“To Free or Not to Free: Alveda King: 90, Black celebrities: 0” by Kerry “Shakaboona” Marshall.
When Reverend Alveda King, the Atlanta pastor and niece of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. met with President Trump at the White House in August, she brought and submitted a list of more than 90 names of federal incarcerated persons that she was advocating to be set free by presidential pardon.
King’s pardon list was compiled with the help of her goddaughter Angela Stanton, an Atlanta-based author and reality show actress who served time herself in federal prison for being involved in a car theft ring.
Reverend Alveda King and Angela Stanton are prime examples of practicing what you preach. They are proactively seeking to use the presidential pardon to free some captive Black men and women from federal prisons now who will otherwise die in federal prison from death by incarceration sentences later, while also seeking to overhaul the criminal justice system completely. Hallelujah.
Now contrast Reverend Alveda King’s presidential pardon lists with Black celebrity athletes and what do you got? You got nothing, nada, zilch, zero. That’s because Black celebrity athletes has not produced a presidential pardon list, has not created policies or introduce bills to Congress to end mass incarceration, nor have they met with top advisors in the White House to discuss the complete overhaul of the criminal justice system to end mass incarceration.
As the score now stands: Alveda King: 90, Black celebrity athletes: 0.
From the belly of the beast at Prison Radio, I am Shakaboona. Thank you for listening.
These commentaries are recorded by Noelle Hanrahan of 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)