All language subtitles for betrayal.at.attica.2021.1080p.web.h264-bigdoc.ENG

(helicopter whirring)

- [Elizabeth] They wanted
people to see what happens

when you rebel.

You know, that they were
prepared to kill you,

and not only kill
you, but kill anybody.

That's the basic
contradiction, you see.

The inmates couldn't believe

that the state
would kill its own.

And the state couldn't believe

that the inmates
wouldn't kill everybody.

And they were both wrong.

- [Man Over Speaker] Those
of you who have not done so,

surrender peacefully.

You will not be harmed.

Place your clasped
hands on your head.

- [Narrator] All
right, here we go.

So, I mean, I guess
tell me who you are

and what your title was.

- Who am I and
what my title was.

I never had a, oh,
well, that's not true.

I was, I still am,
I sort of consider,

a staff attorney at Attica
Brothers Legal Defense.

- [Narrator] On
September 13th, 1971,

the state of New
York shot and killed

39 of its own citizens,
injured hundreds more,

and tortured the survivors.

During the 30-year legal
battle that followed,

the prisoners who fought to
expose the truth of that day

became known as the
Attica Brothers.

Fink joined their
legal team two weeks

after being admitted to
practice law in New York.

- People need human rights.

- [Narrator] She had
a high profile career

defending vulnerable communities
from the most powerful foe

in her time, the US government.

- If you don't put your
government to the task,

then you get our Constitution
being used as toilet paper.

- I'm gonna release
the defendant on his
own recognizance.

(crowd cheering)

- [Narrator] Black Panthers
like Dhoruba Bin-Wahad;

Puerto Rican nationalists,
hacker Jeremy Hammond.

- Freedom, freedom now.

- [Narrator] Her focus was
attacking abuse of power

by defending its victims.

But no case required as
much dedication or attention

as Attica.

- There is no
justice in America.

What empowers you is
the fight for justice.

(audience applauding)

- [Narrator] When she died
in 2015, she left a legacy

as a fierce defender
of human rights,

a lawyer who changed the face
of jury selection forever,

and a mentor to a new
generation of radical
thinkers.

She also left me a box that
she had guarded for decades.

It was an archive with
hundreds of photographs

and over 60 hours of videotape

containing the most
damning evidence

remaining from
the Attica trials.

The state of New York had
declared this material lost

decades ago, but as lead
counsel
in the 26-year civil phase,

Fink figured out
where it was hidden.

This archive proved
allegations of wanton murder

and abuse by state police,

and was a cornerstone of
the $8 million settlement

in the civil trial, the
largest
ever granted to prisoners.

- [Elizabeth] We
needed the evidence,

and it became clear to me

that they were
going to destroy it.

- [Narrator] So, how
do you have it now?

- [Elizabeth] I stole it.

- [Narrator] From?

- [Elizabeth] New York state.

I didn't steal it.

I shouldn't say that.

I expropriated it from them,

as the chief counsel
for the prisoners,

who were the plaintiffs.

We're at this point right now,

where they are refusing to
admit they have all these
files,

and they are lying
about what they have.

And it's all gonna be blown
up because I took it all.

- [Narrator] The archival
photos and videos

used in this film are
from the Fink collection.

They have never been
available to the public.

- [Elizabeth] I mean
we did this huge trial

and everybody wants to ignore
it because it proves up

what we know to be true,

which is that it was a
massacre,
and they did it on purpose.

(intense music)

I should probably go back.

In seventh grade, I was
called Khrushchev's daughter.

Okay?

In ninth grade, I was thrown
out of school for a day
because

I surmised that Francis
Gary Powers was a spy.

And my teacher went nuts on me
and suspended me from school.

Now, the next day, when it was
announced that he was a spy,

he had to apologize,

but trust me, he never
forgave me for that.

I was famous for being
leftist in high school.

You know, I sounded
like my mother,

I talked like my mother,

and I went in there
and I made a scene.

She was the head of the
Eastern Parkway chapter

of the American Jewish Congress.

When I say Jewish, I
mean Jewish communists.

You always gotta
understand communist,

'cause my parents didn't
do Judaism at all.

My father left the party

immediately after
marrying my mother.

My mother didn't leave
the party until 1952.

My mother was into the
race issue, always.

We used to go down to
Florida every year.

We used to drive
down in the car.

And we used to go
into a restaurant

in South Orangeburg, South
Carolina, and we'd order.

And about 10 minutes
before the food would come,

my mother would beckon
over the waitress.

Say, "Oh, do you
serve Negroes here?"

"Oh, no ma'am, don't
you worry about a thing.

We don't let no
niggers in here."

And we would then have to
get up and leave. Okay.

So that was, we didn't eat
much
on the way down to Florida.

(Elizabeth laughs)

On one level, you're
always embarrassed.

But I always, on another level,

I always admired her
ability to do that.

She taught me how to
fight, politically.

She was the most enlightened
person of her age I ever met.

The whole struggle for Black
liberation was so profound.

Those pictures, I
mean, you see them,

those lynching pictures,

with all those white people
looking at those bodies.

I mean, ugh.

(slow somber music)

The thing about Emmett Till
was people for the first time

had to look at it, and
it was unbelievable.

After all, he was 14.

And then everything else,
you know, Little Rock.

And then, when you put
it together with Nazism,

and say, "Well, if
you let this happen,

if you're not
fighting against this,

you ain't no
different than them."

(slow somber music)

I was taught that the
struggle for Black people

for freedom and
justice in this country

was the most important
thing I could be a part of.

That it was my responsibility
as a white person,

to support and do
everything I could.

And that people
had to get together

and organize together
to change their lot.

I was taught that it's
everybody's obligation

to join the movement.

- I think it's better to be
aggressive at this point.

It seems to me that it
is both historically

and sociologically true
that privileged classes

do not give up their
privileges voluntarily.

- When I went to Reed
College, I joined SDS,

but that wasn't my thing.

I became involved in
student government.

And I became a member
of the Community Senate.

And then I became
Student Body President

and head of the Judicial Board.

And then I came out of
Reed and my father died,

which was a terrible
thing for me.

And I had to run his business.

And my mother certainly didn't
want me to run his business.

My mother wanted me to
be a leftist lawyer.

And so she was gonna
facilitate that.

But, in August of 1968, (laughs)

me and a friend named Ken
Linden drove to Chicago

for the Democratic convention.

We were not there
to demonstrate.

We were there to watch.

- [Crowd] Peace now, peace
now, peace now, peace now.

- We walked out of the hotel
and walked into Lake Shore Park

or whatever, and all of
a sudden we're overtaken

by National Guardsmen
with bayonets and rifles.

So, to make a long story short,

we're caught up in this
thing and it's 8:06 at night

on the corner of State and
Grant, and I'm right there.

And I look at the cops
and they go, "You ready?"

And they charged.

(tear gas explodes)

(slow haunting music)

First of what happened is
that they had one charge,

and then the second charge,
Sidney Peck walked over to
them,

who was the leader
of the demonstration,

and was gesticulating,
"Why did you just do that?"

They were beating everybody.

And they beat him to a pulp
down there and dragged him away.

And then everybody started,
there was this police riot.

(tense haunting music)

Okay, so,

at 8:06 p.m. on
August 28th, 1968,

I became a different person,

because then my whole thing
kicked in about, you know,

being the child of Jews
right after Nazism.

And when you have this kind
of thing you've gotta fight.

And as a result of that,

I became an active, principled
and full-time leftist.

(tribal drumming music)

(rapid ticking)

- In America, Black people
are treated very much

as are the Vietnamese people,
or any other colonized people

because we're used,
we're brutalized,

because they have
their orders to do so.

And, just as the
soldiers in Vietnam

have their orders to destroy
the Vietnamese people.

- [Elizabeth] There was
the Black Panther Party,

it was all there.

- [Group] The pigs are gonna
catch hell. Off the pigs.

No more--

- It was Huey and all that,
and
then there was Bobby Hutton,

and then, it just
escalated from there.

Attica was just the end of it.

You had all the people,
you had Martin killed.

You had Malcolm,
you had all of that.

Then in 1969, you
had Fred Hampton.

- I'm the Deputy Chairman
of the state of Illinois

Black Panther
Party, Fred Hampton.

- This is where our Chairman
had his brains blown out

As he was laying in his bed
sleeping at 4:30 in the
morning.

- Started with the gun,
still on single fire,

brought it all the way
across the wall again.

- Fred Hampton, 21 years old,
and a member of a militant,

well-known militant group,
was murdered in his bed,

probably as he lay asleep.

- I mean, they were at war.

There was all this stuff,
there was stuff in LA,

you know what I mean?

So you were looking at that
kinda shootout all the time.

And...

- Good morning, Vietnam and
welcome back to part two

of the "Dawn Buster."

- Your country was at
war, and all these people

from your country are out
there killing all these
people.

- There's a woman running,
so they shoot her down,

and I couldn't imagine
why she's running.

After all, we only raped
three
women in the last village.

And we killed an old
man over there too.

- And doing this
unbelievable stuff to them.

- I shot her about
five or six times.

And I went there
and turned her over

and there was a little
three-month-old baby.

- Which you got to watch
on television everyday.

- So I think I killed
about 18 to 20 people.

- [Interviewer] How
did the guys look

when they were doing this?

- It was like they were
having a lot of good time.

- As far as resistance
is concerned,

we didn't encounter any
resistance whatsoever.

- The fire bombing of villages.

- After we swept through the
village, we turned around,

went back through it and
burned all the buildings.

- [Interviewer] Now, to
destroy
everything in the village

means to destroy the people.

- Right.

- The slaughter of children.

- We figure that the
babies, when they grow up,

they will be VC anyway.

So why give 'em the
opportunity to grow up?

- All of this, constant.

- We didn't believe that
this would be such a

publicity stunt.

We felt that this had been
happening many times before,

and it'd probably been
happening many times since.

- And the people that
they're fighting,

you support with every
fiber of your being.

I mean really, every
fiber of your being.

And that is heavy.

- [Announcer] President
Johnson,
meanwhile, let it be known

that the FBI is closely
watching all anti-war
activity.

- You know, at a certain point
in the 60s and everything,

everybody was in the streets,
it was really revolution,

and they hated it.

And so they had to do
something about it.

And what they did was
mass incarceration.

They took the entire
underclass
and they imprisoned it.

- America's public enemy
number one in the United States

is drug abuse.

In order to fight and
defeat this enemy,

it is necessary to wage
a new all-out offensive.

I went to law school because
I wanted to be a lawyer,

but I certainly didn't
wanna go to law school.

It was boring as hell.

The reason why I went
to Brooklyn Law School

is 'cause it cost $1,500 a year.

- [Narrator] Were there are
a lot of women in law school?

When was it, I mean--

- Oh, no.

There were 150
people in my class.

And 15 of them were women.

In a year, 50% of the
women had been flunked out.

Everybody would snicker
when the women came.

You would be called on to
give your cases or whatever.

The women only were called
on for statutory rape,

all sexual and everybody
would be (muttering).

I had gone to law school, but
I had chosen the revolution

many years before.

So I went to law school
to represent people

who took radical action.

And I got to do that.

- [Narrator] Among the first
radical actors Fink
represented

were the Attica Brothers,
a group of almost 1300 men

who were connected by the
Attica prison rebellion.

She started by learning
the details of the case

and comparing their
stories to the narrative

being developed by the state.

- Truly, Attica is every
prison,
and every prison is Attica.

- [Narrator] In October,
1971, the state of New York

convened an
investigative committee

to study the causes and outcomes

of the Attica prison rebellion.

The McKay Commission
produced a three-volume

written report, as well
as a documentary film

that aired on public
broadcasting stations.

The McKay Commission film
was among the material

declared by the state
of New York to be quote

"lost or missing," unquote.

But Fink had a copy on VHS
that they were unaware of.

It has not been
available to the public

for more than 40 years.

- I think Attica brings
to mind several things.

The first is the basic
inhumanity of man-to-man.

To people, be they
Black, yellow, orange,
spotted, whatever.

Whatever uniform they wore,
that day tore from them

the shreds of their humanity.

- I'm Robert McKay,

Dean of New York
University School of Law,

and Chairman of the Special
Commission on Attica.

43 people died at Attica
in September, 1971.

39 of them in the attack
that retook the prison,

four others during
the insurrection.

The commission believes that
to understand the uprising,

one must understand
the nature of Attica.

Therefore, an essential
part of our report

is a study of the structure
and operation of Attica
prison.

- [Narrator] Attica
sits on 53 acres

of rural Western New
York, near Buffalo.

It's four cell blocks
form a 600-foot square

around recreation yards.

A 30-foot wall,

two feet thick and sunk
12 feet into the ground,

with 14 gun towers,
surrounds the entire prison,

creating an enclosed world
with its own standards,

economy, and government.

- [Elizabeth] New York
produces a lot of
criminality.

Murder Incorporated,
Dutch Schultz, all that,

they weren't in the Feds,
they were in the State.

Up the river, that's Sing Sing.

They only began to mass
incarcerate Black people

after the war.

And really, when the civil
rights struggle became.

Before that, they had a system
which held them in place.

- [Narrator] Prisons in
New York state are called

correctional facilities, but
what they provide is custody.

Guards are called
correction officers,

but their work is the
routine of confinement.

They operate Attica's
security machine,

and that doesn't leave much
time for correctional work.

In any case, few of the
officers have had much
training

in these skills.

- [Elizabeth] Correctional
officer doesn't have any
skill.

All he does is sit and watch
people and beat 'em up.

Watch 'em when they walk, watch
'em here, watch 'em there.

It's like a being a
teacher without teaching.

- [Narrator] correctional
officers, the commission
found,

have in the main chosen
this work for job security,

not because they want to
rehabilitate criminals.

- [Elizabeth] Attica
was this terrible place.

It was run by this hideous
warden, Vincent Mancusi.

It was upstate New York.
All white rednecks.

It was totally segregated.

- [Narrator] Most officers
first come to know Blacks

as convicted criminals,
not social equals,

and racism affects some
officers' judgment.

- They tell you when to
get up in the morning,

when to go to chow, when
to go to sleep at night,

when to go to movies,
when the go to the yard,

when to come back from the yard.

Do you know the frustration
I'm going through

and I'm a good inmate?

Just being incarcerated.

Incarceration is hell, I
don't care what anybody says.

Can you imagine
you not being able

to just express an opinion?

You know the first
thing they'll say is,

"I don't wanna hear it.

When you got an opinion,
I don't wanna hear it."

Huh? I'm a man.

I committed a crime,
but I'm a man.

And I'll be a man
when I leave Attica.

- People were paid
56 cents a day.

You get a roll of
toilet paper a month.

And you know, you had to
work in the metal shop

at 108 degrees,

and they'd only let you have
a shower every two weeks.

I mean, the food was terrible.

- [McKay] Commission found
prison food to be unappetizing

and not up to
nutritional standards,

even though the basic
ingredients were
of good quality.

- The healthcare, the doctors,

Williams and Sternberg,
were Nazis, Nazis.

I mean, I could go on.

- [Narrator] In October,
1970, inmates at Auburn prison

were told they couldn't hold a
Black Solidarity Day meeting.

They held it anyway.

Believing reprisals were
to be taken against them,

they made guards hostages.

They released the hostages
after they got a promise

of no reprisals.

Despite the promise, several
of the alleged leaders

of the protest were shipped
to solitary at Attica.

- [Elizabeth] And had the
shit kicked out of them.

That was the point.

They were promised
no physical reprisals

and then they beat
the hell out of 'em.

- [Narrator] When
released by a court order,

they told Attica inmates
a story of betrayal.

- In the spring of '71,
they sent a manifesto,

saying we really
need changes here.

And they took it from
George Jackson and Folsom.

These were all people
out of the city,

and they were revolutionary,
they were radicals,

many of them, and they
knew everybody was angry

because not two weeks
before they had put on

a prison-wide protest, when
George Jackson was murdered.

And they came into
the mess hall,

and no one took any
food and no one ate.

And mass action by convicts,
ooh, makes people very nervous,

very upset, so they
were gettin' scared.

- [Narrator] Inmate
Lanny Boone was there.

- By noon, everybody
knew what was going on.

- What was the reaction
of the correction officers

to this kind of an
organized demonstration?

- Then were uptight,
to say the least.

- It got away from them
because of Russell Oswald.

- [Narrator] Russell
Oswald told the commission

he took over the prison system

at a time of mounting tension.

- Who was head of the department
of correctional services,

and he was a liberal.

And he was a real
white boy liberal.

And he was trying
to be diplomatic.

He had known that there
was trouble at Attica,

and he was supposed
to come and visit it.

And he came, and he got
waylaid by his wife being
sick.

And he left a tape.

- [Russell] Many of you have
voiced confidence in me,

and in the directions
I have talked about,

and I appreciate this.

I'm certain you realize

that change can't be
accomplished overnight.

- And this was on the seventh.

And, everybody had to listen
to Osward telling them

that he was a good guy and
that he was gonna do this.

"I'm gonna do this,
and I'm gonna,"

and it made everybody
even more angry.

On September 8th, everybody
was gearing up for football.

These two guys were
on the A block team,

Ray Lamorie and Leroy Dewer,
they were white and Black.

And they began to
practice, sparring,

and the guards went nuts.

And they broke it up and they
thought it was a whole thing,

and everybody got uptight.

You know, the guards
had to pull back.

And that was a big thing.

That night they came and took
Ray and Leroy up to the box.

And everybody on the
company went nuts.

This guy, William
Ortiz, threw a soup can

and hit Curtiss, who
was the lieutenant,

right on the forehead.

- No, no, no, no,
no, no, no, no.

- [Elizabeth] Very bad.

- [Narrator] The day's
events left officers uneasy

about what might
happen the next day.

- For some time, we've all
been
concerned about this trouble

that was brewing in the prison.

You could feel it in the air.

- So the next morning
they keep locked him,

which is they
closed his cell door

and they weren't
gonna let him out.

But as they were going
out to breakfast,

somebody flipped the switch,
and Toriano went out too.

So already, we're
into revolution here.

There was a confrontation
right at the A yard entrance,

which is halfway in
that long corridor

between them and Curtiss.

And they took over, and
they grabbed Curtiss.

And, they all converge
on Times Square.

There was the central
area, which is square,

called Times Square, and that
controlled all the prisons.

And if you got in
and out of that,

you had control over everything.

And, one of the gates broke.

- [Narrator] Shortly
thereafter, about 25 inmates

from this group rushed
the Times Square gate

they had just come through.

They shook it and shoved at it.

Officers behind the gate
had no reason to expect

that it wouldn't hold.

- [Elizabeth] Unbeknownst
to everybody, the gate,

the A gate is defective.

It's very old and
there's 45 people pushing

and screaming, with
sticks and rage.

- [Narrator] A
faulty bolt snapped,

and inmates poured through,
attacking the officers.

- [Elizabeth] And they
beat the three cops.

They give Quinn a big-time
concussion, which kills him.

They fracture his skull,
was actually what they do.

And, a lotta people hit him.

Lotta different people.

- [Officer] A guard
named Melvin or Melville

was on this post

when the incident first started.

Arm is pointing to a
hand print on the wall,

imprinted in blood.

We can see

patches of blood on the floor.

- No one, inmate, correction
officer, or prison official,

could've known that one
of the Times Square gates

was held by a weakened bolt.

Many years earlier,
two pieces of steel

were badly welded together, and
the weld covered with paint.

Had the gate held, it is
possible that the uprising

would have been contained.

- Did you have any
understanding as to whether

there was a policy as to what
to do in those circumstances?

- There had been a
riot plan of sorts,

which all supervisory officers

were to familiarize
themselves with.

But it pertained largely
to a single area,

an isolated area where a
disturbance might occur.

It didn't provide for a
institution-wide problem.

- [Questioner] Was that
plan ever communicated

to the officers?

- I don't know. Not
to my knowledge.

- [Narrator] When the inmates
broke into the metal shop,

they took the guards and
civilians working there
hostage,

and ordered them to strip.

- [Elizabeth] There were
civilians throughout the
prison,

who are not correction officers.

- [Narrator] This is
the area from which

a large group of
hostages was taken.

- [Elizabeth] They were account,

the supervisors and the fore
people in the metal shop,

the people who knew
how to do metal work,

welders and stuff.

- [Narrator] Word was
passed for the inmates

to take their
captives to D yard.

- Then, once everybody
got in the yard,

then the politics took over.

Attica was a riot,
it began as a riot

and it immediately
turned into a rebellion.

It was a political time.

People were
political, everywhere.

There were political
movements within the prison.

People couldn't
stand the conditions.

- Although the
Commission recognizes

that many inmate
grievances were justified,

the Commission condemns
the taking of hostages

as a means of obtaining redress.

But unless the dehumanizing
quality of inmate life

is eliminated by
meaningful reform,

inmate frustrations are
bound to find their outlet

in future prison riots.

- Shortly before 9:00
a.m. this morning,

the time set aside for
visitors to the prison,

a violent disturbance broke out

in four of the five cell blocks.

Prisoners took over, over a
thousand prisoners took over,

we'll do it again.

Well damage to prison buildings

will no doubt be
repaired in time.

As far as restoring
order to this facility,

that's another story.

- [Elizabeth] Now
in the laundry,

we have Frank
"Large Brown" Smith.

- And Big Black is not
a political person.

He's a hustler.

He's charismatic, he's
terrific in many ways,

but he is, you know,
he's a hustler.

He was huge, a big guy.

And by the time he was
eight, he was in trouble.

He never really went to school.

He never really learned grammar

or how to write or any of that.

He just didn't
have any, you know,

'cause he was out on
the street hustling.

When he was 12 years
old he got busted,

and he gets outta that one.

They bust them again and
they give them a choice about

whether he wants to go to
prison or go into the Army.

So, he enlists into the
Army and he becomes an MP.

Then they ship him to Korea.

And he doesn't see any
reason why he's here at all.

And all these people
are shooting at him.

Right. You know?

And he didn't like it at all.

So, he came back, he
sold reefer, mostly.

He was a junkie from
the Army, of course.

And then he was hustling,

and he got involved in this
crap game with some others,

and some shit went down and

they called the cops.

They got busted, and he refused
to rat on his co-defendant,

and he got 15 years.

And, he's one of the leading
hustlers in the jail.

He's got an institutional pass.

He does the laundry
for the warden.

And he had this one
guard, Tony Sangiacomo,

who was his outside
bringing-er in.

Right. You know?

And the riot started,
the laundry fell,

and he's about to
walk to C block

and not get involved
in this rebellion.

'Cause he don't want this shit.

And just as he was doing,
someone ran over to him,

and said "Man Tony's
busted, they got Tony,"

his main guy, Sangiacomo.

So he turns around and
goes into the yard.

And Tony's got his arm
broken, and he's a mess.

And Black goes over to Tony
and says, "Man, don't worry,

I'll take care of it."

And he becomes the
head of security,

to determine who's gonna get
out, who's not gonna get out,

and everything else like that.

The next morning he
gets Tony out. Okay?

'Cause he's got a broken arm.

And then he starts to
listen to the whole thing,

and he gets turned on by it.

- [Narrator] As head
of security, Big
Black formed a circle

of disciplined Muslim inmates
to protect the hostages

from the constant threat
of inmate reprisal.

He immediately arranged for
the release of injured
hostages

so they could
receive medical care.

- [Narrator] One of the
first actions of the inmates

in D yard was to release
seriously injured hostages.

At the same time the
inmates asked for

and got medical
supplies and the doctor

for their own casualties.

- [Elizabeth] You know, it's
a violent place, prison.

They did a very good
job, as best they could,

to keep it contained.

The Muslims did that
incredible thing

of guarding the hostages.

- [Narrator] By this time
they were under protection

of a Muslim security guard,

protection that would
remain firm for four days.

- [Reporter] Have you
been treated all right?

- Yes, I have so far, I've
been treated very good.

- There was no brutality,
no beating on us

or anything like this.

There were threats yelled at
us from outside the perimeter.

But the security
people that were

in charge of keeping us
safe, did a real good job

as far as protecting us.

- [Officer] In the
center of our picture,

is men distributing baseball
bats to the other prisoners.

Time is 2:18 p.m.

- Everybody was
thinking politically

because the head of the Muslims

was the murderer of Malcolm X.

He was the chief Iman
at Attica prison.

His name is Thomas
Hagan, Thomas X. Hagan.

And he's the murderer
of Malcolm X.

That's what he did,
he murdered him.

And Thomas, they understood
that they couldn't use Thomas.

So, you know, that
even though he was

the head of the Muslims,
and dealing with everything,

they couldn't put him forward.

So they selected a young
brother named Richard X. Clark,

and he became that person.

And the leaders stood
up, the older people.

Black was older than everybody.

Roger Champen was
older than everybody.

Herbert Blyden was, and
everybody was political,

and they wanted to make a point.

- [Reporter] As far as the
prisoners are concerned,

do they have weapons and such

that they're holding
hostages with?

- Our information is that none
of the prisoners are armed.

However, they are
holding hostages,

I think just by weight
of their sheer strength.

But as far as we're
concerned at this point,

they are not armed.

- [Narrator] Troopers took
firing and observation
positions

on cellblock roofs.

One of them was assigned
a small television camera,

and he recorded what
he saw on videotape.

- [Officer] Time is 1:55 p.m.

We're on the roof of C block,

looking at a detail
of .270 marksman,

with instructions to clear
the catwalks upon command.

- [Narrator] By Friday morning,

the police thought they had
enough men to take the prison.

They chafed at the
delay caused by

Oswald's determination
to negotiate,

and they watched inmates
build defenses and weapons.

- [Officer] More activity
in the central area.

Apparently for further
barricades and such.

- Sergeant Cunningham, now,
would you give us a message

for Governor Nelson Rockefeller.

- I certainly would.

One of the recommendations is,
and if he says no, I'm dead.

- The thing about Rockefeller

is that he knew how to delegate.

And he had delegated Oswald.

And Oswald was trying
to be a liberal,

and hear what people had to say.

Mancusi, who was the warden,

would have sent in
and killed everybody.

If it had been at Coxsackie or
somewhere, but Attica's far.

So, by the time they got there,

Oswald had made the
decision to negotiate,

and hadn't called
the troopers in.

And once negotiations,
then the brothers took over

because they already
had their negotiating,

they had this, they at that,
and they had 39 hostages.

But meanwhile, he would go
and say one thing to them

and then say another thing to
the press, and they had TVs.

So they saw and they knew.

- [Narrator] Corrections
Commissioner Russell Oswald

was escorted to a
negotiating table in D yard

where he agreed to an
extensive list of demands

for both immediate
and systemic relief.

- I earlier promised you
there would be no reprisals.

- [Narrator] The
main sticking point

was a demand for amnesty
by the men in the yard,

who were afraid all 1,200
of them would be charged

for the beating death of
officer William Quinn.

Commissioner Oswald did not
believe he had the authority

to grant the amnesty.

Plus, he had demands of his own.

- When will you
release the hostages?

- He expected them to
be grateful to him,
and they weren't.

Hmm-mm.

So he did this thing, and
he let negotiators in.

- We urgently demand
immediate negotiations

through William M.
Kunstler, attorney at law,

588 ninth avenue,
New York, New York.

- [Officer] Presently
entering is Bobby Seale.

On the extreme right, as they
walk towards us, our right,

is Professor Schwartz,
Arnold Kunstler,

Bobby Seale in the black coat,
and two of Seale's entourage

on the extreme right.

- [Narrator] By late Friday,
33 observers had arrived.

One was Tom Wicker of
the New York Times.

- We had continuing
discussions from the beginning

as to precisely
what we should do,

what role we should be
playing,
were we to view ourselves

as representatives
of the prisoners?

Were we view ourselves as
representatives of the state?

Were we purely
neutral go-betweens?

Were we in fact negotiators?

Events soon settled that.
We had to be, more or less.

- And then when the
negotiators came,

you had all those flamboyancy.

And you had flamboyancy
number 101, right?

And he was Mr. Press.

He understood how to
deal with the press

better than anybody I ever saw.

- You gotta negotiate
for an amnesty.

But that means you have to
sit down and have to work out

a real amnesty.

- He was a German Jew.

His father was a doctor, his
grandfather was a doctor.

Everybody were doctors.

He went to Yale, came in
second.
He was second in his class.

Then he went into the
Army and he was a major.

And he was in the Army
of occupation in Japan.

He went back to
Columbia Law School

and he was in the same class

of all these famous
people together.

And became an estates lawyer.

And he was a liberal. He
was a member of the NAACP.

And it was like '58,

and he was going to
Jackson, Mississippi.

And he became a
civil rights lawyer.

And mostly became Martin
Luther King's lawyer.

So, you had Bill Kunstler
and Herman Badillo

and all these people,
and it became a scene.

- [Reporter] Why did the
inmates ask for you people?

Why are they asking for the
Huey Newtons, Herman Badillos,

Reverend Wyatt Tee Walker.

Why are they doing that?

- They want to be just,
they want to be assured

that if there is an agreement

that the agreement will be kept.

They want to be assured
that there is some mechanism

for enforcing whatever changes
exist in the regulations.

And I think it's a wise idea.

- Power, unity!

- [Narrator] There were
close to 1,300 men in D yard.

More than half of those
interviewed told the Commission

they had not wanted to be
there, but couldn't leave.

Inmates made rules
against using drugs,

fighting, and
homosexual relations.

Some of them built defenses
or looked for food and fuel,

but a large number,
probably the majority,

hung back and did nothing.

Most of them lined up
twice a day for mess call.

- [Reporter] How
do the inmates feel

about the current situation?

- A group of us were
in with the inmates,

we met with them,
we had 2 1/2 hours.

Some of the people are here.

But we really have
nothing to say about it,

except they are firm in
their demands, and that's it.

- It was Bill's finest hour,
Kunstler, in some ways,

and one of his stupidest.

No one told the Attica Brothers

that they were
gonna be murdered.

They didn't tell them
that there were all these

crazy white people outside,
filled with race hate,

and all of them are gonna
be armed to the teeth.

And there's no question
that they're gonna

blow you people away.

- [Officer] Time is
8:10, September 10th.

- [Narrator] As
negotiations stalled,

Governor Rockefeller decided
to rely on the exhausted

and increasingly
agitated state troopers,

who'd been taking shifts
waiting outside the prison
walls

for three days.

- [Elizabeth] It
was cold up there.

They could've worked
something out.

They didn't have to
murder people that way,

but they wanted to.

They wanted people to see
what happens when you rebel.

You know, that they were
prepared to kill you,

and not only kill
you, but kill anybody.

All those white people,
they were fodder.

- [Narrator] You said
earlier that you think

the warden would have
done that (snaps) day one.

- Yeah, they did too.

- [Narrator] Do you
think Rockefeller

would have done that day one
if he would've had the choice?

- The Rockefeller thing,
he was just horrified

that these people thought they
had any right to oppose him.

And that's one of the main
reasons why he killed them
all,

just like his father
did, in Ludlow.

(somber haunting music)

I mean, who were you?

You're scum. I'll show you.

I have all the power.

The cities had blown up.

And they wanted to show
everybody what happened.

"You think we're not
gonna blow you away?"

I mean, Black didn't think
they were gonna shoot.

He thought that they
were gonna come down

and bust some heads
and fuck everybody up,

and that would be it.

And that is what the
National Guard wanted to do.

That's exactly what
they wanted to do.

They wanted to come
out of a helicopter,

come into the middle of the
yard, have them gas everybody,

and take over the yard.

They thought that they
could do whatever,

and they weren't allowed to.

- [Officer] These are some
reinforcements coming in now.

- [Elizabeth] Here you have
a captain in the state police

who runs a barracks
in Batavia, New York.

The only thing they do up
there is run up and down

the highway and arrest
people for driving.

- [Narrator] A principle
task of the state police

is highway patrol.

They are not ordinarily
assigned to military
operations.

- All right, go right
around to the supply truck

and pick up the
shotguns and rifles.

- [Man] On the double, let's go.

- [Elizabeth] I mean, they
understood what the climate
was.

- It's a situation in
which lives are at stake.

And my own personal opinion
is that if lives are at stake

and have any meaning to
anybody, that there oughta be

a serious reconsideration
by the state.

If the state takes the position

that the guards'
lives are expendable,

then the state is going to
cause the murder of many people.

- [Elizabeth] Anybody would
know what was gonna happen.

Those people were crazed.

All they did was sit
around the prison.

They had nothing to do.

There was no discipline,
and they were all lied to.

- There has been some
of the prison personnel

severely injured
here this morning.

And we certainly don't wanna
see any of our people hurt.

- [Elizabeth] So there
it is, right there.

Everything he said was a lie.

They knew full well that
there was no one injured,

and that they were lying.

The meet force, they
knew no one had a gun.

- Your instructions are

that your weapon
is not to be taken

nor are you to be taken.

- [Elizabeth] They
chose the state police,

even though the National Guard
knew what they were doing,

and the state
police had no clue.

- [Officer] The
hostages are on catwalks

with knives at their throat.

- [Officer] Time is 9:45 a.m.

(gunshots popping)

- [Elizabeth] This was
a wholesale murder.

Attica took it to
a different level.

(helicopters buzzing)

The head of the state
police was on vacation

in Bolton's Landing, New York.

So there was absolutely no
reason for him to be there

other than to keep himself
away from this shit.

He wasn't in Europe, he
was in Bolton's Landing.

(helicopter whirring)

They all had gas masks, and
there was no way to communicate

through the gas masks.

There's this incredible
testimony from the
second in command

of the state police.

This guy was a moron, and he
comes out onto the catwalks

and they're shooting,

and there's no reason for
anybody to shoot anybody.

And he's running up and
down trying to get people

to stop shooting, but
there's no way to communicate

because no one could
talk to each other

'cause they have gas masks on.

- [Officer] The hostages
can't be seen now.

- [Elizabeth] I mean,
they did everything wrong.

(gunshots popping)
(deep somber music)

They were all in a hostage
circle in the middle,

and someone began to
run during the assault,

and they all turned and fired
at him with their shotguns,

filled with
double-aught buckshot,

with an indiscriminate
spread of 50 yards.

And that's why they
killed all the hostages.

They didn't register
any firearms.

They told everybody to put
tape over their name tags

so you couldn't tell
who was shooting.

They told people to fight back.

And they told blah, blah, blah.

What they wanted
was what they got.

I mean, the best thing
you could call it

is depraved indifference
for human life,

but it was more than that.

4,500 rounds of ammunition.

Can you imagine?
Nobody had a gun.

(gunshots blasting)

None of them had guns.

That's lot of people, 39 people.

- [Elizabeth] No one
ever saw anybody resist.

Nobody resisted. One
person, Tommy Hicks.

They beat him to a pulp and
killed him, right there.

Gregory Wildridge fired
10 rounds of his shotgun.

And when he was asked
why he fired those shots,

he gives some absolute
lying justification

for the first four.

And the remaining six,

his reason for firing them
was quote, verbatim, quote

"To keep up the noise."

(helicopter fluttering)
(slow somber music)

- [Elizabeth] Aldo Barbolini
was a state trooper,

and he killed Kenny Malloy
in cold blood with a pistol,

with a handgun.

You look at the pictures,
they speak for themselves.

He blew his face apart.

And what he did was
witnessed by Gerard L. Smith,

who testified about it.

So Barbolini killed Kenny
Malloy and he killed Robinson.

And he had a weapon that he
had brought himself, a
shotgun.

And he went back
to his commander

and he handed him the shotgun.

He says, "I took
this off an inmate."

They knew that he
was a goddamn liar,

and that the weapon, it did
not come from an inmate.

He had brought it himself,

and that he had murdered these
two people in cold blood.

And did they arrest
him for murder? No.

What did they do?
They let him retire.

So, that's Aldo Barbolini.

Clore and Virgamini, they
were sent in by the warden

of Auburn Correctional Facility,

Robert J. Henderson,
a swell guy.

They killed D'Archangelo.

They killed Monteleone,

who were the two guys who
were killed on the catwalks.

- [Man Over Speaker]
Surrender peacefully.

You will not be harmed.

(helicopter fluttering)

- [Elizabeth] Santiago
Santos clearly,

was following the instructions

that were given
from the helicopter.

He had his hands over
his head like this,

and he was walking to
the nearest trooper.

And what happened?

He got murdered. He
got shot and killed.

And so when he fell, he fell
with his hands over his head.

Now, that didn't
look good to them.

Before rigor sets in clearly,

so that's like two, three
hours before rigor comes in,

they move his hand and
they put a scissor.

So you think like, he's
reaching for a scissor. Great.

- [Man Over Speaker]
Surrender peacefully.

You will not be harmed.

- [Elizabeth] And then,
there's Kenny Robinson,

who's shot without a weapon.

There's nothing near him.

He was clearly sitting
on this big old seat,

and they shot him and it fell,

he fell, it fell over him.

And the next thing you
know, he's got a big sword.

- [Man Over Speaker]
You will not be harmed.

Clasp your hands
on top of your head

and move to the outside
of the D block corridor.

- The action now under way,

was initiated with
extreme reluctance,

only after all
attempts to achieve

a peaceful solution failed.

To delay the action any longer

would not only jeopardize
innocent lives,

but would threatened
the security

of the entire correctional
system of this state.

(slow somber music)

- [Narrator] The assault on
Attica lasted six minutes

and took the lives of
39 inmates and hostages.

- [Elizabeth] This is all
only for the hostages.

They had an ambulance
for every hostage,

and they had nothing,
nothing for the prisoners.

Dr. Michael M. Baden,
chief pathologist

of the New York State Police,
who conducted the autopsies,

come in and testified
that if there had been

proper medical care at least
eight people could have lived.

I think it's 10, including,
but
not limited to Sam Melville.

He was shot by Vincent
Tobia, who was a member

of the bureau of
criminal investigation

in the New York State Police,

in the same place that
L.D. Barkley was shot.

Collapsed his lung
and he bled to death.

- We are men.

We are not beasts, and we
do not intend to be driven

or beaten as such.

- [Elizabeth] He was
19, and he was in Attica

for a probation
violation for joyriding.

- If they had only
waited till today,

there would be now 40
or 41 people still alive

in this universe of ours.

They would not wait because
these men were expendable.

Guards, prisoners had no
meaning in the scheme of things

of our white totalitarian world.

- [Reporter] How did
they kill the hostages--

- [Man] Let him finish.

- Well, several had
their throat slashed.

I don't have all
the details on it.

I understand one had a chest
wound that he died from.

And, I don't have
all of those details.

- When you read the front
page of the New York Times,

it's a scream, it is.

I mean, they have 'em fighting
hand by hand in the blocks,

for four hours.

(Elizabeth sighs)

- [Narrator] The press
accepted Houlihan's report

of slashed throats,
but the next day

County Medical Examiner John
Edland announced the truth.

- The first eight
autopsies were on the cases

identified to us as hostages.

All eight cases died
of gunshot wounds.

- He was this conservative
Republican, and he was a
doctor.

So, they brought all
these bodies to him,

and he says, "Oh
these were all shot,"

right, nobody's, what're
you talking about?"

- There was no evidence
of slashed throats.

There was one single cut in
the back of one of the necks.

- And, they totally attacked him

and destroyed him, actually.

They totally tortured him.

Wouldn't let him drive the car.

They were pulling him
over, the whole nine yards.

- When the autopsy
record was complete,

it became known that
all the dead hostages

were killed or fatally
wounded by shots fired

by the assault forces.

No hostage was castrated
or sexually molested.

There were no safeguards to
minimize the risk of injury

to hostages and to un-involved
and unresisting inmates.

While the warnings against
indiscriminate fire were
issued,

the plan allowed
individual troopers

to use their own discretion
about firing their weapons.

Many troopers carried
shotguns with ammunition

that scattered lethal pellets

in such a way that
unintended targets

would almost certainly be
hit when troopers fired

into the crowded,
confined space of D yard.

(slow haunting music)

- [Woman] I have Governor
Rockefeller for you, sir.

- Hello?
- There you are.

- [Rockefeller] Mr. President.

for the courage you
showed and the judgment

in not granting amnesty.

It was right, and I don't
care what the hell the papers

or anybody else says.

I don't care what they say,

I think that you had
to do it that way,

because if you would've
granted amnesty in this case,

it would have meant that
you would've had prisons

in an uproar all
over this country.

- [Rockefeller] That's right.

- [Nixon] And you
did the right thing.

It's a tragedy that these
poor fellas were shot,

but I just want you to
know that's my view.

And I've told the
troops around here

they're to back that
right to the hilt.

- [Rockefeller] Well, aren't
you great, Mr. President.

I only called you because
I wanted to alert you

that we were going in.

- Right.
- And when we went in,

we couldn't tell whether all
39 hostages would be killed

and maybe two or 300 prisoners.

And that's a pretty
big, you know.

- [Nixon] Yeah, mm-hmm.

- [Nixon] How many, I only
got the report this morning.

What is the latest report?

How many people--

- [Rockefeller] Seven
hostages were killed.

- [Nixon] Seven
hostages were killed?

- [Rockefeller] Yes,
these were the guards.

- [Nixon] Those
were guards, seven.

- [Rockefeller] It appears
now, Mr. President,

as though quite a few of those
were killed prior to this.

In other words, that
they'd been dead.

- [Rockefeller] The hospital.

- [Nixon] The hospital
can prove that.

- [Rockefeller] Oh yes.

- [Nixon] They can find
out how long a guy's dead.

- [Rockefeller] That's right
and it's a Catholic hospital,

so it's outside of
our jurisdiction.

- [Nixon] Right, tell
me this, is this a,

are these primarily Blacks
that you're dealing with?

- [Rockefeller] Oh
yes, the whole thing

was led by the Blacks.

- [Nixon] I'll be darned.

Are all the prisoners
that were killed Blacks?

Are there any whites?

- [Rockefeller] I
haven't got that report,

but I have to, I would
say just offhand, yes.

- [Nixon] Yeah.

- [Rockefeller] We did it though

only when they were in the
process of murdering the
guards,

or when they were
attacking our people

as they came in
to get the guards.

- [Nixon] You had to do it.

- [Rockefeller] And
otherwise we recaptured

all the cell blocks and so
forth without shooting a
shot,

and no troopers were wounded.

One of them, well, one
of them was in the leg.

- [Nixon] Uh-huh, uh-huh.

Only one trooper
was wounded, good.

Good, good, good.
- That's right.

It really was a
beautiful operation.

- [Nixon] Well they
must've really been,

I would, I, you, you,
you can certainly

tell your people there,
whoever they are,

your other troopers, that I
have great admiration for
that.

That's an efficient operation.

- [Rockefeller] Well that's
wonderful of you to say.

- [Nixon] Well, we back 'em up.

Now, by golly, we're not
gonna have any of that.

We just can not tolerate
this kind of anarchy.

- [Narrator] As soon as
the shooting stopped,

every surviving inmate
was forced to crawl across

the muddy ground into
the middle of the yard.

They were stripped naked
and funneled one by one

into the cell blocks,
where they were beaten

by a gauntlet of state police
troopers and prison guards.

Big Black was described as
a leader of the rebellion,

despite his role
protecting the hostages.

He was singled out and
tortured for hours,

receiving injuries
that would haunt him

for the rest of his life.

- [Narrator] For the
surviving hostages,

the ordeal was over.

For the inmates, another
ordeal was beginning.

The assault reduced the
D yard world to wreckage,

and inmates had lost
any ground they gained

at the negotiation table.

Whether they took part in
the insurrection or not,

the inmates faced correction
officers and state troopers,

many of them
anxious for revenge.

Medics were among
the first outsiders

to reach the wrecked yard.

Major John Cudmore and his
men watched what happened

to inmates after the
shooting stopped.

- They were in a position
of having surrendered,

hands-on-head, were coming
down and were very forcefully

being forced down the steps.

Were forced to lie down
and low crawl across there.

Apparently the method employed
to get them to lie down

was to hit them with a
club across the knees,

or in several instances,
not too disguised attempts

to hit them in the
genitalia was made.

- You had those personnel there

from the heartlands of America
with a very difficult job,

with inadequate training,

and in the light of
what happened in there,

their knowing that their
brother employees were in
there,

and their lives have been
threatened continuously,

they knew some of
'em were injured.

Of course, it's human
and understandable

that they were under
grave stress and anxious,

and had strong
feelings about it, sir.

This is only reality.

- As an administrator
in this field,

had there been a history after
these prison disturbances

of officers losing self-control

and taking it out on inmates?

- This is a concern, a
common concern and problem.

- Although officials were
aware that high emotions

among troopers and
correction officers

might result in unnecessary
violence to the inmates

during and after the assault,

no one took responsibility
to prevent reprisals.

Almost half of the inmates
from D yard suffered bruises,

lacerations, or broken bones,
as a result of such reprisals.

- I would say that

we felt that Mr. Mancusi and
Mr. Vincent would handle this.

We had given orders, we presumed
it would be carried out.

- And he lied. He
lied to these people.

They asked him the question,

did he know about the gauntlet

and the beatings and whatever?

And he says, no, he
didn't go into the yard.

That's a lie.

He went into the yard about
10, 10:30. He saw it all.

And he was forced to tell
the truth in the trial

around the killing of Hubert
Jones, one of the cops.

And he had lied to McKay.

He had lied to,
on his deposition,

he had lied in the grand jury.

I mean, in our case,
we brought that up.

He got held to trial and
he died the day after.

(helicopter fluttering
drowns out man speaking)

When I graduated
from law school,

And, what else could you do?

But ABLD was it.

The Attica Brothers
Legal Defense,

which was the mass
defense office convened

to defend the 63 people
who were accused of crime

as a result of the
Attica prison rebellion.

I had told them that I would
give two weeks of my time.

Now, I was full of shit, and
I knew I was full of shit,

because I borrowed
my mother's car

and put the dog in the car.

So, you know, but I had
to give myself an out.

I got up there on July
4th, and on July 5th

I walked into the office
at about nine o'clock

in the morning, and
I was commandeered

by Frank "Big Black" Smith,
who interviewed me for an
hour,

and then by Dennis Cunningham,

and I fell in love
with both of them.

I mean, they were
amazing, both of them.

They were really into the fight.

And so that was it.

I never left.

The same people who killed
everybody, the state police,

they were the
primary investigators

from the time of the
rebellion
and when it was over on

September 13th, until
February of 1972,

they controlled all
the evidence, they
controlled everybody,

and they destroyed everything.

They returned 38 indictments

against

61 prisoners,

charging them with

1,485 felony counts.

The state troopers and the
guards who killed 39 people,

they were never prosecuted.

In March of 1974,

they convened a
second grand jury

because they decided,
four years later,

that everybody on
the first grand jury

had ties to Attica prison,
and therefore couldn't be
fair

in evaluating anything.

Of course, we had
raised this as an issue,

on November 1st, 1971.

And we were thrown out of court.

My colleagues, my
comrades, Michael Deutsch,

and Dennis Cunningham.

The major employer of Wyoming
County is Attica prison.

There are only white
people in Wyoming County,

even though they're listed
as one of the largest

third world populations
in upstate New York.

Because there are 1800
Black people there.

That they're all incarcerated

and have no right of
franchise, we won't speak on.

- [Court Reporter] Raise
your right hand, please.

Do you solemnly swear
that the testimony

you're about to give will be
the truth, the whole truth,

nothing but the truth,
so help you God?

- I do.

- [Narrator] In 1974, Attica
Brothers Legal Defense

filed a $2.8 billion civil suit

against the state of
New York for damages,

on behalf of 1,281 inmates.

After years of delay
by the appointed judge,

pretrial discovery depositions
got underway in 1991.

These tapes are from
that deposition.

They've never been
available to the public.

- George Alexander Shorts, Jr.

- Yes.

- In Attica's prison.

- I was hit.

- I was kicked in the side,
the back, and the buttocks.

- My head was into the dirt.

- I was kicked in the side,
I was kicked in the hip,

kicked in the back.

- [Interviewer] Any inmates
being kicked in A yard?

- I don't recall that.

- I was hit in the testicles.

- A shotgun.

- I couldn't really say.

I knew I was hit.

I was hit, what, you know,
when you're hit like that

you're not trying to count.

You're scared to death.

I wetted on myself.

I was hit in the head, the
back, my arms, trying to
block.

And the lip.

- Face, yes.

- Yes, I did.

- No. They had taken
them and stomped on 'em.

- Then my glasses was
taken off me, stomped.

You were forced under gunpoint

to crawl the length of the
yard on your knees and elbows.

I was told to take
off all of my clothes.

And I was hit, and
told to "Run, nigger."

- And he put the gun to
my head, cocked the gun,

and said, "Nigger,
I'm gonna kill you."

And that's when I started
pleading for my life.

- There was a correction, two
correction officers was there,

telling me the same
thing, "Run, nigger, run."

And that's exactly what I did.

- And I was told, "When I hit
this door with this stick,

nigger, you better
start moving."

And when he hit the
door, I started moving.

- [Interviewer] Did you
hear what kind of language

was being uttered in that yard?

- Emphatic language, "Get over
there, get down, move along,"

that sort of thing.

- [Interviewer] Did it have
after it words such as
"nigger?"

When he said, "Get down there."

- No, I didn't hear that.
- Move along.

- If I did I'd report it to you.

- [Elizabeth] And then the
gauntlet, 50 correction
officers

and sheriff's deputies,
they lined the corridors

with their sticks and
clubs and two-by-fours

and rifle butts, and
plenty of broken glass.

And they had all these naked
people, and one-by-one,

they made them run through it

while they got beaten with clubs

all the way up the
stairs into the cell.

(slow eerie music)

- [Former Inmate] They
were kicking, and saying,

"Keep moving, keep moving,
keep moving," kicking,

"keep moving."

- Bobby Seales is not here now.

Where's your Black power?

- Well, as I was
being put in the cell,

I was hit in the back of
the head with a billy club

and thrown in the
cell on the floor.

- Whoever beat me,
they came in the cell,

told me to put my hands
against the back of the wall,

and with their
rifles, broke my toes.

- Broke my toes.

He said, "Nigger, you don't
wanna run across our glass,"

and that's when
he broke my toes.

"You'll run it next time."

- The same thing that I
went through downstairs,

I had to go through upstairs.

Every time they came
out and take a count,

I had to have my
head on the bars.

- Yes they did, for
that eight hours.

- He called me nigger.

"Nigger, put your head on
these
bars and you keep your head

on these bars, nigger,
when I come through."

And I was hit on the head.

- No, he didn't.

- I was working in the
hospital that afternoon

and I was assigned to get
four men to form a litter team

and to walk through the
hallway from the hospital

to the BHZ or reception center.

And as I walked in, I got
the door a quarter of a way

or halfway open, and I
saw correction officers,

five, six, or seven,
I wasn't exact,

bending over, beating on
somebody that was on the
floor.

And they told me
to shut the door

that I wasn't allowed
into that room.

- And again, while
I was in the cell,

they were having
standing counts.

They would come around
every 10 or 15 minutes

and say, "Count."

And it got to be the point

where I couldn't stand up
anymore, I was just too
tired.

So I told 'em, I said,
"Look, I'm alive,

but I can't stand up."

The guy told me, "Well
nigger, if you don't stand
up,

get on your knees and pray."

I said, "I'm not
gonna do that either."

So, I think it was two
correctional officers,

they came back with a,

I think he was a state
trooper with a very large gun.

It looked like a .357
Magnum, stuck in my cell,

and told me to get on my
knees, nigger, and pray.

"You gonna die, right now."

So he pulled the trigger, but
there was nothing in the gun.

Just a loud noise.

And, I regurgitated for
about 15 or 20 minutes,

and they thought
it was quite funny.

Then after I did that, then
I start crying quite badly.

Not because I was
scared, I was just angry.

I said to myself, "If I just
get my hands on one of 'em."

Like I say, it's hard for me

to go over some
of these details.

- They made me take my
clothes off, hit the ground.

And then they crawled the
whole length of the yard,

over to A block door.

And just before I was going to,

I was in line waiting to
go through A block door,

a correctional officer picked
me out and put me on the side

of A block corridor,
on the outside.

And he laid me
down on the ground

and put a shotgun
shell on my knee.

And he told me if
that fell, I was dead.

And I laid there for
what seemed like hours.

The officers that were up
on the catwalk above me

were throwing cigarettes
down on my stomach.

The officer that was over by me

would pick them up
and burn me with them,

kick me in my ribs.

As soon as I got to the
top of the third floor,

I was kicked in the testicles,

and I went back down the
stairs
head over heels, one flight,

and then I was made to get up

and they beat me up
the stairs again.

- My back, head, neck, arms,
shoulders, legs, kidney area.

And I was urinating blood.

I was beaten and laid
in the cell for 11 days

before I got any
medical attention.

Stuck rifles inside the cell
bars, pulled the trigger,

and told me I was dead.

- From September 13th,
1971, until November, 1972.

- Yeah. It's not
a time to forget.

- Well, it's hard
for me to recount

things that happened in A block.

It's hard for me to recount
things that happened in A.

It's hard for me to recount
things, I get very angry.

And this anger has caused
me a lot of problems.

I have problems dealing
with authority figures,

have problems dealing
with policemen.

And when I do encounter
it, I get quite angry,

because I can still
see people that I knew

with their eyes blown out
and their heads blown off.

- [Elizabeth] Michael
Smith got shot four times,

and by 10 o'clock, or 10:30,

he was already in the
operating
room being operated on.

So by 10:30, they
knew he had been shot.

He's the person who

Black was supposed
to have emasculated

and shoved his
testicles in his mouth.

And that was the excuse
they used to torture Black.

And they told that story
at 12:30, one o'clock

in the afternoon.

And then they torture him,
and do all this shit to him.

And, there he is.

Big Black.

- I was made to crawl after
I was knocked to the ground.

Pushing, kicking, calling
me all kind of niggers,

telling me to walk,
telling me to run.

Drug, dragged.

- They took me to...

(slow ominous music)

You wanna break?
Take some water?

(deep ominous music)

- Took me and they made me
lay on the table in the yard

and they beat me in my nuts.

Threatened me and dropped
cigarette butts on me,

and hot shells on
me and spit on me.

- [Attorney] Hold on, slow down.

- [Court Reporter]
Hot what, I'm sorry.

- Shells.
- Okay.

- Tell me they was
gonna cut my testicles

and my genitals out.

(tense somber music)

(fists slam)

(tense somber music)

That's what was happening to me.

- Long time.

Three to six hours, all day.

- Under my chin, yes.

- Yes.

- Yes.

- Off and on I'd move and
try and get 'em off me,

and the cigarettes off me.

A bunch of times being beat,

called a bunch of names
'cause my legs was dead,

they was numb, I couldn't walk.

They finally drug me,
put me the hallway,

and I had to go
through the same thing

everybody else
was going through,

because I was about the
last person out of the yard.

They made me run
through the gauntlet.

Made me crawl
through the gauntlet.

- It was in A corridor.

Somewhere in that afternoon.

- I've been struck a lot.
That's all I was was struck.

As I got to the entrance to
HBZ building, I was beat
again.

This happened, my wristes--

- My wrists.

And my body, my legs was
spread eagle on the floor,

and they're played with
my genitals with gun butts

and nigger sticks that they
was calling, pick handles.

And played Russian roulette
with a shotgun at my eyes.

Made me open my eyes,
made me look up in it.

A headache, my back was
hurting, my legs was hurting
me,

my arms was hurting me.

I was a mess. My
mind was messed up.

I couldn't hold
anything on my stomach.

I urinate blood for
two years after Attica.

- Yeah, to the lawyers.

Nobody else would listen.

- [Narrator] In 2001,
after 26 years of struggle,

the Attica Brothers
were awarded $8 million

of the 2.8 billion they sought.

The money was divided
among the survivors

according to the severity
of their injuries,

most receiving a few
thousand dollars.

Big Black went on to work
with Liz Fink as a paralegal,

hounding her to pursue the
civil case to expose the
truth

of the retaking of D yard.

He was a substance abuse and
suicide prevention counselor

who was known to take
desperate clients

into the home he shared
with his wife, Pearl.

At the end of his life, he
was pushing for compensation

for the families of the guards

who were murdered on that day.

In recognition of his injuries,

Big Black received the
largest individual payout,

for $125,000.

Fink was proud of
their accomplishments,

but she did not consider
the settlement justice.

She went on to represent
hundreds of people

in the New York prison system

through the worst years of
the Rockefeller drug laws.

- These were huge
prisons, they still are.

They're still all, every one
of them is still in existence

with thousands of
people in them.

And these huge walls,
right? Horrifying.

Green Haven, which is about
60 miles from New York City.

Comstock, which is on the
Vermont New York border.

Dannemora, which
we all know is up

right next to Canada.

Auburn, which is the second
oldest prison in America.

Huge, in the middle of town.

This monster prison.

Wall, gun towers, the
whole nine yards of it.

Same town as the Harriet
Tubman house. (laughs)

And Sing Sing, which is
right up on the Hudson.

And last, but certainly not
least, Attica State Prison.

Attica was not the worst.

It was the next to the worst.

The worst is Dannemora State
Prison in Clinton, New York.

And all you have to do
is look at the stuff

that just happened as
the perfect example

of how the prison
system has not changed.

- [Reporter] Matt
and Sweat escaped

from the Clinton
Correctional Facility

in Dannemora, New
York on June 6th.

- What does New York state do?

It blames the prisoners,
beats the shit out of them,

waterboards people, and
you have the governor

of the state of New York going
and blaming the prisoners,

and saying he knows that
the corrections people

had nothing to do with it.

And of course they are the ones

who had something to do with it.

And they, by
definition, have to.

- [Reporter] The two
men had inside help

facilitating their escape.

Joyce Tilly Mitchell,
a supervisor

in the prison tailor
department, arrested and charged

with helping them break free.

- The New York
state prison system

is a race-based conspiracy.

Here you have all these
prisoners, they can't vote.

And Clinton County counts them.

They get money from both
the feds and the state

for having a
minority population.

All the Black people
who live in Plattsburgh,

they're all in that prison,

and they don't vote.

- I am strongly in favor
of the death penalty.

I'm also in favor of
bringing back police forces

that can do something instead
of just turning their back.

Because every quality lawyer
that represents people

that are in trouble,
the first thing they do

is start shouting police
brutality, et cetera.

The problem with our
society is that the victim

has absolutely no rights

and the criminal has
unbelievable rights,

unbelievable rights.

- All those people are my
age, they're my generation.

And they decided that they
had a big problem here

that they had to control.

And they were gonna make sure
it wouldn't happen again.

And the first thing
they sort of said,

a free press doesn't
help things at all.

And if you let cameras in
there to show everybody

what's happening, this is
not progressive for you.

They lost any sense of ethics.

So they've created
this situation

where you have the life
that we all have here.

- [Instructor] The
correct grip is obtained

by placing the leather
thong over the right thumb

in this manner.

You say you'd like to see
a practical demonstration?

- [Child] They hurt my mommy!

- [Instructor] Remember
as police officers,

we may only use that
amount of force necessary

to make an arrest.

And the amount of force
must not be disproportionate

to the degree of
resistance offered.

This technique is advocated
when you are in close quarters

and the assailant has
indicated he has the ability

to make a dangerous
attack upon your person.

Your counter should be direct
to the solar plexus area,

then quickly to the collar bone.

- Put your hands
behind your back!

- And if he's still
aggressive,
then up under the chin.

That's it, solar plexus,
collarbone, and up to the
chin.

Next man.

(adventurous orchestral music)

That's the idea.

But to master this
technique takes practice.

So gentlemen, let's begin.

- The jury in the Los Angeles
police brutality trial

has just reached its verdicts.

The four police officers
were found not guilty.

- Not guilty.
- Not guilty on all counts.

(gunshots blasting)

(man screams)

- [Instructor] While accuracy
is certainly essential,

delivering a shot
first is paramount.

Tactical speed
shooting teaches both.

An alternative method
of firearms training,

speed shooting is
gaining recognition

as the next logical step.

(gunshots popping)

- Shooters, ready.

- [Instructor] The
program is also available

to state and local law
enforcement officers,

with a basic training
prerequisite.

- [Officer] That looks
like a bad dude, too.

Could be on something.

(gunshots blasting)

(sirens blaring)
(police radio chatter)

- Hey!

(gunshots popping)
(Philando screaming)

- [Woman] Hey, you just
killed my boyfriend.

(gunshots blasting)

- [Instructor] The overall
program is organized

around the concept
of domination.

- [Elijah] I can't
breathe, can you stop?

- [Instructor]
Dominate the opponent.

Dominate the situation, and
dominate all visual areas.

These skills translate
into a safer,

more controlled officer, who
is less likely to overreact,

or worse, under-react
to the situation.

- [Eric] Don't touch me.

(officers talking at once)

- All right, we've got
him, he's down, he's down.

- [Officer] Let me
see your hands, buddy.

- [Officer] Put your
hands behind your back.

- [Eric] I can't breathe.

I can't breathe.

I can't breathe.

- [Officer] You aren't
gonna breathe in my face.

Just get up.

(George groaning)

- [Officer] What do you want?

- I can't breathe.

- [Elizabeth] It is
all about oppression.

- I can't breathe sir.

- And greed and racism.

(George groaning loudly)

(daunting strings music)

Okay, thank you.

- Thank you.