Systemic impunity keeps Jim Crow alive in Florida prisons

An update on plantation conditions for all who dare believe that slavery is over and Jim Crow is dead

by Keith Soanes

Keith-Soanes, Systemic impunity keeps Jim Crow alive in Florida prisons, Abolition Now!
Keith Soanes

Trust the truth: Neither slavery nor Jim Crow is over. As you can see, the 13th Amendment perpetuates slavery through its exception clause, and Black life still don’t matter, not just personally, but by law.

Jim Crow is being kept alive through systemic impunity. When you let a certain group know that they are above the law, that they can do as they please to other people and they will be protected, you create sadists, bullies and ruffians. When you promote higher wages and rank for any who show fascist tendencies, you create cowards, punks who will wait to brutalize you after you submit to handcuffs.

I would love to say that there are some good pigs, pro-imperialist goons, but there are none. There is no such thing as a good pig because the same ones who kick it with you and won’t be involved personally in you being brutalized will be the same ones who will watch you get brutalized by their colleagues and not only don’t try to stop the brutality, but won’t say a word, won’t even report it to the proper authority. Job scared, or in fear of friendly retaliation.

I will give you proof of how incognizant the average pig really is. They don’t even know what the Whistleblower Act is, and they don’t want to know. I am not just talking about Black or white, I’m talking about all pigs. The end result of economic desperation and miseducation got them so far gone from political reality – “political,” another word they want nothing to do with – that they’d rather suffer living in the feudal trailers on prison grounds. Every time I think of how this system ruins pigs, I think of the words of Winston Churchill, “If you want to see the scum of a society, go to a prison gate at shift change.”

These pigs are really psychologically ruined; they actually believe that they are doing the right thing. They remind you of the soldiers who go to war killing innocent civilians because they were lied to and don’t even know the real reason they are fighting, killing and dying – economic desperation and miseducation.

It’s like asking a KKK why he hates Black people. His answer will only reveal how incognizant he is. He really wouldn’t know. He really won’t have a logical reason. He probably won’t believe he needs a reason. He was simply taught, indoctrinated, ruined by ruined people from generations back leading to the slave patrol and Black Codes.

I see these pigs every day. Their favorite word is, “Oh, you shouldn’t have come to prison.” They still don’t believe or understand that since the system is not egalitarian, there is no telling who is innocent or guilty. They all automatically assume that all prisoners are guilty. And they say it more with their action than their words.

These pigs are really psychologically ruined; they actually believe that they are doing the right thing. They remind you of the soldiers who go to war killing innocent civilians because they were lied to and don’t even know the real reason they are fighting, killing and dying – economic desperation and miseducation.

I’m not saying that all prisoners are innocent. I’m saying that our justice system is way too imbalanced to point fingers and punish others rather than move toward truly rehabilitating the slaves.

I speak from insperience and experience when I say that I watch these people violate their own rules, from minor ones to major. The simple act of brutalizing an innocent man in handcuffs is a crime, a violation of Florida Statute 944.35(3)(a)1. They literally get away with murdering slaves.

Willie Lynch is probably rolling over in his grave at how these pigs beat what he called “good stock.” Then too, the street pigs lynch innocent Blacks who were not even involved in criminal activity and walk, so how much justice can we expect when they lynch us on the plantation known as DOC (Department of Corrections)?

Of course, we, the slaves, can riot, we can revolt, we can stab and kill pigs, but we don’t because of the because. I would love to say because we are the more civilized ones, or because we think of consequences, but that’s not true, because we waste no time at stabbing each other up.

Maybe it’s more because we are afraid of what damage we will do to them. I hear slaves say all the time, “I ain’t scared of these crackers; I’m scared of what I will do to them.” Be that as it may, they are taking advantage of our kindness.

Then too, the street pigs lynch innocent Blacks who were not even involved in criminal activity and walk, so how much justice can we expect when they lynch us on the plantation known as DOC (Department of Corrections)?

I for one don’t want to riot. I’ve been in enough spontaneous reactions in my young days; all this did was get us more yellow lines and fences while they control everything and we get less genuine rehabilitation. DOC is super afraid of genuinely rehabilitated, self-determined, independent thinking, politically conscious men and women.

You know, just as when Adam and Eve got knowledge, they became god (Genesis 3:22), and when the slaves learned how to read, they had to be freed. The system, this crooked fascist system, is safe as long as the slaves remain politically unconscious.

Rehabilitation to the system is being broken and handpicked or groveling and truckling, loyal to the pigs. The genuflectors have the best of everything that’s a privilege on the plantation. I write rebelling reports about plantation conditions, so I am considered dangerous – to the pigs.

Even everything coming to me in the mail is considered threatening, even the Bay View. I and the few other captives who subscribe have yet to receive our monthly issue. However, Capt. Redika, who I mentioned in an October letter to the Bay View to be a KKK who uses cans of chemical agents as his lynch rope, is all of a sudden giving me his attention.

You know, just as when Adam and Eve got knowledge, they became god (Genesis 3:22), and when the slaves learned how to read, they had to be freed. The system, this crooked fascist system, is safe as long as the slaves remain politically unconscious.

On Nov. 7, I returned to G3 dormitory from lunch meal around 1:30 p.m. to find Captain Redika in the wing. He then called my name and asked how I was doing as if we were friends. I told him I was not OK. He asked why.

I told him that because he was there, “Somebody must be about to get lynched.” I said it for all to hear. He then responded how I put him in the newspaper: “You wrote the newspaper on me. I’m only doing my job; you’re only gonna get me promoted,” he said proudly.

At this point I was giving him my back, not paying him any attention. “You have a First Amendment right to say what you want to the papers,” he said, going out the door.

A few days later he said something about me writing to the Bay View about him while I was in the chow line. The fact that I wrote the paper on him was eating him up inside, so I know I’m up for a lynching.

I eat my last meal every day slowly, especially after several pigs warned me that they read my letter to the paper. It’s posted on DCweb (the Florida Department of Corrections website), they proudly informed me.

A few others said they like what they read. My only concern is how they got my letter? Did they intercept it and make a copy before sending it off – if it reached its destination? I for one do not trust the mail clerks here.

The fact that I wrote the paper on him was eating him up inside, so I know I’m up for a lynching.

About a week after the Oct. 3 death – murder – of Tabadrick “TB” Campbell, there was a death by overdose in our wing (G3). A white captive was found dead in his bunk. He had just arrived about a week before his death. Now they’re trying to charge one of my friends, Franklin Manfiston, with his death. I’ll tell you how.

Franklin is a certified law clerk. His cellmate, Kelvy – I don’t know his real name – was suddenly moved out from Cell 8 and placed in Cell 11 so room could be made for the white captive. Kelvy and Franklin got along really well, and they were compatible, meaning there was no reason to move Kelvy out.

Once in Cell 11, Kelvy and his new cellmate, a young Black brother, were not getting along and almost got into knife play one night. So Sgt. Roberts, trying to resolve the problem, placed Kelvy back in the cell with Franklin and placed the white prisoner in Cell 11.

Everything was all good, except one thing. Sgt. Roberts never completed the move by submitting the cell change on paper or official documents, so technically, when the white captive was found dead in Cell 11, he was still assigned to Cell 8. And FDLE (Florida Department of Law Enforcement) were the first to figure it out.

From there, they placed Kelvy, Franklin and the other Black captive in confinement pending investigation. A week or so later, Kelvy and the other captive were released, then picked back up a few days later.

Franklin wrote me a kite informing me that they were trying to charge him with murder, claiming that the white captive got the drugs from him. And we all know that’s a lie. I told him to be sure he called me to testify. He’s currently pending transfer.

Then on Nov. 2, while in the dinner line in the chow hall, a brother named Monroe was caught trying to eat twice. Sgt. J. Mynaugh placed him in handcuffs and walked off with him. I saw him being placed in handcuffs with my very own eyes.

Everything was normal. I sat down to eat. Then the pigs was shouting that no one was allowed to leave the chow hall. I was about to exit the chow hall and there he was.

Monroe was being escorted by a slew of pigs. He was handcuffed, hands behind his back, and he was bloody red and orange from chemical agents. He could barely walk and he fell in front of the chow hall in the presence of all of us.

And this was the worst part: He was so fucked up and bloody and swollen, you wouldn’t recognize him. I couldn’t recognize him. He looked like a walking Emmett Till.  His whole face and head was swollen just that quick.

Monroe was being escorted by a slew of pigs. He was handcuffed, hands behind his back, and he was bloody red and orange from chemical agents. He could barely walk and he fell in front of the chow hall in the presence of all of us.

We came this close to rioting as they brought a wheelchair and pushed Monroe off. Another brother who was always kicking it with the pigs. That’s how they do you for trying to eat a second tray because you’re hungry.

Sgt. Mynaugh was in the chow hall not even a week later – above the law, unfazed by his conscience and without worry of retaliation by any of us. He is safe in Klan territory.

We have to find a way to make them think twice before they act. Martin Luther King once said, “It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it will stop him from lynching me.” It’s kind of hard to agree when the law is doing all the lynching.

The only thing that’s going to stop the lynching is us. We must cease to participate. We need to boycott. We need people power.

“Every move is a mission.”

Send our brother some love and light: Keith Soanes, 191981, Charlotte CI, 33123 Oil Well Rd., Punta Gorda, FL 33955.

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