Red Onion State Prison MEMO: A sly and sneaky way to impose limitations and restrictions on prisoner access to courts

Anytime Government, which prison is a function imposes limitations on access or a service. The reasons given rarely have anything to do with the intent of the government reaction.

Think about this. You are an attorney with a prisoner-client at (Virginia's) Red Onion State Prison [ROSP] and you are restricted to only Mondays and Thursdays or after 4 p.m. on any other day-----which could also mean a time limitations of sorts. This is clearly onerous and restrictive, on the Attorney-Client Privilege, not to mention the violation on various U.S. Constitutional Amendments. i.e The 1st Amendment.

Prison Attorney visits are unlike any other visits and should not be cavalierly and arbitrarily treated as such unless the intent by the government i.e ROSP, is an insidious effort to limit prisoner access to the courts which attorney access enables.

Instead of restricting prisoners access to the courts by imposing onerous and arbitrary conditions. ROSP should stop its systemic violations of the rule of law and operating procedures, it's officials, rank, and file are sworn to uphold, which consequently necessitates prisoners seeking access to courts.

Prima facie evidence of ROSP attitude to the rule of law is this memo attempting to limit prisoner access to the courts, which ROSP is fully aware is unlawful.

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By William Thorpe

I am held in Solitary Confinement at Red Onion State Prison

Yes Prisoners Do Stupid Stuff

Yes, prisoners do stupid stuff. People in the free world do stupid stuff. The issue isn't pointing out the obvious that people do stupid stuff. The question, however, is how do we hold prison officials accountable. Whether or not a prisoner doing self-defeatist stuff has nothing to do with the fact that a prison official has an obligation to comply with and follow those same laws that got the prisoner in prison.

The question is: How do we hold accountable prison officials? One thing for sure is without the focus and attention of prisoner loved ones, families and friends, the only thing we would know about prison is the stupid stuff prisoners do and nothing the about lawlessness of prison officials.

Let's take the recent incident at South Carolina's Lee Correctional Institute where 7 prisoners were killed and 17 injured. For example, all we hear from South Carolina's government and it officials is gang members killed each other over stuff gangs do. Now all of that could very well be true. But instead, it should be on how South Carolina's Government and its prison officials exacerbated, aggravated, incited and ensured the inevitability that gangs would do gangs. How many of you have read the voluminous amount of lawsuits filed by South Carolina prisoners relative to violations prison officials who have taken an oath to follow the law and behave professionally, are anything but?

The earth of South Carolina is historically as any other square inch of U.S. soil, drenched, soaked in blood and injustice and that again is stating the obvious. The question is: How do we hold accountable government officials.

As we work collectively as families and friends of prisoners seeking accountability of prison officials, let's not forget that victims of crime are also members of the collective and we embrace them. We all know that victims of crime would gladly trade in the prison sentence given the perpetrator for a reversal of the criminal act ever happening and there is no such thing as closure. But there has been this us against them narrative that diabolically pits the work of holding prison officials accountable as families and friends of prisoners are not concerned with the realities of crime. When the reality of the criminal act and its genesis has as much to do with the same lack of accountability and transparency by prison officials which we all know too well as above the law impunity.

By William Thorpe, I'm Held in Solitary Confinement 

P.S. As I concluded this work it was announced, 4/25/18; that the U.S. Government is indicating 14 South Carolina prison officials for a number of federal crimes, including racketeering, dating as far back as 3 years. Of course, the recent incident at the Lee Prison sped this up.

Yes, this is a type of accountability but it still fits that one-dimensional definition of malfeasance. South Carolina Prison officials as their brethren in Virginia have broken rules on a daily basis and if there is nothing more democratic than equality under the law, then prison officials must be held to account.
  
By William Thorpe

Jeffery Gardner Warehoused at Pocahontas State Correctional Center Expressing Prisoners Plight

A former Senator once noted avidly before his colleagues (quote) " The Public cannot tour the prisons and interview the inmates". (unquote)  However, the "inmates", as well as their families and friends can" share their experiences with "vapac" [Viginia Prisons Accountability Committee]. Here we amplify the prisoner's voice in society so both sides are presented. The following submission: The reality of prison life by Prisoner Jeffery Gardner confined in Virginia's Pocahontas State Correctional Center expressing the prisoner's plight. Note he has some interesting elements open for discussion. We at "vapac" give thanks to Mr. Gardner for sharing his experience. *Note* Click on pop-out icon for larger view,
By Jeffery Gardner Confined at Pocahontas State Prison

VADOC Post Orders and Food Service Professionalism Verses What It Really Looks Like

 

Shouldn't Delegate Wendy Gooditis Also Care About Virginia Prisoner Suicides

Are we to infer from the omission of the prisoners (jail and state prisons) from 

Del. Wendy Gooditis House Bill 569, dealing with suicide transparency. Which was signed into law by Governor Northam on 3/19/18? That the Commonwealth of Virginia doesn't care and isn't concerned with the prevalence of prisoner suicide who, need it be pointed out were not sentenced to die by suicide in its prisons?

If laws are expressions of societal-maturity, order, and development shouldn't the consequence of its violation, prisons become that nexus of Governmental transparency and accountability? Yet there is this understanding-perversion of the very reason laws exist, to begin with when it comes to prison.

The Daily Press in a recent story on the 1/7/18; death, alleged suicide of Jordyn Charity, a prisoner barely out of his teens, in Solitary Confinement at Red Onion State Prison (a prison that has high rates of suicides in its Solitary Confinement units) exposed the incredulously above the law realities of prison officials as it concerns prisoner suicides. 

As the Daily Press succinctly put it: "The General Assembly must increase DOC oversight especially when prisoners die within the state's prisons".

By William Thorpe #1033929

Held in Long-Term Solitary Confinement at Virginia's Department of Corrections Red Onion State Prison.