Note: Mississippi activists rally and call for an end to prison deaths. From the article below, here is a list of the organizations supporting and in solidarity with this effort, which is impressive, and includes the following:
Mississippi Dreams Prisoner Family Support, Mississippi NAACP, ACLU of Mississippi, Southern Poverty Law Center, Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee (IWOC) of Mississippi, People's Advocacy Institute, One Voice, Mississippi Rising Coalition, the Womanist Alliance, Mississippi Reproductive Freedom Fund, Second Chance Initiative MS, Justice for Jaylan Campaign, Families Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMM), and Alternate Roots, and many others.
I am thankful to my friend and journalist colleague, Earnest McBride of the Jackson Advocate, for sharing his article.
January 19, 2020
Justice Initiative
Rally to end prison deaths
at State Capitol
The murder scenes inside Mississippi state prisons keep getting bloodier and bloodier. The series of pictures captured on inmates' bootleg cell phones less than two weeks ago reveal to the world the deadly truth that Mississippi officials spend a lot more effort to suppress than they have to stop the shocking murders and violent assaults that seem to have no end.
Dozens of protesters including relatives of the captive victims of the prison system and spokespersons of organizations with thousands of members from around the nation gathered outside the State Capitol Tuesday to demand that the state stop the murders immediately.
Lea Campbell of the Mississippi Poor People's Campaign read a plea for solidarity from the Rev. William Barber, the group's national chairman:
"
Today the movement for justice in this nation can't be silent and must stand together to insist that our brothers behind those walls be treated like human beings,"
Barber's message said.
Several speakers reminded the crowd that Mississippi prison conditions have been so bad for so long that feds have had to intervene at least five times over the last 30 years, ordering the state to change its inhumane and unconstitutional prison operations.
"The truth is that MDOC prisons have never been under any kind of control," Campbell said.
Five slayings in the state's prisons closed out the year 2019. The organization Civil Justice Advocates points out that the prison system has a 50 percent staff vacancy rate. The inmate death toll in the Mississippi system has spiked from an average of 51 deaths a year between 2001 and 2014 to 85 in fiscal 2018 and 80 in 2019. Because state authorities have failed to account for the deaths, Civil Justice Advocates is asking the U. S. Department of Justice to investigate instead.
"Mississippi is experiencing a prison crisis of its own making: by locking up too many Mississippians for too long and paying too little to keep safe the population that the state incarcerates," the group says in a Jan. 7 news release.
The Prison population in MS was reported as 24,226 by MDOC in January 2019.
Outgoing Governor Phil Bryant blames the prisoners, the victims, for causing their own deaths. In his view, the state of Mississippi and its officials are blameless, like Pilate condemning Christ to death while washing his own hands of the matter.
Brenda Scott, president of the MASE/CWA Local 3750, the Union that represents prison guards, said Bryant's repeated cuts of the MDOC budget has resulted in the state's inability to hire the staff needed to keep a semblance of order in the prisons.
"It is a majority female work force in a male-dominated prison industry," Scott said. "They go to work from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. If your replacement (relief) fails to show, you cannot abandon your post because it's a public safety issue"
The governor has cut the budget six time in two years, Scott said. "When you cut resources, you have less service. These guys are all about private prisons. Nothing is going to change for us unless we demand it, stand up and fight back against what's happening."
Meanwhile, Corrections Commissioner Pelicia Hall announced her resignation for mid-January. She was appointed commissioner in 2017 after serving as MDOC chief of staff for two years.
Included in the large number of organizations in solidarity with Tuesday's rally were Mississippi Dreams Prisoner Family Support, Mississippi NAACP, ACLU of Mississippi, Southern Poverty Law Center, Incarcerated Workers Organizing Committee (IWOC) of Mississippi, People's Advocacy Institute, One Voice, Mississippi Rising Coalition, the Womanist Alliance, Mississippi Reproductive Freedom Fund, Second Chance Initiative MS, Justice for Jaylan Campaign, Families Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMM), and Alternate Roots, and many others.
Steven Harris, the founder-director of Second Chance Initiative Mississippi, led the march around the capitol at the end of the rally. Harris is a former MDOC inmate and is dedicated to prison reform and the civil rights of the incarcerated.
