Biography
Sitawa Nantambu Jamaa, also known as Ronnie N. Dewberry, is a California prison organizer and a principal negotiator in the Prisoner Human Rights Movement. Already imprisoned on a murder conviction, he challenged prolonged solitary confinement linked to a disputed Black Guerrilla Family classification. He helped organize the 2011 and 2013 hunger strikes and the 2012 Agreement to End Hostilities, and was a plaintiff in Ashker v. Brown. He left long-term solitary confinement in October 2015 but remained imprisoned; his supporters reported that he came home on February 14, 2024. The cases below concern segregation connected to his political activity, rather than treating his entire earlier criminal sentence as activism-related custody.
Sworn account of segregation review
In his 2013 declaration in Ashker v. Brown, Sitawa Nantambu Jamaa said his November 2011 inactive-status review relied on a coded roster, political and historical writings, a Swahili pamphlet, and participation in George Jackson University. He disputed the gang interpretation and described the university as education about African history, culture and prisoners’ rights. He also described serving as a principal negotiator during the 2011 hunger strikes and participating in the call to end racial hostilities. These are his sworn statements, not a finding of gang membership.
Declaration, filed May 2, 2013, PDF pages 16–17, paragraphs 8 and 14–16.
The Winter 2021 Abolitionist describes Jamaa as having received medical parole in 2020 while still confined at the California Community Health Facility in Stockton. The report distinguishes that legal status from physically returning home; it does not establish a 2020 release from confinement. This historical placement is separate from the later homecoming reported in his profile. The Abolitionist, issue 34, page 5.
