Prison Revolts Around The World: Imprisoned Workers Suffer Under Emergency Measures

Between March 7 and 9, as the coronavirus spread in Italy, violent protests erupted in about fifty penitentiaries on the peninsula. Limits on visitation, the suspension of good-behavior leave and day-release (called permessi premi and semilibertà in Italy), and the prisoners’ concerns about the potential for an outbreak made tensions overflow. At the time of this writing two prisoners and two prison officers have died of the virus and hundreds have tested positive. The inmates’ fears about the spread of infection are therefore well founded, considering also that no tests are available in many institutions.

The protests essentially called for the restoration of visitation, house arrest for inmates with minor sentences, immediate actions against overcrowding, and better sanitation. In fact, the protests took place in clearly overcrowded conditions, with unhygienic cells housing up to ten prisoners each. The democratic bourgeoisie and its States have a history of silence and lies on the matter of prisons, so it is not surprising how they reacted to this sad affair. Justice Minister Alfonso Bonafede, a liberal and civil liberties advocate from the Five Star Movement, told parliament that “the State does not move back an inch in the face of illegality” and asked detainees to “respect the rules.” It is outrageous for the State to ask prisoners to respect the rules, forgetting how many times it has been convicted of “inhuman treatment in prisons” even by the European Court of Human Rights, an irrelevant international body created by ruling class. All the other parties in the Senate did not ask for the truth about these deaths, but for more repression.

A cloak of silence has covered the story since it occurred. The government rags supported the hypothesis that all but one inmate died from methadone intoxication or psychiatric drugs, stolen from prison infirmaries during the riots. Photos instead show a massive use of tear gas, which in those closed environments can have serious health effects.

The first protest took place in the penitentiary of Salerno, the following day in Alessandria, Bari, Genoa, Frosinone, Foggia, Modena, Naples, Pavia, Padua, Palermo, Rieti, and Vercelli. The detainees staged protests of varying intensity: from banging dishes on the railings, burning mattresses and sheets, and occupying certain areas for hours, to real riots that included clashes with the police who arrived in support of the prison guards.

The most serious situation was in Modena in the Sant’Anna Correctional Institution where nine prisoners died, five in the prison and four the following day, during transfer to other institutions. The director assured that detainees had been visited before departure. One of the prisoners who died during the transfer was to be released in August, two were awaiting trial, and the fourth had a sentence that could be served be alternative means, but without a permanent address he had not been able to do so.In Rieti there are three dead and eight others hospitalized; two are dead at the Dozza Correctional Institution in Bologna. In Foggia, 77 prisoners escaped during the riots, and some are still in hiding.

In all countries the exceptional measures for the pandemic have further limited the “rights” of prisoners and worsened their conditions. The result is a flood of riots and repression.

In Iran at least 36 are dead and hundreds injured in violent clashes at several prisons. In the Kurdish region of the country, dozens of prisoners escaped from the Saqqez penitentiary, adding to the 23 who escaped from the Khorramabad penitentiary in the western part of the country. Riots also occurred in Aligoudarz prison. The government transferred 85,000 inmates to house arrest and then granted an amnesty to around 10,000.

In Latin America 43 prisoners were killed while trying to escape or protest, 23 in La Modelo prison in Bogota, Columbia. Also in Colombia, a riot broke out in the prison in San Juan de Pasto, which was repressed. In the Dominican capital of Santo Domingo there was a rebellion at La Victoria prison. In Venezuela twelve were killed. In Argentina there were five dead and dozens of wounded. In Peru inmates rebelled at the Trujillo prison. And in Brazil, over a thousand inmates escaped from four prisons in Sao Paolo.

There were also protests in Nigeria, in the Kaduna prison where four prisoners died. In Greece, a rebellion erupted at Eleonas prison in Thebes after a 35-year-old woman died with symptoms of the coronavirus. A similar scenario played out at Korydallos prison. In Lebanon there were several attempts to escape from Qoubbeh prison in Tripoli, and protests in Zahle prison. In Angarsk, Siberia there were clashes and a fire at Penal Colony No. 15, with two dead. As we write to you the protests and escape attempts continue.

The Communists, who recognize the suffering of the many detained proletarians, reiterate that the only possible solution is to destroy and historically overcome the mode of production that created the jails. Prison will cease to exist when, through a revolutionary process, society is freed from class division, from the market, and from profit.