Join OCAP on Friday, August 10th at Prisoners Justice Day 2012

On August 9th, one day before the annual Prisoners Justice Day, the first parts of the Harper Government’s Omnibus Crime Bill C-10, ironically named ‘Safe Streets and Communities Act’, will come in to effect. This bill increases mandatory minimum sentences, removes alternative sentencing options and makes it harder to get a pardon. This bill targets youth by making harsh changes to the Young Offenders Act. Harper is increasing funding for the war on drugs while directly cutting drug treatment programs inside and outside of prison. This bill targets migrants and will lead to more detention and deportation. C-10 will put more people behind bars, making crowded conditions in institutions far worse. At a time that they tell us there is no money for social programs, the government is ready to spend an estimated $1billion dollars in Ontario to build new prison infrastructure.

This bill will bring criminalization of poor people , Indigenous communities and communities of colour. More prisons, more prisoners and more repression.

OCAP has endorsed and will be joining with community groups on Friday August 10th for the annual event outside of the Don Jail at 6pm.

PRISONERS JUSTICE DAY 2012

Friday, August 10, 2012 6pm
Outside the Toronto Don Jail 550 Gerrard Street East
ASL Interpretation Provided

Join us for speakers, performers, children's programming, a mini march and a candlelight vigil at dusk.

August 10th, 2012 marks the 37th anniversary of Prisoners Justice Day. On August 10th, 1974 Eddie Nalon bled to death in a solitary confinement unit at Millhaven Penitentiary in Kingston, Ontario. The emergency call button in his cell failed to work. An inquest into his death found that many call buttons in the unit were broken. The guards had also deactivated the receiving mechanism in the control tower. In 1975 on the first anniversary of Eddie's death, prisoners at Millhaven went on a one-day hunger strike, refused work and held a memorial service, even at risk of punishment.

On May 21, 1976 another prisoner, Bobby Landers, died in the same segregation unit at Millhaven. Landers, active in the struggle for Prisoners Rights at Archambault Penitentiary, was involuntarily transferred to Millhaven and thrown in the hole. He had a heart attack, but the call buttons had still not been repaired and staff ignored his pleas.

Prisoners continue to observe August 10th each year. Community groups and family members gather outside prisons in solidarity. It is a day of protest against all deaths in custody, the inhumane use of solitary confinement, racist policing, the detention and deportation of immigrants and refugees, the taking of land through colonization and the criminalization of First Nations defence of their territories, the denial of justice for Indigenous women and transpeople, the disabling effects of prison, the cruelty of psychiatric incarceration, poverty and homelessness, the separation of families, security certificates, tasers for prison guards and cops, the over-incarceration for people who use drugs or involved in sex work, the over-incarceration of people living with disabilities (especially people labeled with mental health issues and learning disabilities) and the medical neglect of prisoners with HIV/AIDS and the lack of harm reduction in prison.

It is a call for alternatives to incarceration - at a time when governments are enacting repressive U.S. style get-tough-on-crime laws to build more prisons despite a falling crime rate.

Resist Harper's Omnibus Crime Bill: The first part of Bill-C10, the so called 'Safe Streets and Communities Act', comes in to effect on August 9th, 2012, one day before the annual Prisoners Justice Day. Bill C-10 ensures construction is beginning on new prisons and new units across Canada. Prison construction contracts promise to make well-connected private firms wealthy at the expense of our communities. Social programs are being gutted while money is directly transferred to infrastructure for criminalization and incarceration. Bill C-10 will see the enactment of measures like mandatory minimums, harsher sentences especially for youth, an increase in drug related sentencing, and increased criminalization of migrants, just to name a few. Things are about to get much worse: now is the time to get involved!

Friday, August 10, 2012 6pm
Outside the Toronto Don Jail 550 Gerrard Street East
ASL Interpretation Provided

Join us for speakers, performers, children's programming, a mini march and a candlelight vigil at dusk when we read the names of those we have lost to the prison system.

Download the poster here: http://ocap.ca/files/PJDPOSTER2012.jpg

To sign on or donate, email: pjdtoronto@gmail.com