COVID-19

230 | Compassionate Release, Part One

We begin this week with a follow-up conversation with Cory Cardinal, who has spoken with us on our past two episodes regarding a hunger strike at the Saskatoon Provincial Correctional Centre in Saskatchewan, Canada. Previously, Cory detailed his experiences during and after the hunger strike. And now, he gives us some updates and tells Perilous…

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229 | Like a Horror Movie- COVID’s Spread in the Prisons

This week, we hear from two people who explain the rapidly deteriorating COVID-19 situation in facilities in both Saskatchewan and Indiana. As we reported last week, prisoners at the Saskatoon Provincial Correctional Centre in Saskatchewan, Canada organized a hunger strike last week to protest the rapidly-spreading COVID-19 outbreak at the facility. The hunger strike lasted…

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228 | Caged During COVID

This week, we share two interviews with prisoners confronting rampant COVID-19 infections in their facilities. Cory Cardinal, imprisoned at the Saskatoon Provincial Correctional Centre in Saskatchewan, Canada speaks about the hunger strike they organized last weekend to protest the rapidly-spreading COVID-19 outbreak at the facility. Prisoners at the Charles Egeler Reception and Guidance Center (RGC)…

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227 | Careless With People’s Lives- Violence & Neglect in Florida

For our episode this week, we share more from Florida Prisoner Solidarity. Recently, they told us about the drastic retaliatory measures prisoners were being subjected to in the Florida Department of Corrections. These punishments were often given as a response for prisoners advocating for themselves in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. This week, they…

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221 | Isolation as Retaliation

This week on Kite Line, we share a call from a prisoner located in Seattle, who exposes his facility’s careless treatment of prisoners in the face of COVID-19, and how medical isolation and punitive isolation function similarly. Afterwards, we finish our conversation with Keith Malik Washington. Malik was recently released from prison after many years,…

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220 | Are Incarcerated People Disposable?

We begin this week with a short piece by WFHB reporter Aaron Comforty, who reports on an alleged instance of attempted suicide in the local jail, and one mother’s attempts to find out the status of her son. We also speak with Ted Smith, an Associate Professor of Environmental Medicine at the University of Louisville…

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215 | “If They Kill Me in the Hole, I’ll Go Out Satisfied” – ICE Detainees Protest Conditions at Winn

This week, we share important news from around the Midwest and more updates from the struggles in Louisiana’s immigrant detention centers.  Kevin ‘Rashid’ Johnson is facing threats on his life inside the Indiana Department of Corrections.  An abolitionist in Madison, Wisconsin has chosen to enter solitary confinement rather than violate his ethics and testify against…

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208 | What’s Going on is Nothing New- Prisoners on State Violence and the Rebellion

We will continue the final installment of the interview between Kristina Byers and Anastazia Schmid next week, as they talk about barriers to education while incarcerated. This week, though, we received urgent calls. Faheem Shabazz is a longtime whistleblower and militant inside the Indiana prison system, who was released in 2018. He has been targeted…

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206 | From Watts to Minneapolis, The Arc of Anti-Police Protest

In this episode, we have two updates from prisoners in California on their conditions amidst the COVID-19 crisis. Afterwards, we speak with Max Felker-Kantor, historian and professor at Ball State University. Felker-Kantor’s particular focus of study is policing and anti-police violence post WWII. He’s been on Kite Line before, talking about the history of policing…

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205 | The High Stakes of Institutional Racism During COVID-19

This week, we share a phone conversation between Kijana Tashiri Askari and C, one of their outside supporters. Askari is incarcerated in the California Medical Facility- a male-only state carceral medical institution.The recorded this conversation earlier this week, about the conditions Kijana and others are facing, including improper COVID-19 protocol on the part of the…

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