JUSTICE IS RARE IN THE ITALIAN PENAL SYSTEM’S CULTURE OF GRATUITOUS VIOLENCE AND IMPUNITY

Posted on July 27, 2021 by Norwich Radical in Inter|national and tagged Covid-19, featured, human rights, inmates, Italy, Matteo Salvini, organised crime, police brutality, prison, state violence, Stefano Cucchi, systemic violence.

by Alessandra Arpaia

Content warning: violence, abuse, police brutality

Santa Maria Capua Vetere is a small town in the southern Italian region of Campania. A few weeks ago, prison surveillance videos emerged showing guards brutally attacking prisoners after inmate protests took place in April 2020. The footage is proof not only of the abuse of power that takes place in silence in Italian prisons every day, but it also highlights the urgent need for Italy to reevaluate its penal system. Despite being sparked by demands for better Covid protection and testing, last Spring’s protests were a culmination of longstanding issues which have characterised the Italian judicial and penal system for too long; from lack of basic hygiene standards to a general slowness in judicial processes – not to mention the extreme levels of violence perpetrated by prison guards.

SYSTEMIC RACISM IN THE UK CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM: AN UNDENIABLE REALITY

Posted on September 24, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Inter|national and tagged 1312, acab, BLM, courts, David Lammy MP, defund, discrimination, E. Tendayi Achiume, featured, guest post, IAS UK, IOPC, jail, Lammy review, law, lawyers, police, prison, prison complex, racism, systemic racism, uk, windrush.

by Alexandra Jarvis of IAS UK

The brutal murder of George Floyd in America this May sparked revived global conversations on the presence of racism in criminal justice structures around the world today. Despite this movement and its rallying cry across the world that Black lives matter, the UK’s systemic racism is entrenched and stubborn. Just last week in Britain, dance group Diversity’s performance on popular TV show Britain’s Got Talent attracted criticism after daring to depict police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement in their powerful performance. As activists work in the aftermath of the revolutionary protests and petition to push forward change, the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) in Britain has launched an investigation into racism within English and Welsh police forces. Through this, it aims to assess whether Black, Asian, and other minority-ethnic groups are discriminated against by police officers and established practices.

WHY IS THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY NOT PUSHING TO ENTER THE US UNDER THE RESPONSIBILITY TO PROTECT?

Posted on July 21, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Inter|national, Perspectives and tagged anti black, antifa, BAME, barr, black, black lives matter, burundi, CHAZ, Donald Trump, featured, george floyd, iraq, ken cuccinelli, neoliberal, police brutality, police violence, policing, portland, poverty, prison, race, racism, reparations, responsibility to protect, suicide, Syria, system, uk.

by Sarah Edgcumbe

CW: racism, violence, police brutality, suicide

I’ll admit, the title of this article is posed in a slightly tongue-in-cheek manner, but the underlying premise points to two concurring factors: the hypocrisy and northern hemisphere-bias underpinning global governance, and the distinct shift towards authoritarianism that we are currently seeing in Trump’s America; the latter possibly justifying intervention under the Responsibility to Protect doctrine. The Trump administration’s current bent towards authoritarianism is not mere hyperbole, nor the incendiary Twitter-ranting of an orange mad man, but a dark and extremely worrying leap towards the kind of repression that characterizes Assad’s Syria, or the recent kidnappings in Iraq, wherein those protesting against the regime are bundled into unmarked cars and whisked away into the night. Continue Reading

EXTINCTION REBELLION’S STATEMENT ON POLICE WILL NOT VINDICATE THEM

Posted on July 6, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Perspectives and tagged 1312, abolition, anthropocene, anti black, BAME, black, black lives matter, climate change, climate crisis, education, Extinction Rebellion, featured, government, mark maslin, police, police brutality, prison, race, racism, simon lewis, uk.

by Lisa Insansa Woods

In early July, Extinction Rebellion UK released a statement discussing their “relationship with the police.” They explained how they now recognise that their tactics of civil disobedience and mass arrests have been insensitive to and “have excluded Black people, other communities racialised as non-white, and other marginalised groups and contributed to narratives that have put those communities at risk.” They also apologise that this recognition has come so late.Continue Reading

NOT A TEAM: HOW THE POLICE OBSTRUCT OTHER EMERGENCY SERVICES (AND TAKE CREDIT)

Posted on June 27, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Perspectives and tagged 1312, abolition, ambulance, black, black lives matter, defunding, derek chauvin, emergency service, featured, firefighter, jengba, NHS, police brutality, police violence, policing, poverty, prison, race, racism, recruitment, system, uk.

by Kasper Hassett

CW: police brutality, racism

We tend to think of them as a trio: the police; the firefighters; the paramedics. They all answer the same phone line; they all blare the same siren on their way to the scene. Not all three, however, exist to support civilians, nor do they operate in unison, and this façade is what enables the police to be revered no matter how much they tear communities apart and instil fear.Continue Reading

WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT THE RIOTING AND THE LOOTING

Posted on June 10, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Perspectives and tagged #SayHerName, abolition, ahmaud arbery, Akala, anti black, BAME, belly mujinga, black, black lives matter, breonna taylor, CHAZ, coronavirus, derek chauvin, featured, george floyd, judah adunbi, loot, macpherson, mustafa dikec, neoliberal, paulo freire, police brutality, police violence, policing, poverty, prison, race, racism, reparations, say their name, Seattle, Stephen Lawrence, system, tony mcdade, uk, zygmunt bauman.

by Sarah Edgcumbe

CW: racism, violence, police brutality

We need to talk about the rioting. And the looting. And the destruction of statues during recent Black Lives Matter protests. We really do. The failure to recognise the entrenched nature of historical and enduring structural violence in both the US and the UK speaks volumes in terms of the normalization of oppression, enforced poverty, racism and discrimination in contemporary society. Whilst there are certainly white victims of structural violence, it is an irrefutable fact that Black or minority ethnic communities experience the most severe intersecting consequences – not as uncomfortable rarities, but as a grinding, every day, relentless struggle, which as we have seen in the case of George Floyd along with so many other black men, women and youth, can too often have fatal results.Continue Reading

THE ONLY WAY TO END POLICE BRUTALITY IS TO ABOLISH THE POLICE

Posted on June 8, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Perspectives and tagged #SayHerName, 1312, abolition, ahmaud arbery, anti black, anti-asian, BAME, Belly Mujnga, black, black lives matter, breonna taylor, coronavirus, derek chauvin, featured, george floyd, government, J m moore, jengba, lockdown, NHS, norwich, police brutality, police violence, policing, poverty, prison, race, racism, Rodney King, say their name, Steven Lawrence, system, tony mcdade, uk.

by Lisa Insansa Woods

CW: racism, violence, police brutality

A tide of anguish currently sweeps our world, hammering at the white supremacist order. On the evening of May 25th, George Floyd was mercilessly killed by a white US policeman. The world watched from their homes as Derek Chauvin knelt on Floyd’s neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds, ignoring his screams as he called out that he couldn’t breathe. George Floyd was suffocated of his last breath. Three other policemen stood and watched. The state brutally murdered a Black man. The people decided to revolt.

Right now, we are seeing mass protests from the US to the UK to the rest of the world, both on the streets and online, physically and mentally. Police brutality pervades our society and the recent piling up of Black bodies such as George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, and Ahmaud Arbery has become just too much. We need change. The only way to achieve this change is to abolish the police.Continue Reading

AVENUES FOR JUSTICE – INTERVIEW WITH CINDY RUSKIN

Posted on March 24, 2020 by Norwich Radical in Arts and tagged Ananya Wilson Bhattacharya, art, Avenues for Justice, Cindy Ruskin, Community, featured, interview, painting, prison, prison alternatives.

by Ananya Wilson-Bhattacharya

This is the second instalment of the Interviews with NYC Artists series. Part 1 is available here.

Later on that cold December day, after my meeting with Sally, I battle my way through the New York snow to meet the artist Cindy Ruskin in her apartment in Manhattan’s Lower East Side. The apartment is filled with art supplies, paintings and other works, including a renovated garbage can laden with small models and storytelling sketches.

TRANSPARENT TRANSACTIONS

Posted on September 20, 2019 by Norwich Radical in Perspectives and tagged Core Civic, corey donaldson, crime, criminal, education, ethics, featured, jail, justice, katie Allan, linda allan, Polmont, prison, prisoner, reform, stuart allan, transparency.

by David Breakspear

As an active prison reform campaigner, I have wanted the fences and walls which surround our prisons to become metaphorically invisible. But why is this important to me?

As a former prisoner who, due to sentence and not a conviction, will always have to disclose parts of my criminal record, and who will forever have my life open to scrutiny, privacy is not an option; I had or have no choice in the matter. If I’m asked, I must tell. This despite the fact that I am not involved with the system as a ‘resident’ or ‘service-user’ anymore and no longer considered a risk to society. A reformed character, my new label? Continue Reading

THE TECHNOLOGY REVOLUTION

Posted on September 7, 2019 by Norwich Radical in Perspectives and tagged courses, crime, criminal, deterrent, Dr Beth Weaver, education, ethics, featured, Fergus McNeill, HE, higher education, ICT, IT, jail, justice, Office, Open University, prison, prisoner, reform, schools, technology.

by David Breakspear

“ICT and digital systems in prison must support more flexible access to learning that is tailored to the needs of individual learners and enables participation in distance and other learning.” (Coates, 2016)

People are sent to prison as punishment for a crime they are alleged to have committed. I say alleged as I am no longer confident that a finding of guilt in court is an indication of whether the alleged guilty party, is in fact, guilty; however, this is a separate debate.

Why are ICT and digital systems, and of course education, important in prison? Continue Reading

prison

JUSTICE IS RARE IN THE ITALIAN PENAL SYSTEM’S CULTURE OF GRATUITOUS VIOLENCE AND IMPUNITY

by Alessandra Arpaia

SYSTEMIC RACISM IN THE UK CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM: AN UNDENIABLE REALITY

by Alexandra Jarvis of IAS UK

WHY IS THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY NOT PUSHING TO ENTER THE US UNDER THE RESPONSIBILITY TO PROTECT?

EXTINCTION REBELLION’S STATEMENT ON POLICE WILL NOT VINDICATE THEM

NOT A TEAM: HOW THE POLICE OBSTRUCT OTHER EMERGENCY SERVICES (AND TAKE CREDIT)

WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT THE RIOTING AND THE LOOTING

THE ONLY WAY TO END POLICE BRUTALITY IS TO ABOLISH THE POLICE

AVENUES FOR JUSTICE – INTERVIEW WITH CINDY RUSKIN

TRANSPARENT TRANSACTIONS

THE TECHNOLOGY REVOLUTION

Support the Radical

Subscribe

by Alessandra Arpaia

Share this:

Like this:

by Alexandra Jarvis of IAS UK

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Share this:

Like this:

Support the Radical

Subscribe