The prison's security includes razor wire, cameras and gun-toting guards

PELICAN BAY STATE PRISON — Inside the concrete labyrinth of California's highest-security prison, an inmate covered in neo-Nazi tattoos and locked in solitary confinement has spearheaded the largest prison protest in California history.

Convicted killer Todd Ashker and three other inmates — representing the Mexican Mafia, Nuestra Familia and the Black Guerrilla Family— called for a mass hunger strike July 8, largely to protest indefinite incarceration in solitary confinement.

More than 30,000 prisoners answered.

Inmate Javier Zubiate, formerly a lieutenant of the gang Nuestra Familia, is a convicted killer serving time in the Secure Housing Unit at Pelican Bay State Prison.

Inmate Javier Zubiate stands in the concrete recreation area where he is allowed periods of controlled and highly monitored exercise.

Javier Zubiate watches television while writing a letter. He has agreed to provide evidence on other gang members in order to be released from the Secure Housing Unit

Though segregated from others, the leaders, who dub themselves the Short Corridor Collective, have kept the protest going, with more than 600 inmates still refusing food.

Among the four, Ashker is the most outspoken of the collective and the legal brains behind the strike.

Some prisoner-rights advocates describe the intense and sometimes volatile man as a brilliant champion for California's 130,000 prisoners.

Armed with a prison law library and a paralegal degree earned behind bars, Ashker, 50, has filed or been party to 55 federal lawsuits against the California prison system since 1987, winning the right for inmates to order books and collect interest on prison savings accounts.

"There's an element within [the Department of Corrections] who would celebrate some of our deaths with a party," Ashker wrote to The Times in March after prison officials denied access to him.

But others say Ashker is a danger, accusing him of being an Aryan Brotherhood member bent on freeing gang leaders from solitary confinement so they can regain their grip on the prison system.

"We're talking about somebody who is very, very dangerous … who has killed somebody in a pre-meditated way," said Philip Cozens, Ashker's court-appointed defense lawyer in a 1990 murder trial.

Terri McDonald, who ran California's 33 prisons until a few months ago and now runs the Los Angeles County jail system, said Ashker and his compatriots in the Short Corridor Collective are not fighting for rights, but power.

"From my perspective, they are terrorists," she said.

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Todd Ashker, an inmate at Pelican Bay State Prison, has staged a hunger strike within the prison.(California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation)

Ashker has spent nearly all his adult life in California's prison system — and much of that time, he has been in solitary confinement.

Born outside Denver, he wound up in Northern California after his father ran afoul of the law. Lewis Ashker is serving a life sentence in South Dakota for the 1985 murder of a retired police officer during a botched attempt to steal the man's gun collection.

Ashker's mother remarried and moved away in the late 1970s, leaving her son with a friend in Contra Costa County, according to his parole transcripts.

Ashker was 13 when he threatened another student to get his lunch money. It was the first of a long series of transgressions — among them truancy, DUI and burglary — that put him in juvenile halls and boys ranches for most of his youth.

Ashker ascended to state prison in 1982 at age 19 after being convicted of burglary. Five years later, housed at New Folsom State Prison near Sacramento for a second burglary, he stabbed another inmate 17 times.

According to testimony at his murder trial and a subsequent parole hearing, Ashker attacked the Aryan Brotherhood gang member while another inmate held a mattress over the door to block the guards' view. Prosecutors said the killing was a hit ordered by the white supremacist gang. Ashker contended he was acting in self-defense.

Inside Pelican Bay State Prison

By Mark Boster, Los Angeles Times  -  July 16, 2013

As a photojournalist I walk into and out of people’s lives on a daily basis and, in the course of doing so, witness the high points of life as well as the lowest. My intention is to share stories of great triumphs as well as the lowest moments of tragedy.

Several months ago I was given the opportunity, along with Times staff writer Paige St. John, to tour the Secure Housing Unit at Pelican Bay State Prison in Crescent City, Calif.

Crescent City is one of the most beautiful places in Northern California. The rugged, rocky shoreline, shrouded with fog, renders classic postcard coastal views. Inland, a tree-lined road meanders past farms and fields and leads to a maximum-security prison. Pelican Bay State Prison is home to some of the most notorious convicted criminals in California.

Mark Boster with inmate Javier Zubiate in the Secure Housing Unit.

Without prejudice and without passing any judgement, I knew going into this project that my job was to show a small slice of their life and to tell a story that few are allowed to see.

Paige and I were given an official briefing by the warden, shown examples of the various prison-made knives and weapons and fitted for our Kevlar protective vests. After almost two hours of the required briefing we started our tour.

Crossing from an office area into the actual prison complex, a giant steel door slammed behind us and we were suddenly in an area with very tall electrified fences, topped with razor wire and towers manned by guards with rifles. That is the moment when the talk stops and you realize you are in a different world. This is the world of convicted murderers and many people who made some very poor choices.

A short time later we met and chatted with two men who were probably never going to see the outside world again.

Javier Zubiate, with his shaved head, sunglasses and numerous tattoos, gave us a glimpse of his life as a lieutenant of the Nuestra Familia gang. He was soft-spoken and well-mannered. I had to remind myself that he had been convicted in a 1995 murder and there is a good reason why he is now in isolation on the Secure Housing Unit.

Our second inmate interview was with Jeremy Beasley, 39, a member of the Nazi Low-Riders and then elevated to the Aryan Brotherhood. At Pelican Bay since 1998, Beasley is serving a life sentence for murder.

Both men agreed to debrief with prison officials and to provide evidence on other gang members in order to be released from the Secure Housing Unit. We later went to Zubiate’s cell on one pod and witnessed for ourselves how the inmates live there. The small concrete cell with concrete bunk racks, a toilet and a sink are home for him for the rest of his days.

After the tour was over I made the beautiful drive along the coast. I parked my car at a motel and walked along the wet sand and waited for the sunset.