East Coast 'In the Belly' tour report!

We just got back from a two week tour talkin' bout prison abolition along the East Coast. Here's our report-back, including where we went, who we met, and what we learned:

ATHENS, OH-

Played a performance art space in a converted church. It's an art center, subsidized by the city to encourage culture in Athens. Our audience consisted of maybe 30-40 people, students, artists, local eccentrics, old hippies. Athens is a college town, and it seems like most people in the audience were involved or associated with the university in some way. The audience was mostly white, but there was a pretty wide array of ages present.
It was interesting performing in a "real" theatre space, even though we had the audience come up on the stage with us. Having black outs and control of our lighting was nice. We felt good about our performances, and crashed with an old geography friend of Wes'. Stayed up into the night taking about Colorado and artificial arrangements of public space.

Lucasville uprising prisoner dies in Ohio

By Sharon Danann
in: Workers World
Published Sep 17, 2011

Abdul-Muhaymin Nuruddin

Abdul-Muhaymin Nuruddin, a prisoner convicted as James Bell, died this past week of an apparent heart attack while in custody. His body has yet to be released so that his funeral can take place, in disregard of Muslim custom of burial within 24 hours.

Nuruddin was a negotiator on behalf of the prisoners during the 1993 rebellion in Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville, Ohio. He was held in high esteem by his fellow prisoners for his work in SOCF’s law library, where he prepared appeals, writs of habeas corpus and civil law suits.

Update on Pelican Bay Hungerstrike.

The most important part of this update is that Pelican Bay inmates intend to resume their hunger strike on Sept 26th. We will keep everyone informed about what is happening and will hopefully be bringing some solidarity actions together.