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"Attica! Attica! Attica!"
- Thread starter Raptorex
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B
BrothaBill
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Attica! Attica! All or Nothing!!
U
Ulcasterdropout
Guest
I have some stories about the Attica takeback.
S
Spartacus
Guest
On September 9, 1971, inmates at the maximum-security Attica Prison in Western New York started a riot. Within minutes, guards and civilian employees at the prison were attacked or captured by rioting inmates. During the early hours of the riot, 12 injured men got out of the prison, including one—a married father of three, guard William Quinn—who later died of his injuries.
A total of 38 other people were taken hostage. For 4 days these men were mentally and physically tortured by some inmates and protected by others in the prison’s D Yard while their lives were used as a bargaining chip in a standoff over prison reform and social issues beyond their control. On the morning of September 13, the state retook the Attica Prison by force. Ten more state workers—6 guards and 4 civilian employees—were killed by the state during the retaking.
A total of 38 other people were taken hostage. For 4 days these men were mentally and physically tortured by some inmates and protected by others in the prison’s D Yard while their lives were used as a bargaining chip in a standoff over prison reform and social issues beyond their control. On the morning of September 13, the state retook the Attica Prison by force. Ten more state workers—6 guards and 4 civilian employees—were killed by the state during the retaking.
S
Spartacus
Guest
In the weeks following the bloodiest prison riot in American history, state officials pressured 11 widows to accept death benefit checks of a few hundred dollars a month. Many were mothers as well as wives, and they took the state’s offer because Corrections Commissioner Russell Oswald traveled to Attica for a secret meeting with them and promised to take care of them. Only one widow refused their offer.
At the same time, state officials urged the surviving hostages to take up to 6 months off with pay before returning to work.
In both cases, by taking benefits/payroll checks from the state, the widows and former hostages were stripped of their right to ever seek civil redress.
Several families tried to sue the state. Twenty suits were tossed out in 1983. Only Lynda Jones, the one widow who had private legal counsel and refused any state check, was successful. In May 1985, Jones was awarded $1.06 million after the state Court of Appeals determined that gunfire during the retaking “was haphazard and directed indiscriminately at the group of prisoners and hostages.”
In 1976, Governor Hugh Carey closed the state’s book on the Attica riot. He commuted the sentence of John Hill, the man convicted of murdering Guard William Quinn. He ordered no disciplinary action be taken against police officers involved in the retaking, as was recommended by a state prosecutor. He ordered the state’s records on the Attica Prison riot sealed for 50 years.
At the same time, state officials urged the surviving hostages to take up to 6 months off with pay before returning to work.
In both cases, by taking benefits/payroll checks from the state, the widows and former hostages were stripped of their right to ever seek civil redress.
Several families tried to sue the state. Twenty suits were tossed out in 1983. Only Lynda Jones, the one widow who had private legal counsel and refused any state check, was successful. In May 1985, Jones was awarded $1.06 million after the state Court of Appeals determined that gunfire during the retaking “was haphazard and directed indiscriminately at the group of prisoners and hostages.”
In 1976, Governor Hugh Carey closed the state’s book on the Attica riot. He commuted the sentence of John Hill, the man convicted of murdering Guard William Quinn. He ordered no disciplinary action be taken against police officers involved in the retaking, as was recommended by a state prosecutor. He ordered the state’s records on the Attica Prison riot sealed for 50 years.
S
Spartacus
Guest
No person or entity has ever been held responsible for the violence and deaths at the Attica Prison from September 9-13, 1971. No answers, no justice. The widows, surviving hostages, injured corrections employees and family members remained silent.
They were silent until January 2000 when the State and lawyers for inmates who were in D Yard on September 13, 1971, announced they had reached a $12 million settlement. Without explicitly admitting fault, the state agreed to pay the inmates for the violence and death rained upon them during the retaking of the prison. One month later, on February 14, a federal judge in Rochester accepted the deal.
On February 19, widows and survivors and family members gathered for the first time to talk about the Attica Prison riot and the State’s treatment of them since. The group continues to meet regularly.
New York Assemblyman Daniel Burling in March proposed paying each widow or the surviving family members of the slain guards and civilian employees up to $90,000. During a later budget negotiation session, state Senator Dale Volker trimmed that to $50,000 each, or a total payment of $550,000.
They were silent until January 2000 when the State and lawyers for inmates who were in D Yard on September 13, 1971, announced they had reached a $12 million settlement. Without explicitly admitting fault, the state agreed to pay the inmates for the violence and death rained upon them during the retaking of the prison. One month later, on February 14, a federal judge in Rochester accepted the deal.
On February 19, widows and survivors and family members gathered for the first time to talk about the Attica Prison riot and the State’s treatment of them since. The group continues to meet regularly.
New York Assemblyman Daniel Burling in March proposed paying each widow or the surviving family members of the slain guards and civilian employees up to $90,000. During a later budget negotiation session, state Senator Dale Volker trimmed that to $50,000 each, or a total payment of $550,000.
S
Spartacus
Guest
The uprising ended on Sept. 13, when the state police, under orders from Gov. Nelson Rockefeller, began an all-out assault, indiscriminately firing more than 2,000 rounds of ammunition over six bloody minutes, killing 10 hostages and 39 inmates and wounding hundreds of others.
S
Spartacus
Guest
Attica prisoners presented the following demands and the reaction by the state was to then slaughter 39 people (including guards). The New York State Troopers then repeatedly beat, brutalized and humiliated the prisoners.
The Fifteen Practical Proposals
1. Apply the New York State minimum wage law to all state institutions. STOP SLAVE LABOR.
2. Allow all New York State prisoners to be politically active, without intimidation or reprisals.
3. Give us true religious freedom.
4. End all censorship of newspapers, magazines, letters and other publications coming from the publisher.
5. Allow all inmates, at their own expense, to communicate with anyone they please.
6. When an inmate reaches conditional release date, give him a full release without parole.
7. Cease administrative resentencing of inmates returned for parole violations.
8. Institute realistiv rehabilitation programs for all inmates according to their offense and personal needs.
9. Educate all correctional officers to the needsof the inmates, i.e., understanding rather than punishment.
10. Give us a healthy diet, stop feeding us so much pork, and give us some fresh fruit daily.
11. Modernize the inmate educational system.
12. Give us a doctor that will examine and treat all inmates that request treatment.
13. Have an institutional delegation comprised of one inmate from each company authorized to speak to the institution administration concerning grievances (QUARTERLY).
14. Give us less cell time and more recreation with better recreational equipment and facilities.
15. Remove inside walls, making one open yard, and no more segregation or punishment.
"stop feeding us so much pork"
heh
The Fifteen Practical Proposals
1. Apply the New York State minimum wage law to all state institutions. STOP SLAVE LABOR.
2. Allow all New York State prisoners to be politically active, without intimidation or reprisals.
3. Give us true religious freedom.
4. End all censorship of newspapers, magazines, letters and other publications coming from the publisher.
5. Allow all inmates, at their own expense, to communicate with anyone they please.
6. When an inmate reaches conditional release date, give him a full release without parole.
7. Cease administrative resentencing of inmates returned for parole violations.
8. Institute realistiv rehabilitation programs for all inmates according to their offense and personal needs.
9. Educate all correctional officers to the needsof the inmates, i.e., understanding rather than punishment.
10. Give us a healthy diet, stop feeding us so much pork, and give us some fresh fruit daily.
11. Modernize the inmate educational system.
12. Give us a doctor that will examine and treat all inmates that request treatment.
13. Have an institutional delegation comprised of one inmate from each company authorized to speak to the institution administration concerning grievances (QUARTERLY).
14. Give us less cell time and more recreation with better recreational equipment and facilities.
15. Remove inside walls, making one open yard, and no more segregation or punishment.
"stop feeding us so much pork"
heh
S
Spartacus
Guest
Attica: Exorcising the Demons, Redeeming the Deathsmightymouse69 said:
By CLYDE HABERMAN
http://www.nytimes.com/learning/students/pop/010900attica-review.html
The immediate spark, not that it matters after so many years, was a series of misunderstandings. One evening, hours after a prison guard mistakenly thought they had been fighting, two inmates were taken from their cells for punishment. A rumor, no more true than the phantom fight, spread through the cellblock that both had been beaten.
In a way, the whole thing was pretty silly. The consequences were anything but.
The next morning, on Sept. 9, 1971, angry inmates at the Attica Correctional Facility, 30 miles east of Buffalo, N.Y., rioted. They seized control of an exercise yard and took guards as hostages. Thus began a chain of often-bizarre events that produced the worst prison insurrection in U.S. history, indeed the bloodiest single clash between Americans since street riots in New York City a century earlier.
Altogether, 43 people died at Attica, nearly all -- inmates and hostages alike -- when state troopers stormed the prison Sept. 13 and fired indiscriminately through a thick haze of tear gas. It was, a state investigating commission would later conclude, an assault both ill-conceived and poorly executed, leading to needless loss of life. One disenchanted state prosecutor ended up calling it "a turkey shoot."
As if the mass death were not shocking enough, officials at first lied about what had happened. They said inmates had killed the hostages, slitting their throats and castrating them. None of that was true, as autopsies showed the next day. Arguably worse, troopers and Attica guards resorted to brutal reprisals. They forced inmates to strip and crawl over broken glass. One man had a screwdriver repeatedly shoved into his rectum. Another, forced to lie naked for hours with a football propped under his chin, was warned that if he let the ball drop, he would be killed or castrated.
Why rehash those events now? Because the demons of Attica have never been exorcised. Memories of them may have faded, but their shadows are felt just the same.
They were back last week when a federal judge in Rochester announced a settlement that may at last bring finality to Attica's painful aftermath. Under the deal, the state will pay $8 million to inmates who were beaten and tortured, plus $4 million for lawyers' fees. "We have all suffered," said the judge, Michael A. Telesca. "The end is in sight."
Maybe. Some who lived through the 1971 debacle -- inmates, guards, officials, lawyers, reporters -- wonder.
It is hard to exaggerate the body blows that some American institutions endured. The seemingly endless war in Vietnam had already taken its toll by 1971. A year earlier, National Guardsmen in Ohio had opened fire on Kent State students, killing four of them. Now, at Attica, more than three dozen people were shot dead within minutes in the name of the state -- and officialdom's first instinct was to not tell the truth about it.
There was, for many, a queasy feeling that government might be capable of just about anything. Nor did the news media emerge looking good. Tales of inmates' atrocities were reported as fact. There was not nearly adequate attribution to officials who were spreading the lies.
"It was a little like the Vietnam war coming home," recalls Robert Gangi, executive director of the Correctional Association of New York, a prison monitoring group. "You had a brutal application of government power and then the sheer audacity of government cover-up."
For a sense of how deep the cynicism ran, catch "Dog Day Afternoon" the next time it is on television. In that 1975 film, Al Pacino, playing a loser who takes hostages after a botched bank robbery, whips up a street crowd to pressure the New York police to hold their fire. He does it by rhythmically chanting, "At-ti-ca, At-ti-ca, At-ti-ca."
And yet good came out of the 1971 siege. This is separate from the political good it probably did New York's Republican governor, Nelson Rockefeller, who ordered troopers to storm the prison. That action, and tough drug laws that he promoted two years later, helped make the relatively liberal Rockefeller more palatable to conservatives. By coincidence or not, President Gerald R. Ford, invoking the 25th Amendment, named him vice president in 1974.
Attica's broader good was that the public could no longer ignore awful prison conditions. The initial rioting did not really result from minor misunderstandings. Attica, like other prisons, was seething because of overcrowding, bad food and medical care, rigid censorship and meager visiting rights. True, loopy radical demands were made during the riot, symptomatic of the times; the authorities were hardly about to provide transportation to a "nonimperialist" third world country. But the anger stemmed from basic conditions, like rules limiting inmates to one shower a week and one roll of toilet paper a month.
In the years that followed, the situation improved. In New York, special agencies kept an eye on prison operations. For a while, some newspapers covered prisons as a regular beat. A new state-financed group, Prisoners' Legal Services, gave inmates a voice in court. In time, as the state and the country shifted to the right, such efforts were ridiculed as whining on behalf of killers and rapists wanting color TV and pepperoni pizza. But Legal Services has never had a lawsuit tossed out for being frivolous.
Until Attica, "a lot of people didn't see the way that prisoners were dehumanized to no constructive end," said David Leven, who was Legal Services' executive director for years.
Inevitably, time dulled Attica's shock effect. A "lock 'em up and throw away the key" attitude has sent the prison population skyrocketing. And rehabilitation is rarely mentioned in political discourse. Nationwide, there were 198,000 people in federal and state prisons at the time of Attica. In mid-1998, the figure was 1.2 million, not including 600,000 more held in local jails. The New York state prison population today is approaching 72,000, compared with 12,500 in 1971.
Yet, aside from advocates like Gangi, you don't hear much about prisons these days, and even in last week's settlement the state acknowledged no guilt. Here and there, there has been a prison riot, but nothing comparable to 1971. It may be that Attica's most enduring legacy was to make everyone starkly aware of the terrifying possibilities should there ever be a fire next time.
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