Back Broken: No Adequate Medical Help at Kern Valley State Prison

Please share this letter, in hopes his voice will be heard and someone helps him and contacts him, he needs help and is in intense pain with being denied proper medical treatment by CDCR, he needs proper tests and surgery asap and CDCR is denying all pain meds or anything that will help him walk, his address is below.


Dearest Kendra,                                                                                                        6/25/2012

Hi how are you doing? I’m sorry I have not responded back to your last letter but the reason for that is because I suffered a misfortune, I broke my back on 4-6-2012. And till this day, I have not been getting adequate medical treatment. I am currently under excruciating pain and am wearing this cardio vascular vest since April 20^th 2012. 


Here are the facts of my misfortune, on April 6^th 2012 while on the yard playing spores I went for the ball and three bodies landed on my back while I was pinned semi bent, I held their weight for a quick second but then I fell and my back broke in half. I was unable to get up at all and the correctional officers forced me to walk to medical or they told me that I was not going to get any medical treatment or seen I should say. 


So the other two inmates had to carry me to the yard clinic and laid me down on the bench and left. While there I explained to c/o’s and medical staff how my back felt while there was forced to get up and into shackles by c/o’s until the paramedics arrived.

Short thereafter  arrived in Delano Medical Regional Center where I was put in a room for hours until x-rays were performed on my back only to tell me that nothing was wrong with me, quoting from them “you only have back ‘spasms’.” I was like how are you going to tell me there’s nothing wrong when I’m telling you I cannot walk nor stand on my feet? I was kicked back on the yard with no pain medications, no walker, etc… 


On April 11, 2012, I was seen by the yard doctor and I explained to him that I couldn’t walk and that my back feels loose and that I’m in severe pain. He then examined my back and noticed it was swollen and had bumps so he ordered x-rays and so on. 


April 13 2012, I went and got x-rays. On April 17 2012, while in my cell I get called to the institutional hospital and as soon as I arrived the Doctor tells me that I have fractured vertebrae L-1 and a squished disc. I was sent to Bakersfield to be seen by specialist and was told I could end up paralyzed.

Look I’m sorry I may not make any sense but it’s a little difficult for me to focus, I been on my back for 2 months and some change now wearing this vest that does not help me at all, let alone this pain I have to go through 24/7 since having put this vest on. I have not received any pain medications nor a walker, etc… Although I have a (CDCR) Chrono for such. Look I don’t want to bored you with my problems but I wanted to ask you if by chance you know of any law firms that deal with suits, I’m unable to write and the appeals that I do submit are all being sent back to me and need legal & professional help.

As for the hunger strike at Corcoran (ASU), the warden (Warden Gipson) promised all these things on the petition but did not follow through on anything and yes, Christian Gomez died due to not eating. Sorry for this long delay hope to hear back from you, may you and your loved ones enjoy your day/night…

Respectfully,

Juan Jaimes

CDC# V-08644

K.V.S.P., A-6-107

P.O. Box 5101

Delano, CA 93216

Written on 6/25/2012 to Kendra Castaneda, postmarked on 6/27/2012 and transcribed on 6/29/2012. Due to his handwriting very scratchy, it was difficult to make some words out.

Juan Jaimes was one of the main three petitioners for the Corcoran ASU hunger strike for better conditions that happened in December 2011/January 2012 who was transferred to Kern Valley State Prison by CDCR in hopes the strike broke up. http://sfbayview.com/2012/corcoran-officials-retaliate-against-hunger-strikers/

New Email Group and Movement: Prisoners’ Families United to Take Action

Our new email group and movement, Prisoners’ Families United to Take Action, is intended for all families with loved ones in prison throughout California from all walks of life, all racial backgrounds, all economic backgrounds, all cultural backgrounds and all California prisons – from Pelican Bay in the far north to Calipatria in the far south – to come together as one in unity, building resistance and taking action against CDCR (California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation) to fight for our loved ones’ human rights. Resistance of families in unity as one! The more families from all different prisons that bind together, the more power we have to take a bold stand against CDCR to stop their corrupt tactics on our loved ones suffering in segregation.

Families have been inspired to unite by the unity California prisoners demonstrated during the hunger strikes of July and September 2011, when a historic 12,000 prisoners in 13 prisons joined the strike. Families are the strongest voice of our loved ones who suffer within these segregation units – SHU, AdSeg and ASU under CDCR – whose voices have been silenced for years and decades with the torture they have had to endure.

We as families need to carry their voices to the general public to be heard in a bold way during this battle against CDCR and fight for our loved ones. It is up to us, the families, to convince the general public that prisoners – whether they really committed crimes or were wrongly convicted – are human beings who deserve human rights and respect for their dignity.

We are sick and tired of the cruel and inhumane CDCR practices of indefinite solitary confinement, gang validation that can’t be challenged, “security threat group” labels that keep our loved ones in segregation, negligent medical care or none at all, little to no food, no rehabilitation programs, guards inciting racial violence for their amusement, denial of and harassment during visits – and we will expose their cruel tactics to the public!

Families’ unity statewide is needed now more than ever to carry the goals of the five core demands to fruition; we cannot and will not leave our loved ones to fight CDCR alone and risk death or permanent damage from starvation once again. We are the loved ones of men and women suffering inside the torture chambers called segregation units within those prison walls, and our voices will be heard.

There are a couple of ways to join this new email group and movement: Go to www.yahoo.com and search in their Yahoo Groups section under “PrisonersFamAction,” or go to the group home page and join by typing this in your internet browser: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PrisonersFamAction.

To send a message into the group after you’ve joined, just send it through your email to: PrisonersFamAction@yahoogroups.com.

Most respectfully and moving forward in the struggle,

Kendra Castaneda

kendracastaneda55@gmail.com

My bogus validation under CDCR and the inhumane treatment/torture I have endured at Calipatria State Prison ASU

Received via email.

In June 2002, when I was 21 years of age, I arrived at the institution of Pelican Bay State Prison. That is the institution where I was housed at after I left LA County Jail. I was at Pelican Bay State Prison for eight to nine years, most of the time when I was at PBSP I had spent it in the SHU. While I was in the SHU at Pelican Bay State Prison and at each Institution Committee hearing I had; the SHU ‘ICC’ would always tell me “We know you are associated with a prison gang and we want to know”. They tried to make me accept it and force me to accept I was a part of a prison gang many times when I never was. I never bit into PBSP/CDCR’s game that they tried to play with me.

Once I finally got out of the SHU at PBSP in 2008, I was allowed to go to General Population for about a year and a half given clear status, then I was given a transfer to Corcoran for five to six months. After I did those few months at Corcoran without any 115 write-ups, I was transferred to Calipatria State Prison. In 2010, I arrived at Calipatria State Prison and I was on General Population for about six months until I was picked up by the (IGI) Institutional Gang Investigator E. Duarte based on artwork that PBSP tried to use on me when I was there in 2006 to try and validate me in 2006/07. The IGI’s put me in Administration Segregation (Ad-Seg/A5) at Calipatria for this bogus validation saying that I was involved in prison gang activity when I never involved myself in any type of conduct. The reason for me transferring down to a prison closer south was to be close to home by my family and to have a better time with all the rest of my family. I wasn’t going to do anything to jeopardize receiving a 115 write-up now that I was able to be closer to them. But, when I was transferred to Calipatria and while in general population I realized it was harder to receive visits from my family because they had to go through the approval process all over again at Calipatria after being previously approved from Pelican Bay.

When I was served with the bogus validation paperwork, about six to eight IGI’s were telling me that they were after me since I was previously from Pelican Bay State Prison. They also were telling me that in here at Calipatria State Prison the IGI’s falsely told me that a confidential informant told them that I was in a prison gang. I was programing just fine and there was no evidence of a confidential informant and the evidence the IGI’s tried to falsely slam me with was not strong enough to validate me and was false. During this process of being validated on this bogus validation I lost 3 family members; they all past away and my family called the prison a few times so I could get the news of the passing of my loved ones. Calipatria never gave me that message while I was being placed in ad-seg, the IGI’s kept it from me and I had to find out later.

The IGI’s at Calipatria, they took away all of my legal documents of my case I was working on and they trashed them. While I was moved into ASU at Calipatria from A5, during the first two weeks while in ASU, I was given a Chrono 1030, it was put in my file by officers without me knowing. I had to ask for an “Olson Review” in the month of June 2011 to find out what they placed in my file. Then in April 2011, IGI E. Duarte at the ASU unit, planted two weapons in my cell on purpose while I was out to yard. I was given a 115 CDCR write up for those weapons placed in my cell by IGI E. Duarte. My mail is always being tampered with and trashed by officers. All the IGI’s, they mess with us by harassment, mentally, physically by putting us in cuff tie ups, giving us small portions of food, ripped up clothes, trashing our outgoing mail, IGI’s planting specific artwork in our cells while we are at the showers/yard (that are used later to purposely validate us), the IGI’s go into our cell and put toothpaste in our sink with our pictures in the toothpaste and shampoo in our food mixed together.

During the 2^ndHunger Strike last year in September – October 2011, I was rushed to the hospital and in the emergency room the medical-RN staff they tried to take blood out of me for the 2^nd time in a week. While they were trying to take blood out of me, the nurse she didn’t see that she broke the needle in my arm within the view of a lot of fellow prisoners.

At this moment I’m being denied proper “medical attention” for the pain in my feet. I have them all cracked from the bottom and have a few toe nail fingers in pain because of all the flesh cracked I have in my feet. It has been going on for many years. Last month in May, many of us inmates here at Calipatria ASU were finally allowed to be seen at an outside hospital for the first time in years. I was able to go to this outside hospital to get my feet checked out and I was prescribed medication but CDCR is denying all my medication I was prescribed for my feet by this outside doctor. I’m not being allowed that medication for my feet due to CDCR not allowing it and also I think my TB is acting up but Calipatria is not hearing my pleas.

This is how this inhumane, torturous treatment in segregation makes me feel, “so depressed, anger, sad, rage, loss of focus, change of how I used to be, I don’t see people for how they are now or how I used to see them, my thinking is very different than before, I can’t be around too many people now, I have lack of sleep, and I have trouble concentrating.” All of my communication with my family has been cut off now because either my mail doesn’t get to me or I’m too afraid to worry my family of what’s really going on with me. I’ve been going through this for the last “two years” here at Calipatria State Prison ASU and I am up for transfer on waitlist to Pelican Bay State Prison again to be placed in the SHU for years on end due to this bogus validation.

How long do I have to be tortured for? Will I be rehabilitated? Where are the programs available to rehabilitate me instead of torture me? I don’t know; only the Governor, State Assembly have the power to change it but until then all I know is that I am being mistreated in this crooked, broken system called California Department of Corrections and “Rehabilitation”…

“Can somebody hear me out there?”

Gualberto Lopez, CDC# T-81282, Calipatria State Prison ASU

Written on 6/7/2012, postmarked on 6/8/2012 

Letter from Pelican Bay's Arturo Castellanos in response to CDCR's Security Threat Paper

In response to CDCR’s Security Threat Paper:

5-28-2012

I’m one (1) of the four (4) principal SHU-Reps here at PBSP who attends the monthly meeting with SHU-Associate Warden P.T. Smith. Note: my “personal mail” is still restricted to only those on my approved personal mail-list but I can write periodicals in general.

            During our last meeting of May 23, 2011, Warden Lewis and CDCR Deputy Director Stainer dropped in. The reps asked Mr. Stainer several questions about the revisions to the STG. He was vague in his answers and then said although they are on his I-pod, he hasn’t seen them yet. And they should be out in two weeks. Bottom line, it was the same old CDCR evasive tactics and the guy just basically wasted our time. Oh, he did say that the STG will replace the 6 year Inactive Status Program – Big Whoop! Yeah, it will but it will have the same end result. Only this time, we’ll all be bouncing back and forth like a ping-pong ball between step-1 and step-2, all while we’re in the same cell until we die. Thus, I personally don’t see any real change coming in their revisions to the STG that we already rejected in March. I hope I’m wrong but with CDCR’s track record, I doubt that I am.

            My question to you all your readers is, when these so-called revisions come out, and they also remain like the ones we rejected. What is going to be our “peaceful” response to Sacramento-CDCR, other than flat out rejecting it? Write your peaceful suggestions to this periodical ASAP. Myself, I’m not going to sit on my hands in this cell and allow CDCR to in act those same proposals – as is – into the Title 15 Regulations without first standing up and be counted among those who will send a strong peaceful response to change them.

            Finally, I’ll like to take this opportunity to express our thanks and appreciation to Kendra Castaneda, who is presently putting together a “new email group” that will include all prisoners’ families from all over California. Families that feel unappreciated and are not being heard by professional groups, where they have been left out of the process in helping their loved ones in prison. Myself, I support her 100% in her endeavors and all those involved and will be involved in that new group. And I hope when it’s up and running that all prisoners also will encourage their families to be part of it and also fully support it. This way “ALL” family members from all walks of life, education and economic levels will have their very own grass roots movement in support of their imprisoned loved ones. In fact, all interested parties can just email her at her “present” email add at kendracastaneda55 @ gmail.com, and ask her how you can help and support the “new email group movement”.

            A lot of love and respect to all those in the same frame of mind and spirit.

In solidarity, I remain.

Arturo Castellanos (PBSP Main Rep)

Update from Pelican Bay prisoners on the proposal of CDCR regarding Gang Management Policy Change

May 28, 2012

Greetings! Here’s a brief update on where things presently stand re: CDCR’s Gang Management Policy Change Proposal.

The bottom line is this; CDCR will submit their proposal to the office of Administrative Law (OAL), in the near future for a public comment period, and incorporation into the CCR Title 15.

Once the proposal is submitted to the (OAL), it’s a done deal… and absent peaceful direct action to force the mandatory major changes required in order to make any gang management policy changes acceptable, we’ll be stuck with CDCR’s version as is for the next 25 years.

Back in March, we rejected CDCR’s proposal in its entirety! And, people need to remember that as it stands now, CDCR’s proposal means that ALL prisoners classified as validated gang members (STG-1) will continue to be confined in the SHU, tortured in definitely based on the same sham “intelligence” based informational criteria that’s been used & abused by CDCR’s goon squads for the past 25+ years (e.g. confidential informant/debriefers claiming you’re involved in “criminal gang activity”, keeps you in SHU without being formally charged, etc…)

This is not acceptable for reasons spelled out in our March rejection of CDCR’s proposal… and it’s now time for people to present their views on what they believe would be the smartest, most effective peaceful action response to CDCR’s proposed changes; and the best time for it??

People can do this via word of mouth and use of the various periodicals covering these issues!

Also, a big shout out in solidarity and appreciation for the continuing support efforts from families, loved ones, and organizations including Mary Ratcliff of San Francisco Bay View, Kendra Castaneda, and California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement, to name a few!! The outside collective efforts & support of families, loved ones, and other people of conscience together with our collective efforts inside all comes together as a powerful force!!

Together we win, divided we fall!!

With respect & solidarity, Todd Ashker

Solidarity of Calipatria ASU - Statement

Solidarity of Calipatria ASU

Greetings. First and foremost I would like to extend our utmost love and respects to all who remain strong and positive in their situation and in our situation as one against CDCR’s death grip of long-term segregation.

It has been 8 months since the last Pelican Bay-CA Statewide Hunger Strike and there has been some “material changes” here at Calipatria ASU. These “material changes” consist of us being allowed an appliance and the augmentation of canteen items to our list. I emphasize on these being “material changes” because these are things we’ve had coming for years. Yet, we had to add these items to our own demands here and starve ourselves.

Although we were given these “items” and it appears to be a move in the positive direction, one must remember that we had these “items” coming, but Calipatria’s Administration was depriving us of this. This is like patching up a bullet-hole wound by using a band-aide.

In a recent letter to the “ROCK” newsletter (June Issue) an individual wrote that “we won” here in ASU because we got our T.V.’s That’s a big misstatement! Our objective as a “whole” is to see an end to all wrongful validations and long-term segregation/isolation. We all support the men at Pelican Bay State Prison-Short Corridor and the 5 Core Demands. Not only do they apply to them and the SHUs, but they apply to all of us. As the old saying goes “United We Stand, Divided We Fall”. We’ve been through two Hunger Strikes in solidarity with Pelican Bay State Prison and will continue to be as one in unity if another takes place.

Where there has been “material changes” here, there have been NO real changes at Pelican Bay. It took a man to die here for us to be taken seriously and get our voices heard. His death was due to his solitary confinement that brought him mental anguish beyond his control. This is the type of psychological warfare that CDCR is waging against us. Till this day we are still fighting against their tactics that break the mind, body, and soul.

We are all secluded from the outside world which limits our voices to travel. It’s our wives, our families, our loved ones, who speak our minds and lets the public know that we are and have been living through torturous inhumane conditions. This has had an extreme impact on all men of every race, who are living their lives in “long-term” segregation with their loved ones who they can’t hug, touch, and for most, even see. Yet, to mock our situation, we are told that we must either “parole, die, or debrief” in order to get out of this dungeon. Three men have died during the struggle thus far, and if change for ALL everywhere in these torture dungeons doesn’t come soon, CDCR is going to have a lot to answer for when more men are left to die for what they believe is right.

“The ultimate test of man’s conscience may be his willingness to sacrifice something today for future generations whose words of thanks will not be heard.” – Gaylord Nelson

Respectfully,

Robbie Riva, CDC# T-49359, Calipatria State Prison ASU, written on 5-28-2012

"Its not all about me, it's about us all" - Robbie Riva

Lawsuit challenges solitary confinement at California prison

From: SF Bay View:

June 2, 2012

Prolonged solitary confinement at Pelican Bay is cruel and unusual punishment, torture, lawyers say

Oakland – The Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) filed a federal lawsuit Thursday on behalf of prisoners at Pelican Bay State Prison who have spent between 10 and 28 years in solitary confinement. The legal action is part of a larger movement to reform inhumane conditions in California prisons’ Security Housing Units (SHUs), a movement dramatized by a 2011 hunger strike by thousands of SHU prisoners; the named plaintiffs include hunger strikers, among them several of the principal negotiators for the hunger strike.

California Corrections Department spokesperson Jeffrey Callison justifies his assertion that “we do not have solitary confinement in California prisons” by saying that prisoners in the Pelican Bay SHU are allowed out of their cells briefly for exercise. But they are as isolated in the exercise “yard” – a small concrete enclosure often referred to as a dog run – as in their cells. – Photo: Rich Pedroncelli, AP

The class action suit, which is being jointly filed by CCR and several advocate and legal organizations in California, alleges that prolonged solitary confinement violates Eight Amendment prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment and that the absence of meaningful review for SHU placement violates the prisoners’ right to due process.

“The prolonged conditions of brutal confinement and isolation such as those at Pelican Bay have rightly been condemned as torture by the international community,” said CCR President Jules Lobel. “These conditions strip prisoners of their basic humanity and cross the line between human treatment and barbarity.” Advocates hope that the suit will strike a blow against the increasingly routine use of solitary confinement in American prisons.

SHU prisoners spend 22½ to 24 hours every day in a cramped, concrete, windowless cell. They are denied telephone calls, contact visits, and vocational, recreational or educational programming. Food is often rotten and barely edible, and medical care is frequently withheld.

More than 500 Pelican Bay SHU prisoners have been isolated under these conditions for over 10 years, more than 200 of them for over 15 years and 78 have been isolated in the SHU for more than 20 years. Today’s suit claims that prolonged confinement under these conditions has caused “harmful and predictable psychological deterioration” among SHU prisoners. Solitary confinement for as little as 15 days is now widely recognized to cause lasting psychological damage to human beings and is analyzed under international law as torture.

Additionally, the suit alleges that SHU prisoners are denied any meaningful review of their SHU placement, rendering their isolation “effectively permanent.” SHU assignment is an administrative act, condemning prisoners to a prison within a prison; it is not part of a person’s court-ordered sentence for his or her crime.

California, alone among all 50 states and most other jurisdictions in the world, imposes extremely prolonged solitary confinement based merely on a prisoner’s alleged association with a prison gang. Gang affiliation is assessed without considering whether a prisoner has ever undertaken an act on behalf of a gang or whether he is – or ever was – actually involved in gang activity.

California, alone among all 50 states and most other jurisdictions in the world, imposes extremely prolonged solitary confinement based merely on a prisoner’s alleged association with a prison gang.

Moreover, SHU assignments disproportionately affect Latinos. The percentage of Latino prisoners in the Pelican Bay SHU was 85 percent in 2011, far higher than their representation in the general prison population, which was 41 percent. The only way out of SHU isolation alive and sane is to “debrief,” to inform on other prisoners, placing those who do so and their families in significant danger of retaliation and providing those who are unable to debrief effectively no way out of SHU isolation.

Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, California Prison Focus, Siegel & Yee, and the Law Offices of Charles Carbone are co-counsel on the case.

The case is Ruiz v. Brown, and it seeks to amend an earlier pro se lawsuit filed by Pelican Bay SHU prisoners Todd Ashker and Danny Troxell. The case is before Judge Claudia Wilken in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. Click here to read the complaint.

The Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Founded in 1966 by attorneys who represented civil rights movements in the South, CCR is a non-profit legal and educational organization committed to the creative use of law as a positive force for social change. Visit www.ccrjustice.org and follow @theCCR.

Pelican Bay prisoners sue to end ‘torture’ of long-term solitary confinement

by John Rudolf

Excerpt

Jeffrey Callison, a spokesman for the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, said the agency was still reviewing the lawsuit and could not comment on how it would respond legally.

Callison rejected the claim that conditions at Pelican Bay amounted to torture, however.

“There is no torture in California prisons,” he said. “That is not how we conduct business.”

Callison also disputed the lawsuit’s characterization of conditions in the security housing unit as solitary confinement, noting that the prisoners there are allowed each day to briefly leave their cells. “We do not have solitary confinement in California prisons,” he said.

Yet the conditions in the security housing unit clearly meet the United Nation’s definition of solitary confinement, according to an October 2011 report by the U.N.’s special rapporteur on torture, Juan E. Mendez. In the report, Mendez defined solitary confinement as “any regime where an inmate is held in isolation from others (except guards) for at least 22 hours a day.”

The conditions in the security housing unit clearly meet the United Nation’s definition of solitary confinement.

In an October speech to the U.N. General Assembly, Mendez called for a ban on the use of isolation as punishment and for a prohibition on long-term solitary confinement, citing scientific studies linking such conditions to lasting psychological damage.

“Segregation, isolation, separation, cellular, lockdown, supermax, the hole, secure housing unit … whatever the name, solitary confinement should be banned by states as a punishment or extortion technique,” Mendez said. “Indefinite and prolonged solitary confinement, in excess of 15 days, should also be subject to prohibition.”

“Considering the severe mental pain or suffering solitary confinement may cause, it can amount to torture,” he said.

Lobel, the Center for Constitutional Rights president, said he hoped the center’s lawsuit would proceed quickly through the courts. The Supreme Court has held that prisoners have the right to challenge their detention in extreme isolation units. But it has not ruled on whether long-term solitary confinement violates the Constitution’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment.

“We are hoping that this case will be pushed expeditiously and we’ll get some ruling within a year,” he said.

This is an excerpt from the story that first appeared under this headline on the Huffington Post. John Rudolf can be reached at john.rudolf@huffingtonpost.com.