The following update is from a hunger strike that happened at a prison in Indiana just a week before the ongoing hunger strike at Menard Correctional Center in Illinois.
From: Rififi
Received and transmitted:
Saturday January 25
Please man the phones on Monday, January 27,2014.
Westville Correctional Facility (SUPER-MAX Prison) is retaliating against
the inmates who protested last week by refusing to give them heated cells.
Inmates in the A-Pods of “Westville Control Unit” the (Super-Max) are being
deprived of heat because they protested the sack lunch that had been served
to them over the last nine months. The Blue setion, A7 & A8, Yellow setion
5&6 range along with the Alpha Pod are experiencing extremly cold
temperatures.The policy of the facilty states that they cannot use tactics
such as these to punish individuals for demanding the same treatment as all
other inmates; HEAT!
.
To justify their actions, the prison has stated that there is a new
engineer that does not know how to adjust the system up on the roof. In the
meantime they have passed out an extra blanket and jacket to combat the
freezing temperature.
We are once again asking that you call the GOVERNOR’S OFFICE (Pence) at 317
232-4567 and demand that either the heat gets fixed or that they remove
these individuals from these freezing cells and put them in a warmer
section as the policy dictates under emergency procedure.
Also call the Commissioner’s office (Lemmon) at 317 232-5711.
Together we can make a difference.
Wednesday, January 22
Just to let everyone know, the guys on all 4 pods of the Control Unit at
Westville Control Unit received hot trays today for lunch. It had large
portions of hot food, with real (not rancid) meat. People were ecstatic, as
they hadn’t expected the DOC to cave so quickly.
There has been no specific response from the DOC, but word around is that
they’re trying to throw one specific prisoncrat at the Control Unit under
the bus, blaming everything on him: this wasn’t policy, we had no idea this
was going on, we’re fixing it right away, etc.
While this is the end of the specific action regarding food trays, this was
far from the only issue that prisoners were/are dealing with at the WCU:
insufficient amounts of food, insufficient sanitation, blatant abuses of
particularly and randomly sadistic guards, etc. People are working on
following up on on the momentum built with this most recent struggle and
are working to bring down the iron grip of the Control Unit powers. Watch
for updates and interview in the near future.
-Indiana Prisoner Solidarity