Rasta inmates spend 10 years in isolation for hair
http://rr.com/news/topic/article/rr/1110/11195538/Rasta_inmates_spend_10_years_in_isolation_for_hair
May 07 2010
By DENA POTTER
JARRATT, Va. Kendall Gibson would seem to be one of Virginia's most
dangerous prisoners.
For more than 10 years he has lived in segregation at the Greensville
Correctional Center, spending at least 23 hours every day in a cell
the size of a gas station bathroom. In a temporary home for the worst
of the worst _ inmates too violent or disruptive to live among the
rest of society's outcasts _ he has been a permanent fixture.
He is there, he says, not for his crimes but for a crime he will not
commit _ a crime against God.
The only thing imposing about Gibson is his long black dreadlocks,
resting on the front of his shoulders so they won't drag the ground
as he shuffles along in his orange jumpsuit.
It is his hair _ winding locks he considers a measure of his
Rastafarian faith _ that makes him a threat, according to Virginia
Department of Corrections Operating Procedure No. 864.1.
The rule took effect on Dec. 15, 1999. Inmates had two choices: cut
their hair no longer than their collars and shave their beards, or be
placed in administrative segregation.
In the beginning, Gibson was among as many as 40 inmates who opted
for confinement over cutting. By 2003, when a handful of the inmates
filed a federal lawsuit against the department over their detention,
23 remained in segregation.
The lawsuit failed. Some cracked under the pressure of constant
isolation with no visits from loved ones, educational or religious
programs or commissary. Some went home.
Today, it's difficult to tell exactly how many remain in isolation.
The Department of Corrections won't volunteer the information, but
has confirmed 10 names given to The Associated Press by a group of
Rastafarian inmates.
Not everyone can handle it, Gibson says. For those weak in mind or
spirit, the walls can easily close in on them.
"People always ask how I can smile in a place so negative," he says.
The Rastafarian God, Jah, "is my answer. Without Jah in my life I
wouldn't be able to handle it."
--
Like most of the Rastafarians in segregation, Gibson didn't become a
believer until after he entered prison. He was 18 and had a long time
to do, sentenced to 47 years on robbery, abduction and gun charges.
Gibson had always loved the "peaceful vibes of Rastafari livity," but
like many he knew the movement by the hair, the music and the ganja.
In prison, he met others who taught him the spiritual aspects. He
took on the name Ras-Talawa Tafari, a strong leader who inspires awe.
Rastafari draws from the Bible, mixing in African and Caribbean
cultural influences. It is considered by many more of a way of life
or movement than a religion. They preach unity with god, nature and
each other, but are loosely organized and followers are free to
worship with other congregations.
Rastafarians regard Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie I, who was known
as Ras Tafari before he rose to power in 1930, as the second coming
of Christ. They believe Jah inhabits them so there it no real need
for a church. They smoke marijuana as a sacrament and adhere to a
vegetarian diet.
While some view growing their hair as optional, most Rastafarians see
it as demanded by the Nazarite Vow in the Bible (Numbers 6:5), "There
shall no razor come upon his head."
Gibson never entertained the thought of cutting his hair when the
policy was announced or during the 10 long years since. "Jah didn't
lead I to feel that this plight was burden enough to bow," he says.
A person must be willing to stand up and fight for a worthy cause, he
says, echoing Rastafarian messenger Bob Marley's rhythmic chant "Get
up. Stand up. Stand up for your rights."
Gibson longs to hear such reggae music. A clear analog radio that
picks up about nine stations is his only luxury in his small cell,
but the island music doesn't get much air time in these parts.
His days are long but compact. Five days a week, he is led in
restraints to an outside cage that resembles a dog kennel for an hour
of recreation. Otherwise, he only leaves his 8-by-10 cell for three,
20-minute showers each week.
His cinderblock walls are off-white or gray, depending on the way the
light hits them. The cell is freshly painted, drowning out the smell
of his Dove soap resting on his one-piece sink-toilet unit.
If he stands on top of his mounted stainless steel bed Gibson can
peak out the window, where he can see inmates in the general
population recreation yard in the distance. He prefers to stare into
the woods just beyond the razor-wife fence. On occasion he spies a
deer grazing in the field.
The segregation unit has 16 cells, and although the inmates can't see
each other they often talk. Gibson is amazed at what he calls their
pure confusion and senseless babbling _ obsession with the lives of
movie stars and rappers and sports figures.
And then there are the other Rastafarians. "These people may have my
physical body confined, but I refuse to surrender my mind and
spirit," says Allen McRae, also known as Ras-Solomon Tafari, who is
serving 20 years for cocaine possession.
Elton Williams, who is behind bars for armed robbery, gets the
question all the time from inmates pulling stints in segregation.
Wouldn't it be easier just to cut his hair?
His answer: "My very soul depends on the decisions I make."
Williams, 31, likens it to a Christian who is told that, for security
reasons, he must denounce Christ. Williams is set to leave prison in
December; he could cut his hair until then, he says, but what would
happen to his soul?
Then there was Ivan Sparks, a 59-year-old Rastafarian elder who
refused to cut his hair and was sent into segregation at Buckingham
Correctional Center.
He never left it _ except to die at Virginian Commonwealth University
Medical Center last fall, of prostate cancer.
--
The way Department of Corrections officials see it, the inmates could
come out of segregation any time they wish.
They made a choice to go to segregation instead of cutting their
hair, spokesman Larry Traylor says. Should they decide to comply with
the grooming policy, they could return to general population.
"Rules must be in place in order to have a secure, safe environment
for everyone," Traylor said. "An inmate that will not follow the
rules jeopardizes normal prison operations and is potentially a
danger to other inmates and staff."
Virginia is among only about a dozen states, mostly in the South,
that limit the length of inmates' hair and beards, according to the
American Correctional Chaplains Association. A handful of those allow
religious accommodations for Rastafarians, Muslims, Sikhs, native
Americans and others whose religious beliefs prohibit shaving or
cutting their hair.
There is no hair policy for federal prisoners.
The U.S. Supreme Court has said that constitutional protections, like
the right to practice religion, do not end at the prison gates.
Congress has said institutions can restrict religious liberties only
for compelling reasons, like security, but the policies must be the
least restrictive means to accomplish that.
Still, inmates have rarely been successful in challenging prison
grooming policies.
A native American inmate spent a year in his cell and lost other
privileges before a federal appeals court ruled in 2005 that the
California prison system's ban on long hair violated his religious freedom.
In a 2002 case, a group of Rastafarian and Muslim federal inmates who
were housed in Virginia prisons challenged the grooming policy and a
federal court ordered the Bureau of Prisons to transfer them to other
facilities that did not have such policies. The court also required
the federal prison system to evaluate inmates' religious beliefs and
refrain from sending them to Virginia or other states with burdensome
grooming policies.
But in the case filed by the Virginia state prisoners, a federal
appeals court ruled in 2008 that the Department of Corrections'
argument that inmates could hide weapons and other contraband in long
hair or easily change their appearance upon escape was compelling
enough reason to require trimmed hair.
Kent Willis, executive director of the Virginia chapter of the
American Civil Liberties Union, which represented the inmates, said
the outcome was deeply disappointing because he knew the sincerest
believers would be those who would be punished most severely.
"This has a disturbingly mean-spirited aspect to it," Willis says.
"This is not about corrections. This is not about security, but it's
about punishment. In this instance, people are being punished for
their religious beliefs."
Today, the department cuts each inmate's hair when he enters prison.
If he refuses, the use of "reasonable force and restraints" is
authorized. If the inmate grows his hair back and refuses to cut it,
he is sent to segregation.
Thomas Fitzgerald, 52, had grown his locks for 10 years before he was
sent to prison for possession of a firearm by a felon. He said he
started going bald after his hair was unceremoniously shorn from his
head, and he's convinced that there's a connection.
The last time he saw his locks they were being stuffed into a red
biohazard plastic bag. He asked to send them home for a proper
burial; his request was denied.
Fitzgerald has chosen to abide by the grooming policy so that he can
work toward growing the Rastafarian community inside the prison and
when he is released in three years. But it is hard to shake the
humiliation: "Every day is a real struggle for me because I perceive
shaving my face a serious act of mutilation to myself," he says.
--
With his prison-issue eyeglasses, scrawny frame and boyish smile,
Gibson looks much less of a menace than the prisoners stacking lunch
trays just outside the glass-walled visitation room.
Even less intimidating are his words _ talk of love, faith, "upful
vibrations" and, most perplexing of all, happiness.
Now 38, he's proud of the things he's accomplished while behind bars.
Gibson quit school at 15, but once in prison he completed vocational
training in building maintenance and carpentry and in 1994 got his
GED, something he said gave him an "irie," or peaceful and happy, feeling.
Gibson's five co-defendants are out of prison now. He has been denied
parole 12 times for the same reason _ the serious nature of his crime
_ but he knows his refusal to bow to the grooming policy likely
played a role in that.
"Life is what we make of it," he says. "Jah give each person the
fullness of free will to create our own personal heaven or hell and
joy or pain."
He tries "to create good irie vibes of joy and not of pain."
He has bad days, but he tries not to brood, even though he remains in
isolation, year after year, as those who murder, rape and maim other
inmates are rotated in and out.
He has now been in isolation nearly 4,000 days. He begins each one
with prayer, reading scripture and meditation.
At night, when the lights are out, he listens to rodents scampering
through the ducts. Sometimes they run across his cell floor and he cringes.
When it's quiet he can hear a train chugging by and he allows his
mind to wonder briefly what is on it, and where's it's going.
.
--
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