‘We Are Human Beings’: Alabama Prisoners Strike to Protest Abusive Conditions, Excessive Sentencing
Swift Justice, an inmate at the Fountain Correctional Facility in Atmore, Alabama, went to prison at the age of 17. Today, he’s 47, with 20 more years to go on a half-century prison term he got before he was an adult.
“In Alabama, it’s lock ‘em up and throw away the key,” he tells Rolling Stone. It’s one of many reasons Justice and nearly 10,000 other inmates in Alabama have gone on strike, abandoning posts in the dining room and laundry, as well as workshops where they make cheap license plates in exchange for little or no money.
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According to participants, inmates in nearly every facility in the state have joined the strikes. From day one, the guards cut back their food from three to two meals a day. There have been reports of organizers being jumped by guards and thrown into solitary. Still, the men Rolling Stone spoke with are resolute, with some even sounding giddy that their activism is getting attention in the press. The movement reminds Justice of the famous uprising in Attica, with the same refrain. “We are men. We are human beings,” he declares.
Their demands include an immediate retroactive repeal of the state’s habitual offender laws; creation of a statewide conviction integrity unit; streamlined review for medical furloughs; reduction of the minimum of 30 years served before juveniles with life sentences are eligible of parole; and a stop to life-without-parole sentences. They’re also demanding a more transparent parole process.
The same day the strike began, Gov. Kay Ivey’s office called those demands unwelcome and unreasonable. “Unwelcome, maybe,” Justice retorts. “But unreasonable? Our demands are not only reasonable but fully in line with maintaining public safety.”
It’s hard to overstate how out of whack — unreasonable, even — U.S. sentences and prison conditions are compared to most the world. Andres Brevik, the fascist mass shooter that killed 77 people, mostly children, in cold blood got Norway’s maximum of 21 years. Life without parole has been abolished or is virtually never used in every Western democracy but the U.S. America has normalized the idea that millions of people are irremediable, that a teenager who might get into trouble is thrown away for a lifetime in a carceral system that strips offenders of their humanity. The strike is about getting it back.
Tivon Thomas isn’t scheduled for release until 9999. This is not a typo. Several states mete out punishments that would take several generations to complete. Thomas was convicted of attempted robbery where several people were shot but no one was killed. His priors include forgery and marijuana possession. Thomas is being held in “close” confinement, described by the ADOC as the “most restrictive custody level to which an inmate can be assigned,” in which inmates are “housed in a single cell in a close security institution.” It’s essentially solitary. The U.N. has said that more than 15 days in solitary is torture.
“I think everyone deserves a second chance or however many it takes to get them right,” Thomas’ father, 64-year-old Tyrone Brinkley, tells Rolling Stone. “He’s right now and deserves a chance to prove it,” he adds. “He thinks the strike has the right purpose, to bring light on the situation in Alabama.”
In 2020, more than 500 people were serving life without parole in Alabama thanks to the state’s habitual offender statute. “The law — passed at the dawn of the tough-on-crime era — mandates longer sentences each time someone commits a felony, regardless of the time between offenses,” the ACLU of Alabama explained in 2021. The law mandates life without parole for anyone convicted of a class A felony who has prior felonies on their record. As the ACLU notes, murder and rape are class A felonies in the state — but so are robbery, burglary, drug trafficking, and manufacturing of a controlled substance.
Despite the strike’s success so far in getting people to join and being covered by the Associated Press, The Washington Post, and The New York Times, there are drawbacks. The organizers weren’t able to alert people in solitary to allow them to stockpile food. There are reports from inmates in multiple facilities that the two small meals per day are punishment for the strike. Multiple inmates have told Rolling Stone and other outlets that they are perpetually hungry due to the food shortages. A recent meal for diabetics was comprised of a piece of white bread, an apple, and a smudge of peanut butter, according to a Facebook group of prisoner families.
Larry, who asked to have his name changed for fear of retaliation, says the food was never much to write home about, but at least it added up to the right amount of calories. “Now we’re hungry all day,” he tells Rolling Stone. On Wednesday, the Alabama Department of Corrections issued a press release claiming that the food shortage was a result of lack of staffing due to the strike. “This is not a retaliatory measure but logistically necessary to ensure that other critical services are being provided,” they wrote. When Rolling Stone asked the Department of Corrections for comment, they replied by sending the same press release claiming the food shortage isn’t retaliatory.
In addition to changes in sentencing and parole, the prisoners are protesting conditions behind bars. The U.S. Department of Justice has concluded that conditions in the state’s prisons violate the rights of the incarcerated men because of the levels of violence. Daniel, a 42-year-old who also asked for his name to be changed, is serving 10 years. Still, he’s taking part in the strike, because, “The conditions … I never would have believed it until I saw it with my own eyes.” He says he’s witnessed guards cheering on violent brawls among inmates, and even knife fights. “They’ve created this culture in these prisons of violence and abuse. It’s just the norm,” he says. In the summer, temperatures inside can hit 120 and the men swelter in the heat in the absence of air-conditioning. It’s not uncommon for them to find giant cockroaches in their food trays. “We’re not looking to get steak and shrimp for dinner,” he jokes. “Just to be treated as human.”
Fentanyl is easily smuggled into the prisons, which has led to a surge of overdose deaths, according to Justice. “I saw guards giving illegal drugs to prisoners,” Daniel adds. There are all the stabbings, and very little health care. “Get help,” Kastellio Vaughan begged his sister, with a picture of his emaciated body, from an apparent intestinal illness that wasn’t being adequately treated. There’s a lack of educational opportunities that help prepare inmates for healthy reintegration into society.
Justice is beyond fear of retaliation, having previously been thrown in solitary and jumped by guards for his activism, he says. “We’ve had hits put on us. But you can’t stop it. It is what it is. You gotta do what you gotta do. Keep fighting.” (When asked for comment on allegations that corrections officers have retaliated with physical violence and segregation, the ADOT responded with the same press release issued Wednesday, which notes that certain “security measures” have been used to “maintain a secure environment” since the work stoppages began.)
Criminal reform advocates often point out that life or near-life sentences are counterproductive because, if you extinguish all hope, what incentive is there for rehabilitation or self-improvement? Parole boards exist to rectify overly draconian sentences, especially if the inmate shows that they’re changed and no longer pose a public threat. But according to the ACLU of Alabama, in the past few years, the state’s parole board has drastically decreased the rate of pardons. In 2018, they granted 80 percent of appeals; by June of 2021, they only granted 22 percent.
“We’re used to the pendulum swinging a little bit back and forth, but always within a certain range,” Andrew Skier, a Montgomery attorney who’s represented clients seeking parole, told AL.com. “But what we’re seeing now is unlike anything I’ve ever seen in all that time. There are cases now that would have been absolute no-brainers two years ago. That I would have told the client I’m almost positive we’re going to be successful on this that are now being denied and with no explanation.”
Jeffrey, 45, who asked that we don’t reveal his identity, is serving 30 years for a murder he was convicted of at 18. Over and over, he says, the parole board has denied his appeal: “Can a person never change? Or does our worst day define the rest of our lives?”
Larry describes the impact of the state’s glacially sluggish parole process on inmates and their families. “We’re not given the opportunity to redeem ourselves,” he says. He was put in life for crimes he committed as a minor and as such, he’s allowed parole. “But the way the Alabama parole board is operating … they’re virtually giving me life without parole.” His elderly father has made it to his son’s parole hearings, a two-hour drive, only to have the board glance at the case for a few minutes and rule, “Five more years. Five, five, five,” Larry says.
He and the others have had enough. “You’re not gonna keep working us for free, all day every day, year in and year out,” he says. “We made mistakes.”
That inmates are forced to work for free or practically free reminds Justice of another uniquely American institution. “It’s slavery. Plain and simple,” he says.
Diyawn Caldwell is president of Both Sides of the Wall, an advocacy group that helped coordinate the strike. Her husband has been in an Alabama prison for 17 years. “We organized the strike because we got tired of inmates suffering,” she says. “They’ve got no relief. No incentive to do better. They’re just suffering.”
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