together, fearless and unified
On Saturday, January 26, 2013, over four hundred people from across California rallied, marched and chanted to protest extreme overcrowding, deteriorating healthcare and constant lockdown in the women’s prisons. The crowd demanded an end to gender discrimination and unconstitutional overcrowding. Rallies in solidarity were also held in Redwood City, Philadelphia and London. Local media, such as the Merced Sun Star featured the rally in their news coverage : http://www.mercedsunstar.com/
An Op-Ed about the Chowchilla Freedom Rally co-authored by Windy Click and Angela Davis was recently published in the Fresno Bee. For the past 10 years, Windy was member of CCWP and an organizer inside Valley State Women For Prison. She was released in September 2012 after surviving 17 years inside and is a core organizer for the Chowchilla Freedom Rally. Here are some quotations from the op-ed and check out the entire article at the Fresno Bee.
“We are joining thousands of prisoners and families when we declare it is past time to bring our loved ones home. It is past time to stop the prison and jail expansion that has devastated our communities. It is past time to stop the criminalizing of our families, friends and neighbors. It is time to end policies like Three Strikes that leave many to needlessly die of old age in cages. It is time to institute and expand parole for sick and elderly people. It is time to widen alternatives to imprisonment. Thousands of people in women’s prisons can be freed right now. Money saved by reducing the prison population could provide drug treatment, re-entry services, mental health support and job programs.”
“Those of us working to end the prison crisis, and those of us who have lived inside these prisons, can tell countless stories of ongoing suffering: up to eight people living in cells that were built for four, or even two; lack of basic hygiene; the spread of infections; and failure to address preventable illnesses leading to health disasters.
The effects of poor health conditions and crowding are especially difficult for elderly prisoners, and the widespread use of lockdowns are contributing to mental health problems, including suicide. Access to jobs, programs and legal resources are largely unavailable. People living inside these prisons, along with their advocates on the outside, have noted that these unimaginable conditions and the state’s decision to continue to crowd women and transgendered people into these prisons constitute clear violations of human and civil rights.”
The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) is converting Valley State Prison for Women (VSPW) into a men’s prison in response to a U.S. Supreme Court order to reduce overcrowding. Instead of releasing people and closing VSPW, they are squeezing over 1,000 women and transgender people into the two remaining women’s prisons. The population of the other women’s prison in Chowchilla, Central California Women’s Facility (CCWF) is dangerously close to 4,000 even though its maximum capacity is 2,000. The conversion has aggravated overcrowding, created dangerous conditions, and health care is already getting much worse. What’s more, they have added yet another men’s prison to their inhumane system. We’ve had enough! Come show support for all people locked up in Chowchilla’s prisons and tell the Federal Judges that overcrowding must stop now!
CHOWCHILLA FREEDOM RALLY
Saturday, January 26, 2013
Rides available by bus and carpool.
Contact chowchilla.rally@gmail.com or 415-255-7036 x 314
Caravans leaving from MacArthur BART in Oakland at 10:30AM and Chuco’s Justice Center in Inglewood at 8:30AM. We will gather at 2PM at SE corner of Ave. 24 and Fairmead Blvd off Highway 99 in Chowchilla.
Rally begins at 3PM at VSPW.
OVERCROWDING = DEATH
BRING OUR LOVED ONES HOME!
COMMUNITY RELEASE PROGRAMS * PAROLE FOR ELDERS * RELEASE FOR MEDICAL REASONS * END LIFE WITHOUT PAROLE (LWOP)
Solidarity actions encouraged! If you cannot make the rally or do not live in California, we encourage you to organize a solidarity action on the same day in your community. Hold a demonstration in front of the DOC offices or the county jail, organize a speak-out against prisons in a public space, stand in solidarity the Chowchilla Freedom Rally! Please let us know how we can support you! Contact info@womenprisoners.org.
Interested in helping organize this event? Join our coalition! Our next meeting is Wednesday, January 2, 2013 from 6 – 8PM at the CCWP offices. 1540 Market Street, Suite 490, San Francisco. Or contact adrienne@womenpriosoners.org.
The Chowchilla Freedom Rally Coalition includes members from California Coalition for Women Prisoners, Californians United for a Responsible Budget, Justice NOW, All Of Us Or None, Legal Services for Prisoners With Children, Fired Up!, Transgender, Gender Variant, Intersex Justice Project, Critical Resistance, Youth Justice Coalition, Global Women’s Strike, Occupy 4 Prisoners, Asian Pacific Islander Support Committee and the California Prison Moratorium Project.
On June 25, 2012, the Supreme Court ruled that states may not impose mandatory life sentences without parole on juveniles, even if they have been convicted of taking part in a murder.
The justices ruled in a 5-to-4 decision that such sentencing for those under 18 violated the Eighth Amendment?s ban on cruel and unusual punishment. The ruling left open the possibility of judges? sentencing juveniles to life imprisonment without parole in individual circumstances but said state laws could not automatically impose such sentences.
CCWP recognizes this ruling as a small but significant step forward in the fight to eliminate Life Without Parole (LWOP) sentences. We will continue to work with women and trans prisoners with life sentences, and their allies, to stop all LWOP and life-term sentencing and to change the ways that youth are criminalized by the criminal legal system. For more, read the statement by the Campaign for Fair Sentencing of Youth.
By Suzanne Bohan
Contra Costa Times
Posted: 03/01/2012 07:14:19 PM PST
Updated: 03/01/2012 09:48:43 PM PST
When Gov. Jerry Brown signed a law last year drastically changing the rules for oversight of low-level felons upon their release from prison, plans for handling the influx of female parolees fell between the cracks, say many experts.
“I’ve been screaming for a year, ‘What are we going to do with the women?’ ” said Edwina Perez-Santiago, who on Thursday opened one of the few services in the state for assisting “AB 109 women.” Her chief focus for the project, based in Richmond, is finding housing, a challenge heightened by laws barring felons from renting low-cost federal housing.
In April, Brown signed AB 109, a “realignment” bill that transfers oversight of felons exiting state prison for nonviolent, nonserious and nonsex crimes from the state to county probation departments. And effective Oct. 1, newly convicted “non, non, non” felons would be jailed in county facilities instead of state prison, part of an effort to reduce bulging populations at the prisons.
In exchange, the state pays counties for their increased load of prisoners and parolees.
Counties statewide have been scrambling to prepare for the influx, but the focus has been on aiding male felons in transitioning to stable lives with jobs and housing, or on jail accommodations for low-level felons convicted after Oct. 1.
“We’re all focused on the men,” Perez-Santiago said. “What about their mothers, aunties and everyone else?”
Women have unique needs, she explained, such as arranging child care or healing from the emotional scars of domestic abuse.
Advocates for female prisoners agree.
“Women are going to be impacted, proportionally, much more than men,” said Karen Shain, policy director with Legal Services for Prisoners with Children in San Francisco. She explained that more than half of the 7,500 women in state prison were convicted of low-level offenses. Typical crimes included drug use, credit card fraud or larceny.
By June, some 500 women released from state prison will fall under county oversight because of the new law, Shain said. “It’s a problem every county is going to be facing,” she said.
Counties have leeway in how they manage the new parolees, such as GPS monitoring, stays in drug-rehabilitation centers, house arrest or supervised release.
Perez-Santiago’s new service, the “Re-entry-Reunite Project,” is unique, said Terrance Cheung, chief of staff for Contra Costa County Supervisor John Gioia, of Richmond.
Services for AB 109 women “are not as developed,” he said. “She’s the one solely focused on that.
“She’s a credible, formidable woman,” Cheung added. “She knows her stuff.”
Perez-Santiago said several women fresh out of state prison in Southern and Central California for low-level offenses want to relocate to Richmond, but she doesn’t have housing for them because of rents the women can’t afford and the restrictions on federal housing for felons.
Funding for the project now comes from private donations and Perez-Santiago’s own contributions, although she’s seeking county, state and federal funding for it.
A few of these women are in their 50s, she noted, and have been in prison since their teens. Once she does find housing, the nonprofit Reach Fellowship International, which she heads, will provide them with jobs, such as landscaping work. The organization also offers GED, ESL and other classes.
“But as long as I can’t get a roof over their head, it’s a little challenging,” Perez-Santiago said.
Contact Suzanne Bohan at 510-262-2789. Follow her at Twitter.com/suzbohan.
To learn more
What: Re-entry-Reunite Project
Address: 1662 Fred Jackson Way, Richmond
Phone: 510-289-7901
Hours: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday through Thursday