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Giving Life, Wearing Shackles and Chains

By Michael Blankenship

One day last November, the first shudders of childbirth woke Venita Pinckney before dawn. She was well into her ninth month of pregnancy. She was also incarcerated at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility, a state prison. Before she left for the hospital, Ms. Pinckney said, a corrections officer wrapped a chain twice around her waist and handcuffed her to it. Then he covered the handcuffs with a locked black box to further limit her range of motion. Finally, her ankles were shackled.Read more...You would think that after 30+ years of involvement with the criminal justice system that policies and practices such as shackling pregnant women during child birth would: (a) be part of a bygone era; (b) cease to amaze me. Obviously neither of these items are true...continue to full post

Full post as published by The Justice Gambit on July 12, 2009 (boomark / email).