This is Uhuru Rowe. Help make 2017 my last year of incarceration.
Happy belated new year to all of you. I wish you all the best on your personal and professional endeavors. The beginning of a new year always presents an emotional and psychological paradox for those of us in prison. On the one hand, it is a time for us to be thankful we survived one year and we lived to see the next. On the other hand, it is a time when we feel profoundly alone and depressed because it represents another year we remain confined in a prison cell away from our family, friends, and community. At least, that is the paradox I’ve experienced the last 21 new years.
But 2017, which marks my 22nd year of incarceration, feels different. Maybe all the years I’ve spent inside of a concrete box has made me irrational, maybe a bit delusional. But my newfound optimism feels justified. It’s rooted in the rising tide of opposition inside and outside of prison against the criminalization, mass incarceration, warehousing, and disenfranchisement of poor people or people of color, which amounts to what Michelle Alexander has coined “the new Jim Crow.”
My clemency petition, which has been pending for two and a half years, has reached the last level of the review process and is now sitting on the governor’s desk. Governor McCullough, whose term in office ends January of 2018, represents an oasis for unjustly convicted, excessively sentenced, and longtime rehabilitated incarcerated people fighting for our freedom here in Virginia.
Governor McCullough may be our last hoop of freedom amidst the rising tide of fascism being stirred up by Donald Trump. So I am calling on all concerned citizens who believe in justice, fairness, and second chances to please get organized around the struggle to win my freedom and help make 2017 my last year of incarceration. I need 100 people to call governor McCullough on our behalf at 804-786-2211 and urge him to commute my sentence. If you don’t get an answer, please leave a message and then call again, or you can email him at socmail@governor.virginia.gov.
If you need any additional insight on my case, history, and accomplishments in prison, you can go to my blog at aconsciousprisoner.wordpress.com and search for my post titled “21 Years a Prisoner.” Please reference my former name, which is Brian Lee Rowe, as an A.K.A. in addition to my name, Uhuru Rowe, in your phone calls or emails to the government.
I thank you in advance for all your love and your support. Again, this is talking to you live on Prison Radio.
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
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