528 years, 22 years and all of our lives of endless struggle....Poor People built this with a poem- a poem that wound thru shelter beds and tents, poLice sweeps and the lie of rent....

Dear Loving Family/ComeUnity,

We are writing to you with love, gratitude and tears of unbelieving in our hearts that us poor, houseless, incarcerated, disabled and indigenous peoples got this far in building Homefulness. We need your help to make sure that 9 more houseless, indigenous families and disabled elders become homeful and we finish Phase #6. (Donate Here or poor-magazine on Venmo)

Herstory

A dream that started on a shelter bed, park bench, bus shelter and backseat of a car by two houseless indigenous women is made into a reality....now here we are....living into , breathing into Phase #6 and we are asking for support to finalize each unit- so more houseless families can move in and be HOMEFUL- WE NEED appliances, floors, light switches, etc- each family slated to move in is already helping to make this happen- from painting days to writing the Peoples Manifesto and working on healing from krapitalist violence that seems to never end.

Meanwhile since the ongoing violence of poverty, PoLice murder, poltricks and Covid19 rages on- POOR Magazine expanded our weekly Sliding Scale Cafe on BlackArthur to Mercadito de Cambio (Little Market of Change) and ongoing #RoofLESSRadio which has been sharing food and supplies since 2011 and is now sharing masks and hand sanitizers two days a week in addition to resources and food in encampments with our brothers and sisters in Oakland and San Francisco. All of this happens with the help of the Bank of ComeUnity Reparations which is supporting over 700 families a week with diapers, food, masks and love and have 120 families on the wait-list to receive diapers from the Po Mamaz Diaper Fund- We have published two powerful books and led PeopleSKool on Zoom, We have launched a Homefulness #2 liberation. 

This year there has been so much liberation and so much sorrow, prayer love and struggle. We hold all of you in hearts for standing with us, walking with us and changing/transforming with us... WE are still here! ....And none of this would have happened without your ongoing love and redistribution -

Lifting us all up in prayer for the next year to come!!!!!   

In Love and Struggle, POOR Magazine Family- 

Avan was a teenager with a kind soul who was alone and houseless. He lived in a tent in San Francisco and struggled greatly trying to navigate the winding road called life. According to his close friends he barely had any family support nor guidance, so he had to learn how to take care of himself, which was a difficult task because after all, he was just a kid. It was said that earlier this month he was near his tent and allegedly fell off a cliff, suffered a severe head injury and drowned in the freezing bay water. Avan’s friends were having a hard time accepting the alleged “freak accident” calling the fall “suspicious” and “not taken seriously.”

A candlelight vigil was held for the teen by the water and many of his peers and family members attended to honor Avan. Although there were mixed feelings about how he was casted out and forced to fend for himself, his friends remained respectful to the elders and other folks who had allegedly forgotten about him.

Unfortunately, It is difficult to obtain stability in an unstable nation and it doesn’t matter if you are a man, woman, child or elder. What is the real slap in the face is that the “powers that be” deliberately cut budgets and push the need for basic human rights on the back burner with a blazing flame. Many people have lost their jobs, homes, dignity and even their lives relying on a “Sssystem” that has shown us time and time again that we are nothing but “expendable assets”

But what happens to the kids that have no one to support them?  What about the youth who have been shuffled around from foster home to foster home only to be given the boot at the age of 18, under the “maxed out, ass out” protocol? Many of these youngsters wind up in the streets engaging in any activity that encourages self-medication and self-criminalization thus further desensitizing any part of the being that is human only to be blamed by those who have contributed in one way or another to the hell we are all catching.

It is the hell of seeing young folks give up on life completely after trying to hold down a job while living in a car because the rent is unaffordable, only to end up dying in a doorway from a drug overdose. Or the young female who is easily misguided by a “wolf in sheep's clothing” because she never had anyone in her whole life teach her about her worthiness so she bends to the will of those who exploit her just to have a meal and a roof over her head. 

These scenarios mentioned are all too common nowadays with not only the youth but full-grown adults as well. When you throw in the pandemic and the hopes of politicians passing a vote that won’t allow the people to starve to death that is enough nail-biting stress within itself.

Insead of it being against the law for folks to be poor and houseless, it should be illegal to have legislation put in place that allows for children to become houseless in the first place- and in some states removed from their families because of poverty. It also should be illegal to incarcerate kids just because their elders want to come to a “great country” to make a so-called “better life” for the generations that are to come- after all, Angelina Jolie cannot adopt all of the children.

“I’m starting to think that the rich in the world is safe, while the po’ babies resting in a early grave”- Tupac Shakur

CR- Queennandi Xsheba PNN KEXU

When criminal charges were filed last week against former SF police officer Christopher Samayoa for the shooting death of Keita O’Neil on December 1st 2017, San Francisco District Attorney Chesa Boudin received many praises for the decision, that is marked for being the first time in SF history that a officer has been charged with murder while on duty. Samayoa was patrolling the Bayview neighborhood along with Field training officer Edric Talusan when the two had observed Keita O’Neil allegedly carjacking a minivan. After O’Neil was eventually blocked in an alleyway by police, the unarmed man had allegedly attempted to flee and that is when Christopher Samayoa shot Keita to death. It was also alleged that Samayoa did not turn on his police body camera until after the shooting and that lack of following protocol raised suspicion amongst the concerned communities and subsequently he was terminated from his job in early 2018. 

The other charges on file that Officer Samayoa must stand to face are involuntary/voluntary manslaughter, firing a semi-automatic weapon in a negligent manner and assault. The O’Neil family is being represented by Civil rights attorney John Burris and has been waiting three years for some form of justice that was long overdue. There is no word on if FTO Edric Talusan will be held responsible for any wrongdoing or brought up on charges for misconduct.

The task is to reconstruct the lie of privilege being the excuse for violating human rights with impunity because officers were sworn in to represent “law enforcement” not the “outlaw enforcement” behavior that contributes to an already “spiritually unhealthy” society without rules or morals. How can citizens, especially those of color “obey” and “respect” a system whose “agents of the state” possess the mentality of the “you can’t break the law, but I can” double standards? And when you add the poisonous roots of the false sense of superiority and racism it is bound to grow into a toxic tree that shadows the whole nation in a very negative way.

Officers Sgt. Albin T. Pearson and Dwight A. Pitterson from Newport News, Virginia were also brought up on murder charges during the recent “police accountability sweeps” in the shooting death of Henry K. Berry III that happened late December of last year. The 43 year-old man was shot while inside of his home over an incident involving a tussle over a taser. Berry, who was known to have mental health issues was accused of resisting arrest after police had arrived to slap Mr. Berry with misdemeanor charges over repeated distress phone calls to 911. Perhaps law enforcement was more irritated that Henry Berry was calling excessively but the “professionals” completely overlooked the theory that maybe Mr. Berry was calling out for help and the way the police had responded possibly had triggered him in such a way that may have led up to his demise.

The bottom line is that holding police accountable for murdering and violating the people’s civil rights is centuries overdue and it is not easy, especially for the descendants of colonizers to unpack the deeply-rooted “training technique” that has always been used as a strategy to uphold the worldwide stranglehold of white supremacy and oppression. On the flip side it is very courageous of the people to become more empowered by utilizing our voices-to be the change this world needs and no longer shall we wait in bloody vain for the “unjust” to create the change on the people’s behalf because it is a suicidal way of thinking and unrealistic. All that said- Power to the People!

CR Queennandi Xsheba PNN KEXU

Hello my name is Amir Cornish, and I’m from West Oakland. Family Council is a meeting that solves problems that we have with each other. The organization doesn't involve the police because they don’t solve problems.

Family council is an organization run by Aunties, Uncles, Grandpas and Grandmas. This is a community that solves problems within an organization called Homefulness. I have been in many of these family councils.

I even had a family council about me because a friend wrote something bad about me and we had to have a family council to resolve this problem with me and this friend. Some feelings were said and I was kind of relaxed because we got this problem out the way. 

I felt safe in family council because we solve the problem and we were back to being friends. And sometimes in family council things don't go as well as we thought, but some parts are solved. 

Family council is a model for other people too. We are trying to show examples to the world that we do not need cops to be involved  in solving problems that we could solve within the community. 

Tiny is the person who created family council for the organization, and family council involves youth and families. I learn so much from these family councils as a student and as a community member. Being in these meetings, I have changed. These meetings are hard to be in but it's worth it .

Emmett Till, the Scottsboro Boys, the Central Park 5, and the list goes on. The ramifications of being falsely accused of a crime in America can be, and often has been, deadly for Black people. Since the horrors of the European capitalist-economic enterprise, known as the Atlantic Slave Trade, Black people (primarily Black men) have been lynched, burned alive, castrated and every other form of torture imaginable, and as a result of being falsely accused of a crime. On the surface, these accusations seem to be rooted in fear and ignorance, but when investigated, are proven to be rooted in nothing other than a device on behalf of the dominant capitalist, white supremacist, patriarchal culture to maintain a position of power.

Not too long ago, we witnessed an attempt at jeopardizing the life of a Black man in Central Park (just hours before George Floyd was murdered by four Minneapolis police officers) by a white woman, who, not out of fear or ignorance, but due to a boldness provided by her knowledge of how Black men in particular are viewed now and historically in this country. Her attempt on the life of this Black man reveals the ever-present reality of what it means to be Black in America; to live in fear of being hunted. Media outlets immediately noted that things could, and likely would have been drastically different, had the incident not been caught on camera. Protesters and activists throughout the world held up, and continue to hold up signs asking this very question about the latest string of televised crimes against Black people, “How many weren’t caught on camera?” But what about places where there are no cameras?

As an incarcerated person, I immediately began to reflect on my present reality, and what those who are incarcerated know all too well: namely that what occurs in public throughout America has been taking place in the darkness of America’s prison system, since its inception. “The prison is the place where state power is perhaps more forcefully experienced and publicly legitimized without being seen . . .” writes Dan Berger in ”Captive Nation,” He continues, “in other words, the prison is an example of how state power at its most violent extreme, as well as an example of the way that power cloaks itself in invisibility.” The lens through which we have been allowed to look into California’s prison system is of the darkest of opaques. Oftentimes, it takes a major incident for light to be shone on prisons: a riot, stabbing, major contraband bust, etc., anything to slant public opinion against the incarcerated. But when something takes place that puts the integrity of correctional officers, and ultimately the entire system itself into question, silence abounds.

In the aftermath of the violent 3 a.m. raid on approximately 200 incarcerated Black people at Soledad State Prison – if it wasn’t for the tireless effort of my wife, Tasha Williams, whose article in the San Francisco Bay View first alerted the world to what happened here at Soledad, as well as the tireless effort of countless wives, family members, and loved ones sharing her article and the stories of their incarcerated friends and family who were brutalized, the world would, without doubt, still be in the dark about what happened to us. Prison officials, on the other hand, waited an entire week before releasing a statement, and still it was only after, and in response to receiving thousands of phone calls and emails from across the country culminating in protests in front of the prison, that the spokesperson for Soledad State Prison released a statement to the public, a statement that denied the injuries, a statement that denied we were targeted because of our race, and most telling of all, a statement that would not have been released had it not been for the continuous pressure from both inside, and more importantly, outside organizers against a system that thrives in silence. Their silence was an attempt to “cloak itself in invisibility,” and yet their public statement was an attempt to do the same.

The following is a detailed first-hand account and contextualizing of what really happened in the early morning hours of 7-20-20 at Soledad CTF, as well as the events that followed. When I was violently snatched out of my sleep and slammed into the wall head first off the top bunk, I thought I was dreaming. I didn’t know what was going on; all I heard was yelling and felt

hands grabbing my arms and legs. With a knee in my back my hands were zip-tied and I was forcefully snatched up by my throat and dragged out of the cell, but not before my eyes were able to adjust enough to glance to the right – hearing my cell mate; a 55-year-old man with degenerative disc disease in his spine, a chronic shoulder injury, and who is a diabetic, crying out that they were hurting his arm – to see what I believe were two men wearing helmets, equipped with night vision, wearing fatigues, and black marks covering their faces entirely, doing to him what had been done to me. I was carried out of the housing unit barefoot, wearing nothing but boxer briefs, forced to walk on a filthy floor down the central corridor, towards the dining hall. 

Along the way I could see and hear the same thing happening in every unit we passed, officers yelling “drag him” referring to people who had already been ripped violently from their sleep. The atmosphere was filled with fear and uncertainty. To my surprise, when we turned into the dining hall there were close to 200 incarcerated people looking as shocked as I was. Shocked that it was so early in the morning, and at the fact that we were raided in a way never before seen at Soledad. Never has a group of people who haven’t been involved in any disruptive activity, and who haven’t even been arrested for committing a crime, been raided the way we were. Even when someone commits a crime they are not raided the way we were raided. I have been in prison going on 19 years and I have never seen or heard of a group of people having been raided the way we were. But walking out of the dark housing unit, into the brightly lit corridor, I noticed patches across officers’ chests that told me this wasn’t a normal raid. This was an inter-agency operation, a joint team or special ops, security squad officers (SSU/IGI) from both Soledad CTF and Salinas Valley State Prison, as well as CDCR Sacramento, Office of Correctional Safety (OCS), and Special Service Unit Gang intel ops (SSU). But even more so than that, we were shocked at the fact that every single person sitting there was Black. Every age group from early 20s to late 70s. Nobody knew anything. Everyone was complaining about their injuries and the way we were raided. Zip-tied, sitting on stainless steel stools, practically naked in a freezing kitchen during the worst pandemic to hit the world in over one hundred years, we soon realized something that was clearly not the concern of whoever was in charge of this operation, we were sitting next to each other without our masks. We immediately began to demand that we be provided face masks, but just like our demands for medical attention, we were ignored.

We sat there in anger, frustration, fear, and possibly more than anything else, confusion. No one could make sense of “why.” Why after the prison’s Black population was congratulated and praised by the warden on institutional television for helping maintain a peaceful and positive program, were we being treated so inhumanely? But the longer we sat there, a troubling picture began to emerge; people spoke to being told by masked officers “Black Lives Don’t Matter.” Listening to everyone’s experiences, I thought to myself, “this can’t be happening!!!” at which point I heard an officer tell one person who was complaining about the fact that we were crammed next to each other without masks that: “I hope you motherfuckers get COVID!!!” The environment was hostile; an officer was in the guntower pointing his rifle at us, which led to an uproar and chant of “Black Lives Matter,” which resulted in Black buddies being carried away. It was around this time that one Brother from my building, Bernard Harris, told me my hands were purple – I was so cold that I couldn’t feel that my hands had lost circulation due to the tightness of the zip-ties. I immediately walked over to an officer named Brown and showed him my hands and he helped another officer, who looked horrified, cut off the zip-tie and replaced them with a looser pair. This was the only relief experienced while sitting in that dining hall and I don’t believe this could be separated from the fact that Brown was the only Black correctional officer present during our entire ordeal in that dining hall. Brown is a regular correctional officer, not as part of the Security Squad (ISU/IGI) or the extraction team, which also included members of the Security Squad, as well as Sacramento’s Special Service Unit Gang Intel Ops (SSU) all of whom were either white or of an ethnicity that possesses an inroad to whiteness.

While there are cries throughout the world of “defund police” and diversify the ranks of police forces, making them more “racially inclusive,” what happened in the early morning hours of July 20, 2020 here at Soledad begs the question; how much more humanely would our Black bodies have been treated had there been more Black officers present?

When I returned to where I was seated, almost every other individual in that dining hall had to have their zip-tie cut off due to loss of circulation. We sat in that cold dining hall shivering for six hours, some of us zip-tied the entire time. When we raised hell to use the bathroom we were walked to the back of the kitchen to a secluded part of the prison one at a time, forced to walk barefoot in the officers spit, on an already urine-covered bathroom floor, I was forced to strip naked and when I complained I was told, “you shouldn’t have been Black.” Every time I tried to get a glimpse of an officer’s name tag, there was none, only patches that read “CTR/SVSP” and “police.” One officer, who came over to where we were waiting to go to the bathroom however, was recognizable as 3rd Watch Building officer Martinez, a known racist with multiple complaints against him for making racist comments and attempting to incite hostilities between the Black and Latinx populations. It still remains unclear as to why he, a regular correctional officer, was there dressed as a member of the extraction team. Had he been one of the officers who violently extracted incarcerated people (while sleeping) from their beds in the very building he’s responsible for managing five days a week? Is this why they covered their faces and wore no name tags? But Martinez wanted to be seen. Like a sadistic predator circling back to see its victim, he couldn’t help but show his face. However, his presence raises another question: during a pandemic that has forced CDCR officers and officials to take a 10 percent pay cut due to the governor’s budget, and be prohibited from working overtime, per their agreement, how is it that he was able to work overtime coming to work during non-work hours to play “Army”? This wasn’t just my experience alone. Every other Black person in that dining hall early that morning had a similar, and some an even worse experience. One person who was victimized (Erwin Harris #T25610) was pulled violently off his top bunk, dragged out of his cell, zip-tied, and pushed down a flight of stairs. He had to be taken to medical in a wheelchair.

Another person victimized (Eric Frazier #C62189) also had to be taken to medical in a wheelchair, having been dragged violently out of his cell despite telling his captors he had a pre-existing back and hip injury. He was met with racial slurs while his seemingly lifeless body (according to one eye-witness who wishes to remain anonymous) was dragged to the corridor when finally a wheelchair was requested. Another person victimized (Ronald J. Smallwood #C15171) wrote, “At approximately 3:39 am, I was awakened by several individuals which I later found out were IGI, ISU and OCS. I was snatched out of my cell in my underwear and NOTHING else. I was then handcuffed with zip-ties and escorted to the chow hall. I sat there for five hours in zip-ties.” Another person victimized (Derrick Porter #A88849) wrote: “On 7-20-20 at 3:30 am my cell door was pulled open while me and my cellie were asleep. We were attacked and assaulted by ISU Squad members. I was violently snatched off the top bunk by masked CDCR employees. I injured my arm, head, neck, and hip. Several officers jumped on my back and legs, while one put his knee on the side of my head. I was cuffed in, zip-tied and dragged out the cell. Not one ISU/OCS Task Unit officer had an identification name tag. I was put in dining hall #1 with no socks, no shoes, no shirt, and no mask. It was over 100 Black inmates, all zip-tied, and in almost no clothes without masks. We were placed side-by-side and the wall was lined with CDCR employees who wore ISU black patches with CTF/SVSP logos and no name tags. These un-named officers were coughing and sneezing in the dining hall with us in it. SVSP staff came from a prison that has a COVID outbreak amongst staff and inmates. I was scared.” Another person victimized (Marcelle Franklin #J65015) wrote, “At 3:30 am on 7-20-20, I was awakened by unknown individuals wearing helmets and face masks, later identified as CTF/SVSP ISU IGI and OCS. I was forcefully slammed to the ground, zip-tied, and dragged out of my cell by multiple ISU officers, then placed in dining hall #1 without a mask, in nothing by my underwear for over five hours.”

And lastly, in direct contradiction to what the warden said in an email the following day attempting to distance himself from having knowledge of our condition, Marcus Harris #O09716 wrote, “On 7-20-20 at about 3:00 am, I was awakened by my cell door being slammed open and being physically snatched out of bed by some unknown persons. I was taken down to the Central Facility dining hall, handcuffed, with nothing on except underwear, and was made to sit on metal stools with no jacket, shoes, t-shirt, or mask for about five and a half hours. When I asked to see a doctor, I was told “No.” After about five hours, the warden came in and started to give officers “high fives,” telling them “Good job!!!” I stood up and said, “How are you going to give them high fives and tell them good job for messing over a bunch of innocent Black People?” But it wasn’t over. We were then escorted out of the dining hall, still virtually naked, once again down the central corridor, still zip-tied, officers and free staff now clocking in to work looking at us as if we were animals. We were led one by one into what used to be the counselor’s office at the end of the west corridor, where we were interrogated by plain clothed OCS officers. When we get near the entrance, an OCS officer asked my name and CDCR number before handing the officer escorting me a packet that had my picture, in red letters was the word “Target,” below which was a paragraph of which I was only able to read the first line, which said, “his father is Milton Hayes, a validated associate of the Black Guerilla Family . . .” If you know me or have read my most recent blog post “Crying Out From Soledad: An Open Letter to a Lawyer,” then you know that this is an issue about which I already have two pending lawsuits for retaliation, racial and religious discrimination against CDCR officers and officials for harassing me since 2011 for being in contact with my father, as well as my writing and journalism against this racist system, particularly my article in the San Francisco Bay View entitled, “Soledad prison guards refuse to wear safety masks amidst COVID-19 pandemic” for which I was raided less than a week after it was published, and more specifically my last book, “Soledad Uncensored, ”the forward of which was published as a series of articles, also in the San Francisco Bay View entitled, “Soledad Uncensored: Racism and the Hyper-policing of Black Bodies,” the entirety of which speaks directly against what was happening to us these early morning hours of July 20, 2020. Had my writings contributed to my being included in this roundup?

I was led to a room where two OCS officers, one white, one Black, were waiting. They told me to face the wall while they cut off my zip-ties and honestly I thought they were going to beat me, or worse. I was so nervous my mouth instantly became dry. But frustrated that I was once again – based on what I was able to read from the description below my picture – being harassed because of my father’s past, I asked, “What the hell is going on; this is how you guys are getting down now?!! Snatching people out of bed at 3:00 in the morning?!! You have been harassing me since 2011 because of my father !!!” That is when the white officer asked “Why would you say we were harassing you because of your father?”. “Because that’s what is says on the paper you just set aside,” I responded, noticing the look on his face change when the Black officer chimed in saying, “We’re not harassing you. We just want to ask you some questions about Black Lives Matter. How do you feel about what happened to George Floyd? I know what the one cop did was wrong and he deserves to go to jail, but all cops aren’t bad,” which is ironic, considering the fact that here we were, having this conversation about police brutality rooted in racial biases, after approximately 200 Black men were violently snatched from their beds while sleeping – by police. The premise upon which they sought to base the conversation was disrespectful. We had the whole “a few bad apples” conversation before I got tired and asked them, “So you mean to tell me y’all did all this to ask us about George Floyd and Black Lives Matter?!!” when again the Black officer said, “Honestly you have some tattoos on you that indicate you’re BGF!!!” to which I shot back, “I’m not BFG, like I said when I first came in. Y’all have been harassing me since 2011 for being in contact with my father who, according to you, is a validated associate of the Black Guerilla Family. To me he’s simply my father who went to prison in ’89 and had been out of my life until my sister found him still incarcerated in 2005. I have every letter he’s ever written me and not one of them is criminal in nature. They are letters from a father trying to mend a broken bond with his son. And about the tattoo you guys have been harassing me about since 2011, everything about it is Islamic,” turning around to show them my back tattoo which is a dragon with a huge crescent moon and star in the center of it flanked by the sword and staff of the prophet Muhammed, with a verse from the Qur’an over it in Arabic script. “What about the dragon is Islamic?” they ask. At which point I give them a detailed explanation of a hadith mentioned in S.V Mr. Ahmed Ali’ commentary to chapter 96, verse 6-7 of the Holy Qur’an about an enemy of the prophet Muhammed attempting to harm him while he (Muhammed) was praying, but turning back in fear because he saw that the prophet Muhammed was being protected by a dragon.

After explaining my tattoos for the 20th time, as well as explaining to them how racist it is to assume that a Black person in prison with a tattoo of a dragon (or a gorilla or snake, for that matter), is a member of a prison gang that have used such symbols – I further explained my point by saying that “if I was Asian and had a dragon tattoo it wouldn’t be an issue!!!” to which they replied, “but you’re not!!!” and when I asked affirmatively, “So it’s because I’m Black?” They, to my surprise said, “Yes.” After they “apologized” regarding the misunderstanding of my tattoo saying “We hope you can get that cleared up about your tattoo” they told me I could go. When I returned to my cell, still confused as to why we were kidnapped in the middle of the night just to be questioned about Black Lives Matter, George Floyd, and a prison gang from the 70s, I was shocked even further by the way they trashed the cell. Everything was thrown all over the place. My cellmate, who had returned to the cell before me, was busy separating his remaining property from mine when I noticed that every single piece of paperwork, writing paper, envelopes, every letter, picture, photo album, phone book, and book was gone. In the midst of my remaining property was a “Security Squad Receipt” that said the only thing taken was “paperwork.”

Later that morning, when everyone was let out of their cells to set up like we do every morning for “cell reading,” everyone was shocked that we weren’t on “scheduled program,” which is the normal protocol when there is a threat, especially one that necessitates a raid. The first step of a “modified program” due to a threat, is for the officers to conduct a “threat assessment” by interviewing everyone in the prison one-by-one, voluntarily. The fact that they weren’t conducting a threat assessment didn’t make sense. Obviously something wasn’t right. In the process of cleaning up and preparing for breakfast, someone found paper tags presumed to be place markers used during the raid. One had the words “property team,” “tag 1, receipts” and “Charlie” printed over a watermark on the SSU seal. The other has the words, “Charlie wing” which is the unit where the tags were found, as well as the unit I’m housed in. At the top of this particular tag however, were words that would explain everything: “Operation Akili” The name of this operation was a Swahili word that means “intelligence” which comes from the Arabic word “Agli” having the same meaning they were on a fishing expedition, a dragnet – intelligence gathering, which explains why the only thing they took was paperwork, letters, books, pictures, and phone books. There was no threat. Not only did the name of their operation indicate that there was no threat, but the raid itself turned up no weapons, no notes referring to any type of threat or STG activity. The reality is, there has been no Black STG activity here at Soledad whatsoever. In fact, ask CDCR and Soledad CTF officials to release a report stating how many weapons Black incarcerated people have been found in possession of, and how many STG related incidents in the last 10 years have Black incarcerated people been involved in, and I guarantee the answer will shock you. 

I was able to obtain every single Program Status Report (PSR) from 2017 to 2020 and not one single report refers to a single STG activity involving the population of incarcerated Black people, not even in the days surrounding the raid. But herein lies the reason why: CDCR officials can’t wrap their heads around the fact that incarcerated Black people throughout the entire state of California aren’t involved in any STG gang activity. As I’ve been highlighting in my writing these past couple of years, the criminal mentality of old that most people have been conditioned to associate with prison, does not exist. Incarcerated people throughout California realize that the days of languishing in prison until one is useless and unable to contribute to society are over. Even people who entered the prison system as gang members no longer glorify gang culture or the culture of violence. Not only are “self-help” groups being created by incarcerated people themselves to challenge ideas of toxic masculinity and the culture of violence, such as “success stories,” which was recognized by the California Legislature, but law are being passed that have taken into consideration the work that we are in here doing, which gives incarcerated people hope like we’ve never had before. And with the passing of “Assembly Concurrent Resolution No. 186” introduced by Assemblymember Kamlager, that “the Legislature recognizes the need for statutory changes to end extreme sentencing,” which disproportionately subjects Black people by saying, “the Black community is disproportionately subjected to extreme sentences, representing less than 15 percent of the national population, but comprising 48.3 percent of people serving life sentences, 55 percent of people serving virtual life sentences, and 56.4 percent of people serving life sentences without the possibility of parole . . .” and that “research has shown that long sentences do not deter future crimes and that there is no reliable evidence showing that any deterrent effect is “sufficiently large to justify the cost of long prison sentences . . .” and . . . in 2018, only 2.9 percent of people serving life sentences were released and only 0.3 percent of people serving third-strike were released, and . . . out of 988 people convicted of murder were released from California prisons over a 20-year period, only 1 percent were arrested for new crimes. None of the 988 people were rearrested for murder and none of them went back to prison over the 2 0-year period examined.” 

Understanding this, incarcerated people know that it is counter-productive to commit acts that justify one’s incarceration. Not only are incarcerated people politically aware of the effects of violence, but thanks to Black resistance authors such as Bell Hooks, we are aware of the effects of violence in a more holistic way to where non-violence becomes a lifestyle as well as a rock to be used against a system that bases its very existence on our disfunction. It is incarcerated people who promote non-violence that make prisons obsolete. 

CDCR officials are aware of this as well. Budgets are already being cut. Prisons are being scheduled to shut down, and employees of these institutions are going to have to find new jobs. However, a certain segment of CDCR have become so accustomed to this sadistic enterprise that they cannot imagine a world without it. They will go to imperceivable lengths to ensure its continued existence, and since they can no longer use the “violent criminal” as a justification, they have resorted to criminalizing the very existence of incarcerated people. This becomes even more troubling when racism enters into the equation. We know the effects of systemic racism in the police departments and judicial systems, but what many people aren’t aware of, by design, are the effects of systemic racism inside the prison system. Guns don’t exist in prison (except in strategically placed guntowers) so you aren’t going to have “officer involved shootings” of unarmed Black and Latinx people. 

Prison is a different kind of monster; the weapon of choice in prison is, and always has been “documentation.” Michael Foucault wrote in his famous “Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prisons” that, “It must be possible to hold the prisoner under permanent observation; every report that can be made about him must be recorded and compared” He continues, “no detail is unimportant, but not so much for the meaning that it conceals within it as for the hold it provides for the power that wishes to seize it . . .” Departments of “Correction” aren’t concerned with the accuracy of the information about you more than they are concerned with how they can use that information to control every aspect of your existence in order to maintain its position of dominance. Their sole concern is to create, on paper, a perpetual criminal, thereby justifying the perpetual existence of prison.

Just two days after the raid, we received our property back. Well, almost all of it. Almost everyone who was raided got a receipt notifying them of certain items not returned “pending investigation.” Guess what these items were? Books, newspapers, pictures and quotes from Black historical figures. DOCUMENTATION. They kept my book “Soledad Uncensored,” quotes from George Jackson used for research on my book, a picture of Dr. Angela Davis and Johnathon Jackson protesting in front of Soledad in the 70s (also used for my book), and a letter to a journalist about COVID-19 and Anti-Black racism in prison. Their reason for keeping these items, written on the receipt was: “The aforementioned items will be retained for further investigation into your suspected involvement with the Black Guerilla Family (BGF) Security Threat Group-1 (STG-1).” Everyone else who received a receipt had had the same exact words written on it. Items taken from them include newspaper articles about George Jackson, pictures of the San Quentin-6, and even sheets of paper with book titles written on them: “Blood in My Eye,” “The Spook Who Sat By the Door.” This is what we’re dealing with, and it can’t be described as anything other than racist. Every facet of existence of incarcerated people is criminalized, especially if you’re Black. Everything from the books we read to our hairstyles are criminalized. Hairstyles aren’t seen as an attempt to express our individuality in an environment whose intent is to strip us of anything unique, or that points to our being individuals in any way. Instead, our hairstyles are seen by certain elements within CDCR as expressions of “gang culture,” despite the fact that in the history of American street gangs, there has never been a single hairstyle associated with an expression as ones’ affiliation. Even still, young Black men are harassed, and even chased down, to be given “verbal warnings” for having designs shaved into their heads.

Don’t get “caught” with a book by Angela Davis, Marcus Garvey, or Malcom X, and you damn sure better not get “caught” with a book by George Jackson – all of which aren’t on any official list of prohibited books, and are all allowed into the prison through order from Amazon Prime, or any other bookseller – but once an officer sees you with one, you will (if you’re Black) immediately be under investigation as a member of the Black Guerilla Family, an organization formed in the 70s in prison that today, in 2020, is virtually non existent, except in the minds of correctional officers intent on living in the past. So what you end up with is young Black men who are afraid to study their history for fear of being labeled, while those who muster up the courage – being dedicated and committed to non-violence – seeking to understand the pitfalls of the past in order to contribute to a society they once took part in destroying, by preventing others from treading the course of violence, through knowledge, they are criminalized.

Before recent events, I thought this targeting was simply because correctional officers didn’t understand Black culture, but like the white lady in Central Park, correctional officers aren’t acting out of ignorance, but in fact are tapping into the very anti-Black racist ideas that underpin American society. They know we are not members of the Black Guerilla Family, but they also know that in a society so deeply connected to racist ideas concerning prison, that incarcerated Black men are seen as perpetually criminal, and thus labeling us as BGF places a stigma on us that will last throughout the duration of our incarceration, and becomes a barrier in the way of our release. These are the lengths they will go to. Two days after we received our property, people began to receive “validation packets” (a process to becoming validated by CDCR as a member of a Security Threat Group). It was only after this point that the spokesperson for Soledad CTR released his statement to the public that the people who were raided were members of a Security Threat Group. They were trying to cover their asses. People were being labeled everything from “chief financial officer for BGF” to “BGF foot soldier.” I told a friend of mine, “Watch these fools say I have something to do with education,” when lo and behold! That same day I received my validation packet saying that I was “the Minister of Education for BGF,” but that was only the beginning. They said the pictures of George Jackson on my Instagram page managed by my family to advertise my writings, was “BGF propaganda.” They even went as far as saying about my crescent moon and star tattoo, that: “It (the star) contains five outer-pointed and five inner-pointed, with each point representing one point of the 10-point party platform of the Black Panther Party (BPP), which is part of the BGF constitution.” But if you thought it couldn’t get worse, they had the nerve to say that the Arabic verse from the Qur’an (79.14) on my back “translated into English as ‘Assaulter, attacker with alertness’ . . .” I couldn’t believe what I was reading. The officer who wrote it was B. Barron. He wrote: “While conducting photographs of his tattoos (on 4-27-20) specifically on Williams upper back above and below the black dragon, I discovered Arabic writing. I was unable to translate the Arabic writing, therefore, I questioned Williams on the meaning of the tattoos. Williams became defensive and stated, “You can figure that out, do your job.” Based on my training and experience, I know Williams becoming defensive about his tattoos means they are indicative of gang membership. Upon discovering the Arabic writing, I contacted the OCS, Correctional Intelligence Task Force (CITF) and Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) Terrorism Task Forces (CT2) to translate the Arabic writing discovered on Williams’ tattoos. Upon receiving the translation from OCS, the Arabic writing translated to English as “Assaulter, attacker with alertness” and “Tajdeed” This Arabic writing is significant to the BGF also meaning he will conduct assaults on behalf of the BGF. The Arabic writing is also indicative to the membership of the Radical Islamic Group “Tajdeed UL-Islam (TUI) . . .”

I couldn’t believe what I was reading. “Tajdid,” which is on my lower back, is a concept in Islam that refers to returning back to the original humanistic teachings of Islam, popularly known as Surism. To associate such a term with “Radicalism” is disrespectful. They gave me 72 hours to respond to the allegations in writing, and since they were trying to validate me as a member of BGF that’s what I focused on, saving everything else for the lawsuit. What I wrote in response to the allegations mentioned above (in part) was: “I find it strange that B. Barron only pointed out the star attempting to link it with BGF via the Black Panther Party. When pictures were taken of my back tattoo between 2015-2019, 1 st Lt. Officer Pearson(?) immediately recognized the crescent moon and star. B. Barron’s failure to recognize the crescent moon shows that he had his mind set on associating me with BGF. When I said to B. Barron, concerning the Arabic writing on my back, “You can figure it out. Do your job.” I said that out of frustration having already explained my tattoos at least 5 times before, and not because of B. Barron said, “They are indicative of gang membership.” The Arabic writing across my back is Verse 14 of chapter 79 of the Holy Qur’an that translates into English as, “Then behold they will be upon a wide expanse.” Which is a reference to a scene on the Day of Judgment when humanity will be standing “upon a wide expanse” of earth, awaiting God’s judgment. Whoever was responsible for the OCS Correctional Intelligence’s Task Force (CITF) needs to be re-trained. B. Barron stated that he “contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) Terrorism Task Force (CT-2) to translate the Arabic writing.” but only used “the translation from OCS,” which according to them “translated to English as Assaulter, attacker with alertness . . .” according to B. Barron, “this Arabic writing is significant to the BGF also meaning he will conduct assaults on behalf of BGF.” The reason B. Barron omitted the translation from the FBI is because they told him it was a verse from the Qur’an, and therefore didn’t fit his narrative, just like the huge crescent moon and star didn’t fit his narrative, so he omitted mentioning the moon. This is giving him the benefit of doubt. What I believe is that B. Barron never sent a picture of my tattoo to the OCS or the FBI, but that he himself “translated” the Arabic, and therefore must be investigated for falsifying documents, because there is no way that an expert would have come up with that translation.” 

This is what racism looks like inside Soledad State Prison. You will be raided in the middle of the night and assaulted by officers, and when media attention is placed on the officers’ actions, those same officers will falsify documents in order to cover their asses. And because we live in a society where incarcerated people are viewed as perpetually criminal, who knows how far into the future, and to what lengths, officers will carry these allegations. Will our families be targeted next?

#BLACKINCARCERATEDLIVESMATTER

#FREETHEMALL

#FREETALIB 

By Queennandi Xsheba Shabazz, PNN KEXU

There are always mixed feelings when people walk past one of our folks who is homeless, sitting on a sleeping bag or a donated mattress sifting through food given to them by a stranger. There are feelings of helplessness, cluelessness or pity towards individuals going through such hardships in life.

With limited resources coming from the city or state, compassionate folks from all walks of life would take to the streets and distribute food, clothing and other necessities to help alleviate some of the burden of struggle. Even with the dark cloud of Covid hovering above us there are kind souls who try to lend a helping hand to those in need.

On the other hand, there are many people who look down upon poor folks as a “blight” and nothing more than drug addicted mentally ill individuals with the agenda of “getting over on people” to buy a slice of the “devil’s pie” (drugs) and/or alcohol.  Harsh judgement spews from the mouth of passer-bys such as “you people need to be wiped off the face of the earth” or “get a job, you bum!” Saying these kinds of comments to someone that is facing spirit-breaking difficulties in their lives is like giving that final “kick in the face” to them and being “better off” is not an excuse to add on this extra layer of hatred onto an already lost soul.

Poor folks who are in struggle with substance or mental health issues living on the streets are not the only ones feeling the brunt of this burden. We have children who live in cars, hotels and tents who have to live with the experiences of poverty on a daily basis, along with elders with major health problems in which a high percentage of them die within a year of being homeless and vulnerable. In doing my WeSearch I have come across families who worked two jobs while raising children- all while living in a tent because of not only being economically impacted by Covid, but the nosebleed- high rent in the bay area makes it very difficult for folks to obtain decent and safe housing. With that being said, should innocent children and elders be “wiped off the face of the earth” also?

Being homeless is not just a “death sentence” for people dealing with substance or other life altering issues, this violation of human laws affects anyone all across the board regardless of age, gender or cultural background. However when it comes to looking at the injustice system as a whole it is people of color who had the most stones casted upon them. 

Instead of pointing the finger at someone who chose to self-medicate in (dis)order to cope with the systematic hell they have endured, let’s change the conversation to shaming the so-called leaders who always had a bad reputation of “shuckin’ and jivin” around with the issues surrounding poverty. Shame on the “leaders” for enabling “gentrifukation” and greed to push women, men, children, elders AND pets out onto the streets in the first place. Shame on “leaders” for issuing a “stimulate nothing” payment at the beginning of this year that wasn’t even enough for most folks to cover one months’ rent and still continue to “shuck and jive” around the negotiation table over the fate of this nation. It is also shameful that the “homelessphobia” attitude is tolerated to the point that poor folks have been criminalized, attacked and in some cases killed for no reason other than being poor. 

Hatred does not contribute to helping those who cannot help themselves nor does it heal the traumatized spirit, hatred is just another ingredient added to the already potent poison that has killed off the consciousness and morality of this country.

Family Meetings by Amir Cornish:

https://www.poormagazine.org/node/6032

Family Council by Ziair Hughes

https://www.poormagazine.org/node/6031

Homefulness is like Heaven by Amir Cornish

We Still Need Justice For Andre Thompson and Bryson Chaplin THEY SURVIVED

Bryson Chaplin

Andre Thompson

THEY SURVIVED

by Justice for Andre Thompson & Bryson Chaplin 

from occupied Squaxin, Nisqually, Chehalis territory in colonized Olympia, WA and thurston county - from Poor News Network PNW

With Love and Anger We make Demands and invite You to Help put our Demands into Action 

We Demand that the case involving the racist attempted murder of Black, brothers, Andre Thompson and Bryson Chaplin (they survived) by white poLice terrorist Ryan Donald be REOPENED, and that an OUTSIDE INVESTIGATION starts immediately.

POLICE SHOULD NEVER INVESTIGATE THEMSELVES and create expensive false narratives on the taxpayers dime

Kops are lying liars. Ryan Donald is a liar.

Fire officer Ryan Donald, no paid leave, no pension JAIL KILLER KOPS!!!!  Prosecute Ryan Donald for attempted murder of Andre and Bryson!  Ryan Donald caused permanent disabilities to Andre and Bryson!  HE IS STILL A KOP TODAY!!!!

We demand that thurston kounty prosecutor JON TOONhime be FIRED.  He has never held a poLice officer accountable for poLice terror.  He’s the most dangerous local politrickster among us.  

Until there is abolition of poLice, we need RADICAL REFORM! 

WE DEMAND A PEOPLES PROSECUTOR here in thurston kounty and to break up this racist Ol’ Boys Club of hoarded power.

We demand ALL the officers involved in the cover up of Andre and Bryson’s shooting be reprimanded! ALL OF YOU! There’s not a bad apple! It’s a spoiled rancid bunch!

We demand to know how much money the shitty city of Olympia and thurston kounty spent protecting and defending Ryan Donald during kourt proceedings (both “criminal” and civil) - including the so called “reenactment” in civil kourt, made to make Ryan Donald look like a victim. False narrative re-enactments that turned Ryan Donald’s narrative into three different orchestrated performance pieces. THEY HAD TO HAVE SPENT MILLIONS.  Right now Andre and Bryson struggle to pay rent! Please support the family financially http://paypal.me/OlympiaSURJ 

We Demand that Andre Thompson and Bryson Chaplin's personal belongings be returned to them from the evidence hold!  They NEVER got their belongings back. The poLice have been stalling long enough and the Chaplin-Thompson family want everything returned, clothes, shoes, phones, skateboards, etc.

The only people who went to jail for Ryan Donald’s murder attempt were the victims of the shooting, Andre Thompson and Bryson Chaplin. THAT IS AN OUTRAGE!!!

We Demand that Ryan Donald and all the thurston kounty, Washington state and olympia killer poLice be held responsible for killing Loved Ones, Jose Ramirez-Jimenez, Joel Nelson, Vaneesa Hopson, Jeffrey McGaugh, Nephi Leiataua, Yvonne McDonald and Sok Chin Sonthose. We demand Justice for all Loved Ones killed by our local poLice not named here! Hold all the politricksters and poLice accountable who covered up and caused these deaths!  Hold The System accountable for not investigating SO MANY missing and murdered Black and Indigenous people!

We Demand that Mayor Selby step down.  JUST STEP DOWN.  Find a different job.  MAYOR MAYO SELBY NO MORE.

white Olympia Mayor Mayo Cheryl Selby recently compared the racist shooting of Andre Thompson and Bryson Chaplin THEY SURVIVED to the poLice lynching in Minneapolis of Black, Loved One, George Floyd in a public press release. SHE TOLD ON HERSELF when she did that.  She said there have been “changes” since the shooting of Andre and Bryson. She called Andre and Bryson by first name.  DON’T YOU CALL THESE YOUNG BLACK MEN BY THEIR FIRST NAMES AND CLAIM “CHANGE.” The poLice terror has not stopped.  Not for our family, not for our UNhoused neighbors, not for our Community.  Certainly not for Ryan Donald!!!!

TO OUR OLYMPIA AND EXTENDED COMMUNITY WE INVITE YOU TO LEARN MORE AND TO PLEASE TAKE ACTION 

for background about Andre Thompson and BRYSON Chaplin please read:

Two sons shot in the back by police: A mother’s cry for justice by Crystal Chaplin in the BayView https://sfbayview.com/2016/04/two-sons-shot-in-the-chest-by-police-a-mothers-cry-for-justice/

Shots Fired by Crystal Chaplin here in Poor Magazine https://www.poormagazine.org/node/5880

André Thompson and Bryson Chaplin Explain How It Feels to Survive a Police Shooting, They are brothers, and they both lived through it. by Siloh Radovsky for Teen Vogue  https://www.teenvogue.com/story/andre-thompson-and-bryson-chaplin-explain-how-it-feels-to-survive-a-police-shooting

What it's like to survive being shot by the police: Andre Thompson by vicenews https://news.vice.com/en_us/article/a3jjba/police-shooting-survivors 

Keeping Up with those KKKourt Dates: Justice for André and Bryson  in Poor Magazine https://www.poormagazine.org/node/5550 

The PoLice Terror of Olympia's Ryan Donald in Poor Magazine https://poormagazine.org/node/5865

Watch the short video Delivering T-shirts: Justice for Bryson and André https://youtu.be/WSh357NxkVk 

PLEASE FEEL OUR FIRE AND RAGE AND LOVE AND HELP  EMBODY OUR DEMANDS AND PUT THEM INTO ACTION 

We don’t have scripts - you could create some!!! Make calls! Make signs! Create murals! Scream across the Salish Sea!

CALLING MAYOR SELBY and our shitty officials is a place to start. 

Olympia City Council, PO Box 1967, Olympia, WA 98507-1967

Phone: 360-753-8447 (Olympia City Council)

Email: cselby@ci.olympia.wa.us

Call the kop loving Prosecutor who never holds kops accountable Jon TOONhime (360) 786-5540 

Call the Olympia PoLice Department, PoLice cheef Aaron Jelcick 360.753.8300

contact 

Governor Jay Inslee, Office of the Governor

PO Box 40002 Olympia, WA 98504-0002

Phone: 360-902-4111 TTY/TDD call 711 or

1-800-833-6388

E-Message:  https://www.governor.wa.gov/contact/contact/send-gov-inslee-e-message

THE CHAPLIN-THOMPSON FAMILY NEEDS A GOOD LAWYER and legal support to help with these demands and Struggle for Justice!  Please help connect the family with legal support send an email to Crystal Chaplin at olympiasurj@gmail.com.

#JusticeForAndreAndBryson #FireOfficerDonald #JailKillerCops #ReopenTheCase #FuckThePolice #BurnItDown #DisabilityJustice

WE DEMAND THIS CASE BE REOPENED AND THAT THERE IS AN OUTSIDE INVESTIGATION

Sending love to all survivors of poLice terror and to everyone who has lost a Loved One to killer kops. REOPEN ALL THE CASES 

BLACK LIBERATION MEANS COLLECTIVE LIBERATION AND WE WANT IT NOW

The police, an institution put in place to serve and protect civilians, has proven time and time again that when they are called, they spell nothing but trouble for black, brown, and/or poor people in general. I am Tibu, a formerly homeless youth resident of Homefulness and a long time member of POOR Magazine. I have seen first hand that we can't change that system, so immersed in the history of our nation that the idea of police brutality dated back to the founding of America, so at POOR Magazine we decided on a way to not rely on them at all. We are comprised of formerly homeless people of color, so calling the cops would mean a death sentence for us. So we came up with a way to solve internal conflicts without having to rely on intervention from our would-be killers. That way is a meeting/ healing circle called the Family Council.

In Family Councils, we bring up the issue with both parties involved in the room and other members weighing in. These councils are regulated by a chair, who follows a guideline called the Rules of Respect. I have been in many of these, but one that specifically stands out to me is when a certain member of Homefulness slandered our name, and when confronted about it told a series of lies that involved us harming her and attempting to evict her. Over the course of this issue, there were many Family Councils and different attempts at solving the problem peacefully. Because of solutions and mediations within those Family Councils, she left. If we had called the police on her in the beginning because we were trying to get her to leave as she was not following the rules that come with living here and not contributing in any way to this project the whole process would have been easier. However, we have no idea that if when we called the police on her, or took any sort of legal action, they might harm/kill her or us in the process, and the whole reason we came up with this process is so we wouldn't have to take that risk.

Family Councils are usually extremely uncomfortable, and long, but they are necessary for the kind of movement we are running. They perfectly encapsulate the hard work we put into making sure everyone is safe and listened to, especially the aggressors and conflict starters. Homefulness, POOR Magazine, and especially Deecolonize Academy (which I am a student of), cannot exist without the Family Council and Rules of Respect system, and due to both of those systems I can be confident in saying I have a strong grasp in problem-solving and conflict resolution. Movements like ours that consist of black, brown and poor people need resolution methods like these for survival. There is no other option, or last resort for us. We can't use one of these, but when it becomes too difficult call the police. We are the ones seen as enemies to this system, and relying on it to solve our problems takes the point away from our movement itself.   

With the deadly COVID 19 disease running out of control in the United States and no viable cure in sight, millions of Americans are faced with an uncertain future as poverty steadily rises at an exodus rate.  Due to pay cuts or income loss altogether it is difficult for the struggling majority to cover expenses necessary to accommodate the quality of life. Families are forced to either live in cars or tents and in a lot of cases, Cruel landlords taunt those who are faced with hard times instead of advocating to the powers that be the importance of keeping their tenants housed.  While president Trump claims that the economy is “improving”, the majority of the people say otherwise and the masses of people living in tents in the bay area shows otherwise also.

While the politicians are at a standstill trying to figure out a “bill” that doesn’t include allowing folks to starve to death, people are actually suffering and waiting in vain for the ruling countrymen and women to take a vote on much needed assistance. So far earlier in the year, “we the people” have received a stimulus payment for $1200 along with a $500 child credit that some parents to this day still did not receive. Many folks that I had spoken with in regards to the stimulus package had said that the $1200 payment barely covered a month’s worth of bills and almost immediately, they were right back in the hole again.

Other countries have opted to provide monthly assistance to the people residing within, for instance, Canada was consistent in assisting those in need by providing a monthly $1400 to people living there while Costa Rica provided a little over $200 (USD) a month. Bailout programs for employees in other countries have their wages covered up to 90 percent and 100 percent to those earning minimum wage in the event that the workers’ hours were cut or they lost their jobs due to the pandemic.

If the people living in the US were assisted with monthly support payments it would help to get the economy back on track in the long run and minimize the demonization of people and families who are forced to live in tents and automobiles.  Since the COVID outbreak city services have  been coming up short such as street cleaning, garbage and other obligations to help with the maintenance of the city. However traffic enforcement and utilities such as phone, internet, cable  and even convenience stores particularly in low-income neighborhoods have no boundaries when it comes to leniency during a pandemic and in many cases, businesses such as those mentioned above have inflated their prices capitalizing off the people’s hardship. 

Another tragic fact is that while there are complaints of the “blight” contributed by houseless folks there is no immediate housing available for many who are forced to live in the streets. One suggestion would be for homeless people to be compensated for the upkeep of any area they are “camped out” on, instead of power washing poor folks to the next street over. A percentage of what is earned can be set aside to tend to housing, mental health and substance abuse services. This suggestion that crossed my mind personally can help to motivate those living out on the street to utilize a fault that would help them to help themselves. 

What also proved to be helpful as a “temporarily band-aid” is that the owners of private parking lots and other slices of unused land have allowed for people who are forced to live in tents to “set up camps” on the space. There are security guards, porta potties and wash basins on the sites to accommodate the folks living there temporarily. Reports of violence, drug use and unsightly filth was very low due to the accommodations and the “camp sites” are cleaner because the “tenters”, formally “renters” have access to water, cleaning and hygiene products. Like I had mentioned before, those going through this hellish hardship deserve to have those who rule over this “richest country in the world” assist in helping us misfortunates get back on our feet without waiting hopelessly on the “votes” of the powerful to do the right thing by the people without “Taking a break from Capitol Hill” because while the politricksters are “breaking” real people are suffering and dying and when it comes to lives and folks’ livelihood that should be “non negotiable”...

Queennandi Xsheba PNN KEXU -2020

At Herbert Circle the view reaches from Eastside to San Pedro, from the Chicano Alps to shores of the North Pacific.

People hurry here from carne asada and weenie grills to huddle in the middle of the street.

To seize from the holiday a way of seeing themselves in their own light.

In anticipation for darkness to come rushing, for the show to begin,

I was early to stand among the crowd.

Following the first explosion from an artillery shell others take flight.

In an instant, night is set on fire.

Forbidden fireworks become sight.

Ground shakes.

Bright, boom, ah inhabitspace.

After just a moment, the wind carries pungent scents of sulfur to every hillside and hole.

The barrio flexes its muscle.

Youths assemble demonstrations, a competition for best in show with a combined sense of mischief and pride.

Parents gleam.

Children cheer from deep in the chest.

And abuelas caution missing fingers, encouraging grandchildren to run away from a hissing fuse.

Roman candles.

Piccolo Pete’s.

Butterflies.

Buzz grenades.

Fire crackers.

Cherry bombs.

M80s.

Sticks of dynamite.

Rockets rage.

Night sky filled with deafening thunder in hues of red, purple, green.

Blinding light.

Screeches.

Smoke.

Shots.

Screams.

Not from cops.

Not because of ICE.

Not tonight.

Not on the 4^th of July in City Terrace.

Following the show, we applaud the effort with full expression.

Some people whistle.

Others watch smoke figures retreat into the clouds, etching shapes of light in memory, storing sounds of pride for other times.

Kids promise parents to take part next year.

Elders slowly retreat, looking over their shoulder for one last blast.

And I, peering over the city from an ancient hillside, wish for an encore.

Silence ensues.

The Eastside is now, for a moment, all calm.

Royta Demarco Giles was a young 8-year-old black boy who was shot and killed at his local mall in Hoover, Alabama. He along with his sister, father, and mother were in the crossfire. His death is left with no answers, and I only beg to differ if we're asking the right question. Are we questioning ourselves enough and should we reevaluate our situation with our children and weapons?

Royta Demarco Giles’s mother who at this time wishes to be confidential about her identity is quoted saying ‘’They took a good one,’’ referring to her son who was shot and killed at 3 pm at a local mall called the RiverChase Galleria. The first shots were heard by witnesses at 3:18 pm. This is when 4 people along with Royta were riddled down with a hailstorm of bullets.

The family has been told that one suspect has been taken into custody, and the police department are confident there are more people responsible for the dramatic actions. This was not the only shooting at the Galleria. On November 22, 2018, Emantic Fitz ‘’EJ’’ Bradford Jr. was shot unjustly by police with a legal weapon as a black man.

EJ’s story is a different one but being similar in location and it’s ties to gun violence. EJ in short was a black man in the Galleria on thanksgiving. EJ had been shot by police because he was mistakenly taken as a suspect. The police who shot him said they thought EJ was an immediate threat and therefore was not convicted for shooting EJ.

I understand the right to bear arms is deeply embedded into the DNA of this country. Though it is hard to look at the truth. The fact of the matter is people are dying and the more we can have these discussions of gun violence the faster we can find a solution and find a light at the end of this tunnel.

The recent shooting in San Francisco’s Tenderloin district on June 22nd that left several people wounded was a sad reminder that even with the pandemic of covid-19 running rampant amongst us there is always room for not only police brutality, but for community violence. It’s horrible enough that we hold on to our families with paralyzing fear of police terror, we also have been cornered by a few unconscious folks from our very own communities that traumatizes us as well. 

In our hoods, there has been violence committed against elders at random, assaults on minors by adults and way too many unnecessary brawls where in some cases elders have egged on the youngsters, instigating fights that could have been avoided. Calling the police to deal with some of the issues had proven to be an epic fail as testimony from those in the community ranged from being treated fairly by very few authorities, to being made to feel inferior by officers who didn’t take the situation seriously and in one case, a cop smirked at a resident because he thought that the person was faking an injury. The question is what do you do when you have community conflict but no confidence in an institution that has taken an oath to protect and serve you? Who can broken people turn to when we cannot rely on a broken system that BROKE all of our spirits in the first place? How do you solve problems within the hood with only the input of just the hood?

Indeed there was a time when strong, fierce but wise elders had taken on the duty of being the mediators and regulators in the neighborhood and the younger generation did not show disrespect to the solutions the elders set forth, nor did we disobey them. If there were serious offences then the fathers, brothers, uncles, cousins and grandfathers would stand up as enforcers to ensure everyone’s safety. Everyone came together to guide the children in the right direction and no crime a youngster had done, especially in the presence of an elder went unpunished. Young girls rarely went out after dark without being accompanied by a male relative and we were taught to be an upgrade from the previous generation by not following in the footsteps of the elders’ shortcomings. Unfortunately that way of life slid through the cracks of community responsibility and has gotten lost.

Police departments from California to Georgia have been catching heat for the recent deaths of unarmed black citizens and others of universal majority and poverty status. Protests erupted across the nation and worldwide condemning a crime that has been committed against black folks since the kidnapping of our Ancestors from the motherland centuries ago. However, if

we are to address the violence our neighborhoods endure, we have to go across the whole board and name every angle whether it be a cop or a miseducated knucklehead that affects our communities and our lives. To turn the other cheek to the crimes that are being committed against us out of fear only enables wrongdoers, no matter who they are, to stagnate progress and continue to violate us with impunity.

As far as the hood goes, I overstand that there is an indescribable amount of pain, trauma, anger, tragedy, ptsd (post traumatic stress disorder AND post traumatic slave disorder), poverty, death, addiction and homelessness but the fact is that we must come together collectively and heal from these community ailments. We must re-learn to unpack the generational layers of inhumane treatment that have some folks possessing the mindstate of beastiality similar to the oppressors. Educate the children with wisdom and teach them right from wrong, skool them on why it is important that we show up in large masses whenever there is an issue of unjust instead of showing up by the dozens to spectate a boxing match. It is a difficult task but with a deep breath and logical thinking it can be accomplished.

Queennandi

Growing up, as my Mama's Sun and a formerly houseless student of a revolutionary school called Deecolonize Academy, I have read many books about the true history of the United States, one that until recently, wasn't eagerly taught by our country's public education system. I have heard stories time and time again of the man who discovered the place I live in today, and the many ways he tortured innocent indigenous people from all over the world. I learned about what came after, the brutal colonization of this land, and the slaves from another land that were brought here to build this civilization. However, hearing it in this fashion, with the words soaking into my brain as easily as water does into a paper towel, made it all the more easier to understand, and the different information being displayed far easier to understand than before. Mumia Abu-Jamal didn’t only tell the now widely known story of colonization and genocide, no, he went in depth in the philosophies behind the men and women who committed these atrocities. He examined these philosophies and used them to connect with the conflicts against poor people and people of color in modern day United States.

I have a wealth of political consciousness, and a lot in this book I was already aware of. However, with everything, there were some amazing teachings that I soaked up from this book, like the history of the Aryan race. The myth was that the Aryans, originating in what is now known as Iran, (Iran deriving from the word Aryan) were a blond haired, blue eyed, unusually intelligent and strongly built race of people who was a natural “civilizer” a conqueror. As time continued, the aryans made the mistake of mixing with non-whites, and creating a crossbreed that was shunned and looked upon with disgust. This is what has dominated the collective consciousness of white colonizers for millenia, one of its most famous representatives and believers being the german politician Adolf Hitler, who sought out the return of the pure race, the aryans of old.

The bastard childs of the pure aryan race were born, as the story is told, and through the ashes rose a new civilization, one advanced, conquering nation called the Teutons, or as I like to think of them, Aryan 2.0. Theodore Roosevelt, the 27th president of the USA, in a speech in 1906, stated that “ the world would have halted had it not been for the Teutonic conquests on alien lands”. The idea of the white conqueror, coming to civilize new and foreign lands with their presence is the idea that America is founded upon. The story about the Aryan race sets the foundation for the reasoning that 16th to 19th to 21st century colonizers had to rape indigenous land and people, steal their culture, and never stop. Mumia weaves these intricate and in-depth facts about history that give an interesting insight on how colonized thinking went on in the beginning, and how it continues to show its face in the modern day.     

In 1865, slavery was offically abolished in the United States. Abraham Lincoln single-handedly destroyed one of its biggest money making industries. Most of the people who led that industry ran the country, and influenced the passing of the bill that outlawed slavery, the 13th amendment, by adding things to it. They added that slavery wouldn’t take place “except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted.” This in turn created a whole new money making system for this country, the prison industrial system. People who are imprisoned work in slave-like conditions for the country, and in doing so create substantial revenue for it. Production of clothing, food development, recycling, and furniture production are a few modern factories that are run in prisons, but in California, a state known for its wildfires, the main prison occupation is firefighting.

California has been very good at its firefighting business, due to the fact that 60% of its firefighters are paid at most 1.15 USD an hour, and are bound by the prison system. Given the same training and stricter supervision than official firefighters, detained firefighters work for years for slave-like profits to get time off their sentences. After they are released, because of the criminal charge on their record, fire stations don't take them in and they are left with years of experience going to waste. In a time when forest fires are stronger than ever, California needed to make a change.

“CA’s inmate firefighter program is decades-old and has long needed reform. Inmates who have stood on the frontlines, battling historic fires should not be denied the right to later become a professional firefighter. Today, I signed #AB2147 that will fix that.” Those were the words of California's Governor Gavin Newsom, on the new bill he signed. Many people believe this is a step in the right direction, however, many more know that he has the power to completely dismantle the prison slave labor system in California, and is only putting this law into place because of necessity. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected many different people in different ways. In the case of the prisons, hundreds of inmates are dying because of improper management of these incarceration systems. Because of this, most prison inmates cannot fight fire on the front lines, and fires have raged in California further and less controlled than in recent years. One of the things that bother me about this, among the many civil and human rights violations, is the handling of COVID-19 in prison systems. I’m no genius, but I feel that with this whole outbreak, the prison systems could have improved drastically the way they handled COVID-19 in their penitentiaries.

In the constitution, declared by the 13th amendment, slavery was never officially abolished in the United States. For the past 100+ years the loophole of slavery being allowed in our prison system has served companies and the country in general very well. However, once a virus that doesn't allow them to use these slaves to the utmost breaks out, they need to pass a law giving those slaves and former slaves rights. The government of California is clearing the records of many reformed and most often not even guilty individuals who have put in years of work, but not paying them for the work they did. They are treating this small gift as an unbelievable act of kindness and not something that should have never needed to be done in the first place.    

This summer's People Skool for people with race, class and/or formal education privilege is coming up on August 29 and 30th! This workshop is aimed at service providers, media creators, educators, organizers, researchers, artists, legislators, policy-makers, donors/philanthropists, students, community members- anyone who wants to learn about following Black, Indigenous POC and poor leadership and aligning your work with poor people-led self determination movements. 

Fill out the application here or go to racepovertymediajustice.org to download a paper application and learn more. Please fill out the application by Tuesday August 25!

(please note- the application is long- it is the first step in the learning of this workshop, and includes reflecting on your life and circumstances).

Contact deeandtiny@poormagazine.org if you have questions, or if you want to find out about People Skool for poverty skolaz)

I'm Ziair and in my neighborhood West Oakland, hearing gun fire is normal. My brother got shot in the same hood where I live, so I really know how it is to have a family member shot. In West Oakland little kids as young as 11 have and play with guns. Kids that I hoop with carry weapons.

Me and my family have been impacted by gun violence when I lost a loved one.

Natalia Wallace, age 7 from Chicago. Natalia was “sweet, shy, loving, and good at math” said her family. In Chicago an innocent kind kid's life was taken, first degree murder. The getaway driver was found and denied bail. She was killed after being struck by a stray bullet at a family 4th of July party in the 100-block of North Latrobe Avenue.

Natalia was playing on a sidewalk when police said three armed men got out of a white car and fired more than 20 times in the direction of the people holding the party that police said included many children  Natalia was killed while playing with her cousins In a yard In the Austin neighborhood.

Losing my brother Torian was horrible. I didn't think it was real. I thought no, not my brother.

Everybody knew him and he knew everybody but some envied. Torian was killed by a black on black crime. He died in a park. Iit was traumatizing for me because my brother smiled at me while he was in the emergency car at the same time slowly dying. It really hurt me. I never knew somebody that close would die ,little did I know that would be the last time I would see him.