‘Babies behind bars’ — For . . .

Press, 2 May 1984, Page 15

‘Babies behind bars’ — For . . .

From

DOLORES BARCLAY,

Associated Press in New York

Rosemary London has seen her 10-year-old daughter only three times in the last two years. She says she understands why the youngster hates to visit — her mother is locked away for 20 years. “She’ll write to me and say, ‘I miss you,’ and that hurts,” says Ms London, who is serving a sentence at the Virginia correctional centre for women in Goochland, for grand larceny. But at the Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women, New York, Fern Andre, a cheque forger, says it is a blessing that her baby lives with her. About 20,000 women are imprisoned in the United States and about 75 per cent have young children, according to Ellen Barry, director of the San Francisco-based Legal Services for Prisoners with Children. Many prisons try to preserve ties between mothers and children. Twenty-one of the 61 facilities for female offenders in the United States provide children’s centres where youngsters may visit. Eighty per cent of the 55 women’s prisons studied last year by Dr James Boudouris, director of the Correctional Valuation Programme for lowa, allow inmates to spend time off the prison grounds with their families and children. Inmate mothers in Michigan can take two days a year to visit children. At the Federal Correctional Institution at Pleasanton, California, inmates and their children may spend week-ends together at a children’s centre. The Massachusetts Correctional Institution at

Framingham is starting a family visiting room to offer a home-like environment for visits of up to six hours. Bedford Hills is the only prison in the United States with a nursery where infants may live with their inmate mothers until they are a year old. In other states, infants born in prison are kept in the infirmary only until they can be placed outside with relatives or foster parents. Corinna Akers, aged 20, was eight months pregnant when she began an eight-year sentence for grand larceny at Goochland. When she went into labour, she was taken to a hospital and gave birth to a boy. Three days later she was back at Goochland. “I have seen my son only for 4¥z hours since I left the hospital,” she says. Her eight-month-old son lives with his paternal grandmother, who has sued for custody. “If it would be possible, I would want him here,” Ms Akers says. “I have a daughter of five years, and I found with her that the first few years are going to be crucial to the rest of our lives together. Me and my son are missing a lot.” Ms Akers and three other inmates filed a class-action lawsuit last July asking that mothers be allowed to keep their babies until they reach early childhood. The lawsuit was dismissed and is now on appeal. The 61-year-old Bedford Hills programme is enthusiastically supported by the prison administration, but correction officials in

general are divided on the question of bringing up baby behind bars.

Sister Elaine Roulet, director of the children’s centre at Bedford Hills, maintains that babies do not know they are in prison. “It’s a good experience to have the first year with your mother,” she says. “Our babies are fat and happy and don’t have any of the prison pallor.” But Ann Downes, warden of the Virginia facilitiy, says: “You have to take into consideration the safety and security of these children. “Women can be vindictive, and believe me they often are here. What better way to get back at another woman than through the child? I do not believe that prison is a place for a baby or a child.” Proponents of prison nurseries argue the concept of bonding, which holds that a close physical tie between mother and child is essential for the child’s later development and emotional growth. Others say babies can develop a bond with anyone who nurtures them. “I would think that the mother and child should have that bonding relationship,” says Dr Robert B. Levinson, a psychologist with the American Correctional Association in Washington. “A child at the earliest stages of development would have a distinct advantage in having contact with the mother.” Eventually, if they are going to separate, would not that be traumatic? The answer is yes. “Inmate mothers, of course, are

not always good mothers,” says Dr Velma Lapoint, an assistant professor of human development at Howard University. She recently studied imprisoned mothers for the National Institute of Mental Health. Her research shows that onefourth of the mothers she studied had low-quality parent-child relationships. Mothers were not providing adequately for their children. For mothers who had maintained high quality of relationships before incarceration, there was a strong desire to continue the relationship, and a high degree of parenting despite the separation. Ms London, the Goochland inmate, says she has been in and out of jail since Tammy was three years old. When she broke into a house to steal, she didn’t think about her daughter. *T never gave her a thought. I wish I had. If I had, I would never have done it.”

Tammy attended the prison’s family picnic last year. “She was right up under me all the time. She was scared of the people (other inmates),” Ms London says. “I ask my daughter all the time, ‘You want to stay with mommy?’ She says no.

“This is a penitentiary, not a nursery. The judge didn’t send us

here to take care of our children. You can pick up some pretty bad habits, like language, and I don’t want my daughter going around saying those things.” Sister Elaine says the Bedford Hills programme allows inmates the time and opportunity to be good parents. “I don’t think it’s easy here,” she adds. “Women get fewer privileges when they live in the nursery. If they want to go to a big event, such as a movie, they can’t because they have to watch the baby.” The presence of children in prison can raise security problems and legal issues. “If a child should die of cot death, who is responsible?” says Ms Downes. “What about the rights of the child not to be incarcerated? What about the rights of the father? What about the rights of the grandparents, who probably have custody and don’t want the child in prison?” Babies up to 18 months of age were kept at the Florida Correctional Institution at Lowell and the Broward Correctional Institution from 1957-75. The legislature revoked that permission in 1981. Lawmakers said a prison was not a normal place for children, that the Department of Corrections could not function as a baby-sitting service, and that if a baby were killed by an inmate, the state would be liable.