We, the undersigned, petition:
Donald J. Trump
Greg Abbott
Department of Justice
William Barr (Attorney General of
the United States)
Eric S. Dreiband (Assistant U.S.
Attorney General for Civil Rights Division, DOJ)
Ken Paxton (Attorney General of Texas)
Michael Carvajal (Director, Federal
Bureau of Prisons)
Kathleen Hawk Sawyer (Director, Federal
Bureau of Prisons)
Release or Home Confinement for Dr.
Aafia Siddiqui from Coronavirus-Infected Prison
Dr. Aafia Siddiqui, a Pakistani neuroscientist, is serving an 86-year term
at FMC Carswell. Carswell is a prison-cum-medical facility for female
prisoners. Other than Seagoville Prison, which is also located in the Dallas-Fort
Worth area and has 1,359 cases, Carswell has the largest COVID-19 outbreak of
any U.S. prison. According to Bureau of Prisons own website, the number of
reported cases there is 542. (Other sources place it even higher, at 571.) Carswell’s
inmate population totals 1,357. That makes the current infection rate at
the facility 40%. Three female prisoners, Andrea Circle Bear, Sandra Kincaid,
and Teresa Ely, have died from the virus at the facility. Of these dead women,
Circle Bear, a 34-year old Native American, was much younger than Dr. Siddiqui.
So, the risk to Dr. Siddiqui is clearly grave.
According to the Appeal, a project
of the Justice Collaborative, "There's no air conditioning; incarcerated
women are confined to their cells; the commissary is closed indefinitely, so
women are running out of basic hygiene products like soap and shampoo; the
warden was nowhere to be found; women weren't getting necessary medical care;
inedible meals arrived in brown sacks." The facility is also sorely
lacking in cleaning supplies and PPE.
(Much of the information on conditions at Carswell originates with the Fort
Worth Star-Telegram, a local news outlet in the area, with no political agenda.
The paper has been reporting on the situation there since April. The reports
were later picked up by the local NBC affiliate, Time Magazine, and Newsweek.)
The bottom line is that Dr. Siddiqui, an MIT and Brandeis graduate, with no
prior record of violence, and who was likely turned in by a vindicative,
abusive ex-husband, has a greater than 40% chance of contracting Coronavirus while
in U.S. custody. She is already in very poor physical, as well as mental
health, having been denied timely medical treatment from a gunshot wound when she
was captured in Afghanistan. The torture she endured while in captivity in
Pakistan and Afghanistan exacerbated her physical condition. The death of her
baby, Sulaiman, in the course of her arrest, and the imprisonment of her other
two children, Ahmad and Mariam, along with her (they were each separately
released years later), added to her grave mental trauma.
Not one person was killed or injured in connection with the charges for
which Dr. Siddiqui was convicted. And she was convicted in New York District Court,
on the basis of ambiguous and highly contradictory testimony, due largely to
the climate of fear and Islamophobia which existed at the time. Upon her
conviction, she called for her supporters to stay calm, and to refrain from
violence. She has continued to maintain her innocence throughout her 17-years
of captivity.
Her sister, Dr. Fowzia Siddiqui, a Pakistan-based physician who holds a degree
from Harvard University, has long spearheaded a national campaign in Pakistan,
calling for her release. In Pakistan, the broad masses of people believe Dr.
Siddiqui to be innocent, and the prevailing view is one of disbelief that the U.S.,
which touts itself as a supporter of women's rights, has accorded torture,
solitary confinement, and now (the prospect of) COVID-19 to this Pakistani
woman neuroscientist.
Supporters from the Aafia Foundation and other groups hold annual rallies
outside FMC Carswell calling for her release. Human rights advocates in London,
Durban, New York, Boston, and other cities worldwide regularly march calling
for Dr. Siddiqui's release.
Countries like China and Russia are often associated with the jailing of scientists.
The U.S. need not join their ranks. Dr. Siddiqui's release on humanitarian
grounds from a COVID-infected prison would open the door to improved
U.S.-Pakistan relations.
Dr. Aafia Siddiqui, is neither a threat to public welfare, nor a flight risk.
She has suffered enough. We ask that she be released to home confinement with
supporters in Maryland; or, that she be repatriated to Pakistan, where her
elderly mother and her children have long awaited her. As COVID-19 ravages
Texas prisons, particularly Carswell, Dr. Siddiqui’s life may depend upon it.
Sign the petition here.
