| 
| 
| 
| 
Nebraska prisons: Not a place for Mexicans
by Rudy "Huitziloxipe" Rosales
AT FIRST GLANCE, Lincoln, Nebraska, the state capital, is just a small, quiet, midwestern city known for its college champion football team and wholesome living. But this city of fewer than 200,000 inhabitants is home to 2 major maximum security prisons and a work release institution. In the entire state of Nebraska--with only 1,578,385 total population--there are already 12 correctional institutions. And since those do not seem to be enough, a new supermax control unit prison is under construction in the small town of Tecumseh (cost estimated at $83 million), scheduled to open by 2002. Nebraska claims to be one of the safest states in which to raise a family and takes pride in its low crime rate.
Why would such a sparsely populated state build so many prisons at such an alarming rate? The answer is simple! Prisons are the number-one profitable industry for the state's economy. And without mincing words, the people singled out and unjustly incarcerated in Nebraska are the Mexican/Latino population of this state.
According to the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services Statistics/Data Inmate Population report, the Mexican/Hispanic prison population steadily increased in 1998-1999. Mexican/Hispanics were about 2.3% of the state's population (Nebraska Demographics as of 1990-US Census estimated total 1,578,385), but formed about 10.3% of the inmate population-a clear overrepresentation of Mexican/Latinos in Nebraska prisons. By comparison, the Anglo population of Nebraska consists of 93.8% overall, but the Anglo prison population is only 56.8%. Why this shocking difference? The harsh truth is that it represents blatant racism in a state that still views Mexicans as a lower caste of humans.
Mexicans are indigenous to this continent, settled here long before the Anglos and Spanish invaded and subjugated the North American Natives as well as the Central and South Americans. Yet they are referred to as wetbacks, opportunists, illegals, job grabbers, drug dealers, gangbangers; and Mexican women as whores, not only in Nebraska but throughout the US. These prejudices are poorly concealed by the small percentage of Mexican Americans with roots in Nebraska dating back to the 1800s, who are used as political pawns. For example, the Nebraska State agency known as the Mexican American Commission, is overseen by the Governor's office and employs a staff of 2 or 3 Mexican Americans on a hairstring annual budget--yet cannot get involved with legal civil rights or criminal matters!
Recently, the media has given extensive coverage to the growing Mexican/Latino pop­p;ulation in Nebraska. As a result, in some rural towns and cities, local law enforcement agencies and the white population have experienced near hysteria and bona fide panic. Many blame various meatpacking corporations for the influx of undocumented workers from Mexico, who work for very low wages and under slave-like conditions. A recent public television program aired a special on Mexican/Hispanics. The format resembled a town hall in a high school auditorium in the small rural town of Lexington, Nebraska. A panel of people represented Mexican/Hispanics and some state officials, a police chief, and representatives from the IBP meatpacking company. One local Anglo resident got up and said, "The Mexicans have ruined our town with drugs and gangs, and have also brought poverty." This is the mentality dominant in Nebraska. The state's solution is simple--give law enforcement and the criminal justice system carte blanche to arrest Mexicans and prosecute them with minimum due process, many falsely convicted of old unsolved crimes.
Many unfortunate Mexicans who do not escape this hysteria and do not speak English are, in fact, undocumented, so the local pasha, county jails, and state prisons will keep them as long as possible for economic reasons. Many--their only crime being a Mexican worker in a meatpacking company--are convicted on trumped-qup charges, provided no qualified translators, and required to work with court-appointed attorneys who cannot speak Spanish. Undoubtedly, many Mexicans in Nebraska prisons are guilty of some criminal offense; however, the majority receive harsher sentences for nonviolent crimes than other prisoners do and without the same opportunities.
The racism does not end when a Mexican is wrongfully convicted or given a harsher sentence or incarcerated for a time in a Nebraska state prison. It continues when most of them are turned over to the INS for deportation and possible additional federal criminal charges for breaking the law while undocumented. When released from the Nebraska prison, the Mexican is hauled off in shackles by the US Marshal Agency to a county jail, located anywhere in the country, which will be paid by the Federal government for housing them. Many are held for years without a hearing after doing a lengthy state prison sentence. In addition, many Mexicans in Nebraska prisons are subjected to harsh disciplinary treatment by racist staff, or because they lack English skills are left to die in prison from medical neglect. As of this writing, a Mexican inmate, Manuel Cantu, is being buried by his family in Omaha, Nebraska. He died because the medical staff at the Omaha Correctional Center denied him insulin for his diabetes, despite his repeated requests.
Mexican prisoners in a Nebraska state prison who do not speak English and receive a three- to-six-year sentence for possession of marijuana, should be eligible for parole in two years after completing a mental health program, drug program, and AA program. But a non-English-speaking prisoner cannot complete these programs because they are not offered in Spanish. So the Mexican prisoner will have to spend up to 5 years to expire the sentence.
The situation at the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services prisons and the Nebraska judicial criminal justice system is not a conundrum. The solution is simple--stop the racism against the Mexican population! Several Nebraska state legislators have taken notice, but it will take much more than a few lawmakers who have to watch their agendas due to public opinion and the voting public. After all, there are only two state legislators who are people of color, so it is unlikely that anything will be done soon.
After unmasking our prejudices and liberating our colonial thinking, we Mexican/Latinos must understand who we are and recognize the central protagonist of our history and the indispensable component of our future as equality. We must all let the ideal of the white ruling class fade into obscurity. We must become socially responsible. No state in the country should treat human beings this way. Nebraska is not a wholesome and peaceful state, but a racist state with an abusive criminal justice system, currently declaring open season on Mexican/Latino people.
--Rudy "Huitiziloxipe" Rosales, currently a political prisoner serving a 15-20 year sentence for a politically motivated action, is due to be released in 2001.
|
|
|
|