Month: July 2017

Reposted from ACJ Health Justice

On Tuesday night, Keyshawn Givens, an inmate at Allegheny County Jail who has been awaiting trial since December 2015, was sent to a local hospital to be treated for injuries sustained from an “altercation” with another inmate.

Both the warden and deputy warden have not released any information on his condition to his family members. There are 300 cameras in the jail, and somehow, this incident was not recorded. No family members have been contacted on his position, yet it is the jails policy to do so.

Allegheny County Jail has a long history of abuse and neglect. Just a couple of years ago, ACJ had the highest national rate of deaths due to medical neglect in the U.S.

Please call in to Rich Fitzgerald and Orlando Harper’s office to voice your concerns and demand answers. Make the phone ring of the hook, his family deserves to know what has happened to their loved one.
Call-In:

Rich Fitzgerald: 412-350-6500

Email: executive@alleghenycounty.us

Warden Orlando Harper: 412-350-2000

Healthcare Services: 412-350-2201
Suggested Script:

“I am calling as a community member of Allegheny County. Keyshawn Givens’ family deserves and should know the whereabouts of their family member. I demand that the Allegheny Count Jail notify Keyshawn’s family about his medical condition. I demand to know why his “altercation” was not captured on film. I demand that Keyshawn and all inmates receive the medical care they need.”

On Tuesday August 1st two separate incendiary speaking tours will both land in Pittsburgh. At 6PM at Glitterbox Theater, Ben and Firehawk will be speaking about last fall’s prison strike and repping their new zine The Fire Inside. Directly afterward representatives of the Revolutionary Abolitionist Movement will be talking about their organization and their new book Burn Down the American Plantation at the Big Idea. See the Torchlight calendar for details, and tell all your friends!

At today’s long-delayed preliminary hearing, nine of he protesters arrested at  last March’s noise demo at Allegheny County Jail accepted a plea deal. The deal involved pleading guilty to two summary offenses each and covering restitution costs of about $780 per protester. Please donate to help defray these expenses!

Two defendants were not offered this deal and had their cases continued. This post will be updated with further details as they become available.

UPDATE JULY 31: One of the remaining defendants pled guilty today to possession of a prohibited weapon as well as two summary offenses and was sentenced to a year of probation plus restitution. This person will have to come up with $50 a month in probation costs, so please donate! (Link above).