To the Editor:
Joshua Rubenstein’s review of three books on Soviet psychiatry [Soviet Psychoprisons, by Harvey Fireside, Institute of Fools, by Victor Nekipelev, and Punitive Medicine, by Alexander Podrabinek, Books in Review, November 1980] exposes yet again the USSR’s suppression of Jewish and other dissidents by psychiatric torture. Alexander Podrabinek is now awaiting trial in Yakutsk and is ill with untreated hepatitis. His brother, Kirill, who contracted tuberculosis while serving a prison sentence for having protested the abuse of Soviet army recruits, has also been rearrested. Anyone wishing to protest their imprisonment can write to Soviet Ambassador Dobrynin and contact Amnesty International or the International Committee to Defend the Podrabinek Brothers, c/o Dr. David Shi-man, Secretary, College of Education, University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont 05405
John Felstiner
Stanford, California