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Pennsylvania
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 Pennsylvania.
431Documented
6In custody
377Released
2Awaiting trial
Eras of repression in Pennsylvania
Where Pennsylvania’s entries fall across the census’s historical eras.
1700s 77
1910s 73
1930s 68
2020s 41
1950s 36
1970s 30
Documented cases
431 entries in the census — every one stays in the record, whether the case is open or closed.
J
John Schmidt
Released
John Schmidt was a Quaker conscientious objector from Pennsylvania imprisoned during World War I. Court-martia...
M
Michael Schmoyer
Michael Schmoyer was a Pennsylvania German participant in Fries’s Rebellion from the Macungie (Millerstown) ar...
J
John Schuchardt
Released
John Schuchardt is a former United States Marine Corps officer and lawyer who became one of the eight defendan...
J
Jared Schultz
Released
Jared Schultz, 30, ARA/Antifa member; LOVE Park 4 co-defendant in the July 23, 2007 FBI SUV damage. Felonies d...
I
Irving Schwartz
Released
Irving Schwartz was arrested at the furriers' convention delegation in Philadelphia in May 1932 and charged wi...
J
Joseph Scott
Released
Joseph Scott was among the western Pennsylvania men taken into federal custody during the suppression of the W...
T
Thomas Sedgwick
Released
Thomas Sedgwick was one of twenty men arrested during the Whiskey Rebellion in western Pennsylvania and marche...
G
Guido Serio
Released
Guido Serio was an Italian anti-fascist labor leader — a former national secretary of the Seamen's Union of It...
C
Charles Sharp
Charles Sharp was convicted of the November 1863 murder of mine owner George K. Smith and hanged at Mauch Chun...
R
Raphael Shaw
Released
Raphael Shaw, 20, broke into a Wells Fargo on West Philadelphias 52nd Street corridor on May 31, 2020 wearing...
J
J. G. Shellenberger
Released
J. G. Shellenberger appears in the National Civil Liberties Bureau's March 1919 compilation "War-Time Prosecut...
E
Edward Sherwood
Released
Edward Sherwood was an eighteen-year-old Pittsburgh striker beaten by coal-company guards and arrested during...
E
Eli Sitkin
Released
Eli Sitkin was arrested at the furriers' convention delegation in Philadelphia in May 1932 and charged with "i...
A
Andy Skarupa
Released
Andy Skarupa was a Westland-district striker held in the coal roundup at the Blawnox Workhouse, one of the Nat...
M
Mike Sklovski
Released
Mike Sklovski was a Gilmore striker beaten and arrested during the National Miners' Union coal strike that swe...
C
Charles Skowronski
Released
Charles Skowronski was arrested at a Manayunk strike meeting in Philadelphia in May 1932 and charged with 10 d...
Y
Yvonne Small
Political prisoner identified as a petitioner in the 1990 Special International Tribunal on Political Prisoner...
R
Robert T. Smith
Released
Robert T. Smith led clothing-store pickets in New Kensington in 1950. He served ten months following an affray...
W
William Drewet Smith
Released
William Drewet Smith, a Philadelphia druggist, was among those arrested in September 1777 and named in the exi...
W
William Smith
Released
William Smith, a Philadelphia broker (so distinguished in the records from the other men of that common name),...
J
Julius Soich
Released
Julius Soich was listed on the ILD's 1932 winter-relief roster of Western Pennsylvania class-war prisoners — c...
K
Kate Sorensen
Released
Kate Sorensen was an activist with ACT UP/Philadelphia and the Philadelphia Direct Action Group, arrested arou...
S
Stephen Stanley
Released
Stephen Stanley was a conscientious objector from Pennsylvania imprisoned during World War I. Court-martialed...
H
Henry Stark
Released
Henry Stark was listed on the ILD's 1932 winter-relief roster of Western Pennsylvania class-war prisoners — co...
Institutions in Pennsylvania
Prisons, jails, and detention centers in Pennsylvania that appear in the census’s case files.
Allegheny County WorkhouseBlawnox, Pennsylvania
23 cases
Walnut Street JailPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania
20 cases
Philadelphia GaolPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania
18 cases
Butler County PrisonButler, Pennsylvania
13 cases
United States Penitentiary, LewisburgLewisburg, Pennsylvania
13 cases
FCI AllenwoodWhite Deer, Pennsylvania
12 cases
SCI DallasDallas, Pennsylvania
12 cases
Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas / SCI Pennsylvania state prisonsPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania
9 cases