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Few Protections for Pregnant Prisoners

Jill

Zuzu touched on this a few days ago, but the mistreatment of female prisoners certainly deserves another look.

Pregnant inmates are routinely shackled, even during childbirth. Forty-one states and the federal prison system allow the shackling of pregnant prisoners, and 23 states and the Federal Bureau of Prisons shackle women during childbirth. Some prisoners have had their childbirths forcibly induced.

Female prisoners are routinely sexually assaulted by prison guards, with no recourse. Numerous states have insufficient laws about sexual conduct between jail staff and prisoners, and Vermont has no law. Many states punish the inmate for any sexual relations, unless she can prove that she was raped. Arizona has particularly heinous laws: It allows for criminal punishment of female inmates who have sex with jail staff, even if the sex wasn’t consensual.

Nine state departments of corrections don’t refer to an outside agency when investigating sexual misconduct. Five lack special procedures for investigating sexual misconduct. Twenty-four states may place women in solitary confinement for reporting sexual misconduct.

Read the entire Amnesty report here. Thanks to Dad for the link.

4 thoughts on Few Protections for Pregnant Prisoners

  1. Even better: Idaho is nearing passing a law that would imprison pregnant women who are caught ingesting any illegal controlled substance. How likely is it that a pregnant addict in Idaho is going to seek prenatal care, given the treatment of women in prison?

  2. Arizona has particularly heinous laws: It allows for criminal punishment of female inmates who have sex with jail staff, even if the sex wasn’t consensual.

    Excuse me, this is a misprint, isn’t it? You meant “Iran” or “Libya” or maybe “China”. Not Arizona. Rape victims can’t be considered to have committed a crime by being raped in any part of the US, no matter how red the state. I’m going to deny it and close my eyes until the evidence goes away…Actually, I found this little additional bit of insult to injury on the AI report on AZ: “AZ does not consider this section [prior charges of rape of a prisoner] relevant to background checks for prison guards.” Lovely. They don’t even make a token effort to keep out the predators.

  3. I worry about female prisoners all the time. I THINK that women are kept in Women’s Prisons? So the only MEN they ever see are the Guards? So if they get pregnant, then they MUST have been RAPED !! RIGHT? Oh wait, I guess the bitch could have begged for it…….Sheesh, the only SANE thing would be for it to be UNLAWFUL to have SEX with the female prisoners….oh but wait, that would deprive the rapists of their HAREM. I think I am going to throw up.

  4. Kathy:

    Some prisoners are pregnant at the time of incarceration.

    Still, even though we’re a small county we always try to have at least one female corrections officer present during every shift at our jail. It makes a big difference.

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