Memphis: Protests after Black man dies of injuries following MPD traffic stop.
Texas prisoners hunger strike to protest inhumane solitary confinement.
US, European firms supply Myanmar’s brutal junta.
NATIONAL NEWS
Memphis: Protests after Black man dies of injuries following MPD traffic stop
On Jan. 7, Memphis police pulled over Tyre Nichols, 29, for reckless driving. What happened next is a little unclear. Authorities say that there was a “confrontation” between Nichols and the officers who approached him, after which Nichols ran away. There was then another “confrontation” before police managed to apprehend and arrest Nichols.
Following this confrontation, “the suspect complained of having a shortness of breath, at which time an ambulance was called,” police said, and Nichols was taken to an area hospital in critical condition. According to the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, Nichols “succumbed to his injuries” three days later on Jan. 10, though the agency didn’t specify the nature of the injuries. Immediately following the incident, TBI opened a use of force investigation on Memphis PD.
Nichols’ family said he was “brutalized” to the point he was “unrecognizable“. Rodney Wells, Nichols’ stepfather, said Nichols suffered cardiac arrest and kidney failure because of a beating by officers. “When we got to the hospital, it was devastating,” Wells said. “All of that still should not occur because of a traffic stop. You shouldn’t be on a dialysis machine looking like this because of a traffic stop. That’s inhumane.”
Over the weekend, Nichols’ friends and family and other community members gathered to remember him and staged protests near the site of the stop. Nichols’ family have retained renowned civil rights attorney Ben Crump. Crump has represented bereaved families in numerous high profile incidents where Black people were killed by police or in racially-motivated attacks. Nichols’ family want a more answers about their son’s death and are demanding the release of police bodycam footage from the incident.
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Texas prisoners on hunger strike to protest inhumane use of solitary confinement
Prisoners in over a dozen state correctional facilities in Texas have been on hunger strike for nearly a week. Texas’ State Department of Criminal Justice says 72 inmates are on hunger strike, but outside organizers say it’s closer to 300. The prisoners, all men, are protesting the state’s overuse of solitary confinement and deteriorating conditions. Organizers say that staffing shortages throughout the prison system has created inhumane living conditions for solitary inmates.
In solitary, prisoners spend 22 hours a day alone in their cells. The nature of their confinement creates greater demands on staff who must closely supervise their time outside their cells, when they shower or have their one hour of recreation time each day. Inmates wrote a letter to state lawmakers stating that because of staffing cuts, these needs aren’t being met. At one facility, solitary inmates have only had outside recreation a handful of times in the last few years and guards find it difficult to allow the inmates to shower more than once a week.
Decades in solitary
The protesting inmates also want reforms to better govern how Texas prisons use solitary confinement. Prison officials say they use solitary confinement for inmates considered to be an escape risk or those who’ve exhibited violent behavior while in prison. But Texas also uses solitary confinement to isolate prisoners that are affiliated with certain gangs, even if they’ve not committed any other offense while incarcerated.
In order to leave solitary, gang members have to go through a program that requires them to snitch on fellow gang members, which places the inmates in mortal danger when they return to the general prison population. As a result, prisoners with gang affiliations could spend their entire sentences, years or even decades, in solitary. When they eventually return to society (as 80% of them will) the psychologically crippling effects of extended solitary confinement stay with them. Extended solitary confinement is known to cause long term effects such as PTSD, hallucinations and psychosis.
Texas is one of the last few states to place inmates in solitary based solely on gang affiliation. California ended the practice years ago following a weeks-long hunger strike involving hundreds of inmates and a class-action lawsuit.
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INTERNATIONAL NEWS
US, European firms supply Myanmar’s brutal junta
An independent group of international policy experts has found that companies from 13 countries are supplying Myanmar’s brutal military dictatorship with tools, machines and software that allows them to create weapons to use against the regime’s opponents. Several of these countries, including the US, Germany, and France, have imposed sanctions on Myanmar’s junta.
Myanmar’s military (known as the Tatmadaw) seized control of the country in February 2021. They imprisoned Aung San Suu Kyi, the country’s elected president. After several prosecutions against her, the military-controlled courts have sentenced her to decades in prison, with more prosecutions to come. Much of the country’s other high-ranking civilian leaders are also in jail.
Opposition groups and ethnic minority militia’s in Myanmar’s border regions have engaged in all-out civil war against the Tatmadaw. The military have carried out numerous atrocities in an attempt to stamp out rebels, laying waste to entire villages. According to the Special Advisory Council on Myanmar, the companies from these 13 countries are supplying the Tatmadaw with hardware and services that enable them to wage war on their own people.
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