From Prism Reports
Fort Worth, Texas, on a bond of $75,000—a price hard enough to pay as a single woman with no income, and close to impossible for a pregnant single woman with no income.
I was charged for the abuse that my abuser of six years inflicted on my 3-year-old daughter, resulting in her death. I was seen as the mother who had stayed in a toxic environment. I was no longer a victim of my abuser’s violence—I was now a defendant. My time in jail would include the birth of the child I was carrying and a sentence of 15 years, which I am currently serving in a Texas state prison.
Many pregnant women arrested in Texas feel caught in a system that is only interested in locking them up, rather than providing them with diversion resources that would help them have safe and healthy pregnancies. Though the Eighth Amendment requires prisons and jails to provide prenatal care, such as parenting education, special diets, and testing, many prisons lack the policies needed to ensure the health and safety of the parents-to-be and their children. Even facilities with policies in place to provide necessary prenatal care cannot guarantee that pregnant people actually receive those resources. According to the Prison Policy Initiative, a 2016 survey showed that only half of people who were pregnant at admission had received special testing, dietary changes, and childcare instruction. Continue reading >>>
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