Friday, April 25, 2014

Albert Woodfox Speaks to the Experts

The essay featured below, Albert Woodfox Speaks to the Experts, from the Why Am I Not Suprised? blog is reprinted in full with permission of the author. 

Now 42 years since Albert was first put in solitary, Amnesty International has renewed its call for Albert's immediate release (view Amnesty's recent statement and essay). If you have not yet done so, please sign the Amnesty petition today.

(PHOTO: The author with Albert Woodfox)

This past weekend, I visited Albert Woodfox for the umpteenth time in the last five years. All but one of the visits have been at the David Wade Correctional Center in Homer, Louisiana, five hours from where I live.  At the beginning, it was a grueling trip because I wasn't used to it and I have to go up on Saturday and come back the following day for a total of ten hours behind the wheel in one weekend. Sometimes it rains and once, it poured all the way up and all the way back.

Thursday, April 17, 2014

A3 Newsletter: Beyond Imagining - 42 Years in Solitary (April 17, 2014)

RELATED:  Albert Woodfox Speaks to the Experts II  Amnesty International Blog -- 42 Years of Injustice: When Will Louisiana Wake Up? 



(PHOTOS: A billboard campaign to mark the 42-year commemoration launched in New Orleans today.)

As we mark the 42nd year since the tragic and as yet, unsolved murder of Angola correctional officer Brent Miller, and the 42nd year since Albert Woodfox was first put in solitary for a crime he didn't commit, we are confident that it will be the last.  We remain hopeful that the 5th Circuit will finally side with justice and affirm Judge Brady's second decision to throw out Albert's conviction once and for all.  Although he will then have to petition for bail and potentially face a retrial, freedom will not be far behind.  With the civil case only months from trial, thousands of others who languish in long-term solitary could soon have the necessary legal precedent to challenge their conditions as constitutionally cruel and unusual.

Monday, April 14, 2014

Solitary Confinement Exhibition Plants Seed for Advocacy Among SULC Student Body


Solitary Confinement Exhibition Plants Seed for Advocacy Among SULC Student Body

Written for Angola 3 News by Arisa A. Banks
 

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

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

Tuesday, April 1, 2014

Razor Wire, Prison Cells, and Black Panther Robert H. King’s Life of Resistance --An interview with filmmaker Ron Harpelle


Hard Time (2014) from Shebafilms Kelly Saxberg on Vimeo.


In Security from Shebafilms Kelly Saxberg on Vimeo.

Razor Wire, Prison Cells, and Black Panther Robert H. King’s Life of Resistance
--An interview with filmmaker Ron Harpelle


By Angola 3 News

A new 40-minute documentary film by Canadian History Professor Ron Harpelle, entitled Hard Time, focuses on the life of Robert Hillary King, who spent 29 years in continuous solitary confinement until his conviction was overturned and he was released from Louisiana's infamous Angola State Prison in 2001.