Kite Line: Recent Episodes
Kite Line
Kite Line is a radio program devoted to prison issues around the Midwest and beyond. Behind the prison walls, a message is called a kite: whispered words, a note passed hand to hand, or a request submitted to the guards for medical care. Illicit or not, sending a kite means trusting that other people will bear it farther along till it reaches its destination. On the show, we hope to pass along words across the prison walls.
Earlier this fall, the grassroots organization Care Not Cages won a decisive victory against the large new jail proposed for Monroe County. Ignoring financial warnings and public outcry, county officials were moving forward with selecting a greenfield site northwest of Bloomington for jail construction, until mobilization at a council meeting finally stopped them in their tracks. In this episode, we share two pieces on the struggle, with an eye towards next steps as well. As their name suggests, Care Not Cages means not only blocking carceral expansion but creating alternative approaches to preventing harm that don’t rely on police and prisons. What is required is a process of “substruction,” in which one future, based on racist violence and profit-seeking, is subverted, and another future, based in care and mutual aid, is constructed consciously, on at least the scale of Monroe County, if not the whole continent.
After decades of neglect, Martin Sostre is finally receiving his due as a pioneer of prisoner organizing and Black anarchism. Garrett Felber’s powerful biography, A Continuous Struggle: The Revolutionary Life of Martin Sostre, excavates his many contributions as well as the work of his support committee in the successful Free Martin Sostre movement. This week, Kite Line spoke with Garrett about his work on Sostre and its connections to the struggles continuing to our present day.
This episode focuses on the ICE raids still accelerating across the country, and the resistance spreading in response. We speak with K, an organizer in Los Angeles, who reflects on the ICE invasion and the movement against it, which has become a beacon for struggles across the US. Since Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill, Immigration and Customs Enforcement has grown into the largest police force in the country and it’s clear that future movements against policing will have to place organizing against ICE, borders, and citizenship at their core.
This week, we interview Orisanmi Burton on his book Tip of the Spear- Black Radicalism, Prison Repression, and the Long Attica Revolt. The Attica prison uprising was a monumental rupture emerging out of the movements for black liberation of the 60s. Burton reflects on his conversations with people who took part in the revolt, new prison repression strategies post- Attica, and his diagnosis of prison as a form of war. To learn more about the Attica prison revolt, and hear our previous interview with Orisanmi Burton, visit kitelineradio.org.
This week we return to the Pittsburgh Anti-Repression Convergence. From this unprecedented cop city RICO indictment to the nation-wide retaliation against students and others protesting the ongoing genocide in Gaza, the repression of social movements has become a shared experience for activists across North America. In this context, the Pittsburgh Anti-Repression Convergence (or, PARC) was organized this past summer. Over the course of three days, the Convergence committed to “studying the evolving tools of repression and what we have learned in our work to destroy them.” Panels, workshops, and group conversations drew from existing examples of jail and prison support, movement defense, and the various uses of technology as strategies to counter the state violence, surveillance, and trumped-up charged inflicted on movements.
We return to Sheila, who was featured in episode 366 with the episode “Shoving From All Sides”: https://wfhb.org/news-public-affairs/august-9-2024-shoving-from-all-sides/
From this unprecedented cop city RICO indictment to the nation-wide retaliation against students and others protesting the ongoing genocide in Gaza, the repression of social movements has become a shared experience for activists across North America. In this context, the Pittsburgh Anti-Repression Convergence (or, PARC) was organized this past summer. Over the course of three days, the Convergence committed to “studying the evolving tools of repression and what we have learned in our work to destroy them.” Panels, workshops, and group conversations drew from existing examples of jail and prison support, movement defense, and the various uses of technology as strategies to counter the state violence, surveillance, and trumped-up charged inflicted on movements.
Many of the presentations during PARC focused on the ways that movements suffer repression from within their own ranks. This week, we hear a reading of “Addicted to Losing,” presented during PARC, which offers a powerful account of the ways that white supremacy and anti-blackness within social movements undermine their own power to effect social transformation. The author, Athena, points to the implicit ways that radical milieus contribute to the unfreedom of people of color by reinforcing a sense of powerlessness. Instead, Athena calls for a joyful militancy that “turns to our fugitivity, an irreducibly black mode of sociality which affirms blackness as a force that escapes control.”
“Organizing Everywhere” was a panel discussion at Redbud Books organized by the Monroe County anti-jail activist group, Care Not Cages. It convened four organizers involved in related struggles: two organizing against new county jails in Indiana, one in Fort Wayne and one in Bloomington; one Kentucky-based activist fighting prison expansion in Appalachia, and a filmmaker currently documenting union organizing at the multinational e-commerce magnate, Amazon.com. The conversation allowed the four abolitionist community organizers to share experiences, project a larger horizon than local organizing can sometimes allow and encourage each other in fighting the systems that can feel overwhelmingly large. The filmmaker, Brett Story, who was in town to show her oeuvre of films at the IU Cinema, makes a number of stunning connections between the contours of mass incarceration and the conditions of work and of organizing at Amazon. The reverse also emerges: the ways working conditions contribute to mass incarceration both for members of criminalized communities and laborers forced to work within the system.
The Mississippi Five are the last remaining women sentenced to life with the possibility of parole after ten years, before Mississippi virtually abolished parole in 1995. Although they have been parole-eligible for three decades, the state has routinely denied their release without reasonable justification. They have been imprisoned for over 175 years and denied parole 47 times collectively. Today we will hear from one of the group, Loretta Pierre, who has been denied parole 14 times, more than any other woman in the state’s history.Although it started long before it had a name, the campaign to Free the Mississippi Five was initiated by Study and Struggle with the RECH Foundation in 2023, following the most recent round denials. Study and Struggle is an abolitionist collective concentrated in Mississippi that organizes through political education, mutual aid, and community building across prison walls. Many of the Five are members and have hosted radical study groups inside since 2020.You can find out ways to get involved at: https://www.studyandstruggle.com/ms5
In this episode we air a recording from the final talk of the Pittsburgh Anti-Repression Convergence, which served as a space for activists, political prisoner supporters, and former political prisoners to strategize against repression in the context of social movements, with an eye towards total liberation for the earth and all of it’s inhabitants. We’ll hear from Sheila, who defines and discusses anti-repression, counter-repression, and movement defense.
They began their presentation with Diane’ Di Prima’s REVOLUTIONARY LETTER #8:
Everytime you pick the spot for a be-in
a demonstration, a march, a rally, you are choosing the ground
for a potential battle.
You are still calling these shots.
Pick your terrain with that in mind.
Remember the old gang rules:
stick to your neighborhood,
don’t let them lure you
to Central Park everytime, I would hate
to stumble bloody out of that park to find help:
Central Park West, or Fifth Avenue, which would you choose?
go to love-ins
with incense, flowers, food, and a plastic bag
with a damp cloth in it, for tear gas, wear no jewelry
wear clothes you can move in easily, wear no glasses
contact lenses
earrings for pierced ears are especially hazardous
try to be clear
in front, what you will do if it comes
to trouble
if you’re going to try to split stay out of the center
don’t stampede or panic others
don’t waver between active and passive resistance
know your limitations, bear contempt
neither for yourself, nor any of your brothers
NO ONE WAY WORKS, it will take all of us
shoving at the thing from all sides
to bring it down.
This week, we are sharing a piece created for Montreal community radio station CKUT, on the show Other Worlds on Earth. The piece provides an excellent analysis of the case against Krystal and Peppy, two organizers in Pittsburgh targeted by the FBI and who are alleged to have acted in solidarity with trans people. After their analysis and introduction, Other Worlds on Earth interview one of Krystal and Peppy’s supporters. This support work has been both vital and difficult, since Peppy has now been held in jail for more than a year, due entirely to alleged conduct at a demonstration.
The escalated repression aimed at Krystal and Peppy is part of a society-wide crackdown that affects far more than just political activists. The shredding of environmental regulation due to the Supreme Court’s Chevron reversal goes hand-in-hand with the brutal shutdown of refugee claims at the US-Mexico border, throwing the balance of state action decisively away from any claim that it is protecting us, by reducing toxicity or slowing the climate crisis, and orienting it towards police violence. The massive police funding increase since 2020 leads not only towards the construction of big, useless megaprojects like Cop City, but also to the escalation of racial violence as emboldened police attack Black children. On the 4th of July, Pittsburgh police attacked a 14-year old child. Tanisha Long described the incident this way:
“Tonight the Pittsburgh police handcuffed and detained a 14 year old child claiming that he was a missing child. They picked a Black child off the street, decided he was the missing child, handcuffed him, and ignored the fact that his mom was on the phone telling them it wasn’t him. They put their hands on advocates, an attorney, and other minors.They pulled a taser on me for asking questions and recording. They told the crowd they weren’t allowed to be near.”
This experience presents disturbing echoes of the police attack on three Black children in Bloomington earlier this week. Police are emboldened but also understand that significant portions of the population have grown to distrust and hate them, leading them to take aggressive measures to stop bystanders from filming them and to prevent crowds from gathering in response to their violence. Before the feature on Krystal and Peppy, we will share a press release from Bloomington abolitionist group Care Not Cages regarding the police violence here earlier this week.
After our news, we are sharing the final installment of our conversation with Leon Benson, who was recently exonerated and released after decades in the Indiana prison system. Leon is an inspiring organizer who fought for freedom for other prisoners, organized self-education circles inside, and has, since release, jumped into important community empowerment projects. We were grateful for the opportunity to speak with him.
This week, we spoke with an NYU professor about the Gaza encampment movement there. Through this conversation, the global stakes of place-based struggles come to the foreground, as we wrestle with balancing local demands for divestment versus the way the camps themselves are resonating in Gaza; Palestinians seem most excited by the fact that a solidarity struggle is underway around the world, not that particular demands are being made to particular universities. This question highlights the global character of anti-colonial and abolitionist movements, since the possibility of local struggles overflowing their particular, reformist bounds, and “organizing their space in the most radical way possible” offers their most important contribution to an international momentum.
Eight days ago, students and others established a tent camp – a Liberated Zone – at IU’s Dunn Meadow, as part of a national rising tide of protest against Israel’s war in Gaza. Within hours, Indiana State Police arrived from Indianapolis and attacked the students, injuring dozens and arresting 34 students and faculty. The protesters were undaunted, rebuilt their encampment, and faced a repeat assault that Saturday. The repressive apparatus reached this level of violence across the country, with dozens of camps and occupied buildings facing militarized incursions by police. This begs the question of why the state turned so quickly to naked violence, even compared to previous movements that have had to face down and defeat police violence. Many have pointed to Cop City and similar police training facilities, which have worked since the 2020 George Floyd Uprising to prepare cops to squash anti-racist protest. We have covered the Stop Cop City movement previously on Kite Line. There is certainly an intimate relationship between prisons, police violence, and this country’s long history of racist repression. We spoke to local IU faculty and other movement participants about this sequence and what it says about the future.
This week, we focus on two people who are studies in dignity in the face of state repression. Jack Mazurek was arrested in Atlanta yesterday and charged with arson. These allegations stemmed from an attack last July on police motorcycles, which was rooted in the movement against Cop City. He is standing strong despite the serious charges against him, as people around the country mobilize in his defense. After addressing Jack’s charges, the rest of the episode features Leon Benson, who survived decades in Indiana prisons, organizing against the guards and admins despite terrifying repression, and who emerged unbroken and exonerated a year ago.
For our first episode of the new year, we wanted to begin sharing an interview with Leon Benson. In this conversation, he covers his release from prison, reflections on the treatment he received from the authorities, and his work on the outside. This is a special privilege for Kite Line, since we have aired Benson’s work and thought many times over the years, since he was a leading organizer and thinker inside the Indiana Department of Corrections. We are thrilled that he has been released and are excited to share news of his ongoing work to challenge the prison system. In this segment, he shares the story of what led him to be arrested for a murder he didn’t commit. We will continue this interview in our next episode.
You can hear previous episodes with Leon and his family members:
74 | You Can’t Force the State to Abide by the Law
253 | Truth Never Dies
122 | Leon Benson in His Own Words, Part One
123 | Leon Benson in His Own Words, Part Two
125 | Staying in Touch: a Conversation with Leon Benson
In this episode, we have our monthly round up of prison disturbances, as compiled by Perilous Chronicle. Afterwards, we have a conversation with Sophia Johnson, also known as Candle, who is an anarchist writer who currently serving a sentence in Oregon. In this conversation, she talks about writing in prison, and her ongoing struggle to receive adequate health care.
Since 2021, a diverse movement in has challenged the construction of Cop City, which is slated to destroy Atlanta’s South River Forest. The forest is also known by its Muscogee name, Weelaunee. The movement has created new intersections between abolitionist and environmental politics, since it is defending a forest with important ecological elements for the surrounding Black community, in order to protest the creation of new police training facilities.
In the movement’s latest phase, a new coalition called Block Cop City made an ambitious proposal for mass, non-violent action. That action forced the city to suspend construction that day- and as of our airdate- has not resumed in the days since.
Here are selections from the statement issued by Block Cop City about the mobilization:
On November 13th, a bold and joyful procession of roughly 500 people marched along a public road to the proposed Cop City construction site. Holding banners and giant puppets, and accompanied by drummers and a brass band, Block Cop City activists reclaimed Atlanta’s rich civil rights legacy from politicians who continue to tarnish it with every voter disenfranchised and each tear gas canister thrown. Despite the violent response by police, activists minimized arrests and harm through careful planning, extensive preparation, and close attention to lessons learned from generations of revolutionary struggles against repression and authoritarianism.
Despite numerous stated commitments from religious leaders and city officials to honor the right to protest, armed riot police terrorized the crowd with tear gas grenades, attack dogs, clubs and ballistic shields.
As other protestors took to planting tree saplings in the Weelaunee Forest, journalists were forcibly separated from the crowd and threatened with arrest by police. We condemn this infringement of these journalists’ rights as well as the arrest of protestors including the Indigenous activists arrested while visiting Tortuguita’s altar in the Weelaunee Forest over the weekend.
The movement to Stop Cop City and Defend the Atlanta Forest is undeterred by today’s police aggression.
Photo credit: Mia Beach
On today’s Kite Line, we are sharing more research conducted collectively by Micol Seigel’s Inside-Out class. Last spring, this course brought together students at Indiana University and students held by the Indiana Department of Corrections. This presentation is focused on the tension between surveillance and sousveillance, a term for when apparatuses like social media and smartphones are turned around and used against state violence and official abuses.
Thanks to the students who wrote and recorded this project.
Content Warning: This episode contains references to sexual trauma and harm. We start off this episode with our monthly round up of prison disturbances, as compiled by Perilous Chronicle- followed by some recent prison news. We close our episode with a feature created by students as part of Dr. Micol Seigel’s Inside Out program at …
And now we return to the second part of our conversation between Micol Seigel and Amanda Hall. Last week, Hall talked to us about how her firsthand experience of incarceration led her to her current work in prisoner and re-entry support. And now she talks through her continuing advocacy through Dream.org and the ACLU. You …
For this episode, we share the first part of a conversation between Micol Seigel and Amanda Hall. Hall talks to us about how her firsthand experience of incarceration led her to her current work in prisoner and re-entry support. We will air the second part of this conversation next week. You can find out more …
On the morning of May 31st, Georgia Bureau of Investigation and Atlanta Police Department raided a house and arrested three staff members of the Atlanta Solidarity Fund. The Atlanta Solidarity Fund is a non profit organization that supports those arrested for protesting or otherwise prosecuted for involvement in social movements. Over the last year, the …
This week on Kite Line we air a discussion from 2021, in which we speak with prison abolitionist journalists Maya Schenwar and Victoria Law.
We share the first part of our discussion on their recent book, Prison by Any Other Name: Harmful Consequences of Popular Reforms. The book is an in-depth look at the various “alternatives to prison” that are held up as substitutes for incarceration, but which, in many cases, bring surveillance into our homes and communities. The alternatives mentioned in our discussion today – electronic monitoring, probation, court mandated psychiatric confinement or Assisted Outpatient Treatment (AOTS), and the sex offender registry – are just a few of the methods critiques in their book.
Law has been on the show before, and you can hear her talk about women’s resistance within prisons here, and on a panel about carceral feminism here.
The U.S. was shaken this week by the death of Lashawn Thompson in Atlanta’s Fulton County Jail. He had been moved to the psychiatric ward after being jailed on a simple battery charge. Physically healthy when he was arrested, he was left in a cell infested with bed bugs and other vermin. Michael Harper, an attorney for Thompson’s family, said he had been “eaten alive,” with over 1000 bites on his body. This is only the latest scandal to rock Atlanta-area jails, which hold thousands of people in brutal conditions of neglect.
In order to think more broadly about the context of medical and psychiatric care in prison, we are sharing an earlier Kite Line episode this week featuring a conversation on the subject between Michelle Jones, Anastazia Schmid, and Micol Seigel. Recorded in 2016 while Jones and Schmid were both still incarcerated, we are happy to report that both women have since been released. Jones is one of the authors of the recent book, WHO WOULD BELIEVE A PRISONER Indiana Women’s Carceral Institutions, 1848–1920.
This week, we share the final part of a conversation about policing sex. Micol Seigel talks to Anne Gray Fischer about her book, The Streets Belong to Us: Sex, Race, and Police Power from Segregation to Gentrification. Today, their focus turns to Boston and Atlanta, discussing Boston’s vice district, known as the Combat Zone, and how the police used this zone to attract middle class white people for sexual tourism, while targeting, arresting, and banishing Black women in the area.
On the other hand, there was also a sustained pattern of arresting and banishing Black women in Atlanta, despite the presence of the Black political leadership there. White middle class businessmen created a campaign of sexual policing of Black people. Their group, Central Atlanta Progress Inc., shamed the Black leadership by threatening economic repercussions.
First, we have our monthly round up of prison disturbances, as compiled by Perilous Chronicle. Afterwards, Angela Davis shares a statement in support of the Stop Cop City movement. And we finish sharing a panel hosted by Haymarket Books on the abolitionist struggle to Stop Cop City. In this section, we hear organizer Kwame Olufemi of Community Movement Builders and journalist Micah Herskind, who walk us through the current state of repression and momentum in the movement to Defend the Atlanta Forest.
You can hear our previous episodes with this panel on our website: kitelineradio.org
This week we continue sharing a panel hosted by Haymarket Books on the abolitionist struggle to stop Cop City. In this section, we hear Hugh Farrell in conversation with Sarah Haley, a leading historian of Black feminism in the South, organizer Kwame Olufemi of Community Movement Builders, and journalist Micah Herskind. Haley roots contemporary resistance to Cop City within a longer Black abolitionist trajectory, while Olufemi and Herskind walk us through the current state of repression and momentum in the Stop Cop City movement.
Our first parts of the panel are here and here.
You can find out more at: https://defendtheatlantaforest.org/
If you want to watch the panel online, please visit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWwJkxxMuhQ
This week, we continue sharing Haymarket Press’s panel, “the Abolitionist Struggle against Cop City.” In this segment, Stuart Schrader and Micah Herskind fill in the past 40 years of historical context for why the Cop City project is being pushed through specifically in Atlanta. Schrader teaches at Johns Hopkins University and wrote Badges without Borders: How Global Counterinsurgency Transformed American Policing. He speaks about the surprising connections during the 1980s between the local political class, civil rights leadership, and Atlanta’s role in the Guatemalan civil war and genocide of indigenous people. The Atlanta Police Department started training counter-insurgent police in Guatemala and Cop City appears to be a continuation of this tragic history. Herskind, on the other hand, discusses the contemporary context in Atlanta, focusing on the relationship between expanded police funding and broader trends in social cutbacks and carceral expansion targeted at Black people there.
This week we begin sharing a panel hosted by Haymarket Books on the abolitionist struggle to stop Cop City. In this section, we hear from Kwame Olufemi, of Community Movement Builders, and Sarah Haley, a leading historian of Black feminism in the South. Olufemi powerfully situates in the Cop City proposal in Atlanta’s recent history. He juxtaposes popular demands for a Rayshard Brooks Peace Center, named for a 2020 victim of police murder, with the government’s preference for Cop City, an urban warfare training center. The city of Atlanta actively sabotaged the modest peace center plans while pushing through the expensive Cop City proposal despite overwhelming opposition. Haley goes deeper in time to put Cop City in the context of long cycles of anti-Black violence, plantation-based prisons and alleged carceral reforms. Special thanks to Haymarket Books for hosting the panel.
During a dramatic week of action in the Atlanta forest this past week, hundreds of forest defenders sabotaged a construction site for the unpopular “Cop City” development. Police responded with an act of extreme collective punishment against the entire movement, attacking a nearby Stop Cop City music festival, tasing, beating, and arresting concertgoers at random. 34 people were detained, with 23 being charged with domestic terrorism, just for being present. Maggie Gates, a 25-year old farmer from Bloomington, was tased and arrested and is now facing these charges. People across the country and in Bloomington have mobilized in solidarity, contesting these disturbing charges and extreme police violence. Other media outlets in Bloomington, such as the Herald-Times, have inaccurately reported that the arrests happened at the construction site project. This false statement has been repeatedly debunked, as Gates and the other arrestees were not arrested at the construction site, but rather at the music festival.
The movement in Atlanta remains unbowed, with continuing actions across the city and a large downtown rally organized by Community Movement Builders and Black Voters Matter. Overhanging all of this is the police murder of Tortuguita in the Atlanta forest in January. Police have stonewalled any investigation even as the police narrative has been undermined by emerging facts. Tortuguita’s family released the results of an independent autopsy showing that Tortuguita was sitting crosslegged and with their hands up when police shot them to death. Among more than a dozen other wounds, they were shot in both palms.
You can find out more about the movement to Stop Cop City here: https://defendtheatlantaforest.org/
From March 4-11th, thousands of people will be converging in Atlanta’s Weelaunee Forest, as part of the abolitionist and environmentalist struggle to stop “Cop City,” a police training facility set to be built over a vast urban forest. Reflecting this unprecedented mobilization, we are focusing on the history and current stakes of the struggle.
For context, we start off with a message from Mekko Chebon Kernell, a Muskogee elder, who recorded this message last summer. Afterwards, we hear more insights from Sarah Alvarez of the Civil Liberties Defense Center. Then, the CLDC’s Lauren Regan walks us through some things to be mindful of- whether in the streets or in the woods.
Following that, we hear Kali Akuno at a teach-in about Cop City, where he explains why this is not a project that is only local in scope- it’s one of national and international consequence. We end this episode with a brief history of The Old Atlanta Prison Farm.
You can find out more about the fight against the replacement of the largest urban tree canopy in the country by the largest police training compound in the country here:
https://defendtheatlantaforest.org/
The Civil Liberties Defense Center has many resources for people who might participate in direct action struggles or who are facing legal repression:
https://cldc.org/resources/
Earlier this week, Keith LaMar went on hunger strike at the Ohio State Penitentiary. He has faced escalating harassment from administrators and guards as his execution this fall looms and as solidarity momentum builds on the outside. This harassment extends to new arbitrary rules preventing him from wearing spiritually-significant jewelry and systematic interruptions during visits. Keith is on death row due to allegations that he acted as an interracial peacemaker in the leadup to the seminal 1993 Lucasville Prison Uprising. He was seized by guards during the first day of the uprising and was not present during any of the deaths which later occurred. His support crew asks that people call Regional Administrator Eric Lyle at 614-752-1736 and demand that Keith’s demands for respect and safety are met. More information can be found at keithlamar.org.
Also this week, Emily Murphy’s struggle for adequate food in the Atlanta City Detention Center focused attention on the 19 people facing charges for domestic terrorism for their participation in the mass movement to stop the construction of a cop city in the Atlanta forest. Emily is one of those forest defenders who is still being held and has been denied access to vegan food for almost a month. They have not only protested on their own behalf, but have drawn attention to the systemic neglect and abuse all prisoners face in this jail.
As of February 24th, it seems as though protest and a flood of calls from outside have forced the jail to begin providing adequate vegan meals, shifting the struggle to Emily’s release and defeating the state of Georgia’s wider campaign of repression and intimidation. On this episode we hear from Emily and one of Emily’s dear friends. After that, we share an interview we conducted with Sarah Alvarez, a lawyer with the Civil Liberties Defense Center, who powerfully analyzes the fraught charging strategies Georgia prosecutors are using.
This we continue our conversation between Micol Seigel and Anne Gray Fischer about her recent book, The Streets Belong to Us: Sex, Race, and Police Power from Segregation to Gentrification, an account of gender and sexuality’s crucial role in the history and exercise of police power.
[ Here are our previous episodes ] with Anne Gray Fischer on the book
We start this week’s episode with our monthly round up of prison protests and disturbances, compiled by Perilous Chronicle. After that, we share an Interview with Maru Moro Villalpando of La Resistencia, a project that organizes against the Northwest Detention Center in Tacoma, Washington. Once again, prisoners within the detention center have gone on hunger strike, and Maru returns to the show to continue to shed light on their struggles.
Our previous episode with Maru Moro Villalpando is here:
308 | A Great Moment to Push Further
Today’s episode highlights the campaign to close Rikers jail in New York and continues our conversation with Anne Gray Fischer about the intertwined stories of policing, the surveillance of women’s bodies, and the creation of the racialized American ghetto. Both Sy, an organizer against Rikers, and Gray Fischer, extend the histories of control and racial domination back to the middle of the 20th century. Sy connects their work in solidarity with Rikers prisoners to a family history surviving the Holocaust and resisting the Nazis, and Gray Fischer charts how police in the 1940s systematically punished women for transgressing the color line in their sexual relationships.
Here are some of our previous episodes about Rikers Island:
309 | Captives with Jarrod Shanahan, Part One
310 | No Reforming Them- Jarrod Shanahan on Rikers Island
258 | Stick-up on Rikers Island
275 | Close Rosie’s
Here are our previous episodes on Anne Gray Fischer’s recent book, The Streets Belong to Us: Sex, Race, and Police Power from Segregation to Gentrification:
337 | Policing Womens’ Bodies
338 | Sex Work at the Birth of the Ghetto
This week, we reflect on the complex lethality of the white supremacist system in the United States, as it has dealt out death to Black people and others whose lives are devalued within this system.
We are responding to the release of the footage earlier this week of Tyre Nichols’ murder by Memphis police, which has led to a profusion of shallow statements by politicians and police chiefs, who seem palpably afraid that this brutal killing might trigger another movement like the 2020 George Floyd Uprising.
But we are also still digesting and mourning the murder by Atlanta police of forest defender, Tortuguita, and the death of IDOC Watch co-founder and Kite Line contributor, Angaza Iman Bahar, in Indianapolis two weeks ago. The movement to defend the Atlanta forest has demonstrated the possibility of militantly responding to police murder while simultaneously challenging police media spin.
It has been harder to immediately challenge Angaza’s death, which is the tragic result of being sucked into street violence, but later in this episode, we share a moving tribute and political analysis made by Angaza’s longterm comrade inside Indiana’s prisons, Shaka Shakur.
Below are links to some of our episodes with Angaza, Shaka, and Max:
54 | Prisoner Perspectives on Collateral Damage
92 | Are Prisons Obsolete? Part Two
137 | Policing Los Angeles, Part One
139 | Policing Los Angeles, Part Two
206 | From Watts to Minneapolis, The Arc of Anti-Police Protest
29 | Families and Prison, Part Three
30 | Support Communities
173 | More Kites from the Inside
68 | Two Weeks Into the Hunger Strike at Wabash Valley
Today, we share the tragic news that police killed Tortuguita, a forest defender in the South River Forest in Atlanta on the morning of Wednesday, January 19th.
We have previously covered the movement to protect the Atlanta forest in light of its history as a plantation and prison farm and the future plans to build a vast police training center. Our correspondent spoke with Sarah from the Atlanta Anti-Repression Committee, who filled us in on the state of the movement, this week’s violent police raid on the forest camps, Tortuguita’s death, and next steps.
As she says, the movement’s slogan, that “cop city will never be built” seems more true today than ever before, as an outpouring of grief and anger sweeps the country in the wake of this murder.
We also include a roundup of monthly prison disturbances as compiled by Perilous Chronicle.
We are pleased to continue sharing a conversation between Micol Seigel and Anne Gray Fischer. Fischer’s powerful book, The Streets Belong to Us: Sex, Race, and Police Power from Segregation to Gentrification, was published in 2022, and is an account of gender and sexuality’s crucial role in the history and exercise of police power. In this conversation, Fischer and Seigel discuss the archive and research at the foundation of the book and its relationship to wider abolitionist organizing. They work through the relationship between sex work and vice policing, aimed primarily at womens’ bodies, along with race, which allowed wide swathes of Black neighborhoods to be treated as red light districts, subject to intensified police surveillance and violence. Fischer shows that vice policing was key to developing the American ghetto, as well as its devastating effects on Black people.
We are pleased to share the first part of an interview between Anne Gray Fischer and Micol Siegel. Fischer’s powerful first book, The Streets Belong to Us: Sex, Race, and Police Power from Segregation to Gentrification, was published earlier in 2022, and is an account of gender and sexuality’s crucial role in the history and exercise of police power. In this conversation, the first of two we will present on Kite Line, Fischer and Siegel discuss the context of the book and its relationship to wider abolitionist research. They also work through the relationship between vice policing, aimed primarily at womens’ bodies, and race, which allowed wide swathes of Black neighborhoods to be treated as red light districts and subject to intensified police surveillance and violence.
December 17th marked two years since the passing of Russell Maroon Shoatz.
He was a founding member of the Black Unity Council, a former member of the Black Panther Party and a soldier in the Black Liberation Army. After twice escaping from prison, and twice being recaptured, Shoatz was held in solitary confinement for more than 22 years. This solitary confinement was controversial — while Shoatz had successfully escaped twice, he actually had an excellent record of behavior within the prison itself. Advocates and Shoatz himself argued that his extended solitary confinement reflected the personal offense taken by prison officials, who were embarrassed both by his ease in escaping, and his sharp critiques of the American prison system.
Shoatz is remembered today as, among other things, a well-respected author. One famous essay, The Dragon and The Hydra, is widely available online. Listeners interested in honoring the anniversary of Shoatz’ passing but unfamiliar with his work may find this essay insightful, short, and accessible, as a history of one important aspect of revolutionary organizing.
This episode we’ll share a previously aired interview with Shoatz, recorded on August 15th 1996, at State Correctional Institution-Greene in Pennsylvania. The interview was originally aired on the Peoples Video Network, and was conducted by Dhoruba Bin Wahad.
This week, we speak again with Isaiah Willoughby. Last time he was on the show, he reflected on being incarcerated due to the 2020 George Floyd Uprising. He was released from prison last March, but he’s now housed once again in SeaTac Federal Detention Center on a parole violation. It took three separate calls to complete this interview: calls in the facility are limited to ten minutes, and prisoners must wait an hour in between each call. Because of this, prisoners line up waiting for their turn to make a phone call. He tells us about his re-entry experience, which are issues with returning to the outside world that many people face after incarceration. He talks about the murder of his friend Manny at the hands of police. The police who killed Manny are currently out on bail, and their trial is set for September 2023. Isaiah ends by explaining his civil case against SeaTac Federal Detention Center.
You can hear the first episode with Isaiah here: https://www.kitelineradio.org/podcast/296-words-from-an-incarcerated-blm-demonstrator/
This week, we feature interviews on Life After Lockup from the Kunta Kenyatta Files. Kunta Kenyatta uses YouTube to speak to a range of people in Cleveland, Ohio, often featuring videos shot from the 107 Club, a half-way house and neighborhood hub. He speaks with neighbors, former prisoners, and others, amplifying important voices and preserving memory of key struggles like the Lucasville Uprising. First, we hear him speaking with Mosi Paki about the Lucasville Uprising, and then his friend Porky, who shares his personal reflections on his time inside as a young man in the 1960s.
You can check out more of Kenyatta’s interviews and other videos on Youtube.
We turn our focus this week to a local struggle. Here in Bloomington Indiana, Monroe County Government is quickly moving forward with a proposal for a new $60+ million dollar jail to replace and expand the downtown jail. With little input from community members, consultants hired by the county have recommended jail expansion, and the county government has begun the purchase of an 87 acre, $10 million property.
In response to the jail proposal controversy, a group of concerned local community members called Care Not Cages has been speaking up. Supporters want the county to pause the construction process and consider alternatives to expanding incarceration. We spoke to a member of the group to get some context about recent events. After that, you’ll hear excerpts from a recent CJRC meeting… where supporters of Care Not Cages shared various concerns about the jail proposal and the direction of the committee.
We start out with news about the recent execution of Kevin Johnson in Missouri, and a call to strike from Pennslyvania prisoners. Afterwards, we share an interview conducted by James Kilgore, who spoke with Albert Woodfox and Robert King of the Angola 3. After that, we will feature part of Kilgore’s interview with Sekou Kambui, a longtime New Afrikan political prisoner, who reflects on his involvement in past prison strikes.
Woodfox spent more time in solitary confinement than anyone else in the US, and was released shortly before this conversation took place. Woodfox died earlier this year, so we wanted to return to this 2016 interview to honor his memory. Further, all the interviewees share important reflections on past prison strikes, which feel particularly apt given the January strike called in Pennsylvania.
This week, we share the second installment of a talk by Dina Alves, an abolitionist researcher and scholar who is currently visiting the US from Brazil. Her talk is simultaneously translated from Portuguese by Micol Seigel. In this feature, she talks about the findings of her interviews with women prisoners in Brazil.
We hear examples of how Black women are more subject to legal persecution, and how, as Alves puts it, Black women in Brazil are last in line for rights, but first in line for punishment.
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We regret to report the passing of Linda Greene, long time Kite Line news volunteer. Linda has been with us from the beginning. Since helping us launch in 2016, Linda has collected and written news stories for us. She was always on the lookout for the latest prison news- which isn’t always easy to find. She was an avid listener, and was the first to alert us of an on-air snafu that might need attention. We are grateful for all her help over the years. Rest in Power, Linda.
This week, we share the first part of a talk by Dina Alves. Alvez is a Brazilian lawyer with a doctorate in Anthropology, and has been an anchor in the feminist, antiracist legal scene in São Paulo since 2009. She is currently visiting the US, and recently gave this talk, generously translated by Micol Seigel, …
In our previous episodes, Sincere paints a picture of life in a women’s prison. Today, they wrap up by talking about prison conditions- such as poor food, exploitative practices, and overly harsh punishments- such as losing visits as retaliation for saying “I love you” to another inmate. They also answer audience questions about a wide …
We start this episode with our monthly round up of prison disturbances, compiled by Perilous Chronicle. You can find out more at perilouschronicle.com. This week, we share the second part of a conversation between Focus Initiatives’ Jok Huerta and Sincere. Sincere spent 13 years in Indiana prisons, and now organizes in Indianapolis with other formerly …
This week, we share part of a conversation between Focus Initiatives’ Jok Huerta and Sincere. Sincere, who spent 13 years in Indiana prisons, and now organizes in Indianapolis with other formerly incarcerated people. Sincere speaks to the experience of arriving and getting settled into prison. She also movingly addresses the frequent abuses she witnessed and …
After the news, we hear from Daniel McGowan, former political prisoner and member of the Certain Days Collective. Daniel’s been on the show before, talking to us about the Certain Days calendar- which is out now. Later on in the episode, we talk to an organizer with the group Both Sides of the Wall. Alabama …
We start off this week with a statement, released today, by Alabama Confined Citizens, speaking for people striking behind the walls of the Alabama prison system. We then speak with Elizabeth, who is one of many supporting the strike because they have an imprisoned loved one. In contrast to official narratives from the Governor and …
We start off this episode with our monthly round up of prison disturbances, as compiled by Perilous Chronicle As mentioned in our headlines, Alabama prisoners have been striking since September 26th. Prisoners at all 13 prisons in the Alabama department of corrections system went on labor strike, demanding improvement to conditions. We spoke with an …
This past week, we spoke to Swift Justice, who is an incarcerated organizer in Alabama. Thousands of Alabama prisoners began a strike last week to protest poor prison conditions across the state, where prisons are overcrowded, understaffed and notoriously dangerous. Today, Swift Justice speaks about the recent retaliation the strikers have faced. He updates us …
This week, we share the second part of a recorded discussion hosted by the Civil Liberties Defense Center. CLDC has been at the forefront of anti-repression legal work for decades now, working on many of the Green Scare cases, in which the FBI infamously hounded and smashed radical environmental organizing between 2000 and 2008. In …
This week, we share a recorded discussion hosted by the Civil Liberties Defense Center. CLDC has been at the forefront of anti-repression legal work for decades now, working on many of the Green Scare cases, in which the FBI infamously hounded and smashed radical environmental organizing between 2000 and 2008. In this discussion, Chava and …
Shawn Sutton is from Greenville, North Carolina, and she participated in the George Floyd Uprising when it spread there in late May 2020. Shawn was imprisoned due to her participation and has been recently released. Today, she discusses the incident surrounding her arrest and the overall way recent years have shaped her politics. You can …
Up first, we have our monthly round up of prison disturbances, as compiled by Perilous Chronicle. In celebration of over 300 consecutive weekly episodes of Kite Line, we are revisiting some features from our archive of shows. In this clip from Episode 58, which aired in 2017, we return to the topic of incarceration’s impact …
This week, Zolo Azania returns to Kite Line. He recently visited Indiana University’s campus, and gave a talk that we began airing last week. On that episode, he reflects on that visit and talks about his history, focusing on how learning to use the law improved his life. The efforts of Azania, his lawyers and …
This week, Zolo Azania returns to the show. Azania was on the Kite Line back in 2019, shortly after he was released after surviving decades on Indiana’s death row. He speaks with Jok Huerta, who has been on the show previously, moderating discussion with various Indiana prisoners. Zolo will be on upcoming episodes of the …
Keith LaMar, also known as Bomani Shakur, is a prisoner on Ohio’s Death Row. He is facing execution in autumn 2023 after being framed in prison due to his advocacy for other prisoners and his refusal to snitch on others in the aftermath of the 1993 Lucasville Uprising. He has consistently expressed solidarity with other …
We launch into this episode with our monthly roundup of prison disturbances, as compiled by Perilous Chronicle. Afterwards, we have audio from a prisoner, Paul Lee, reporting on a massive transfer of inmates back in February from Pontiac, Illinois correctional facility to Centralia Correctional Center due to an ongoing black mold problem, which had been …
We are again sticking close to home this week. We share the second part of a panel on the effects of incarceration on families. Max E. Smith, Becky Harris, Stacy Flynn, and Ashley C. Ford speak on their experiences of having incarcerated loved ones or how their time inside affected their family members. All Indiana …
We are sticking close to home this week. We share the first part of a panel on the effects of incarceration on families. Max E. Smith, Becky Harris, Stacy Flynn, and Ashley C. Ford speak on their experiences of having incarcerated loved ones or how their time inside affected their family members. All Indiana residents, …
We recently marked our 300th consecutive episode, and in honor of that we have been airing our favorite selections from previous shows. As we approach the upcoming 4 year anniversary of the most recent National Prison Strike, we wanted to air these calls from two prisoners inside South Carolina, who risked their own safety to …
This week on Kite Line, we return to Atlanta’s proposed “Cop City”- a police training facility set to be built over a vast urban forest. People from across the city and the country have been organizing against its construction, which would make it the largest police training facility in the United States. People have been …
This week, we share the final part of a conversation about Rikers Island between Bella Bravo and Jarrod Shanahan. Shanahan is a writer, activist, and professor of Criminal Justice based in Chicago. He has previously appeared on Kite Line to discuss mass incarceration and the George Floyd rebellion. We are speaking again today about his …
This week, Bella Bravo speaks with Jarrod Shanahan, a writer, activist, and professor of Criminal Justice based in Chicago. Shanahan has been on previous episodes, discussing mass incarceration and the George Floyd rebellion. We are speaking today about his new book Captives: How Rikers Island Took New York City Hostage. Captives recounts the last seventy …
Interview with Maru Moro Villalpando of La Resistencia, a project that organizes against the Northwest Detention Center. In this conversation, Maru passes a kite along on behalf of immigrants housed in the facility. As they point out, facilities like this are “black boxes” where extra effort must be taken to shed light on conditions inside. …
This week we return to our conversation between Baye Sylvester and Focus Initiatives’ Jok Huerta. Both formerly incarcerated in Indiana, they described the circumstances that brought them to prison in a previous episode. In this segment, they talk about the way the prison system strips people of their humanity- and the struggle to retain one’s …
For this week’s episode,Bella Bravo spoke with Johana Bhuiyan, a journalist and author of a powerful series of articles about immigrant surveillance. She covers the vast program called “intensive supervision appearance program” which purports to be “humane alternative” to immigration detention. Managing the program on behalf of ICE is BI Inc, a subsidiary of the …
This week we return to our conversation between Baye Sylvester and Focus Initiatives’ Jok Huerta. Both formerly incarcerated in Indiana, they described the circumstances that brought them to prison in a previous episode. In this segment, they talk about the way the prison system responds to politically-engaged prisoners. When prisoners become conscious and organized, the …
This week on Kite Line, we return to Atlanta’s proposed “Cop City”- a police training facility set to be built over a vast urban forest. People from across the city and the country have been organizing against its construction, which would make it the largest police training facility in the United States. People have been …
This week, we hear the first part of the recent webinar ‘USA vs. Jessica Reznicek: fighting the criminalization of Water Protectors’. The webinar description reads: “Since the No-DAPL movement, dozens of states have passed critical infrastructure laws that increase criminal penalties for anyone taking action against destructive fossil fuel projects. In 2017, 80 Republicans and 4 …
In celebration of recently completing 300 consecutive episodes, we are airing some of our Kite Line crew’s favorite clips from our archive of hundreds of episodes. After we hear a round up of prison disturbances as compiled by Perilous Chronicle, we play a clip from episode 119, in which Talila Lewis (TL) describes some of …
Last week, marked our 300th episode! Over the next few weeks, we will be sharing clips of our favorite moments from our archive of shows. The following story is from Mark Cook, one of our all-time favorite guests on Kite Line. In this gem, Cook, a founding member of the Walla Walla Black Panther Party, …
Welcome to the 300th episode of Kite Line. Over the upcoming weeks, we will be sharing some of our favorite moments from our archive of shows, but we encourage you to go to our website, kitelineradio.org, to browse the other 299 episodes and find some favorites of your own. On our end, we will be sharing moments …
Eric King is an anarchist prisoner who was arrested in September 2014 after he carried out a solidarity action to support the Ferguson Uprising. We speak again today with his lawyer, Lauren Regan, about the harsh violence and repression he has faced in prison, culminating in trumped-up charges of assaulting a guard, charges which he …
Eric King is an anarchist prisoner who was arrested in September 2014 after he carried out a solidarity action in support of the Ferguson Uprising. We speak today with his lawyer, Lauren Regan, about the harsh violence and repression he has faced in prison, culminating in trumped-up charges of assaulting a guard, charges which he …
For our show this week, Micol Seigel talks to Abby Cuniff. Cuniff is a reporter who recently published an article about arsenic contamination in Kern Valley State Prison in California. In this conversation, they talk about the prevalence of arsenic in California’s Central Valley- including in its prisons. She also describes the impact of the …
This week, we share Isaiah Willoughby’s story. He’s been on the show before, talking about his incarceration due to actions on behalf on the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020. Today, he walks us through the events leading up to and after his arrest, including the police murder of his neighbor in Seattle and his …
This week, we speak with Dan from Michigan Abolition and Prisoner Solidarity. MAPS is an exemplary grassroots abolitionist group, which arose out of the 2016 National Prison Strike and, specifically, the Kinross uprising in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Dan lays out this history, and gives us an inventory of COVID-19 in Michigan prisons, based …
This week, we share a conversation with Brian Dolinar. He has been on the show before, speaking about Parole Illinois. In this episode, he talks about Guardian RFID, a company that produces handheld devices that allow jail guards to do headcounts for inmates electronically via scanning. As he explains, various technologies are being used to …
We begin this episode with our monthly round up of prison disturbances, generously compiled by Perilous Chronicle. Afterwards, we share a piece by IU graduate student Kayan Tara about the death of Malik Ali Malik, who died during a police chase in Bloomington last spring. Then, we return to the topic of long-term prisoner Leonard …
In this week’s episode, we air the final part of a conversation between Jok from Focus Initiatives and Rodney Jones, known as Big R. Big R was a witness to the beating that sparked the 1985 Pendleton prison uprising here in Indiana. In previous episodes, they discussed the circumstances that led up to the beating, …
In this week’s episode, we air the second part of a conversation between Jok Huerta from Focus Initiatives and Rodney Jones, known as Big R. Big R was a witness to the beating that sparked the the 1985 Pendleton prison uprising here in Indiana. This conversation is part of a series put on by IDOC Watch and …
In this week’s episode, we air the first part of a conversation between Jok Huerta from Focus Initiatives and Rodney Jones, known as Big R. Both men share stories of their own incarceration, and describe life in a Maximum Restraint Unit. As Big R puts it, when you leave general population for the MRU, “you’re …
We open this episode with our monthly collection of prison disturbances, generously compiled by Perilous Chronicle. Afterwards, we share a conversation between Daniel McGowan and Brian Whitener about the Certain Days calendar. The Certain Days: Freedom for Political Prisoners Calendar is a joint fundraising and educational project coordinated between outside and inside organizers in the …
This week, we continue to air selections from a presentation moderated by Ruth Wilson Gilmore and featuring James Kilgore speaking on his new book Understanding E-Carceration. Speaking from his own experience, he emphasizes that electronic monitoring is another euphemism for the expansion of the carceral net across the globe, enriching corporations and shackling prisoners — …
This week, we share two features dealing with the cunning ways that the carceral system conceals itself and the harm it causes. The first is an account from Adrien Espinoza, who has been on the show before, speaking about conditions in the Maricopa County Jail. As a child, Adrien survived the Adobe Mountain School in …
This week, we air an interview with WFYI reporters Lauren Bavis and Jake Harper in Indianapolis. They co-host the podcast called Sick, the second season of which focuses on health care issues in the Indiana Women’s Prison. As they share on the show, the arrival of the coronavirus pandemic ignited their interest in IWP and …
The explosive spread of the Omicron variant has brought our focus back to the COVID-vulnerability the prison system imposes on its captives. This week, we speak to two people — one outside and one inside the walls — dealing with the effects of COVID on California prisoners.. We start off with an interview with Olivia …
This week, we honor the late Russell Maroon Shoatz. On December 17th, Russell Maroon Shoatz passed away. In 1970, Shoatz was convicted for the murder of a police officer in Pennsylvania and was sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. On February 20, 2014, Shoatz was returned to the prison’s general population after …
This week, Mwalimu Shakur calls us from inside Corcoran prison in California to share his experiences in the Secure Housing Unit. He’s been on the show before, talking about the gladiator fights used by guards to punish and control the imprisoned population. Housed in Corcoran for decades, he describes how he kept going under such …
We are sad to report that Russell Maroon Shoatz, who was recently granted compassionate release after his decades in prison, has passed away. This week, we return to the final part of our conversation about carceral non-profits with Zhandarka Kurti and Jarrod Shanahan. Kurti is a professor of criminology and Criminal Justice at Loyola University …
This week, we cover carceral non-profits in an interview with Drs. Zhandarka Kurti, a professor of criminology and Criminal Justice at Loyola University Chicago, and Jarrod Shanahan, professor of criminal justice at Governors State University in Chicago. Bella Bravo interviews Zhana and Jarrod, who are abolitionist scholars researching incarceration, and in recent years, their work …
We begin our episode with our monthly round up of prison disturbances contributed by Perilous Chronicle. We close out the episode with a call from Adrien Espinoza, who is currently housed in Maricopa County in Arizona. Espinoza, who got his paralegal degree inside, has contributed to the Prisoner Correspondence Project, the Silvia Rivera law project, …
Our news today is focused on the long-term consequences of incarceration. Not only was one of the oldest juvies in the country finally shut down due to systemic abuse of young prisoners, but a number of old school imprisoned militants, from Khalfani Khaldun to Sundiata Acoli, are being hit with repression or are fighting for late-life …
This week we continue to talk to our guests about prison phone industry giant Global Tel Link and its attempt to whitewash its image by donating money to Sesame Street. Recent grassroots activism from incarcerated people and advocates have led to a wave of legislation mandating reduced costs or even free phone calls in some …
This week, our guest is Bianca Tylek, who fills us in about the prison phone industry. GTL and Securus among others profit off of prisoners and their families by charging them exorbitant fees for access to the phone lines which are so key for surviving prison. Recent coverage confirming that Sesame Street had entered a …
This week, we finish our conversation with Kelly Grace Price about the campaign to close Rosie’s. Rosie’s refers to the Rose M. Singer Facility, an all-women’s jail on Rikers Island. On average, Rosie’s detains around 630 women, girls, transgender, gender non-conforming, and intersex females while they await trial. Suzanne Singer, the granddaughter of the jail’s …
This week, we hear from Kelly Grace Price, a co-creator of the Close Rosie’s campaign. Rosie’s refers to the Rose M. Singer Facility, an all-women’s jail on Rikers Island. On average, Rosie’s detains around 630 women, girls, transgender, gender non-conforming, and intersex females while they await trial. Price deconstructs the reformist arguments made NYC Board …
We start off this week’s episode with an update on Marius Mason’s transfer to a men’s facility. Marius is an imprisoned environmentalist who, in addition to waging an Earth Liberation Front sabotage campaign, was an important aboveground organizer for social movements in Indiana and Michigan for decades. He came out as transgender while in prison, …
This week, we hear from a friend and supporter of Jessica Reznicek, who was recently sentenced federal prison after she admitted to sabotaging the widely opposed Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) in 2017. In this episode, Monte tells Jessica’s story from her childhood influences to her experiences in the NoDAPL Movement, in solidarity with the struggle …
Our main story this week is a contribution from our friends at Perilous Chronicle. Perilous is an independent digital research and media project focused on prisons, and moments of protest, unrest, and repression inside them in the US and Canada. This week, Perilous Chronicle’s Ridley Seawood guides us through the The Minnesota Sex Offender Program …
In 2008, Monroe County moved to build a new, expanded jail -framed as a “justice campus” using humanitarian rhetoric. In response, a diverse group of local residents founded an organization called Decarcerate Monroe County (DMC). Judah Schept, who returns as our guest alongside Micol Seigel, was an organizer in the successful DMC campaign to block …
In 2008, Monroe County moved to build a new, expanded jail -framed as a “justice campus” using humanitarian rhetoric. In response, a diverse group of local residents founded an organization called Decarcerate Monroe County (DMC). Here is how they later summarized their activities: “DMC’s framework included embracing alternatives to punitive justice, promoting ways to decarcerate, …
This month, we are commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Attica prison uprising, a high point of the cycle of prisoners’ struggle of the 1960s and 1970s. We share experiences from former Attica prisoners Joseph Hayden and Carlos Roche, and attorney Elizabeth Fink, who all describe the events of that day and the days leading …
Three years ago on Kite Line, we aired an episode about the Attica Prison Uprising of 1971. This week, September 9th to September 13th, will mark fifty years between us and the event. We share this piece again today, with updated contributions from its author, analyzing the growing challenges to our collective survival, both inside …
This month, we commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Attica prison uprising, a high point of the prisoners’ movement of the 1960s and 70s. On September 9th, 1971, prisoners revolted, building on their own organizing and local grievances, as well as responding to the assassination of George Jackson by guards at Soledad Prison in California. …
For our episode this week, we share the second of a two-part conversation between Nicole Fleetwood and Micol Seigel. Fleetwood’s recent book, Marking Time: Art in the Age of Mass Incarceration, is a wide-ranging exploration of visual art made by people in prison. Fleetwood explains “I started working on this book as a way to deal …
We start out by sharing a statement from Jailhouse Lawyers Speak about the Shut ‘Em Down campaign, scheduled for August 21st and September 9th, historic days for Black struggle inside and against prison. Afterwards, we share the first of a two-part conversation between Nicole Fleetwood and Micol Seigel. Fleetwood’s recent book, Marking Time: Art in …
This week, we share urgent messages – kites – sent by a range of people caught up in the prison system. It’s important to listen for the voices of prisoners, whether it’s the hunger strike declaration by a longterm inside organizer like Shaka Shakur, Jessica Reznicek’s reflections as she is about to enter prison as …
This week, we return to our conversation with David Campbell, a former antifacist political prisoner from New York. In this episode, Campbell continues to talk about his time on Rikers Island, this time focusing on jobs and other ways that people pass the time inside- sleeping, video games, visits, and how the tedium of incarceration …
This week, we are highlighting two experiences of outside solidarity with prisoners. First, we share audio from last week’s rally in Indianapolis for clemency, including a recorded statement by Leon Benson, a longtime imprisoned organizer, as well as a speech by his son, Leon Bluitt, about the impact of growing up with an incarcerated parent. …
This week on Kite Line, we continue our conversation with prison abolitionist journalists Maya Schenwar and Victoria Law. We share the second half of our discussion on their recent book, Prison by Any Other Name: Harmful Consequences of Popular Reforms. The book is an in-depth look at the various “alternatives to prison” that are held up …
This week on Kite Line, we speak with prison abolitionist journalists Maya Schenwar and Victoria Law. We share the first part of our discussion on their recent book, Prison by Any Other Name: Harmful Consequences of Popular Reforms. The book is an in-depth look at the various “alternatives to prison” that are held up as …
This week, amid a spate of prisoners’ strikes, we share our monthly round up of prison disturbances for June 2021, compiled by Perilous Chronicle. Prisoners are hunger striking across the continent, agitating for safer conditions, and pushing back against labor exploitation. We share an excerpt of the story entitled Prisoners Strike Against Racism and Colonialism …
This week, we continue talking to David Campbell, former anti-fascist political prisoner who recently did a year on Rikers Island. In our last conversation with David, he discussed the circumstances of how he ended up in the Rikers facility- the short of it being that he was sentenced to his time after a fight with …
Our episode this week is a memorial to Cory Cardinal. Regular listeners will remember Cory as the organizer of the recent hunger strikes in Saskatoon Correctional and as a past contributor to Kite Line. An inspiration to many and a tireless advocate on behalf of incarcerated people, Cory passed away earlier this month. Written and …
This week, Kite Line shares hard-earned lessons based on experiences of struggle on both sides of the prison walls. Perilous Chronicle’s Ryan Fatica returns with Lauren Regan from the Civil Liberties Defense Center, who has guidelines for protestors. IDOC Watch discuss their campaign for mass clemency in Indiana. Malik Washington talks about getting off paper …
Our show this week returns to June 11th, the international day of solidarity with long-term anarchist prisoners. The focus of June 11th is overcoming the isolation that these long-term prisoners face, as the movements they participated in years ago give way to new struggles and new generations of radicals. The day of solidarity works to …
We start off this week’s show with a roundup of prison disturbances compiled by Perilous Chronicle. Afterwards, we speak with Lauren Regan, the Executive Director of the Civil Liberties Defense Center. Regan has been on the show before to discuss state repression and her efforts to support people facing political charges. She returns today to …
This week, we hear from Koby Bluitt, daughter of Leon Benson, a long time Indiana prisoner and organizer. She tells us about Leon, their relationship, and her current efforts to help him get free. We’ve covered Leon’s case on Kite Line before: a case of poor eyewitness testimony that helped convict the man of a …
This week, we share two stories from people reflecting on their time inside and on re-entry. Both have wise words about surviving incarceration, and the overall political context of prisons. First is David Campbell, a former political prisoner at Rikers Island in New York. We will hear more from David later, but in this episode, …
Last week, we heard from Kim, Shari, Lauren, Pablo and Brian about Parole Illinois, a group fighting to reinstate, as they put it, “earned discretionary reentry”. This is the last of a two-part conversation with them. In 1978, Illinois abolished discretionary parole system. Today, it remains one of just sixteen states (plus the District of …
We start this episode with our monthly list of prison disturbances compiled by Perilous Chronicle, an journalistic collective that tracks prisoner protests across the US and Canada. Afterwards, we share the first part of a conversation with people working with Parole Illinois, a group campaigning for a fair and inclusive parole system. In 1978, Illinois …
On today’s episode, we share two perspectives on the role of study, as practiced in the face of repression and directly against repression. First, we complete our interview with Garrett Felber, with a focus on his termination by the University of Mississippi in retaliation for his outspoken criticism of its white supremacist structure and how …
This week, we share the second part of a conversation between Garrett Felber and Micol Seigel. Felber has been on the show before, discussing the Nation of Islam and its relationship to the origins of the modern prisoners’ movement. His new book, Those Who Know Don’t Say: The Nation of Islam, the Black Freedom Movement, …
This week, we share the first part of a conversation between Garrett Felber and Micol Seigel. Felber has been on the show before, discussing the Nation of Islam and its relationship to the origins of the modern prisoners’ movement. His recently released book, Those Who Know Don’t Say: The Nation of Islam, the Black Freedom …
In this episode, we share information about the recent disturbances in St. Louis. Afterwards, we have the second part of a conversation with Balagoon, an Indiana political prisoner who has been locked up for almost 43 years, 31 of those in isolation. In this episode, he first describes the context of the 1985 uprising in …
Up first, we have a comprehensive overview of prisoner protests compiled by Perilous Chronicle, who are collecting information about the many prison uprisings and disturbances now occurring regularly. They will be sharing these updates with us each month. For our feature this week, we share the first part of a conversation with Balagoon, an Indiana …
Our show this week returns with the second part of a conversation between Kite Line’s Micol Seigel and three members of the Carbondale, Illinois community: Chastity, Kim, and Nick. They speak about the ongoing struggle for the use of the Eurma C Hayes Community center. Originally opened by the city as a space for youth, …
For our show this week, we have the first part of a conversation between Kite Line’s Micol Seigel and three members of the Carbondale, Illinois community: Chastity, Kim, and Nick. They speak about the ongoing struggle for the use of the Eurma C Hayes Community Center Originally opened by the city as a space for …
This week, we are trying something new so that we can cover the full range of increased prisoner struggles. We will be teaming up with Perilous Chronicle at the beginning of each month to give you headlines tracking disturbances in prisons, jails, and detention centers. Perilous is a project seeking to gather and track information …
This week, we return to an important conversation about grand juries and state repression. Recently, Steve Martinez, an Indigenous and Chicano Water Protector who opposed the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) on the Standing Rock reservation in 2016, was held on charges of civil contempt of court for his refusal to cooperate with a federal grand …
This week, we brought together three segments that focus on ways the system attempts to repress participants in collective struggles and those who fight for a better world. In a segment that originally aired on KPFA, we hear about the punitive measures Malik Washington is facing after speaking out about the COVID-19 outbreak in a …
Mwalimu Shakur, who spoke in last week’s episode about COVID-19 protocols in his facility, returns this week to share more reflections. He shares first-hand experiences of gladiator fights and organizing against the SHU (Secure Housing Unit) from the inside. Corcoran State Prison was the first prison to develop the ultra-repressive SHU. He also talks about …
This week, we followup on the COVID-19 conditions at Corcoran Prison in California and share news from the uprising in the St. Louis Jail. Afterwards, we finish a conversation between Dr. Jeffrey Ian Ross and Dr. Micol Seigel. Ross is a Professor at the University of Baltimore, and has researched, written, and lectured extensively on …
On January 30th, guards attacked Robert Earl Council, and beat him until he was unconscious. Council, also known as Kinetik Justice, is a longtime imprisoned organizer and cofounder of the Free Alabama Movement. Outside supporters have urged as many people as possible to call the Donaldson Correctional Facility and express concern for Council’s welfare. The …
This week, we share audio in support of Dan Baker and Loren Reed, and from Panagioti Tsolkas, who tells us about the important #CagingCOVID campaign and their upcoming February 1st day of action. As we’ve previously documented on Kite Line, facilities across the country have systematically failed to protect prisoners from COVID-19 and its uncontrolled …
On Kite Line this week, we share two interviews with advocates working on the physical well-being of those locked inside. The first conversation we hear is with Olivia, who is part of a group trying to get the word out about unsafe conditions at the California Medical Facility, or CMF, a prison for inmates …
This week on Kite Line, we have a wide variety of ongoing prison news- ranging from the recent executions of prisoners in Terre Haute to a prison disturbance in St. Louis. Afterwards, we share a conversation that was sent to us from an outside supporter of the ongoing Saskatoon Correctional Facility hunger strike. In this …
This week, we share an urgent statement from the Free Alabama Movement about their ongoing hunger strike and economic blackout. Afterwards, we speak with David Pellow, Fabiana Lake, and Camber Wilson, who recently coauthored a report on ‘Environmental Justice Struggles in Prisons and Jails Around the World,’ via the Prison Environmental Justice Project. Environmental justice …
Happy New Year! This week, we broadcast kites from Strawberry Hampton in Illinois and Daniel Dawson in Saskatchewan, who both called in this week to update us on their conditions. Strawberry Hampton, a Black transgender woman and niece of Fred Hampton, shares the horrific abuses she has suffered inside. Hampton received a rare transfer to …
Today, we broadcast Part 2 of our series on Compassionate Release. Compassionate Release is the principle that sentences should be adjusted given “particularly extraordinary or compelling circumstances which could not reasonably have been foreseen by the court at the time of sentencing”. We now continue to hear from Alison Guernsey, who tells us about the …
We begin this week with a follow-up conversation with Cory Cardinal, who has spoken with us on our past two episodes regarding a hunger strike at the Saskatoon Provincial Correctional Centre in Saskatchewan, Canada. Previously, Cory detailed his experiences during and after the hunger strike. And now, he gives us some updates and tells Perilous …
This week, we hear from two people who explain the rapidly deteriorating COVID-19 situation in facilities in both Saskatchewan and Indiana. As we reported last week, prisoners at the Saskatoon Provincial Correctional Centre in Saskatchewan, Canada organized a hunger strike last week to protest the rapidly-spreading COVID-19 outbreak at the facility. The hunger strike lasted …
This week, we share two interviews with prisoners confronting rampant COVID-19 infections in their facilities. Cory Cardinal, imprisoned at the Saskatoon Provincial Correctional Centre in Saskatchewan, Canada speaks about the hunger strike they organized last weekend to protest the rapidly-spreading COVID-19 outbreak at the facility. Prisoners at the Charles Egeler Reception and Guidance Center (RGC) …
For our episode this week, we share more from Florida Prisoner Solidarity. Recently, they told us about the drastic retaliatory measures prisoners were being subjected to in the Florida Department of Corrections. These punishments were often given as a response for prisoners advocating for themselves in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. This week, they …
This week, share an update sent to us from Michelle Freeman about her husband, Vernell. Michelle’s impassioned plea on behalf of her partner is both urgent and inspiring, and we will continue to air messages from her in the future, as Vernell’s situation evolves. You can hear our episode about Vernell here. Afterwards, we speak …
This week, we return to stories of electronic monitoring also known as e-carceration. Micol Seigel talks to Cody, who says he spent about half his life locked up. He’s 26 now, and spent time in Pendleton Correctional Facility and Wabash Valley Correctional Facility, both in Indiana. He tells Seigel first hand about e-carcerations disruptions to …
After news, we share a conversation between Christina and Leslie about their experiences obtaining an education while in prison. Both women reflect on the barriers to getting a degree on the inside, and how effective the degree was in helping them once they got out. They also talk about some of the differences in educational …
This week, we are airing two kites- the first from a woman advocating for her brother, Billie Allen, who is on death row here in Indiana, despite his fight to prove his innocence. We will talk to Yvette more in the coming weeks, but in this conversation, she introduces us to her brother’s case, and …
This week, we are talking about youth in detention. We are laying the groundwork to continue to talk to current prisoners who were placed in facilities while young, including people who are still locked up to this day, about how the impact of incarceration since childhood has shaped them into adulthood. We start with an …
This week on Kite Line, we share a call from a prisoner located in Seattle, who exposes his facility’s careless treatment of prisoners in the face of COVID-19, and how medical isolation and punitive isolation function similarly. Afterwards, we finish our conversation with Keith Malik Washington. Malik was recently released from prison after many years, …
We begin this week with a short piece by WFHB reporter Aaron Comforty, who reports on an alleged instance of attempted suicide in the local jail, and one mother’s attempts to find out the status of her son. We also speak with Ted Smith, an Associate Professor of Environmental Medicine at the University of Louisville …
After this week’s news and updates, Kite Line sits down with Keith Malik Washington, who was released from prison last month. We’ve shared many of Washington’s essays and audio dispatches over the years, as he exposed the ongoing injustices and hazards he faced alongside others behind the prison walls. Even though Washington is now on …
This week, we hear from Michelle Freeman, who describes the horrifying conditions in which her husband, Vernell Freeman, is being held in Miami Correctional Facility, here in Indiana. Speaking on behalf of her partner, Michelle tells Kite Line about the repeated incidents of medical neglect and retaliatory violence Vernell has been subjected to within the …
Last week marked the 49th anniversary of the Attica prison rebellion. In this episode of Kite Line, we finish our conversation with Dr. Orisanmi Burton. A professor at American University, Dr. Burton introduces us to the diverse demands of the Attica rebels, as well as misconceptions about the demands and the rebellion itself. He also …
This week marks the 49th anniversary of the Attica Uprising, when 1300 prisoners in New York state overcame physical, social, and political barriers to accomplish their revolt. We spoke with Orisanmi Burton, a professor at American University, who has interviewed many participants in the uprising and is currently preparing a book on the event. Professor …
This week, we share important news from around the Midwest and more updates from the struggles in Louisiana’s immigrant detention centers. Kevin ‘Rashid’ Johnson is facing threats on his life inside the Indiana Department of Corrections. An abolitionist in Madison, Wisconsin has chosen to enter solitary confinement rather than violate his ethics and testify against …
ICE detainees are a week into a hunger strike at Pine Prairie, Louisiana. This week, we broadcast audio of a call between an anonymous Pine Prairie ICE detainee, and a member of Perilous Chronicle. More information on the struggle there can be found at perilouschronicle.com. The strike at Pine Prairie is not an isolated incident, …
Today, August 21st, is the 49th anniversary of George Jackson’s murder by San Quentin guards. Jackson was a leading theorist and militant in the prisoners’ movement which had emerged over the previous decade in close relationship to the rise of Black Power. His books, Soledad Brother and Blood in my Eye, remain touchstones for prisoners’ …
This week, Bella Bravo speaks to Zhandarka Kurti and Jarrod Shanahan. Kurti is an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Tennesee in Knoxville, and also works with Face to Face Knox, a campaign to restore in-person visitation to Knox County detention centers. Shanahan is an assistant professor of criminal justice at Governors State …
This week marks our 4-year anniversary, and we would like to thank all those who have contributed their stories, labor, and expertise to Kite Line, making it possible to air news and experiences of incarceration for 211 consecutive episodes. Thank you! — In this episode, we share news from a major prison riot in Georgia, …
This week, we share the voices of three prisoners in Florida. Choosing to speak anonymously due to repression, they told us about horrible conditions inside the Florida prison system. They explain the racial injustice in the prison system, the importance of letting lifers out, the prevalence of moldy, rancid food, poor hygiene in the face …
We return this week to the second part of the conversation between Kristina Byers and Anastazia Schmid. Schmid is an award-winning, formerly incarcerated scholar who went to extraordinary lengths to complete her education on the inside. We last heard Schmid describe the impact of Ball State University, which she attended while in the Indiana Women’s …
We will continue the final installment of the interview between Kristina Byers and Anastazia Schmid next week, as they talk about barriers to education while incarcerated. This week, though, we received urgent calls. Faheem Shabazz is a longtime whistleblower and militant inside the Indiana prison system, who was released in 2018. He has been targeted …
This week, we broadcast an interview digging into the problem of barriers to higher education during incarceration. This interview is between Kristina Byers and Anastazia Schmid, both former inmates at the Indiana Women’s Prison. Anastazia speaks to the difficulties accessing a successful educational experience behind prison walls. These interviews conducted on the barriers to higher …
In this episode, we have two updates from prisoners in California on their conditions amidst the COVID-19 crisis. Afterwards, we speak with Max Felker-Kantor, historian and professor at Ball State University. Felker-Kantor’s particular focus of study is policing and anti-police violence post WWII. He’s been on Kite Line before, talking about the history of policing …
This week, we share a phone conversation between Kijana Tashiri Askari and C, one of their outside supporters. Askari is incarcerated in the California Medical Facility- a male-only state carceral medical institution.The recorded this conversation earlier this week, about the conditions Kijana and others are facing, including improper COVID-19 protocol on the part of the …
The whole country is in upheaval as a vast Movement for Black Lives continues to challenge white supremacy and the institutions of policing and prison. As monuments fall and precincts are seized in Minneapolis to Seattle, the lies and hidden truths of American society are being revealed. We’ve been reminded of James Baldwin’s line that …
In the wake of uprisings across the world in response to the murder of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police, this week’s episode shares thoughts on these revolts and their demands, along with considerations on police reform. We broadcast a June 11th message from Marius Mason’s lawyer, a call from long-term prison rebel …
On this episode, we have a letter from a prisoner at Pendleton Correctional Facility about his experiences with COVID-19 there. We share a short PSA about street safety during protests, and a message from Keith “Malik” Washington. On June 3rd, Bloomington residents occupied the courthouse square in order to support the movement for black lives. …
This week, we broadcast updates on a riot in Macon State Prison, and two calls from mothers of prisoners at Westville Correctional Facility. After a rebellion by prisoners on April 22, over a dozen prisoners have been moved to a new segregation unit and are being subjected to a variety of tortures and abuse. The …
Welcome to the 200th episode of Kite Line. This week, we revisit the important intersection of incarceration and higher education. Barriers to higher education are a key way the incarcerated and the formerly incarcerated are trapped by the system in a cycle of unemployment, low-wage work, and recidivism. We are proud to again host an …
This core of this week’s Kite Line is a conversation between Anastazia Schmid and Jennifer Fleming about trying to get an education before, during, and after incarceration. You’ve likely heard Anastazia before on Kite Line, both while she was inside at the Indiana Women’s Prison, and since she was released last year. We will be …
The country might be locked down, but struggles inside prisons and out continue to develop chaotically and unexpectedly intersect with the COVID-19 crisis. Prisoners in Stateville in Illinois report that they continue to suffer from a full lockdown, restricting their programming and access to phones. Yet, guards are patting them down without washing their hands …
This week, we continue our coverage of the coronavirus within the prison system with three messages from the inside. First, we have some audio sent to us from Oakland IWOC, who recorded a statement from Eric Wayne, housed in the Santa Rita Jail in Alameda County. Afterwards, Abu Faheem Shabazz reports on the coronavirus situation …
Across the country, politicians and businessmen are calling for the economy to reopen, regardless of the consequences. At the exact same time, the corona virus is spreading nearly uncontrolled inside America’s prisons and jails, with concentrations of infections spiking from Rikers Island in NY to the Marion Correctional Facility in Ohio, where 73% of prisoners …
For this week’s episode, we continue airing messages about the coronavirus from prisoners around the country. You can call in on behalf of a loved one, or they can call in to record a message at (765) 343-6236. This week, we hear from prisoners in Wisconsin, Louisiana, Indiana, Illinois and Ohio about how the coronavirus …
This week, we continue our coverage of the pandemic’s impact on prisoners across the country. A COVID-19 uprising broke out in Washington state this week. On April 8, 100 prisoners refused to comply with orders to disperse a protest, and were attacked by so-called “less lethal weapons” like rubber bullets and pepper spray. They had …
Prisoners across the US, and the world, face terrifying prospects as COVID-19 spreads almost uncontrolled inside the prison walls. It’s now or never as they and their loved ones struggle for their release, for adequate sanitation inside, and to self-organize pandemic response in the absence of serious measures by guards and administrators. We hear from …
This week, we continue to air urgent messages from people on the impact of the coronavirus on prisoners around the world and closer to home. We start off with a call from a prisoner at Waupun Correctional, in Wisconsin, where an outbreak of COVID-19 has been reported. We share a statement from someone in Brazil …
As the coronavirus pandemic continues to change life on the outside for people all over the world, the prison population stands to suffer immensely in these times. Last week, we spoke to someone in Italy, who described the riots and protests inside and outside the prisons in areas around that country. This week, we are …
The entire country of Italy is now a “red zone,” not quite quarantined, but facing serious restrictions to movement and public gathering due to the coronavirus. Prisoners were told that they would lose all family visitation, even though the Justice Ministry was not taking any other steps to offer them medical care or prevent transmission …
This week, we return to the Breakaway Recovery House to share a conversation between Micol Seigel and four of the women who lived there: Hillary, Janet, Britney, and Kelsey. All four women interviewed have been on electronic monitoring at some point. They tell stories about their experiences under e-carceration, and the problems they suffered. From …
The Indiana legislature is currently debating SB 449, which would expand the range of situations that would send children to adult court and adult prison. As of 2017-2018, 69% of the cases where children were sent to adult court involved African American youth. Under the proposed bill, children as young as twelve could be sent …
This week, we focus on the history of police in the United States, and the concept of community policing. Alex Vitale, author of the new book, “The End of Policing” shares his research about the origins of modern police, and the inadequate ways that police respond to community issues. Prison abolition often focuses primarily on …
In this week’s episode, we start off with a call for action from Jailhouse Lawyers Speak. JLS is calling for a new set of actions from August 21- September 9, 2020. After we hear from them, we share the story of Nick, a long-time Bloomingtonian who passed through both private prisons and those run by …
This week focuses on call-ins from two prisoners: Khalfani Malik Khaldun in Indiana, and Muti Ajamu-Osagboro in Pennsylvania. First, we hear from Muti. Muti Ajamu-Osagboro is a prisoner currently incarcerated in Pennsylvania. Muti was sentenced to life without parole as a teenager. Despite the fact that the US Supreme Court has decided that it is …
This week’s episode ends our series of conversations with Valrice “Whop” Cooper. Whop is the legendary cornerman who learned his craft training prisoners in the Louisiana DOC’s boxing program. For this episode, they discuss how he was punished inside the prison system for standing up for his trainees, how these athletes stay fit behind prison …
This week continues our set of conversations with Valrice “Whop” Cooper, the legendary cornerman who learned his craft training prisoners in the Louisiana DOC’s boxing program. For this episode, we discuss how he got into the game, the politics behind such programs as the PAL, or Police Athletic League, and what it takes to succeed …
This week starts our series of conversations with Valrice “Whop” Cooper, the legendary cornerman who learned his craft training prisoners in the Louisiana DOC’s boxing program. For this episode, we discuss his thirty-five-year prison term that began in 1976 at the age of 17, and how coming into contact with the Black Power movement- one …
The Federal government rolled out the weed and seed program in the early 1990s in response to a new wave of urban uprisings. It placed social services under police control, so that cops could first “weed,” (i.e. remove undesirable elements) and then “seed” by distributing resources, following a classic model of counter-insurgency. Two decades were …
Our episode this week finishes the conversation between Rojas, Meg, and Cyrus. Last week, they spoke about the conditions of transgender and gender non-conforming prisoners in the prison system. They continue talking about efforts to support transgender and GNC prisoners inside and outside of the walls. Additionally, they talk to each other about exciting upcoming …
Our episode this week is a conversation between Rojas and Cyrus, two advocates with the California Coalition for Women Prisoners. CCWP is an organization that exists, in their words, to “monitor and challenge the abusive conditions inside California women’s prisons. We fight for the release of women and trans prisoners. We support women and trans …
On our show this week, we hear from Dennis Boatright, a co-organizer with MAPS- Michigan Abolition and Prisoner Support. Boatright presents ‘From Convict to Inmate’, tracing the counter insurgent and repressive measures- such as isolation, book restriction, and even the colors used within the facilities- used by the Michigan Department of Corrections to neutralize and …
For the first part of this week’s episode- we hear from Onishona. In this interview, she tells us about her experiences with recidivism and problems with re-entry. She also talks about the role books, and specifically how books about mass incarceration, such as The New Jim Crow, shaped her prison experiences. After her interview we …
This week, we speak with two writers, Laura Lasuertmer and Wendy Lee Spacek. Spacek and Lasuertmer run a writing workshop in the local jail. They tell us about the writing program, what led them to do this project, and its impact on folks in the inside. Then, we share a selection of writings that came …
This week, we visit the women of the Breakaway Recovery House. Located in New Albany, Indiana, this halfway house is the residence for 14 formerly incarcerated women. In last week’s discussion of e-carceration, Breakaway was mentioned as a resource enabling women to transition to life on the outside. Recently, Micol Seigel visited Breakaway, and talked …
This week, we share a recent round table on e-carceration here in Bloomington. This event was part of a series across southern Indiana, as community members hurt by e-carceration and their families come together to discuss their experiences and work together to understand this complex web of social control. E-Carceration involves local jails, county governments, and …
This week, we share two messages sent to us from the inside. We hear from Shaka Shakur about the issues he has been facing since being transferred to Virginia from Indiana. Afterwards, we play a statement by Khalfani Malik Khaldun recorded from the inside prior to his 50th birthday. We finish up this episode with …
After hearing statements of solidarity with striking South Carolina prisoners, we share stories and reflections from Willis X, a former prisoner of 23 years, who became an advocate for others still inside. He talks about his false conviction, and eventually winning his freedom after being sentenced as a teenager. He lives in Michigan, where he …
As we covered last week, prisoners in California have been subjected to a new and disturbing round of gladiator fights – conflicts between prisoners instigated by guards for their own amusement or to break down solidarity between different groups on the inside. This week, we continue sharing a powerful conversation with three women whose husbands …
Prisoners in California have been subjected to a new and disturbing round of gladiator fights – conflicts between prisoners instigated by guards for their own amusement or to break down solidarity between different groups on the inside. This week, we will begin sharing a powerful conversation with three women whose husbands have suffered from this …
For this episode, we share calls from folks on the inside. First, we have the statement from the striking prisoners at the Clallum Bay Correctional Facility in Washington State. After their statement, Abu Faheem Shabazz calls in to talk about conditions at Westville Correctional Facility, followed by Myron Walker talking about education at Putnamville Correctional …
This week, we finish our conversation with Anastazia Schmid. This time around, she talks about labels- and the media’s role in the stigmatization of incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people. Schmid also talks to us about the Indiana Women’s Prison History Project, and other ways of presenting her historical research, especially outside of the academic setting, …
We return this week to our conversation with Anastazia Schmid. Speaking to her just weeks after her release, she talks about stigma and control- both for women and for the incarcerated. After spending 18 years in Indiana prison, her case was recently overturned- due largely to her own tenacity. During this part of the conversation, …
This week, we share the first part of an interview with Anastazia Schmid. Schmid has appeared on Kite Line before, analyzing women’s health care in the prison system. Now, she joins us on the other side of the walls, talking through her release and subsequent support, and the meaning of truth in light of trauma. …
This week, we hear a talk by H.H., who spoke recently at the Bend the Bars conference in Lansing, Michigan. H.H. shares his story, including the inside scoop on the Kinross prison uprising on 2016 and its aftermath. He was only released last month, after being in prison from age 17 to 48. H.H. also …
First, we hear some prison news and reflect on the anniversary of the Attica prison rebellion. Then, we hear more from last month’s Bend the Bars conference, which was held in Lansing, Michigan. In a compelling panel called “Fighting Immigrant Detention Centers”, organizers with the Little Village Solidarity Network explain the processes that children go …
This week, we speak on the phone with writer and prison abolitionist Craig Gilmore, who begins by discussing his recent piece in Commune Magazine. The article, “The Business of Incarceration” is a review of American Prison, a critically acclaimed 2018 book by Shane Bauer. In his conversation with us, Gilmore critiques the book’s thesis on …
It’s been one year since the August 2018 National Prison Strike. This week, we feature a talk from Ben Turk and Amani Sawari- both of whom were important outside supporters of last year’s national Prison Strike. This talk took place at Bend the Bars 2019, a prison abolitionist conference focusing on the initiatives of prisoners …
For this week’s episode, we share a conversation between Melanie D. Newport and Anne Gray Fisher. They talk about the history of Cook County Jail- the largest facility in the country. Melanie D. Newport is an Assistant Professor of US History at the University of Connecticut-Hartford. Her work explores the criminal justice system in the …
This week, we share a panel that took place last week in Indianapolis. As we heard last episode, Indiana Against E-Carceration has been organizing to educate the public about the issues surrounding electronic monitoring. They are struggling to prevent the grim possibility that sentencing and jail “reforms” set for 2020 will lead to an explosion …
This week, we share a statement from former political prisoner Ray Luc Levassuer about the recent death of his comrade, Tom Manning. Then, we speak with Micol Seigel about e-carceration, otherwise known as electronic monitoring. Seigel works with the group Indiana Against E-Carceration, who have a series of upcoming events lifting the voices of people …
This week, we hear from two people- Faith, who talks to us about the practice of inmate lending- and Jason Renard Walker, who speaks on the retaliation he is facing inside. We spoke to Faith at the Fight Toxic Prisons convergence recently, and she told us about the practice of inmate lending, where prisons bid …
This week, we hear reflections from members of the MOVE Organization. Speaking at the 2019 Fight Toxic Prisons convergence, they give their thoughts on the past and current struggles of MOVE family members behind bars. Mike Africa, Jr., who was born in prison, speaks about the MOVE Organization, and having his parents on the inside …
This week we share two presentations from the recent Fight Toxic Prisons convergence. Held this past month in Gainesville, Florida, Fight Toxic Prisons is in its fourth year of an annual conferences that focus on the intersection of mass incarceration and the environment. Our first segment features Jamani and Jordan, who speak about the environmental …
This week, we share an interview with Julie, a researcher who studies the effects of climate change on prisoners. The conversation was held at last month’s Fight Toxic Prisons conference, and focused on her work on how intensifying extremes of heat and cold impacts prisoners’ health. As this interview is broadcast, a hurricane is bearing …
This week, we spoke with participants in the struggle to close Dekalb County jail in Atlanta, Georgia. They walked us through the launch of the movement there, when prisoners smuggled out photos of horrendous conditions inside, which were posted on social media by family members. Since then, a wide range of people have worked to …
Over the past year, the political prisoner support movement has won an exciting number of releases, with long-term political prisoners from MOVE and the Black Panthers finally gaining their freedom. But many other political prisoners remain behind bars, and their supporters are not slowing down. Leonard Peltier is a member of the American Indian Movement …
Kevin Steel speaks to us about being sentenced to twelve years in prison at the age of 17. Speaking to us from the 4th annual Fight Toxic Prisons conference- which you can hear at points in the background- Kevin touches on a lot of different topics, including the Influence of the Black Panthers and other …
This week, we have several kites, or messages, from people inside and outside of the prison walls. First, we have a statement that was recorded for us on behalf of Keith Malik Washington, who is housed in a Texas prison. In his statement, he talks about the negative health impacts of prison, along with other …
This week, we speak to two long-term supporters of Marius Mason, a long-term anarchist prisoner. He is currently held in a federal women’s facility in Danbury, Connecticut, despite years of struggle inside for recognition of his identity as a transman, and his advocacy for other trans prisoners to be able to access support and medical …
This week, we cover some sensitive topics on the show. We speak with Fable, who tells her story of incarceration when she was barely 18 years old. Fable shares her complicated experiences with mental health, sexuality and gender, consent, and violence in prison. In a prison system where many young people spend formative periods of …
On May 20th, Carlos Gregorio Hernandez Vasquez became the fifth child to die in border patrol custody since December. He was 16, and had been held for a week in a border patrol outpost that lacked proper provisioning. He had fled Guatemala, currently wracked with drought and violence, and reached the U.S. on May 13- …
This week, we air part of a conversation with Brandon Ackerson, a 36-year-old survivor of an 18 year prison sentence in the Indiana prison system. Newly released, he talks about using the skills he learned and honed during life in the DOC, in which he became a successful writer while in the Indiana Prison Writers’ …
This week, we return to our conversation with Zolo Agona Azania, who was recently released after surviving decades on Indiana’s death row. In the second part of the conversation, he talks about researching the death penalty and appealing his death penalty sentence. The efforts of Azania, his lawyers and supporters helped to successfully free him …
We recently sat down with Zolo Agona Azania, who was recently released after surviving decades on Indiana’s death row. In this first section of the interview, he covers his early experiences in prison, the role of imprisoned Black Panthers in mentoring him, and the cycle of prisoners struggles that lasted in Indiana from the late …
This week, we finish our conversation between Toussaint Losier and Micol Seigel. This is part three of a series in which we hear Losier, author of Rethinking the American Prison Movement, speak to Seigel about his research while writing his book, in which he builds a cohesive picture of the long history of incarceration. In this final …
This week continues the conversation between Toussaint Losier and Micol Seigel. This is part two of a series in which we hear Losier, author of Rethinking the American Prison Movement, speak to Seigel about his research while writing his book, in which he builds a cohesive picture of the long history of incarceration. In this episode, …
This week, we have a conversation between Toussaint Losier and Micol Seigel. This is part one of a series in which we hear Losier, author of Rethinking the American Prison Movement, speak to Seigel about his research while writing his book, in which he builds a cohesive picture of the long history of resistance to …
This week, Kite Line welcomes the continued contributions of Mark Cook, who we recorded in conversation with Alejo Stark. Mark is a former prison rebel, dating back to ambitious organizing on the inside in the 1960s. Following his release from prison, he co-founded the Seattle chapter of the Black Panther Party and later went underground …
This week, Kite Line welcomes the contributions of Mark Cook for a second time. Mark is a former prison rebel, dating back to ambitious organizing on the inside in the 1960s. Following his release from prison, he co-founded the Seattle chapter of the Black Panther Party and later went underground with the George Jackson …
Last week, we heard the first part of a lecture by Max Felker-Kantor on policing in Los Angeles, from the Watts Rebellion in the 60s to the brutal police beating of Rodney King in the 90s. This week, he continues to talk about the police murder of Eula Love, and how her death affected the …
This week, we air the first of two episodes tracking the rise of police racism and militarization in Los Angeles, from the Watts Uprising of 1965 to the 1992 L.A. Riots after Rodney King’s beating. Max Felker-Kantor, author of the book, Policing Los Angeles, walks us through the changes in policing, as well as the …
This week, we interview a participant in Perilous, a new prison history project. Perilous launched its website earlier this year, with a goal of compiling all the grassroots, collective mobilizations that have happened in US prisons since the prisoners’ movement seriously kicked off again in 2010. With this interview, we got a sense of their …
In the past months, the California prison system, or CDRC, has been convulsed by hunger strikes and a series of so-called “gladiator” or “dog fights,” in which guards pit prisoners against each other. Brook, an organizer with the Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee in Oakland, spoke with us to provide vital context for understanding this volatile …
First, we have updates on the Vaughn 17 and hunger strikes and noise demonstrations from immigrant detention centers around the country. After the news, we share a conversation with Phillip Roberts and Debra Des Vignes. Des Vignes is the founder of the Indiana Prison Writers Workshop, and Roberts participated in the project for almost a …
This week is an interview with Samantha Johnson, from No New Jails in Brooklyn, New York. As we reported recently, the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn recently was the target of large scale demonstrations, after prisoners expressed to their loved ones on the outside that they were being denied basic human needs such as heat, …
This week, we share two different reflections on time inside, focusing on how prison interrupts life, education, and development. The first is the conclusion of Chantal’s account of her weeks inside a French immigrant retention center after her arrest during Yellow Vest clashes in Paris. She describes her and other prisoners’ efforts to pass the …
This week, we hear more from Chantal, who tells us about her time detained in France in December. We also cover breaking news on hunger strikes in immigrant detention centers across the US, as well as the victory of hundreds of hunger strikers in Corcoran prison in California. Medical malfeasance by prison officials, and the …
This week,we hear a statement regarding a hunger strike that took place in France this month. On January 8th, detainees at the same immigration retention center that Chantal, the subject of this week’s Kite Line, was held in released a statement announcing that they had begun a hunger strike, and calling on detainees in other …
In this episode, we read a statement by Keith Lamar, also known as Bomani Shakur, who just had his execution date set. In his statement, Keith wrangles with the violent death the state of Ohio is seeking to inflict on him, but also with the vast challenges and ruptures that we as a whole face …
Since the Ferguson uprising in 2014, the Black Lives Matter movement has shone a light on a range of American institutions, revealing their white supremacist origins and functions. In addition to police and the discriminatory mortgage market, cash bail is one of the most important of these institutions to be revealed and resisted. Community bail …
We are completing our series on Brazilian prisons by airing an interview between Beny and Rosângela, who wanted to discuss her experiences with health care there. Her account of deprivation of care, along with the over application of psychiatric drugs, will be familiar to anyone who has spent time inside an American prison. She likewise …
This week, we share an update from the U.S./Mexico border, as well as two more illuminating conversations from inside the Brazilian prison system. First, we hear from Luce, who has just returned to the U.S. after doing legal aid for unaccompanied minors at the Barretal migrant shelter in Tijuana. As we mentioned in last week’s …
This week, we have the first of several interviews that were conducted this fall in São Paulo, Brazil. Kite Line contributor Micol Seigel was there to teach a course on American prison history at the state university. Seigel’s academic host introduced her to an activist civil servant at the Secretariat of Penal Administration, who connected …
This week, we speak more with Leon Benson, who calls us from inside the Pendleton Correctional Facility here in Indiana. Benson shared his story with us in the past several Kite Line episodes, and now he talks to us about the conditions inside the prison. Benson demonstrates the importance of prisoners being ableto form bonds …
A new movement of refugees fleeing violence and starvation in Central America began to reach Tijuana last month, in the hopes of applying for asylum in the United States. Comprised of multiple, self-organized caravans, the refugees passed through incredible hardship and risk before thousands were temporarily settled in the Benito Juarez shelter – a sports …
This week, we are continuing our talk with Leon Benson, who speaks to us from inside Pendleton Correctional Facility here in Indiana. He’s been inside since 1998, for a murder conviction and he has been trying to clear his name and win his freedom ever since. Benson was incarcerated at 23 years old, and talks …
This week, we hear from Leon Benson, who calls us from inside an Indiana prison. You might remember some of Leon’s story from a Kite Line episode we aired in December of last year, called “You Can’t Force the State to Abide by the Law” in which his sister, Valerie, introduced Leon’s story. Leon’s been …
This week, we listen to Kathleen Rumpf share her stories of her time inside FMC Carswell, a United States federal prison in Fort Worth, Texas for female inmates with special medical and mental health needs. Kathleen shares her experiences and wisdom from her time with the Catholic Workers, where she participated in the plowshares movement, …
Today, we are sharing the next part of an interview with Talila Lewis and Dustin Gibson, two organizers and researchers addressing the intersection of disability and incarceration. You heard their interview about the impact of prison on the Deaf community, and the organization they work with, HEARD- Helping Educate to Advance the Rights of the …
Today, we are sharing an interview with Talila Lewis and Dustin Gibson, two organizers and researchers addressing the intersection of disability and incarceration. After TL describes the high stakes of being deaf in prison, they move on to sketch out the ways that children of color are disabled across society and pushed towards feeling inept …
In this interview, Elizabeth Hinton sketches the relationship between the civil rights movement, urban uprisings and the beginning of the “War on Crime,” with a focus on the Harlem Riot of 1964, and the1 965 Watts Rebellion, which was triggered by police brutality and became a key law-and-order talking point. She then moves through a …
This week, we share the final story from the Voices of the Formerly Incarcerated panel that took place during the Fight Toxic Prisons conference in Pittsburgh. After we hear updates on Kevin Rashid Johnson and Keith Malik Washington, we close with anecdotes from Wendell Caldwell. Caldwell speaks on his time inside, its impact on his …
This week, we hear from Curtis Ray Davis II, who talks about the racist history of Angola Prison- the Louisiana State Penitentiary. After we read a statement from hunger striking prisoners in Orange County, we then hear a moving account from Davis. He talks about Louisiana’s non-unanimous verdict, which essentially nullifies the votes of non-white …
This week, we hear the stories of three men who share their experiences from years being on the inside. Khalid Raheem discusses his experiences with the Black Panther Party, solitary confinement, and educational options in prison. Carrington Keys talks with us about the Dallas Six case, and how racist prison guards not only failed to …
This week’s episode covers the situation in the Midwest. We hear from Ben and Aaron, who work on supporting prisoners in Ohio and Indiana, respectively. Ben informs about Ohio prisoners who are still facing repercussions from the 1993 Lucasville uprising. We’ve introduced Lucasville in previous episodes of Kite Line, including an early episode focusing on …
Across the country, thousands of prisoners are facing consequences for their participation in the national prison strike. Some are being denied contact with the outside world, others have lost access to hot food. Others have faced violence. For many, outside solidarity has meant the difference, like the prisoners at an Indiana prison facility who were …
This week, we are sharing the words from a prisoner who contacted us from inside the South Carolina prison system. In addition to his thoughts on the recent National Prison Strike, of which news still continues to trickle in, he talks about what prisoners are experiencing every day. From severe medical neglect, inedible food, and …
This week we are honoring the anniversary of the Attica Prison Uprising of 1971. The current National Prison Strike began on August 21st, the anniversary of George Jackson’s assassination, and is slated to end in two days, on September 9th. We have updates on the prison facilities across the country and their participation in the …
The National Prison Strike is on its second week. Shutdowns have been confirmed in five Florida prisons, with new strike activity in Georgia, California, and Maryland. Although information is slow to come in, we know of a hunger strike in Indiana, commissary boycotts in South Carolina, and solidarity demonstrations across the country. This week, we …
This week, we’re sharing selections from an historic interview with George Jackson, whose assassination on August 21, 1971, at the hands of San Quentin prison guards, remains a reference point for the US prisoners’ movement. Indeed, Jailhouse Lawyers Speak called for the 2018 strike to begin on this date in his memory. George Jackson spent …
Next week, on August 21, is the start of the 2018 National Prison Strike. Anticipated to be the largest in U.S. History, this strike comes after many years of various strikes, work stoppages, boycotts, and other forms of rebellion. In this episode, we hear about the intended transfer of 3,200 Puerto Rican prisoners to Arizona, …
As the 2018 National Prison Strike quickly approaches, we have news of hunger and work strikes already underway. We have updates on the successful, 108 day hunger strike of Mapuche Shaman Celestino Cordova, who had been denied access to his ceremonial altar while in Chilean prison. We also get updates from Siddique Abdullah Hasan and …
As we approach the August 21st launch of the national prison strike, Kite Line is focusing on the historic and recent precedents for the current prisoners’ movement. This strike, called by Jailhouse Lawyers Speak along with a growing coalition of grassroots prisoners’ groups, is grounded in four decades of organizing, symbolized by George Jackson’s state …
In last week’s episode, we introduced Johdy Polk, who spoke to us about her time behind the prison walls, and urged audiences to see the other ways that people are confined by society. Now, we continue to hear more of Johdy’s story- about the relationships she built while on the inside, her transition to daily …
This week, Johdy Polk, from Gainesville, Florida, describes her time inside a women’s prison, while sharing cutting observations on growing up as a black woman in a white supremacist society. She also makes an urgent call to tear down our inner prisons, a call that we think resonates with the torrent of news we are …
Last week, Aren Aizura guided us through the history of colonialism in Australia, including racist measures to control non-white immigration, and later, in the 1980s, the implementation of mandatory detention for refugees. He focused on his experiences in an occupation outside the remote Woomera Detention Center, and the way that supporters on the outside grew …
In light of the ongoing struggles across the country against deportations, family separations, and ICE detention centers, we are sharing an interview we did last year about struggles in Australia against refugee prison camps. In 2002, imprisoned refugees inside Australia’s remote Woomera immigration prison coordinated protests with 2500 supporters who had pitched a No Borders …
For this episode, we are returning to the conditions in immigrant detention centers. Alejandra spoke at the Fight Toxic Prisons conference in Pittsburgh, which was held earlier this month. Growing up in California, she was the only child in her family to be undocumented. As an adult in Arizona, she had a minor arrest that …
This week, we will focus on a specific story about an immigrant detention case in Pittsburgh- and hear firsthand from family impacted by these harsh repercussions for undocumented immigrants. Martin Esquivel-Hernandez was detained after a traffic stop, held by ICE, and eventually deported, leaving his family behind in Pennsylvania. Today, we will hear his story …
First, we hear part of a panel from the recent Fight Toxic Prisons conference, which was held last week in Pittsburgh. Saleem Holbrook shares his experiences after doing nearly three decades inside, with a focus on what it’s like to organize behind the walls. Coming into the system when he was young, he describes the …
This week’s episode is packed with news of struggles and repression. We start with coverage of Indiana prisons and two prisoners who need outside support right now. More information on these requests for help from Indiana prisoners can be found on our website, https://kitelineradio.noblogs.org/ Then we get updates and two statements from prisoners in Florida continuing …
This week, we are returning to the topic of Carceral Capitalism. We interviewed the poet and author Jackie Wang in episodes 89 and 90 of Kite Line. You can access those on our website, kitelineradio.noblogs.org. There, Wang discusses the relationship between the growth of municipal debt and the emergence of fine farming and other ways …
In this episode, we hear from Timothy Stewart-Winter, an Associate Professor at Rutgers University with a background studying sexuality and incarceration. Stewart-Winter wrote the book “Queer Clout: Chicago and the Rise of Gay Politics” and co-directs the Queer Newark Oral History Project. In this episode, they speak about the policing of sexuality and some of …
This week, we share the first part of a conversation we had with “Joe”. After doing ten years in prison for a sex offense conviction, Joe is now outside and navigating the difficult tightrope that many people convicted of such crimes must walk. A difficult topic to even discuss, Joe expresses the way being on …
This week, we share a moving keynote speech recently given at the University of Michigan by Michelle Jones. Jones has been featured on multiple episodes of Kite Line, who shared some of her experiences at the Indiana Women’s Prison, particularly issues of mental and physical health on the inside. Now, she speaks of the extensive …
Last week, we began hearing the voices of prisoners on the topic of Angela Davis’s book, Are Prisons Obsolete? Up first, we have Anastazia Schmid’s response to the book, followed by Angaza Iman Bahar reading his response to us from Miami Correctional Facility.
This week, we start in on the topic of Are Prisons Obsolete Over the next couple of Kite Line episodes, we will be sharing the words and writings of prisoners- many of whom have been featured on previous episodes- and their responses to Angela Davis’s book, “Are Prisons Obsolete” For context, the Abolition Study Sessions …
For this week’s episode we share the first part of a conversation between Micol Seigel and Jackie Wang. Wang is the author of the recent book, Carceral Capitalism. Today, she shares what led her to carceral studies, and the themes in her new book. She speaks about how having an incarcerated sibling shaped the trajectory …
This week, we start by finishing the discussion between Micol Seigel and Jackie Wang. You can hear more of their conversation on carceral capitalism in last week’s episode. After that segment, we share a series of letters and updates from Operation PUSH, which is still ongoing in some parts of the Florida prison system, and …
We begin this week with a letter from a prisoner at Pendleton Correctional Facility. He writes about the educational programs available in the prison. He works through some of the problems prisoners encounter when trying to get a meaningful vocational training or degree on the inside. And then, we hear more from Abu Faheem Shabaz, …
This week we share the first of two episodes on Jay Smith’s story, also known as Abu Faheem Shabaz, who was recently released from the Indiana Department of Corrections after spending years inside. As he states, Shabaz was part of the carceral system since childhood, and he describes coming of age within the walls of …
This week, we are airing selections from a panel discussion that took place earlier this month here in Bloomington. Andrea Ritchie and Victoria Law, both of whom were featured on Kite Line earlier this month, sit alongside Andrea Sterling at a panel called “Building Community Resilience”. In it, these women discuss the myriad ways that …
This week, we speak with Victoria Law- a freelance journalist, mother of a New York City high school student, author of the book Resistance Behind Bars, the co-author of the forthcoming book Your Home Is Your Prison, as well as the editor of Tenacious, a journal of art and writing by incarcerated women. She …
This week, we share a conversation we had with Andrea Ritchie, an attorney and activist whose work focuses on police violence against the queer community and women of color. She speaks about current political conditions, and the concepts in her most recent book, Invisible No More: Police Violence Against Black Women and Women of Color. …
This week is focused on words from prisoners sent or smuggled from inside. From the jail in Evansville, Indiana, to letters from participants in Operation PUSH- the still-ongoing prison strike across the Florida department of corrections- to a collection of poems from our local jail, prisoners are finding ways to share their individual experiences and …
In this episode, we share a phone call and three short essays from Timothy Smith. Smith spoke to us from inside Cook County Jail, the most recent place he has been held over ten years in custody. Timothy has been at a several institutions around Illinois, and describes entering prison and specifically Menard Correctional Center. …
This week, we return to the history of black radicalism within the prison system. You can hear more from Dr. Micol Seigel and Dr. Garrett Felber about this in last week’s episode. Early in this episode, the prisoner reporting on Operation PUSH, the sit-down strike in Florida’s prisons, mentions being transferred to a different area …
This week, we are changing our format slightly. After hearing a letter from a prisoner involved in Operation PUSH, we are broadcasting an interview between Dr. Micol Seigel and Dr. Garrett Felber on the role of the Nation of Islam in prison life and prisoners’ struggle. Beginning in the middle of the last century, the …
This episode, we start out with a statement from Anastazia Schmid, a prisoner in the Indiana Women’s Prison. She walks us through a brief history of how prisons, and specifically the modern practice of prison slave labor, came about. She also talks through some basics of how prison serves to isolate those on the inside, …
In this episode, we start with updates from Operation PUSH. After that, we continue hearing from Craig, who spent significant time in the Monroe County jail. You can hear the first part of Craig’s interview in last week’s episode. He spoke about his experiences in the various parts of Monroe County Jail, and also his …
First off, we include an update from outside supporters of Operation PUSH, the strike in Florida prisons that is now in its fifth day. We will continue to give updates on the situation in Florida’s prisons as they arrive. After the news, we share the first part of Craig’s story, who was recently released from …
This week, we feature two snapshots from fast-developing situations inside the prison system. First, we share an anonymized statement from a prisoner participating in final preparations for Operation: PUSH, the statewide strike inside Florida prisons next week. Second, we broadcast an analysis by a Michigan prisoner of the recently instated mail ban there, which is …
In this week’s episode, we speak with Karen Smith in Florida, who gives us insights into Operation PUSH. Kicking off in just 10 days, Operation PUSH is a prisoner-organized work stoppage inside Florida’s sprawling Prison System. In their own words, Operation PUSH is “asking all prisoners within the Department of Corrections to take a stand …
In this week’s episode, we hear from Valerie Buford, the sister of Leon Benson, a prisoner here in Indiana. Valerie talks about the circumstances that lead to Leon being imprisoned on a murder charge since 1998. Through her story, you can hear how difficult it is to navigate the legal system, especially with few financial …
This week we speak with Naomi Paik about her 2016 book, Rightlessness. Her work addresses the most pressing contemporary issues, drawing together the brutal state of exception imposed on Haitian and Muslim prisoners in Guantanamo with the historical experience of Japanese internment camps and the current anti-immigrant drive. She focuses on the spaces – whether …
This week features our second segment on PREA- the Prison Rape Elimination Act. Last week, we heard from Irene, who is being held in the Indiana Women’s Prison. She described her run-ins with PREA, leading to a broader analysis of the failure of prison bureaucracies to meaningfully respond to real abuse. At the same time, …
This episode is the start of our conversation about PREA, the Prison Rape Elimination Act. PREA was passed in 2003 with unanimous support from both parties in Congress. The purpose of the act was to “provide for the analysis of the incidence and effects of prison rape in Federal, State, and local institutions and to …
This week, we share part of a talk from two women organizing with prisoners. They speak candidly about the basics of supporting prisoners, and include some of the dynamics they noticed while working with those on the inside. We have more to share from these women committed to such solidarity, but we are offering this …
In this episode we give follow-up information about the hunger strike at the Wabash Valley Correctional Facility. Then, we finish a conversation with Salomon X, a former prisoner in southern Illinois. Two weeks ago, he shared stories of different issues he faced in a variety of facilities. Now, he continues talking about his experiences behind …
In Wabash Valley, Shaka Shakur is maintaining his hunger strike, demanding an end to guard abuses and the isolation of active prisoners in camera cells. We spoke with his wife, Akili Shakur, who provided context for the struggle undertaken by Shaka and other prisoners, along with background on his imprisonment and the role of guards …
This week, we share the words and experiences of Salomon X, a former prisoner in Illinois. In the first of two episodes with Salomon, he describes poor conditions and exploitation in the Menard prison, site of many recent struggles, and compares it with other facilities. Many of his memories will be recognizable to Hoosiers; elsewhere, …
This week, we speak with Lill, a resident of Whitesburg, Kentucky. Whitesburg is located in Letcher County the proposed home to a new federal prison to be built on a mountaintop removal site. We have previously covered the strong local organizing in Letcher County that had helped put a stop to this toxic proposal. In …
Last April, the Indiana Department of Corrections banned all correspondence to it’s 25,000 prisoners, except that which is handwritten on lined white paper. The official explanation is that this is an attempt to block trafficking of synthetic marijuana which can be applied to paper. But many prisoners and advocates have pointed to a long series …
Our news this week focuses on the prisoners who are fighting California’s wildfires for as little as a dollar an hour while actually fighting fires. In total, about thirty-eight hundred male and female inmates are fighting fires in California. They constitute around thirteen percent of the state’s firefighters. Their low salaries save taxpayers a hundred …
This week we share the first part of a lecture by Elizabeth Hinton delivered at IU on October 12. In her talk, she traces the creation and rise of mass incarceration as a strategy of America’s ruling class. Her historical research, which culminated in a book last year called “From the War on Poverty to …
This week is the first episode of several about the intersection between the media and prison struggles. In January of 2015, journalist Barrett Brown was sentenced to 63 months in prison for his role reporting on Anonymous’ hack of Stratfor, a private security and espionage company. Today, we are sharing a talk he gave at …
The phenomenon of mass incarceration has made the United States the world leader in carceral punishment. With only four percent of the world’s population, the United States accounts for 20% of the world’s incarcerated persons. In fact, the U.S. Is the pioneer of mass incarceration and the attendant police militarization and prison industry that are …
This week, we have two contributions –one closer to home and one many more miles away- but both aim to describe an unfair relationship of power each contributor’s community faces. We first hear an essay from a prisoner in Southern Illinois, followed by a statement sent to us from a member of the community of …
This episode is an interview with Kwame Shakur, who is currently incarcerated at the Pendleton Correctional Institution. On August 11th , Indiana prison activists held a demonstration at the state capitol building in Indianapolis opposing new Indiana department of corrections regulations restricting incoming prisoner mail. The new policy prohibits all mail which is not hand …
In this episode, we continue our conversation with Ray Luc Levasseur. He is a former underground combatant with the United Freedom Front, which carried out a campaign of attacks from 1975-1984 against South African Apartheid and US intervention in Central America. He spent 13 years in solitary confinement after his capture. This week, he shares …
Ray Luc Levasseur is a former underground participant in the United Freedom Front, which carried out a campaign of attacks from 1975-1984 against South African Apartheid and US intervention in Central America. He spent 13 years in solitary confinement after his capture. In the first episode of our series on Ray Luc’s experiences in prison …
This week’s story is that of Kara Wild. An anarchist prisoner from Chicago, Kara is a trans woman who has been in a French prison for over a year and a half. We first give some background on her case, and then hear from her friends and loved ones, who share some stories about Kara. …
We cover a range of news in this week’s episode- from a brief history of Black August and the upcoming August 19th prison demonstrations, to current prison conditions in regards to education, visitation, and forced sterilization. We then read a letter from prisoner Keith Malik Washington about the continued suffering from extreme heat in Texas …
We start this episode with a message from Angaza, a prisoner in the IDOC system who describes recent unfair changes in prison correspondence and what people on both the inside and outside are trying to do about it. As of April first, the Indiana Department of Correction is no longer accepting any correspondence for inmates …
This week, we share a conversation with Ramona Africa, who talks about the MOVE 9 case, the 1985 police bombing of the MOVE house, and the relationship between this history and contemporary struggles against prisons and police violence. We also hear updates on the struggle at the medium security facility in St. Louis, called the …
In this episode of Kite Line, we cover the recent demonstrations outside the Workhouse in St. Louis, Missouri. On July 21, police there used pepper spray to disperse 300 people protesting conditions in a medium-security jail called the Hall Medium Security Facility, known popularly as the Workhouse. The demonstrators demanded that the jail be closed, …
Maintaining contact with long-term prisoners is key to both their survival and to ongoing struggles across the prison walls. In this episode, we hear a statement from Cindy Crabb, supporter of long-term anarchist prisoner Marius Mason, who will soon enter his 9th year of incarceration. Cindy stresses the need for us on the outside to …
We return for our final episode with Mark Cook, former political prisoner and member of the Black Panther Party and the George Jackson Brigade. After hearing some news and a request from a supporter of Indiana prisoner Khalfani Malik Khaldun, we hear from Mark Cook about the impact of outside solidarity. Not only did outside …
This week, we return to our interview with Mark Cook. You can hear more about his history in last’s week episode. Now, Mark leads us through several very interesting and entertaining stories from his own release, to his project providing jobs for people as they get released from prison, and other ambitious plans launched with …
This week is the first part of our interview with Mark Cook. Mark served 24 years in prison for his participation in a bank robbery and jail break associated with the George Jackson Brigade in Seattle. He co-founded the Walla Walla chapter of the Black Panther Party, and Mark continued his activism throughout his captivity. …
This week takes us to Texas, where we hear from Candice Bernd, speaking at the 2nd Fight Toxic Prisons Conference, which took place earlier this month in Denton, Texas. Candice talks about the intersection between environmental activism and the carceral system. In Texas, prisoners are subjected to extreme conditions, and some prisoners have filed a …
This week, we return to the story of Clinton “Boo” Gilkie, who died one year ago- on June 7, 2016- in the Monroe County Jail. We discussed the circumstances of his death in our episode 2 weeks ago, and recommend that you to listen this episode of Kite Line for more context. Our interview today …
This week on Kite Line we feature Arianna Staiger, daughter of Marius Mason, an anarchist prisoner who used to live and organize in Bloomington. Ariana speaks about how she experienced Marius’ arrest and persecution, her thoughts on ongoing support and about June 11, a day set aside every year to support and honor Marius and …
June 7th marks the one year anniversary of the death of Clinton Gilkie, and so we devote our June 2nd and June 16th episodes of Kite Line to his story and his memory. Clinton “Boo” Gilkie was held in the Monroe County Jail since he was 16 after a failed robbery using a toy gun. …
The death penalty is the barest, most explicit aspect of state violence. Relatively few people are sentenced to death, and even fewer are actively, legally killed by the state but the death penalty persists as an assertion of the sovereign right to take life or to let live. This week on Kite Line, we’ll begin …
This week we share news and stories from two people who have been caught up in very different ways in the web of prison. Both Bresha Meadows and Patrick Pursely have recently made steps forward in escaping this web, and we are excited to share news from them. Listen in for updates on reduced charges …
This week we feature an interview with Patrick, who reflects on his experience with addiction and prison. His story is both deeply personal and analytic, illuminating systemic connections and paths forward. We also share a long letter from a current Indiana prisoner, who makes an urgent plea to all of us for contact and for …
For prisons to function smoothly and profitably, the major tools of control – violence, surveillance, separation – must be complimented by a host of less obvious instruments and technologies. These include censorship in the mail room, the cultivation of racial tension, integration of prisoner labor into facility maintenance, cafeteria operations, and private contracting, among many …
This week features a variety of conversations that we are sharing with you through a partnership with StoryCorps. The event, Dismantling Barriers to Life, was about the impacts of mass incarceration. Dismantling Barriers to Life was hosted last month in Chicago, and these are some of the stories collected for the event. We hear people …
This week, we focus on the closing of a volunteer-run dorm in the Monroe County Jail. The Addicts in Recovery, or AIR Dorm, has been a unique part of the local jail programming for several years. The AIR program provides a place for selected inmates to participate in intensive addiction recovery programs (addiction treatment, anger …
Content Warning: This episode contains strong imagery about domestic violence and other abuse. This week, we examine the intersections between domestic violence, along with other forms of gendered violence, the courts, and the prison system. To begin, we share thoughts from a collaborator about Bresha Meadows – a teenager facing murder charges after killing her …
Our focus for this episode is writing to prisoners. After some prison-related news, we speak with Lukah Revolt, who explains how she went from writing a few political prisoners to writing more than 30 people on the inside. Lukah explains the basics of sending a letter inside, and why it is important to communicate with …
This episode is a conversation with Steve Garrett, who during his time in Ohio’s prison system, used the legal loopholes and statutes he learned to challenge the State on its own terms. He shares stories with us about how he used the law to his advantage.
In this episode, we speak to people with experience with both homelessness and incarceration. Often, there is a cyclical relationship between these two situations. We speak with Forest Gilmore, the director of the Shalom Center here in Bloomington. Forest talks about various barriers that both people who experience homelessness and those who have been incarcerated …
This week concludes our series on the mass escape from the Woomera immigrant detention center in 2002. Aren Aizura, who helped organize the solidarity camp outside the prison over Easter weekend of that year, tells us more about the aftermath: follow-up organizing with captive refugees, and the Australian government’s push to move the prisons to …
In the second episode of our series on the mass escape from the Woomera refugee detention center in Australia, Aren Aizura parses out the stakes of the protest camp, its participants, and the escalation to the breakout. From there, Aren moves to the escape itself, the emotional meeting between refugees and outside supporters, and the …
In 2002, imprisoned refugees inside Australia’s Woomera immigration prison coordinated with 2500 outside supporters who had pitched camp outside the facility. Their coordination allowed them to stage a mass breakout. This is the first of three episodes dedicated to telling this story, from an interview with a participant in the solidarity camp. It’s a vital …
This episode, we focus on two individuals who are working to organize support systems for communities that are directly affected or targeted by law enforcement and incarceration. First, we continue our conversation with Akili Shakur, wife of prisoner Shaka Shakur, who works to organize support groups for family members of prisoners. Then, we hear from …
Our focus for this episode returns to the impact of incarceration on families. First we have a discussion between our friend Lucy and one of her fellow classmates at Indiana University, Rafael Green, III. Rafael describes having multiple family members in prison during his childhood, and the way that affected both his childhood, and the …
We return to the topic of education within the prison system. After some prison news, we hear a statement written by someone who taught in prisons in the Midwest. Then we return to Micol Seigel’s discussion with Jarrod Wall, who tells us about getting a degree while incarcerated, and the effects/benefits of education while incarcerated, …
In this episode, we introduce a new topic, going “off-paper.” When prisoners finish their time and re-enter the free world, they confront a whole host of barriers and questions that extend the hold that institutions have on them well past their “on-paper” sentences. To begin, we hear a recently released anarchist prisoner who reflects on …
We go to the neighboring state of Ohio this week in order to dig into the history of Midwestern prison resistance. We share more of the story of Siddique Hasan – one of 5 prisoners on death row for their role in the 1994 Lucasville Uprising – as well as his organizing and his case. …
This week’s episode focuses on the importance of education in prison. We speak with Dr. Scarlett Brooks, who has taught English and writing in several inmate education programs . We also hear some reflections from Maureen, who has experience teaching art in Indiana Prisons. Later, we share a letter written by Zolo, a long-time inmate …
Our topic this week is creativity behind bars. We showcase poetry from prisoners working with the Indiana Prisoners’ Writing Project, a piece by Shaka Shakur, entitled “Black Pain”, and a song by local musician Billy Young. Shakur is currently serving time in the Wabash Valley Correctional Facility here in Indiana. Billy Young will speak with …
This week, we hear some prison-related news and then return to the topic of pregnancy in prison. We continue our discussion with Dr. Alicia Suarez, a sociologist who researches pregnancy and childbirth as it relates to incarcerated women. She continues the discussion from our Pregnancy in Prison episode, and walks us through the process of …
Our episode focuses on the experience of being pregnant while in prison. First, we hear prison-related news. Then, we speak with Dr. Alicia Suarez, PhD, who teaches at DePauw University. Suarez researches pregnant prisoners at the Indiana Women’s Prison, and speaks with us about the daily life and issues facing these women. In our next …
This week, we explore various spaces of exception. We spoke with Matt Peterson, a documentary filmmaker and contributor to a multimedia project called the Native and the Refugee. Along with Malek Rasamny, he has worked in both native reservations and Palestinian refugee camps, drawing links between each as spaces of exception, excluded from the national …
This week, we are sharing a conversation we had with Kristian Williams, author of Our Enemies in Blue and American Methods: Torture and the Logic of Domination. Kristian spoke at IU earlier this month on the history of policing in America, but we were eager to pick his brain about the intersections of police, racism, …