[ "The pebble that he threw in the pond became a ripple, became a
wave. And so, this will carry him on into eternity," said fellow
Angola Three Black Panther Robert King. "He wont be forgotten." ]
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ALBERT WOODFOX, IMPRISONED FOR 43 YEARS, DIES AT 75  
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Brett Wilkins
August 5, 2022
Common Dreams
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_ "The pebble that he threw in the pond became a ripple, became a
wave. And so, this will carry him on into eternity," said fellow
Angola Three Black Panther Robert King. "He won't be forgotten." _

Albert Woodfox, photographed here in 2016, was imprisoned for 43
years in solitary confinement at the Louisiana State Penitentiary.,
Alain Jocard/AFP via Getty Images

 

ALBERT WOODFOX, A WRONGFULLY imprisoned Black Panther activist who
spent his 43 years in solitary confinement uplifting himself and
others before finally being freed in 2019, died Thursday of
complications from Covid-19 at age 75.

"With heavy hearts, we write to share that our partner, brother,
father, grandfather, comrade, and friend, Albert Woodfox, passed away
this morning," Woodfox's family said
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in a statement. "Whether you know him as Fox, Shaka, Cinque, or
Albert—he knew you as family. Please know that your care,
compassion, friendship, love, and support have sustained Albert, and
comforted him."

The family added
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that Woodfox was a "liberator" who inspired Americans to "think more
deeply about mass incarceration, prison abuse, and racial injustice."

Civil rights attorney and former NAACP Legal Defense and Education
Fund president Sherrilyn Ifill called
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of the most extraordinary human beings I've ever met."

"He deserved more time to experience his freedom, but what he did with
[the] time he had was transformative," she tweeted. "May he rest in
eternal peace and power."

Born February 19, 1947 in New Orleans, Woodfox—the oldest of six
siblings—admitted to choosing the wrong path in his youth.

"I robbed people, scared them, threatened them, intimidated them. I
stole from people who had almost nothing," he wrote
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in 2019. "My people. Black people."

In 1971, Woodfox was serving a 50-year sentence for armed robbery at
the notorious Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola, a former slave
plantation then known as one of America's toughest prisons. That year,
he and fellow inmates Herman Wallace and Robert King formed a chapter
of the Black Panthers to combat the rampant rape and sex trafficking,
violence, and horrific living conditions at the prison. They organized
strikes and sit-downs, earning the respect of many of the prison's
Black inmates and raising the ire of racist prison officials.

"Our cells were meant to be death chambers but we turned them into
schools, into debate halls," Woodfox told
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_The Guardian_ after his release in 2019. "We used the time to develop
the tools that we needed to survive, to be part of society and
humanity, rather than becoming bitter and angry and consumed by a
thirst for revenge."

On April 17, 1972, Angola guard Brent Miller was stabbed to death at
the prison. Woodfox, Herman Wallace, and Robert King—the Angola
Three—were immediately charged with the killing and locked up in
solitary confinement.

Woodfox was tried and convicted twice for Miller's murder but courts
later overturned both convictions. A judge ruled in 2008 that Woodfox
was denied due process, citing ineffective legal counsel and
questionable evidence in his trials. Woodfox's lawyers also
successfully argued that their client's conviction was literally
bought by the state, whose case relied heavily upon the testimony of
jailhouse informants rewarded for their cooperation.

Woodfox always maintained his innocence, claiming he was wrongfully
punished for Miller's murder because of his political activism.

"We dared to resist," he told
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_The Washington Post_. "We were very influential."

For four decades, Woodfox would spend 23 hours a day alone in a 6-by-9
foot cell. He read Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and Nelson
Mandela and inspired other inmates to read and fight for their rights.

"We saw some things that was amiss, in prison and out of prison,"
Robert King told
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Democracy Now_'s Amy Goodman in a Friday interview. "And we decided
that we could add our little pebble to the pond. And so, Albert...
threw the pebble in the pond, knowing that it would create a ripple
and knowing that it would eventually create a tsunamic effect... The
pebble that he threw in the pond became a ripple, became a wave. And
so, this will carry him on into eternity. He won't be forgotten."

In 2008 U.S. District Judge James Brady reversed and vacated Woodfox's
conviction and life sentence. However, Louisiana's attorney general at
the time, James "Buddy" Caldwell, appealed the ruling to the U.S. 5th
Circuit Court of Appeals, which found Brady had acted erroneously.

"I do not have the words to convey the years of mental, emotional, and
physical torture I have endured," Woodfox wrote
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to supporters in 2013. "I ask that for a moment you imagine yourself
standing at the edge of nothingness, looking at emptiness. The pain
and suffering this isolation causes go beyond mere description."

Legions of lawyers and laypeople, activists, celebrities, and
international organizations and individuals rallied behind the Angola
Three. King, who spent 29 years in solitary confinement, was freed in
2001 after his conviction was overturned. Wallace was released in
October 2013 following more than 41 years in solitary after a federal
court ruled he had not received a fair trial. He died
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three days after leaving prison.

Woodfox, who would have to wait over two more years for his freedom,
raised his fist triumphantly as he walked out of prison
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on February 9, 2016. After 44 years and 10 months behind bars, his
spirit was unbroken.

"I can honestly say I've never ever thought of giving up," he told
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the Innocence Project in 2021. "It never ever came close to breaking
my spirit. And that's what solitary confinement is designed for… to
break people."

"One of my inspirations was Mr. Nelson Mandela," Woodfox told
_Democracy Now!_ days after his release, referring to the_ _South
African_ _racial justice activist who spent years of his 27-year
imprisonment in solitary confinement before being freed and
subsequently elected the country's first post-apartheid president.
"You know, I learned from him that if a cause was noble, you could
carry the weight of the world on your shoulder."

After his release, Woodfox wrote and published a book, _Solitary_, a
Pulitzer Prize finalist
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focused worldwide attention on the practice of prolonged solitary
confinement, which is widely recognized
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as a form of torture. More than 80,000
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and children locked up in U.S. prisons and jails are currently
believed to be held in solitary confinement.

Woodfox filled the few years of freedom he enjoyed with activism,
educating people in the United States and beyond about the
fundamentally flawed U.S. carceral system. He remained an eternal
optimist.

"I think what I went through has made me a better man, a better human
being," he told the _Post_. "I've been asked a lot: 'What would I
change in my life?' And people are surprised when I say, 'Absolutely
nothing.'"

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