[Pnews] Visiting Political Prisoner Herman Bell In The Age Of Trump

[Prisoner News]

http://gaycitynews.nyc/visiting-herman-age-trump/


  Visiting Herman In The Age Of Trump

*BY SUSIE DAY* | February 1, 2017

This past year was good for prison activists. Those who advocated for 
high-profile political prisoners in the federal system celebrated when 
President Barack Obama commuted the sentences of Chelsea Manning and 
Oscar Lopez, both now scheduled for release on May 17. Activists who 
supported less-known “social” prisoners, most serving inordinate time 
for what the media like to call “nonviolent drug offenses,” rejoiced at 
Obama’s unprecedented 1,715 commutations by the end of his presidency.

Locally, New York State activists, having spent years beseeching Andrew 
Cuomo to grant prisoners clemency, finally saw a little light when Cuomo 
commuted the 75-year-to-life sentence of Judith Clark, as well as those 
of six other people with felony convictions. All told, about 1,722 
actual human beings, who once contemplated their deaths inside prison, 
are now free or facing the increasing prospect of walking out alive.

But given that Obama also denied a record number of petitions (14,485, 
including Leonard Peltier’s) and that this country has for years held 
the world’s largest prison population, there remain about 2.2 million 
people behind US bars. Social prisoners and political prisoners, 
disproportionately black and brown. People like my friend Herman Bell.

    SNIDE LINES

Eleven years ago, I wrote about visiting Herman 
<http://www.gaycitynews.nyc/gcn_506/visitingherman.html>, a former Black 
Panther convicted of killing two police officers and sentenced to 25 
years to life. In 2006, my partner Laura, our Canadian friend Tynan, his 
two-year-old daughter Frankie, and I visited Herman at the Eastern 
Correctional Facility on his 58th birthday. Herman was then preparing to 
go before the New York Parole Board for the second time.

I’m writing again about visiting Herman, except that Frankie is 13 and 
prefers to be called Franca; and Herman has just turned 69 and has now 
been denied parole seven times.

Herman’s also been moved around to several other prisons, so these days, 
we take a five-hour bus ride to see him at the Great Meadow prison in 
Comstock. Since this “correctional facility” allows prisoners only three 
visitors, Franca couldn’t come this time. Ty, Laura, and I go through 
the usual body scan and metal detection before we’re allowed in the 
visiting room. We’re assigned a bench behind a long metal table set on 
painted cinder blocks, over which Herman will lean to hug us when he 
gets here.

“Imprisonment exacts an incalculable toll on the body and mind,” Herman 
once wrote. It’s “the closest descent into Hell as one can imagine.” He 
ought to know. Herman’s been caged since he was 25. Research shows that, 
because of stress, bad food, and inadequate medical care, people in 
prison age rapidly – so fast that by the time they’re 50, they’re 
considered “elderly.” That’s one reason why Laura, with Herman’s 
encouragement, helped start an organization called Release Aging People 
in Prison (RAPP).

Now in walks Herman, in a rumpled green uniform, much the same “tall, 
sweet-smiling, quiet man” I described over a decade ago. But he’s 
looking more worn and tired. For weeks now, he’s been telling us how he 
expects to lose his cell on the honor block. There are rumors that, 
because of the 2015 escape of two honor-block prisoners at Clinton 
prison, honor blocks in every New York state prison may close.

If you’re a long-term prisoner in New York, honor blocks are an 
essential means of survival, especially as you age. To be granted the 
“earned housing” privilege, you have to work long and hard, avoiding any 
write-ups for misbehavior. The Comstock honor block isn’t much different 
from the rest of the prison, except that it’s blessedly quieter and has 
its own recreation area, making it easier to get to the phones to call 
the people allowed on your list. Without it, there’s uncontrollable 
noise, a kind of psychic drowning.

Herman appraises the spread of junk food we’ve amassed from the vending 
machines. He starts to peel the plastic off a microwaved burrito, and we 
catch up on life. Laura keeps Herman posted on RAPP meetings. Tynan 
mentions Franca’s roller derby team, the Rhythm and Bruise. Herman’s 
relieved he didn’t see his name on this morning’s list of people to be 
moved off the honor block. He figures he’s safe for now.

I buy a chocolate chip muffin, hoping it will pass for a birthday cake; 
but first, some prison gossip. Rural, intensely Caucasian Comstock – yet 
another prison holding mostly African Americans and Latinos – seems to 
have employed exactly one black guard, who, Herman says, refers to 
himself as French Canadian. “Name of Deshawn,” sneers Herman, “yeah, 
right.” The muffin is still sitting unopened when a white guard taps 
Herman on the shoulder.

“We’re packing up your cell,” he says. Herman can stay at the visit or 
go back to see that his possessions – which fit into a few cardboard 
boxes – aren’t broken or waylaid on their way to another cellblock. 
Herman says he’ll stay with us, but we insist that he go protect his stuff.

People who’ve never been inside a prison usually can’t fathom how small, 
bureaucratic changes like this can prove life-threatening. And 
disappearing honor blocks may not be all that’s coming down the 
pipeline. Governor Cuomo, citing budgetary constraints, has proposed 
cutting visiting days at maximum-security prisons to three a week. Then 
there’s Cuomo’s 2017 State of the State platform. Even after Judith 
Clark’s commuted sentence, it doesn’t mention releasing other prisoners 
in the “graying” population. Instead, Cuomo plans to “create a 50-bed 
dormitory at Ulster Correctional Facility to house eligible individuals 
aged 55 years or older.”

As the Trump regime sinks its talons deeper into our body politic, 
people like Herman – anybody left behind bars – will be the first to be 
forgotten. Standing Rock, refugees, healthcare: such emergencies will – 
rightfully – demand our attention. Yet part of the trick of our survival 
will be to connect our lives to the lives of these people inside, 
grappling with their own deepening hells.

Here at Comstock, Herman returns to our visit. He’s shaken, but cracks 
that his new cellblock resembles “south of the Mason-Dixon line.” Which 
makes us worry at yet another level. We sing “Happy Birthday,” share 
Herman’s cupcake, shoot a crap game with “dice” Ty has improvised from 
scrap paper, and leave when visiting hours end.

We’ll need to contact Herman’s wife. Tell her he may not be able to call 
for a while.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

/Susie Day is the author of “Snidelines: Talking Trash to Power,” 
<http://www.abingdonsquarepublishing.com/snidelines.htm> published by 
Abingdon Square Publishing./

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
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