Fifty years after the founding of the Black Panther Party, we focus on an
overlooked part of its history: political prisoners. Many former members are
still held in prison based on tortured confessions, while others were convicted
based on questionable evidence or the testimony of government informants. We
host an historic roundtable with four former Black Panthers who served decades
in prison, beginning with two former members of the Angola Three who formed one
of the first Black Panther chapters in a prison. Robert King spent 32 years in
Angola—29 of them in solitary confinement. He was released in 2001 after his
conviction was overturned. Albert Woodfox, until February of this year, was the
longest-standing solitary confinement prisoner in the United States. He was held
in isolation in a six-by-nine-foot cell almost continuously for 43 years at the
Louisiana State Penitentiary, known as Angola prison. He was released on his
69th birthday
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