We started the Campaign to Free Incarcerated Survivors of police Torture (CFIST) around a year ago. During that time the campaign has mainly focused on securing pardons for the tortured and wrongfully convicted. With the threat of covid-19, the goal is #MassReleaseNow
CFIST has been building power and demanding that the governor pardon Gerald Reed and other torture survivors for over a year before the COVID-19 crisis with no action from the governor. Now we demand #MassReleaseNow and the governor is still not doing enough.
Our vision is to completely dismantle the prison industrial complex. The Alliance has always highlighted the human rights violations inflicted by prisons and police. These violations by CPD and the IDOC have been brought to the UN Commission on Human Rights.
Now it is even clearer that prisons are a human rights violation. Prisons and jails have become epicenters for covid-19 because you cannot social distance while confined with thousands of other people. To keep people incarcerated now is to sentence the most vulnerable to death.
Since beginning our campaign we have developed petitions, call scripts, and fact sheets on the tortured and wrongfully incarcerated among other resources. We have contacted various government officials and met with some, but their response has been negligible.
In doing this work we have built up our support base and organizational capacity. Our petitions have gotten thousands of signatures and the campaign has been endorsed by over 25 organizations. This puts us in a position to escalate our demands and tactics.
We are pushing these covid-19 specific demands published by @ChiBondFund for the the release of:
- all persons at elevated risk of contracting covid-19 due to age or underlying health conditions.
- all pregnant people.
- all persons on misdemeanor or probationable felony charges.
- all persons being held on money bond who can't pay for their release
- all persons held in pretrial detention
- all persons serving sentences in the jail
- all persons who remain in the jail because they have no place to stay. The city must secure shelter for these people.
We also demand daily covid-19 testing and treatment for those who need it.
We maintain our original demand of an immediate pardon for Gerald Reed and all survivors of police torture and wrongfully incarcerated people.
If you would like to get involved in CFIST, email CFIST@CAARPR.org and see what work you can get plugged into.
We are currently working through media, event planning, and outreach committees.
You can support CFIST right now by calling the governor, Kim Foxx, Judge Evans, and other elected officials and raising the demand to free Gerald Reed, free all torture survivors, and #FreeThemAll.
Sign our petitions:
For all torture survivors: caarpr.org/cfistpetitiont…
For Gerald Reed: caarpr.org/pardonreed
Sign this petition from @ChiBondFund: chicagobond.org/2020/03/22/984…
Donate to and share the Chicago Alliance's gofundme: gofundme.com/f/carceration-…
Share these asks and demands widely through social media, texts, calls, and emails with all your friends, families, neighbors, acquaintances, etc.
Lastly watch out for calls to action through our social media and other platforms. Stay ready to fight for our incarcerated siblings!
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