Amnesty International defines prisoners of conscience as people who have not used violence but have been imprisoned because of their political or religious beliefs, ethnicity, gender, race, sexual orientation, or any other aspect of their personal being (“Prisoners of Conscience”). There are prisoners of conscience held all over the world, even in the United States. Many are imprisoned without a fair trial or formal charges and some are tortured. Often these prisoners are arrested for speaking out on their beliefs, even though freedom of speech is considered to be a human right. Amnesty International recently named Danilo Maldonado Cuba’s only prisoner of conscience. Maldonado is a thirty-two year old graffiti artist who was arrested on December
