On May 2nd, 1973, Assata Shakur awoke in a hospital room, chained to her bed, dying of brutal injuries of an attack inflicted by New Jersey State Troopers. They told her that one of her friends was dead, another was escaped, and that they knew she was the one who had shot one of the troopers and killed him when her car was pulled over on the New Jersey turnpike. Even though there wasn’t any substantial evidence, she had existing warrants for her arrest, and the entire legal system was working against her. While Assata struggled to get the evidence she needed to prove her innocence and escape police custody, no one saw any punishment for the brutal injuries that were inflicted on her during the events on the turnpike. Her guards pointed their guns at her face, hit her, and put chemicals in her eyes. Assata was just trying to reveal the truth of the event. to her captors.
Almost 40 years later on February 26th, 2012 in Sanford Florida,…show more content… We have the same systems of oppression in place that she fought against in her time as a revolutionary. Assata knew that only a huge change was going to make a difference, and even then, it would be temporary. She knows that even though progress has been made, it’s been moving far too slowly for far too long. Assata makes a comment in court in 1973 while standing trial for a bank robbery she didn’t commit, that “what has happened to me...does not exist in a vacuum. There are a long series of events and attitudes that led up to us being her.” (pg 166) She records history as her people have experienced it: that President Lincoln only freed them to get ahead politically, that most of the last names of black americans are inherited from the families that once owned them. Assata sees the world how it operates, which may seem dismal at times, but she always praises her people for getting through times of crisis and oppression and coming through even stronger than