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AMP Report – April 14, 2008
Dr. Sami Al-Arian put in solitary confinement
Dr. Sami Al-Arian, a former Florida professor currently on his second hunger strike in federal detention to protest unjust treatment by the U.S. authorities, has been placed in solitary confinement, with no medical monitoring, in a Maryland detention facility.
Dr. Al-Arian, who has already lost almost more than 30 pounds, began refusing food and water on March 3rd to protest a third attempt by prosecutors to compel his testimony in court.
According to the Tampa Bay Coalition for Justice and Peace at 1 a.m. on April 12, Dr. Sami Al-Arian was moved by hostile prison guards from a regular holding cell at the Howard County Detention Center in Jessup, Maryland, to the "Special Housing Unit."
The SHU is an extremely punitive and restrictive section of the prison where inmates are placed in solitary confinement 23 hours a day, usually in freezing temperatures. Prisoners are normally moved there for violating prison rules.
However, in the case of Dr. Al-Arian, he has always been placed there without reason or any explanation. In the SHU, prisoners are subjected to continuous, deafening alarm sounds and have little contact with the outside world. With no medical supervision, this is an extremely dangerous place for Dr. Al-Arian to be during his hunger strike, which is on its 41st day.
Dr. Al-Arian was also held in solitary confinement for 37 months before and during his trial. This was a deliberate attempt by the government to break him down physically and psychologically and to prevent him from preparing for his trial.
Amnesty International has written several letters decrying the prison conditions of Dr. Al-Arian, calling his treatment "gratuitously punitive" and "inconsistent with international standards for humane treatment."
The Tampa Bay Coalition for Justice and Peace urged all conscientious individuals and organizations to contact the Howard County Detention Center and call for humane treatment of Dr. Al-Arian. “We also call on media outlets to cover these abuses, which so far have received no attention.”
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), a leading Muslim civil rights group, also called on American Muslims and other people of conscience to write letters - urging Al-Arian's release - to Judge Gerald Lee of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, to Attorney General Michael Mukasey and to congressional leaders.
Al-Arian began his first hunger strike last year after being given a sentence of up to 18 months for refusing to testify before a grand jury in Virginia. His attorneys say an earlier plea agreement freed him from further cooperation with the government. Supporters also say the government's actions amount to a form of harassment.
In December of last year, a judge decided to lift civil contempt charges against Al-Arian. The charges were dropped when the grand jury he was subpoenaed to testify before expired.
In 2005, a Florida jury rejected federal charges that Al-Arian operated a cell for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Al-Arian later pleaded guilty to a lesser charge and was scheduled for release and deportation in April.
Read also:
Abuse of judicial system to keep Dr. Al-Arian in prison
Civil rights advocates urge Justice Department to honor Al-Arian plea agreement
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