[Pnews] CDCr "Step Down" program - The Con Game

[Prisoner News]

    Voices from Solitary: "The Con Game"
    <http://solitarywatch.com/2014/06/06/voices-solitary-con-game/>


by Voices from Solitary <http://solitarywatch.com/?author=15>
*http://solitarywatch.com/2014/06/06/voices-solitary-con-game/*

June 6, 2014

/In Fall 2012, California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation 
(CDCR) unveiled its "Step Down" program 
<http://solitarywatch.com/2014/02/10/seven-months-historic-prison-hunger-strike-opponents-solitary-confinement-california-prepare-hearing-gauge-pace-change/> 
to evaluate prisoners with indefinite terms in its notorious Security 
Housing Units (SHUs) for release to general population. The program 
immediately drew criticism from both prisoners and their advocates, who 
charged that even those who have spent years in the SHU may not be 
released under this program./

/In February 2014, shortly before legislative hearings around solitary 
confinement,  CDCR released new proposed regulations 
<http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/Regulations/Adult_Operations/docs/NCDR/2014NCR/14-02/Text_of_Proposed_Regulations.pdf> around 
its gang policies. Former hunger strikers and their outside allies 
continue to decry the program. Among their concerns is the requirement 
that SHU prisoners fill out a sequence of journals as part of completing 
the programming 
<http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/Regulations/Adult_Operations/docs/NCDR/2014NCR/14-02/Text_of_Proposed_Regulations.pdf>./

/Lorenzo Benton is one of those who has voiced outrage about the 
proposed Step Down program. Benton is currently in the SHU at Pelican 
Bay State Prison, participated in both 2011 hunger strikes as well as 
the 2013 hunger strike. He describes the problematic nature of The Con 
Game, the first of the journals that SHU prisoners in Step Three are 
required to fill out. Other individuals in California's SHUs have 
expressed similar concerns 
<http://www.ncttcorshu.org/2014/05/open-letter-to-assemblyman-tom-ammiano.html> 
about the coercive content found in the journals./

/These critiques comes at a time when California's solitary confinement 
policies are being debated in both houses of the state legislature, 
where bills have been introduced 
<https://prisonerhungerstrikesolidarity.wordpress.com/2014/05/13/may-1-2014-letter-from-pelican-bay-prisoner-reps-to-legislators/>, 
as well as in the federal courts, which have granted class status 
<http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/04/us/judges-decision-to-hear-inmates-case-threatens-practice-of-solitary-confinement.html?_r=0> 
to men in long-term isolation at Pelican Bay in a lawsuit against the 
state. In addition, the CDCR recently proposed new rules 
<http://prisonerhungerstrikesolidarity.wordpress.com/2014/06/05/fight-new-prison-censorship-rules-submit-comments/> 
that would expand the definition of contraband to include any 
publications and correspondence it deems unsavory--perhaps leaving some 
individuals in solitary with little to read other than the likes of The 
Con Game.  --Victoria Law/

*.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .*

Recently, I had the (un)fortunate opportunity to peruse what is being 
presented as the initial stage of the CDCR (California Department of 
Corrections and Rehabilitation) tentatively approved/implemented 
Security Threat Group (STG) Step Down Program (SDP) for those who have 
been classified by prison officials as being affiliated with such a 
group, meriting a SHU (Security Housing Unit) placement for an 
indeterminate period of time in accordance with the SDP. This program, 
as currently structured, requires its participants, at the initial stage 
of the SDP, to take part in the completion of a total of fourteen 
self-directed journals in a 26-week period, subject to review and 
evaluation by prison officials, the same institutional classification 
committee officials who have held us in SHU all these years and who will 
now be responsible for continuing to make arbitrary decisions on whether 
or not one's responses in these journals are satisfactory enough for 
advancement within this program as one works towards general population 
release.

Now as for my own observations and analysis of the first self-directed 
journal that I was introduced to (titled /The Con Game/), it does not 
embody and/or address the needs of the majority of us in SHU, of what 
and who we are nor is it indicative of what's in our best interest. This 
journal is comprised of a series of questions that are designed to 
elicit a response more so of one who continues to hold true to a 
criminal conviction as opposed to one who has risen above that and now 
lives one's life in accordance with a more humane existence. I am of the 
opinion that anyone with even an inkling of integrity would not respond 
in the affirmative to the majority of these questions (if not all) given 
that just about all of these questions are centered around one answering 
in the affirmative (yes) to a negative character trait, further 
acknowledging such a trait within oneself (whether one has it or not) 
and as an explanation of it. For example, "Do you have a problem when 
people correct you, even if they do it in a supportive way? Yes/No. Give 
an example of how you might think and/or act in this way." "Do you ever 
play the 'Con Game'? Yes/No. Explain." And so on. All of the questions 
in this journal follow a similar pattern and one can't help but believe, 
if one does not respond in the affirmative to said questions, that the 
reviewers/ evaluators of said responses would deem one a program 
failure, not suited for advancement within said-program because the 
overseers of this SDP view us all as flawed in character with no social 
or moral compass.

Furthermore, when I read /The Con Game/, I just about responded in the 
negative to each question except for one, so can reasonably conclude by 
doing so that I will be viewed as a program failure, stuck in purgatory 
(precluded from advancing forward to the next level) until one succumbs 
to the program, which is a form of brainwashing that is not in one's 
best interest.

As one looks into the minute details and its overbroad effects, one can 
also reasonably conclude that this Step Down Program in its current form 
is some type of Machiavellian debriefer tactic with a one-to-five year 
installment plan, designed to break one's spirit and then one into 
informants for the prison system. Now with the CDCR catapulting this 
program to the forefront while knowing full well that the majority, if 
not all, of us on indeterminate SHU status would not be receptive to its 
introduction nor of the mindset to participate in it as a result of us 
seeing it for what it is is surely a sign of the CDCR's attempt to 
undermine any foreseeable real change in response to our five core 
demands. This attempt to thwart our forward motion and break our spirits 
will be futile because, as real men and women seeking humane and just 
treatment, we refuse to play their game (a "con game"). We are not 
debriefers and should not be treated as such!!!

Now as for those of us who survive the CDCR's policies of torture and 
control, it has not always been an easy task, but through fortification 
of will and understanding, many of us have been able to keep our 
priorities intact (life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness).

It should also be noted, as one now takes an intense look into what's 
being instituted, via this Step Down Program, that it will be utilized 
as a means of institutionalized abuse and distrust as the CDCR carries 
out its latest gang management policies. These policies can subject one 
to a STG classification with a SHU assignment of one to four years or 
more for those who fall under its classification. Many of us who have 
already been in SHU on indeterminate status for the last five, ten, 
twenty, thirty years of more, who fall victim to this program, should be 
afforded time served and all prisoners who have spent the last four 
years held in SHU/Ad-Seg should and shall be released to the General 
Population forthwith if they have not received a SHU determinate term!!!

In conclusion, with the STG Step Down program now before us, in contrast 
to the previous six years' policy whereby one only had to remain 
allegedly gang-activity free for six years to be eligible for release to 
General Population, this SDP requires only four years. But these four 
years can be just as long as the previous six years in practice because 
advancement in the Step Down program is not guaranteed, leaving one 
stuck in the SHU indeterminately. Assigning people to SHU under STG Step 
Down program under the illusion that one is eligible to get out of the 
SHU sooner, as opposed to later, is something we stand in opposition to, 
so with this glimpse into the imperial effects of the CDCR's gang 
management policy, one can expect for them to be duplicated if they are 
not successfully challenged and/or deterred in their attempts to 
circumvent real change (today).

End all solitary confinement!!!

End all indeterminate SHUs!!!

Restore a determinate SHU to all!!!

/Dadisi Kambon (Lorenzo Benton), B-85066,
PBSP SHU
P.O. Box 7500
Crescent City, CA 95532-7500/

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