Prison Strike Leader Moved to Infirmary after Twenty Four Days Refusing Food
Siddique Abdullah Hasan, a national prisoner leader has been on hunger
strike since Monday, February 27th. On Friday, March 24th he was moved
to the infirmary, presumably due to failing health. His appeal to the
Rules Infraction Board (RIB) was also denied by Ohio Department of
Rehabilitation and Correction (ODRC) Director Gary Mohr.
The administration at Ohio State Penitentiary (OSP) has been targeting
and restricting Hasan’s communication access on any pretense they can
find or invent since his outspoken support for the nation-wide prisoner
strike on September 9th of 2016.
Hasan and another prisoner, Jason Robb began refusing food when the OSP
administration put them on a 90 day communication restriction for being
interviewed by the Netflix documentary series Captives. Hasan appealed
the RIB’s decision, arguing that they violated policies regarding
timelines, access to witnesses, and prisoners’ due process rights.
Director Mohr’s response to the appeal was a form letter that did not
address any of the issues Hasan raised.
Hasan and Robb are on death row and have been held in solitary
confinement since the 1993 prison uprising in Lucasville. They believe
that the ODRC and the Ohio State prosecutors targeted them after the
uprising because of their role in negotiating a peaceful surrender.
State officials, in both the Captives documentary and a 2013 documentary
called The Shadow of Lucasville, have admitted that some prisoners were
given deals to testify against Hasan, Robb and others, and that no one
really knows who committed the most serious crimes during the uprising.
In court, they argued the opposite to secure death penalty convictions.
The Lucasville Uprising prisoners have been fighting to tell their story
for decades, and are currently suing the ODRC over an unconstitutional
media blockade, which the Captives documentary crew circumvented by
unofficially recording video visits with Hasan and Robb. The current
hunger strike is part of an ongoing struggle for equal protection, basic
human rights and survival after decades of living under the most
restrictive and torturous conditions of confinement at OSP, Ohio’s
supermax prison.
Supporters are asking people to please call Director Gary Mohr at
614-387-0588 or email him at drc.publicinfo@odrc.state.oh.us as well as
Northeast Regional Director Todd Ishee, 330-797-6398. Demand that the
punishments being imposed on Jason Robb and Siddique Abdullah Hasan be
reversed and that OSP authorities be severely reprimanded for violating
their rights to due process and displaying bias toward them.
For more information on the Lucasville Uprising, the struggles of these
prisoners, and the media blockade against them, please visit
LucasvilleAmnesty.org.
Hasan’s Conduct Report and appeal:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bxez-nYn2VrpVTVESENUZENnaVU/view?usp=sharing
Gary Mohr’s form letter response:
https://drive.google.com/a/lucasvilleamnesty.org/file/d/0B9q-BEqATW6TeHVUUHM1ZVF5bnc/view?usp=sharing
Feb 28th announcement of hunger strike:
http://www.lucasvilleamnesty.org/2017/02/uprising-prisoners-censored-respond.html
Info about the lawsuit against media blockade:
http://www.lucasvilleamnesty.org/2014/04/aclu-articles-on-lucasville.html
Articles about Hasan’s involvement with the September 9th prison strike:
http://www.lucasvilleamnesty.org/search/label/strike%20september%209th
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