The Politics of Punishment: A Critical Analysis of Prisons in America by Erik Olin Wright

Author:Erik Olin Wright [Wright, Erik Olin]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: Social Science, Penology, Prisons, General, United States, Political Science, Addresses; Essays; Lectures
Google: amJHAAAAMAAJ
Publisher: Harper & Row
Published: 1973-09-15T23:51:12+00:00

174 T H E P O L I T I C S O F P U N I S H M E N T

dead inmate or other Caucasian inmates who just "wouldn't let

a nigger get away with killing a white m a n . " Or I would end up in the gas chamber for defending myself against inmates attempting to take my life, because they, the officials, would see

that "the word got in the right places." Pictures of the body of the dead inmate were placed in my central file along with the

write-up accusing me of the offense and the findings of the

committee of prison officials.

In A p r i l of 1968,1 was transferred to Soledad from San Quen-

tin and placed on the first floor of O wing, commonly known as

Max Row. U p o n my arrival I was confronted with extremely

hostile prison officials who made no effort to conceal their racial

hatred of blacks in general and of me in particular. One guard

pointed in my face and remarked to another that San Quentin

had sent them one of the niggers involved in the July killing and

that the inmate who was killed was a fine fellow because he

hated niggers.

While waiting to be taken to the classification committee, I

watched a black inmate, Clarence Causey (nicknamed Dopey

Dan), be set up and cold-bloodedly murdered. He had been

assigned to a work group of consolidated Caucasian and M e x i -

can American inmates who both identify themselves and are

known around the prison as Nazis. He was the only black. He

was immediately set upon with knives and stabbed to death

while three guards, including the one who had made the re-

marks to me referred to above, stood by indifferently and

watched until he fell on his face in a puddle of his own blood.

T h e n the guards shot tear gas onto the tier, ordered the inmates

back to their cells, and removed the mortally wounded black

inmate from the tier. Approximately half an hour later they

took h i m to the prison hospital. After repeated inquiries, we

were finally informed that night that the black inmate was

dead. No search was made of the prisoners who did the killing

until after they had been returned to their cells and given more

than ample time to hide or get rid of the murder weapons.

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