Protest hits Texas death row

A spirited protest against illegal and inhumane living conditions on death row April 8 drew a favorable response from passing cars as well as shoppers in the rural east Texas town of Liv ingston. Activists from Houston and Austin met in downtown Livingston for a demonstration in support of prisoners’ rights, the first ever at the Polk County Courthouse.

Angie Agapetus, Gloria Rubac and Njeri Shakur in Livingston, Texas. Photo: Art Browning

Carrying signs that read, “Honk to stop prison torture!” and “Isolation is cruel and unusual punishment!” the demonstrators were pleasantly surprised when passers-by honked and shouted in support. “East Texas is Klan country. I never expected so many people supporting us in a town where many are employed by the prison system,” said Njeri Shakur of the Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement in Houston.

Local residents have told activists that the only group remembered for demonstrating in the town square is the Ku Klux Klan, which holds recruiting rallies wearing their hoods and robes.

Buoyed by the positive response, the activists then went to the office of the Polk County Enterprise, the local newspaper. When the publisher, Alvin Holley, was asked if the newspaper could give some coverage to the torture going on in the prison, he responded, “They deserve it!”

“We told him that people in his city supported the idea of stopping the torture, but he told us he didn’t give a damn,” Casey Davis told Workers World. He then said he would have the whole group arrested if they didn’t leave immediately. Green Party activist Art Browning asked the editor, “You support torture and do you go to church on Sunday?” Again the response was a threat of arrest.

The demonstrators then drove in a car caravan for the four miles from the town to the prison. The 400 men on death row are housed at the Polunsky Unit outside of Livingston, 80 miles north of Houston. They were moved here in 2000, after an attempted prison escape by six prisoners at the Ellis Unit in Huntsville, where death row had been housed for decades. One man, Martin Gurule, did escape, but his body was found a few days later in a river. The other five never made it over the fences.

Families join protest

Joined by several families of people on death row, the protest began directly across the highway from the prison. People carried balloons and colorful signs encouraging motorists to honk. Many did honk their horns and some even stopped to speak with protesters.

“Tropic Blue,” a world beat band from Houston, provided live political music and the demonstration created a lively and spirited sight across from the super max prison housing over 2,000 men, 400 of them awaiting execution. As families entered and left the prison for visitation, they honked, smiled and shouted approval.

Speakers from the Campaign to End the Death Penalty and the Texas Death Penalty Abolition Movement took the microphone between songs to agitate and educate the crowd and the families in passing cars. They saluted the men on the row with the D.R.I.V.E. Movement who are protesting inside the prison by refusing to move from their cells for showers or visits, thereby causing guards to have to summon higher officials. Then these men enumerate their grievances and ask for a change.

In a closing ceremony, protesters released six bright purple helium-filled balloons, calling out for each one. The first balloon was for the total abolition of the death penalty. The second was for those men with the D.R.I.V.E. (See www.drivemovement.org)

The third was for Harvey “Tee” Earvin, a founder of the P.U.R.E. organization on death row, Panthers United for Revolutionary Education, whose birthday was that day. The next balloon was for abolitionist Njeri Shakur, who has fought against the death penalty for over a decade and was also celebrating her birthday. The fifth balloon was for all the activists from Houston and Austin who had given up their Saturday to stand in solidarity with the brothers on death row.

The last balloon was released for all the families who joined in the protest and those who support their loved ones living on the most active death row in the country. Families of Louis Perez, Joseph Nichols-Bey, and Ramon Hernandez and a friend of prisoner Sam Bustamante attended the protest and then went into the prison to visit.

Also participating in the demonstration were members of the New Black Panther Party of Houston.

The prison board can change death row conditions if they so choose. But for the last five years the board has chosen to allow these men to be tortured and develop serious mental illnesses. The April 8 demonstrators vowed to have another protest outside death row in the fall and to also protest at the July meeting of the Texas Board of Criminal Justice.