A Clean Hell

A Clean Hell: Anarchy and Abolition in America’s Most Notorious Dungeon by Eric King is a searing firsthand account from inside the most repressive prison in the United States, a place built not for rehabilitation but for disappearance.

The federal supermax ADX Florence is the most secure facility in the United States, a dungeon of isolation, sensory deprivation, and psychological disintegration. Here, cruelty isn’t accidental; it’s the design. Built in 1995, the “Alcatraz of the Rockies” was made to cage the so-called worst of the worst: bombers, gang leaders, political enemies, and anyone the government deems too rebellious, too inconvenient, or too visible.

Among them was antifascist prisoner Eric King, targeted for his politics, brutally tortured by the Bureau of Prisons, and ultimately entombed at ADX after beating a politically motivated federal prosecution. A Clean Hell tells the story of Eric’s decade behind bars: the years of surveillance and retaliation, the years locked in solitary confinement, the reality of being known as a “race traitor,” and the daily acts of resistance that kept him—and others—alive.

More than just a firsthand survival story and exposé, this is a blistering indictment of the carceral state and the sanitized violence it tries to hide. A Clean Hell is a crucial document of solidarity and struggle inside the belly of the beast and required reading for anyone concerned with mass incarceration, political repression, or the inhumane architecture of the US prison system.

Eric King is an anarchist who was imprisoned in 2014 for acts of solidarity with the Ferguson, Missouri, uprising. While in federal custody Eric was indicted for a self-defense incident at FCI-Florence. Eric took it to trial and is one of the absolute few people to ever win at Federal Trial. After his victory Eric was sent to the Federal Supermax, ADX, where he spent most of his final two years of his prison bid. During his time in prison Eric coedited the political prisoner anthology Rattling the Cages: Oral Histories of North American Political Prisoners. Eric survived years of documented physical and psychological torture and made it out of prison with heart and soul intact. Eric is an activist, antifascist, and loving father and husband. He lives in Denver, CO.

Raymond Luc Levasseur is a Vietnam veteran, human rights activist, revolutionary, writer, and political prisoner. Levasseur was part of a revolutionary Marxist organization that waged a militant struggle in the 1970s and ’80s against racism and imperialism.

Josh Davidson is an abolitionist, a member of the Certain Days: Freedom for Political Prisoners calendar collective, and part of the Children's Art Project with political prisoner Oso Blanco. Josh coedited Rattling the Cages: Oral Histories of North American Political Prisoners with Eric King. He works in communications with the Zinn Education Project, which promotes the teaching of radical people's history in classrooms and provides free lessons and resources for educators.