Letter from Stuart Highway to Gary Meyerhoff (received today)

Wed 25th October 2005

Stuart Highway
Darwin Prison
PO Box 1407
Darwin NT 0801


Hi Gary-O from the Barrio!!

Just got your letter at the morning muster. Great to hear from you! I’ve been wondering how you’ve been out there. No, I didn’t get your letter, probably because of the magazines and newspapers you sent with it. Prisoners here aren’t allowed magazines and newspapers, we don’t even get the NT News! Ema told me in her letter the they confiscated the Just Us I sent her. Joe Toscano’s Anarchist Age Weekly Review, 2 copies of the same issue, got through somehow, though.

I was going to ring you this morning, as I got a receipt saying that $15 had gone into my account, but it seems you need another piece of paper as well before you can make any calls. There is so much I want to talk to you about. How’s your 6th smoke-in case going? And how is Rob going with his C M’s office? On Saturday afternoon I had a visit from Nilva, her partner Christine, Rebecca and Kathy Newman, which was terrific.

Thanks for the support work you’re doing for me – that gives me a huge boost. I feel my sanity is hanging by a thread stuck out here in Clare Martin’s gulag, with big mobs of people, mainly indigenous, of course, who shouldn’t even be here either. I’ve heard plenty of people’s horror stories but I’ll have tot sae them for later because they’d probably censor them if I tried to tell you now. I don’t think I’ve ever been this stressed out in al my 42 years as I’ve been the last few days. Things are too bad in this hole. I feellike I didn’t sleep a wink last night.

B Block was OK but my classification (class) was downgraded last Friday and I’ve been in M Block, Medium Security. It’s horrible here. They lock \us up in cages like animals. There are 3 wings made up of 4 doms each. Guantamono Bay must be something like this. Now I think I know what Vicki Rosepiler feels. Each dorm is the size of my flat and contains 8 to 12 bunk beds. Remember B Block and Remand? LUXURY compared to here. I asked for a cell to myself, but the guards just smiled as if it’s all a great joke. So I’m on the waiting list for a single cell but that could take months, apparently.

I’ve had STACKS of letters, more than everyone else in the block put together maybe. (There must be about 100 blokes in this block.) When I came in, with another bloke who was lucky enough to get only 28 days for 4 kilos of cannabis, over from B Block last week, there were 7 of us in this 8 bunk dorm, but now there are only 5, and I think one gets out of prison tomorrow, lucky bloke.

I’ve met 3 Indonesian fishermen in this block and made firm friends with one. I’ve made some good friends. A couple of blokes have asked about you, at least one of whom remembered you from B Block last year. Oh yeah, Nilva told me that she spun out to find NAP on Wikipedia. She’s amazed at the work you’ve done.

After reading your letter this morning I filed out a form (there are forms to fill out for every bloody thing in here) asking Legal Aid to help me lodge an appeal urgently, against this latest thing, unlawfully damage property. I was so depressed and stressed out and assumed an appeal was hopeless because my defiant stance had made the judge so angry. But maybe just an appeal against sentence? Maybe I could even get out of here on bail pending that? Do you reckon that’s a possibility? I filled out another copy of the same yellow, yesterday, I think, asking Legal AID to help me seek leave ASAP to withdraw the Full Bench Parliament appeal on Monday 31st because there’s no way I can prepare for it in here. I asked for them to just do an appeal against the sentence. Maybe they can help us (or me) knock out the 5 month sentence. I’ve had letters from Shane Dexter from Priestly regarding the Victims of Crime case. The hearing was set down for 16 November, I think. Priestleys says I’ve got little or no chance of success in it and are threatening to do me for costs if I lose. So I asked Legal Aid on the yellow form yesterday to get that withdrawn too, because I just can’t be bothered trying to deal with that shit from in here. I think that D’Souza would’ve learned a lesson by now and will think twice before pulling a mean trick like that on anyone again. Not that I’ve necessarily finished with that campaign yet!

It gets noisy in here, particularly after we get locked into the cages (dorms) after 3pm, although we’re getting locked up at 1.30pm instead today. The TV is going in each dorm, the dorms are close together, so often you get 3 or 4 different TV channels blaring at you from different directions and it drives you crazy. It’s 5 to 1 now (12.55pm) so I’ll get this finished off to be posted before lock-up in 35 minutes. Yeah, when the TVs are going sometimes you can’t hear yourself think. I’d find it impossible to concentrate on complicated legal stuff. It’s not so bad when the TVs are on the same channel, like for example when they put the movie on throughout the complex in afternoon, and again in the evening. Sometime’s it’s the same DVD movie, arvo and evening.

We just received our buy-up goods, and this is the first page of my new pad. I just ordered 25 envelopes, this writing pad and 2 black ballpoint pens. I didn’t bother with any of the other crap like munchies, thongs or the ‘anti-cancer sunglasses.’

Christ, I’m feeling dizzy or like I’m about to black out or something but I’ve got to get this finished and posted.

So, no need to send any magazines or newspapers, Gaz, because they won’t let me have them. In any case I don’t have much time to read. There’s not much peace and quiet. I have to watch about 10 hours of garbage on TV every day. It’s frustrating when there are so many other things I want to do. Oh well, the news isn’t so bad. At least we get to see a bit of what’s going on in the world. Nguyen Tuong Van’s written a farewell letter to his family and is expected to be executed within weeks. Why is this execution necessary? What a cruel, sick world we live in. ALL IT TAKES FOR EVIL TO TRIUMPH IS FOR GOOD PEOPLE TO DO NOTHING.

I feel like Vicki R. I can’t believe this nightmare is happening to me. I thought there was a DVD movie on now, but it’s only the TV.

OK, that’s about it for now. Afternoon clean-up is in progress. Please keep me posted with developments. You mob are out there for us, us mob are in here for you.

Solidarity

Stuart Highway