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For about three weeks starting on July 1st, a multiracial group of inmates from the Pelican Bay State Prison’s Secure Housing Unit or SHU, began a hunger strike to protest inhumane conditions such as arbitrary solitary confinement and more. Thousands more prisoners from 13 other California prisons joined the hunger strike in solidarity, bringing to light the cruel treatment they face. After years of unsuccessfully working through the complaint process and launching legal challenges, the inmates saw a hunger strike as the only way to call public attention to their conditions. Through the solidarity work of outside activists, the prisoners managed to express specific demands for an end to the human rights abuses they face. Their strategy worked – the strike generated more coverage of the conditions at Pelican Bay and other prisons in mainstream media than years of litigation, with article such as an Op-Ed in the New York Times, entitled “Barbarous Confinement.” The Guardian of London wrote, “The widespread use and abuse of solitary confinement in US prisons and jails is one of the nation’s most pressing domestic human rights issues, and also perhaps its most ignored.” As a result, the California Department of Corrections (CDCR) has come under scrutiny for failing to address the problems. On August 23rd, there will be a legislative hearing on Torture and the SHU at Pelican Bay. On July 21st, the Pelican Bay prisoners suspended their hunger strike based on assurances from the CDCR that some of their minor demands would be met immediately and that the rest would be addressed in the long term. There are reports that inmates in other prisons inspired by Pelican Bay to strike, are still going hungry. Today in Los Angeles, there will be a “Day of Action” from 10 am to 5 pm at the Ronald Reagan State Building, 300 S. Spring Street with a press conference at 11 am. And from 7 to 9 pm, there will be a demonstration outside the Men’s Central Jail, at 441 Bauchet St.

GUEST: Ron Ahnen, President of California Prison Focus, a member of the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition. Ron also sat on the mediation team between the hunger strike leaders at Pelican Bay and the CDCR

Read the statement from the Pelican Bay Prisoners Collective here: http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2011/07/27/18686182.php

Read the blog of the Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity activists at prisonerhungerstrikesolidarity.wordpress.com.