Building an Inside-led prison abolition movement:
An interview with Bennu Hannibal Ra-Sun
By Devin Cole posted on January 12, 2021
On Jan. 5, Devin Cole spoke with Free Alabama Movement co-founder and freedom fighter Bennu Hannibal Ra Sun about the economic side of the ongoing 30-day Economic Blackout and Alabama prison strike in January, the growth of social media and prison abolition, and what it will take to build a truly structured prison and slavery abolition organization.
Devin Cole
: Members of the Free Alabama Movement and other prison abolitionists are saying that Securus Technologies’ implementation of video visitation equipment is a front for permanently removing all in-person visitation and replacing it with video visitations only. Can you talk about these concerns and why they want to do away with in-person visitation?
Eleven Alabama prisoners begin hunger strike!
By Devin Cole posted on January 8, 2021
Occupied Muscogee Creek land Montgomery, Ala.
Ronnie Miller, after assault by guard.
With the announcement of the Alabama prison strike/30 Day Economic Blackout, 11 incarcerated workers in the segregation unit of Kilby Correctional Facility in Montgomery, Ala., have begun a hunger strike. (See “Alabama prisons: On Strike!” Workers World, Jan. 5)
They are protesting the inhumane conditions of the prison, as well as in all prisons across the state of Alabama.
On the morning of Jan. 4, a prisoner participating in the #Alabama11 hunger strike was beaten and bloodied by a guard for his participation in the hunger strike. The prisoner’s name is Ronnie Miller, #244648. He is out of the infirmary, but photos show him with a busted lip and large lumps on his head and cheek. Miller has been subjected to several beatings by guards at Kilby Correctional Facility.
Alabama prisons: ON STRIKE!
Occupied Muscogee Creek / Cherokee / Yuchi / Choctaw / Shawnee / Chickasaw land
As of Jan. 1, 2021, incarcerated workers in Alabama’s odious prison system are on strike! Led by the Free Alabama Movement, incarcerated workers throughout the state of Alabama have put down their work tools and refused to go to work from now until Jan. 31.
The inhumane conditions of Alabama Department of Corrections, their negligence around COVID-19, and their implementation of video visitation equipment in prisons that ADOC claims is “due to COVID,” but is really a front for eliminating in-person visitation, has contributed further to the psychological warfare against everyone incarcerated in Alabama prisons and has fueled this strike.