Prisoner Support

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A message from Joe Sellers – Free Frank Fernie Campaign

With sentencing on young protesters becoming less and less reasoned, increasingly disproportionate and twice as frequent, it is massively important that over the following months, we as the public can begin to come together and support the real victims of protest. The defendants.

July this year saw Francis Fernie sentenced to a 12 month custodial sentence, 220 miles away from his family, for throwing two placard sticks in the direction of heavily protected police officers at the M26 London protests. These were the police officers that only minutes prior to this incident had shown Frank the full definition of police brutality.

Instead of settling into his University life in Sheffield as should have been the case, Frank is now instead preparing for his release back into society this coming Monday with many of his future prospects suddenly appearing cloudy.
Alfie Meadows was beaten so severely that he was required to undergo brain surgery in order to save his life. As if that were not unnecessary punishment enough, he now stands charged with violent disorder and could be looking at a similar situation as Frank.

These are only two examples from a list that has grown rapidly over the last 5 months. It is important that all of those involved in this horrible situation are not forgotten and that as individuals, they are constantly reminded that they are not alone in fighting for their rights.

In the case of Frank Fernie, the support group and campaign that was erected around him have been priceless in making his time in prison easier and now, in the long run, shorter. Through the small actions of many, Frank’s time has been made all the more bearable.

Swarms of letters and emails sent to Frank by those who feel for his cause have not only reminded him throughout his sentence of the outside support he has, but have also managed to occupy a huge part of the tedious time he has spent locked away.

Postal orders sent through the post meant the Frank has had more money than he has had time to spend. Stamps, envelopes and photos meant that Frank has had plenty of activities to keep him busy, responding to letters and being reminded of the external efforts to fight his cause.

The facebook page set up in support of Frank grew over 1000 members in less than a week and helped us provide witnesses, photographic evidence and an un countable amount of contacts with inside knowledge of both protest and the system. Without this, the entire process of defence and appeal would have been impossible.

We feel that this sort of effort and support should be readily available to each individual defendant.

Below are a few useful links to help people get informed and start to show support even at this early stage.

Best website for learning info about individual prisons. Particularly useful for friends and families so that they know what prisoners will be doing certain days etc. Came to great use when working out when free time for potential phone calls may fall:

http://www.insidetime.org/info-regimes.asp

Government website providing information on sentencing processes etc. Again incredibly useful:

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/CrimeJusticeAndTheLaw/Sentencingprisonandprobation/index.htm

Best website to use to get in touch with a prisoner. Takes 5 minutes to set up an account. You can email a prisoner for 30p a time and they will receive it the very next day. Prisoners have no access to personal internet and so responses will be sent as a written letter, not as an email:

http://www.emailaprisoner.com/