December 29, 2012
In: SF Bay View
Since Dec.
13, 1994, Indiana political prisoner Khalfani Malik Khaldun (aka Leonard
McQuay) has been held in control units, i.e. administrative segregation or
isolation. It began when police and prison investigators manufactured a murder
charge against him after a guard was stabbed and killed. Brother Khalfani is a
Muslim and New Afrikan revolutionary educator who professes a strong sense of
radical politics and culture.
Interview
by the Campaign to Free Khalfani Malik Khaldun
 |
| Khalfani Malik Khaldun 042711 |
Campaign:
How long have you been in Indiana’s prison plantation?
Khalfani
Malik Khaldun: I entered the Indiana Department of Corrections in 1987, when I
was a senior in high school.
Campaign:
How old are you?
KMK: I was
born Nov. 30, 1969. That makes me 43 years old.
Campaign:
Explain to us what your life is like on the inside?
KMK: The
best way to describe it is I am in prison sanctioned to indefinite solitary
confinement engaged in multiple fights. One fight to regain my freedom, one
fight to maintain my physical health, one fight to be released into the general
population, and the last fight is to maintain my sanity – an all-day job.
Campaign:
How has your activism made you a target for harassment or repression?
KMK: Being
identified as a prison leader, political agitator, activist or revolutionary,
we get automatically singled out as threats to others and threats to the safety
and security of the prison plantations. Having been restricted from general
population for so long, my influence has been reduced to small units. The idea
behind all this is to destroy our ties and relationships with comrades and new
youth coming in.
Campaign:
Share your position on the political nature of your murder charge involving
that prison guard, Phillip Curry.
KMK: On
Dec. 13, 1994, the night this guard was killed at the Indiana State Prison, he
was killed on the tier above where I lived. D-cell-house was where the
prisoncrats housed the worst of the worst – their term, not mine. I was at that
time agitating, educating and organizing the radical elements who would listen.
So when
this happened, having been a thorn in the prisoncrats’ side already, they made
me the responsible party that night; they were mad and wanted someone to pay.
In 2001, they made me pay by finding me guilty and giving me a fresh 60-year
hit.
One of the
jurors who found me guilty, Juror No. 12, came forward after my trial; she
regretted her actions and went to the judge. Instead of calling for a new trial
and reversal of the charge, the judge told her to go home; the judge has since
retired. They manufactured evidence to obtain their conviction against me.
I am in
prison sanctioned to indefinite solitary confinement engaged in multiple
fights. One fight to regain my freedom, one fight to maintain my physical
health, one fight to be released into the general population, and the last
fight is to maintain my sanity – an all-day job.
Campaign:
Explain the corruption that exists inside Indiana’s criminal justice system.
KMK: Like
any system of corrupt politicians and abuses of power, whoever can afford to
pay a greedy lawyer to represent them here may stay out of prison. These
lawyers have judges and prosecutors who will give one a pass as long as they
receive a nice payoff.
Poor people
get sent to prison to fulfill the schemes of the prisoncrats and political
regime here; more bodies mean more money. As they say, power corrupts, but
absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Indiana
legislators have slashed prison funding for educating prisoners and providing
meaningful rehabilitative programs, so that money would be solely for building
new prisons. So they are perpetuating a system that leads to more recidivism.
Not having a viable re-entry program for prisoners prior to their release
ensures a return to prison: capitalism at its best and the human exploitation
of prisoners.
Campaign:
Why are they continuing to house you in solitary confinement after nearly two
decades?
KMK: The
executive body of the Indiana Department of Corrections launched its political
war against me in 1994, the night they lost one of their own. Being the only person
accused, then later charged and convicted for this murder, to them Khalfani
Malik Khaldun is Indiana’s public enemy number one; so they have condemned me
to a prison existence in solitary confinement.
This goes
beyond my sentence of 60 years. The courts did not say serve out this term in
administrative segregation. The Indiana Department of Corrections wants
payback, so in retaliation they want me suffering to the point of psychological
incapacitation. They want me an old grey-hair grey-beard and no longer imposing
a potential threat.
I am
currently “conduct clear” for eight years, and I have completed the following
programs: Substance Abuse; Stress Management; Anger Management; Commitment to
Change; Prison-Life Skills; Parenting; Cage Your Rage; Rage, Recidivism and
Recovery; Prison-Life Skills No. 2; Houses of Healing; Bridging the Gap; and
Inside-Outside Dads.
I have been
eligible for release to general population for years now. Their justification
for not releasing me is they say I killed their officer, and nobody is
comfortable with signing off on my release from solitary confinement.
Campaign:
Why is it so important to build a networking support base on the outside of
prison?
KMK: For
the revolutionary, political prisoner, jailhouse lawyer, prison activist,
outside resources and support is crucial. The prisoncrats isolate us to control
our movements and neutralize our influence on other convicts.
Having a
network of loyal people who have your best interests in mind helps to keep the
public informed. These supporters can be family members, friends or anyone
doing prisoner support work. They can help us expose whatever ill treatment we
go through. When the prisoncrats know you have people who genuinely love and
care about you, they’re less likely to openly mess you around.
Campaign:
Explain how the Indiana Department of Corrections utilizes control units and
why?
KMK: In the
early 1980s, Indiana experienced several prison riots as a result of racism and
brutality by guards on militant aspiring revolutionaries and lumpen proletariat
prisoners, forcing prisoners to take a stand to defend themselves. Indiana
prisoncrats learned some lessons from these insurrections – and one lesson was
that there was a threat to the Indiana Department of Corrections posed by
politically-unified convicts.
Indiana
prisoncrats lobbied for funds to build two solitary confinement units here in
response to the rebellion of militancy from convicts willing to sacrifice for
change.
In 1991, the Indiana Supermax was built, a control unit meant to be a
tool of social control of the state’s most violent prisoners.
In 1993, the
prisoncrats built the Secured Housing Unit (SHU), a unit styled after the SHU
at Pelican Bay State Prison.
Both units
were meant to cut the prisoners off from normal prison relations, while helping
to keep the prisoners in the general population sort of in check. No one wants
to spend unlimited years in Administrative Segregation, or solitary
confinement.
The fear of
being held in these units creates snitches who will tell prisoncrats whatever
to stay in population. You may read about these units by going to the Human
Rights Watch report, “Cold Storage: Super-Maximum Security Confinement inIndiana.” Amnesty International just released a 68-page report called “The Edgeof Endurance,” exposing solitary confinement in California.
Campaign:
How important is it to stay in touch with your loved ones?
KMK: Doing
time is like having cannibals eat away at your flesh day by day. Family love
and their help to assist us in maintaining are paramount. I am a conscious,
self-educated New Afrikan (Black) man who loves myself and those who love me.
That connection helps to keep me determined, motivated and hopeful in times of
sadness and loss of loved ones.
Since 1997,
I have lost my mother, two brothers, an uncle and two cousins. I am fighting
for my life, unable to cry, mourn or be a comfort to my family. Since 1994, my
loved ones have been harassed, intimidated, threatened and discouraged by
prisoncrats to not visit or write me at times. I have not had a contact visit
since 2000. We continue to persevere through it all – because it is necessary.
Campaign:
How do you work to maintain your health both mentally and physically?
KMK: For
years I have maintained a consistent physical exercise routine and a healthy
study habit of reading quality books and magazines. I don’t eat pork, and
that’s been since 1987. I stopped eating red meat for 15 years; I recently
started back eating it. Exercise and study has kept me active and healthy for
many years.
One
realistic fact that I want to share is no one leaves these experiences the same
as they were when they came in. I am scarred by anxiety, depression, paranoia
and hypertension as a result of being in long term isolation so many years.
I have made
a conscious effort to humble myself and be less reactionary in emotional
situations. This way these prisoncrats won’t have any ammunition to use to
justify keeping me in solitary confinement. As long as I am living, I’m going
to keep on fighting.
Campaign:
How long did they keep you on the SCU – Special Confinement Unit?
KMK:
Prisoncrats sent me to the SCU unit way in January 2003, and I spent 10 years
in that windowless torture chamber. For the most part, that is one of Indiana’s
most racist prisons, and the staff are 98 percent all-white with this
philosophy of Southern racism.
That was
the worst 10 years of my 26 years in prison. Altogether now I have 18 years
straight in units of solitary confinement. They have tried to break my will to
be defiant and destroy my mental faculties. Allah has guided me out of each
storm. Allah-u-Akbar.
Campaign:
What do you think prompted the prisoncrats to finally transfer you out on April
18, 2012?
KMK: A
variety of reasons, but one in particular is my constant pursuits in civil
court. On April 4, 2012, I filed with the court a motion for an immediate
permanent injunctive relief judgment and a memorandum of law requesting the
court to order the Indiana Department of Corrections to release me to general
population. These prisoncrats moved me 14 days later to Pendleton Correctional
Facility.
This in my
opinion was done to get me out of their custody so I wouldn’t be a problem any
longer. I had been challenging my department-wide solitary confinement status
for years. The classification supervisor and superintendent also refused to
release me in 2010, when I had completed a program serving as re-entry back to
population. That ACT Program is an incentive for release. They released my
entire class but not me.
Photo: Indiana’s
Pendleton Correctional Facility was built in 1923.
Campaign:
What are the conditions like at Pendleton Correctional Facility?
KMK: The
transfer on April 18, 2012, out of the SCU to Pendleton did not land me in
general population. Right now the general population is run like a
concentration camp with fences and cameras everywhere; the whole prison is
“controlled movement.”
The
prisoncrats placed me on DWAS, Department-Wide Administrative Segregation.
Inside G-cell-house, where all the potential threats and alleged troublemakers
are housed, D-block is where all disciplinary segregation prisoners are housed.
Also, C-block, where I am held, houses prisoners on Facility Administrative
Segregation and prisoners on DWAS, Department-Wide Administrative Segregation,
the status I am on.
DWAS are
all single-man cells, with recreation one hour a day and 23 hours locked in a
cell. We get recreation on Monday, Wednesday, Friday, Saturday and Sundays,
showering only on Monday, Wednesday and Fridays. The only interaction we get is
during recreation outside when we’re in the dog-run individual cages.
Campaign:
Since your arrival at Pendleton, have any officials discussed with you your
possible release from that status?
KMK: The
prisoncrats are seriously playing games. Superintendent Keith Butts, who
recently retired, sent me a letter claiming he would set up a plan to consider
my release from DWAS status, but it was all a smokescreen to get me to ease up
on my demands to be treated like the rest of these prisoners who are being
released. They are picking and choosing and playing prison politics with our
lives.
The current
regime in the commissioner’s office at the Indiana Department of Corrections
are not willing to give me a chance to prove them wrong. That is, if they
released me and I transitioned without incident, they will not be able to say
“That’s the bad guy” no more. There is no legitimate justification for my still
being held captive in these units.
Campaign:
How can people outside that are interested in helping you join the campaign to
help free you? How can you benefit from their support?
KMK: Having
been in prison since 1987, I have had the misfortune to lose family, friends;
and my ties to relationships I’ve had with my female companions I have had to
rebuild, which hasn’t been easy, then establish an extended family.
Right now,
I need someone who is computer-savvy who can network with organizations to
encourage them to take on my case. I need a website on Facebook that solely
covers my entire case, and we need a law firm that assists political prisoners
that is activist-conscious. We also need someone qualified and good with
fundraising.
My success
with Indiana lawyers haven’t been great. They seem to be afraid to go up
against the Indiana Department of Corrections and the lawyers from the Indiana
Attorney General’s Office. We must find a lawyer out of state who can practice
in the state of Indiana.
Those
wanting to join this campaign to assist me in my freedom, please write me
directly and we’ll go from there; honestly, we need all the willing working
bodies we can get on this campaign.
Right now,
I need someone who is computer-savvy who can network with organizations to
encourage them to take on my case. I need a website on Facebook that solely
covers my entire case, and we need a law firm that assists political prisoners
that is activist-conscious. We also need someone qualified and good with
fundraising.
Campaign:
How is your civil and criminal fight coming along in the politics of the
Indiana Court System?
KMK: On
Jan. 11, 2013, I have a hearing on my civil law suit challenging my continued confinement
by the Indiana Department of Corrections. I filed several motions pro se that
will be covering primarily my request for the court to order my release to
general population.
My criminal
murder case is currently at a standstill, and my initial post-conviction appeal
was denied, because the Public Defender’s Office gave me an attorney who felt I
was guilty and I should do my time. He messed my case up.
I am
preparing a successive post-conviction relief petition. My rights are being
violated civilly and criminally, and I will never relent nor lose my
self-determination to fight.
Campaign:
Any final words you want to share with the public and the revolutionary
community?
KMK: I can
honestly say that Indiana as far as prisoners abandoning their criminal
mentalities and transforming to political consciousness goes, our “think
tanks,” we’re very aggressive in producing politically-active prisoners, but we
seem to have lost our momentum somewhere.
Prisoners
are still studying and having individual dialogues, and I think prisoners, in
an attempt to avoid being captured and held for 10-20 years in solitary
confinement, are becoming less vocal and active. My having been held for the
past 18 years is their prime example of where they don’t want to be.
To me, life
is not easy, never has been, and to struggle means to reject being the victim.
One who struggles is a rejuvenated fighter life-long. We are organized,
prepared and multi-talented. To struggle is to understand complexity and to
pick one’s own battles. There cannot be fruitful progress without a real
struggle. I am not broken by my adversity, but I am experiencing psychological
fatigue. A luta continua.
Send our brother some love and light: Khalfani
Malik Khaldun (Leonard McQuay), 874304, Pendleton Correctional Facility, GCH
17/2C, 4490 W. Reformatory Road, Pendleton, IN 46064.
