Rattling The Bars

The prevalence of sexual violence in the US prison system is so widespread and accepted that it's often made the butt of jokes in popular culture. Yet the reality is that countless survivors of the prison system carry the scars and traumas of sexual abuse—and for many, the perpetrators of these crimes were the very prison staff charged with their protection. Juvenile victims of the prison system a...

From Assata Shakur to Leonard Peltier, social movements have lifted up political prisoners as revolutionary examples and fought protracted, often decades-long campaigns to secure their release. Now, a new collection from AK Press, Rattling the Cages: Oral Histories of North American Political Prisoners , gathers the experience and wisdom of some 30 political prisoners in one place for the first ti...

The system of mass incarceration in the US offers few second chances to prisoners, and Maryland is no exception. As The Real News has previously reported , the state's parole system puts incarcerated people at the mercy of an inefficient, capricious process that is unlikely to deliver a speedy release for many. Now, a new bill in the Maryland legislature could create new pathways to freedom for pr...

A group of current and former prisoners have sued the state of Alabama with the support of two unions who have signed on as co-plaintiffs, the Union of Southern Service Workers, and the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union. The lawsuit claims that Alabama's system of prison labor amounts to a "modern-day form of slavery" that generates massive profits for private businesses and revenues fo...

The US has one of the highest prisoner recidivism rates in the world: over 70% of incarcerated people who are released from prison in the US will be rearrested within five years of their release date. That is not an accident. Our system of mass incarceration sets people up to fail as they leave the prison system and try to reintegrate into society. That is why organizations like Hope for Prisoners...

The crisis of mass incarceration is about more than the conduct of police officers—it's a question of public expenditures, and how pouring taxpayer money into incarceration at the expense of other, more humanizing ventures takes a toll on society at large. As public schools and public health programs across the nation grapple with a host of preventable problems arising from underinvestment, state...

Black people have produced their own historical accounts as long as Black people have been in America. From oral tradition to the first publications of Phyllis Wheatley, to the many Black publishing houses and newspapers that blossomed after emancipation, Black people have always been the foremost chroniclers and documenters of their own stories. Now, a new collection compiles some 400 historical...

Last June, the state of Wisconsin placed two correctional institutions in Green Bay and Waupun on lockdown due to concerns about overcrowding and the quality of facilities. In the ensuing months, several other Wisconsin state prisons have been affected by the lockdown, and Gov. Evers has yet to present a clear plan to end it. Meanwhile, thousands of incarcerated people have been trapped in horrend...

The nightmarish reality of the prison industrial complex depends on a vast array of stereotypes and tropes about incarcerated people that have proliferated through our culture. From the myth of the ‘superpredator’ to other racist and anti-poor constructions of the prisoner, the real stories and lives of the human beings trapped in the prison system are obscured by a veil of assumptions propagated...

Regarded by many as a form of torture, abolishing solitary confinement has become a goal for many activists for prison reform and abolition. In Washington, DC, the End Solitary Confinement 2023 bill would seek to end the practice in District facilities by requiring incarcerated people have access to at least eight hours a day outside their cells. Herbert Robinson, co-facilitator of the Unlock the...

Less than 15 percent of parole-eligible prisoners serving life sentences in Maryland have been released since 2015. With advocates across the state clamoring for parole reform , Maryland's legislature has the opportunity to address the state's soul-crushing parole system this legislative session. Al Brown and Tyrone Litte, who each served decades in Maryland's prison system, join Rattling the Bars...

The 13th Amendment of the US Constitution makes an exception to the abolition of slavery in order to permit the use of "involuntary servitude" as punishment for a crime. The modern system of mass incarceration depends on this exception to justify paying millions of incarcerated people subminimum wages that many advocates say is virtually indistinguishable from forms of slavery. Various US states a...

The holiday season is a time to be spent with loved ones—yet for the nearly 2 million people incarcerated in US jails and prisons at any given time, that's not a possibility. Rattling the Bars host Mansa Musa and TRNN Editor-In-Chief Maximillian Alvarez discuss how the holidays are experienced behind bars. Click here to watch Max's interview with Eddie Conway on being incarcerated during the holid...

Malik Rahim, a former Black Panther and long-time prison and housing activist, joins Rattling the Bars to discuss the conditions faced by prisoners at the notorious Louisiana State Penitentiary, more commonly known as "Angola." Rahim also delves into the necessity of environmental justice in the face of a future where climate collapse and fascism will come hand-in-hand. Studio: Cameron Granadino,...

Four Louisiana police officers in the city of Baton Rouge are facing charges in connection to the torture and sexual abuse of a detainee at a secret torture warehouse known as the 'Brave Cave.' Two lawsuits and the separate testimony of a third victim describe a pattern of abuse and torture perpetrated by the now-disbanded anti-street crime unit of the Baton Rouge police. Rev. Alexis Anderson of P...

Thomas "Tahaka" Gaither was out on parole when then-Gov. Glendening of Maryland revoked parole for all persons convicted of a life sentence. Since the late 1990s, Gaither has remained incarcerated—despite once having been deemed fit for release. His story is not unusual for those who've experienced Maryland's parole system. Since 2015, barely half of 523 parole-eligible prisoners serving life sent...

El Salvador's Nayib Bukele has now suspended the rule of law in his country for 18 months, during which time more than 70,000 people have been rounded up and imprisoned without trial in the naming of stopping crime. While Bukele's approval rating has skyrocketed, many families of the incarcerated paint a much grimmer picture of suspended civil liberties and indefinite detention. TRNN contributor M...

After two years of resistance against the proposed "Atlanta Public Safety Training Center," more commonly known as Cop City, more than 60 activists associated with the movement have been indicted on RICO charges. The push to build Cop City and the heavy-handed state response to local protests cannot be separated from the past decade of neoliberal crisis and anti-police protests rocking Atlanta and...

While the death penalty has been abolished in 23 states and Washington, DC, other states are doubling down on the barbaric practice of capital punishment. Idaho wants to bring back firing squads, and now the state of Alabama is pushing to become the first state to execute a death row inmate, Kenneth Smith, by forcing him to inhale pure nitrogen. Why are these states seeking such cruel execution me...

After 52 years of incarceration, Edward Alan Poindexter is among the longest serving political prisoners in US and world history. Originally part of the "Omaha Two," Poindexter and Mondo we Langa, both leaders of the Omaha Black Panthers, were convicted of the murder of Omaha police officer Larry Minard in 1971. Poindexter and we Langa's case has long been a subject of scrutiny, with Amnesty Inter...

Read the transcript of this podcast: https://therealnews.com/george-jacksons-unfinished-revolution At the age of 18, George Jackson was condemned to a prison sentence of one year to life for the alleged robbery of $70 from a Los Angeles gas station. Jackson spent the remainder of his short life behind bars, but it was from the confines of prison that he became one of the most powerful revolutionar...

Read the transcript of this podcast: https://therealnews.com/juvenile-sentencing-in-the-us-is-barbaric-racist-and-ineffective “The United States is the only country in the world that permits youth to be sentenced to life without parole,” the Juvenile Law Center notes. “Sentencing children to die in prison is condemned by international law . For children or adults, a sentence of life without parole...

The shocking arrest, prosecution, and imprisonment of Nebraska teen Celeste Burgess and her mother, Jessica Burgess, has now become one of the best-known cases of abortion criminalization in post-Roe America. But the Burgess case is just the tip of the iceberg. Since the 2022 Supreme Court Dobbs decision, abortion bans only make it easier to criminalize all pregnancy outcomes. Emma Roth of Pregnan...

The revelations of widespread torture of detainees at the illegal US naval base in Guantanamo, Cuba, rattled the American conscience during the Bush Jr. administration. Two decades later, detainments at Guantanamo continue, but the public has largely moved on. Yet for many former detainees of Guantanamo, release from their former prison has just opened a new chapter of horrors. A recent report fro...

Mass incarceration as we know it today owes much of its existence to the political rationale created by the War on Drugs. Although proffered as a solution to the public health crisis of drug addiction, prisons actually provide little in the way of real care or rehabilitation for people struggling with substance abuse. In Alaska, True North Recovery, an addiction treatment and advocacy organization...