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Last updated August , 2011
“
RBG Attica Revisited-Attica Is All of Us
”
Page 1
“
RBGAttica Revisited-Attica Is All of Us
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Inmates tell their own story
Last updated August , 2011
“
RBG Attica Revisited-Attica Is All of Us
”
Page 2
THE ATTICA RIOT ANDTHE RIGHTS OFPRISONERS
The Attica Riot
On 9 September 1971 inmates began a riotand takeover at the Attica StateCorrectional Facility in New York. Thetakeover ended four days later when lawenforcement officers stormed the prison.Forty-three people were killed: ten prisonguards who were being held as hostagesand thirty-three inmates. The Attica riot captured the attention of the nation, directinginterest to prison conditions and the rights of prisoners.
Background
The riot at Attica came after a summer of tension and unrest at the prison. The prisonwas over-crowded, housing 2,250 men in a facility considered safe for 1,600. Racialtensions were also high. The prison had no black guards and only one Puerto Ricanguard, yet the inmates were 54 percent black and 9 percent Puerto Rican. Tensions atthe prison grew after inmate George Jackson was shot to death at San Quentin prisonin California. Inmates assumed that he had been murdered because he was a blackradical. On 9 September minor disciplinary actions against two fighting inmates eruptedquickly into a full-scale riot involving more than a thousand inmates. Fifty prison guardswere taken as hostages. Most were beaten by angry inmates. Several seriously injuredhostages were released, and one hostage died as a result of his injuries.
Demands
The inmates quickly organized a negotiating team to put together demands for theprison administration. Their initial demands included complete amnesty for participantsin the riot, federal intervention, and the organization of an independent negotiatingcommittee made up of public figures sympathetic to the prisoners' conditions to ensurethat the prison officials kept their promises. State officials refused to offer amnesty,particularly after the hostage guard died. They did organize the negotiating teamrequested by the inmates. The negotiations focused on amnesty and prison conditions.
Last updated August , 2011
“
RBG Attica Revisited-Attica Is All of Us
”
Page 3
The prison administration agreed to twenty-eight of the inmates' requests, including anend to the censorship of reading materials, a right to be active politically, a morenutritious diet, an expansion of library programs, more recreational opportunities, andtrue religious freedom. Officials refused a complete amnesty from criminal prosecutionfor the riot and the removal of the prison superintendent. Negotiations stalled at thispoint. State officials then presented an ultimatum to the inmates: either accept the offeror have the prison retaken by force. The inmates refused to accept.
Storming the Yard
New York governor Nelson Rockefeller then ordered state police, sheriffs' deputies, andcorrectional officers to launch an attack on the area of the prison controlled by inmates.They fired tear gas into the cell blocks; officers fired rifles and shotguns into the prisonyard from roofs and other high points. The attack lasted ten minutes. Initial reportsstated that nine hostages had their throats slashed by inmates and that twenty-eightinmates were killed in the attack. Later investigations made clear that inmates had notkilled any hostages during the attack. Instead, ten hostages had been killed by gunshotsfrom the police and prison guards retaking the prison yard. Twenty-nine inmates werekilled in the attack; three others had been killed by other inmates before the attack.
The Aftermath
New York State officials were heavily criticized as the cause of the hostages' deathsbecame known. They were criticized for their attack and for the prison conditions thathad led to the riot in the first place. Attica came to symbolize the dangerous conditionsof many prisons and the often-petty restrictions on prisoners' religious and politicalfreedoms. The Attica riot provoked several efforts to reform prison conditions across theUnited States. Those reform efforts often failed because of budget constraints andescalating prison populations, which increased prison overcrowding. Prison populationsgrew 88 percent from 1970 to 1981, while new prison building lagged behind. Prisonconditions and overcrowding were considered more of a problem at the end of the1970s than they were at the time of the Attica riot.
The Constitutional Rights of Prisoners
The 1970s also brought a growing concern for the constitutional rights of prisoners. Thegeneral principle was stated by the Supreme Court in
Wolff
v.
McConnell
(1974):"Lawful imprisonment necessarily makes unavailable many rights and privileges of the
ordinary citizen.… But though his rights may be diminished by the needs a
nd exigenciesof the institutional environment, a prisoner is not wholly stripped of constitutionalprotections when he is imprisoned for crime. There is no iron curtain drawn between theConstitution and the prisons of this country." In
Wolff
v.
McConnell
the Court guaranteed
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