Sign this Petition for Alice Marie Johnson

March 14th, 2016

Lynne says: I knew Alice at Carswell and she certainly has more than served her time !!

Petitioning Barack Obama, Robert A. Zauzmer

Grant Clemency to Alice Marie Johnson Serving a Life Sentence

Petition by Tretessa Johnson
Chandler, Arizona
22,503
Supporters
19 years ago my family’s life changed forever when my mother, Alice Marie Johnson, was sentenced to Life in Federal Prison.  She was one of thousands of first time, non-violent offenders who were given mandatory lengthy prison terms. She was sentenced as part of a larger drug conspiracy with 10 other codefendants who were given lesser sentences in exchange for their testimony against my mother who never sold drugs.  My mother has accepted responsibility for her actions that led to her imprisonment and has used that experience to better her life and the lives of others.

Since being incarcerated my mother has been a model prisoner who mentors women and has become an ordained minister. She has also written, directed, and produced several plays and writings for conferences outside of prison walls, choreographed dance teams, and completed many classes and certifications.  In addition, she was selected as the #1 Inmate Deserving Clemency by the CAN-DO Foundation in 2015.  She was also featured in the ACLU’s Report, A Living Death. Mama’s supporters include Congressman Steve Cohen (D) Tennessee, Congressman Bennie Thompson (D) Mississippi, and Congressman Marc Veasey (D) Ft. Worth, Texas.

Her desire upon release is to assist the community with the needs of ex-offenders to help reduce recidivism. Alice is the mother of 4 children and has 4 grandchildren.  She will be 61 years old in May 2016 and it serves no purpose or benefit to society to have her locked up for life.  She is currently petitioning the United States Pardon Attorney’s Office for clemency. Her large and loving immediate and extended family and friends would welcome her return.

Please sign and share this petition to show your support and to ask President Obama to grant clemency to a mother, grandmother, sister, aunt, and friend who wants to use her experience to assist others and give back to her community. Justice should never be without mercy.

Sign Tretessa’s petition

To learn more about Alice, please check out her profile on the CAN-DO Foundation’s website at http://www.candoclemency.com/alice-marie-johnson

Lynne Speaking at Day of Peace and Solidarity (NYC)

March 9th, 2016

Rally 2 pm 34th & 6th Ave., NYC, 4 pm march to UN

Please share this link everywhere: http://thndr.me/TV0D9q
Peace Poets, Lynne Stewart, Ramsey Clark, Kathy Kelly, Ann Wright, Ray Laforest, Margaret Kimberley and others

Everybody Turn Out for a Day of Peace and Solidarity in New York

*Money for Jobs and People’s Needs, not War!
*Rebuild Flint! Rebuild our Cities! End the wars!
*Defend the Black Lives Matter movement!

http://warisacrime.org/content/everybody-turn-out-day-peace-and-solidarity-new-york

What happens when there are endless wars accompanied by militarized policing, spreading racism, erosion of civil rights, and concentration of wealth, but the only news is election news, and none of the candidates wants to talk about shrinking the world’s largest military?

We happen. That’s what. We turn out for a Day of Solidarity and Peace in New York City on Sunday, March 13th. We start by signing up at http://peaceandsolidarity.org and inviting all of our friends to do so. If we can’t come, we invite all of our friends anywhere near New York to sign up and be there. We sit down and think of every person we remember hearing ask “But what can we do?” and we tell them: You can do this.

We stopped the war mongers who wanted to rip up the agreement with Iran last year, and the political progress in Iran reflects the wisdom of diplomacy as an alternative to yet more war. We stopped a massive bombing campaign of Syria in 2013. Our brothers and sisters just this month stopped the construction of a U.S. military base in Okinawa. Read the rest of this entry »

Support Dr. Aafia Siddiqui Event

March 9th, 2016

Lynne will be speaking at this event.

WBAI Update

March 3rd, 2016

Special Bulletin: WBAI Justice & Unity Campaign, www.justiceunity.org

1. My Way or the Highway: Indy-ACE Board Members Stage Phony Boycott

2. Speak out at next Local Station Board meeting – Wed., Mar. 9

_____________________________________________________________________

1. WBAI Indy/ACE Board Members: End Phony Boycott – Step Up or Step Aside! Sign the Online Petition

Since the January Local Station Board election results created a 12-12 tie between Justice & Unity and the Indy-ACE group, they have refused to attend board meetings. We need a minimum of 13 members to elect local officers and national representatives and do other business. Their “boycott” prevents any binding action on urgent station problems.

We think that they ran for office and so they should serve or step aside. Below is a petition that urges them to come to the table and also alerts the Pacifica National Board, of which the WBAI LSB is a committee. Please sign it!

In a February 23 letter to the Pacifica National Board (updated version available HERE

), the governing body of WBAI’s parent foundation, the 12 Justice and Unity local board members requested “action in the face of this continuing emergency.” According to the letter, initiated by member Lynne Stewart, the prominent former activist attorney who was the top-vote getter in the recent elections, “One of the opposition was actually overheard saying that there may be no LSB meetings for the next year.  Such a we-rule-or-we-ruin ideology has no place in a democratic process….Together we must defeat this attack on the democratically constituted and elected WBAI Local Station Board.”

More background on this issue is HERE

We urge you to sign the online petition to tell the 12 Indy Caucus/ACE board members:

Please respect the bylaws and the decisions of the station’s voters and show up and do the work that you were elected to do: Save WBAI.

You can sign on HERE

. Spread the word on social media!

2.  Speak out at next Local Station Board meeting – Wed., Mar. 9

The next Local Station Board meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, March 9 at 7 PM at the ARC Senior Center, 120 W. 140 St., between Malcolm X Blvd. & Adam Clayton Powell Blvd., Harlem, NY 10030. Come out and speak out during the meeting’s public-comment section about whatever issues concern you in this time of the station’s continued financial crisis.

Ralph Poynter: Whats Happening Radio

February 29th, 2016

Tues., March 1, 2016Ralph Poynter :What’s Happening – call in  # 347 857-3293 (9-10pm est)

Ralph Poynter says “What’s Happening”“They don’t want  heroes & sheros   because they give us hope….When we are afraid to fight back & resist, the oppressors win. Watch all who claim to be leaders but follow those who support our political prisoners because they gave us hope…’Dare to struggle, dare to win.’ — RALPH POYNTER: What’s Happening – Tues., March 1, 2016

1. News Analysis: Can we expect to see Wall Street money i.e. corporations, big business, supporting Hilary over Trump, if they each get the presidential nod from each of their parties? Ralph Poynter, Larry Pinkney, Lynne Stewart, Tom Siracuse, Joel Meyers, Razakhan Shaheed

2.    Excerpts from the Black Writers Guild – Larry Pinkney – Black Panther &  former pol. prisoner

3.    N.Y.C. Jericho – Political Prisoner Updates from Anne Lamb

4.   What does the current election process teach us about American History and the act of committing gradual    suicide ?         Poynter, Stewart, Pinkney, Siracuse, Meyers

WILL YOU JOIN THE WOMENS MARCH IN HARLEM – Harriet Tubman Monument –SATURDAY, MARCH 5, 2016- 12:30pm-122 St & Frederick Douglass Blvd?? – March for jobs, housing, health care, public education & human rights

Important Read: Buzzfeed Article on Political Prisoners

February 17th, 2016

From Lynne: This is a link to a fine article on Buzzfeed about two of our PPs that have now served 45years—yes 45!  We should all be paying close attention !

The Forgotten Panthers

by Elena Carter

On a 100-degree day this past July, Edward Poindexter woke at 8:30 a.m., as he does most mornings, and walked for an hour around the 400-meter track in the west yard of the Nebraska State Penitentiary in Lincoln. If you walk alongside the fence enclosing the yard on Monday, Thursday, or Saturday mornings — moving quickly so you won’t be noticed by the guard in the closest security tower — you might catch a glimpse of Poindexter: big, bald-headed, propelling himself forward in figure eights, a cane in each hand. A fixture here, he is sometimes joined by young gangbangers seeking advice.

As a reserved, introspective child growing up in the early 1950s in Omaha’s predominantly black Near North Side, Poindexter’s favorite activity come summertime was to walk, alone, to an open field on the outskirts of the ghetto. Once there, he’d gorge himself on mulberries and admire the nice homes around a nearby elementary school in the white part of town. The first time he found the field he was stunned. Up to that point his entire world was eight or nine blocks. Omaha, he realized, was a big and varied place.

In some ways, 71-year-old Poindexter is more like his childhood self than the hotheaded man he was in April 1971 when he — along with David Rice, now known as Wopashitwe Mondo Eyen we Langa — was tried, convicted, and sentenced to life in prison for the murder of Omaha policeman Larry D. Minard. Minard died when a suitcase bomb exploded in a North Omaha home on August 17, 1970 — one of a series of bombings to shake the Midwest that spring and summer. He was responding to a phony report that a woman had been dragged, screaming, into the vacant home.

At the time, Poindexter and we Langa were leaders in Omaha’s National Committee to Combat Fascism (NCCF), the successor to the recently dissolved Omaha chapter of the Black Panther Party. The two were arrested after Duane Peak, a 15-year-old former NCCF member, implicated Poindexter and we Langa as the brains behind the bomb plot, though he initially confessed to planting the bomb and placing the phony 911 call alone. By the time their trial was over, Peak would again change his testimony, Poindexter’s and we Langa’s alibis would check out, and the two men’s hands would test negative for the dynamite residue found on their clothes. Key evidence would be withheld from the defense. The jury — of which 11 of the 12 members were white — found them guilty.

Since then, we Langa and Poindexter’s case has penetrated every level of the criminal justice system, from local officials to former governors to the FBI to the Supreme Court. It’s been mired in suspicions of murky police practices, backroom plea deals, allegedly planted and suppressed evidence, and a teenage suspect whose testimony may have been coerced.

Read the full article at Buzzfeed.

(T)ERROR on Independent Lens / PBS

February 12th, 2016

Lynne hoped people could watch this important film.

(T)error, from filmmakers Lyric R. Cabral and David Felix Sutcliffe, premieres on Independent Lens on Monday, February 22 at 10:00 p.m. ET (check local listings) on PBS. The first documentary to place filmmakers on the ground during an active FBI counterterrorism operation, the film raises questions about the balance between civil liberties and national security. How far are we willing to go to prevent terror? What liberties are we willing to sacrifice to get there?

Cuba in Focus Segment on Ana Belen Montes

February 12th, 2016

Lynne wanted folks to hear this segment on Ana Belen Montes.

LISTEN HERE: Cuba in Focus on Ana Belen Montes (MP3)

Information to Shut Down Racist Anti-Black Panther Rally

February 12th, 2016

SEIZE THE TIME! Countermeasures To Address and/or Shut Down Next Weeks Racist NYPD & PBA Sponsored…”Anti-Beyonce … Anti-Black Panther Party … Anti-Black PP/POW Rally @ NFL Headquarters”

A big celebration of the 50th anniversary of the founding of the real Black Panther Party is planned for Oakland in October 2016.

STEP 1:
In order to try and prevent counter demonstrators from disrupting their protest; The Pigs are providing “FREE” Tickets for folks to be able to cross police lines and get into their rally.

We can collectively destroy this stupid tactic by just clicking on the below racist website and getting a “FREE” ticket which will not only gain us access but more than likely cause them to cancel. https://www.eventbrite.com/e/anti-beyonce-protest-rally-tickets-21446744791?utm-medium=discovery&utm-campaign=social&utm-content=attendeeshare&aff=
STEP 2:
If they DO NOT Cancel then join the “Freedom Fighters Contingent” and veteran members of the “original” Black Panther Party to gather outside of St. Patrick’s Cathedral on 51st Street/Fifth Avenue & march two blocks to NFL Headquarters at 51st Street/Park Avenue for our own Black History Month Rally To Both Defend The Legacy of The Black Liberation Struggle and To Demand Freedom For All Black Panther Party Exiles, Political Prisoners & Prisoners Of War.

NYC Jericho Movement Announcement: Demonstration February 5th

February 3rd, 2016
For Immediate Release

Once again, our country Haiti is in turmoil and thus in the front and editorial pages of the U.S. mainstream press. The justified revolt of the Haitian masses against the centuries old genocidal plots of our sworn enemies is once again being sold as the incapacity of Haitians to resolve our differences and govern our country. Were Haitians to “play nice” and allow the continued abrogation of our sovereignty, the pillage and plunder of our country’s resources, to be play toys for foreign tourists, and to be no more than a cheap labor pool for international capitalism then, of course, our country would cease to be called a failed state. Haiti was born in struggle. Struggle is in our DNA.

We are a coalition of 4 New York City based Haitian community organizations, Citizens Committee to Protect Haitians, KOMOKODA (The Committee to Mobilize Against Dictatorship in Haiti), Fanmi Lavalas NY Coordination, and Platfòm Pitit Desalin who have come together to demonstrate our support for our sisters and brothers who are in the streets of Haiti fighting and dying for justice and their human right to respect and dignity. We support their demand for the immediate ouster of illegitimate U.S. installed puppet President Michel “Sweet Micky” Martelly; the end of the US-UN occupation of our country; and the end of the 200-plus years of foreign meddling in the political affairs of our country.

We ask everyone to join us this coming Friday February 5th, 2016, 1pm-4pm as we protest outside the New York City office of the US State Department. For those who are not in the area we are calling for all in the Haitian diaspora and all true freedom loving people wherever you maybe to hold a protest that day or sometime this week in solidarity with the people of Haiti. February 7th is a historic date for our people. It is the date that the Duvalier dictatorship was forced to flee in 1986. On that day in 1991, Jean Bertrand Aristide, our first democratically elected president came to power. It is day this year that the apprentice dictator Martelly is to give up power. He has so far said that he will not leave.

NYC Haitian community protest in front of the NYC U.S. State Department Office

Date:     Friday, February 5th, 2016

Time:     1pm – 4pm

Place:     666 5th Avenue, New York, NY 10019
Entrance on 53rd Street between 5th & 6th Aves.

Article of Note: Parole Board Drags Its Feet on COMPAS

January 25th, 2016

Parole Board Drags Its Feet on COMPAS
New York Law Journal
http://www.newyorklawjournal.com/id=1202747554518?keywords=compas&publication=New+York+Law+Journal

January 21, 2016

New York State and the entire country are engaged in a serious public conversation on the meaning of justice and how it is applied in our communities, courts and prisons. Issues of particular importance to the legal community enter into that discussion, including sentencing reform, mandatory minimums, wrongful convictions and the ways in which racism shapes the application of justice. As lawyers with many decades of experience representing people caught up in the criminal justice system, we welcome that conversation. Whether in the media, including the New York Law Journal, in courtrooms, or in legislatures, there is a growing recognition that our justice system has too often been unfair and its punishments vengeful and draconian.

From this conversation has emerged a national consensus that we have relied too much on incarceration to solve social problems and enhance public safety. The incarceration of huge numbers of people has not lowered our crime rate. It has, however, separated families, contributed to the impoverishment of entire communities, and returned literally millions of people to the community burdened with statutory and social obstacles to successful lives. Read the rest of this entry »

California Event: Support Leonard Peltier!

January 25th, 2016

Honoring Leonard Peltier & Ending Solitary Confinement

Saturday, February 6 at 6 PM in PST

School of Arts & Culture @MHP in San Jose, California

Thanks to the generous support of Resist, Inc. - Funding social change since 1967.