Post by Anja on Jun 9, 2006 1:59:36 GMT -5
Resist Against the Machine and the Routine
As one police officer slammed the van door shut, with 6 of us in tow
destined for the county jail, an officer in the driver's seat turned the
key to get us on our way. But nothing happened. He turned the key again.
And again, nothing. For several minutes, this went on. We waited patiently
in the back, strapped to chairs, and handcuffed behind our backs.
I couldn't avoid thinking about Willie Brown, there in the prison at that
moment, just yards away, strapped to a gurney, hooked up to a new machine
that the prison promised would save him from any pain.
In the weeks building up to this moment, the state was forced to assure a
U.S. District Court judge that medical staff would be able to guarantee
that prisoners would not suffer during their lethal injection of poisonous
drugs. Because the Department of Corrections could find no doctor or
anesthesiologist who was willing to violate the medical code of ethics and
oversee the process of exterminating a "patient," faith was put into a
machine - a machine that would tell a prison doctor and nurse when the
brain was dead.
Despite the obvious failure to meet the judge's request, and even though
the manufacturer of the machine said that it was sold to Central Prison in
error, the judge nodded okay, the governor turned his head, and the
machine made history.
But we all know that you can't always trust a machine to work.
After several more minutes of banging on the steering wheel and jamming
the key into the ignition switch, the officer finally got the van started,
and we were whisked out of the prison parking lot, past Willie Brown's
family, past the vigilers on the sidewalk, and to the jail.
Once to the jail, our van approached the electronic gate that leads into
the indoor prisoner transport parking area. The gate did not raise on cue.
Once again frustrated, our police driver backed up the van, then drove
forward. Nothing. Backed up again, forward, back, forward. Finally the
machinery of the gate worked, and we were in.
There were 6 of us, and we had all been through the process before: paper
work, finger prints, a photograph, waiting, seeing the magistrate,
promising to appear in court, sitting in a jail cell until 3 a.m. waiting
to be released once the execution had been carried out.
The officers at the jail know who we are now. They know who has been
arrested before, what our names are, and who the new people are. They know
the routine.
The routine is that North Carolina is a killing state, and doesn't
hesitate to arrest and jail those who dissent by action. During the winter
and spring months so far, North Carolina has been on a rampage of killing
6 prisoners in 6 months. This pace has put this state as the number 2
killing state - only behind Texas.
And the people have responded. During the last 4 executions, 55 arrests
have been made.
College and high school students and faculty, mothers, pregnant women, a
former death row prisoner, family members of murder victims, national
organizational leaders, human rights advocates, and so many others have
been willing to put their bodies in harms way at the risk of intimidation,
persecution and prosecution.
Just 12 hours earlier in the day, dozens of people packed the courthouse
across the street from the jail to support those facing charges for
trespassing during the January and March executions. 15 defendants
appeared in court, prepared for trial, with witnesses and attorneys ready
to make their case, but our day in court was put off until June 19.
As the officer at the prison told me to stand up so he could handcuff me,
I said, "That is not necessary. I am not a criminal." He repeated his
request, and I reiterated mine. At that moment I didn't feel like a
criminal. The real crime was what the state was doing that night to Willie
Brown and his family.
In the end, I got handcuffs that were a little tighter than everyone
else's.
In the eyes of the state, we are criminals. We deserved to be dragged,
pushed, threatened, harassed, strapped, cuffed and jailed. Why? Because
not only do we oppose the state and what the state does to murderers, but
we act with consistency in what we preach.
The magistrate at the county jail announced that we were all being held in
jail until we could pay a $3000 bond to secure our release.
We all spent the night in jail. Some of us were fortunate enough to get
bailed out by mid morning, while 2 stayed in until late afternoon when a
judge ordered their release without the bond.
Willie Brown got out that night too, with a ride in a police van. But his
bail was much higher. Just after 2:00 a.m., prison workers loaded his
poisoned body into a body bag and put him into the back of the van to be
taken to a hospital.
I wonder if the van started right away for him that night. And did the
machine monitoring the execution work too?
We surely cannot put our faith in the machine, nor can we put faith in the
leaders of our state. Everything and everyone is slave to routine. And
when the failing machine takes over and routine becomes the norm, then we
have lost our soul as a society.
As long as killing remains routine in our justice system, and as long as
we put our faith in machines and not in God and Love, our resistance at
the prison and elsewhere will continue to engage the powers so that the
routine and the machine are slowed to a grinding halt and killing will be
no more.
Note: The trial of the execution protesters is scheduled for June 19 in
Raleigh, North Carolina. They face multiple counts of trespass.
(source: Scott Langley, Instrument of Peace)
As one police officer slammed the van door shut, with 6 of us in tow
destined for the county jail, an officer in the driver's seat turned the
key to get us on our way. But nothing happened. He turned the key again.
And again, nothing. For several minutes, this went on. We waited patiently
in the back, strapped to chairs, and handcuffed behind our backs.
I couldn't avoid thinking about Willie Brown, there in the prison at that
moment, just yards away, strapped to a gurney, hooked up to a new machine
that the prison promised would save him from any pain.
In the weeks building up to this moment, the state was forced to assure a
U.S. District Court judge that medical staff would be able to guarantee
that prisoners would not suffer during their lethal injection of poisonous
drugs. Because the Department of Corrections could find no doctor or
anesthesiologist who was willing to violate the medical code of ethics and
oversee the process of exterminating a "patient," faith was put into a
machine - a machine that would tell a prison doctor and nurse when the
brain was dead.
Despite the obvious failure to meet the judge's request, and even though
the manufacturer of the machine said that it was sold to Central Prison in
error, the judge nodded okay, the governor turned his head, and the
machine made history.
But we all know that you can't always trust a machine to work.
After several more minutes of banging on the steering wheel and jamming
the key into the ignition switch, the officer finally got the van started,
and we were whisked out of the prison parking lot, past Willie Brown's
family, past the vigilers on the sidewalk, and to the jail.
Once to the jail, our van approached the electronic gate that leads into
the indoor prisoner transport parking area. The gate did not raise on cue.
Once again frustrated, our police driver backed up the van, then drove
forward. Nothing. Backed up again, forward, back, forward. Finally the
machinery of the gate worked, and we were in.
There were 6 of us, and we had all been through the process before: paper
work, finger prints, a photograph, waiting, seeing the magistrate,
promising to appear in court, sitting in a jail cell until 3 a.m. waiting
to be released once the execution had been carried out.
The officers at the jail know who we are now. They know who has been
arrested before, what our names are, and who the new people are. They know
the routine.
The routine is that North Carolina is a killing state, and doesn't
hesitate to arrest and jail those who dissent by action. During the winter
and spring months so far, North Carolina has been on a rampage of killing
6 prisoners in 6 months. This pace has put this state as the number 2
killing state - only behind Texas.
And the people have responded. During the last 4 executions, 55 arrests
have been made.
College and high school students and faculty, mothers, pregnant women, a
former death row prisoner, family members of murder victims, national
organizational leaders, human rights advocates, and so many others have
been willing to put their bodies in harms way at the risk of intimidation,
persecution and prosecution.
Just 12 hours earlier in the day, dozens of people packed the courthouse
across the street from the jail to support those facing charges for
trespassing during the January and March executions. 15 defendants
appeared in court, prepared for trial, with witnesses and attorneys ready
to make their case, but our day in court was put off until June 19.
As the officer at the prison told me to stand up so he could handcuff me,
I said, "That is not necessary. I am not a criminal." He repeated his
request, and I reiterated mine. At that moment I didn't feel like a
criminal. The real crime was what the state was doing that night to Willie
Brown and his family.
In the end, I got handcuffs that were a little tighter than everyone
else's.
In the eyes of the state, we are criminals. We deserved to be dragged,
pushed, threatened, harassed, strapped, cuffed and jailed. Why? Because
not only do we oppose the state and what the state does to murderers, but
we act with consistency in what we preach.
The magistrate at the county jail announced that we were all being held in
jail until we could pay a $3000 bond to secure our release.
We all spent the night in jail. Some of us were fortunate enough to get
bailed out by mid morning, while 2 stayed in until late afternoon when a
judge ordered their release without the bond.
Willie Brown got out that night too, with a ride in a police van. But his
bail was much higher. Just after 2:00 a.m., prison workers loaded his
poisoned body into a body bag and put him into the back of the van to be
taken to a hospital.
I wonder if the van started right away for him that night. And did the
machine monitoring the execution work too?
We surely cannot put our faith in the machine, nor can we put faith in the
leaders of our state. Everything and everyone is slave to routine. And
when the failing machine takes over and routine becomes the norm, then we
have lost our soul as a society.
As long as killing remains routine in our justice system, and as long as
we put our faith in machines and not in God and Love, our resistance at
the prison and elsewhere will continue to engage the powers so that the
routine and the machine are slowed to a grinding halt and killing will be
no more.
Note: The trial of the execution protesters is scheduled for June 19 in
Raleigh, North Carolina. They face multiple counts of trespass.
(source: Scott Langley, Instrument of Peace)