Six victims of Pennsylvania's prison travesty managed to escape from SCI-Pittsburgh in January 1997. You are sure to be reading about lots more escapes, riots, assaults and other serious problems in the prisons. They will surely cost many millions of tax dollars.
The Republican government is guaranteeing deadly and costly troubles in the prison system. Not satisfied to just crush liberty, the Republican government has crushed hope. Prisoners have no hope for parole. They have no access to help from the courts. Their living conditions are hellish. They are being financially gouged and abused. They are being physically abused.
You will be reading about many more prison riots, many more assaults by prisoners and upon prisoners, and many more escapes and escape attempts.
Escape from imprisonment is not just a natural and healthy instinct, it's the duty that very person owes to himself. For prisoners of war, your government makes escape a patriotic duty. It's no less a duty for a person held in captivity by an unjust government. And that's sure as hell what Pennsylvania has at the moment.
In the January escape from SCI-Pittsburgh, six men hopeless with the corrupt and cruel system, tunneled under the prison wall. The newspapers report the valiant prisoners as:66-year old George Conard and 36-year old Carmen Keller, both doing life sentences. That really means death; death from old age!
In addition, Leslie Billingsley, 30-years old, was doing a 70 year sentence...70 years! for taking something that didn't belong to him. Thomas Berkelbaugh, 48-years old, was doing 20 years for robbery. Nuno Pontes, 30-years old, was doing 24 years for burglary.
The youngster of the group was Andrew Heim. He's 26-years old and doing "only" 15 years for theft. With the exception of him, all these men had nothing to look forward to except to die in the prison hellhole. There are many thousands of other prisoners in the same situation. Expect many of them to get fed-up and to rebel, attack or escape. It's called "fight/flight."
The Republicans pretend to save you a few dollars by squeezing the prisoners. They give you the opportunity to express your hatred and vengeance by subjecting people to cruel and excessive punishments. It will backfire and cost you many, many millions of dollars and not a few human lives. Excess always has its price.
Just reflect for a moment on SCI-Pittsburgh in the two weeks prior to the escape. A prisoner infuriated over mistreatment by the guards, attacked and cut-up five or them. Another prisoner was electrocuted, apparently murdered either by guards or by another prisoner. The prison seems to be covering-up the real cause of death by pretending that it was an accident. Their story is that the man was killed by faulty earphones!
It's just the beginning!
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