Mark Kauffman, right, along with his fiancé Sara Sheaffer.
It’s not a nice day for a white power wedding!
HONEY BROOK, PA – Saturday was supposed to be the day that prominent neo-Nazi Mark Kauffman was supposed to marry his fiancé and fellow neo-Nazi Sara Sheaffer. Instead, Sheaffer found herself still single this weekend and begging for bail money after Kauffman was picked up at the wedding venue the night before on an outstanding warrant in Massachusetts from six years ago.
According to court records from Chester County, PA, Kauffman is being held at the Chester County Prison in lieu of $75,000 bail. Records further indicate this was an “Arrest Prior to Requisition” which indicates the arrest of someone who has been charged with a crime in another state or jurisdiction. In February 2018, an arrest warrant was issued for Kauffman who law enforcement said was connected to a shotgun, rocket launcher and methamphetamines found in a Hadley, Massachusetts storage unit on Route 9 in Hadley, Monday. The Hadley Police Department say Kauffman is facing charges of trafficking in methamphetamine of 100-200 grams, possession of a large capacity feeding device and two counts of possession of a firearm without a license.
The location of the wedding location was an Air BnB that was publicly announced via a wedding website that indicated that the couple would be at the house on Friday after 6:00 PM and staying there until Sunday. A Telegram post on Sunday noted that Kauffman was arrested the eve of his wedding, with Sheaffer, who is five months pregnant, standing next to him. Her Venmo and CashApp accounts that are found on the wedding website are now being used to raise bail money.
Front page of wedding website.
According to Jersey Counter Info, Kauffman and Sheaffer, both from Massachusetts, are leaders of a neo-Nazi group based in the New York/New Jersey/Pennsylvania tri-state area called Storm 14 (S14). Kauffman founded the group in March 2023 after he split from another group called the National Socialist Youth Alliance (NSYA). As has been the case with neo-Nazi groups as of late, S14’s activities have been regulated to posting stickers on public property and participating in pop-up rallies that would be put on either by themselves or other groups. Kauffman was identified as one of the participants of a rally last week in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on an overpass that also included neo-Nazi and registered sex offender Benjamin Ryder. On Telegram, Kauffman used the name “Joachim Peiper” after a Waffen-SS war criminal during World War II who was convicted of killing American POWs, and although was initially sentenced to hang had his sentenced commuted and released in 1956. The real Joachim Peiper remained a committed Nazi, privately associated with fellow Nazis and even gave interviews in France after the French Communist Party exposed his presence in the country. On Bastille Day 1976, his home was attacked and torched by antifascists calling themselves the Avengers. Peiper’s charred remains were found in the aftermath holding a pistol.
Were Kauffman to post bail before he was extradited to Massachusetts, he would have to return to the state of his own accord.
(It was announced today that Russell “Maroon” Shoatz has joined The Realm of the Ancestors. This Q+A interview was conducted in 2006 by Comrade Sobukwe and Marcus Schell, both supporters of the Russell “Maroon” Shoatz Defense Committee. Marcus Schell is the son of the late Reggie Schell, a founding member of Philadelphia’s Black Panther Party. The interview is part of the 2013 book Maroon The Implacable: The Collected Writings of Russell Maroon Shoatz, edited by Fred Ho and Quincy Saul and published by Oakland’s PM Press. Light editing was done on this excerpt.)
*****
How did you get involved with the Black Movement of the 1960s and 1970s?
As a Black male who was born in Philadelphia in 1943, I can honestly say that until the age of twenty I was “dumb-as-do-do” so far as political and broad social issues go. Moreover, my father was a long-distance truck driver and he made very good money. So outside of eating some surplus cheese here and there, my family and my working/middle-class neighborhood was not a place of economic hardship. Thus, there was no incentive there.
In fact, my parents, and the adults in this neighborhood in general, were all on the go-to-school, go-to-church, and be-home-at-a-respectable-time kick. Social and political issues were never discussed or hinted at in the homes, churches, and schools!
All these Negroes (that’s what we were all then known as) were busy trying to get ahead as best a Negro could, even though in Philly just about everything was dominated and controlled by whites: city hall, police stations, firehouses, all the schools, neighborhoods, downtown businesses, and transportation. A Negro couldn’t even become a Boy or Girl Scout!
So, although there was no out-front segregation, like in the South, Philly’s Blacks were segregated in neighborhoods and allowed to leave only in order to work, shop, pay bills, and travel—sort of like apartheid South Africa.
Until I was twenty, that was my life, with the addiction of being deeply involved in gang activities.
Although by 1960 I could see some of the southern Civil Rights Movement struggle being played out on TV, I couldn’t relate to the nonviolence that they practiced. Everybody I knew believed in an eye for an eye and a tooth for tooth—except when it came to the police. We were uniformly scared of them.
Consequently, I can put my finger on the exact instant, the exact circumstance that began my awakening and journey into political life: going to a rally in Harlem, New York, and listening to Malcolm X speak.
In 1963, I was twenty and had moved to Harlem to live with an aunt, to get away from my Philly gang and find a job. I was also running from an arrest warrant for a rape, which is a whole another story. Anyway, my aunt warned me not to go around to 116th and Lenox Avenue (now Malcolm X Boulevard) because “the nationalists are having a rally, and there might be some trouble.” Now I had no idea what a nationalist was, but trouble was my thing. I was still steeped in the gang culture’s way of viewing things.
Malcolm, flanked by Nation of Islam security, talked on an outdoor stage for hours. The streets were shut off and throngs of people were on the sidewalk, in the street, in the adjoining park and hanging out of buildings and high-rise projects—all alternately evenly engrossed in his words, then shouting, clapping and screaming at the top of their voices!
But not me. I was, instead, oscillating between being mesmerized by his A-to-Z explanation of things, and a nagging fear. I was like Neo in The Matrix when Morpheus told him he had been living in a dream world. My whole world was being blown away and reshaped as I listened. What put the icing on the cake was the actions of the police, who were dispersed throughout the crowd. They were smoking and joking like they were not listening to Malcolm take apart everything they and the entire American system commonly indulged in!
And although I couldn’t understand everything, I still knew he was challenging them to either come up there and prove him wrong or come up there and shut him up. Never had I seen anyone handle the police like that.
And although nobody could tell me that I wasn’t a tough guy, that was some deliciously scary shit that won me over to begin following politics and important social issues.
But like Neo, I wasn’t ready just then to become actively involved. In fact, it wasn’t until after a squashing of the rape allegations, a return to Philly, a failed marriage that produced four offspring, and a horrible stint as a drug-dealing hustler that I finally ran out of places to hide. In order for me to begin living like a full human being, I had to cast all fear to the wind and start following Malcolm’s example.
What was the Black Unity Council and why did you help found it?
The years 1967-1968 found me completely fed up with being a modern-day slave—a conclusion I had come to since Malcolm had begun my awakening. It was doubly maddening became damn near all my friends, family, and neighbors seemed content to go along with the bullshit that by then was being exposed and attacked in Black communities, on college campuses, and elsewhere, from one side of the globe to the other. They were still trapped in the Matrix.
A former gang buddy named Points, however, had reached the same conclusions that I had, so we decided to put out the word that we were gonna have an open meeting and form an organization to address some of our concerns. Of course, by that time there were other organizations in Philly that we felt good about, but none of them were in our immediate neighborhood.
So one weekend we held the meeting at the house of another gang buddy named Brick and, surprisingly, about fifteen to twenty people showed up, male and female—including my blood sister Gloria, who I had no idea shared my concerns and ideas. Indeed, we all were experiencing feelings of frustration and isolation.
So right there the name Black Unity Council was chosen and the group was formed, although no officers were selected, nor would the BUC ever choose any officers. We always worked by consensus—at least up until we got deeply involved with paramilitary activity about two years later.
In fact, outside of current events and local concerns, the BUC never discussed political theories, ideologies, or much about Black history. Most of us were nevertheless very impressed with the Black cultural nationalists. We admired their knowledge of Black/African history and their choice to dress in African garb—especially how beautiful and graceful it made women look.
We especially liked their emphasis on armed self-defense! At that time the Revolutionary Action Movement, known as RAM, was very active in Philly. Their cultural workers and semi-clandestine paramilitary arm called the Black Guard had a center close to our neighborhood, and we would always hang out there. They had regular seminars, history/cultural classes, karate classes (for women and men with some very sharp sisters along the Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon vibe!) In addition, they had a “liberation school” that the BUC planned to emulate.
At the time, the BUC had about thirty regulars—mainly in southwest Philly and Germantown. We were able to assemble enough people to fill a gym or large church and also in each other’s homes. Eventually, we rented a large house and furnished it with the necessities for our own liberation school. We charged each person a can of food to attend our affairs, which we would give to needy families.
Since a number of us had gang backgrounds we also became involved in citywide efforts to get gangs to sign a truce.
Yet all of that was brand new to everyone in the BUC. We didn’t have any experienced political/social workers to work with us on a regular basis. As a consequence, I know now that our emulation of RAM’s emphasis on armed self-defense—not balanced with other considerations—caused many in the BUC to push it to become a strictly paramilitary group. On the other hand, the extremely brutal and terrorist Philly police, coupled with our newfound consciousness that freed us from our fear of them, also played a major role!
We had listened to Malcolm chide Blacks for being ready, willing, and able to kill each other, and, while in the U.S. Army, kill hundreds of millions of Chinese, but being essentially cold cowards when it came to defending themselves right here at home. And RAM hammered that same message home by preaching that Blacks had to stop believing that the police were bulletproof!
Regrettably, although many in the BUC were no longer afraid of the police, most of the community members that they sought to serve still were—sort of like Morpheus telling Neo that he must remember that those they were trying to free from the Matrix were not ready for that. On the other hand, the police no doubt couldn’t imagine that we had lost our fear of them!
Anyway, within two years the BUC had turned into a paramilitary group containing about fifteen and male and female members, fully armed with shoulder-fired weapons, sidearms and even hand grenades. We belonged to shooting/hunting clubs, practiced karate, went on outdoor maneuvers, and fortified all of our homes. In fact, think about today’s survivalists and you’ll see where the BUC was at: food, water, first-aid stocks, and all.
Undoubtedly, today’s readers may also have a hard time understanding the BUC’s zeal unless they view a documentary like the acclaimed Eyes on the Prize. Only then will they get a proper feel for the type of social, political, and psychological ferment that surrounded the BUC.
Thus, when the paramilitary BUC first learned about the Black Panther Party we had already been established for close to two years. Indeed, we liked what we were learning but, on the other hand, we grieved for their comrades being killed off in the streets and in their offices like sitting ducks. So we decided to contact them in order to see if we could assist them in their work and staying alive!
Hold up! I need to backtrack for a minute in order to elaborate on the BUC’s decision to become a paramilitary-style group. Otherwise, the reader may be left with the impression that the BUC was some kind of nutball formation.
The fact of the matter is that in 1968, Philly had similar Black paramilitary-style formations all around the city. Essentially, all of them were motivated by a heightened consciousness, a need to make more sophisticated their neighborhood’s defenses against adjoining white neighborhoods, which had always displayed aggression but were now more fearful due to the rising Black pride on display. We also wanted to prepare for the inevitable showdown with either the police or the National Guard in the event of another rebellion (a so-called “riot”), as had happened in North Philly in 1964, the first of the nation’s “long, hot summers.”
Certainly, most of these groups could easily be identified by their military-style clothing, which, unlike today, signaled to everyone that the wearers were paramilitary elements of the Movement. In that regard, RAM was the largest and best-known local practitioner of this approach. Around that time, moreover, RAM had a very large youth group, militant Black males and females known as the Liberators. They always wore black berets, jackets, pants and combat boots. This is before most people in Philly knew that the West Coast-based BPP also dressed in the same way. And the police didn’t wear black back then!
The BUC was in negotiations with the Liberators’ leadership about merging forces, with the more mature BUC members being asked to serve as officers for the younger Liberators.
Obviously, the police were always aware of this paramilitary-style activity, especially due to RAM’s open agitation and spray-painting of “Join the Black Guard” all over the city. Another formation threw hand grenades into a police parking lot, damaging patrol cars and provoking heavily-armed police to raid Black neighborhoods all over the city.
By the time the BUC decided to contact the local Black Panther Party, many of RAM’s leaders and many of the other paramilitary formation leaders had been jailed, forced underground, or decided to become less militant. As Malcolm said, a lot of people were not clear on what they were doing. He told us that once they found out, they would get back in the alley and change their names.
Anyway, in mid-1969, the BUC contacted the local Panthers, who were headquartered in North Philly. Although by then we had learned a lot about the national organization, our talks left us disappointed. In a nutshell, it was apparent to us that the BUC cadre was much more advanced than the local Panthers—militarily, anyway. Since we were the strongest of the two in this regard, we felt that we could negotiate a relationship the same way we had done with RAM. It was possible since the BUC was governed by consensus.
We found out, however, that the local Panthers couldn’t do that, since the Black Panther Party was a tightly-controlled, top-down organization. Our disappointment arose from the fact that they were getting killed all over the country and their leaders couldn’t come up with a strategy to combat that. In addition, the Panthers were being too rigid to allow local leaders the flexibility needed to create such a strategy. So the talks broke off, more or less, because the BUC never gave up supporting the local Panthers, and around that time some things occurred that cannot be revealed here because that would endanger the freedom of others. If this was not the case, I could give up some raw, hardcore rap that is usually hidden from this generation. Like Malcolm used to say, “Those who know don’t tell; those who tell don’t know.” As a result, a lot of cockeyed urban legends have sprouted up and become accepted as historical fact. I will attempt to set the record straight as much as possible.
First off, people must understand that in dealing with the history of the Black Panther Party, nobody knows it all—not the Panthers, not the police or FBI or other repressive arms of the state! This is because a whole lot of activities happened on a need-to-know basis. In other words, a lot of stuff was so delicate that it was known and handled both by who needed to know about it, with the downside to that being that you were on your own if things didn’t go right or if you got caught. That’s how it worked in the real world. Cadre who went on those types of missions accepted that upfront.
So why did the BUC merge with the Black Panther Party?
In December of 1969, the Chicago police led a deadly raid that resulted in the death of Panthers Fred Hampton and Mark Clark and the wounding of others. When members of the BUC heard this on the news, we were furious, sad and disgusted all at the same time. Certainly, our fury was directed toward the killers and our sadness for the dead, wounded, and terrorized Panthers. Our disgust was reserved for the Panther leadership that persisted in an unimaginative strategy that was getting some of the best and most sincere youth in urban areas killed and jailed. We were not experts, but even we had reached the conclusion that Panthers shooting it out with more heavily armed police from fixed positions was downright ludicrous! Even if they survived, it still left them in jail or hospitalized, causing everybody else to have to drop important work to bail them out and raise money for their legal defenses.
Consequently, after some discussion, we essentially decided to again get in touch with the local Panthers. But this time we planned to stick to them closely, no matter what. We just wanted to be around when their turn to get “vamped on” (raided by police) came. Of course, they had already been subjected to home raids, but nothing deadly. We planned to be in a position to upgrade their defenses and react to the expected attacks.
Rightly or wrongly, the BUC had reached the conclusion that in order for Blacks in the United States to be truly free, we would have to wage armed struggle. We believed that our oppression had many facets—social, political, economic, cultural and psychological. We did not have a handle on the intricacies surrounding these aspects, but we did know that in general Blacks did not have any substantial political power. Economically we were last-hired-and-first-fired and culturally we had been stripped of everything that would anchor us to our African past. We knew that it was up to us to prove we were as much man and woman as anyone else!
Can you describe your experience working within the Black Movement’s underground?
In a nutshell, it taught me the absolute necessity of all armed actions having broad, deep, multidimensional support. Otherwise they are open to isolation and destruction, which was the fate of the Black Panther Party.
This has nothing to do with whether armed actions fall into the so-called “terrorism” territory. That accusation is based on purely self-serving and hypocritical grounds. The need for multidimensional support has to do with the simple fact that we must have the resources, energy, creativity, and enthusiasm of the people on the side of the armed struggle. Otherwise, armed movement forces have very little chance of winning against the oppressive forces that do have broad and deep support.
Putting together this support must be very well thought-out. In a multi-racial, multi-cultural, sexist and class-ridden country and world this is a tough task!
That said, I think that we do not learn enough from the successes of the past. We have a goldmine of tried and tested successful approaches if we study how our ancestors used the Underground Railroad. It’s well-known that the Railroad is a shining example of a broad and deep multi-dimensional movement that set the stage for the destruction of slavery. Check out “The Real Resistance to Slavery in North America,” my essay in this book.
Quite frankly, I’m fed up with so much narrow-minded, paranoid crap masquerading as ideology being dished out by a lot of cowardly veteran activists who don’t want to step out of their comfort zones. They are misleading young people who are hungry for direction. Building conscious support is the absolute first step toward militantly challenging our oppressor. These old cowards know that! Nothing is more important than putting in work to stop this global, genocidal oppression!
How did the split in the Black Panther Party affect the local organization?
In my opinion, the “split” in the BPP is of secondary importance. We must instead look deeper into the BPP, the Movement in general, and toward those forces opposing us for a better understanding of what occurred and what should have been done.
Certainly, many splits in organizations during every historical period are more common than not. Splits serve good ends just as often as bad. The 1971 split in the BPP helped destroy it as a revolutionary organization.
From the ashes of the split, the Huey Newton-led West Coast faction showed its true intentions: to gut as much of the old BPP as possible and guide the remainder along clearly reformist and less threatening lines in exchange for some breathing room from the government repression and the campaign of terror that COINTELPRO was leveling against the party.
Perhaps this was a necessary “strategic retreat.”
On the other hand, the East Coast faction never got on his feet, essentially due to the sheer lack of experience of its youthful cadre in attempting to do the following:
Reorganize itself separately from the West Coast, which had control of their main organizing tool—The Black Panther newspaper.
Continue along the revolutionary path by fielding a semi-autonomous armed wing.
Continue to expand its political base.
Survived the intensified government repression.
True, they did begin publishing their own paper called Right On! But nobody ever heard of it, and it was shortly plagued with all types of problems hindering its organizing utility.
Their role in fielding the armed wing, however, served as a double-edged sword. On the one hand, the escalating terror leveled against the entire BPP hit the East Coast faction hard. Another batch of bogus arrests was planned to decimate their ranks, like the earlier New York 21 case, when twenty-one BPP members were jailed, tortured for two years, and finally found not guilty by a jury. But this time the arrests would be connected to a COINTELPRO-provoked “shooting split” in the BPP.
On the other hand, instead of chancing arrests and trials in this (by then) well-known conspiracy-to-commit-a-grocery-list-of-crimes dance, many BPP cadre decided to take the courageous decision of joining the fledgling armed wing that came to be called the Black Liberation Army. Although the BPP started off in an armed self-defense mode, by 1971 it had essentially gotten rid of that tactic, on Newton’s orders, except in a ceremony mode such as funerals.
Thus, the BPP who became the BLA chose to continue down the revolutionary path as fully armed members of the Movement. It was a positive decision under the circumstances. The separate armed wing would take away the government’s ability to justify its ongoing oppression of those BPP members who didn’t go underground with the BLA. And the BLA could still use armed members to help protect the Movement and the community from rampant police terror and murders, as well as provide the oppressed with a sense of hope that one day they might build up a counterweight to the armed might that they had always been crushed by—an evolution of the BPP’s mission.
Still, so many BPP members going underground, coupled with the ongoing repression and all-around lack of experience in handling such a complex maneuver, all but brought the expansion of the political base to a halt. This was because most of the veteran organizers were either in the BLA or providing it with support.
Finally, the handful of East Coast BPP members not fully occupied with the above were easily intimidated and subsequently demoralized by the repression. They opted to either give up or try to join the underground.
Plus, and I hate to say this, but it’s hard for me to see how an inexperienced group of young people could have surmounted all those obstacles except with the charismatic and visionary leadership of a few key BPP members. This would have at least given them—us—enough time to adapt to such a task!
We did, however, prove Malcolm and others right: the oppressors ain’t bulletproof!
What can we learn from the strengths and weaknesses of the armed underground?
For my part, I’ve written an essay on that entitled “Black Fighting Formations: Their Strengths, Weaknesses, and Potentials,” included in this book. In that piece, I generally critique Black armed groups in this country from 1960 to 1994.
How were you treated by the prison authorities after you were initially captured, given that you were charged with a “crime” that was highly publicized and political but was a direct assault upon the system?
Well, of course the jailers at Philly’s Detention Center locked me and my comrades who had been captured with me in our cells all day. But for some reason, in a few days, they sent a high officer to let us into the general prison population—after threatening us sufficiently, of course.
Actually, that move might have been because of the presence in lockup of Shamsuddin Au, Philly’s Nation of Islam power, who was known as “Captain Clarence” back in 1972. The so-called “Black Muslims” had hundreds of members in that and other local jails. I believed they wanted him in the general population in order to keep them under control. So we were also let out so it wouldn’t be obvious that the jailers were using him in that manner.
In places such as California, New York, and New Jersey, the BPP/BLA had a tremendous presence and influence in the prisons. To what extent did the BPP/BLA have a presence inside the Pennsylvania prison system?
Regrettably, by 1972, the local Black Panthers in the streets had all either been ordered to move to Oakland, California, expelled on bogus allegations connected to Huey Newton’s attempts to distance the BPP from its militants, left to form other organizations, had just retreated altogether or gone underground to form BLA movements.
And connected to that was an aggressive recruitment strategy undertaken by the Nation of Islam and orthodox Muslim groups that essentially swallowed up most of those in the Philly jails and later in the Pennsylvania state prisons who were most susceptible to revolutionary-sounding ideas and organizing.
Moreover, just about all of my own comrades from the BUC/BPP merger had become Muslims, as well as other local BPP/BLA soldiers who had been captured in armed activities, along with those political-minded prisoners under their sway. Indeed, the feeling was that joining those religious groups was simply the next step in our collective evolution toward true self-determination. This, however, proved not to be true. But that’s a story that’s best left for later.
Nevertheless, BLA recruitment and activity still grew in the midst of this situation, and was only eradicated after a protracted struggle within the state jails and prisons.
What are your ideas about prison organizing and what should forces on the outside be doing?
It would help to first give a few reasons why we must see this as a crucial strategic task for our times. Quite frankly, it’s hard for me to imagine anyone living in this country who is not simply terrified by the thought of falling victim to any combination of circumstances that would leave them into the clutches of America’s jails and prisons! And the gatekeepers, the paramilitary police, and paparazzi-style prosecutors will come down on you whether you’re eight or eighty, blind, crippled, rich, or crazy!
So if for no other reason we must not allow ourselves to be held hostage by those in power through the use of the police, prosecutors, jails, and prisons.
Yet that’s still too abstract, especially since most people just think that they can stay out of the way. On a real level, the Black and Brown communities of this country, in particular, are the victims of an extremely callous set of political and economic calculations in which the jails and prisons play a controlling role. This situation invariably leads to the “normalization” of a reality in which a huge segment of its population is simply fuel for the prison-industrial/depressed-communities hustle.
Furthermore, we have to do our homework so that we’ll see beyond the obvious racial aspects of all this. In truth, it’s not race that’s the determining factor as to why Black and Brown people populate the jails, detention centers, and prisons in such overwhelming populations. No! It’s a matrix of foreign policy concerns, immigration control, government/CIA-controlled drugs, money, political corruption, racism and prisons.
To be sure, this is not an easy thing to fully come to grips with. Of course, most of us have strong suspicions about how it fits together, but I know it’s still murky in the minds of most people. The matrix of drugs, money, political corruption, racism, and prisons equals genocide! Go research for yourself and see if I’m right or not! We have to start educating people about this, about the fact that the overwhelming majority of today’s prisoners—Black, Brown or otherwise—are pawns in a giant domestic and international con game. This is the exact thing that I and other political prisoners were seeing, describing and fighting against in the 1960s, ‘70s, and ‘80s.
We must also refine our ideas about how many political prisoners this county holds and just who they are. Then we can actively move to integrate efforts to free the ones already recognized as well as those who have not been recognized.
Check out my essay “Twenty-first-Century Political Prisoners: Real and Potential” elsewhere in this book. No doubt, such an analysis and its recommendations will not fit comfortably with some, who may think it’s too broad and too diverse to include those imprisoned for distributing drugs, for example, as political prisoners. To these individuals, I can only shake my head and wonder: where do they think we’ll amass the counterweight to overcome those powerful and self-serving elements controlling this hustle, if not from other “self-interested” elements? And this says nothing of one’s moral and ethical responsibility to struggle and fight against the real gangsters in the White House, State Department, banks, police agencies, U.S. military, along with all the other bloodsuckers.
So unless you have an analysis and plan that can convince me that my own eyes are lying to me, let’s get started!
Today is June 11th, the international day of solidarity with Marius Mason and all long-term anarchist prisoners! Read the 2024 call including updates on international political prisoners, and the 2024 statement from Marius Mason.
The first official J11 was held 20 years ago in support of Jeff Luers and all eco-prisoners. In 2014, Jeff told the story of its origins and subsequent evolution:
In June 2000, I along with Craig Critter Marshall set fire to 3 vehicles at a Eugene car dealership in an effort to call attention to climate change. Unbeknownst to us I was currently under investigation and surveillance by the same counter terrorist unit that years later would be responsible for operation backfire. As a result, we were arrested and after a year of court battles Critter was sentenced to 5.5 years and I received a sentence of 22 years and 8 months.
Across the country and the world people expressed outrage that a young idealistic youth was to serve more time in prison than he had been alive for an action that harmed no one. In the years that followed that outrage would take shape in the form of the international day of solidarity with Jeff Luers and all eco-prisoners.
The majority of my incarceration was spent defending my actions to a skeptical public and media all the while being punished by the state for my articulate defense of direct action.
It was through this media campaign and the amazing work of my support group that my support network began to grow. Before my second year was finished Critter and I had been added to the list of political prisoners being supported by the Jericho Movement, ABCF, and numerous other prisoner support groups. We were among the first eco-prisoners in the US to be accepted in radical circles as political prisoners.
On June 11 2004, after years of networking and public outreach, the first international day of solidarity with Jeffrey Free Luers and all eco-prisoners was held. The event quickly drew the fury of the state and the FBI issued an unprecedented national security alert warning of imminent eco-terrorist attacks across the nation. News headlines for a week warned of the attacks, showing my picture along with the eco-terrorist caption.
In the years that followed June 11 came to be a rallying cry for social and environmental justice movements the world over to protect our planet and to demand that those that have sacrificed their freedom doing so be recognized as political prisoners and not terrorists. I have spent the years of my life since my conviction combating the application of the terrorist label to activists and eco-activists in particular.
As an anarchist and a veteran activist who spent 9.5 years of my life in prison because I fought to protect an imperiled planet, I humbly ask that we remember that June 11 is about gaining political recognition for eco-prisoners and their struggles.
[This post only contains information relevant to Philadelphia and the surrounding area, to read the entire article follow the above link.]In this column, we present our monthly roundup of political prisoner, prison rebel, and repression news, happenings, announcements, action and analysis. Packed in as always are updates, fundraisers, and birthdays.
There’s a lot happening, so let’s dive right in!
General Prison News and Abolitionist Media Updates
David Elmakayes 77782-066
FCI McKean
Federal Correctional Institution
P.O. Box 8000
Bradford, PA 16701
Anthony Smith
14813-509
FCI Fort Dix
Federal Correctional Institution
Satellite Camp
P.O. Box 2000
Joint Base MDL, NJ 08640
Upcoming Birthdays
Jarreau “Ruk” Ayers
Vaughn Uprising prisoner, one of the only two prisoners from the Vaughn 17 to be convicted.As one write-up put it, “Jarreau Ayers and Dwayne Staats, already incarcerated under the hopeless sentence of life without parole, took it upon themselves to admit to involvement to prevent the rest of their comrades being found unjustifiably guilty, which led to success – not guilty verdicts or their charges being dropped.” You can learn more about Ruk in his own words at Rebellious Hearts and his instagram.
Pennsylvania uses Connect Network/GTL, so you can contact him online by going toconnectnetwork.com, selecting “Add a facility”, choosing “State: Pennsylvania, Facility: Pennsylvania Department of Corrections”, going into the “messaging” service, and then adding him as a contact by searching his name or “NS9994.”
Birthday: June 15
Address:
Smart Communications / PA DOC
Jarreau Ayers – NS9994
SCI Phoenix
PO Box 33028
St. Petersburg, FL, 33733
Join us on Monday May 27th at 6:30pm at Wooden Shoe Books to write letters to Philadelphia’s own Ant Smith. Ant is a high school social studies teacher in North Philly, an activist with organizations including Food Not Bombs Solidarity and Philly for REAL Justice, and a beloved community member currently serving a yearlong sentence for politically motivated charges related to the 2020 George Floyd Uprisings.
On Oct 26 2020, Ant was taken from his home and charged with obstructing law enforcement during a civil disorder and aiding and abetting the arson of a police cruiser. An outpouring of community support and outrage immediately followed. The impact of his tireless pursuit of collective liberation for his community was made clear to the court from the statements in his support released by the North Philly Peace Park, Philly Student Union, the Racial Justice Organizing Committee, the Coalition for REAL Justice, as well as the over 70 character letters submitted by students and colleagues after his arrest.
At his sentencing on Nov 21 2023, Ant’s friends and supporters had to be packed into a second overflow courtroom. U.S. District Judge Juan Sanchéz heard emotional pleas that Ant not be sent to prison from family, students and coworkers. Sanchéz sentenced him to a year and a day in prison, and two years probation on top of the three years of house arrest already served, and monetary restitution for the burnt police cruiser. Ant’s felony conviction also bars him from teaching for 10 years.
Just as Ant worked selflessly for all of us before he was imprisoned, we need to have his back while he’s in prison. This includes writing him letters to let him know he’s not alone. If you can’t join us in person on Monday May 27th, you can still write to him at:
Anthony Smith
14813-509
FCI Fort Dix Federal Correctional Institution
Satellite Camp
P.O. Box 2000
Joint Base MDL, NJ 08640
We once again approach June 11th, a day of remembrance and active solidarity, in a world of multiple crises and struggles for liberation. All of these are interconnected; there are no separate worlds. Across borders, languages, contexts, and identities, both catastrophes and victories of spirit and defiance reverberate around the globe. One environment is not untouched by another. The personal is not separate from the political. The positive project is not separate from that of destruction. Prison is not separate from the “free world.” Means are not separate from ends. Bridging these divides is a shared curiosity and commitment; bridging these divides is solidarity. This is not to flatten or oversimplify diversity and differences in circumstance, intensity, and consequence. Rather, that these different pieces are held together like organs of the body held by connective tissue. So we consider: how do we strengthen this connective tissue? How do we remain strong, yet supple and flexible? Bridges, connection, must also be built through time, especially in a world that moves too fast, from one crisis to the next. June 11th aspires to be one of these bridges: to build solidarity across borders, between movements, and among generations. Remembering and supporting long-term prisoners, as well as carrying on shared struggles, are two ways to strengthen this connective tissue. A stronger connective tissue will, in turn, bolster us against further repression.
Each year, as part of our effort to be a bridge between movements, time, and borders, we assess the terrain. We consider what threats from the state look like at this time, how imprisoned comrades can be connected to activity on the outside, how have the struggles they are a part of continued despite repression, and how remembering those locked up can become a natural part of anarchist activity. Often repression and criminalization feel new; but frequently, this is a failure of memory. There are innovations to pay attention to, while seeing their lineage in tactics and ideologies used against our forebears. What can we learn from how people have responded in the past? What can we learn from people in times and places where innovative repressive tactics were developed, and how can we act in complicity alongside them?
As the day of solidarity nears, we are struck by the unfolding of the current terrain; the horrors abound, and confront us in new ways, but these are also patterns and histories in repetition. Power is scrambling to maintain itself amidst the uncertainty of our fragilely constructed society, and individuals and groups continue on with our refusal of their world. We see continued colonial violence, through prisons, guns, bombs, and nationalist ideologies in places such as Palestine, Ukraine, and West Papua. Too, extremely harsh treatments of people in Russia acting against militarism and colonialism, as well as the criminalization of pro-Palestinian activity all over the world.
Palestinians, fighting for their freedom and against policing, surveillance and detention for decades, have faced an all-out culmination of violence and genocide at the hands of the Israeli state — crisis and colonial violence continue to rapidly unfold. So too, does an intense current of Palestinian resistance: solidarity actions have taken place across the globe in attempts to refuse complicity and the feelings of powerlessness fueled by the geographical distance, the 24-hour news cycle, and the propaganda and war machines that abound.
As people continue to flee their regions due to capitalist and imperialist-made violence, and the catastrophic consequences of climate collapse, we are witnessing a renewed fear-mongering at U.S and European borders, as white supremacist militias murmur about confronting ‘migrant caravans’, and individual states implement a greater level of violence to keep people out of artificial borders. This crisis extends throughout the globe, as people worldwide move to eek out any stability, and others rush to enforce the promised order of borders and citizenship.
Colonial violence springs up daily, in guns drawn and territory stolen, in extraction projects and the expansion of policed land, and in the loss of the last wild spaces. But resistance to a homogeneous and hollow future being sold to us by tech-giants, green capitalists and the State still continues across the world. Pipelines, cell-towers, and extraction infrastructure is being targeted, both in individual sabotage, as well as ongoing land defense world-wide. The dependence of this noxious future on policing, surveillance, and control couldn’t be clearer, and struggles are confronting the ways these practices interact. Rebellions break out against police, prisons, and the indignity and macabre realities of daily life. For every crisis, and moment of resistance we could list, there are countless others simmering, exploding, or simply being disappeared from the public, global view. Freedom and resistance always find their way through the cracks of this horrifying society.
Publicfood serves being harassed, heightened criminalization of houseless populations, RICO charges for bail funds and the “conspiracy” of anarchist ideas and practices, as well as proximity, associations and social networks. Intense and courageous acts of sabotage continue. Everything is new, and nothing is. The question is not ‘what are the solutions?’, but ‘how do we expand, deepen and intensify what we already know works?’. How do we see ourselves in one another, how do we understand our plights as intertwined, as inseparable, and how can we continue to expand these relationships of solidarity. How do we embrace the reality that there are no separate worlds, and explore the ways that we can break through the limiting effects of prison walls, border walls, time, place and context.
There are moments worth celebrating, when we feel the opening of possibilities and capacity, of cohesion and strength; there are certainly also many moments to mourn, when it feels like we’re losing it all and our bodies or spirits are taking a beating. We can savor a touch of solace when we notice the deep desperation apparent in the moves of the state. They’re scrambling, finding new ways to criminalize even the most basic of acts. This can serve to motivate us. If anything even vaguely anarchist is enough to throw us to the helm of repression, we must choose to live our lives as we decide, regardless of the consequences. As more and more of us interact with repression, jails, courts, prisons, let this possibility be a never-ending invitation towards continuing to remember and include those locked away as an ongoing part of our moves toward getting free. Time, geography, the barriers of the prison wall-none of these are strong enough to obliterate the vast network of bridges that keep us interdependent, connected, fighting the same enemies of freedom, worldwide.
This year saw the passing of many who carried the vivacious anarchist spirit. Some may be known to us, while many remain unknown. They sowed rebelliousness in every path they walked. Perhaps their impact is incalculable, though never nonexistent. We can carry the same spirit, traverse similar paths, and remain steadfast and diligent, just as those who have come before us have. Rest in power: Alfredo Bonanno, Klee Benally, Ed Mead, Sekuo Odinga, Tortuguita, Aaron Bushnell.
Rest in power to all of those whose names we’ve never uttered, not known, but who walked these lengths, nonetheless. Time is merely constructed; those that have come before us, and passed onto death, still impact the lives of the living, still contribute to the history of anarchists and anti-authoritarians, and our shared struggle. Let us make them a part of our active memory, and continue forward, in a fight for lives against domination. May these words spark a fire in you-encourage you to get up, forge ahead and seek what it might feel like, to live like you’re trying to get free.
After a lapse of three years anarchists held their own May Day demonstration. May first is an anarchist celebration of spring, remembrance, rebellion and it’s important to me that the left doesn’t completely co-opt this anarchic holiday. I’m heartened that anarchists have organized our own way of commemorating and celebrating the arrival of May. I encourage anyone who doesn’t know the history of May Day to look up the Haymarket Affair in Chicago and how anarchists across the world have celebrated.
The May Day demonstration was held behind the Juvenile Justice Center (a prison for kids) in West Philly. A group of us walked over from a nearby meeting location, and upon arriving shot fireworks, lit flares, howled against the police, and made a lot of noise. The kids locked inside could be seen silhouetted against the frosted windows, banging in response to our loud presence. The police arrived very shortly afterward and the crowd dispersed.
The police’s arrival was surprisingly fast. Previous demonstrations at the same prison have lasted longer and were met with less police, about five police cars showed up after at most three minutes. I have some thoughts on why this may have happened. The assembled crowd was dressed in anonymous multi-colored clothing. This wouldn’t be particularly suspect if people were seen in twos or threes but a large group of masked people still draws attention. Moving from one location to another in a more dispersed way or meeting up behind the prison without all walking together could have reduced the attention we drew to ourselves on the street. The benefit of not wearing all black means that we don’t stand out in a crowd or on the street but if we are the crowd then that benefit is lost. This combined with the fact that there were a good amount of people on the street leads me to believe someone called the police on the group as we walked over. There’s no way to know for certain, but, we can learn from the situation and figure out ways to be more discreet when the situation calls for it moving forward.
Free Palestine!
Solidarity to the struggle at Rockview prison!
Down with the prisons! Up with the spring!
Happy May Day!
[This post only contains information relevant to Philadelphia and the surrounding area, to read the entire article follow the above link.]
In this column, we present our monthly roundup of political prisoner, prison rebel, and repression news, happenings, announcements, action and analysis. Packed in as always are updates, fundraisers, and birthdays.
David Elmakayes 77782-066
FCI McKean
Federal Correctional Institution
P.O. Box 8000
Bradford, PA 16701
Anthony Smith
14813-509
FCI Fort Dix
Federal Correctional Institution
Satellite Camp
P.O. Box 2000
Joint Base MDL, NJ 08640
Upcoming Birthdays
Abednego Baynes
A former Vaughn 17 defendant. Baynes was found innocent of all charges in relation to the uprising, but he has still been punished with a move out of state, and deserves respect and support for staying in solidarity with his co-defendants throughout the process and refusing to cooperate with the prosecution. You can read more about Baynes in his own words here.
Pennsylvania uses Connect Network/GTL, so you can contact him online by going toconnectnetwork.com, selecting “Add a facility”, choosing “State: Pennsylvania, Facility: Pennsylvania Department of Corrections”, going into the “messaging” service, and then adding him as a contact by searching his name or “NT0594”.
Birthday: May 20
Address:
Smart Communications/PADOC
Abednego Baynes, NT0594
SCI Mahanoy
PO Box 33028
St Petersburg, FL 33733
This May Day, Philly anarchists went back to doing what we do best….anti-gentrification and anti-prison actions. The evening started out with a demo at the juvenile detention center in West Philly. Around 20 of us walked from the meet-up spot to the parking lot behind the facility, where demonstrators can be heard from the kids’ dorms. There were a bunch of loud fireworks, flares, and anti-cop chants, as locked-up kids pounded on their windows in response. This unfortunately only lasted about two minutes, as apparently the cops’ response times to these kinds of demos has dramatically improved. Cop cruisers immediately pulled up and blocked both exits we’d been planning to use, and one cop car attempted to run over a couple of our friends on their way out. Luckily as far as we know there were no arrests and everyone got out fine in the end, if a little shaken.
Around twelve of us met back up a couple hours later to attack a very ugly new apartment building on Spruce St and 49th St. This is another classic of Philly anarchy – terrorizing gentrifiers by mobbing up to attack a new building while its residents are already living in it. At least ten of its huge windows were taken out and a paint bomb or two got thrown.
Attacking isn’t always easy; most of the time it takes a lot of courage just to show up and a lot of planning to make sure everyone gets out safely. We appreciate how carefully these two actions were organized and everyone who showed up. Let’s keep being brave and supporting each other and maybe one day we can take down Amerikkka 😉
Solidarity to the comrades struggling in and around SCI Rockview, you are not alone! Long live anarchy! <3
Join us on Monday April 29th, 6:30pm at Wooden Shoe Books as we complement the 2024 NE Bash Back Convergence in Philly with a letter writing for incarcerated transgender anarchist, environmentalist, and animal rights activist Marius Mason. Marius is currently serving an almost 22-year sentence for property damage conducted in defense of the planet.
After years of aboveground organizing for social movements in Indiana and Michigan, Marius embarked on a Earth Liberation Front sabotage campaign in the late 90s. In 1999, he set fire to a lab at the University of Michigan that researched genetically modified organisms (GMO) for Monsanto. Threatened with a life sentence, lacking financial stability, and wary of dragging his family into a costly legal battle, Marius pled guilty in 2009. At sentencing, the judge applied a terrorism enhancement, makng Marius’s sentence the harshest punishment levied on anyone convicted of environmental sabotage in the US to date. No one was ever harmed in any of his actions.
Marius lived and worked in the Detroit area for most of his life. Like the late Earth First! (EF!) organizer Judi Bari, he was part of a generation of radicals who worked to link the environmental and labor movements, and was jointly active in both EF! and the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). This alliance contributed vastly to the initial successes of the anti-globalization movement, including the 1999 anti-WTO demonstration in Seattle. Mason was an editor of the the Industrial Worker, and is also a musician. In 1999, he recorded “Not For Profit,” a neo-folk album with EF! comrade Darryl Cherney.
If you can’t join us in person this month, you can still write to Marius at the address below. Please review his current mail restrictions before drafting your letter.
Marius Mason #04672-061
FMC Fort Worth
P.O. Box 15330
Fort Worth, TX 76119
We’ll also sign and send birthday cards to U.S.-held political prisoners with birthdays in May: Xinachtli (May 11th) and Kojo Bomani Sababu (May 27th).
SCI Rockview is a prison in central Pennsylvania where incarcerated comrades have been facing repression for demanding justice in the face of impunity by racist COs and following a year of prisoner deaths due to institutional toxicity and guard violence. We speak to an outside supporter about the situation at Rockview, the reactions of administration, inside / outside relationships and solidarity that have flared up. We hope that this conversation contributes to increased and thickened ties between folks on both sides of the walls.
This conversation was conducted via encrypted messages and recorded by a comrade Golem and Ash from the the MolotovNow! Podcast, so a big thanks is due to them.
Announcement
Jorge “Yorch” Esquivel
Jorge has now been held in prison for over a year without a trial, and urgently needs funds to cover legal fees and prison costs (food, water, phone calls, visits, administration fees, service costs, etc).
Jorge “Yorch” Esquivel is a beloved compañero of the punk community, and a long-time participant of the Okupa Che. He was arrested on December 8, 2022 by plainclothes police as he was leaving the campus of the Ciudad Universitaria (of the UNAM university) in Mexico City as part of a campaign of criminalization against the Okupa or squat.
BACKGROUND
On February 24, 2016, an operative was carried out in which plainclothes policemen detained him, “planting” drugs on him in order to fabricate crimes, and accusing him of drug trafficking, as part of a campaign of repression on the squatted auditorium Okupa Che in UNAM (still existing). The whole case was plagued with irregularities. He was transferred to Oaxaca and then to a maximum-security prison in Hermosillo as a strategy to hinder his legal defense by taking him far away from his support networks. Thanks to the solidarity and legal work, he was reclassified from the crime of drug dealing to simple possession of narcotics, and was released on bail in March 2016.
Even though he was no longer in prison, he was not out of danger. Constant threats and journalistic reports did not cease; the press even reported his death and accused him of participating in organized crime. Meanwhile, steps were being taken to frame him once again and re-arrest him for the same fabricated crime.
On December 8, 2022 he was arrested in exactly the same place – a few steps outside Ciudad Universitaria, where the Okupa is located, once again by plainclothes police – with the grounds for this illegal
detention being that the Attorney General’s Office appealed the decision to reclassify the crime.
The compañero’s health is fragile due to an extended hospitalization a couple years back and the toll the prison conditions have taken on him.
CURRENT SITUATION
Jorge is currently incarcerated in the Reclusorio Oriente prison in Mexico City. The legal process is still in the evidence stage. Several hearings have been postponed and Jorge’s process is being delayed and prolonged to keep him in what is called “preventative imprisonment” with no sentence, which is common for cases of political prisoners in Mexico.
Despite the fact that there is no evidence to keep him in prison, the strategy of the State is clearly to drag it out as long as possible, which is a tortuous level of uncertainty for all of us close to Jorge.
Thanks to the solidarity of individuals, collectives and networks, it has been possible to cover Jorge’s expenses inside the prison, which have been very high due to the corruption that reigns in Mexican prisons. We are raising funds to support his legal costs and basic needs to be able to survive in this unjust incarceration, and to re-join the community on the outside as soon as possible. We call upon the solidarity of our friends and compañerxs around the world to help us in supporting our compañero Yorch.
“In this episode, we speak with the Spouses of incarcerated organizers who exposed SCI Rockview’s attempts to cover up anti-Black racism in their prison. In November 2023, guards hung two nooses in the bubble in view of incarcerated people. Listen to how incarcerated people and their accomplices have been demanding accountability from the prison.”
[This post only contains information relevant to Philadelphia and the surrounding area, to read the entire article follow the above link.]
In this column, we present our monthly roundup of political prisoner, prison rebel, and repression news, happenings, announcements, action and analysis. Packed in as always are updates, fundraisers, and birthdays.
David Elmakayes 77782-066
FCI McKean
Federal Correctional Institution
P.O. Box 8000
Bradford, PA 16701
Anthony Smith
14813-509
FCI Fort Dix
Federal Correctional Institution
Satellite Camp
P.O. Box 2000
Joint Base MDL, NJ 08640
Mumia Abu-Jamal
Mumia is an award winning journalist and was one of the founders of the Black Panther Party chapter in Philadelphia, PA. He has struggled for justice and human rights for people of color since he was at least 14 years old; the age when he joined the Party. In December of 1982, Mumia, who moonlighted by driving a taxi, happened upon police who were beating his brother. During the melee, a police officer was shot and killed. Despite the fact that many people saw someone else shoot and then runaway from the scene, Mumia, in what could only be called a kangaroo court, was convicted and sentenced to death. During the summer of 1995, a death warrant was signed by Governor Tom Ridge, which sparked one of the most effective organizing efforts in defense of a political prisoner ever. Since that time, Mumia has had his death sentence overturned, but still has a life sentence with no opportunity for parole.
Pennsylvania uses Connect Network/GTL, so you can contact him online by going toconnectnetwork.com, selecting “Add a facility,” choosing “State: Pennsylvania, Facility: Pennsylvania Department of Corrections,” going into the “messaging” service, and then adding Mumia as a contact by searching his name or “AM8335.”
Birthday: April 24
Address:
Smart Communications/PA DOC
Mumia Abu-Jamal #AM8335
SCI Mahanoy
Post Office Box 33028
St Petersburg, Florida 33733
Pennsylvania uses Connect Network/GTL, so you can contact him online by going toconnectnetwork.com, selecting “Add a facility,” choosing “State: Pennsylvania, Facility: Pennsylvania Department of Corrections,” going into the “messaging” service, and then adding him as a contact by searching his name or “NU0423.”
