Nearly two months after Attica’s retaking, Commissioner Oswald summoned “about 50 employees and wives at a meeting in a Presbyterian church, without anyone in the community notifying the press” to discuss what might lie ahead of them now that they were without a regular breadwinner.47 Overall Oswald’s message was a relief, albeit a bit strange. As June Fargo remembered it, the good news was that “Commissioner Oswald told the men not to worry, to take six months off” because it was implied that they would be taken care of.48 Even better, each of the widows and the surviving hostages had already been given some checks, meager but most welcome, to help them get by. And yet, more ominously, they were clearly instructed in this meeting “not to talk about what had happened.”49 Although the CO families largely heeded this message, others in the nation were not so compliant. Many parties were determined not only to keep attention focused on Attica, but also to probe what was happening to the prisoners inside in the wake of the retaking.
27
Prodding and Probing
Attorneys Herman Schwartz and William Hellerstein, who had obtained the temporary order from Judge Curtin late in the evening on September 13, remained determined to enter the prison to represent the prisoners and make sure they were safe. When Superintendent Mancusi violated that temporary order, refusing them entry into the prison, they feared the worst. The problem was, the lawyers weren’t sure how to get Curtin to force the issue. As Schwartz put it, the lawyers were in “a true ‘Catch-22’ situation, since we couldn’t show the need [to get in] if we couldn’t get in and if we couldn’t show the need [to get in], we wouldn’t be able to get in.”1
This is exactly what Attica’s administrators were hoping for when they headed into the hearing that Judge Curtin had ordered for September 14, the day after the retaking. In the hearing, DOC Deputy Commissioner Walter Dunbar managed to persuade Curtin they were doing what was necessary to attend to the needs of the prisoners. No one was interrogating prisoners, he maintained, so there would be no need for their lawyers to come in. Curtain was sufficiently convinced.
The prisoners’ attorneys, however, were undeterred, for they were convinced that abuses were still occurring at Attica and adamant that they be let in to ensure that the abuses were stopped. On Wednesday the 15th, they finally obtained some concrete evidence of abuse that they hoped would reengage Curtin. A National Guardsman named James Wilson came forward to provide excruciating and gruesome details that confirmed fears about how prisoners were being treated.2 He had witnessed physical assaults and medical neglect of prisoners’ wounds and injuries, as well as a violent, highly charged atmosphere in which guards hurled racial insults and obscenities at the prisoners.3 And so Schwartz and Hellerstein got another meeting with Curtin the very next day to present this new evidence. The judge, however, was still unwilling to issue an order to admit them.4 What he did suggest, however, was that it might be possible for them to get in under the auspices of the so-called Goldman Panel, an observational body created by Governor Rockefeller just the day before.
On the 15th, under great pressure to answer questions from many quarters about how the prisoners were being treated post-retaking, the governor had asked Presiding Judge Harry D. Goldman of the Appellate Division, Fourth Judicial Department, “to name a distinguished panel of impartial visitors to observe and report on this transitional period at the Attica State Correctional Facility so that the public may be assured that the constitutional rights of the inmates are being protected.”5 The panel included, among others, former Attica observer Clarence Jones; Dr. Austin H. MacCormick, executive director of the prisoner-friendly Osborne Association; and Luis Nuñez, national executive director, Aspira of America (an educational and leadership organization for the Puerto Rican community).6
Judge Curtin’s instinct proved correct. Much to their surprise, the lawyers Schwartz and Hellerstein received a call later that same day telling them they would, in fact, be let in.7 So, along with the just-appointed Goldman panelists, on Friday, September 17, a team of prisoner rights attorneys entered Attica. The Goldman panelists were told they’d be allowed in the prison twelve hours a day, seven days a week, “visiting cells, the hospital, halls, mess hall, and even HBZ block,” yet somehow they then got restricted. On their first visit they were told they must leave by 5:00 p.m. and, thereafter, their hours of access were restricted to “between 9 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday and from 9:00 a.m. to 5 p.m. weekdays beginning next Monday.”8 Given that they had to interview many hundreds of men, and also were allotted only four rooms in the prison for this purpose, these time limitations were frustrating. “At this rate,” Schwartz noted dourly, “it would take us weeks upon weeks upon weeks to interview them.”9
The restricted schedule was Mancusi’s way of making sure that he could still limit the impact that prisoner rights lawyers might have. He had argued strenuously against admitting the Goldman panelists too, but Oswald made it clear he had no choice but to cooperate with them fully. The good news for the state was that the panelists and the prisoners’ lawyers would be getting all of their “logistical and liaison information” from two people as interested in protecting the state as Oswald was—Rockefeller’s lawyers, Michael Whiteman and Howard Shapiro. Even better, from the state’s perspective, Whiteman had made it clear to the Goldman Panel that its job was time-limited—approximately thirty days—and that the “Panel was not an Investigative group”; rather, it was just there to monitor what was happening inside the prison.10
As soon as Goldman Panel cochairs Clarence Jones and Austin MacCormick began walking around Attica and also, eventually, visiting Attica prisoners now housed at Great Meadows on the 24th, Clinton on the 25th, and Green Haven on the 27th, it became clear that even the simple task of monitoring would be arduous. At least eighty-three of the inmates they encountered had been so severely injured that they “required surgical treatment, and some were wounded so badly, so hurt that they had to be interviewed at Meyer Memorial hospital.”11 Many men at Attica had not seen any medical personnel since the afternoon of the retaking—more than a week earlier—at which time doctors, including National Guardsmen and others, had insisted that their serious injuries not go untreated thereafter.
It wasn’t until the morning of September 21 that a new team of doctors actually began conducting medical examinations in the prison. Trying to make the clearly scared prisoners feel more comfortable, the Goldman Panel had “requested that there be at least three black doctors and two Spanish speaking doctors on the Panel to carry out the examinations.”12 Eventually a group of nine doctors was assembled to examine 1,220 prisoners and to make an inventory of their medical needs, all in a mere four hours on the 21st. But even with such a cursory look at these men, it was clear to these physicians that they were still in terrible shape, that they were suffering ongoing abuse from the guards, and that conditions in the prison were still unacceptable. As one of the doctors, Lionel Sifontes, reported, prisoners were still suffering from numerous gunshot wounds as well as first- and second-degree burns from the tear gas they’d been covered with in the first minutes of the assault.13 As noticeably, “most of the prisoners were observed to have multiple body bruises and this was true of all floors of Cell Block A.”14 Dr. Sifontes minced no words about these bruises when he spoke to federal officials a month later; they were “fresh, less than 48 hours old and received since Monday, September 13, 1971. The bruises were apparently inflicted by a long blunt instrument.”15 As important, the Goldman Panel–appointed doctors noted, prisoners were terrified of identifying who had been hitting them. “One prisoner with bruises to back and cheek and a head dressing told the doctor that ‘he had fallen down the stairs.’ ”16
Despite reports from the physicians it had called to Attica, Goldman Panel members were more willing to call attention to the abuses that had already happened at Attica than ones still occurring. In its final report, for example, the panel noted that “of the inmates who had been a part of the uprising, 63% ha
d suffered a reprisal immediately following the assault, from a mild injury, such as abrasions, to a severe injury, such as fractured ribs or a lacerated scalp, to lost glasses or dentures,” but it said next to nothing about what physicians like Dr. Sifontes had witnessed.17
And when the Goldman Panel held its first press conference after canvassing prisoner injuries, they reported that their doctors had found no bruises or wounds inflicted since the 13th.18 As one Goldman Panel monitor put it: “From our observations at Attica we are convinced that inmates are treated decently, with fairness, and without brutality by Correction Officers. Their physical needs are adequately met. Food is good, Cells are clean, medical attention is provided. Inmates appear to be washed, shaven and cleanly dressed.”19
Such a conclusion struck many who knew anything about the retaking at Attica as dangerously dishonest. Various former Attica observers committee members including Herman Badillo, “demanded the resignation of the Goldman Committee,” and said that it should be disbanded because, among other things, “it has been unable to…guarantee [the prisoners’] physical safety.”20 The composition of the panel had in fact bothered prisoner advocates from its inception since so many of the monitors, even if officially seen as prisoner advocates, were also close friends with Rockefeller. The potential conflicts of interest at work here were perhaps even worse than they suspected. Panel cochair Austin MacCormick had written a personal letter to Rockefeller indicating support for the actions he had taken at Attica on September 13. “I was disturbed and indignant over the unjust and unwarranted criticism you received for not going to Attica,” he said. “If you would have gone to Attica,” he continued, “you would inevitably [have] found yourself cheek by jowl with Mr. Kunstler and Bobby Seale, and some others little better than they.”21 The governor, MacCormick went on, was right to retake the prison as he did since the observers committee had “made rational negotiation well-nigh impossible” at Attica.22
And yet, even though some Goldman panelists were sympathetic to Rockefeller, and the panel as a whole had been unwilling to mention the continuing and persistent abuses that their own doctors indicated were taking place, this monitoring body did insist that serious work needed to be done at Attica on behalf of the men locked up there. They called, for example, for a more permanent monitoring system to be set up in the prison and staffed by people unaffiliated with the prison, and, “in view of allegations by inmates of post-riot beatings,” they called for improvements in prisoner rights, including prisoners’ greater access to legal counsel.23
Some improvements were eventually made at Attica thanks to the panel’s recommendations. By the panel’s last visit on November 15, the prison had two dentists, two nurses, and two part-time psychiatrists on staff for two days a week. But while this was a welcome development, prisoners also needed help “securing replacement of [their] legal papers, necessary for appeals, parole applications, etc. which had been deliberately destroyed by the guards,” as well as much more attention paid to their safety at the hands of these same guards.24 As important, and as even the panel had to acknowledge publicly, the “danger of harassment of inmates” still loomed at Attica, as did “the likelihood of unjust retaliatory and inflammatory acts in parole and other areas.”25
28
Which Side Are You On?
While members of the Goldman Panel were insufficiently critical of state officials’ treatment of prisoners at Attica, others across the country were much more outspoken in their outrage—taking to the pen and to the streets. Songwriters like John Lennon, for example, wrote powerful ballads to commemorate the prisoners at Attica, while activist James Foreman penned a poem to
Attica, Attica, Attica. Black men, brown men, white men—shot down at Attica by the command of Nelson Rockefeller and supported by the Nixon administration. Black women, brown women, white women, families, friends, lovers, wives, millions of people mourning the loss of those slaughtered at Attica, killed on American soil by weapons developed in the Vietnam War.1
Prisoner rights activist Angela Davis also authored an opinion piece, in her case for The New York Times, arguing strongly that the men at Attica needed support—particularly since “in the aftermath, officials would resort to equivocation, untruths and myriad efforts to shift the blame onto the prisoners.”2
In the wake of the Attica retaking, myriad rallies in support of the prisoners also took place across upstate New York: outside Elmira prison, at the African Studies and Research Center on the Cornell University campus, and also Cornell’s Rockefeller Hall, where they demanded, among other things, that the building be renamed “Attica Hall.”3 Other demonstrations took place in Albany, the state capital and also the location of the Department of Correctional Services offices, which were in buildings known as the twin towers. The largest of the Albany protests involved “about 500 demonstrators [who] marched for three miles through this city…to the steps of the Capitol.”4 This group, described as “mostly young and white,” joined at least three hundred others who had already congregated at the capitol.5 “Run Rocky, run Rocky, run, run, run—People of the world are picking up the gun,” they chanted, while carrying pictures of the governor with the words “Wanted for murder, the butcher of Attica.”6
An Attica protest in Albany, 1971 (Courtesy of the Democrat and Chronicle)
Such public protests made New York’s commissioner of corrections, Russell Oswald, extremely nervous. He already felt he was “under tremendous pressure”7 after the retaking, in no small part because there had been “at least 15 bomb threats at the twin towers that resulted in evacuation” since September 17.8 According to the commissioner, “his wife was getting threatening calls” as well.9 What is more, Oswald reported to Rockefeller, he felt personally harassed. “There seems to be a relatively well-organized group called the Prisoners Solidarity Committee,” he explained, “which has decided to ‘bird dog’ all of my appearances” and, at one such appearance, “they tried to take over the luncheon meeting, grabbed the microphone, kept chanting ‘murderer’ and carried huge banners insulting you and me.”10
Many months after the retaking, protests against Rockefeller were still going strong, including some particularly high-profile events in Manhattan. At a gala hosted by the Cerebral Palsy Foundation of New York City in December, where the governor was to receive a humanitarian award, more than a thousand people showed up to picket.11 People from all walks of life came out against the governor’s actions at Attica, including artists who paraded outside the Museum of Modern Art while demanding Rockefeller’s resignation from the museum’s board of trustees.12
Attica-related protests also exploded in other American cities right after the retaking. In Los Angeles at least 150 people crowded into downtown on a sticky 90-degree day in September to show solidarity with the Attica prisoners and to call for prison reform nationwide.”13 Over seventy-five African American students at the University of Oklahoma in Norman blocked a one-way street for several hours chanting and carrying signs, one which read “30 Brothers dead, and things go on as usual.”14 According to the National Student Association, the country’s largest organization of college students, by October 1971 Attica “teach-ins on prisons and prison reforms” had been planned at “more than 20 college campuses.”15
To be sure, not all of the protests were critical of the state of New York’s actions at Attica. There were also rallies in support of Governor Rockefeller such as one held on Wall Street by a conservative student organization, Viva—Voices in Vital America—little more than a week after the retaking of Attica.16 Members of law enforcement, correction officers, and townspeople in upstate New York were all grateful to see this support of the governor since they feared that the anti-Rockefeller types would soon be protesting against them. Some Attica residents had decided to arm themselves in case this happened and New York state troopers near the town were regularly “on the lookout for troublemakers.”17 They patrolled the highways into the big cities nearby as well, looking for anyone
they thought might be a prisoner supporter. As entries in the NYSP’s official call log read: “2:50 pm: Trooper had stopped two car loads of Blacks who claim they were en route to ‘Panther Headquarters’ in Buffalo,” and then, two hours later, “4:26 pm: 4 Blacks were stopped on Thruway by patrol and advised they were en route to Panther Headquarters in Buffalo.”18 Troopers even kept tabs on former Attica observers Herman Schwartz and William Kunstler.19 And every time there was word of some protest, troopers were alerted and they worked with city and town officials to monitor the gatherings if not prevent them from happening altogether. When rumors began circulating about a massive demonstration “by outsiders planned for Oct 2” and “approaching black invasions” in Attica, the village’s five-man board of trustees called an emergency meeting to decide how to respond.20 Among other things, they discussed arresting anyone parading without a permit as well as adding a curfew.21
Officials from the Department of Correctional Services were also worried about new protests erupting within their penal facilities, and at Attica itself.22 “The situation at Attica continues to be tense,” Commissioner Oswald wrote to Rockefeller in December of 1971, and worse, he went on, “the tension at Attica is seemingly an epidemic having spread to other facilities causing severe problems in overtime payment [to COs].”23 Officials were particularly concerned about what might happen at Clinton prison, where many Attica prisoners recently had been transferred and which was already known to be a hotbed of discontent. Even before the rebellion at Attica, Herman Schwartz had observed that “Clinton looks very serious. It may blow up, although there are so many State Troopers there at the moment, probably that won’t happen for a while.”24 In the wake of Attica’s retaking the danger at Clinton had only grown, according to Oswald. Three months after Attica’s end he was worrying about the fallout at Clinton, noting in a memo to Rockefeller that a recent cell search of this prison had “uncovered large numbers of hidden and buried weapons.”25
Blood in the Water Page 30