The Prison Policy Initiative, among other organizations, have laid out some key steps and policy recommendations to address the threat of COVID-19 among prisoners, which include releasing elderly prisoners and those with medical needs, reducing the number of people coming into jails, and stopping the practice of re-arresting and imprisoning people for technical probation and parole violations. These are often central demands in our campaigns, as they are practical and liberatory steps to decarceration. We fully support these recommendations, and believe that we must go further. For instance, Iran has released 70,000 prisoners (which accounts for around 30% of its entire prison population) to mitigate the spread of the disease in prisons, and there are still demands for more to be released.
For more information: https://mailchi.mp/criticalresistance/abolitionist-steps-to-combat-covid-19-behind-bars
Anonymous on March 26, 2020