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California

Political repression plays out state by state — shaped by local institutions, prosecutors, and movements for defense. These are the documented political prisoners and cases the census holds for California.

1,533Documented
32In custody
958Released
13Awaiting trial

Eras of repression in California

Where California’s entries fall across the census’s historical eras.

1930s 361 1970s 206 1960s 205 1910s 176 2020s 125 1980s 90

Documented cases

1,533 entries in the census — every one stays in the record, whether the case is open or closed.

Solomon Nitzberg
Solomon Nitzberg was forced from his house after vigilantes answered a shotgun blast with tear gas that overca...
Robert Noble
Released
Robert Noble was a Los Angeles political agitator and leader of the Friends of Progress, which he directed wit...
Edward D. Nolan
Released
Edward D. Nolan was a machinist and officer of the International Association of Machinists in San Francisco, i...
Gail Noldon
Released
Gail Noldon was jailed on August 1, 1969 while distributing the Panther newspaper near San Francisco’s bus ter...
Lorine Norman
Released
Lorine Norman, also known by her married name Lorine Kinz, was a Sacramento labor activist. Born in Texas, she...
Frank Nubin
Released
Frank Nubin was a 46-year-old Oakland, California steelworker — married, studying structural engineering — who...
George O'Connell
Released
George O'Connell was an Industrial Workers of the World member from Imperial, California, prosecuted in the fe...
Jenny O'Connell-Nowain
Released
Jenny O'Connell-Nowain is a former preschool teacher from Redding, California with no prior criminal history....
Tom O'Connor
Tom O'Connor was a Newspaper Guild president involved in the 1939 Huntington Park Bulletin strike in Californi...
Bill O'Donnell
Released
Father William “Bill” O'Donnell, a Berkeley peace activist associated with the San Carlos Foundation, crossed...
V. V. O'Hare
Released
V. V. O'Hare was a miner from Los Angeles, California. V. V. O'Hare was convicted at the mass IWW trial in Chi...
Richard O'Neal
Released
O’Neal was a former Black Panther connected to Bay Area political organizing who became entangled in the reviv...
Richard Oakes
Released
Richard Oakes was a Mohawk activist who led the 1969–1971 occupation of Alcatraz Island, a landmark event of t...
Amjad Obeid
Amjad Obeid was one of the Los Angeles Eight, detained in U.S. maximum-security prisons for several weeks in 1...
Ayman Obeid
Ayman Obeid was one of the Los Angeles Eight, detained in U.S. maximum-security prisons for several weeks in 1...
Kevin Olliff
Released
Kevin is an activist from the Bel Air neighborhood of Los Angeles, CA. A vegan since age 15, Kevin has been in...
Edward James Olmos
Released
Edward James Olmos, the Mexican-American actor of Stand and Deliver and Battlestar Galactica, was arrested in...
Tillie Olsen
Released
Tillie Olsen was a writer and labor activist associated with the Young Communist League. She was jailed in Kan...
Alejandro Orellana
Released
Alejandro Orellana, an East Los Angeles activist, was arrested on June 12, 2025 and federally charged with con...
Anthony Orendorff
Released
Anthony Orendorff is an independent journalist and photographer who documents Los Angeles communities. LAPD of...
Samuel Ornitz
Released
Samuel Ornitz, a novelist and screenwriter and a founding member of the Screen Writers Guild was one of the “H...
Arvid Owens
Released
Arvid Owens was among seven workers arrested after a demonstration demanding work at Oakland City Hall on Dece...
Eddie Page
Released
Eddie Page was detained in August 1977. A Black Marine private, the Pendleton 14 defendant given the harshest...
John Pancner
Released
John Pancner was from Chicago, Illinois. John Pancner joined the IWW in 1905 and worked as aunion organizer in...

Institutions in California

Prisons, jails, and detention centers in California that appear in the census’s case files.

San Quentin State PrisonSan Quentin, California
171 cases
Federal Bureau of Prisons
60 cases
Sharp Park Detention CampSharp Park, California
33 cases
Presidio StockadeSan Francisco, California
28 cases
Los Angeles County JailLos Angeles, California
26 cases
Folsom State PrisonFolsom, California
22 cases
San Quentin Rehabilitation CenterSan Quentin, California
16 cases
Metropolitan Detention Center, Los AngelesLos Angeles, California
15 cases