Hello, my name is Preston Stanke. I am a programmer here at KAOS and it is 9:10 in the morning (of Friday) and I am speaking to a jailed protester in Seattle, Washington. Whatís your name, sir?
Iíd prefer not to give my name. Weíre trying to have anonymity and solidarity here in the prison.
Wow. Is everybody pretty positive orÖhow are things up there?
Itís for the most part positive right now; when all the protesters came yesterday (we were definitely at a low point before they came) and since they came weíve gotten a lot more support. Thereís gonna be another protest up here starting at noon leaving the union temple and moving down to this prison, which is the King County prison.
Yeah, weíve got word of the march here at KAOS from members of the community thatís going to be at noon from the labor temple. How long have you been in?
I was first arrested at five oíclock on Wednesday and then they took us to Sandpoint Navy base and held us in busses where we had to urinate and defecateÖ well I donít thinkÖ we did kind of have to hold the shitting but we had to urinate on the bus and basically sit there for about eight hours; it was on the city bus, too. And then they took us in from there, and, like, took us through what was a booking thing and then they said it wasnít an official booking; took us over here and held us in a room housed with twenty seven people in a ten by ten room which isnít even enough room to lay down to sleep at night. Most people here havenít hardly slept at all since weíve been here. Thatís the basic situation. Some people have definitely sustained extreme physical abuse from the prison guards including like losing a massive amount of hair from being pulled, having their face smashed up against the wall. I think internal affairs is on that case right now.
What about food and water, is that being provided inÖ
Yes, right now weíre going on a hunger strike though because there are prisoners who have basically been put in solitary confinement because they were taking on leadership roles. Our, I mean weíre completely out of contact with them, we donít know their condition, so weíre trying to go on a hunger strike to get them regained into our community.
Well I think this is definitely a very serious situation. I donít know what to say. I donít know what to ask at this point, but I want to thank you for contacting the station here in Olympia and letting us know whatís happening. Is there anything more youíd like to let us know?
Iíd just like to say that the majority of people here were protesting in completely peaceful protests. People here, some people were taken in on Tuesday that werenít being violent but they just didnítÖmass arrests Wednesday and ThursdayÖand people who were participating in completely nonviolent protests. The charges are completely, like, almost laughably, funnyÖhorribleÖdepending; from like I had a failure to obey the mayor ? is my charge. Which I guess is like arresting me for not watching television to know that he didnít want anyone gathering in groups more than four downtown on Wednesday. Itís just the more people who come up right now to support during these protests today the better chance weíll have of getting out before the weekend cause they can hold us for seventy two hours without really doing anything except hold us to keep us out of the city and to punish us for our right to assemble; and the seventy two hours doesnít include the weekend, so we could be here until Tuesday without officially being processed.
Oh my. Well you certainly have our support here in Olympia.
Hey, and Iím a Greener, so any of all of you guys who wanna come up thatíd be nice!
Okay
Alright, and thereís a lot of us in here!
(laughter)
Alright, thanks for, ah, doiní this.
Yeah no problem. And thank you.
No problem.
I look forward to hearing from you again sometime or your fellow prisoners calling the station again.
Okay weíll do that.
Thank you very much.
Bye.
That was an anonymous protester that has been jailed in Seattle for
some time now. This is KAOS 89.3 fm.
Credit
digital sound editing on the audio transcript of this interview by
Phil of the Gil, ESC.