Rattling The Cages: “Continuing The Struggle Inside & Out” (Ray Luc Levasseur, Ashanti Alston)
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![25 year sentence, and then, because it was the shootout and two cops got hurt, and after that they kept us separated. We was never to be in the same Was 10 10 20 for that. Now we’re in always the different prisons, prison anywhere again except towards the end, and in [Summers] when fperiod of time— Ihad made parole—we was there at least for several months together. one of my comrades was transferred there, and for a b But I think what I wanted to bring up, is that, because our minds is still at war, I studied. trained. My comrades studied. ‘Eric King: You say trained, you mean physically? ‘Ashanti Alston: From physical to just exercise, because we had the examples of stories from Huey P. Newton in prison. We had the stories of George Jackson. 1t was almost like if you’re in the cell, and here comes the guard just making his regular rounds, we might, just to play with him, pop down on the floor, we knocking out 20 push-ups or whatever, you know. Otherwise, we’re doingall the other things, because we want to stay ready. That whole “Stay Ready” mentality. It was not depressing for me, I didn’t go through no depression. 1t was just the “Ready” mentality. But read, already... The first stop was Oxford, Wisconsin. e 1said before. I read all the time. So, going off to prison I had ‘Eric King Oh, that was your federal prison? Ashanti Alston: That was the first. No... Well,that was the first one they sent me to because I had to do the federal time first, right, and go to Federal, go to Oxford, Wisconsin, and one of my comrades comes there also, who’s down in prison in Georgia now, Kamau Sadiki. It was one of the first times that me and another comrade from the BLA was in the same prison. Same mentality. We’re at war. We got a brother that’s training us in kung f and everything else, and we got to do it secretly, because you can’t do it in the open, the guards don’t play that stuff. But then, 1 had put in for a transfer to Lewisburg prison, and eventually I got transferred to Lewisburg, because at least it was the closest to home. Lewisburg was one of the major maximum prisons, federal prisons. Eric King Serious place. ‘Ashanti Alston: Serious place. Me, you know, I’m a young guy, and there 5 et s](rattling-the-cages-continuing-the-struggle-inside-out-ray-luc-levasseur-ashanti-alston-rattling-the-cages 8.png)
![general population, but they walking us to segregation—it’s Rafacl [Cancel] Miranda of the Puerto Rican independentistas. He’s letting us know that they already know that we’re on our way there. They had already got the word through the grapevine. Herman Bell was there. Other comrades who may not be known like Joe Monaco and Bobby Holmes. There was other political prisoners there, because Marion took, the place of Aleatraz. The experience of Marion was like this was supposed to be the most escape-proof prison at the time, and one of the things for me, it was so electronic, everything was. You want to open up the gate or something, the cell, they got to push a button, and it opens up. All that stuff was new for me. The surveillance... The guards took a lot of notes on individuals. T never made it to general population. Eric King: We’ll gt to repression here soon. We’ll be talking about that. ‘Ashanti Alston: Okay. So, there, those political prisoners and politcized prisoners had one of the most fantastic libraries. Again, ’m learning. ’m ncreasing my understandings of struggle and the anti-authoritarian aspects, the anarchist aspects, and moving closer in that dircction. But still had connection through the defense committees to the movements, some of the movements that was going on, but those numbers were dwindling, because they were getting hit with a lot of repression. Safiya and them and others decided to go underground because there was these. grand jury searches, rying to get them on different charges of supporting other actions to help free BLA folks or politial prisoners. Like I said, wasn’t a lot of letters, wasn’t all that stuff, ut we know, we’re soldiers, thisis what we gonna do. Next thing from there, some of s was like, the word was, “Don’t accept general population.” S0, some of us decide o stay in s to force them to transfer us, and they ended up transferring some of us to Lompac, California. Who was amongst that group? Leonard Peltier. Bobby Holmes. Joc Monaco, Curley Raul Estramera, he’s BLA, Puerto Rican BLA. And others Here we are. Now we’re all Lompoc, but Lompoc was just in the process of transferring from medium sceurity to maximum, and it was kind ofa modernist place, and it had fences, but they hadn’t had all the constantino wire up yet. Here we are, all doing all this time. We like, “Man, we got to hit this fence before they get all this constantino wire up.” In the process, we are meeting other folks, supporters from the outside, and especially, at this time, some revolutionary groups in California, one was called the W g thecages](rattling-the-cages-continuing-the-struggle-inside-out-ray-luc-levasseur-ashanti-alston-rattling-the-cages 10.png)
![Wellspring Collective or Tribal Thumb, which was a very anti authoritarian group, and they would come up to visit. More and more, am learning different ways that people struggle and are trying to carry onin that California area, because a lot of them politicized prisoners who was with George [Jackson] or out of them circles were coming out also in getting involved with grassroots organizing. I feel like that’s always my prison experience. 1 gotta learn, I gotta be ready, and 1 gotta make sure that I’m interacting with folks who are still carrying us on or figuring out wways to keep the momentum. Many of us was on that same page. So, then Connecticut, and eventually I get parole, parole to the Connecticut state. prison, and I finished the second half of my sentence there, and eventually get out. Eric King: Perfect. Thank you. Also, you mentioned Tribal Thumb. Someone Ilook up to, Bill Dunne, was a member of Tribal Thumb, 50 it’s ‘Ashanti Alston: Listen, just to say about him, Bill Dunne, think—1 believe —that part of the reason he got captured, recaptured, was because we. needed him to help us. There’s a special part of me that’s lways there for n, because he made a sacrifice Eric King: For the people listening, if you’d like to write Bill Dunne, he currently at the medical facility in FCI Butner, if anyone wants to write. Ray, would youlike to touch on that same topic about how you maintain struggle both or cither ide or outside of those movements? Ray Luc Levasseur: Well, first of all, Bill Dunne. Yeah, itd be very nice if people could write to him at Butner. 1 just got a letter from him a few wweeks ago. I first met him back in.. He’s struggling with health issues and everything, but he’s still got the same strong spirit and good sense of ‘humor. He always has. He needs alttle support. Eric King: Lots of support. Ray Luc Levasseur: Briefly, as I mentioned, you know, we’re talking one struggle here: two parts of it, inside and outside. I’ve always found it interesting that the political prisoners on the inside always gravitate to each other, no matter which movement or which organizations they come ating the cages: "](rattling-the-cages-continuing-the-struggle-inside-out-ray-luc-levasseur-ashanti-alston-rattling-the-cages 11.png)
![who represents themselves have a fool for a client. Well, I represent myself on paper, but what I was really representing in a co-defendant trial —there was seven of us in the first trial eight in the second—1 was representing everything we had fought for and what we represented politically and in principle. When you go pro se, you can do that, and the biggest case they had against us we won. 1 mean, we were charged with two RICO counts and sedition. They were looking to bury me and others forever, and we won that case. The battle starts there, because when they pack you offto the joint after you done the trials, you better have some kind of support network into place, and the start of that was in the legal proceedings. And they sent e directly to Marion, and this is post-1983 Marion, its a lockdown joint, 23 hours a day, when I got there, in your cell My usual toolbox was gone, and of course anybody who knows my history knows some of the stuff that was in my toolbo, 50 1 had to find another way to continue to struggle and to connect, Fortunately, that budding network that we helped build during the legal cases, which transverse five years of cases, followed us inside to some degree. We had supporters that we could work with. Thad to write. That was the key: a pencil, a pen. It became enormously important for me and my co-defendants, and 1 like to think it made a contribution to the ongoing struggles on the streets. T wrote prolifically for quite a long time. 1 wrote one of the first, the first really published, widely-spread article outside of mainstream media about ADX. ‘Eric King: In Prison Legal News. ‘Ray Luc Levasseur: Yeah. Disarmed from whatever you armed yourself with on the street, it changes inside. T was fortunate that we had supporters on the street—this is, you know, pre-internet, and everything, up to a point—to take those writings and developments concerning us and amplify and widely distribute it as much as possible. The reason I first heard of Ann Hansen was because there were groups in Canada doing the same thing for political prisoners up there. This was an important network and was an important method for me to communicate. For somebody like Leonard Peltier or Oscar Lope [Rivera), it was art. Tom i art. There’s different ways it can be done. With Marilyn [Buck], poetry. There’s any number of ways that you have to keep your spiri your politics alive and relevant somehow, and that was the way we and dit I think the most important action we took as political prisoners during W g hecages](rattling-the-cages-continuing-the-struggle-inside-out-ray-luc-levasseur-ashanti-alston-rattling-the-cages 14.png)
![non-violent Civil Rights Movement. But it’s also the point where Black ing into being, Stokely Carmichael’s voice. H. Rap Brown, . who’s now... Poweris con Jamil Al-Am Eric King . prisont! God. Ashanti Alston: Yeah, back in prison. They were raising more of the Malcolm X spirit,in the sense of, “We want to be free.” Black Power also was directing us towards, “What does self-determination look like? How might we actually take over our commaunities, the institutions, ete?” It gave more of a conerete picture of, “What are we fighting for here?” Not integration. Now we beginning to explore socialism, Mao Tse-Tung, communism, and the Black Panther Party having to read Karl Mars, and then Frantz Fanon, and all these other folks. It made us see more of the reality of this monster we’re facing, that it could not be changed, it could not be even modified. This monster has to be challenged, and we have to build the kind of revolutionary movements that can, like George Jackson says, bringit to its knees. I don’t know how that sounds to other people, but when you know your history, when you know what this country on the back of Turtle Island has did to Indigenous nations, what it has and continues to do, what it has did to African people and continues to do, what it had did to the Mexicans and others who come here. This is not something you try to reform. You see the necessity—even us as teenagers —of fighting. Develop the capacity to fight. The great thing about the Panther Party was that fight took the form of survival programs as well as liberation schools. The survival programs were so key, because it was pretty much telling people that we can feed ourselves. The free health clinics was saying we can take care of our own health issues. The political education classes was like f the schools are not going to teach s what we really need to know, then we need to do that. That was that self- determination nationalist attitude. We knew that there had been other efforts—when we talk about Nat Turner and all the other folks—we knew that there were those who did fight back by any means necessary. [Eric King holds up the book, John Brown The Hero, to the camera.] Right on. 1’ the same thing with the guy now that speaks on Palestine a lot, Norman Finklestein. The thing he talks about the Nat Turner rebellion, and he says clearly, like that was a pretty vicious thing that he and the erew did, but it was an act of rebellion. o g thecages](rattling-the-cages-continuing-the-struggle-inside-out-ray-luc-levasseur-ashanti-alston-rattling-the-cages 16.png)
![took it over, the first thing that the city government did, once they was contained, was to put some swimming pools in the playgrounds and they called that, you know, y’all should be satisfied with that now. Plainfield ain’t been right since. To this day. Even afterwards with Black mayors. It ain’t been right since, because we could not hold that self-determination, that Black Power perspective, because of how that Black middle class wanted to just fit in, they wanted to integrate. The lesson we should know from that is that we can’t integrate into this poisonous monstrous empire. We have really got to figure out that the way forward is to cut it loose. Cut itloose in every way we can. ‘Eric King: Thank you. Shout out Plainield! Ray Luc, do you have an opinion or a thought on why this generation, particularly with what’s going on, why we’ve seen such a decrease in ant action or direet action compared to when you guys were coming Ray Luc Levasseur: Lagree condition. It was a much i ith alot with Ashanti said. Time, place, ferent time. During our earlier political t years it was a much different time in the world. Che [Guevara] said, "One, two, three, many Vietnams,” and 1 had come out of Vietnam, and that seemed like a real possibility. Ashanti, you’re talking about 1967, 1 was in Vietnam in 1967, and we got an old Life Magazine over there, a very popular American weekly at the time, showing pictures of Detroit after the ’67 rebellion. T saw that, and when I was in ‘Nam I had done a lot of flying in helicopters, and the devastation I saw in the pages of the Life Magazine looked similar to what 1 was seeing in parts of Vietnam. I went up to Detroit to look at it myselfafter I got back, as I was stationed in Fort Campbell, and I could see there was a real war going on here, too. When I got out in 2004, one of the things I noticed about people or the general climate was I felt people were fearful. You know, this is following 9/11. T was inside during 9/12. But there was a sense that people have a sense of fear, insecurity, anxiety that 1 hadn’t sensed 20 years earlier, when I went in. It is a real challenge. acti Imean, I’m involved in Palestine work here right now in Maine. What I’m seeing in Maine is certainly alot of energy has been generated around supporting Palestine, for different reasons among different people, but there’s real potential there, for this movement that’s happening around g hecages](rattling-the-cages-continuing-the-struggle-inside-out-ray-luc-levasseur-ashanti-alston-rattling-the-cages 18.png)
![Newsweek magazines—so ook for those in that time period, because | want to have things 1 could show people. ‘This is September 1970 around Angela Davis. [Ashanti holds a magazine depicting Angela Davis and the title “The Making of a Fugitive” to the screen.) ‘This is March 1965, Ho Chi Minh! [Ashanti holds a magazine depicting Ho Chi Minh and the title “Behind the Peace Feelers” to the sereen.] This is 1970, June 1970. [Ashanti holds a magazine depicting a dozen of Palestinian “fedayeen” (guerrilla fighters) in uniform and formation and the title “Palestinian Arabs: new pride and unity” to the sereen.] How long these struggles have been going, for so long, and the reason 1 go for them is because I want to at some point have a place where peaple— some of the old Panther stuff that T have, too—so that people can actually sce some things and maybe read some of the things from the Panther paper, and I got more, 1 even got a Nation of Islam Muhammad ‘Speaks stuff. But you get to see what the articles were talking about, what was the focus But what Thad wanted to get back to around here, like the difference between then and now. I do think fear, yes, is a big, big part. Because I think that once they had captured a lot of us, what was put in place? Not only more militarized police. But on a cultural level, television had beaucoup cop shows, beaucoup cop shows millions and millions of people would watch every week. Because in the cop shows the cops always got the criminal, and in many instances the eriminals was folks like me and Ray, right? People are getting convinced—like they captured us—don’t you try to do the same thing, because we’ll get you, t00. You cannot escape us.Twent in 74, and when I got out at the end of 5, I’m living with my. lawyer until he can work it out. My lawyer had a close relationship with a ot of Black high school students in New Haven that had basketball skills, and what he wanted to do was make sure, if they got scholarships, he wanted to make sure they had the best scholarship. He would go in there to help them, to make sure they wasn’t getting screwed around and stuff But one of the young high school students—you know, because he would be around the legal office—and I just, out of curiosity, asked him, “What do you know about the Black Panther Party?” And he asked me, “Was it a B g thecages](rattling-the-cages-continuing-the-struggle-inside-out-ray-luc-levasseur-ashanti-alston-rattling-the-cages 20.png)
![concerns, but I’m going to just tie it into this and not really get too deep into it. Like many things, this system has the ability to co-opt, regurgitate, and spit something else back out to us as ifit was their idea. I think that has been happening, and I think other abolitionists who have been developing this for years see the same thing, that this thing with abolition is getting distorted and watered down to the point where you got many people who will use the word abolition, they’re abolitionist, you know, “Defund the Police,” and all that other stuff. ’m not really that big on the defund the police, because I think that doesn’t show any understanding of the role of the police. That they ain’t gonna sit around and like, “Oh, you ‘gonna take our job from us? No, no, no. We’re killers. We’re shooters. We control you. That’s our job.” No. I think people can be kind of naive. I am ‘more for tying abolition into real grassroots organizing that people can see the need to take back their lives. 1 like the initiative coming from the People’s Senate... Eric King: This is Jalil [Al-Amin]? ‘Ashanti Alston: That’s Spirit of Mandela, which is putting forth a sort of dual power possibilty of people developing the capacities to develop their own power in opposition to the white supremacist capitalist powers that be. I really ke Dhoruba Bin Wahad’s idea that he’s been pushing in terms of developing a united front against fascism as we tried back in the days of fascism think what s 50 key about that is that Dhoruba s very analytical and pointed into the role of the technologies of political control. He sces. He’s trying to get people to see the role of the police in a much broader picture that we need to get ready for that. would encourage people to go to the Spirit of Mandela website. You can, if you put in united front against fascism, put Dhoruba’s name in there, you’l sce where he has the conversation with JillStein and Cornell West. Both have a united front aspect, and both want to reach masses of people from different communities from different perspectives. But to be clear about how we need to focus on the role of the frontline forces who are going to always be there to prevent us from developing this capacity to transform t ‘madness. So, ifit’s there, then it’sless of a worry for me about, Is the language going to be shifted offinto something else and becomes ‘meaningless again?” Can we stay focused on the need to bring this empi down as even the best way to help stop the genocides that’s going on in Palestine and in Africa and other different places? But we don’t eally talk about the genocides in Africa as much, but those of us out of the Black g teages 2](rattling-the-cages-continuing-the-struggle-inside-out-ray-luc-levasseur-ashanti-alston-rattling-the-cages 29.png)
RATT|LING THEQ
ORAL HISTORIES oF
NORTH AMERICAN @)
POLITICAL PRISONERS m
v
“Continuing the Struggle
Inside & Out”
Originaly hosted us aliv conversation by Firestorm Books,
recording available on Firstormn' youtube channel
[ ————————
June 16,2020
Publshed by AK Pross, Ratding the Cages: Oral Histries of North American
PoliticalPisoners s roject of abolitionists Josh Davidson and Eric King, The
ook illed with the expericnce and wisdom of over hist current and former
North Amrican poiical prisoners. It provides first-hand detal of prison e and
the poliieal commitments that continue o lesd prisoners into direet confrontation
with state authorites and insitutons.
Transcription, editng, and formatting by ev, Danielle,Josh & Jeremy with help
from Firestorm Boak.
allsbor votunteered
with whatever weapons a hand
‘Eric King is a father, poet, author, and activist. In December 2023 he was
released from the supermax ADX prison after spending nearly ten years as
hael
a political prisoner for an act of protest over the police murder of
Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. He was held in solitary confinement for
‘years and was met with violence by guards throughout his incarceration.
Eric has published three zines: Battle Tested (2015), Antifa in Prison (2019),
and Pacing in My Cell (2019). His sentencing statement is ineluded in the
‘book Defiance: Anarchist Statements Before Judge and Jury (2019). Eric
now works as a paralegal for the Bread and Roses Legal Center.
Ashanti Alston s an anarchist who was in prison for 4 years for his
involvement with the Black Liberation Army. Prior to his arrest Ashant
was a member of the BLA and the Black Panther Party. He has since
release played an important role on the stcering committee of the
National Jericho Movement to Free US Political Prisoners. Ashanti wrote
the afterward to the political prisoner anthology, Let Freedom Ring: A
Collection of Documents from the Movement to Free US Political
Prisoners (2008).
‘Ray Luc Levasseur was a member of the United Freedom Front and the
m Melville-Jonathan Jackson Unit who spent over twenty years in
prison. The group known as the Ohio 7—Ray, Patricia Gros Levasseur,
Barbara Curzi- Laaman, Carol Saucier Manning, Tom Manning, Jaan
Laaman and Richard Williams —were working.class revolutionaries
charged with actions against US military facilities, recruitment centers,
and corporate headquarters. These actions were done in solidarity with,
the people of South Affica and Central America, who were bearing the
brunt of US imperialism. Ray spent twenty-one months imprisoned in
‘Tennessee State Penitentiary in Nashville and at Brushy Mountain State
Petros, Tennessee, between 1969 and 1971, before spending
twenty years imprisoned from 1984 to 2004 for his actions with the UF.
Ray has published three zines—Family Values; Letters from Exile; and The
Trial Statements of Ray Luc Levasseur—all of which are to be republished
by Kersplebedeb and Burning Books in 2024
ating the cages: 3
Libertie Valence: Welcome to everybody. Big thanks to everybody who's
joining us tonight. My name is Libertie, and 'm a member of the,
Firestorm Collective. Tonight we're really excited to host con
Rattling the Cages: Oral Histories of North American Political Prisoners.
We'll be doing a conversation tonight on their experiences behind bars
and the importance of international solidari
utors to
both then and now.
Firestorm is a 16-year-old radical bookstore owned and operated by a
queer feminist collective in southern Appalachia on the land of the
Cherokee People. We strive to feature books and events that reflect our
interests and the needs of marginalized communities in the South, and
we're continuing to do some of our events virtually, like this one, both
because we know it expands the possibility of what we're able to do and
also makes this space accessible to lots of folks who for a variety of
reasons are still not spending a ot of time at in-person events.
Without further ado, 'm going to pass it off to Eric who's going to take it
away here. Thanks so much, Eric.
‘Eric King: Thank you so much. Before we get into the deep questions, this
week was my six month free anniversary, and I was wondering if either of
you two could tell me what your memories were of your release date
What you felt, what you were wearing, what you ate, just any recollections
or memories you have from the day that you were released from prison,
Ashanti Alston: 1 was captured in 74 and was released at the end of 85, A
year before I was released, me and Safiya Bukhari had got married, so 1
definitely remember the release date, because Safiya picked me up. We
had a trailer visit before—that one—but it was just special, this woman
who I married picked me up. But the problem was New York wasn't
allowing me to come back to New York, which is where Safiya lived. She
took me to my lawyer’s house, and my lawyer was like, until he can work
that out with New York to get me back to New York, I'm going to live with
him and his family. We spent that day at my lawyer's house celebrating
my release with him. That's my memories of that. 1 don’t remember what
we ate. I don't remember none of that stuff. But, man, well, one of the
things was that my lawyer had a sense of humor, because the Connecticut
—this is Connecticut, 1 don't know if I said it—the bank expropriation took
place in New Haven, Connecticut. My lawyer had a sense of humor, 5o he
wanted to make sure we drove by the bank. I was like, “Okay, okay.” That
A et s
was his sense of humor, and I appreciatet
around.)
it at the time. (Laughter all
After all that time, getting out and knowing that 1 left some comrades
behind in prison in Connecticut... Like with Safiya, I know 'm coming out,
P coming out hitting the ground running, getting right back to work
around the political prisoner issue probably before anything else.
Eric King: Yeah, absolutely. Alright, Ray?
Ray Luc Levasseur: When I was released from Brushy Peni
was alittle bit different. Time, place, and con
that time, 1 was released on parole on a condition that Tleave the state of
Tennessee, so couldn't stay in Tennessee. I was released from Brushy
Mountain, right? There was nobody. I didn’t know anybody in the area, so
there was nobody waiting for me. T had just enough money for—a guy
dropped me off at the bus station—for a ticket back to Maine. I was
dressed in a prison outfit, the old brogans and everything, and I went
aKMart department store near the bus station, and I got a pair of jeans
and a t-shirt, a pair of sneakers, went in the dressing room, threw all the
prison clothes into the trash, changed over, got on the long bus back. The
last thing 1 did after I got out the front door was turn around and give the
place the finger. 1 mean, it was kind of a bittersweet moment for me. 1
took that long bus drive back to Maine, and an important point I want to
‘make is—1 may make this later if we get into this more—is that political
prisoners, like any other prisoners, most of us return back to the class we
came from, and I came from a working class family, worked at shoe
factories and shit, and they didn’t have a lot of resources, so when 1 got
back, first thing I got to do on my agenda s to survive.
to
P sleeping on a couch. 1 got to find a job. I found a job making conerete
blocks. You can imagine how thrilling that was after coming out of a steel
and conerete encased prison, but you got to do what you got to do to
survive, to get back on my feet, right? That's what 1 was doing six months
later. But it was just after that, and that’s a delicate time for people, when
they get out after that six-month period, I got a lttle breathing room—and
we can get into that later, how I made use of my time there politically and
otherwise. Fast forward, I was at the USP Atlanta, federal penitentiary in
Atlanta when got out, and the last person I saw leaving there was Mutulu
‘Shakur, who I had just spent four years with. Fine, fine brother. That was a
ating the cages: s
painful thing about leaving. Mutulu and the conseious brothers, they had.
given mea send-off the day before. But to walk out and leave Mutulu
there, there was some pain involved in that. I sincerely hoped that he was
going to get out a lot sooner than he did, and he did as well, but you know.
what happened. They didn't let him out until many years later, and he
died shortly after.
‘There was also joy, because as soon as I got out from those thick granite
walls there, Jamila, my wife, was waiting for me. We had our shotgun
marriage in the penitentiary a few months earlier, and she was going to
accompany me from Atlanta back to Maine. They had tried to force me to.
g0 to New York City. Most people would have grabbed on that. There was.
anetwork there I could connect to, but I needed to get back home,
because my mother was elderly, she wasn't going to be around much
longer. You know where it hit me? I'm really out, 'm really out, and how
doTknow that? Because we got to get from the joint to the airport, and
the BOP gave us an escort to make sure [ got to the airport, and then,
when we got to the airport, the FBI comes over, and they said, “You know
why,” and they took me around security so I didn't get snagged up in that,
then went into the secure area. They said, “You know what? There’s a
couple hours before your flight leaves. We're going to go with these
guards here and grab a bite to cat. We'll meet you back here inan hour
and a half” That's when I knew my ass was definitely out of prison when
they walked away from me instead of trying to grab my ass over the many
years that they did. They wanted to make sure, because of the No Fly list,
that I got on that freaking plane, that’s what the FBI was there for. When
we got back home, I was very fortunate that Jamila s a registered nurse,
and so 1 had something there materially to help support me, so 1 didn't
have to sleep under a bridge when I got out, and to help me with those
initial steps.
‘Eric King: I think I just learned that all three of us got married inside
prison
‘Ashanti Alston: Uh huh. You too?
‘Eric King: That's wild. Both of you did overa decade in prison. Ray, you
did two decades. During that time, how were you able to maintain or be a
part of the struggle, either the struggle inside the prison or the struggle
that you were a part of that landed you in prison? How were you able to
6t thecages
continue and mai
ain that struggle if you were?
Ashanti Alston: Well, inside, when we were captured in New Haven,
Connecticut, there was support groups that was there for us from New
York. They was support groups, even ones that I had been a part of—at a
certain point 'm underground—but some of those same folks, when we
was in New Haven going to trial, them same defense committees was
there for us during the trial. There was one local group in New Haven,
which was actually a Trotskyist group that was there for s, and they were
really solid, really consistent, really great, and also they was the first ones
to give me a much better understanding of what it was to be a Trotskyist
in the movement, because I kind of brushed it off, because Marxist-
Leninist-Maoists, sometimes you don't really question, “Well why do we
got this thing with the Trotskyists? Why is that?” Anyhow, they were
really solid and really great supporters. Inside, those support groups,
defense groups, also helped to keep you in touch with family. If the family
needed help to come up to see me, they would help with that process. The
letter writings—and the letter writingsat that time was really, really
important, because, though our minds at the time during the trial was
stll,“We ain't really trying to sit here for the process of this trial. We
really are looking for avenues out,” but you got to deal with both realitis,
both possibilities. You might have to do this trial and get sent, or you
‘might find an opening and you're out of there, but they provided that link
that kept us hopeful with the course of the struggle, that folks were still
carrying on the struggle.
Our particular case, because we were captured in the midst of this
expropriation, we had no illusions about getting acquitted. We were
fortunate enough to have good lawyers who volunteered their services.
‘Two of them, David Rosen and Ed Dolan, were also part of Erica Huggins’
and Bobby Seal’s legal defense team. They contacted us and said, “Hey,
we're here for you if you want it. We're here to defend you.” We were I
“Right on.” There was another lawyer t00, John Williams, who also had
politics. We knew that this was going to be a political trial. During this
time, our minds was still “We're at war.” The process of this trial was
almost like a distraction, but it was the connection with the defense
committees, the New York ones, the New Haven ones, and there was not a
Lot of support, but it still kept us connected. We wasn't able to get out
aftera few attempts. Prison. We get sentenced. It was the banks, s
federal charges and state charges. Tor the bank expropriation, it was a s to
ating the cages: 3
25 year sentence, and then, because it was the shootout and two cops got
hurt,
and after that they kept us separated. We was never to be in the same
Was 10 10 20 for that. Now we're in always the different prisons,
prison anywhere again except towards the end, and in [Summers] when
fperiod of time—
Ihad made parole—we was there at least for several months together.
one of my comrades was transferred there, and for a b
But I think what I wanted to bring up, is that, because our minds is still at
war, I studied. trained. My comrades studied.
‘Eric King: You say trained, you mean physically?
‘Ashanti Alston: From physical to just exercise, because we had the
examples of stories from Huey P. Newton in prison. We had the stories of
George Jackson. 1t was almost like if you're in the cell, and here comes the
guard just making his regular rounds, we might, just to play with him, pop
down on the floor, we knocking out 20 push-ups or whatever, you know.
Otherwise, we're doingall the other things, because we want to stay
ready. That whole “Stay Ready” mentality. It was not depressing for me, I
didn’t go through no depression. 1t was just the “Ready” mentality. But
read,
already... The first stop was Oxford, Wisconsin.
e 1said before. I read all the time. So, going off to prison I had
‘Eric King Oh, that was your federal prison?
Ashanti Alston: That was the first. No... Well,that was the first one they
sent me to because I had to do the federal time first, right, and go to
Federal, go to Oxford, Wisconsin, and one of my comrades comes there
also, who's down in prison in Georgia now, Kamau Sadiki. It was one of
the first times that me and another comrade from the BLA was in the
same prison. Same mentality. We're at war. We got a brother that’s
training us in kung f and everything else, and we got to do it secretly,
because you can't do it in the open, the guards don’t play that stuff. But
then, 1 had put in for a transfer to Lewisburg prison, and eventually I got
transferred to Lewisburg, because at least it was the closest to home.
Lewisburg was one of the major maximum prisons, federal prisons.
Eric King Serious place.
‘Ashanti Alston: Serious place. Me, you know, I'm a young guy, and there
5 et s
was a few other guys in there, young, we're young. But there’s a collective
there, and what the collective does, you come into the collective of
comrades from different formations, right, and you're studying, you're
training You got other folks in there, prisoners who want to be a part of
that kind of revolutionary consciousness-raising stuff. I's an easy
conneetion still at the time, because this is the mid 70s going into the late
*70s.8tillit’s, “How can we get out of this big prison with these tall walls?”
But support groups kept us connected to the movements. Like I will say
over and over, it wasn't like we got letters from a lot of people, it wasn't
like that. Like the National Jericho Movement and other groups will have
letter writing nights and all that. We didn't get that. We wasn't getting
‘money for commissary and all that. We was just facing this situation,
doing this time, looking for openings to get out. But Ilearned a lot there. I
read. Even all the times 1 was in and out of segregation, ' like, “You can.
put me in seg, just give me my books.” But now I'm reading, and P'm
interacting with others. I'm beginning to read the radical psychologies,
the feminisms. I'm beginning to read the more in-depth histories of
ferent struggles like the Irish freedom struggles with the IRA.
Eric King: Now we're talking.
‘Ashanti Alston: The Philippines, the Hukbalahap rebellion, maybe even
‘more in-depth Chinese Revolution, the Cuban Revolution, because
comrades was still able to get books and things in, so there was books.
always floating around. So, P also learning i this environment. T don't
give a damn that it’s in prison. Sundiata Acoli would say when we used to
Correspond—we wasn't supposed to, but we did—he would say, “Tur that
prison into a university.” It's ll about preparing you for getting out. That
was my experience there. But the repression inside the prison got to be
really bad. This particularly fascist warden came in at a certain point, he
was clamping down on a lot of stuff. I worked industry with others at the
time, and some things happen in industry, like industry caught on fire a
few times. “Hey, what I know... By chance,” that's what I say. Who did
they come after? They they came after me, a few other comrades,
jailhouse lawyers. Next thing I know, they swooping us up, we on the bus
on our way to Marion, llinos.
Eric King: You were at O1d Marion?
‘Ashanti Alston: At Marion, who's one of the first people we see—who's in
ating the cages: s
general population, but they walking us to segregation—it's Rafacl
[Cancel] Miranda of the Puerto Rican independentistas. He's letting us
know that they already know that we're on our way there. They had
already got the word through the grapevine. Herman Bell was there.
Other comrades who may not be known like Joe Monaco and Bobby
Holmes. There was other political prisoners there, because Marion took,
the place of Aleatraz. The experience of Marion was like this was supposed
to be the most escape-proof prison at the time, and one of the things for
me, it was so electronic, everything was. You want to open up the gate or
something, the cell, they got to push a button, and it opens up. All that
stuff was new for me. The surveillance... The guards took a lot of notes on
individuals. T never made it to general population.
Eric King: We'll gt to repression here soon. We'll be talking about that.
‘Ashanti Alston: Okay. So, there, those political prisoners and politcized
prisoners had one of the most fantastic libraries. Again, 'm learning. 'm
ncreasing my understandings of struggle and the anti-authoritarian
aspects, the anarchist aspects, and moving closer in that dircction. But
still had connection through the defense committees to the movements,
some of the movements that was going on, but those numbers were
dwindling, because they were getting hit with a lot of repression. Safiya
and them and others decided to go underground because there was these.
grand jury searches, rying to get them on different charges of supporting
other actions to help free BLA folks or politial prisoners. Like I said,
wasn't a lot of letters, wasn't all that stuff, ut we know, we're soldiers,
thisis what we gonna do. Next thing from there, some of s was like, the
word was, “Don't accept general population.” S0, some of us decide o stay
in s to force them to transfer us, and they ended up transferring some
of us to Lompac, California. Who was amongst that group? Leonard
Peltier. Bobby Holmes. Joc Monaco, Curley Raul Estramera, he's BLA,
Puerto Rican BLA. And others
Here we are. Now we're all Lompoc, but Lompoc was just in the process of
transferring from medium sceurity to maximum, and it was kind ofa
modernist place, and it had fences, but they hadn't had all the constantino
wire up yet. Here we are, all doing all this time. We like, “Man, we got to
hit this fence before they get all this constantino wire up.” In the process,
we are meeting other folks, supporters from the outside, and especially, at
this time, some revolutionary groups in California, one was called the
W g thecages
Wellspring Collective or Tribal Thumb, which was a very anti
authoritarian group, and they would come up to visit. More and more,
am learning different ways that people struggle and are trying to carry
onin that California area, because a lot of them politicized prisoners who
was with George [Jackson] or out of them circles were coming out also in
getting involved with grassroots organizing. I feel like that’s always my
prison experience. 1 gotta learn, I gotta be ready, and 1 gotta make sure
that I'm interacting with folks who are still carrying us on or figuring out
wways to keep the momentum. Many of us was on that same page. So, then
Connecticut, and eventually I get parole, parole to the Connecticut state.
prison, and I finished the second half of my sentence there, and
eventually get out.
Eric King: Perfect. Thank you. Also, you mentioned Tribal Thumb.
Someone Ilook up to, Bill Dunne, was a member of Tribal Thumb, 50 it's
‘Ashanti Alston: Listen, just to say about him, Bill Dunne, think—1 believe
—that part of the reason he got captured, recaptured, was because we.
needed him to help us. There’s a special part of me that's lways there for
n, because he made a sacrifice
Eric King: For the people listening, if you'd like to write Bill Dunne, he
currently at the medical facility in FCI Butner, if anyone wants to write.
Ray, would youlike to touch on that same topic about how you maintain
struggle both or cither
ide or outside of those movements?
Ray Luc Levasseur: Well, first of all, Bill Dunne. Yeah, itd be very nice if
people could write to him at Butner. 1 just got a letter from him a few
wweeks ago. I first met him back in.. He's struggling with health issues and
everything, but he's still got the same strong spirit and good sense of
‘humor. He always has. He needs alttle support.
Eric King: Lots of support.
Ray Luc Levasseur: Briefly, as I mentioned, you know, we're talking one
struggle here: two parts of it, inside and outside. I've always found it
interesting that the political prisoners on the inside always gravitate to
each other, no matter which movement or which organizations they come
ating the cages: "
from, while the support organizations on the street seem to do a lot more
squabbling with each other and can't seem to deal with all the obstacles.
they need to form a more united front around political prisoners. Briefl
my first experience in Tennessee at Tennessce pen in Brushy Mountain, it
was my first prison experience, and I didn’t have... T had been politically
active before, when I went to Southern Student Organizing Committee,
but hadn’t been in the movement that long. So, my support network.
wasn't that strong, Initially, yes, 1 was able to get books and correspond,
with people, and this s very helpful, like Ashanti pointed out, political
education inside.
Right from the get go, we had a food strike over conditions at the county
jail in Tennessee. What was particularly interesting and pertinent about
that was you had white and black prisoners, and you had to overcome
that racial barrier to get everybody together on the same page and go and
e over these conditions. We managed to do that.
stri
‘Eric King: In the state prison it was still racially split like that?
‘Ray Luc Levasseur: Well it was, but 'm not there yet, I'm in the county
jail.
‘Eric King: Oh, sorry. Right.
‘Ray Luc Levasseur: I presented the demands. We threw all our food back
out, made a mess, wouldn't eat. The goon squad comes up, the whole deal.
Igot the demands ready. Top of the list: have to improve the food and the
‘medical care, which was basically non-existent. They dragged me out the
next day to the courthouse and got me a forced transfer to state
penitentiary in Nashville. Every joint I've been in has been either max or
supermax. Right away, I got a jacket, and that jacket follows me through
the rest of my time in the Tennessee prisons, and it shows up again many
‘years later for the next 20 years in the federal prisons. Once you get that
jacket—and what my jacket says is, “He’s a troublemaker, he's a radical,
and he's a racial agitator.” That, they stuck on me after I got to Nashville,
but the seeds for that was in the food strike, because the most radical
thing I did and could be done when I got to the state penitentiary was
eross the color line. It was basically Jim Crow. Once they pull me up on
this shit, put me in seg, that’s exactly what, those are the exact words they
put on my jacket: “He's a racial agitator.” Why is this guy trying to bring
B g thecages
people together as if there’s something wrong here? Because prison
systems are notorious for keeping people divided on racial lines. Crossing
that racial line is what 1 did as a matter of principle, as an already
practicing anti-racist from my time with SSOC. Then they stuck me on
death row to get me off the compound. I was actually on death row. They
had several cells for miscreants that they considered real troublemakers
from the population. They put me there. 1was in there with brothers from
‘Memphis who gave me an education about white supremacy and killer
cops Iwill never forget. Learning is a two-way street inside, and we were
doing political education.
' going to cut this short. Then they sent me to Brushy, which was a
conneetion to the old conviet-leasing system. I got there in 1970. If I got
there in 1965, [ would have been mining coal. In 1970 it was a supermax,
one of the early supermaxes. We were locked up almost all the time. They
cut offall books, ll newspapers, no phone calls, restricted, very restricted
correspondence: immediate family, lawyer, clergy, that was it. That was
another racist place. Every single guard in Brushy Mountain—this isin the
East Tennessee mountains—was white. Half the prisoners there were
Black. They moved death row and me there at the same time, and most of
prisoners on death row were Black. I literally had to fight my way out of
that place. Tused to tell people, “T'm a Vietnam vet. I was in a war.” Before
Tever got to this war, 1 was in a foreign war. I'm a veteran of foreign and
domestic wars, because it was a battle to get out of there. Fast forward, I
gotta do 20 years here in the feds. Most of it was at Marion and ADX—you
know about those places—about 13 years of it in some kind of isolation or
solitary confinement. Box-car cells, the epitome of isolation, right, Eric?
You know about them.
In terms of the struggle, where did it start? The day 1 was captured. Ok, go
right to the trials. You don't just go to the penitentiary for the most part,
ier plea or go to the trial. One way or another, you're gonna be in court,
and the battle against the system continues on another level from where 1
had been, and it starts in the courts. That's the battle for... O, shit. Can
you hear me?
Eric & Ashanti: Yeah, we can hear you.
Ray Luc Levasseur: So, forming defense committees... [ was pro se.
‘There's an old saying by lawyers—like they know everything—a person
g tecages 13
who represents themselves have a fool for a client. Well, I represent
myself on paper, but what I was really representing in a co-defendant trial
—there was seven of us in the first trial eight in the second—1 was
representing everything we had fought for and what we represented
politically and in principle. When you go pro se, you can do that, and the
biggest case they had against us we won. 1 mean, we were charged with
two RICO counts and sedition. They were looking to bury me and others
forever, and we won that case. The battle starts there, because when they
pack you offto the joint after you done the trials, you better have some
kind of support network into place, and the start of that was in the legal
proceedings. And they sent e directly to Marion, and this is post-1983
Marion, its a lockdown joint, 23 hours a day, when I got there, in your cell
My usual toolbox was gone, and of course anybody who knows my history
knows some of the stuff that was in my toolbo, 50 1 had to find another
way to continue to struggle and to connect, Fortunately, that budding
network that we helped build during the legal cases, which transverse five
years of cases, followed us inside to some degree. We had supporters that
we could work with. Thad to write. That was the key: a pencil, a pen. It
became enormously important for me and my co-defendants, and 1 like to
think it made a contribution to the ongoing struggles on the streets. T
wrote prolifically for quite a long time. 1 wrote one of the first, the first
really published, widely-spread article outside of mainstream media
about ADX.
‘Eric King: In Prison Legal News.
‘Ray Luc Levasseur: Yeah. Disarmed from whatever you armed yourself
with on the street, it changes inside. T was fortunate that we had
supporters on the street—this is, you know, pre-internet, and everything,
up to a point—to take those writings and developments concerning us
and amplify and widely distribute it as much as possible. The reason I first
heard of Ann Hansen was because there were groups in Canada doing the
same thing for political prisoners up there. This was an important
network and was an important method for me to communicate. For
somebody like Leonard Peltier or Oscar Lope [Rivera), it was art. Tom
i art. There's different ways it can be done. With Marilyn [Buck],
poetry. There’s any number of ways that you have to keep your spiri
your politics alive and relevant somehow, and that was the way we
and
dit
I think the most important action we took as political prisoners during
W g hecages
my time at Marion was we did a work refusal. They had it set up where
they would not release you from Marion until you went to a pre-transfer
unit that made military hardware. We drew the line and said, “We will not
dothat as a condition for a transfer to somewhere else.” We weren't there
on disciplinary charges, they had just sent us there because of our jackets,
we wereall radical, and so we refused it. Me, Tom Manning, Mutulu
Shakur, Osear Lopez Rivera, and others. We refused that work, and then
we ended up in ADX.
just reiterate, what Ashanti said. Through all this i
study, political education, physical conditioning, all of it. The one time of
vear that Talways see that happen, when I was inside—and 1 got out in
‘August from Atlanta, and 1 did it with Mutulu and the other conscious
brothers before I left—is we commemorate Black August throughout the
prison system, state or federal, which involves fasting, which involves
political education, which involves physical exercise, as much as you can
doit, together. It's commemorating the sacrifices of those Black freedom
fighters, like George Jackson, Jonathan Jackson, and others before them
and after them, and it continues to this day.
Eric King: Thank you. Brilliant. It turns out not only were all of us married
in prison, but we were all placed inside the US federal supermaxes, either
one or both of them, 5o that is also interesting.
Inthe 605, 705, and 'sos—this isn't a question I've listed, but is
something I'm curious about—we saw more direct action. We saw bank
ms. We saw people putting their freedom on the line, T feel,
seration struggle. Why do you, if you have an opinion, why do
‘you think that has vanished? Why do you think we do not see that sort of
ant action anymore? Ashanti, if you want to go first, brother.
‘Ashanti Alston: That’s a question that is always on my mind. To explain
why it’s always on my mind... The ‘60 and *70s I still fel like, man, that
was such a period for me to come of age from 14 10 16 0 17. Me and Jihad
Abdul Mamil, we joining the Black Panther Party. It was such a time to be
alive, it was just 1 You didn't have all the
distractions, I guess, as today. You had to deal with this struggle. You saw
that the Civil Rights Movement was getting beat down. You could turn on
that television, it wasn’t but maybe six channels on that television, you're
going to see what these fascists are doing to the Civil Rights, the
S0 many ways may
g tecages 18
non-violent Civil Rights Movement. But it’s also the point where Black
ing into being, Stokely Carmichael's voice. H. Rap Brown,
. who's now...
Poweris con
Jamil Al-Am
Eric King . prisont! God.
Ashanti Alston: Yeah, back in prison. They were raising more of the
Malcolm X spirit,in the sense of, “We want to be free.” Black Power also
was directing us towards, “What does self-determination look like? How
might we actually take over our commaunities, the institutions, ete?” It
gave more of a conerete picture of, “What are we fighting for here?” Not
integration. Now we beginning to explore socialism, Mao Tse-Tung,
communism, and the Black Panther Party having to read Karl Mars, and
then Frantz Fanon, and all these other folks. It made us see more of the
reality of this monster we're facing, that it could not be changed, it could
not be even modified. This monster has to be challenged, and we have to
build the kind of revolutionary movements that can, like George Jackson
says, bringit to its knees. I don't know how that sounds to other people,
but when you know your history, when you know what this country on
the back of Turtle Island has did to Indigenous nations, what it has and
continues to do, what it has did to African people and continues to do,
what it had did to the Mexicans and others who come here. This is not
something you try to reform. You see the necessity—even us as teenagers
—of fighting. Develop the capacity to fight. The great thing about the
Panther Party was that fight took the form of survival programs as well as
liberation schools. The survival programs were so key, because it was
pretty much telling people that we can feed ourselves. The free health
clinics was saying we can take care of our own health issues. The political
education classes was like f the schools are not going to teach s what we
really need to know, then we need to do that. That was that self-
determination nationalist attitude. We knew that there had been other
efforts—when we talk about Nat Turner and all the other folks—we knew
that there were those who did fight back by any means necessary.
[Eric King holds up the book, John Brown The Hero, to the camera.]
Right on. 1’ the same thing with the guy now that speaks on Palestine a
lot, Norman Finklestein. The thing he talks about the Nat Turner rebellion,
and he says clearly, like that was a pretty vicious thing that he and the
erew did, but it was an act of rebellion.
o g thecages
Eric King: .an act of necessity.
‘Ashanti Alston: An act of necessity. He went to what the Abolitionist
‘movement leaders were putting out in their papers and in their talks to
give it some perspective, and, basically, what the Abolitionist movement
was telling people was like, “We told you things like this were going to
happen, because you have these people enslaved.” Norman Finklestein
\was comparing t to the open-air prison in Palestine—Gaza—and it's like a
prison break It’s really great, and he continues to do it even now when
you hear him talk. But that was what we were trying to get across also to
People. Don't call us crazy because we are trying to develop the capacity
1o be free, which will mean that we have got to confront this monster with
all means necessary. All means necessary. The Black Panther Party, I feel,
came closest to bringing that into fruition, because it started off Black
Panther Party for Self-Defense, but also in its growing process understood
this aspect of armed struggle. We need to defend our communities.
Eric King: We. We don't need torely on the police to o it, we need to do it
‘Ashanti Alston: Because, clearly, the police i an occupying force. That
language at the time was key. When Eldridge Cleaver and them talked
about this being an internal colony, and we're inside the mother country,
he was giving us a way to see what this settler colonialism was. To see that
was also to see our struggle on a much broader level, compared with the
African liberation movements, theliberation movements coming out of
Asia, the revolutionary struggles even in Germany, Japan, and other
places. We may get into that with the solidarity stuff too. But those of us
in the Black Panther Party who went underground, we had always
understood that we have to develop the capacity to defend ourselves. Who
do we come up against? Al those bourgeois negrocs and others who want
10 stay connected to the monster, and want (o convince our people like,
“Yo, do not follow them crazy people. Stay with the monster. They're
going to give us a few trinkets. They're going to give us alittle bit more.”
Let me el you what happened, quickly. After the rebellion in my
hometown—this is 67, this is what pretty much brought me into the
‘movement, I'm like 13 or 14 years old—the rebellion in Plainfield, when
Black folks took over the Black community, because they went and got
crates of M rifles. They was able to hold it for a week. 13 or 14 year old
Ashanti was like, “Oh my God, this is blowing my mind that we are able to
do this.” But then, after the National Guard came in with the tanks and
g tecages 7
took it over, the first thing that the city government did, once they was
contained, was to put some swimming pools in the playgrounds and they
called that, you know, y'all should be satisfied with that now. Plainfield
ain’t been right since. To this day. Even afterwards with Black mayors. It
ain't been right since, because we could not hold that self-determination,
that Black Power perspective, because of how that Black middle class
wanted to just fit in, they wanted to integrate. The lesson we should know
from that is that we can’t integrate into this poisonous monstrous empire.
We have really got to figure out that the way forward is to cut it loose. Cut
itloose in every way we can.
‘Eric King: Thank you. Shout out Plainield!
Ray Luc, do you have an opinion or a thought on why this generation,
particularly with what's going on, why we've seen such a decrease in
ant action or direet action compared to when you guys were coming
Ray Luc Levasseur: Lagree
condition. It was a much i
ith alot with Ashanti said. Time, place,
ferent time. During our earlier political
t years it was a much different time in the world. Che [Guevara]
said, "One, two, three, many Vietnams,” and 1 had come out of Vietnam,
and that seemed like a real possibility. Ashanti, you're talking about 1967, 1
was in Vietnam in 1967, and we got an old Life Magazine over there, a very
popular American weekly at the time, showing pictures of Detroit after
the ’67 rebellion. T saw that, and when I was in ‘Nam I had done a lot of
flying in helicopters, and the devastation I saw in the pages of the Life
Magazine looked similar to what 1 was seeing in parts of Vietnam. I went
up to Detroit to look at it myselfafter I got back, as I was stationed in Fort
Campbell, and I could see there was a real war going on here, too. When I
got out in 2004, one of the things I noticed about people or the general
climate was I felt people were fearful. You know, this is following 9/11. T
was inside during 9/12. But there was a sense that people have a sense of
fear, insecurity, anxiety that 1 hadn’t sensed 20 years earlier, when I went
in. It is a real challenge.
acti
Imean, I'm involved in Palestine work here right now in Maine. What I'm
seeing in Maine is certainly alot of energy has been generated around
supporting Palestine, for different reasons among different people, but
there’s real potential there, for this movement that's happening around
g hecages
this country right now to develop to the level it was around South Africa
25 years ago. But that is an exception. I don't have a firm answer for what
you're saying. One of the questions I get, used to get a lot, not so much
now, but 1did over the years—it indicates to me why people are thinking
different than they were decades earlier. There’s a sense about people...
They were kind of overwhelmed by the power of the system. They would
say, “Well, how how can you challenge something like this? It seems like
everything that we do or try doesn’t get anywhere, because it's just too
big,it's too powerful”
‘The other one was about sacrifice. If you go up against this system there
are consequences.
Eric King: Serious consequences.
Ray Luc Levasseur: We on this panel right now are demonstrating what
some of those consequences are. But there’s a lot of other consequences.
Pve heard you, Eric, talk about an organization I've been very involved
with with—Rosenberg Fund for Children.
Eric King: Love ‘em.
Ray Luc Levasseur: This is an organization that supports children of
political prisoners. If you go and you look at the parents of these children,
the activists, how many different ways the government can make you pay
for your activism, whether you're an immigration activist, a climate
activist, an anti-faseist activist, and the different levels of activism,
depending on where you are, and there’s other factors, but there’s a whole.
Lot of people that are paying a price for their activism. It seares a lot of
people. 1 know we got a ways to go yet, so I don’t want to take any more
time on that question.
Eric King: Thank you. Thank you so much. Ashanti, you wanted us to
come back, you had a followup.
‘Ashanti Alston: Yea, Listen. I so funny, because when Ray mentioned
that Life Magazine, I think I got the one that he was talking about, but
was just going through them, I can't find it,right? Because what I would
doislike, 1 go to thrit stores, 1 go to these different places, and T would
actually look for—they may have collections of ld Life magazines or
g tecaes 19
Newsweek magazines—so ook for those in that time period, because |
want to have things 1 could show people.
‘This is September 1970 around Angela Davis. [Ashanti holds a magazine
depicting Angela Davis and the title “The Making of a Fugitive” to the
screen.)
‘This is March 1965, Ho Chi Minh! [Ashanti holds a magazine depicting Ho
Chi Minh and the title “Behind the Peace Feelers” to the sereen.]
This is 1970, June 1970. [Ashanti holds a magazine depicting a dozen of
Palestinian “fedayeen” (guerrilla fighters) in uniform and formation and
the title “Palestinian Arabs: new pride and unity” to the sereen.]
How long these struggles have been going, for so long, and the reason 1 go
for them is because I want to at some point have a place where peaple—
some of the old Panther stuff that T have, too—so that people can
actually sce some things and maybe read some of the things from the
Panther paper, and I got more, 1 even got a Nation of Islam Muhammad
‘Speaks stuff. But you get to see what the articles were talking about, what
was the focus
But what Thad wanted to get back to around here, like the difference
between then and now. I do think fear, yes, is a big, big part. Because I
think that once they had captured a lot of us, what was put in place? Not
only more militarized police. But on a cultural level, television had
beaucoup cop shows, beaucoup cop shows millions and millions of people
would watch every week. Because in the cop shows the cops always got
the criminal, and in many instances the eriminals was folks like me and
Ray, right? People are getting convinced—like they captured us—don’t
you try to do the same thing, because we'll get you, t00. You cannot escape
us.Twent in 74, and when I got out at the end of 5, I'm living with my.
lawyer until he can work it out. My lawyer had a close relationship with a
ot of Black high school students in New Haven that had basketball skills,
and what he wanted to do was make sure, if they got scholarships, he
wanted to make sure they had the best scholarship. He would go in there
to help them, to make sure they wasn't getting screwed around and stuff
But one of the young high school students—you know, because he would
be around the legal office—and I just, out of curiosity, asked him, “What
do you know about the Black Panther Party?” And he asked me, “Was it a
B g thecages
‘martial arts group?”
Eric King: That's from your interview.
‘Ashanti Alston: .. which helped me to understand what our enemy does in
order to recoup, to recover from,that revolutionary period. We was on
the edge...
Eric King: So close.
‘Ashanti Alston: .of revolution. I eltlike in so many ways they know
what they're doing. On the miltarized level and on that culturallevel,
they was recouping. think the generations after that showed that, and
not to rule out also the influx of drugs into the community around this
same time, too. Because when many of us got out and saw the
proliferation of street organizations that was involved with this
‘murderous drug game, oh,this is way more than we know how to handle.
Way more. All these things are stll with us today. That's why I wanted to
get back to that, because we talking about today. There’ real,legitimate
reasons, but we still got to figure out how to confront the fear, because if
wwe don't, they continue. T don't want to hear all that talk about the emj
isonits last legs. 1 ge tired of that. People make predictions and all that
shit. No. And i it is, who's going to be the ones that’s going to really suffer
ifit really does. It's going to hit us on the bottom. We got to figure out how
1o till organize, fght this thing on multi-dimensional levels, because the
trauma...Justlike what the Palestiniansis going through now... The
trauma it’s intergenerational, and it's ongoing.
Ray Luc Levasseur: Can I just add one quick thing? People are more likely
tostep up into various kinds of activism around various issues—all of
which is needed, that's clear. Hasn't been that long since we saw these
huge Black Lives Matter demonstrations, right? A good example of what
P talking about how the system operates and what we need to do is Stop.
Cop City, al right. You're talking about intimidating people. 1f we—and
Ashanti knows this, because we've been doing this work for decades—if
we don't support the activists who are jailed and imprisoned, then we're
not worth shit, okay. Every movement that has succeeded in challenging
the system and making some advance are those movements and
revolutions that support, have supported their prisoners, the people that
get locked up. You make a sacrifice, you can lose your life, or you can be
g tecaes 3
imprisoned, or you can some suffer some other consequences, as I
‘mentioned earlier.
You're talking about the struggle in Palestine? They don't forget their
prisoners in Palestine, anybody that’s fallen in the struggle in Palestine,
and they never have, and they never will, and that’s part of what makes
their movement and spirit so strong. If you look at the Irish independence
struggle, same thing. If you go back to South Africa in the anti-apartheid
‘years. Nelson Mandela. There was a lot of others, whether it was ANC or
PAC. They didn't leave their prisoners behind. They kept support
networks going for them. They didn’t abandon them, It’s been a constant
struggle in this country to get recognition of political prisoners and
activists that get jailed and don’t let them get abandoned. What Cop City’s
trying to do is: you better abandon them or we're going to have your ass
to0.Tknow one of the Stop Cop City defendants here in Maine, and I can,
tell you that after talking with him in-depth a couple of times, he was
pretty well shell-shocked when he came out of the RICO indictments
against them. We have alittle-known case going on right now in Southern
New Hampshire, where three young women being charged with felonies
for what is nothing but a lttle bit of vandalism at an Elbit plant in
Southern New Hampshire, Elbit being a major military supplier of Isracl.
You can’tlet these people be forgotten. If people see that they get
absolutely no support when they step up and do something, they're g
tobe less likely to do something, It doesn’t mean that they don't sce the
issue and they don’t think something needs to be done, but they're
concerned about what happens if they do .
‘Eric King: That's a great point. Something that I think my generation of 30
1040 year-olds noticed was when the Green Scare happened, those people
got smashed. They got smashed with sentences that my generation did
not think still happened. I think that scared a lot of people away, when
you see the 15 to 30 year sentence range happen, like Marius Mason, and
Eric McDavid, and Jake Conroy, all those guys, all those people.
Iwant to switch base real quick and jump to what's happening right now
on college campuses that we're seeing, and that is college kids coming
together, doing encampments, and facing extreme police responses in
some cases. Here in Denver, my boss Z Williams and the co-director of our
legal firm, Claire, both were arrested just for being at an enempament,
just for showing up to support the students. 1 was wondering if ither of
B g thecages
‘you two had views or had opinions on the positive aspects of the
Palestinian movement, where we're lacking, or anything in between that
‘you would like to talk about.
‘Ashanti Alston: Well, one, Imma tel you T haven’t been this excited ina
long time, with the support that's been coming out for the Palestinian
people, you know, occupied Palestine. I think what has surprised me so
‘much about it s not only the protest but especially, 1l say, white Jews,
‘young Jews, but Tknow it's across the board, who are disconneeting
ionism from Judaism, breaking off that propaganda. Who would have
thought? I mean, who would have thought? You know, because the
zionism in the United States is really strong, That hold on consciousness
i really strong. And to see these young folks challenging that and older
folks, 00, it warms my heart, They re coming out. And thisis anti-war,
\when one says against genocide, its because of that war, that genocide
wwar on the Palestinian people. 1's at a great time. My fears is it's going to
be siphoned offinto this presidential election. Ifall these folks who are
against genocide and for the Palestinian people to be free, o be liberated,
docs that stop there? I think one of the things 1 felt during the anti-war
‘movement back in the day, was that once that war kind of concluded,
there was stillissues that we were fighting for: Black folks fighting for
liberation, Indigenous folks fighting for sovereignty, Pucrto Ricans
fighting for independence, you know, the Chicanos fighting for the
liberation of Aztlan, the workers are fighting, the women are fig
Doesit stop there? That's my concern, that what we're doing for
Palestine... We have our Palestine here, yes,in this empire that's on the
back of Turtle Island.
=
P really excited about one of the books 'm almaost finished with now is
‘Muhammad Abdow’s book Islam and Anarchy. Really great, really great
book. Really great. Who I've known for like 20 years, and I think he's been
working on this this book for 20 years, but he brings up some really
great... His starting point is 1492 Because of his experience in Egypt—he's
an African Anarchist from Egypt—so he's got the experience of the so-
called Arab Spring. He lived in Canada, so he has that experience of
developing deep relationship with the struggles there, particularly the
Indigenous struggles, and connected with struggles here as well. He's on
the ground. He's not really the academic only guy. He is really a
revolutionary. He's really an anarchist. The thing that he brings up that 1
think is key for folks now, not only those who are Jews, but those who are
g teages 25
immigrants here—a term he uses is settlers of color—are those
immigrants who come here looking for a better life, but they buy into
empire. I think one the things that can help this expression of massive
resistance now in the United States is that there’s got tobe a
consciousness that deepens around this is Turtle Island, and there’s still a
struggle going on here. There is Affican people who are brought here
enslaved.
If conseiousness is not there, then people will continue to fight for a better
America. Make America live up to its ideals and all of that bullshit.
Because when folks who come here do that, then you have to accept that
you're doing it on the backs of those original sins that empire has
committed and it continues. Empire is not just something that happened
in the past, continuing thing that just goes on. One of the ways
tobreak it is to develop a consciousness where you know, you learn how
‘madness, because Muhammad also talks about m
Tascism, and the micro-fascism is also those ways that we internalize our
oppression or we internalize the values of the empire. In our struggle to
. we have to also figure out how to get it out of us in our
daily interaction. He talks about the political and the ethical. That has
become very important for me, because I want us to avoid reproducing
different hierarchical systems, different systems. That is me. That is still
me. Alot of his work focuses on that, so that we know that it's just not
getting something external away, but realizing that it’s in us, t00.It's in
s, too. If we don't figure out how t0 do it in that multi-dimensional sense,
we could possibly win on one level, like many struggles have, but just end
up reproducing some other oppressive madness that's using
revolutionary rhetori
S0, Palestine s in us as well. We're Palestine here as well. And we got to
figure out how to get this madness off of us and into the dust bin of
history.
‘Eric King: Thank you. Thank you for sharing that. Ray, do you you have
any views on this?
‘Ray Luc Levasseur: Just briefly, yeah, I'm pumped about t, t00, about the
student movement that we've seen rise, and it's a really solid example of
international solidarity. 1 like the cross-pollination of it with—like Ashanti
‘mentioned—it's not just students, it’s, interestingly enough, tied into
B g thecages
Iabor, because in the California University system and some of the other
big university systems, a ot of those who have joined the campus
demonstrations are actually union members on campus, and then you got
community people also. I think that’s important, and of course it is
student leadership, and students have had a historic role in this country.
s, in terms of social change and challenging the
system. The future really is with youth. Nothing would please me more
than abunch of students asking Ashanti and 1 to politely step aside while.
they kept marching You know, as a much older activist, 1 don't believe
taking up space a younger activist should be taking up. 1¢’s a spark, and it
could be built on, and 'm hoping and cautiously optimistic that they will
continue to build on it. I's a training ground for the future. The last point
is that the seed is there, like in a lot of the Palestine work that's going on
now, for long-term solidarity. The long term. And, of course, just one part
of that is going to be BDS. We got to boycott, divest, sanction, just as it
wwas during the anti-apartheid movement. When I say they're building
something, that work those students are doing, it has a real potential to go
long-term and join with a lot of others for that kind of solidarity work
that’s got to be done once the killing stops as it's happening today.
and in other countr
Eric King: I'd like to take a second to rep Bread and Rose’s Legal Center,
and thank them for all the work they do supporting the Palestinian
protesters and the trans liberation struggle here in Denver.
Ray, you brought up BDS, the boycott, divestment, and sanction
‘movement, and that’s often something that T try advocating for to shut
down the prison system for the abolitionist cause. If we cut off the
financial head of the snake, the rest of it can be disintegrated into
community-based healing and those sort of tacties. Do cither of you two,
have have an opinion on what could be done to change or get rid of the
prison system in America?
Ray Luc Levasseur: Il tell you one step. This is a multistep thing, okay?
Abolish a system... O, that was a Freudian slip, I guess. I said “abolish the
system,” not prisons. Well, the fact is, if you want to get rid of this gulag as
it exists in the United States of America today, it requires system change.
Pm an ab £.10s an ideal of mine. But how do you do that? 've been
seeing a lot of problems and issues rising up among the prison abolition
jon thing. T actually was involved in a panel
iscussion around security abolition, which s get rid of the FBI and the
g teages 25
1A and all the rest of it. 1didn't initiate it. 1 was asked to speak at it But
you're not going to do that without smashing capitalism and uprooting
White supremacy. That is the number one issue. Think local and act global
Remember that. I've been involved in prison work, mass incarceration,
solitary confinement stuff for years in Maine, as a founder of the main
prison advocacy coalition before 1 left after eight years, because it got way
t00 reformist for me. Just alitle local project here in a place like Maine, in
Penobscot County here, Wabanaki land. Of course they're going to name a
aftera Native American right? Penobscot. They should put on the
ide on that that’s because disproportionately number of Native
Americans are inside that fucking jail. They want to double the size of that
jail. They want to build a new jail twice the size of the one they got now.
Five years ago they came up with a plan, an architectural plan, to do
exactly that. But they need the money, which requires a referendum, the
county voters got to vote on it. We tore that plan apart. 1 got involved in
this. T thought, one way or another, a year, either way it goes, new jail or
1o new jail. Every plan they put up we have stopped. Now we're in year
number five. The point is how can you do anything about the largest
prison system in the world or talk realistically about abolition ifyou
cannot stop this expansion of it,larger prisons, larger jails.
‘You want to see a generational thing? Just very quickly. Ashanti and Iboth
talk about Marion, one of the real shitholes in this gulag system. The
architect that built Marion prison back in 1963, I think it was, to replace
Aleatraz, is one of the architeets on the bid to double the size of this new
jail right here in my neighborhood. Over a half century later these
motherfuckers have been sucking all this money up. You know, what kind
of resume is that? But if you go on their website and look, they got all the
nonprofit industrial complex rhetoric down flat. They say they're going to.
ht? But the point is—and
probably nobody listening to this knows where Penobscot county is or the
‘s a small project, but
you take that, and you amplify and multiply it, what if every little town,
every small city, was able to do the same thing. We could make some
headway. I think that's just a practical step, that is almost a prerequisite
step, as part of moving towards abol
‘Eric King: Thank you. Ashanti, do you have a view on this?
‘Ashanti Alston: Yeah, well, I'm definitely an abolitionist. I have some
3 g thecages
Palestinian Arabs:
New Pride and Unity
BEHIND THE
PEACE
FEELERS
concerns, but I'm going to just tie it into this and not really get too deep
into it. Like many things, this system has the ability to co-opt, regurgitate,
and spit something else back out to us as ifit was their idea. I think that
has been happening, and I think other abolitionists who have been
developing this for years see the same thing, that this thing with abolition
is getting distorted and watered down to the point where you got many
people who will use the word abolition, they're abolitionist, you know,
“Defund the Police,” and all that other stuff. 'm not really that big on the
defund the police, because I think that doesn't show any understanding of
the role of the police. That they ain't gonna sit around and like, “Oh, you
‘gonna take our job from us? No, no, no. We're killers. We're shooters. We
control you. That's our job.” No. I think people can be kind of naive. I am
‘more for tying abolition into real grassroots organizing that people can
see the need to take back their lives. 1 like the initiative coming from the
People’s Senate...
Eric King: This is Jalil [Al-Amin]?
‘Ashanti Alston: That's Spirit of Mandela, which is putting forth a sort of
dual power possibilty of people developing the capacities to develop their
own power in opposition to the white supremacist capitalist powers that
be. I really ke Dhoruba Bin Wahad's idea that he's been pushing in terms
of developing a united front against fascism as we tried back in the days of
fascism think what s 50 key about that is that Dhoruba s very
analytical and pointed into the role of the technologies of political control.
He sces. He's trying to get people to see the role of the police in a much
broader picture that we need to get ready for that. would encourage
people to go to the Spirit of Mandela website. You can, if you put in united
front against fascism, put Dhoruba’s name in there, you'l sce where he
has the conversation with JillStein and Cornell West. Both have a united
front aspect, and both want to reach masses of people from different
communities from different perspectives. But to be clear about how we
need to focus on the role of the frontline forces who are going to always be
there to prevent us from developing this capacity to transform t
‘madness. So, ifit's there, then it'sless of a worry for me about, Is the
language going to be shifted offinto something else and becomes
‘meaningless again?” Can we stay focused on the need to bring this empi
down as even the best way to help stop the genocides that's going on in
Palestine and in Africa and other different places? But we don't eally talk
about the genocides in Africa as much, but those of us out of the Black
g teages 2
Liberation struggle, we do. But if we want a real good way, Il
Guevara would say, we're in the brain of this Empire.
‘Eric King: The belly!
Ashanti Alston: 1 say the brain. Let’s get that ancurism going, Bring this
thing down, so that the role that the United States Empire plays in world
oppressions can get disrupted, and to help other people to develop the
spaces in other countries and other struggles o free themselves. I'm more
concerned with the abolitionist rhetoric today and with a lot of people
that are coming to the fore. There’s no deep class analysis, there’s no deep
race analysis, there’s no idea of a settler colonial situation here. Without
them things, then you really talking about, “Oh, I want to make America
live up to ts ideals.” 1 don’t want to make America live up o its ideals,
because this is the ideal, regardless of its rhetoric. What we see now is the
best that it can do and the best that it wants to do. We deserve beter.
‘Eric King: This is going to be our last question here. Ray and Ashanti, if
either of you two have any projects you're working on that you want to
talk about, anything you just want to get off your chest or just get out
there, Lask you to please take this time to do that now.
Ashanti Alston: The work of Jericho. s political prisoners, yall. T mean,
seally. We got to be there. We got to be there for them folks that take them
chances, take them risks. Like Tortuguita in the Stop Cop City thing in
Atlanta, Was he expecting to die on that day? No. Was all those people
expecting to get arrested under new versions of RICO? No. And Ma
Luther Kingr, how many times was he arrested? We have to be mre real
about that. The other thing that I want to say is, 'm an anarchist. All of
you folks out there who are anarchists, feel we got alot to offer, and I el
Jike, man, we need to start talking more and being able to have more of a
0 shaping these struggles a they unfold. 'm asking
Yl let’s figure out how to make that happen.
‘Eric King: Thank you! Ray?
‘Ray Luc Levasseur: I definitely would encourage people to look into Spirit
of Mandela, People’s Senate. There is some conversations going on about
building a united front against faseism. 1’s another thing I see around the
Palestine work a lot of potential to bring a lot of different groups and
o g thecages
people together, and in addition to long-term solidarity work I think this
could generate new ideas on which way forward, especially when you get
alot of young people involved. I stopped trying to deliver a hardline party
line awhile back, so I want to leave you with a litle parable. Very short.
Dve got much longer ones, but Tl spare you. I've lived and operate
huge cities for a long time, but most of us aren’t in New York City or LA
and Chicago, 5o 1 kind of gear what I say a lot of times to the people that
live in less populated areas. There are many of us in small towns, suburbs,
small cties. Providence is not oo bigif remember. Right, Ashan
‘Ashanti Alston: Not to0 big
Ray Luc Levasseur: Speaking with people, they raise a lot of issues about,
you know, you can say “united front against fascism.” Sounds good, but
how do we get from here to there? You can identify the problem fairly
easily—smash capitalism, imperialism, and white supremacy—and you're
offin the right direction. But how do you get there? So, without coming
down with a party line, I don't represent a particular sectarian party.
Coming from a working background, I made my living as a carpenter—as a
lot of things—but up until got old and retired, 1 made my livingas a
carpenter. Not a hugely skilled carpenter, I'm a frame carpenter. But that
‘means I can build it from bottom o top. When a dude hired me on the job,
Iwas trying to get any kind of job I could, because I was on parole and T
needed a job, I needed money. I said, “Well, Pll be a carpenter’s helper,”
because I didn’t have any skill at ll, you know. “Lug this, lug that, Tl give
you good day’s work.” And he says, “We don't want no carpenter’s helper.
Everybody is a carpenter with just different skill levels.” And he gave me
some advice that I've extrapolated to use in political organizing and
advoeacy. He says, “How many people can just go out there and build a
house? It would be overwhelming for the average person. You gonna build
ahouse? No, you get somebody that’s a carpenter or a contractor to do
He says, “Don’t try to build a house until you've built a shed first.” live in
the country, I've built quite a few sheds among other things, right? So,
unskilled as I was, before 1 developed those skills, 1 built a shed, because to
build a shed requires the same basic principles and blueprint as building a
house. The basic framing, the walls, the floor, the stairs, put a window in, a
door in, a roof, a gable roof, shingles. It's an oversimplification, I
understand, but you will learn the basics of how to build what they call
the “good bones” of a house. When you look at an old house, if you look at
it, you look what kind of bones it’s got. So, take that and put it into.
g tecaes 31
community organizing terms. Don't be overwhelmed. We're going to build
aunited front against fascism. You want to deal with white supremacy?
‘You want to deal with Palestine? Whatever. Start with what you've got to
work with. Build a shed first. Get a program going. Get a few people
together. Get things started. I first got a taste of that because 1 was
group, SCAR, that patented ourselves to a degree after the Black Panther
Party, although we were predominantly white, but we took seriously the
survival programs that the Panthers did. You have to start smaller to get
peaple involved in working on their own to see what it takes to get toa
higher level, survival pending revolution, without giving up your politics.
‘That's my parting suggestion for the day.
‘Ashanti Alston: That's old man wisdom, right there.
‘Eric King: Like anyone that talks to me on social media, what I always
leave people with is, “Please write a prisoner.” Please write a prisoner.
Whether they're a political prisoner, a social prisoner, whether they're in
the lower custody level or the highest custody level, please write someone
inside. Please start a project with those inside. See what you can do to help
them and help make their time and their comrades’ time inside better.
‘Ashanti, brother, I thank you so much. Ray, thank you so much. It was a.
real honor talking to both of you.
‘Ashanti Alston: Thank you, Eric
Ray Luc Levasseur: Thank you, Libertie.
‘Ashanti Alston: Free allpolitical prisoners
‘Erie King: Al of them.
Ray Luc Levasseur: And Free Palestine!
‘Libertie Valance: Thanks y'all. This has been an incredible conversation. If
you haven'talready picked up a copy of Rattling the Cages, definitely
want to encourage you to grab that from your local radical bookstore or
diret from the publisher at AK Press or from Firestorm if you don't have.
local. Also want to appreciate Josh Davidson for helping to make this
series possible. Ray, Ashanti, thank you so much,
S g thecages
‘Ashanti Alston: And Eric, you know, we proud of you, man. We proud of
Ray Luc Levasseur: Good to see you out.
g tecages 55
‘People, laces, Events, & Organizations
‘Safiya Bukhari — Safiya had a long history of revolutionary struggle. While in
college, Safiya began volunteering with the Black Panther Party (BPP) Free
Breakfast program. n 1969, she witnessed an officer harassing a Panther who
was slling papers in Times Square and was arrested when she told the officer
the Panther had a right to disseminate politicallterature. These incidents led
her to join the BPP. She worked out of the Party’s Harlem office, becoming in
charge of Information and Communications for the East Coast Panthers. After
being subpoenaed to testify about the Black Liberation Army (BLA) in April 1973,
she went underground with the BLA (0 avoid testifying. On January 25, 1975,
Saffya was captured after s shooting in VA that left a fellow BLA member dead
and another injured. Even though she had alicense (o open carry in public she.
was charged with illegal possession of a weapon, felony murder, and attempted
robbery, and was sentenced to 40 years. Safiya escaped from prison on New
Year's Eve 1976, after one month o frequent hemorrhaging for which she was
fot allowed to see s doctor, but was captured two months later. While
imprisoned, Bukhari and fellow inmates founded a program called Mothers
Inside Loving Kids (MILK) to prevent the separation of children from
incarcerated mothers. Ater releasing on parole in 1953, Safiya immediately
threw herself into politcal prisoners support work. Safiva founded the Fre
Aumia Abu-Jamal Coalition in NYC in 1992, and by 1998 she, along with others,
founded the Jericho Movement to free ll politial prisoners. Safiya was also the
vice president of the Republic of New Afrika. Safiya passed away on August 24,
Erica Huggins — While in university, both Ericka and her husband John Huggins
were inspired to leave school and oin the Black Panther Party. Her motivation
came from a Ramparts magazine article she read that discussed the crucl
treatment of Huey P. Newton while incarcerated. A picture n the article
depicted Newton shirtless, with a bullet wound in his stomach, strapped to a
hospital gurney. In 1967, the couple arrived in Los Angeles and joined the Black
Panther Party. Eventually, her husband John Huggins, became leader of the Los.
‘Angeles Chapter of the Black Panther Party. While she was at home with her
three week old daughter, John was assassinated on January 17, 196, on the
UCLA campus along with Panther Bunchy Carter by COINTELPRO infiltrators.
Following Joh's funeral, she moved to his birthplace to open up a new Black
Panther Paty branch. She led this new chaptes along two other women,
Kathleen Neal Cleaver and Elaine Brown. While involved with the Black
Panthers, Huggins held several positions: both an editor and writer for the Black
Panther Intercommunal News Service,dircetor of the party’s Oakland
Community School, and a member of the party’s Central Committee. After being
released from prison and all charges being requited, Insights and Poems, s book
of poetry, co-written by Huggins and Huey P. Newton, founder of the Black
Panther Party, was released in 1975
S g thecages
Bobby Seal — Bobby was a co-founder of the Black Panther Pasty with Huey .
Newton. While working at the North Oakland Neighborhood Anti-Poverty
Center, Bobby met Bobby Hutton, who later became the first recruited member
of the Black Panther Party. Strongly inspired by the teachings of Malcolm X,
who had been assassinated in 1965, Bobby and Huey joined together in October
1966 to reate the Black Panther Party for Sell-Defense, which adopted the late
activist’s slogan “Freedom by any means necessary.” Bobby and Huey together
werote the doctrines “What We Want Now!” “the practical, specific things we
ned and that should exist” and “What We Believe,
philosophical principles of the Black Panther Party, which were part of the
party’s Ten-Point Program. Bobby was one of the original “Chicago Eight”
defendants charged with conspiracy and inciting a iot in the wake of the 1968
Democratic National Convention in Chicago. While in prison, Bobby said, “To be:
a Revolutionary is o be an Enemy of the sate. To be arrested for this struggle is
tobe a Political Prisone.” Though he was never convicted in the case, on
November 5, 1969, Judge Hoffman scntenced Bobby to four years in prison for 16
counts of contempt. While serving his four-year sentence, Bobby was tried in
1970 as part of the New Haven Black Panther trials. In 1968, Bobby wrote Seize
the Time: The Story of the Black Panther Party and Huey P. Newton.
which outlines the
George Jackson — George was a revolutionary prisoner and Minister of Defense
for the Black Panther Party. During his first years at San Quentin State Prison,
where he was imprisoned at age 20 for stealing $70 from a gas station on a
sentence of one year to lie, George became involved i revolutionary activity,
after becoming acquainted with the works of Marx, Lenin, Mao, and Fanon. On
January 17,1970, prison officer shot and killed three Black prisoners during a
set-up fight with members of the Aryan Brotherhood. Following their
assassinations,thirteen black prisoners began a hunger strike in the hopes of
sccuring an investigation. A grand jury was convened three days later that
exonerated the prison guard after permiting no black prisoners to testify.
Thirty minutes after the grand jury decision, another prison guard was thrown
offa cell-block tr to his death, and George Jackson, Fleeta Drumgo, and John
Clutehette—who came to be known as the Soledad Brothers —were indicted.
Many revolutionaries would join the Soledad Brothers Defense Committee,
such as Angela Davis who would become the leader of the committee and friend
t0 George, who sent her the book Soledad Brother: The Prison Letters of George
Jackson. On August 7, 1970, George Jackson's 17-year-old brother Jonathan
Jackson burst into a Marin County courtroom with an sutomatic weapon, freed.
prisoners three prisoners,including Ruchell Magee, and took s judge, district
attorney, and three jurors hostage to demand the release of the Soledad
Brothers. Police killed Jonathan, the judge, and wounded three others in the.
ensuing chase. On August 21,1972, George puled a 9 mm pistol from beneath o
wig and said: “Gentlemen, the dragon has come,” quoting Vietnamese
revolutionary Ho Chi Minh, and ordered prisoners’ clls opened, escaped to the
vard,and was murdered by guard from a guard tower. George finished writing
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the book Blood in My Eye, which was published in 1972 just days before his
escape and death. Blood in My Eye is a masterpicce of urban guersilla theory,
political cconomy, and theories of armed Black liberation.
Kamau Sadiki — A former member of the Black Liberation Army (BLA), who is
currently serving a life sentence for the killing of an Atlanta police offcer in 1971
With the US counter-insurgency program COINTELPRO that attempted to
neutralize and destroy revolutionary organizations like the Black Panther Party,
many members [el they had no choice but to go underground or risk
imprisonment and death, which Sadiki id in 1971 In 1973 he was captured as
part ofa federal stakeout for a bank expropriation and was tried with his co-
defendant Assata Shakur—which ended frstin a mistrial and after s second trial
with a jury acquittal. 1n 1973, he was ried in another bank expropriation, found
guilty, and sentenced to s years in prison. During these trials, Assata was
pregnant with child she shared with Sadiki. She would later escape to Cuba.
Sadiki's case was part ofa renewed campaign during the carly 2000s to target
former revolutionaries [rom the 19605 and 70s. Sadiki has claimed his innocence,
stating that the government refused to allow testimony that would exonerate
him and used his case as a way 1o pressure Sadiki to help in capturing Assata
Sadiki was convicted and sentenced in 2003, His health continues to deteriorate:
torthis day
freckamav.com
‘and support for his liberation is crucial. More information:
National Jericho Movement — Jericho is a movement with the defined goal of
gaining recognition of the fact that politica prisoners and prisomers of war exist
inside of the United States,despite the United States” government's continued
denial, and winning amnesty and freedom for these political prisoners. The
Jericho Movement grew out of a call for a national march on the White House
uring the Spring of 1998 by political prisoner Jalil Muntagim The call was made
in October of 1996 through the Provisional Government-Republic of New Afrika
and the New Afrikan Liberation Front, but the organizers decided to use this
opportunity to jumpstart a much needed movement to build a national support
organization for political prisoners in general. More information:
wwwthejerichomovement com
IRA — The Irish Republic Army was a revolutionary organization that fought a
guerrilla war against Briish settler-colonialism from 1919 t0 1921, The IRA was.
descended from the Irish Volunteers, founded in 1913, who staged the Easter
Rising in 1936, which simed at ending British rule in Ireland, rebellion that was
bratally suppressed. Following treaty with the British in 1921 that ended the
war ofindependence, a split oceurred within the IRA betsveen members who
supported the treaty (Irish National Army), and the majority apposed to the
treaty (IRA), who fought a civil war against the Free State Army in 1922-192,
with the intention of ereating a fully independent all-lreland republic. In the
decades following the defeat of the IRA, various guerrilla organizations would
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contine to struggle for independence, such as the eruption of guerilla warfare
duing the so-called Troubles from the late 60's to the late 90's. Captured
‘members of the IRA and Irish republican political prisoners waged fierce battles
for recognition as political prisoners against the British government,such as the.
1981 hunger strike which left Bobby Sands and 9 other prisoners dead from
‘Hukbalahap rebellion — The communist Huk Resistance led a 12 year guerrilla
campaign against Japanese and American colonialism from 1942 10 1954 n the
Phillippines. Ater the guerrillas iberated the Phillippines from the Japanese,
the US-supported government disarmed and arrested the Huks for their
attempts to continue s peasant’s revolution, who would retreat again into the
‘mountains to continue the struggle as the People’s Liberation Army. The
Communist Party of the Philippines and the New People’s Army, the inheritors
of the Huks, have been waging a guerrill war against the Phillippines state and
American support since 1965.
‘Sundiata Acoli — & New York Black Panther, he endured two years of prison
‘awaiting trial for the Panther 21 Conspiracy Case. He and his comrades were
eventually acquitted on all the bogus charges. The case was historic and a classic
example of police and government attempting to neutralize organizations by
incarcerating their leadership. As result of this political attack and because of
the immense pressure and surveillance from the FBLand local police Sundiata,
like many other Panther leaders went *underground” with the Black Liberation
Army. On May 2,197, Sundiata Acoli, Assata Shakur and Zayd Shakur were
‘ambushed and attacked by state troopers on the New Jersey Turnpike. Assata
wvas wounded and Zayd was killed. During the gun battle a state troaper was
shot and killedin self defense. Sundiata was tried in an environment of mass
hysteria and convicted, lthouigh there was no credible evidence that he killed
the troaper or had been invalved in the shooting Sundiata was sentenced to lfe
in prison and was finally granted parole in May 2022 at the age of 5. More
information: sundiataacoliorg,
Rafael Cancel Miranda — A Puerto Rican independentista, revolutionary, and
poet. Rafal, long with Lolita Lebrén, Andsés Figueroa Cordero, and lrvin Flores
Rodriguez, atacked the House of Representatives in 1954, Rafael joined pro-
independence political groups as youth, after his family survived the Ponce
‘massacre, when police opened fire on a march commemorating the abolition of
slavery in Puerto Rico. Rafael was later sentenced to two years in prison for
refusing the draft, and upon release self-exiled to Cuba, where he stayed until
the Batista coup and was expelled. In New York, he met other Puerto Rican
independentistas and became involved in the attack on the House, o
continuation of the pro-independence uprisings that began in 1950 in Pucrto
Rico. Rafael received a prison sentence of 55 years, which was commuted in 1979,
after 25 years. Aer his commutation, Rafael authored nine books and remained
g teags 7
active in the struggle for Puerto Rican independence. Rafael passed away in San
Juan, Puerto Rico on March 2, 2020.
Herman Bell - A former member of both the Black Panther Party and the Black
Liberation Army, and he was imprisoned for forty-five years. Herman was
captured in New Orleans in 1975, and eventually he, alil Muntagim, and Albert
Nuh Washington were convicted of attacks on police. Herman was also
implicated in the San Francisco 8 case and pleaded guily to a lesser offense. He
spent five years imprisoned in the federal system, in the Marion control unit for
two ofthose years, before spending decades in various New York State
maximum secarity prisons. While imprisoned he was committed to community
work,and he is founding member of the Victory Gardens Project and the
Certain Days Collective. He was released in 2018, after his cighth parole hearing.
Leonard Peltier — A Native American political prisoner serving two consecutive
life sentences for crime he was set up for —the killing of two Bl agents. In the
carly 70's, Native Americans on the Pine Ridge Reservation were assaulted and
murdered by a group of vigilantes and looked towards the American Indian
Movement (AIM) for help. Hundseds of AIM members oceupied the village of
Wounded Knee in Pine Ridge in 1973, demanding an end to the US-backed
murder and intimidation of AIM supporters on the reservation and that the
treaties signed by the US be honored that gave the Lakota people the right to
selfule the land surrounding the Black Hills. Federal suthorities surrounded
the accupation with an army of over 300. The Indians refused to back down.
‘They used weapons to defend themselves and held off the government forces for
72 days. Aer the siege, Leonard came to Pine Ridge with a few other AIM
members in 1975 and set up camp in the village of Oglala to protect the village
from vigilantes. O July 26, 1975 two FBI sgents drove into the property
unannounced and unidentified, and a frefight erupted, leaving the two FBI
agents and one AIM member dead, while scores of FBI agents and US Marshals
surrounded the property. It's believed that the attack against the AIM activists
was an attempt to create a diversion for a secret agreement 1o transfer parts of
the Pine Ridge Reservation to the federal government. With fabricated evidence
and preventing Leonard from claiming sell-defense, Leonard was convicted to
two life sentences in federal prison. The struggle for Leonard's reedom s not
aver. More information: whoislconardpeltierinfo
Bill Dunne — Billis an anti-authoritarian sentenced (0.90 years for the
attempted liberation of comrades from Seattle’s King County Jailin 1975 and for
attempting to break himeelf out of Leavenworth Penitentiary in 1085, Bill was
charged with possession of an automatic weapon, auto theft, and aiding &
abeting the escape. Charges further alleged the operation was financed by bank.
expropriations and facilitated by illegal acquisition of weapons and explosives.
Bill and his codefendant, Larey Giddings, were aceused by police of being.
members of asmal, heavily armed group of revolutionaries,” ssociated with
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the anascho-communist Wellspring Communion. Dunne has made the rounds of
the federal prison system-—including a stint ot the infamous Control Unit in
Marion, linois, where he assisted prisoners with political & academic
education. Bill also organizes solidarity runs in conjunction with the Anarchist
Black Cross Federation's Running Down the Walls and has edited & written for 4
Struggle magazine. Billalso helped run the newsletter “Prison News Service”
from Marion, which was incorporated into the Toronto anarchist prisoner
support magazine Bulldozer.
880C — The Southern Student Organizing Committee (SSOC) was a student
activist groupin the southern Usited States during the 19608, which focused on
many political and social issues including: Black liberation, opposition to the.
Vietnam War, workers' rights, und feminism. t was intended, in part to be
Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) for Southerners and Student
Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) for white students-—at a time when,
it was dungerous for SDS 10 attempt to organize in the Deep South and when
SNCC was starting to discuss expelling white volunteers.
Prison Legal News — Prison Legal News (PLN) is a monthly American magazine
and online periodical published since May 1990, the longest running newspaper
produsced by and for current and former prisoners in U.S. history. It was started
by revolutionary £ Mead, political prisoner imprisoned for his activities with
the George Jackson Brigade, and extremely successful jailhouse lawyer. PLN has.
been nvolved in litigation concerning First Amendment and censorship issues
in the prison and jail context since 1994, Co-editor Ed Mead was prevented from
asisting in publishing Prison Legal News due to 8 condition of his parole.
prohibiting association with other felons —a policy specifically enacted to
prevent him from further involvement with PLY.
Ann Hensen — Ann Hansen stood trial as one of the Squarnish Five, merbers of
‘a radical Canadian anarchist group known as Direct Action who sabotaged
government and corporate property in the 1980s. The group carried out militant
actions which included an attack on a BC Hydro substation on Vancouver sland
‘and the Litton Industries bombing in Taronto, which was preparing to build
components for US cruise missiles —the explosion played a part in Litton losing,
the contract, Ann was handed a ife sentence but was released from Canada’s
infamous Prison for Women (P4W) after ncasly e
vears in prison and on parole and has returned to prison twice for parole
Violations. Now on the outside, An tirelessly continues her abolitionist cfforts
‘and continues (o inspire younger generations. She has published two books,
Direct Action: Memoirs ofan Urban Guerrilla (2002) and Taking the Rap: Women
‘Doing Time for Society’s Crimes (2015).
ght years. She spent over thirty
Osear Lépez Rivera — A Pucrto Rican revolutionary who was a member and
suspected leader of the Fuerzas Armadas de Liberacion Nacional Puertorriqueda
g teags
(FALN), a clandestine guersilla organization devoted (o Puerto Rican
independence that carried out more than 130 bomb attacks in the United States
between 1974 and 1952, Osear Rivera declared himself prisoner of war and
refused to take partin most of his tial He maintained that according to
internationallaw he was an anticolonial combatant and could not be prosecuted
by the United States government. Sentenced to 55 years in federal prison, Oscar
was ot dircetly linked to any specific bombings, and released in May 2017,
having served 16 years in prison, longer than any other member of the FALN.
US. President Bill Clinton offered him and 1 other convicted FALN members
conditional lemency in 1999, which Oscar rejected the offer on the grounds that
not allincarcerated FALN members received pardons. Oscar Lpez Rivera, Entre
la'Tortura yla Resistencia, a collection of his letters was released in 2011
Tom Manning — A member of the United Freedom Front and the Sam Melville
Jonathan Jackson Unit who spent over twenty years i prison. The group known,
s the Ohio 7Ray Luc Levasseur, Patricia Gros Levasseur, Barbara Curzi-
Lsaman, Carol Saucier Manning, Tom Manning, Jaan Laaman and Richard
Williams—were working-class revolutionarics charged with sctions against US.
military fuc enters, and corporate headquarters. These
actions were done in slidarity with the people of South Africa and Central
America, who were bearing the brunt of US imperialism. Tom contributed
revolutionary ast to Hauling Up the Morning, collection of witings, poetsy,
and art by politieal prisoners organized by Ray Lue Levasseur and Tim Blunk
“Tom passed away in prison in July 2015
Marilyn Buck — An anti-imperialist revolutionary who was imprisoned for her
participation in the 1979 prison escape of Assata Shakur, the 1981 Brinks
robbery, and the 1982 US Senate bombing, Marilyn joined Students for o
Demoeratic Society (SDS) during the height of activism against the Vietnam war
whille at the University of Texas. In 1967 she moved to Chicago where she edited
the SDS newsletter New Lelt Notes, and incorporated Marxist feminism into the.
organization's polities.In San Francisco, she worked with Third World Newsreel,
amedia collective that showcased anti-imperialist and anti-colonialis struggles
around the world. Convicted for purchasing ammunition for the Black
Liberation Army in 1973, she was sentenced 1010 years in prison, furloughed in
1977, and went underground instead of returning to prison. After her capture
and convictions in 1965, she was sentenced 1o 80 years in federal prison, where
she wrote on women in prison, soltary confinement, political prisoner support,
and revolutionary poetry. Masilyn passed away on August 3, 2010.
Mutulu Shakur — A Black Liberation Army political prisones who was sentenced
0160 years in prison for his involvement i the Brinks robbery. Dr. Shakur was
active as a teen in the Revolutionary Action Movement (RAM), Black
Nationalist group that struggled for Black self-determination and socialist
change in America. Dr. Shakur lso worked very closely with the Black Panther
o g hecages
Party, supporting Lumumba and Zayd Shakur. He was a member of the
Provisional Government of the Republic of New Afriks, which endorsed the
founding of an independent New Afrikan (Black) Republic and the establishment
ofan independent Black state in the southern US. In the 70's Dr. Shakur worked.
with the Lincol Detox program, which offered drug rehabilitation for heroin
addiction using acupuncture. Dr. Shakur was one of several Black Liberation
Army members to carry out the October 1981 Brinks robbery, aided by the May
15 Communist Organization and former members of the Weather Underground.
In June 2022, it was revealed that Dr. Shakur had terminal bone marrow cancer
with “six months tolive.” Dr. Shakur passed away from the disease on July 7,
2023, at age 72, about eight months after being paroled.
Black August — An annual commemoration and prison-based holiday to
remember Black political prisoners, Black freedorm struggles in the United
States and beyond, and to highlight Black resistance against racial, colonial and
imperilist oppression. I takes place during the entire calendar month of
August. Black August was initiated by the Black Guerilla Family in San Quentin
State Prison in 1979 when a group of incascerated people came together to
commemorate the deaths of brothers Jonathan P. ackson (d. August 7, 1970) and.
George Jackson (d. August 21, 1971) at San Quentin State Prison. Observers of
Black August commit to higher levels of discipline throughout the month, This
can include fusting from food and drink, frequent physical exercise and political
study, and engagement in political struggle.
Kwame Ture (Stokely Carmichael) — A Black revolutionary who played a major
role in the Black liberation movement in the United States and the global pan-
African movement. He was a key leader in the development of the Black Power
movement, first while leading the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Commitice
(SNCC), then as the “Honorary Prime Minister” of the Black Panther Party,and
lastana leader of the All-Mrican People’s Revolutionary Party (A-APRP). Kivame
was one of the orginal SNCC freedom riders of 1961, and a major voting rights
activist in Mississippi and Alabama after being menored by Ella Baker and Bob
Moses, but became disillusioned with the two-party system after the 1961
Democratic National Convention filed to recogaize the Mississippi Freedom
Democratc Party. SNCC conducted ts first actions against the miliary drafl
‘and the Vietnam War under Kwame's eadership. He popularized the oft-
repeated anti-dralt slogan “Hell o, we won't gol” during this time. Kyvame
privately took eredit for pushing Martin Luther King toward anti-imperialism.
‘During this period, he raveled and lectured extensively throughout the world,
visting Guinea, North Vietnam, China, and Cuba. He became more clearl
identified with the Black Panther Party asits “Honorary Prime Minister.”
Kwame remained in Guinea after his separation from the Black Panther Party
He continued o travel, write, and speak in support ofinternational letst
‘movements. n 1971 he published his collected essays n a second book, Stokely
Speaks: Black Power Back to Pan--Africanism. This book expounds an explicitly
g tecages 1
socialist Pan-African vision, which he retained for the rest of his life. For the
final 20 years of his lfe, Kwame was devoted to the All-African People’s
Revolutionary Party (-APRP). His mentor Kwame Nkrumah had many ideas for
unilfying the African continent, and Kwame extended the scape of these ideas to
the entire African diaspora. He was a Central Committee member during his
association with the A-APRP and made many specches on the party's behalt
Kwame passed avay in Guinea in 1995,
Jamil Al-Amin — Formesly known as H. Rap Brown, the lmam came (0
prominence in the 19603 as chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating
Committec and the Justice Minister of the Black Panther Pasty. He i perhaps
most famous for his proclamation during that period that *vielence is as
American as cherry pie,” as well as once stating that "If America don't come
around, we're gonna burn it down.” In 1968, Jamil went underground after facing
weapons and incitement to ot charges following a raly that occurred in
Cambridge, Maryland which left Jamil with a shotgun wound to the head. After
38 months in hiding and on the FBI's Most Wanted list, Jamil resurfoced in an
attack of a New York City bar which was targeted forits exploitation of the
community. This action resulted in a shootout with police that eft Jamil and two.
cops with injuies. Jamil subscquently spent 5 years in prison for charges related
tothe incident. Upon his release, Jamil apened a grocery store in Atlanta, which
he maintained until 2000 when he was arrested for the murder of a Fulton
County cop. Later that year, another man confessed t0 the shooting. In 2002
Jamil, was convicted and sentenced to lfe without parol
whathappenedzrap.com
More information:
Maleolm X — A Black revolutionary and Nation of slam spokesman. During the
Civil Rights Movement, Malcolm X advocated for freedom "by any means
sary.” Alter leaving the Nation of Islam, Malcolm traveled to Africa and
West Asia, meeting with revolutionary Pan-Alrican socialis leaders such s
Kwwame Nkrumah, Ben Bella, Gamal Abdel Nasser, and others. Before his
assassination, Malcolm converted to Sunni slam, and after completing the Hajj
to Mecea he became known as "el-Hajj Malik el
with the communist Revolutionary Action Movement (RAMD and advocated
revolutionary Black internationalism, before he was assassinated on February
habuzz.” Malcolm connected
Frantz Fanon — A revolutionary political philosopher, and Marsist from the
French colony of Martinique. His works have become influential in the fields of
post-colonial studies,crtical theory, and Marxism. As well s being an
intellectual, Fanon was s political adical, Pan-Africanist, und Marxist concerned
with the psychopathology of colonization and the human, social, and cultural
consequences of decolonization. In the course of his work as a physician and
paychiatrist, Fanon supported the Algerian War of independence from France
‘and swas o member of the Algerian National Liberation Front. With his health
S g thecages
declining, Fanon's comrades urged him to seck treatment in the US as his Soviet
doctors had suggested. The CIA likely had a role n his death of peumonia. His
works Black Skin, White Masks, A Dying Colonialism, and The Wretched of the
Earth are still ead to this day by revolutionaries around the world.
Nat Turner — Led the Southampton Insurrection, a slave rebellion in Vieginia, in
August 1891, Nat Turner was enslaved in Southampton County, Virginia in the
carly 19th century. He thousght that revolutionary violence was necessary for
liberation. On an annular solar eclipse on February 12, 161, Nat Turner
envisioned this as a Black man's hand reaching over the sun and started the
rebellion a week later, o August 21 The rebelion expanded from several
trusted slaves to over 70 enslaved and free Blacks, some of whom were on
horsebuack, armed with knives, hatchets, and blunt instruments. The state
‘milita suppressed the rebellion at Belmont Plantation on the moring of August
20, The rebels kiled betwveen 55 and 65 White people before being defeated by
the militi, making it the deadliest slave revolt in U.. history. The miliia had
twice the manpower of the rebels and three companies of artllery. Nat Turner
wvas not captured and survived in hiding for more than 50 days afterward. To
this day Nat Turner is recognized as a resistance hero for avenging the suffering.
of Africans and African Americans
John Brown — A prominent leader in the American bolitionist movement in the.
decades preceding the Civil War. First reaching national prominence in the
15503 for his radical abolitionism and fighting in Blecding Kansas, Brown was
captured, tried, and executed by the Commonsvealth of Virginia for a raid and
incitement ofu slave rebellion at Harpers Ferry in 185 John Brown first gained
national attention when he led anti-slavery voluntcers and his sons during the
Bleeding Kansas criss of the late 18508, a state-level civil war over whether
Kansas would enter the Union s a slave state or free state. He was dissatisfied
with abolitionist pacifism, saying of pacifists,
need s action - action!” In May 1856, John Brown and his sons kiled five
supporters of slavery in the Pottawatomie massacre, and then commanded ani.
slavery forces at the Battle of Black Jack and the Battle of Osawatomie. In
Octaber 1859, Brown led a raid on the federal armory at Harpers Fesry, Virginia,
intending to start a slave liberation movement that would spread south. He
scized the armaory, but seven people were killed and ten or more were injured.
John Brown was captured, tried and charged with treason, and exccuted, being
the first person executed for treason against in the US. John Brown was inspired
by the Haitian revolution, slave rebellions in the Carribean, and maraon
colonies of escaped slaves during the Seminole Wars.
“These men are all talk. What we
Eldridge Cleaver — An casly leader of the Black Panther Pasty, having the tides
in the Party as Minister of Information and Head of the Internationsl Section of
the Panthers, while a fugitive in Cuba and Algeria. After releasing from prison in
1966, Eldridge joined the Oukland-based BPP, serving as Minister of
g tecages 45
Information, or spokesperson. Afler Martin Luther King was assassinated,
Eldridge and 14 other Panthers were involved in a confrontation with Oakland
police. Cleaver was wounded during the ambush and 17-year-old Black Panthers
member Bobby Hutton was killed. Charged with attempted murder after the
incident, Eldridge jumped bail to flee to Cuba n late 1965, Eldridge then went
with his wife Kathleen Cleaver to Algeria, where they helped to set up a local
headquarters that would soon welcome Donald Cox, Sekou Odings, and Larry
Mack, s the Black Panther Party would embrace internationsl revolutionary
struggles, Black and Arab alike. Multiple American radicals hijacked planes to
Algeria for safety with the BPP office. After split with Huey P Newton over the
role of armed struggle in the BPP, Cleaver would eventually be expelled from
the BPP.
Che Guevara — An Argentine Marxist revolutionary, physician, author, guerrilla
leader, diplomat, military thearist, and leader in the Cuban revolution. Che
interspersed his college training in medicine with motoreyele travels around
South America,including Guatemala during the 1954 CIA-sponsored coup,
where his close contact with exploitation would solidify his communist beliefs
in armed struggle and revolution. Che met Rail and Fidel Castro while exiled in
Mexico City, joined their 26th of uly Movement, and sailed to Cuba sboard the
‘yacht Granma with the intention of averthrowing US-backed dictator Fulgencio.
Batista.Che became an integral part of the rebel army and was appointed to
second in command during the guerrilla war of beration to defeat the US-
supported Batista regime. After the revolution, Che was involved with
revolutionary tribunals, instituting agrarian land reform as minister of
industries, helping spearhead a successful nationwide literacy campaign,
serving as both president of the National Bank and instructional director for
Cubas armed forces, and traversing the globe as a diplomat on behalf of Cuban
socialism. He composed a seminal guerrilla warfare manual, numerous diaries,
and theories of imperialism and colonialism. Che lft Cuba n 1965 to foment
continental revolutions across both Africa and South America, first in the Congo,
and later in Bolivia, where he was captured by CIA-assisted Bolivian forces and
summarily exeeuted.
‘Angela Davis — An American Marist and feminist political activist,
philosopher, acadeic, and suthor. A longtime member of the Communist Party
USA (CPUSA), she was also affliated with the Los Angeles chapter of the Black
Panther Party, while a philosophy professor at UCLA. A leader in the Soledad
Brothers Defense Committee, after Jonathan Jackson attempted to liberate the
Soledad Brothers through an attack on the Marin County Civic Center in 1970,
an arrest warrant for Angela was issued after it came to light that she had
bought sevaral of the guns Jonathan used in the attack, She was captured by the
FBland released on bail after a 16 month international “Free Angela” campaign.
‘Angela was acquitted of the charges in June 1972. Angela was twice the
Communist Party's candidate for vice president. In 1997, she co-founded Critical
S g hecages
Resistance, an organization working (0 abolish the prison-industrial complex.
Angela's books and theories are a foundation in the prison sbolition movemen.
fedayeen — The Arabie word that usually connotes Palestinian guerrilla ighters.
Stap Cop City — A decentralized movement in Atlanta, Georgia, whose goalis to
stop construction of the Atlanta Public Safety Training Center (known a5 Cop
City) by the Atlanta Police Foundation and the City of Atlanta. The proposed
location for the fcility i the Old Atlanta Prison Farm. The movement has
involved forest defense tactics like tree-sits, encampments, industrial sabotage,
‘s well s broader tactics like acting against contractors involved, mass
demonstrations, petitions,ete. Georgia State Troopers and other ugencies
launched a said against forest defenders on January 15, 2024 and assassinated o
young forest-defender named Tortugita (Manuel Terin). Afleru protest on
March 5, 2021 during a week of action convergence, construction and police.
equipment were destroyed, and police launched a raid on a nearby music
festival arresting dozens of people. At least 61 Defend the Atlanta Forest / Stop.
Cop City protestors have been charged with domestic terrorism under RICO
charges, inchuding an Atlanta bail fund.
Nelson Mandela — A South African anti-apartheid revolutionary and political
prisoner who served as the first president of South Africa from 1994 10 1999
Committed to the overthrow of the settler-colonial apartheid state, he was
repeatedly arrested for seditious activities with the African National Congress
(ANC) party. Influenced by Marxism, he secretly joined the banned South
African Communist Party (SACP). Although initially committed to non-violent
protest, in association with the SACP he co-founded the ANC guerrilla
organization uMkhonto we Sizwe ($pear of the Natior) in 1961 that led a
sabotage campaign against the apartheid government. He was arrested and
imprisoned in 1962, and, ollowing the Rivonia Trial, was sentenced to I
imprisonment for conspiring to overthrov the state. Amid growing domestic
and international pressure, he was released in 1990. Mandela led the effort to
negotiate an end to apartheid, and served as the frst president of South Africa.
Merrimack 4 — In November 2023, The “Mersimack Four,” were involved ina
Palestine Action US protest in New Hampshire that halted operations at Elbit
Systems, Lsracls largest weapons supplier which provides cighty-five percent of
its military drone leet used against Palestinians in Gaza. They were initialy hit
with a slew of felony charges—conspiracy, eriminal mischie, busglary, and
more—that threatened a maximum of thirty-seven years in prison. They are
serving a 30 day sentence in jai from November to December 2024,
Green Scare — For years, the FBI targeted ecological activists s their #1 priority
This s one of the chief reasons environmental devastation has continued
unchecked. At the end of 2005, the FB opened a new phase of its assault on
g tecages 45
carth and animal liberation movements — known as the Green Scare—with the.
arrests and indictments ofa large number of sctivists. This offensive, which
they dubbed Operation Backfire, was intended to obtain convictions for many of
the unsolved Earth Liberation Front arsons of the preceding ten years —but
more 50, to have a debilitating effect on all ecological direct action.
Unfortunately many of those charged cooperated with the state and snitched on
their fellow co-defendants.
Marius Mason — a transgender environmental and animal rights activist and
anarchist. In 1999, in the name of the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) he set fire toa
lab at the Uiversity of Michigan that was conducting research on genetically
modified organisms (GMO). After Marius’ husband turned state’s-evidence,
Marius was threatened with a lfe sentence for the arson and other acts of
sabotage. With lttle financial stabilty and fear of dragging his family into a
cosly legal battle, Marius pled guilty and was given an extreme sentence of
nearly 22 years. No one was ever harmed in any of bis actions. More:
information: supportmariusmason.org
Eric MeDavid — an American green anarchist who was arrested along two.
others in 2006, as part of the Green Scare. All three were charged with
“Conspiracy to damage and destroy property by fire and an explosive.” The
conspiracy charge s, quite lterally, a thought-crime. No actions were ever
carried out by Eric or any of his alleged co-conspirators. Eric's arrest was the
diveet result of an FBL informant know only as "Anna,” who was paid over
65,000 for her work with the FBL, spent a year and a half drawing him in,
fabricating a crime, and implicating Eric in i. In 2015, Eric released from prison
after the FBl admitted it had vithheld approximately 2500 pages of documents
potentially useful for his defense.
Jake Conroy — one of the Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty (SHAC) 7 defendants,
who were arrested for llegedly spearheading the campaign to force the closure
of Huntingdon Life Sciences (HLS), an animal-testing company based i the UK
and US. SHAC was one of the most successful grassroots animal rights
campaigns in history. The SHAC 7 were the first to be charged under the Animal
Enterprise Terrorism Act. During the trial the defendants were probibited from
providing evidence of animal cruelty taking place at Huntingdon Life Sciences
testing laboratorics. Jake was sentenced to 48 months in federal prison, and s
currently working at an international environmental non-profit campaigning
against corporate polluters.
People’s Senate /Spirit of Mandela — The Spiit of Mandela (So) i a coalition
founded in 2018, led by Black Liberation organizers and former political
prisoners working with Black, Brown, and Indigenous Peoples and their alles to
bring international ttention to US human rights violations amounting to
Eenocide. Through s endeavors, the SoM Coalition successfully initiated the
s g e cages
2021 International Tribunal charging the United States government with five
counts of violations based on international law, and an independent Panel of
Jurists found the US guily of genocide on all five counts. Subsequently, SoM has
launched one of the most comprehensive national action campaigns initiatives
in decades—the Peoples’ Senate—seeking to unify progressive and radical
activists across geographic, ideological, and other divides. More information:
spiritofmandelsorg/
g teags 47
Write to Political Prisoners
‘mentioned in this conversation
‘Kamau Sadiki* #0001150688.
Augusta State Medical Prison
3001 Gordon Highway
Grovetown, Georgia 30813
“Address envelope to Freddie Hilton.
Leonard Peltier #39637-152
USP Coleman T
Post Office Box 1033
Coleman, Florida 33521
‘nycabe.wordpress.com/write-a-letter/
g thecags
Write to Political Prisoners.
‘mentioned in this conversation
Bill Dunne #10916-086
FeI Victorville Medium 1
Post Office Box 3725
Adelanto, CA 92301
Abdullah Al-Amin #99974-555
USP Tucson
Post Office Box 24550
Tucson, Arizona 85734
Marius Mason #04672-061
FMC Fort Worth
Post Office Box 15330
Fort Worth, Texas 76119
‘nycabe.wordpress.com/write-a-letter/
g teags 49
Rattling the Cages
1) Political Prisoners, Mass Incarceration, & Abolition
Eric King, Herman Bell, David Gilbert, Susan Rosenberg
2). Continuing the Struggle Inside & Out
Eric King, Ashanti Alston, Ray Luc Levasseur
3) Antifascism Behind Bars
Eric King and David Campbell
4) Black August & Prisoner Support
Eric King, dequi kioni-sadiki, Harold Taylor
5) Eric King in Conversation with James Kilgore
Eric King, James Kilgore
6) Post-Prison Activism & Archiving Resistance
Eric King, Jake Conroy, Claude Marks
%) Until All Are Free
Eric King, Jason Hammond, Jeremy Hammond
8) Revolutionary Women Behind Bars
Eric King, Linda Evans, Laura Whitehorn, Nicole Kissane
) Becoming Politicized in Prison
Eric King, Josh Davidson, Heetor Rodriguez, Farhan Ahmed
10) Rattling the Cages: How We Dit It & How You Can Too
Eric King, Sara Falconer, Josh Davidson
all conversations are available @FirestormCoop on youtube
S et thecges
Support Political Prisoners.
As you've heard & read, it is vital that we support the political prisoners
of our liberation movements. Providing support builds bridges across and
through prison bars, giving those locked inside a connection to the
outside world. Your support matters.
Get involved. Write to a political prisoner—a simple letter provides a
needed escape. Visit them in prison. Ask what a political prisoner needs
and do what you can to help them. Offer them support.
Visit the NYC Anarchist Black Cross website (nycabe.wordpress.com) and
learn more about those currently imprisoned for political reasons.
Buy a Certain Days: Freedom for Political Prisoners calendar
(certaindays.org).
Visit your local Books Through Bars group and send books to those
incarcerated (booksthroughbarsnyc.org/resources).
Join your nearest Anarchist Black Cross group (abefner).
Visit rattlingthecages.com to learn more.
g teas 8
linktr.ee/rattlingthecages
Four contributors to Rattling the Cages: Oral
Histories of North American Political Prisoners
discuss their experiences withimprisonment,
education behind bars, organizing with fellow
prisoners, and the ongoing importance of
international solidarity with captured
revolutionaries.
FRESTORM