FREE MARK LANKFORD DEFENSE PROJECT AUTUMN 2003 EDITION

The past few months have been quite eventful, yet my situation remains the same in almost all ways. The legal team filed a motion for reconsideration shortly after the denial of my Habeas Corpus petition, but there has been no decision as of this writing. We anticipate that the decision will come before Christmas, but this is all theory.

The reconsideration motion was accompanied by the letter my brother wrote accepting responsibility and guilt for the crimes he committed in 1983. The State objected, as usual, but the truth is difficult to sweep away, it just keeps coming back! It is my understanding that my brother has written another letter, with much the same text, but notarized, since the State has a penchant for denying authorship and contesting anything that exonerates me.

My brother has now been moved 5 cells down from me and has been told that he will not be getting out of solitary any time soon. This is due to his alleged assault on an officer while at the private prison last spring. There is some dispute about the exact nature of the assault and who actually initiated the action. My understanding is that the State was going to file criminal charges against Bryan, but decided to abandon this plan. This only adds to the questions surrounding the altercation. Bryan says that he was attacked because of his conviction concerning a military person and his opposition to the Bush warmongering attack on Iraq. This is Idaho, so it sounds probable. I feel well and the decision to move some of us out of solitary has been stalled. There is a lot of politics at play in this regard, for fear is a great motivator for inaction. There are certainly important issues at play, but the thinking process does not seem sophisticated enough to adequately address them. The policy has been massaged to the point that if we are allowed out into this Maximum Security prison's general population, we will not be allowed to live in two blocks nor go to the ball field for recreation. This is due to the fear from the Director's office of an escape and the impending bad publicity, which would ostensibly be the end of his $95,000+ job. The officers here find this laughable, but most of them have no respect for the stewardship of the Director. He has not lobbied for a raise for these workers, who have not had an increase in pay for several years! One officer told me that the Director can "kiss his ass" for the alleged statement that he (The Director) could train a monkey to do the officer's job. Sounds like a good working environment! The decision of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has been a watershed for condemned inmates in Idaho, Montana and Arizona. The application of the retroactivity standard to the "Ring" decision, if upheld on appeal to the US Supreme Court, will mean that all these men and women (including me) will have to be resentenced by a jury. Most of us were sentenced by a judge, which has been deemed unconstitutional. The dishonesty of the State advocates is obvious, for they wish, with their appeal, that some Americans not be treated in accordance to the US Constitution. They maintain that simply due to the element of timing, some citizens should be executed unconstitutionally! They probably call themselves Christians and patriotic Americans, yet they have no respect for the rule of law, Jesus Christ or the US Constitution, which this country was founded upon!

The confession of Rush Limbaugh being a dope addict was about what I expected. This fat blowhard was higher than a kite on drugs when he was promoting Bush and all his warmongering and anti- American talking points, which turn out to be a pack of lies!

The drugs were synthetic heroin, some of the strongest stuff a person can get, so no wonder he could talk for hours and lobby for those who use drugs getting sent to prison! I can see where he would be convinced that Bush was a good guy, for Bush was giving him huge tax breaks which allowed him to buy even more of the opiates he so craved!

The fact that Limbaugh would make his lowly housekeeper actually get out of the vehicle with a cigar box filled with money to actually make the drug deals is indicative of his cowardice! It has not been adequately explored as to why or how this self-appointed King of the Moral Right knew people that could supply him with this massive amount of controlled-substances, and it is improbable that he will be prosecuted. It is a crime simply to have someone buy the drugs for you! Since George W. Bush has his brother Jeb sitting as Governor of Florida, I do have serious doubts that this will ever be prosecuted and that when fat boy comes out of rehab, all his right-wing hypocritical allies will rejoice, whereas, if this had been some downtrodden black mother addicted to crack, she would be pilloried, condemned and imprisoned as a societal pariah without ever getting treatment. These amoral idiots would then blame Clinton, the Democrats, the 60's and anyone that disagrees with them for the drug epidemic. The only bright spot in all this darkness is that fat boy Limbaugh is forced to spend millions on an attorney that defended a member of the Kennedy family and he will never be seen as unsullied!

As the holidays approach, it weighs heavy on me that this will be my 21st Christmas in solitary. However, I look back with the knowledge that I have survived, beyond expectation. Certainly I have stood up to Idaho and the bloodthirsty segment that wishes to murder me for my brother's crimes, even though they have more than enough evidence of my actual innocence! I would rather be me on death row, condemned to death and in solitary for over 20 years than to live a life of freedom as any of these death mongers! I KNOW the truth and I can live with this knowledge, yet these inhuman entities have no grasp of character, dignity, truth, fairness, generosity or understanding. How did this world get to this point?

This is easy to answer, for people have become so selfish as to not really care about anything except their own little lives. The epidemic of obesity in America is a good indicator of this, for it is gluttony. The drug epidemic is in the same vein, for it is an escape from reality or self-inflicted pain. The huge pornography industry depicts the lustful nature of a huge segment of the population. All of this illustrates that we have become a society of pigs, creating messes of everything we touch. I continue to have hope, but there needs to be an awakening, a revolution of the collective spirit. The tree of democracy must sometimes be watered with blood, which Jefferson said. I believe that the tree must be watered with tears and sweat, so that a brighter future will exist for the little ones. Will we adults act like adults, instead of whinning and moaning? We shall see, for I see a day of reckoning soon approaching!

Namasté and peace! Happy Holidays!

Mark H Lankford, 29 October 2003

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