Rally at Cheshire
In late November, SHAWN team members Amy, Emily, and I attended the Stop Solitary CT rally held outside Cheshire Correctional Facility. This is a recap of the rally.
We arrived on time after a short drive. The weather was chilly but luckily dry. We had made large signs, Amy’s read, 765 Women in CT prison, 40% pre-trial. #FreeHer, mine read End human rights abuse in the prisons, and Emily’s read Solitary = Torture.
We gathered outside the prison along a main road with lots of traffic so people could see us. A small part of the prison was visible from behind barbed wire fences. We were told that the rally was partially visible to the men incarcerated in the building, which I thought was amazing as our presence would remind them that people are defending their rights.
Barbara Fair is the lead facilitator and founder of Stop Solitary CT, and a licensed clinical social worker. She spoke strongly about the dangers of solitary confinement and shared her experience of her sons’ incarceration. She emphasized that incarceration is not limited to the individual: The entire family suffers. Ms. Fair expressed her upset that many people will not spend Thanksgiving with their family due to unjust incarceration, and, even worse, many will spend it alone, locked in solitary.
We learned there was a law passed in 2022 (The Protect Act) to better regulate the use of solitary confinement in CT prisons and ensure it is not being used unjustly. However, there have been administrative issues with organizing the oversight board charged with monitoring these new policies (read this article to learn more). Barbara is campaigning to ensure this bill is carried out and enforced as written.
Other people at the rally also spoke and shared touching and personal stories, including formerly incarcerated men and the mother of Carl Robert Talbot who was murdered by correctional officers while in CT prison by the excessive use of pepper spray in solitary confinement. Another speaker received a phone call to a person incarcerated in the Cheshire jail and this person spoke briefly to the group about their experiences inside the prison. This made the experience more personal as we heard the first-hand experience of a currently incarcerated person. The event made me realize how close I am to experiencing the same rights violations, and that I have a responsibility to use my privilege of freedom to defend others.
We must continue educating others on incarceration issues and injustices. This work includes fighting the stigma around incarceration which influences social opinions, perpetuating marginalization and violence. For example, criminal-legal systems are biased against people of color. Consider the disproportionate imprisonment of Black people. Harsh incarceration, including the excessive, unmonitored use of solitary confinement is a racist, classist and ableist practice that must be reformed. There are many deep-rooted layers to incarceration: justice-involved people are not simply “people who broke the law,” they are people. We must that demand human rights for everyone. It is a very dangerous path for us, as predominantly working-class citizens who are powerless against the law, to agree to strip incarcerated people of their human rights as this creates leeway for the government to strip others people of their human rights as long as there are “justifications.”