Okay, hello world, my name is Mansa Musa, and I’m currently incarcerated at the RJ Donovan Correctional Facility in San Diego, California. I want to bring awareness to an incident that’s transpiring in my life, but I know that this is happening to millions of people who are incarcerated not only in the United States but around the world.
I participated in a hunger strike for the whole month of August, and we did that in a form to send solidarity to the revolutionaries of our past or our ancestors who paved the way before us. I’m experiencing a lot of discrimination and aggressiveness from the custody from CDCR, and these individuals have singled me out.
They have been pestering me, and they have been trying to set me up. If it wasn’t for the camera system that has been installed and instituted at this prison, then I would have been in an administrative segregation right now with a battery on a police officer as well.
With this interview, I’m declaring to the international community and tto the people, my current status as a political prisoner, because I’m declaring my innocence. I have found exculpatory evidence that has been existent since the inception of the case from when I was 16, which I’m now serving five years on at 26 years old.
And so at 26 years old when my base term is up, I now have an additional 5 years to serve because of a juvenile prior that was not even a robbery, although I pled guilty to it through coercion, and unintelligently and unknowingly, I pled guilty to a robbery, but I did not commit a robbery at 16 years old.
And I’m now serving an additional 5 years, through an enhancement from something that transpired when I was 16. And so this is the draconian nature of the legislation that is now prevalent in our country, the free world, the land of the free is what we called it, is that when you look at the 13th amendment that slavery has never has never been abolished, and that it was redesigned and only was applicable to those who were convicted of a crime.
And so understanding that even though we’re living in the land of the free, that constitutionally slavery is still legal and it still exists to this day in the guise of mass incarceration. And so I really implore and I called on the communities that are significantly impacted by mass incarceration and whose loved ones are living in anguish and despair because of the draconian nature of these laws that are affecting them.
And that I stand with you and that upon my release, you can count on me to be an acolyte and an advocate and a proponent for those who are among the voiceless and those that are locked in these cages in inhumane conditions, is that this is not okay, and we have to get our incarceration population down.
And so I think that with the leadership of Governor Newsom and especially the leadership of other governors in different states, I think that we can bring this into a tangible reality, that we have to right our wrongs and we have to rectify the past, and it starts with this generation and it starts today.
Um, I will be doing more interviews in the future with prisonradio.org. This is a wonderful organization, and I want to thank them for creating a platform for people among the voiceless to have a medium of communication to the public.
These commentaries are recorded by Prison Radio.
![Prison Radio is sharing an abbreviated version of a press release covering recent racist incidents at SCI Rockview in PA and the organizing to demand accountability. We are reaching out to people incarcerated at Rockview as well as recently transferred folks, inviting them to call, in hopes of hearing commentaries from them.
Benner Township, PA.-
On November 24th, 2023, imprisoned people at SCI Rockview found two nooses hanging in the CO’s office, displayed visibly for many prisoners to see. When the prisoners asked the staff why the nooses were hung, they were told it was a joke.
By December 4th, prisoners filed a grievance to document what they saw, noting that the hanging of the nooses was “unethical, racially motivated, hateful, [a] deliberate debasement of black inmates" and “unsafe for inmates, staff, [and] the whole prison in general.” In the grievance, they demanded that Sgt. Mosser and CO Richard be fired and investigated for a hate crime, and for CO Kirchner to get therapy. Captain Andrews, the head of security, denied the grievance.
The sergeant and COs are still working in the prison to this day, with no repercussions...
As of March 10th, prisoners have reached out to Pennsylvania officials at the Dept. of Corrections in a letter campaign, sending 100 copies of the grievance. Copies of the letter also were mailed to Governor Shapiro, Senator Fetterman, Senator Street, and various advocacy groups. The demands for relief in the original grievance have now become the platform of demands for this campaign. About 20 of the 100 letters were withheld by the prison.
Activists on the outside are joining forces with prisoners to elevate their demands, flooding the phone lines of DOC offices, assisting with outreach to media, and circulating the stories of prisoners who have found unity in opposition to the facility's virulent institutional racism.
In any other workplace, hanging a noose would be grounds for immediate termination. However, Nicki Paul, the superintendent's assistant and "grievance coordinator" informed the public that they self-investigated their staff and found they did nothing wrong.
Read the full article at i
https://conta.cc/4ayDxlB](https://www.prisonradio.org/wp-content/plugins/instagram-feed/img/placeholder.png)