• Black Nova Scotia
  • Economy
  • Education
  • Environment
  • Health
    • COVID
  • Investigation
  • Journalism
  • Labour
  • Policing
  • Politics
    • City Hall
    • Elections
    • Province House
  • Profiles
  • Transit
  • Women
  • Morning File
  • Commentary
  • PRICED OUT
  • @Tim_Bousquet
  • Log In

Halifax Examiner

An independent, adversarial news site in Halifax, NS

  • Home
  • About
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Commenting policy
  • Archives
  • Contact us
  • Subscribe
    • Gift Subscriptions
  • Donate
  • Swag
  • Receipts
  • Manage your account: update card / change level / cancel
You are here: Home / Commentary / Black Lives Matter in prison, too

Black Lives Matter in prison, too

June 14, 2020 By El Jones 3 Comments

“[Senate Human Rights] Committee chair Senator Wanda Thomas Bernard looks into a cramped cell with two bunk beds at Dorchester Penitentiary.

A group of federally incarcerated Black prisoners have written the following statement. It was read to El Jones, and has been slightly edited for length and clarity.

We have been watching the Black Lives Matters protests and the conversations about police violence. We have been taking part in our own conversations with prisoners of all races. We would like to share some of our conversations and conclusions with people outside prison.

The movement against police brutality is important, but it is also larger than that. We must also address injustice in the criminal justice system, in prisons, and at parole. At every stage of this system, Black people and Indigenous people are discriminated against. We have come to realize that all these systems are connected.

Just two days ago, on Friday, Rodney Levi was shot and killed by police a few kilometres from Miramichi, New Brunswick. Atlantic Institution, the maximum security prison for the Atlantic region, is located in Renous, close to Miramichi. In sending our condolences to Rodney Levi’s family and friends, we also reflect on how many Indigenous men and women are held in federal prisons across this country.

Prisons are built in small rural towns. Recently, in a conversation with one of the workers, she told us she was in favour of the prison being built because it would offer jobs. When she was told about the conditions and that we do not have programs or any rehabilitation, she was shocked.

We want to send a message to people who believe that building a prison in their community will stimulate the economy. Prisons are not a retirement plan or social security. Putting money into prisons is not a solution to poverty or to any social problems. We ask people living in these communities to reject spending money to put more people, especially Black and Indigenous people, into prisons.

We have also learned that crime is at some of the lowest levels since 1969, and that crime is steadily dropping. How can crime be down, but we continue to incarcerate more and more people? We know that there is no connection between crime and funding prisons. Why are we building more prisons when reserves in this country don’t even have clean water?

We have seen many videos in the last few weeks of police brutality. In these times where all the police are under the threat of being caught on video, there is no one to catch what happens to us on camera. The violence and abuse against us in prisons is still hidden. We have had guards use racial slurs. We have had guards use racial slurs to white prisoners thinking they would agree. We are pepper sprayed and restrained. We have seen and heard people beaten and even die.

When we are charged in the institution, we don’t even have the right to a lawyer. We can be put into solitary confinement, transferred across the country away from our families and communities, and denied parole. There is no justice because no one can see, and no-one is there to defend us.

But even in the courts, where we had lawyers, we have experienced how racist the criminal justice system is. We are judged in front of all-white juries, the same people that may see videos of police shootings and defend the police. There is no prosecutorial oversight, and nobody to stop racist prosecutions. Even if we are in open court, nobody holds the prosecutors accountable for their behaviour. Many more of us simply take deals because we are threatened by higher sentences. It still feels like the 1920s in the courtroom.

All of this is supposed to happen so we can be rehabilitated. But has the public ever asked what prisoners are doing on a day-to-day basis? You might think that we are getting job training, or learning to deal with addictions or mental health problems. We are not. There is nothing to do in prison, and there are hardly any programs to help people. You might ask yourself then why we are spending so much many to keep people behind bars but doing nothing to fix any of the problems.

For Black people, parole is like a unicorn. We end up serving even longer sentences because we are judged by the colour of our skin. We are accused of being gang members. We are punished for talking together. Our visitors are accused of bringing in contraband, so we tell our mothers not to come and see us. Guards antagonize us and then discipline us when we respond. There are no programs made for us. And when we go in front of an all-white parole board, they will not let us out.

Every day, we are seeing people in the streets protesting for Black and Indigenous lives. We want to thank everyone for being where we can not be, and fighting what we cannot fight for. We also know that after the protests, Black lives will still not matter in prison.

We join the calls to defund the police, and we also say it is time to defund the prison. Canadians should ask themselves why so many Black and Indigenous people are incarcerated. You should ask yourselves why your money is going to a system that doesn’t work to solve crime. You should ask why a prison is being built in your community and whether it will actually make your life better.

We hope some of the experiences we have shared have made you think about some of the assumptions you might have about us, or about the idea that people get help in prison. We hope our words show you what you cannot see on video. We have heard people say until all Black lives matter, no one’s life can matter. Until Black prisoner lives matter, can anyone be free?

Filed Under: Commentary, Featured Tagged With: Black Lives Matter (BLM), defund police, life in prison, police brutality, police violence, racism in the justice system and in prison, Rodney Levi, Senator Wanda Thomas Bernard

Comments

  1. Paulette says

    June 16, 2020 at 10:45 am

    The status quo – a white person’s privilege – is the mentality that funds prisons – this mentality maintains oppression, discrimination, racism, overt bias and unconscious bias. The silencing of voices (protesting inequities and injustices) is the status quo and it is fuelled by the legal community and the courts who are disproportionally and unfairly incarcerating black and brown souls – especially at the provincial level. The deliberate and often unconcsious thinking/acting is this: black and brown populations are less worthy and therefore less human and less deserving of humanity, dignity and decency – it’s called systemic racism. Many white people in places of power (RCMP – Brenda Lucki for example) are unconscious and in denial – they have never studied in my view; they don’t know they don’t know. A leader should know better. This Chief Commissioner and others like her should be removed from these positions because they present a liability for change regarding respect and responsible accountability. Brenda Lucki represents the system that perpetuates the status quo and sustains a white privileged monopoly that targets the vulnerable and disenfranchised populations in Canadian society.

    Log in to Reply
  2. msheppard says

    June 16, 2020 at 1:30 pm

    The importance of the work you do on prison advocacy, El, cannot be overstated.

    For everyone who argues in favour of “free speech”, prisoners are individuals we deem as a society as unworthy of this right – from the expensive phone calls to the lack of right to vote. No one knows the government apparatus known as the criminal justice system better than the individuals directly implicated by it, yet we silence them and we do not seek them out. You seek them out and publish their voices for all. I hope people are listening.

    Log in to Reply

Trackbacks

  1. newsletter (summer 2020) – Prison Justice Network says:
    July 22, 2020 at 8:49 pm

    […] click here for resources, calls to action, news, inspiration, and publications by, for, & with prisoners/detainees! Table of Contents events Prison Justice Day Memorial Aug 10 (6-8pm) Trout Lake, Vancouver (Claire Culhane memorial bench), 1 https://facebook.com/events/750663738837338 Joy James (author of Resisting State Violence) talk July 30, 22 https://actionnetwork.org/events/fypu-joy-james https://fuc-series.org Stark Raven radio show Aug 3/Sept 7/Oct 5 (7-8pm), 2 http://prisonjustice.ca/stark-raven resources phone number for people incarcerated in Alouette to call, 1 [email protected] Coming Together Vancouver, 1 https://comingtogethervancouver.org Downtown Eastside Response, 2 https://dtesresponse.ca Who To Call Instead Of 911: BC Version, 25 https://i.redd.it/0llzn3607z751.jpg calls to action COVID 19 TV Donations, 1 https://lincsociety.bc.ca Sign ‘Contain Covid-19, Not People’, 3 https://change.org/p/give-ontario-prisoners-access-to-free-phone-calls/u/25992231 Defund the Vancouver Police, 3 https://instagram.com/defundvpd Sign to ban police street checks in BC, 3 https://act.bccla.org/banstreetchecks End policing in Vancouver schools, 3 https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdw7TzWwlzUCAdBTAewwwckxjwuYOb9uwUeFyFZv14_vRAOBg/viewform?fbzx=-8967389605019866402 Ban police use of facial recognition technology, 3 https://action.openmedia.org/page/63295/petition/1 Support demands of Maplehurst (Milton) hunger strikers, 12 https://docs.google.com/document/u/5/d/e/2PACX-1vRYJk6j0OLoGQvzb95gW4Yw7QM1W5uQ8oyEVtZjosKWlAdBj6bBthpEIXD2nGB9jqMExZ9ccXxH-i1Q/pub Demand status now for migrants, 3 https://harvestingfreedom.org/2020/06/18/four-ways-you-can-take-action-in-support-of-farm-workers-demands-for-dignity Denounce tracking bracelets on migrants, 4 https://solidarityacrossborders.org/en/tracking-bracelets Sign to bring Abdulrahman home, 4 https://bringabdulhome.ca Support people in Kashmir including free all political prisoners, 4 https://petitions.ourcommons.ca/en/Petition/Sign/e-2607 https://actionnetwork.org/letters/canadian-government-urged-to-hold-india-accountable-in-regard-to-grave-situation-in-occupied-kashmir news Call for inquest into death at Mission from covid-19, 4 https://bccla.org/news/2020/04/thirty-eight-rights-groups-call-on-bcs-chief-coroner-to-direct-immediate-public-inquest-into-death-in-corrections-custody Lawsuit from Mission against CSC, 4 https://noprisons.ca/federal Lawsuit from Joliette against CSC, 4 https://noprisons.ca/federal Petition for Collins Bay release, 4 https://noprisons.ca/federal Prison Is A Death Sentence events, 5 https://springmag.ca/prison-is-a-death-sentence Hunger strike Lindsay “super jail”, 5 https://facebook.com/TorontoPrisonersRightsProject/posts/171879661018615 Hunger strike OCDC in ON, 6 https://tpcp-canada.blogspot.com/2020/06/update-hunger-strike-ends-at-ocdc.html Migrant farmworkers, 5 https://migrantworkersalliance.org/unheededwarnings US prisoners and COVID-19, 6 https://propublica.org https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2768249 Hunger Strike at NWDC in WA, 6 http://laresistencianw.org AZ detainees file lawsuit, 6 https://firrp.org Detainees strike against racism and abuses of healthcare, 7 https://www.ourprism.org/1952428 https://democracynow.org/2020/7/7/otay_mesa_covid_outbreak WA farmworkers win strikes, 7 http://familiasunidasjusticia.org inspiration Noise demos at prisons, 8 https://fb.me/prisonjusticevan Solidarity at Bordeaux, 9 https://thelinknewspaper.ca/article/anti-carceral-group-organizes-noise-demonstration-outside-bordeaux-prison Memorial at Bordeaux, 10 https://noprisons.ca/voices/may24 How Toronto Prisoners’ Rights Project grew to 56 people, 11 https://youtube.com/watch?v=TXckQmgYK-s https://torontoprisonersrightsproject.org Decriminalize Seattle wins 50% cut to police budget, 12 https://decriminalizeseattle.com publications P4W Memorial and art, 12 https://www.modernfuel.org/files/Syphon%205.0_digital.pdf https://p4wmemorialcollective.com We Can’t Police the Pandemic dialogue videos, 13 https://youtube.com/channel/UCkH3byXyGKX0yAET_O9Iprg Webinar videos, 14-16 https://facebook.com/TorontoPrisonersRightsProject/videos or https://facebook.com/CSSDPRyerson/videos Defunding Police and Prisons A Wall is Just a Wall: Open Mic Prison Is A Death Sentence Indigenous Knowledge & Abolition Supporting Those Left Inside Censorship in Prisons webinar video https://tpcp-canada.blogspot.com/2019/04/care-and-compassion-in-community-not.html Black Liberation and Prison Abolition webinar video https://facebook.com/watch/live/?v=1008665122881563 Learning Together (while staying apart): Online Events video links https://haymarketbooks.org/blogs/124-learning-together-while-staying-apart-online-event-schedule Decarceration from the US to Palestine Abolition Can’t Wait: An Online Teach-in with #8toAbolition A Stronger Desire to Live: PEN Prison Writing Celebrating Juneteenth with Critical Resistance The Fire This Time: The New Uprising Against Racism and Police Violence with Marc Lamont Hill and Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor Abolish ICE is Not Just a Slogan: Immigrant Justice in the Age of Coronavirus with John Washington and Justin Akers Chacón Mutual Aid: Building Communities of Care During Crisis and Beyond with Mariame Kaba and more On the Road with Abolition Ruthie Wilson Gilmore with Naomi Murakawa Sick of the System – new Ebook https://btlbooks.com/book/sick-of-the-system Never Go Back to Normal by Michigan Abolition and Prisoner Solidarity, 17 https://michiganabolition.org/2020/06/06/were-never-going-back-to-normal Pandemic and prison in WA, 18 https://waprisonhistory.org/pandemic-prison Defund police in “Canada”, 18-19 https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2020/06/09/End-of-Policing http://tiny.cc/defund-police-elearning https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2020/07/13/Locking-Youth-Up-After-Overdose-More-Harm https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/defund-police-canada-black-indigenous-lives_ca_5ed65eb2c5b6ccd7c56bdf7d https://vice.com/en_ca/article/bv8med/racism-kills-in-canada-as-much-as-in-the-united-states How to Support Harm Doers in Being Accountable video, 19 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhANo6wzBAA http://bcrw.barnard.edu/building-accountable-communities #DefundPolice Toolkit https://issuu.com/interruptingcriminalization/docs/defund_tooklit Cancel Canada Day video with Idle No More, 22 https://facebook.com/IdleNoMoreCommunity/videos/608003983157857 Canada Day What? Fighting Colonialism & Anti-Black Racism, speakers Eriel Tchekwie Deranger (Indigenous Climate Action) and El Jones (Black Power Hour https://ckdu.ca/shows/227), 22 https://facebook.com/MigrantRightsCA/videos/913957022455076 Uprising for Black Lives video, 20 https://haymarketbooks.org/blogs/173-sayhername-charleena-lyles-police-murder-and-the-uprising-for-black-lives Ruth Wilson Gilmore, 20 https://www.ucl.ac.uk/racism-racialisation/transcript-conversation-ruth-wilson-gilmore Solutions are with us, 21 https://nacla.org/blog/2020/05/14/opportunistic-border-logic-pandemic Black political prisoners in US, 21 https://pageone.noblogs.org/files/2020/06/BL_PPzine5.pdf https://thejerichomovement.com Fire This Time video with Angela Y. Davis, Herman Gray, Gaye Theresa Johnson, Robin D.G. Kelley, and Josh Kun, 22 https://youtube.com/watch?v=3I22E2Sezi8 Storming migrant detention, 22 https://trueleappress.files.wordpress.com/2020/02/168.-freeheartlandkids-miigrant-detention-center-stormed.pdf Border militarization video, 22 https://tni.org/en/article/walls-must-fall Black Lives Matter in prison, 23-24 https://halifaxexaminer.ca/featured/black-lives-matter-in-prison-too […]

    Log in to Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

PRICED OUT

A collage of various housing options in HRM, including co-ops, apartment buildings, shelters, and tents
PRICED OUT is the Examiner’s investigative reporting project focused on the housing crisis.

You can learn about the project, including how we’re asking readers to direct our reporting, our published articles, and what we’re working on, on the PRICED OUT homepage.

2020 mass murders

Nine images illustrating the locations, maps, and memorials of the mass shootings

All of the Halifax Examiner’s reporting on the mass murders of April 18/19, 2020, and recent articles on the Mass Casualty Commission and newly-released documents.

Updated regularly.

Uncover: Dead Wrong

In 1995, Brenda Way was brutally murdered behind a Dartmouth apartment building. In 1999, Glen Assoun was found guilty of the murder. He served 17 years in prison, but steadfastly maintained his innocence. In 2019, Glen Assoun was fully exonerated.

Halifax Examiner founder and investigative journalist Tim Bousquet has followed the story of Glen Assoun's wrongful conviction for over five years. Now, Bousquet tells that story as host of Season 7 of the CBC podcast series Uncover: Dead Wrong.

Click here to go to listen to the podcast, or search for CBC Uncover on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or any other podcast aggregator.

The Tideline, with Tara Thorne

Two young white women, one with dark hair and one blonde, smile at the camera on a sunny spring day.

Episode 79 of The Tideline, with Tara Thorne, is published.

Grace McNutt and Linnea Swinimer are the Minute Women, two Haligonians who host a podcast of the same name about Canadian history as seen through a lens of Heritage Minutes (minutewomenpodcast.ca). In a lively celebration of the show’s second birthday, they stop by to reveal how curling brought them together in podcast — and now BFF — form, their favourite Minutes, that time they thought Jean Chretien was dead, and the impact their show has had. Plus music from brand-new ECMA winners Hillsburn and Zamani.

Listen to the episode here.

Check out some of the past episodes here.

Subscribe to the podcast to get episodes automatically downloaded to your device — there’s a great instructional article here. Email Suzanne for help.

You can reach Tara here.

Sign up for email notification

Sign up to receive email notification when we publish new Morning Files and Weekend Files. Note: signing up for this email is NOT the same as subscribing to the Halifax Examiner. To subscribe, click here.

Recent posts

  • Dartmouth man charged with wilful promotion of hatred May 19, 2022
  • “Representation matters”: Vince Williams talks about the inaugural CFL Officiating Academy training camp May 18, 2022
  • Developer wants to clear trees early at fast-tracked Dartmouth development sites May 18, 2022
  • Property owner applies to infill Halifax Harbour at Dartmouth Cove May 18, 2022
  • Halifax chief administrative officer Jacques Dubé resigns May 18, 2022

Commenting policy

All comments on the Halifax Examiner are subject to our commenting policy. You can view our commenting policy here.

Copyright © 2022