Keith LaMar has been in solitary confinement for more than 22 years, but Thursday night he spoke to groups across the United States.
LaMar is currently a resident of a supermax facility in the Youngstown, Ohio, State Penitentiary. He has been in prison since 1988 and is currently on death row.
A group supporting the Campaign to Free Keith LaMar gathered at Monroe County Public Library to listen to LaMar through the Internet. LaMar spoke in 15-minute intervals before having to call back.
“This call is originating from an Ohio corrections facility and may be recorded and monitored,” the automated voice said each time.
The event allowed the members of the audience to post questions in a chat from which the interviewer could select to ask. LaMar didn’t speak of his own case, but instead decided to speak about human rights and current racial issues.
LaMar said the justifications for police brutality against black Americans are “just words they say to confuse people.”
“People don’t walk around believing they’re racist, and somehow that makes it even worse,” LaMar said.
LaMar was incarcerated for a murder during a 1988 drug deal, which LaMar does not deny. However, LaMar was later accused of several additional murders during the 1993 Louisville, Ohio, prison uprising, which he does deny.
The uprising began due to an administrative decision to perform a tuberculosis test using alcohol, an act which Muslim prisoners protested. Violence erupted inside the prison resulting in many deaths. LaMar and his defendants said he was in the yard at the time of this uprising, according to a documentary.
Since being in solitary confinement, LaMar has continued to deny the 1993 murders he was convicted of in 1995.
“I believe that he was targeted by the state of Ohio for a crime that he, essentially, didn’t do,” Bloomington event coordinator Adam Scouten said. “I also believe that the prison uprising that he was present at, that he wasn’t part of, but was ultimately blamed for was caused by the administration.”
The event opened with a few words from the group explaining LaMar’s case and then played a documentary of his story.
The documentary referenced a lack of evidence provided from the prosecution which would have aided LaMar’s defense. Law professionals, including LaMar’s lawyer at the time of his death sentence trial in 1994, were interviewed and gave their support that the LaMar was unfairly represented in court.
There will be another event hosted by the same group March 10.
