 1/2 hours a day. He spends the other 1 1/2 hours alone in a small concrete yard. \u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>A reminder—a valuable reminder—of what's happening in the prisons we pay for while we're going about our lives. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Links to Laura Sullivan's series:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5584254\" target=\"_blank\">At Pelican Bay Prison, A Life in Solitary\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5589778\" target=\"_blank\">Making It on the Outside, After Decades in Solitary\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5589233\" target=\"_blank\">Working the Isolation Unit: A Prison Officer's Tale\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5587644\" target=\"_blank\">As Populations Swell, Prisons Rethink Supermax\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Somewhere far up the North Coast—well out of sight and out of mind for virtually all of us—is California's \u003ca href=\"http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/Facilities_Locator/PBSP.html\" target=\"_blank\">Pelican Bay State Prison\u003c/a>. It's a facility built for the most violent, dangerous inmates in the state prison system. Many of the 3,300 prisoners there are in indefinite isolation. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pelican Bay's in the news today because of a prisoner attack on three guards. From the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation:\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>The attack occurred about 9:25 a.m. when two inmates rushed the officers with prison-made weapons while being released into the exercise yard. Custody staff in the immediate area responded and stopped the attack with physical force and batons. Two weapons were recovered.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At least two inmates have been identified as suspects. One inmate, age 20, is serving a 50-year sentence from Los Angeles County for first-degree murder. He has been in prison since Oct. 26, 2009. The second suspect, age 36, is serving 60 years for carjacking and making terrorist threats. He also was convicted in Los Angeles County and has been in prison since Feb. 7, 1997.\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>One of the newsroom veterans here reminded us of a series reported by NPR's Laura Sullivan in 2006. This is how she set the scene inside Pelican Bay's Security Housing Unit: \u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>Associate Warden Larry Williams is standing inside a small, cement prison cell. Everything is gray concrete: the bed, the walls, the unmovable stool. Everything except the combination stainless-steel sink and toilet.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>You can't move more than eight feet in one direction.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\"Prison is a deterrent,\" Williams says. \"We don't want them to like being in prison.\"\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The cell is one of eight in a long hallway. From inside, you can't see anyone or any of the other cells. This is where the inmate eats, sleeps and exists for 22 1/2 hours a day. He spends the other 1 1/2 hours alone in a small concrete yard. \u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>A reminder—a valuable reminder—of what's happening in the prisons we pay for while we're going about our lives. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Links to Laura Sullivan's series:\u003c/p>\n\u003cul>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5584254\" target=\"_blank\">At Pelican Bay Prison, A Life in Solitary\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5589778\" target=\"_blank\">Making It on the Outside, After Decades in Solitary\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5589233\" target=\"_blank\">Working the Isolation Unit: A Prison Officer's Tale\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003cli>\u003ca href=\"http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5587644\" target=\"_blank\">As Populations Swell, Prisons Rethink Supermax\u003c/a>\u003c/li>\n\u003c/ul>\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
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"info": "Political Breakdown is a new series that explores the political intersection of California and the nation. Each week hosts Scott Shafer and Marisa Lagos are joined with a new special guest to unpack politics -- with personality — and offer an insider’s glimpse at how politics happens.",
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"possible": {
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"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
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"radiolab": {
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"reveal": {
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"info": "Created by The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX, Reveal is public radios first one-hour weekly radio show and podcast dedicated to investigative reporting. Credible, fact based and without a partisan agenda, Reveal combines the power and artistry of driveway moment storytelling with data-rich reporting on critically important issues. The result is stories that inform and inspire, arming our listeners with information to right injustices, hold the powerful accountable and improve lives.Reveal is hosted by Al Letson and showcases the award-winning work of CIR and newsrooms large and small across the nation. In a radio and podcast market crowded with choices, Reveal focuses on important and often surprising stories that illuminate the world for our listeners.",
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},
"rightnowish": {
"id": "rightnowish",
"title": "Rightnowish",
"tagline": "Art is where you find it",
"info": "Rightnowish digs into life in the Bay Area right now… ish. Journalist Pendarvis Harshaw takes us to galleries painted on the sides of liquor stores in West Oakland. We'll dance in warehouses in the Bayview, make smoothies with kids in South Berkeley, and listen to classical music in a 1984 Cutlass Supreme in Richmond. Every week, Pen talks to movers and shakers about how the Bay Area shapes what they create, and how they shape the place we call home.",
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