In fact, the U.S. exports its prison policies all over the globe.

The gross violations of human and civil rights that occur in prisons daily on American soil rarely receive substantive media attention. Perhaps this is because abuse, harassment and neglect in America are not new.

In Massachusetts prisons, for example, the violation of human and civil rights has been going on for decades, with occasional reforms, followed by new and ever more repressive measures.

Now there is a growing number of ordinary folks—incarcerated people, formerly incarcerated people, friends and families of prisoners and community activists—who refuse to accept the status quo.

We document the abuses. We strive to hold officials accountable for the neglect, abuse and lawlessness perpetrated by the Department of Correction upon those in its custody.

However, it is not enough to just document abuses. We are obliged to end them and to call our officials and state employees to account.

Politicians ignore pleas

In recent years we have repeatedly brought prisoner deaths, suicides, medical maltreatment and torture to the attention of the executive, legislative and judicial branches of the Commonwealth.

Unfortunately many officials are loath to change prison conditions. This resistance may stem from wanting to appear “tough on crime,” wanting to advance their careers, from a desire to ally with powerful politicos or from simply not caring about people they consider unworthy of their attention. We cannot say why Senator Jarrett Barrios appears to ignore his responsibility as Co-Chair of the Joint Public Safety Committee.

The Senator claims to be a champion of progressive ideals. However, we share the experience of having our letters go unanswered; our phone calls unreturned and our concerns ignored, dismissed or trivialized. We’ve attempted to get Barrios’ help for abused and dying prisoners. We have acted in good faith by bringing our complaints to him over several years. In May we urged the Senator to visit a paraplegic prisoner whose intestines were protruding from his lower back. That inmate died a month later soon after a beating.

Last week the Senator ignored a letter requesting a response and a meeting to discuss the recent rash of “suicides” behind bars.

Senator Barrios has the obligation, as a member of the General Court, to serve his constituents; the authority, as Chair of the Public Safety Committee, to bring the Department of Correction into compliance; and the responsibility to work to end these abuses. He has not done so.

Today we bring our efforts to your attention. We place Senator Barrios and his colleagues on notice. We will speak the truth of what we know of prison conditions. We will demand real oversight and accountability. We will bring the evidence of human rights violations to international bodies, to shame Massachusetts for the pain and suffering it inflicts upon prisoners, their families and their communities. People are sentenced to prison as punishment, not for punishment. Those in positions of authority must be held to at least as high a standard as those in their custody. The medical maltreatment by guards, administrators, physicians and nurses must stop now.

Psychological abuse, torture, and the deprivation of sufficient food, clean air and water must end now. Human rights abuses in Massachusetts’ prisons and houses of correction are far too many to be listed comprehensively here. The following is just a short list:

• Guards have slipped razor blades to suicidal prisoners and encouraged them to kill themselves. There is reason to believe that such an incident is how Steven Koumaris found the means to commit suicide on October 12, 2006.

• Prison officials have covered up dates of conception for women in prison to hide the fact that guards rape women prisoners.

Medical care withheld

• Medical staff repeatedly ignore requests for medical care.

• Physicians and nurses routinely do the bidding of guards.

• Health Services Units are filthy; infection control is lacking.

• Prescribed medications are not dispensed in a timely manner.

• Prisoners are not sent for scheduled hospital appointments and/or surgery.

• Prisoners of color receive the harshest treatment at every level.

• Guards regularly hurl homophobic and racist epithets at prisoners. There are no consequences for their behavior.

• Prisoners’ efforts to report abusive treatment are responded to with retaliatory disciplinary reports. In hearings and appeals, the word of guards and other staff always carries more weight than that of prisoners.

• Queer prisoners are placed among violent, homophobic prisoners, with little regard to issues of safety.

• Mentally disabled prisoners are targeted for abuse: guards gas and beat people unable to understand and comply with commands.

• Transgender prisoners are denied access to hormone therapy and other needed therapies to support their identity. In one case the neglect became so bad that an inmate attempted to slice off her genitals and commit suicide.

• Suicide attempts are classified as disciplinary infractions. Seclusion is used as a response to suicide attempts.

• Prison guards condone the practice whereby vulnerable prisoners buy the protection of bullies in exchange for sexual and other favors. This practice serves as a means of social control.

• Repeated, unnecessary strip searches are conducted as punishment. Prisoners often remain naked for long periods of time, which leaves them open to taunts of passers-by.

• Medical conditions are ignored until it is too late to provide appropriate treatment.

We repeat our call for a meeting with the Senator. We call for him to take immediate action. Please join us. There are people suffering as we write. Barrios can hold the Department of Correction accountable for the abuses it inflicts with impunity.

His actions are essential but let us not forget that we must move away from mass incarceration toward decarceration. Getting people out of an out-of-control system is the only way we will truly bring an end to prison abuse.

Susan Mortimer, Statewide Harm Reduction Coalition, Sister of prisoner Glenn

Nancy Ahmadifar, First Church in Jamaica Plain, Social Justice Committee Member

Karen Scovil, Family of the late Kelly Jo Griffen

Michelle Griffen, Mother of the late Kelly Jo Griffen

Lorraine Jaillet, Mother of the late Anthony Garafolo

Andrea Hornbein, Statewide Harm Reduction Coalition

Jason Lydon, Congregational Direc-tor, Community Church of Boston

Holly Richardson, OutNow, State-wide Harm Reduction Coalition

Sue Huskins, Prison Voices, and Mother of the late Michael Besson

Letter to State Senator Barrios

Allston, MA 02134 November 5, 2006 Honorable Jarrett Barrios The State House, Room 309 Boston, MA 02133

Dear Senator Barrios,

We are writing today to request a meeting with you regarding an urgent matter: the on-going abuse and medical maltreatment of Massachusetts prisoners.

We are a varied group consisting of friends and relatives of prisoners and pre-trial detainees, prison activists and human rights activists. We are ‘professionals’ and lay people. We have in common the experience of seeing our loved ones mistreated, killed or maimed by Department of Corrections’ employees and medical staff.

We have turned repeatedly to the Legislature, the Courts and the Executive branch.

These abuses are not new. We remember the investigation into the death of Robin Peeler at MCI-Framingham, the U Mass report and its recommendations regarding the "suicide" of John Salvi at Cedar Junction and an internal report on the vicious beating of a blind, and burn-scarred prisoner. Recently we urged the legislature to act to end the staged ‘lock-down’ at MCI-Shirley and the brutal medical abuse of a prisoner in the DOC unit at the Lemuel Shattuck Hospital. We consider the Harshbarger Commission to be ‘window dressing’ by the Commonwealth.

We request a meeting with you at your earliest convenience. Please respond to this communication by Wednesday afternoon. You may reach Andrea Hornbein, of Allston, at -------------. We look forward to meeting with you very soon.

Yours truly,

Nancy Ahmadifar, Jason Lydon, Lorraine Jaillet, Susan Huskins, Andrea Hornbein, Susan Mortimer, Holly Richardson, Karen Scovil

Hand delivered to the office of Senator Barrios Nov. 5, 2006