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Critics condemn B.C. decision to separate moms from babies in jail

Canadian Press Article online since August 12nd 2008, 23:00
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VANCOUVER - Mothers who want to bond with their newborn babies will no longer be able to do that in a British Columbia jail.
Corrections B.C. has cancelled a plan that allowed pregnant inmates to keep their babies with them while they served time. Now, babies born to jailed moms will go to a relative or be placed in foster care.
The change, apparently for safety reasons, angered Alison Granger-Brown so much that she left Corrections B.C.
"I perceived they were taking us away from rehabilitation and therapeutic programing and deeper into policy that was more about containment," said Granger-Brown, a social worker within the prison system.
She said there were obvious benefits to the program of mothers nursing and bonding with their babies.
But there was an added bonus: Other women in the Alouette Correctional facility connected with the children.
"Women didn't use bad language around the children. They were gentle," she said. "It just changed the culture."
Former inmate Jennifer Smith, 24, said if it wasn't for the program allowing her to keep her daughter, Sierra, she would likely be back on drugs.
"She wouldn't be here with me. I wouldn't be where I am. I would probably be out using still," Smith said.
"Because if she was taken from me from the beginning I would miss that bond."
The program was a four-year experiment for the provincial government. Corrections spokeswoman Lisa Lapointe said safety was key in the decision to scrub the program.
"Our staff are not trained to supervise infants and they're not (trained) in infant first aid or anything," she said.
"If something went wrong and we didn't respond appropriately, we just couldn't risk putting an infant in that situation."
No other province in Canada allows women to keep their babies in jail after giving birth, and Lapointe said the program was unfair to women who have young children but didn't give birth while in jail.
Women given federal prison time have been allowed to take their babies to prison with them.
Corrections B.C. is working on a program that would allow mothers to visit with their children for several hours every day, no matter what the age of the child, she said.
The courts also have the option of giving a pregnant woman a conditional sentence, keeping them out of jail, Lapointe added.
Smith, who was in jail for drug-related charges, believes cutting the program is a mistake for the mother, her child and for the corrections system.
"They'll give birth to their child in a hospital, they'll go back to jail and go back to the stuff they've know before," she said.
Smith said there would be no incentive for a woman to change what she's always been doing if the child isn't with her.
Lapointe said 12 mothers and babies went through the program.
Granger-Brown has followed the paths of nine babies and said one is back in foster care, another is with its father and the remaining seven are with their mothers who have managed to stay out of jail.
Kelly Murphy, 46, who spent six months in the same section as the mothers and babies, said the experience forced her to re-evaluate her own relationship with her teenage daughter.
"I stepped up to the plate, you know like, was I going to do this or not? Was I going to get on with this or not?" she said.
Murphy and Smith became friends and have supported each other out of jail.
"Even when I wanted to screw up, I had to think about something other than myself," said Murphy.
"A lot of healing went on for me in the six months I was in there with those babies,"
Ardent environmentalist Betty Krawczyk was serving a 10-month term in the same section of the prison and said the babies seemed to have a stabilizing influence on everyone from fellow prisoners to guards.
"These children that are allowed to be there are the focus of much love and care and attention," she said.
Krawczyk, who turned 80 last week, said she was the grandmother figure in the unit.
"These babies represent hope for the future," she added.
Krawczyk doesn't buy the safety argument and believes funding cuts and the provincial government's "huge mean streak" are behind the plan to drop the program.
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