THE CONCH-HOUSE JOURNALISM OF THE LIMPET

Well dear friends, The Limpet newspaper is switching from monthly to occasional publication.  The Limpet ran as a monthly from September 2008 till August 2019, running to 204 issues.  The paper initially got started as a vehicle to publicize Cornwall Council’s disastrous plan to destroy a small beach and area of tidal rocks at the heart of Penzance.  The business consortium involved included H.R.H. Prince Charles, Duke of Cornwall and future King of England.  After rallying popular opposition to this plan, working in partnership with a small group of local activists, we won the case and defeated the opposition.  A small beach was saved and you can visit it to this day.  We saved the Holy Headland (Cornish: Pen Sans) and The Limpet was deeply happy to have played a part in that struggle.

After the police-slaughter of Ian Tomlinson in London I wrote extensively on police-violence and murder and covered a variety of cases in Britain and abroad.  The Limpet brought attention to the Lao Gai system of slave-labour camps in China, producing cheap goods for the western market and also the barbarism of organ-harvesting that continues in the Chinese state.

The Limpet’s RESIST CARDIAC ARREST campaign got started in 2010 and has robustly campaigned for a moratorium on tasers and weapons of conducted energy.  The RCA campaign succeeded in getting an admission from the British Government that tasers are lethal weapons.  This contradicts the aggressive strategy of Taser International, the manufacturing company, that spent millions in suing coroners who linked fatalities to tasers in USA. 

After making contact with Florida’s “Caged Crusader,” Harold Hempstead, The Limpet largely concentrated on amplifying Hempstead’s advocacy for justice for Darren Rainey, a mentally-disabled black Muslim man who was steamed to death in a specially adapted torture-shower in Dade prison, Florida, back in 2012.  Harold was awarded for bravery by the American Civil Liberties Union due to the risks he took to reveal the story of Darren Rainey.  He was himself an inmate at Dade, Florida’s most lethal prison and his life was in the hands of guards who themselves described the place as “Auschwitz.”  I’ve written more on this topic than any other, as the contemporary horrors and injustices of the US penal system represent a vast human rights crisis that gets barely any coverage in the big media.  Harold is serving 165 (one hundred and sixty five) years without parole for his part in some non-violent burglaries.  Overwhelming evidence exists to prove that his trial was conducted illegally and his case really is one of the most outrageous distortions of justice that you could ever hear of.  Please consult the numerous articles on Harold Hempstead and Darren Rainey and also check out his book, that talks about the system we set up whereby he would send me messages from prison to publish from Britain.  In my position as a ‘foreigner’ I was able to help him with communications without fear of intimidation and revenge by the corrupt authorities of the State of Florida.  Working with Harold has definitely been the high point of my journalistic efforts and I regard him as a man of immense integrity, vision and courage.

I deeply recommend his book, Department of Corruption, and also the website I edit for him: Harold Hempstead Caged Crusader.  They are both scrupulous and encyclopaedic archives of evidence proving a miscarriage of justice in the Rainey case and also throw light on Harold’s own background as a childhood Confidential Informant for Florida police departments and how he was set up and exploited from an early age. 

There will definitely be more publications on Harold Hempstead on this channel.

Recently The Limpet has given coverage to the planetary crisis we all now face in the form of Climate Chaos.  I am convinced that cooperation and open communication between all of us is absolutely vital for humanity to have a chance of literally saving the world before it’s too late.  Only democratically accountable and transparent activism can succeed in this, the ultimate theatre of action, and it’s natural for any movement to attract egotistic ‘leader-types’ but the movement must evolve beyond that level if it is to attract mass-participation.  The Limpet recommends that everyone, meaning everyone, starts germinating and raising trees for guerrilla-gardening.  Don’t leave it to others to plant the trees we need, start your own little forest on your window-sill. 

Limpets will still appear when the tides are right.  

Wishing you all peace and happiness.  A better world is in our hands if we dare to reach for it.

Jeremy Schanche, Editor, The Limpet – nature, democracy, free speech – Since 2008.

Cops Plant Marijuana

Who would know more about police-corruption than someone who had worked for them since the age of 13?  Who would be more informed about the way the Florida police ruin the lives of innumerable, innocent, mostly Black or Latino citizens, with the policy of "fitting them up" on false drug charges?  The author of the following official complaints was recruited by St.Petersburg Police Department as an immature youth, for purposes of infiltrating highly dangerous criminality, which involved guns, cocaine, multiple pounds of marijuana etc.  

I expect it is quite easy to pull in a youth for questioning over a petty theft or similar matter, then pile on the pressure until they agree to go undercover and work as as police-spy.  In the case of Harold Hempstead, they certainly managed to find a vulnerable family to exploit, as his father had died and his mother was spending spells in psychiatric care while the children were young.  Having got involved with undercover police-work, Harold's problems started after he exposed police-corruption and misconduct.  Eventually he was sentenced to 165 years in prison for allegedly leading a conspiracy to burgle various  empty houses.  Due to a dubious "motion in limine" the judge was able to effectively suppress a lot of evidence that was vital to Harold's defence - including the little fact that he was working for the cops when arrested.  The very same cops who testified against him at  his medieval-style trial.  

Trained as a Confidential Informant from childhood, trained to collect evidence in a methodical way, imprisoned for 165 years by a corrupt judiciary, witness and whistle-blower to the torture-murder of Darren Rainey and the torture and death by starvation of various convicts in the Florida Department of Corrections, Harold Hempstead eventually rose to a kind of fame as the "Caged Crusader" who was awarded for Bravery for his advocacy in the Darren Rainey murder case.  During his years behind bars, in the nightmare world of US prisons, Harold became a born-again Christian and is one of the most religious and spiritual people I have ever encountered.  His advocacy for Darren Rainey and the others was all done at the risk of his life and I think he got his nickname of the Crusader because nothing, even the threat of death, will stop him speaking out for what is right.

Following the publication of his second book, detailing his juvenile police-work, Harold is publicly exposing some of the corruption he encountered in his earlier years.  A study of his writings will show a systematic pattern of racially-profiled arrests, often on spurious evidence. 

It will be interesting to see the reaction of the St.Petersburg Police Department to the statements accusing them of gross corruption.  I will happily publish any response the police care to give.  I do not believe in censorship.  Free speech is at the very heart of democracy, and considering the incredible sacrifices some people, like Florida's "Caged Crusader" have made for its sake, the least we can do is give a fair hearing to what others have to say, no matter how disagreeable some of it may be.  

Jeremy Schanche, 4th May, 2019.

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INTERNAL AFFAIRS COMPLAINT

To:  St Petersburg Police Department

Attention:  Internal Affairs Division

1300 First Avenue North

St Petersburg,  Florida, 33705.

Subject of Complaint:  Former St Petersburg Police Officer Mike Brown

FACTS

I authored a book entitled “Used And Abused By The St.Petersburg Police Department.”   My book can be located at crusaderbooks.com or lulupublishing.com.

In my book I explain in detail how I know from personal knowledge that former St.Petersburg Vice and Narcotics Detective Mike Brown was behind setting up Michael Ashmead of St.Petersburg, Florida, with a frivolous felony sales and possession of marijuana charge in 1992.

Additionally, I explain how St.Petersburg Vice and Narcotics Detectives James Mosely and Jim Haley engaged me in conversations in 1998 asking me to aid them in setting up Jose Cortes of Tampa, Florida, on drug charges.

Finally, in my book, I also explain how I was subjected to retaliation and censured for previously trying to expose misconduct by these detectives.

From personal knowledge I know that several St.Petersburg Police Department Vice and Narcotics Detectives were involved with setting up numerous individuals with false drug charges in the nineteen nineties.

Presently, dozens, if not hundreds of individuals, have been arrested and are possibly incarcerated on false drug charges, who were set-up by St.Petersburg Police Department Vice and Narcotics Detectives.

I’m requesting that you conduct administrative, civil rights and criminal investigations into the pattern and practice of St.Petersburg Police Department Vice and Narcotics Detectives setting people up on false drug charges. I also request that appropriate action be taken against any detectives involved with the violations mentioned in this complaint.

Finally, I request that you ask the Federal Bureau of Investigations and Department of Justice to investigate the pattern and practice of St.Petersburg Police Department Vice and Narcotics Detectives setting-up individuals with false drug charges.

Unnotarized Oath:

Under penalty of perjury, I swear that everything stated herein is true and correct.

Dated this 7 day of February, 2019.

Affiant: (Signature appears here on original document)

Harold Hempstead, #577366,

Northeast Correctional Complex,

P O  Box 5000,

Mountain City,  TN 37683-5000.

Attorney for Harold Hempstead:

John Trevena

801 West Bay Drive

Largo, Florida 33770

CC:

John Trevena

Kathryn Varn

Casey Frank

Julie Brown

Craig Patrick

Meg O’Connor

Rick Kriseman

Jeremy Schanche

Harold Hempstead, #577366

————————————-

SWORN COMPLAINT

To:

Florida Department of Law Enforcement

Criminal Justice Standards and Training Commission

P.O. Box 1489

Tallahassee, Fla.,32302 – 1489

Subject of Complaint:  Former St Petersburg Police Office Mike Brown

FACTS

I authored a book entitled “Used And Abused By The St.Petersburg Police Department.”   My book can be located at crusaderbooks.com or lulupublishing.com.

In my book I explain in detail how I know from personal knowledge that former St.Petersburg Vice and Narcotics Detective Mike Brown was behind setting up Michael Ashmead of St.Petersburg, Florida, with a frivolous felony sales and possession of marijuana charge in 1992.

Additionally, I explain how St Petersburg Vice and Narcotics Detectives James Mosely and Jim Haley engaged me in conversations in 1998 asking me to aid them in setting up Jose Cortes of Tampa, Florida, on drug charges.

Finally, in my book, I also explain how I was subjected to retaliation and censured for previously trying to expose misconduct by these detectives.

From personal knowledge I know that several St.Petersburg Police Department Vice and Narcotics Detectives were involved with setting up numerous individuals with false drug charges in the nineteen nineties.

Presently, dozens, if not hundreds of individuals, have been arrested and are possibly incarcerated on false drug charges, who were set-up by St.Petersburg Police Department Vice and Narcotics Detectives.

I’m requesting that you conduct administrative, civil rights and criminal investigations into the pattern and practice of St.Petersburg Police Department Vice and Narcotics Detectives setting people up on false drug charges. I also request that appropriate action be taken against any detectives involved with the violations mentioned in this complaint.

Finally, I request that you ask the Federal Bureau of Investigations and Department of Justice to investigate the pattern and practice of St.Petersburg Police Department Vice and Narcotics Detectives setting-up individuals with false drug charges.

Unnotarized Oath:

Under penalty of perjury, I swear that everything stated herein is true and correct.

Dated this 7 day of February, 2019.

Affiant: (Signature appears here on original document)

Harold Hempstead, #577366

Northeast Correctional Complex

P O  Box 5000

Mountain City,  TN 37683-5000

Attorney for Harold Hempstead:

John Trevena

801 West Bay Drive

Largo, Florida 33770

CC:

John Trevena

Kathryn Varn

Casey Frank

Julie Brown

Craig Patrick

Meg O’Connor

Rick Kriseman

Jeremy Schanche

The Actions That Pinellas County Florida Officials Have Taken To Censor Me From Talking About My Past As A Former Confidential Informant In The Tampa Bay Area Of Florida

(1) I was set-up on two false felony-charges that the State Attorney’s Office dismissed against me.

(2)  Law enforcement disclosed my identity as a confidential informant to people who had the ability to kill me.

(3)  The Pinellas County, Florida Circuit Court refused to allow me to disclose my past as a confidential informant and matters relating to such in my trial.

(4)  The Pinellas County, Florida State Attorney’s Office filed a Motion B in limine prohibiting me from being able to raise anything in my trial on the charges I’m incarcerated on, about not being allowed to have my confidential informant file for the trial.

(5)  The court denied every attempt I made to disclose matters relating to my past as a confidential informant.

Harold Hempstead

FREE HAROLD HEMPSTEAD

There are many people in prison in USA who by rights should not be there.  With a prison-population that has peaked at well-over two-million, Amerika has a nation within its own nation.  Among the very many people wrongfully incarcerated inside that nation, the case of Harold Hempstead stands out as an extreme story of injustice faced with incredible courage and humanity, which is why I've written many previous blogs on him at this site, and also work with Harold to run the website Harold Hempstead Caged Crusader Wordpress where I publish his evidence on human rights abuses in the Florida Department of Corrections and specifically on the case of the murder of mentally disturbed convict Darren Rainey.  What happened to Rainey was so evil that it catalyzed all sorts of people into action.  The case has dragged on for over five years now without satisfactory result as yet, but due to its gravity, I believe this murder will eventually receive the full international exposure it warrants.  

  I was talking to someone in a shop the other day and she randomly referred to the 'state of the world' with a sense of 'what can you do?'  I understood her feeling, and it certainly can be overwhelming to contemplate the daily flood of tragic, cynical and violent news stories.  My answer to her was that for anyone thinking of trying to take on the 'problems of this world,' you just had to pick a front and start fighting.  

  There are many ways you can fight for a better world for your children.  For anyone who does not know me, I use the word 'fighting' in the sense of struggle for a cause.  I'm no advocate of violence except in extreme cases of self-defense.  Planting a tree and raising it can help nature and reward you with a feeling that you could get no other way.  Befriending old folks and giving them a bit of help with their needs is always appreciated.  Some old folks are too proud to ask for the help they actually require, so a bit of tact is needed.  Some people round where I live like to organize Beach-Clean-Ups and get everyone out collecting the plastic and rubbish from our beautiful coast.   Someone in West Cornwall is organizing holiday accommodation for the people who lived at Grenfell Tower in West London and survived the traumatic and terrifying fire that destroyed so many lives and homes and perhaps signals the end of the tower-block as a 'housing-solution.'  Some people rescue animals and re-home them, others give their time to plant bee-attracting flowers in the park, now the corrupt local council has given up on planting them, citing the neo-con bullshit about 'austerity', whilst paying themselves handsome salaries.  So there is corruption and injustice and pollution everywhere around you if you care to open your eyes to it.  It's like tidying up a room - don't get bogged down in the totality of the mess, just start by picking up one thing and dealing with it.  Just pick a front and start fighting.  

When he witnessed the brutal slaughter of Darren Rainey in a Florida prison torture-chamber, Harold Hempstead went through a long, dark night of the soul and came through it a changed man.  Trained from childhood by corrupt Miami police in espionage and evidence collecting, framed for witnessing against police crimes and sentenced to one hundred and sixty five years, Harold Hempstead had already endured over a decade in Florida's gulag, its production-line of death, when he witnessed the Rainey murder and, having made a deep commitment to Jesus Christ while in prison, Harold risked his life to witness, speak-out and testify to the numerous crimes of Florida's prison guards, staff and officials.  

This website and Harold's own site will be continuing to publish more evidence on the Darren Rainey murder and other human rights issues in FDC, please follow and share this info, particularly with anyone you know who is politically active and working for justice.  With what's happening in the USA these days, Justice needs all the help it can get.  There's some people over there who take 'Justice For All' as their war-cry, and I salute their courage, energy and imagination with the deepest respect and admiration.  Many activists have had family members killed by police or prison-guards, or seriously violated in prison and they've had to stand up to intense intimidation from the Amerikan state and its machinery.  It's good to share information on facebook and sign petitions but it's also good to take it to the streets - after all, this world is ours, isn't it?

Florida Prison Guards Boast Of Killing Prisoners - Latest - September 2017

Harold Hempstead

SUSPECT DEVICE - May DUPE Deal Gonna Blow Up In Your Face

My name is Jeremy Schanche and I live in West Penwith, the Westerly tip of Kernow, or Cornwall, in Britain.  Following our general election one week ago, Teresa May is trying to form a government by propping up her minority of Conservative  MP's with a handful of MP's from the Northern Irish 'Democratic Unionist Party' - the problem with this is that it might lead Britain straight into another war.  

I am very worried that  May's plan will cause so much offense that it may well lead to bloodshed.  The peace in Ulster is a fragile and vulnerable thing, the value of which cannot be calculated. 

Apart from the fact that virtually no-one in mainland Britain and the British Isles feels any friendship with the DUP and their violence-ridden history,  there are a lot of people in Ireland who will feel it a lot harder than us in Britain.  With Northern Ireland's notoriously tragic history of extreme 'religious' or rather, ethnic (Kelt/Saxon) bigotry, hatred and violence, and its extremely volatile relationship with the British Government, it seems sheer madness to risk destroying the peace in Ulster for a deeply unpopular lame-duck 'government' to cling to power for a few more futile months. 

When we have crazy so-called 'Islamic' terrorists killing us on the streets of London in these times, is it in the national interest to trash the Irish Peace Process?  That's what this issue boils down to - Teresa May would risk a whole new wave of bombings in Belfast, Derry, London and Birmingham, just to keep the capitalist Tories in power.  I think that is a despicably irresponsible thing to do.  I know the DUP folks got voted in legally according to the current version of British Democracy and that fact cannot be denied.  However, giving those extremists any influence over mainland British politics is deeply reprehensible to most clear-thinking people - the issue is being portrayed in the media according to the liberal agenda, which is deeply concerned with human rights, in all its branches.  Whilst respecting the rights of all groups of humans potentially affected by the Conservative's coalition with the UDA, or UDP, or DUPE, or whoever they are, my own view is that a far greater problem is the potential threat of terror-war, as some of us remember from the sixties, seventies, eighties, nineties, etc..  It blighted countless lives, directly or indirectly.  No-one in their right mind would risk kicking off 'The Troubles' - but is Teresa May in her right mind?  You decide.  My own view is that any right-wing lackey MPs that go along with this treacherous coalition are endangering our national security and courting tragedy and violence.   

I would encourage everyone reading this blog to ask themselves if they really want a government that could trigger another terrorist campaign in our land when we are dealing with one already? I'd like to see a tolerant, inclusive society, based on socialism, compassion and basic human kindness and Love.  I'd like to help build a society where anyone can walk down the street and be themself, without fear from bullying, hatred, terrorism, police-oppression or any other form of intimidation.  If people want to marry their own sex (or sax) it's not a problem to me, but if your lover gets blown up by a terrorist bomb, you can't marry them, whatever their sex.  

The first duty of a government is surely to look after the best interests of the people and avoid bringing armed conflict to the high streets, shops and pubs of Britain and Ulster.  

This proposed coalition of May's is an insult to all Catholics, all Kelts (which includes most of Europe and America, black and white), Women, LGBTs, Republicans (this word is a bit loaded in Britain - I should point out that you can be a Republican without endorsing violence), and all people who do not like fascism.  

In '92 I heard the City of London bomb go off from up on Hampstead Heath and it's a sound I'll never forget.  I don't mind hearing people arguing about politics, but the sound of bombs going off is something I don't want to hear again.              

  A few notable Irish things:      Bloody Sunday       Easter Rising     Skellig Michael   James Joyce    The Book of the Dun Cow   DUPE   

In May and June, the UVF petrol bombed a number of Catholic homes, schools and businesses. It also shot dead two Catholic civilians as they walked home.^[56][59] These are sometimes seen as the first deaths of the Troubles. Following the killings, the UVF was outlawed and Paisley denied any knowledge of its activities.^[58] One of those convicted for the killings said after his arrest "I am terribly sorry I ever heard of that man Paisley or decided to follow him"   
From the fascinating Wiki article on the odious founder of the so-called DUP, the 'Reverend' Ian Pailsey...... a man who made the Witch-Finder General seem like your genial uncle after a couple of lagers.

Does Derek Thomas share responsibility for the fire at Grenfell Tower, West London?

Stiff Little Fingers - Suspect Device

The Bothy Band - Old Hag You Have Killed Me


Meet William Ulsterman....


The Dubliners - More Of The Hard Stuff

Thin Lizzy - Whiskey In The Jar

The Undertones - Teenage Kicks


Stiff Little Fingers - Alternative Ulster (Live '79)


Suspect Device - Stiff Little Fingers  (Live, Ulster TV, June, 1978)


The Johnsons - Curragh of Kildare


Brenda Wootton - Delyo Syvy


Traddodiadol Plethyn-Golau Tan Gwmwl


Judy Collins - Farewell To Tarwathie


Trasna na dTonnta


The Lass of Aughrim - Frank Patterson


Oppose Teresa May's collaboration with these bitter and hatemongerous people - they are an obstacle to our progress and a threat to our peace.  Let us lawfully, peacefully and intelligently oppose them with all our energy.  They are a bunch of bigots but we are bigger than them.

DARREN RAINEY UK DEMO MAY DAY 2017

May Day Report – Penzance, Cornwall, 1^st May, 2017

Well, as planned, I kicked off Europe’s first protest for Darren Rainey today, in a very modest way.  This time last year, I organized a demo outside Penzance Hospital, in support of the National Health Service –  those were days of Momentum, before it played out – the spirit was weak but the flesh was weak.  Luckily this – the fizzling of momentum, left me free to devote myself to helping Harold Hempstead with his work on the Darren Rainey case and other matters relating to the Florida Department of Corrections. 

It was a chilly and windy day, overcast and threatening storm.  The town was nearly deserted – it’s what the English call a ‘Bank Holiday’ which I think all other nations call a public holiday.  We are not ruled by banks in Britain, don’t get me wrong.  Anyway, it’s the kind of day when people go elsewhere.  They go to other places than the centre of Penzance, which is where I was going.  Well, it wasn’t quite empty, truth is, the centre of town has been taken over by a group of street-folk, whom I have nothing against, though they can be a tad noisy at times.  A fella came up to me, his voice subdued, opiated;  his face blenched white, eyes pinned.  He took a leaflet and mumbled something, seemed like a nice fella really, just poppied-out somewhat.  Well I stood there with my three cardboard signs that I’d stayed up most of the night making – they still looked very home-made – each one was double sided – I’d been thinking of doing a ‘Subterranean Homesick Blues’ number with the shuffling sign-boards.  It was very windy, as I said and the cardboard was flapping a bit.  My plan was to regularly shuffle the signs, I was holding all three so I could simply turn over the one at the front, then the next one, etc..  This was to be my ‘act’, whilst I also held a handful of small flyers, hoping to entice punters with these strategies.  Dumb old me, I’d forgotten what a miserable bunch of shallows the British Punterhood actually is.  As the occasional minute trickle of citizens walked by – many of them obviously avoiding me – I stepped up, offering a flyer and, as I imagined, cordially inviting them to ‘Oppose Torture’ or even go so far as to ‘Stand up for Human Rights.’ 

Well, let me explain something to those of you who live outside Britain or are not familiar with our national psyche…  We’ve been conditioned over here to believe that it’s alright to be cold and unhelpful, as long as it’s done under a veneer of politeness.  Trouble is, this strategy wears a little thin in some situations and is a poor substitute for human warm, or even direct honesty.  So I’m there going ‘Human Rights in America!’ and trying to give out leaflets and honestly, about nine out of ten of them would walk by and say ‘no thank you’ in a horribly English way.  It would be better if they said nothing at all.  I can’t help it, it brings out the sarcasm in me.  So when I say ‘Human Rights’ and they say ‘No thank you’ in a weirdly plummy, emotionally cold and disconnected way, I can’t help laughing – as if they really do not want any rights.  What they are saying is they do not wish to consider whatever it is that I might be saying.  They’re not saying they want anyone tortured to death – they’re just saying they don’t want to talk to a bloke in the street holding a cardboard sign.  They’ve been conditioned to get their info through shiny channels, not dodgy-looking home-made ones.  I admit, after very little sleep, that their lack of interest was mildly annoying and perplexing, but then there were the other ten per cent who make it worthwhile. 

So despite thin numbers and broody, moody, uncheerful weather, I still managed to get rid of quite a few flyers and then I remembered the Limpets.  I’d done a rare thing and printed out a load of copies, printed on both sides!  That’s up-market stuff to me.  It was issue 170, one that means a lot to me, as it’s Harold Hempstead’s blog entitled ‘A Fight For The Value Of Life’, which I find very moving, and the front cover is my poster of Darren Rainey in the stars, which also means quite a lot to me, as I wanted a positive, spiritual and strong image of him out there.  Quite a few people showed mild interest and a few stayed and talked in a little more depth.  Another thing to bear in mind is that in Britain the right-wing press has for a long time been associating the term ‘Human Rights’ with stories of foreigners exploiting the law and using it to worm around various things.  The dumb tabloids have trained the uncritical to react to the term ‘Human Rights’ with a knee-jerk reaction of scathing suspicion, as if it’s a by-word for fraud.  Rather sad really, when you think that establishing Human Rights in conventions, treaties and international law was how the ‘allies’ defined post-war western civilization – in contradistinction to nazi ‘culture.’  All the great Human Rights Declarations and Conventions of the post-war epoch are exactly that – an attempt to legally define just what it was that made us different from the fascist enemies we were forced to fight and kill – well, our grandparents were, I should say…  so it’s saddening to realize that people, well, some people, are suspicious of ‘human rights’. 

Being out in my local street like that reminded me of just how closed most people are.  But it was also very rewarding to engage with the caring minority of the people.  Those who obviously care.  Those who grasp the subject quickly, not staring blankly with bored eyes, but eyes that show life, interest, comprehension. 

Sadly, no press turned up, nor any friends with cameras so the event itself went unrecorded (they even turned off the Orwellian street cameras some years back, after the local authorities blew all the town’s money on an erotic adventure to Thailand or something)  I got there before 12, and left soon after one, feeling chilly but satisfied.  Just as I was packing up, I heard my name called and there across the street were two friends of mine, an old activist guy who’s a barricade-rat from decades back and a poet lady who spent years in Egypt and witnessed the blood there.  What a pleasant end to my demo.  They were going to our local left-wing café, where some friends were having a get-together to celebrate the Spring.  We were soon all babbling away, with Pete taking the lead.  He’s a personal friend of Corbyn, going back many years and we debated, or were treated to a debate on Party-Political matters.  After a while, ol’ Pete kindly agreed to do a brief film clip of me, a kind of micro-version of the protest, as it had not been filmed.  We trooped out into the main drag of Penzance and I ranted at the camera for a few moments, with my poet friend egging me on with a couple of questions in a mini-interview type thing.  When we went back into the café I joined a salsa combo on congos for a few tunes, I’d played with some of them years before, ha- before I quit the band to concentrate on campaigning to Save The Holy Headland….. that’s going back a while……  anyway, I jammed with them on guiro, that scratchy-reggae bead-gourd-thing, clave etc.. and then the guitar player approached me.  I’ve known him for years.  Last time I’d seen him he had annoyed me by criticizing my flyers for the Darren Rainey justice petition.  I’d told him then that they were done in a rush and the message was the main thing.   He reopened the topic.  He got out his flash phone and even showed me a mock-up version of a flyer he’d designed himself.  It had that grotesque drawing that looks nothing like Darren Rainey on it with some bland text and no proper link.  I asked him if he had signed the petition.  He had not.  He had done nothing to promote it, but spent considerable time designing a dummy flyer just to show me how it should be done.  He hadn’t even signed the petition.  Then he started criticizing my ‘attitude’ and that’s about when I said a loud and hearty ‘fuck you’ to his face and walked out, trailing ripples of turbulent air.  I laughed to myself as I relaxed soon afterwards.  People think it’s a game.  Perhaps they’re right.  I see it as a titanic struggle – perhaps I’m wrong.  Either way, let each go their own way, the way they think best and to many folks, the crusted layer of cynicism is worn like a helmet-hat to protect the hollow head – I’d rather go hatless and blundering towards what I think to be true.  I just had a lesson in the people’s prevailing – but not total – indifference.  I still believe most people are good if you can get through to them – but it’s such hard work, it would break the nose of a rhinoceros. 

Pretty much the biggest buzz came from knowing that my friend in Georgia was marching on the Courthouse in Gwinnett County, also choosing May Day as the day of action for justice.  Well done, Mori and I hope it went off without any trouble.  When I think of what you go through in your land, the ‘land of the free’ it just inspires me to carry on, in my relatively safe European home, where guns are rare and parole is the norm.  Where prisoners in medical distress get taken to a clinic, dentist or whatever they need.  Where, though the system is ancient and somewhat crusted with archaic rust and corrosion, at least we have some basic rights, children are not tried as adults, people are not kept in solitary confinement for more than three weeks maximum and we no longer kill our killers to prove that killing is wrong, like they are in Arkansas right now. 

P.S.  When I get the film footage – I’ll put it up…..    The signs mentioned Krishna Maharaj and I discussed him with some people.  It’s a shame the local press didn’t show up.  They’re owned by big business, so I think they have a policy of strict control over political news.  It probably would have stopped them from covering or mentioning the holocaust until decades later too.  So I didn’t get a chance to talk to any press about an innocent Brit in the FDC and about how my MP won’t respond to me on it.  A non-conspiracy of apathy, cynicism and silence.  No wonder poor Kris is still literally rotting in jail.  They have flesh-eating bacterial disease in the South Florida Reception Centre, you see, and I tried to tell Derek Thomas MP and ask him to communicate with Foreign Secretary Clown Johnson, but Derek couldn’t deign to reply to me.  That’s why we pay him £68,000 per year. 

My ‘Boycott Florida’ protest was small, low-key and humble, but it’s a start.  The first Rainey Protest outside USA, probably outside Florida!  I wish they would spread to France, Germany, Ukraine…. Portugal, Holland, Norway, all my neighbouring states…  I certainly reached a few people and planted a couple of seeds and it’s always good to get out on the streets, take Democracy back to its original home and birthplace – the Agora.  Be not afraid.

 Fe@r not – fight b@ck.  H@ppy M@y D@y Brothers @nd Sisters. 

When I got home I found this incredible film on youtube, combining some things I dearly love:  Paul Robeson singing Joe Hill to a group of Scottish Miners....... what a deep joy that gave me. I hope you all can feel it like I did.

Joe showing signs of road-fever?  Looks like Tory Crimes on drums - how apt.
Whatever happened to that ol' spiky sound?

The Selecter - Out In The Streets.....

Please see Harold's growing archive of evidence in the Darren Rainey case, thank you.  

WATCH OUT AFRICAN AMERICANS. YOUR LIVES ARE IN DANGER

''As I’ve watched the events that have happened over these last several years, the only thing that I can say to African Americans is:  Watch Out – Your Lives Are In Danger.

As African Americans continue to get killed and the people that kill them are not prosecuted because the culprits are white, or the people involved with the investigation and/or prosecution of the case are racist, the people of America are seeing they can get away with killing African Americans.

You African Americans need to think about what I’m saying.  What type of statement is tacitly being made every single time an African American is killed and the culprit is not prosecuted?  The answer is obvious.  The statement that is being tacitly made is, that people can get away with killing African Americans.

America has been built on the backs of African Americans and I believe it’s time for African Americans to rise up in love and unity in mass peaceful protest which is a Constitutional Right of all American people.  This is the only way that I believe the African Americans of our great nation can show the people of our country and the World that Black Lives Matter and enough is enough.

If you think that African Americans can continue to be killed and the people who kill them not be prosecuted and that this is not sending out a statement that people can get away with killing African Americans please let me know!  If you believe that Black Lives Matter, please let me know.

Please share this blog with your friends and anybody you believe can help us with getting justice for Darren Rainey.  Please sign our petition on Chang.org entitled THE LIFE OF BLACK, MENTALLY DISABLED MUSLIM PRISONERDARREN RAINEY DOES MATTER

Caged Crusader''

 
 

This latest message comes from Harold Hempstead, the man known as the Caged Crusader - he's the white guy pictured above, in the prison uniform.  The black man next to him is Darren Rainey, the guy who was killed in a specially constructed steam-chamber, in the mental-wing of a Florida prison in twenty twelve.  

There's going to be a lot more messages like this coming out on Harold's blog, but we need more people reading it and spreading the word - can you help?  

All the time people talk about Amerika and politics - please harness the energy of talk into some action, then you go from being an observer, commenting passively on a situation, to a participator, engaging actively in the World - and you'll grow from doing so.  Darren's dead and Harold's in prison - he's doing what he can, but is obviously restricted in his activities.  It's up to us so-called 'free' people to please do what we can to help these brave warriors behind bars who are engaged in a stark fight between good and evil.  If ever you've wanted to give your power to a cause, this is for you.  Harold's message is all about Humanity, all about Love and  Unity and, of course, it's all about Justice - Real Justice, which the People are quite capable of determining for themselves, once the truth of events is made fully known.

We believe that when a bright enough light is shone upon the 'Rainey case', the World is going to sit up and take notice - and Demand some Real Justice.  I fully believe this will happen in time - but with inmate-witnesses lives being in danger, time is of the very essence.

Please help my friend the Caged Crusader - he's a good man and he needs all the help he can get. He's not fighting for himself, but for all inmates, even for Humanity in general.  For the voiceless, the mentally disturbed who are locked away in Solitary and subjected to terrible sufferings.  Please add your light to our accumulation of light. Shine a light into the darkness.  Thank you brothers and sisters.

Y'all need to read this, if you haven't already done so.... it's a classic On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau - a book from the nineteenth century that has given me great inspiration and insight into the relationship between citizen and state.  The author was also a nature-mystic who wrote the book 'Walden' about when he lived in a hut in the woods - one of my heroes...

Florida Stop Endangering The Witness To Your Crimes

Harold Hempstead Caged Crusader Wordpress dot com – Darren Rainey, black Muslim tortured/killed by Florida prison guards – Harold Hempstead, white Christian risks life to bear witness to the crime… Please see the new site dedicated to the work of Harold Hempstead who is a major whistle-blower on the grave human rights violations in the Florida Department of Corrections and the murder of Darren Rainey. 

https://haroldhempsteadcagedcrusader.wordpress.com/

This story is so murky and entangled it’s hard to know where to begin.  I’ll try to summarize for those of you who are not familiar with these events.  Harold Hempstead was illegally recruited by Florida police at the age of 13, for confidential operations.  He was involved in a great deal of danger and a world of corruption, from a young and impressionable age.  Having witnessed predatory activity of police, he tried to expose certain crimes committed by officers.  He was set up to be killed more than once by police and eventually found himself accused of dealing in stolen goods and organizing a ring of burglars to rob vacant houses.  All the actual robbers were given a deal whereby if they agreed to testify against Harold, they would not receive custodial sentences.  The prosecutors also tried to pressure his sister into testifying against him, with threats of framing her on similar charges.  All the robbers testified against Harold.  Various police detectives also testified against him – all of whom knew that he was working for police, three of whom had personally employed him. 

The (impartial) judge Brandt Downey III sentenced Harold to 165 (one hundred and sixty-five) years in jail, without parole, adding “you are a despicable human being.  I hope you die in jail..”

Nearly eighteen years later, Harold Hempstead has managed to survive the deadly gulag that is the Florida Department of Corrections.  He’s survived countless transfers to an endless series of different prisons, where Florida’s one hundred thousand inmates are housed, many of them in years-long solitary confinement.  He’s survived regimes where convicts would be woken in the middle of the night with barked orders to stand on a pair of footprints painted on the cell floor, or immediately get drenched in tear-gas and other toxic chemical-sprays that have killed many inmates.  He’s survived, so far, a system in which last year 366 inmates died in suspicious circumstances.  And he survived Dade. 

Dade Correctional Institution is where Darren Rainey was housed, in the Transitional Care Unit, or mental hospital within the prison.  This is a place so far gone in sadism, tyranny and dysfunction that new arrivals were greeted by a representative of the State of Florida telling them “welcome to Auschwitz,” and they meant what they said.  Inmates were systematically starved, leading to multiple deaths.  Inmates were bullied into attacking and raping each other by sadistic guards who seemed to know no bounds of humanity.  People were handcuffed and foot-cuffed before being kicked senseless by half a dozen burly guards.  Every manner of physical, sexual and psychological barbarity was practiced by these guards, whom the state was paying to protect these disturbed and tormented souls who had done wrong and fallen into the hands of the state.  Well, ostensibly they’d done wrong, but in at least one case, they were innocent people who should never even have been in prison at all. 

It was here in the ‘hospital’ that guards started using a specially hooked-up shower with two water inlets – a normal one and one from a sink that was hot enough to boil noodles with.  The staff had been using this water-supply to cook their snack-lunches.  After it was converted into a torture chamber in early 2012, five inmates were subjected to extreme temperatures for extended periods until they begged for mercy and were eventually let out with a promise of ‘good behaviour.’  The fifth inmate was dead when the shower door was opened and he’d lost most of his skin in the 183° water.   Harold Hempstead witnessed Darren Rainey being taken to the shower, heard the agonizing screams and cries for mercy, heard the thump of Rainey’s body collapsing and blocking the shower-drain and saw the guards carry his disfigured corpse right past his cell.

These nightmarish events so traumatised and galvanized Harold Hempstead, a devout Christian, that he set his mind to witnessing the truth of what happened to Darren Rainey.  Despite the authorities sordid attempts at a cover-up and at considerable ongoing risk to his own safety, Harold finally succeeded in revealing the Darren Rainey murder to the Miami Herald newspaper who published it. 

Since this time, the story has had very modest coverage in USA and virtually none internationally, outside the DIY blogosphere.  The Miami Herald have however published a series of excellent articles on FDC, as has Eyal Press in the New Yorker.  Four and a half years later though there has been no conclusion to the official enquiries by Florida authorities into the Rainey murder.  This is outrageous. 

Meantime, Harold Hempstead and other inmates continue to talk to the press from time to time and they are suffering extremely serious reprisals for it.  Harold has been deprived of his vitally needed medicines, had his operation for a broken wrist cancelled, his mail violated and stolen, legal papers removed and been housed with a series of convicted murderers who are also currently abusing spice and other drugs and getting into psychotic states in the cell with him.  This is all set up as retaliation and is the policy of Florida Department of Corrections. 

Rather than let his voice be stifled by fear, Harold has put out a stream of sworn statements, addressed to the Department of Justice, Florida Department of Law Enforcement, Dade County State Attorney and the media and human rights organizations.  These statements are meticulously detailed accounts of the various crises in the Department, from murder to disabled abuse, from sexual predation of child prison visitors to the prevalence of razors, drugs etc. in the prisons. 

Because of the risks to himself that he is taking to seek justice over the murder of Darren Rainey, we’ve got up a petition to demand that the guards and the prison-authorities stop persecuting Harold Hempstead for practicing Free Speech, as enshrined in the U.S. Constitution and international law. 

Harold is standing up for the rights of those who have no voice.  Will you join us?  Please take a moment to sign the petition for Harold’s safety.  There’s also a petition for justice for Darren Rainey – and the brand-new website dedicated to this cause – Harold Hempstead Caged Crusader Wordpress dot Com.  You hear a lot of talk about America these days – here’s a way you can actually do something to help – follow this campaign and spread our message.  Justice is for everyone because all lives matter.

And here's the Petition for Justice for Darren Rainey

Odetta – Another Man Done Gone

Rev. F.D Kirkpatrick with James Collier and Pete Seeger- 
Everybody's Got a Right To Live

Wailers – One Love

Here's some flyers to print out, cut up and give out - 
tell others about these petitions:

https://haroldhempsteadcagedcrusader.wordpress.com/

https://helpmybrotherharoldhempstead.wordpress.com/

https://wobblywarrior.wordpress.com/

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/05/02/the-torturing-of-mentally-ill-prisoners

http://www.miamiherald.com/search/?cx=partner-pub-7642884967523832%3A9709061890&cof=FORID%3A10&ie=UTF-8&q=harold+hempstead&sa=Search#gsc.tab=0&gsc.q=harold%20hempstead&gsc.page=1
....because Darren Rainey's life matters.............