Black Panther political prisoner Albert Woodfox free after 43 years solitary confinement

This video from the USA says about itself:

After 40 Years in Solitary, Angola 3 Prisoner Albert Woodfox Ordered Freed for 3rd Time in Louisiana

28 February 2013

A federal judge has once again ordered the state of Louisiana to release Albert Woodfox, a former Black Panther who has spent more than 40 years in solitary confinement. Woodfox and Herman Wallace, another prisoner of the “Angola 3,” were convicted of murdering a guard at Angola Prison. The Angola 3 and their supporters say they were framed for their political activism.

On Tuesday, the same federal judge that ordered Woodfox’s release in 2008 again ruled Woodfox should be set free on the basis of racial discrimination in his retrial. It was the third time Woodfox’s conviction has been overturned, but prosecutors successfully reversed the two previous victories. The state is expected to appeal once again to keep Woodfox behind bars. We’re joined by two guests: Robert King, the third member of the Angola 3, who was freed in 2001 after three decades behind bars; and Mwalimu Johnson, a longtime member of the Angola 3 support team.

From daily The Morning Star in Britain:

Jailed activist to be freed after 43 years

Wednesday 10th June 2015

Judge bars third murder trial after earlier convictions quashed

by James Tweedie

HUMAN rights groups welcomed a court order yesterday to free Angola Three inmate Albert Woodfox after 43 years of solitary confinement in the United States.

Baton Rouge district judge James Brady ordered the release of Mr Woodfox and took the extraordinary step of barring Louisiana prosecutors from trying him for a third time.

Mr Woodfox was originally jailed for armed robbery in 1971, but he escaped from the courthouse during his sentencing hearing and joined the Black Panther Party.

He was recaptured and sent to the Angola prison, named after a nearby former slave plantation, where he met Robert King and Herman Wallace.

The Angola Three, as they became known, founded a prison branch of the Black Panthers and campaigned for improvements to prison conditions, organising prison strikes and other protests.

In 1972 Mr Woodfox and Mr Wallace were convicted of the murder of prison guard Brent Miller, a crime which they always denied, and placed in indefinite solitary confinement.

Mr Woodfox has been tried and convicted twice for the guard’s death, but both convictions were overturned.

Judge Brady said the “exceptional circumstances” of the case had led him to bar the state from seeking a third trial.

In his ruling, he cited doubts that the state could provide a “fair third trial,” Mr Woodfox’s age and poor health, the unavailability of witnesses, “the prejudice done onto Mr Woodfox by spending over 40 years in solitary confinement,” and “the very fact that Mr Woodfox has already been tried twice.”

Mr Wallace died in October 2013, just days after being released from the prison.

Mr King, who was also solitarily confined in 1972, was convicted of murdering another prisoner in 1973, only to be released in 2001.

The International Coalition to Free the Angola Three’s Tory Pegram, who had worked with Mr Woodfox’s lawyers on his release, said they were all “thrilled that justice has come for our innocent friend.”

ANGOLA THREE inmate Albert Woodfox remains jailed in the US despite an order for his release as he faces a third trial for the same murder: here.

A federal appeals court ruled Friday that Albert Woodfox, the last “Angola Three” prisoner still behind bars in Louisiana, must remain incarcerated for the time being. The decision came despite a district court judge’s ruling Tuesday that Woodfox be freed after more than four decades in solitary confinement: here.

The suicide of Kalief Browder, who at 16 was accused of stealing a backpack and thrown into New York’s Rikers Island prison, where he was tortured and starved in solitary confinement without ever having been convicted of a crime, has exposed before the world the barbarity of America’s “justice” system. Kalief’s three-year imprisonment was documented last year in a Pulitzer Prize-nominated exposé in the New Yorker magazine, which chronicled his struggle to adjust to life outside of prison after having been psychologically shattered by three years of incarceration at Rikers Island: here.

HOW ‘ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK’ MISREPRESENTS WOMEN’S FEDERAL PRISON “While Crazy Eyes, Jimmy and Lorna are the only characters who display any mental health issues on the show, in reality 62 percent of all women in federal prison suffer mental health problems. Jails are now our country’s largest mental health providers.” [HuffPost]

The US government is drastically underreporting police killings: here.

Glenn Ford died on June 29 at the age 65 at his home in New Orleans, Louisiana. He succumbed to lung cancer just 15 months after being released from the notorious Louisiana State Penitentiary, known as Angola, where he spent 29 years 3 months and 5 days on death row: here.