Redux: Of Prisons
By Alex Rose -Times of Israel - May 1, 2016
(Originally published 10/13/2012 - Current title: From My Archives - Of
Prisons)
http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/from-my-archives-of-prisons-10132012/#.Vya42LbA_c5.gmail

On March 28, 1998, President Clinton accompanied Nelson Mandela on a visit
to Robin Island, where President Mandela had been incarcerated for 18 years.
It was in this setting that Bill Clinton expressed amazement that Mandela
had emerged “without having his heart turned to stone, without giving up his
dream……”

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Even as they viewed the bleak six-by-six-foot Cell No. 5 with only a bucket
for a toilet, Clinton mouthed appropriately selected verbiage that while
everyone faced unfairness and cruelty, “…99.9% of the people will never have
a challenge like the one Mr. Mandela faced…”. He followed by pointing out
that how one’s outlook on life after the type of experience which Nelson
Mandela endured “…is beyond the control of anyone else…”.

Perhaps the most telling remarks which emerged from Bill Clinton’s lips was
how fundamental goodness and courage and largeness of spirit can prevail
over “power, lust, division and obsessive smallness in politics.”

By his own admission, Nelson Mandela is on record as saying that next to a
release, his greatest demand was for a good diet, proper clothing outfit,
bed and mattress, newspapers, radios, bioscope [movies] and better family
contact. This is recorded in a letter addressed to the Minister of Justice,
dated April 22, 1969. These then, represented items of hardship throughout
the early years of imprisonment.

How does this contrast with the experiences of one incarcerated in that
bastion of freedom, the United States, whose citizens grow up with the
belief in a system of checks and balances? The case of Jonathan Pollard is
not only revealing but should disturb every thinking citizen.

Arrested on November 21, 1985, Jonathan Jay Pollard was sentenced to life
imprisonment on March 4, 1987. The crime? According to the records, he
pleaded to one count of violating 18 U.S.C. 794, the transmission of
national security information to a foreign government. Mr. Pollard’s
conviction was not even based upon that portion of 794 that is predicated on
an intent or reason to believe that harm to the United States would result
from his conduct.

One can only wonder how it is possible that in a democracy one can be
charged with a sentence that not only does not reflect the crime, but be
subjected to a harshness bordering on the medieval and well beyond its
calling. Consider then, Pollard spending the initial 10 1/2 months in a
prison cell at the Springfield [Missouri] Medical Center for Federal
Prisoners, the first of which he was kept naked. This “medical center”
houses mentally unbalanced criminals. Only through the efforts of Rep. Lee
Hamilton [D-Indiana] was Pollard transferred out of this establishment. In
fact, in a letter to Mr. Hamilton, Federal Director of Prisons, Michael
Quinlan acknowledged that Jonathan Pollard was not in Springfield for
treatment and that he was the only sane inmate of a federal prison to
receive such treatment.

In Springfield, Pollard, occupying a nine foot by six foot cell, was
subjected to the inhuman screams of patients analogous to the sounds
emanating from Dante’s Inferno. He shared a single shower with other
inmates on the ward and by the time he gained permission to use it, the
shower had the appearance of a latrine. According to Jonathan Pollard, the
undesirable choice of smelling like an animal seemed preferable to “stepping
into AIDS-infected fecal matter.” Add to this the many attempted suicides
he witnessed where individuals attempted to cut their own throats from ear
to ear and the lack of sleep, it is difficult to envisage the fortitude he
displayed in enduring these appalling conditions.

However, the most difficult situation he confronted involved a commode which
backed up with concerted regularity. This had the effect of inundating his
cell with organic matter of a vile indescribable nature. Pollard has
described how the smell was so overpowering that on several occasions he had
to don a makeshift gas mask, which he fashioned out of toilet paper, rubber
bands, and a large Styrofoam cup.

Transferred to the K Unit at Marion maximum security prison, Jonathan was
held, for the most part, in solitary confinement. It has been said of this
prison that the officers who operated the Lefortovo Prison in Moscow could
have elevated their perverse ideas from the staff at this facility. Amnesty
international, generally reluctant for its readiness to criticize the Unites
States, has openly condemned Marion. In an early 1990 Newsweek article
about America’s prisons, David Ward, a University of Minnesota professor
said of the prisoners in Marion’s K Unit: “They are there for symbolic
reasons – to show what the Federal government can do if it really gets
angry.”

Marion Prison is notorious for housing some of society’s most dangerous
criminals, including Mafia don John Gotti and former Colombian cocaine
kingpin, Carlos Lehder. It was in this environment that Pollard was held
for more than six years in solitary confinement in an underground prison
cell with temperatures ranging in the summertime, between 102 and 107
degrees. He spent 23 out of every 24 hours in that cell where the heat and
humidity were often so intense that he could neither exercise nor even
breath properly. For the one hour a day, the guards permitted him
recreation, Jonathan Pollard was placed either in a small indoor space or
in a confined area outdoors surrounded by high concrete walls. In many
ways, he preferred not having any view of existence outside the prison
since scenes of trees and grass aggravated his desire for freedom. During
this period, Jonathan was only permitted four personal telephone calls each
week, exclusively to immediate family members and his visitation rights were
highly restricted.

During the late 1980’s, Jonathan Pollard was subjected to such treatment as
having himself spread-eagled against the wall while his testicles were
squeezed, his tefillin [phylacteries] split open by overzealous guards,
served spoiled kosher food and his kippah [head covering] thrown to the
ground. This Gulag type scene, reminiscent of the Spanish Inquisition or
18th century Ukraine actually occurred in Marion. On June 21, 1993,
Jonathan Pollard was moved from Marion to F.C.I. Butner, a medium security
prison in Butner, North Carolina, where “inmates are put to work”. He is no
longer in solitary confinement, but he is also not exactly in paradise.

Much has been documented on the subject of the obvious injustice, unfairness
and total lack of proportionality of Pollard’s sentence. What has been lost
in all this is the unprecedented harshness and cruelty which has been
inflicted upon him. How does one explain how a life sentence, albeit
totally incorrect, allows this form of behavior beyond the actual sentence?
And how should one interpret the motivation? How should one judge President
Clinton’s refusal to release Jonathan on humanitarian grounds given his
reaction to Nelson Mandela’s prison conditions in contrast to Pollard’s?
The same Clinton , who had had been visibly disturbed by “Schindler’s List”,
which portrayed a man who violated his country’s laws to save Jews, moved by
Mandela who also violated his country’s laws on behalf of his people, cannot
look mercifully on the actions of Jonathan Pollard despite the glaring
parallels.

We are once again approaching the 60th anniversary of the execution of
Shlomo Ben Josef, the first Jew to be executed since the time of the Bar
Kochba Revolt of the second century. His crime? An act of frustration in
the face of an Arab campaign of murder in which 250 innocent Jews had been
brutally killed, including women and children. To be sure, Ben Josef killed
nobody in the bus of Arabs from the village where the murders were resident.
When British Colonial Secretary, Malcolm MacDonald was confronted by
Vladimir Zev Jabotinsky, he had this to say; “Unruly elements must be taught
a lesson to keep them quiet.”

In other words, Ben Josef’s sentence had little to do with the act, but the
British intended to make an example. In more recent times, we have heard
the same thoughts expressed towards Jonathan Pollard by no less than the
President himself asserting the “need to deter every person who might ever
consider such actions”, and yet, apparently it is politically incorrect to
suggest that anti-Antisemitism is a factor in a history of injustice and
unfair treatment towards a Jewish prisoner.

In summary, much is known about the disproportionate severity of Jonathan
Pollard’s sentence while the cruel and harsh treatment he has endured has
been lost in an overall assessment of a situation which hardly squares with
theories on the virtues of the world’s leading democracy.

The question has often been raised as to whether Pollard is an American
Dreyfus. It is true that the former was innocent whereas the latter
admitted his guilt. Beyond this singular difference lies a remarkable
similarity. Both shared a Jewish identity. Neither were traitors nor did
they harm the country of their citizenship. Dreyfus was falsely accused in
the place of the acknowledged traitor, Colonel Esterhazy. From all
accounts, Pollard was blamed for crimes committed by Aldrich Ames. Dreyfus
was freed through the efforts of one extraordinary individual, a non-Jew,
Emile Zola as a result of one newspaper article entitled “J’accuse”.
Pollard has had many “Zola’s” who did not have to flee the US and Pollard
has yet to be released.

In any event, the Pollard and Dreyfus cases are so similar that every decent
US citizen needs to be concerned as to whether respect for human rights is
not the privilege of all.

Alex Rose is a Member of the Executive of Americans for a Safe Israel,/AR

Postscript

June 2, 1995 NY Daily News: Sydney Zion – Did Pollard take the fall for
damage done by others ? Both Aldrrich Ames and Robert Hassen were found
guilty of compromising a large number of US spies in the USSR resulting in
death of at least 13. They have been incarcerated for life with no
possibility of parole.

January 2, 1999 Washington Post :Justice and Jonathan Pollard by Angelo
Codevilla, Irwin Cotler, Alan Dershowitz and Kenneth Lasson – all
distinguished law professors – “There is ample evidence that Pollard is
being punished for a crime he didn’t commit and is being dis-proportionally
punished for the one he did.”

June,2003 Moment Magazine:”The Truth about Jonathan Pollard” by John Loftus,
a former Justice Department Attorney. “Pollard did not have special ‘blue
stripe clearance”’ as did Ames and Hassen. Consequently he was limited to
access documents which could justify the incredibly harsh sentence he
received.