Central California Women's Facility
Often used as a political football, the war on women has been going on for a very long time. It is not just reflected in the battle for a woman's right to control her own body, but also in efforts to gain financial parity. Neither battle seems to be going particularly well.
Women make up two-thirds of minimum wage workers, and the same percentage serve as primary or co-breadwinners of families. The poverty rate for female-headed families with children is 40.9 percent, compared to 22.6 percent for male-headed families with children, and 8.9 percent for families with children headed by a married couple. According to the American Association of University Women, the gender pay gap, as of 2013 is 78 percent overall. Both the poverty rate for female heads of household and the pay gap are worse for women of color:
|
|
|
|
|
Poverty rate female head of household with children |
Women's earnings as ratio of white male earnings |
|
Native American |
56.9% |
59% |
|
Hispanic |
48.6% |
54% |
|
Foreign born |
47.1% |
NA |
|
Black |
46.7% |
64% |
|
White, non-Hispanic |
33.1% |
78% |
|
Asian |
26.3% |
90% |
|
Women are poorer than men. A woman is
two and a half times more likely than a man to be a single head of household. And women are more likely to have been victims of
domestic abuse.
There is another area in which the women exceed men, and that is the increase in the rate of incarceration. Over the last thirty years, our prison population has exploded, going from 300,000 in 1980 to over 2.3 million today. The increase is due largely to the war on drugs that has targeted people of color and applied discriminatory mandatory minimum sentences, even for first-time offenders.
Not widely known however, is the fact that the number of women incarcerated over this period increased at nearly 1.5 times the rate of men.
Who they are and why they are in prison, below the fold.
The Sentencing Project reports that the "number of women in prison increased at nearly 1.5 times the rate of men." Between 1980 and 2010, the female prison population increased by 646 percent. Today there are over one million women under the control of the justice system, either serving sentences or on probation or parole.
Who are these women?
They are women who have generally suffered some form of abuse, either sexual or physical, and often as children. About three quarters of the women at New York’s Bedford Hills Correctional Facility were in severely abusive relationships as adults. A stunning 82 percent suffered severe physical or sexual abuse as children, according to the Correctional Association of New York. In total, over 90 percent of the women had suffered some form of abuse during their lifetime.
A U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics report revealed that 43 percent of women in state prisons had been physically or sexually abused before incarceration. A rate that was three times greater than that for men (12 percent).
They are mothers: 67 percent of the women surveyed had one or more children under the age of 18 when in state prisons and 70 percent of them lived with their children prior to incarceration.
They are poor. In the Justice survey, 38 percent of the women were receiving benefits from Social Security, welfare, or charity and 85 percent had an income under $25,000 a year.
And it is likely that they are women of color:
As of 2001, the lifetime likelihood of imprisonment was:
- 1 in 19 for black women
- 1 in 45 for Hispanic women
- 1 in 118 for white women
In 2010, black women were incarcerated at nearly 3 times the rate of white women (133 versus 47 per 100,000). Hispanic women were incarcerated at 1.6 times the rate of white women (77 versus 47 per 100,000)
And this is despite the fact that women of color use drugs no more, and often less, than white women.
The ACLU reports that:
These racially disparate effects are the result, in significant part, of racially targeted law enforcement practices, prosecutorial decisions, and sentencing policies. Selective testing of pregnant women of color for drug use as well as heightened surveillance of poor mothers of color in the context of policing child abuse and neglect exacerbate these racial disparities.
Why are they in prison?
Click on image to enlarge
They are mostly in prison for nonviolent crimes, either property crimes that include shoplifting, larceny, fraud and forgery, or they are there for drug offenses. Take Sasha Binns, who was sentenced to two and a half to five years in prison for unlawfully receiving $1,512 in TANF and SNAP benefits in 2012. She admitted in court that she was pawning items and using the unreported income to buy heroin. It was the unreported income that resulted in the charge of fourth degree welfare fraud and misuse of food stamps.
With her shackles clinking as she brushed away tears, Binns admitted taking and forging a $69.50 check from a neighbor on March 28. Pleading guilty to second-degree forgery, Binns admitted using the check to buy groceries and obtain cash.
She will go to prison, and she will probably still be a heroin addict when she is released. She will also have to pay $1,556.01 in restitution according to the
Auburn Citizen. And because it is New York, she could also be liable for the cost of her room and board while in prison, and the cost of her probation/parole supervision, if any, once released.
Local newspapers are filled with the names of women being sentenced for welfare fraud. On October 15, 2014, the headline of Lancaster Online proudly proclaimed Six Lancaster County residents plead guilty to more than $20,000 in welfare fraud. Entries are like this:
Stefanie A. Balzarano, 41, of Manheim, was sentenced to three years' probation for illegally receiving more than $1,700 in Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits. Balzarano pleaded guilty and, in addition to probation, was ordered to pay full restitution, court costs, fees, and fines. She also was disqualified from receiving SNAP benefits for a period of 12 months.
The article concludes with the name and number of the Welfare Fraud Tipline. Pennsylvania is one of
41 states that compel probationers to pay for their own supervision. So in addition to paying restitution and court costs and fines, Ms. Balzarano will also have to pay a monthly probation fee, perhaps to a private contractor, for three years. No longer eligible for SNAP, one wonders where she will find the money to pay off her debt.
In a 2008 study in San Diego, California, it was found that the total average annual income of those convicted of welfare fraud, including all TANF, SNAP and other assistance as well as all unreported earnings, was $13,356.
Women tend to fare worse than men under our drug laws. They suffer from the same mandatory minimum sentence structure that has put so many men of color behind bars that Michelle Alexander called it the New Jim Crow in her book of the same name. But the women involved in the drug trade are generally bit players, incidental arrestees usually picked up by police with their male co-conspirators in the hope that they can provide information in return for a reduced sentence.
Unfortunately, because they rarely have any information of value to trade, they tend to serve longer terms.
Dorothy Gaines was a 42-year-old widow, with two children, who encouraged the new man in her life to enter treatment for his addiction to crack cocaine. He entered treatment and continued in the program for eight months. After leaving treatment he relapsed and once again stated using crack.
Alabama State Police raided the home Dorothy shared with her partner, and even though they found no drugs or weapons, they arrested both on conspiracy to deliver cocaine. Turns out her boyfriend was a small time driver for a large-scale drug operation.
According to the ACLU:
Charges against Dorothy were initially dismissed, but several defendants in the conspiracy made a deal with the prosecutor to reduce their own sentences by providing information to assist in the prosecution of others. They alleged that Dorothy had delivered small packages of cocaine to local street sellers. On the basis of their testimony Dorothy was charged and convicted of conspiracy to distribute the total quantity of drugs involved in the drug operation, and served six years in prison before she was granted clemency.
The conspiracy charge that convicted Dorothy Gaines is one of the expanded liability provisions in drug laws that tend to ensnare women. In a conspiracy, all conspirators are held liable for the entire amount of the drug involved. So even though there were no drugs in her home, Dorothy was held responsible for the total amount of the drugs held by all members of the conspiracy, even those she didn't know.
Accomplice liability is another provision that catches women up in the drug war even if there was no direct knowledge of any crime on the part of the woman:

In Brenda Prather’s case, the act triggering liability was handing a piece of aluminum foil to her husband. Brenda Prather was sentenced to 40 years to life imprisonment upon conviction of criminal sale of a controlled substance. Brenda was charged with this offense after her husband sold drugs to an undercover New York State police investigator on two occasions. The charge was based in part on the fact that Brenda handed her husband a roll of foil from their kitchen that he subsequently used in drug-related activity. Although her husband testified that Brenda was unaware of the drug transactions for which she was charged, the state imputed knowledge of the drug transactions to her.
Forty years to life for aluminum foil.
These are nonviolent offenders. Mostly poor, addicted, and abused, they don't belong in prisons. They need to be placed in community facilities where they can receive treatment for their addictions, therapy for their abuse and vocational training. For the sake of their children, they need to be placed close to home where communication and visitation are simpler and more economical.
Even more importantly, the laws that put these women in prison need to be reviewed. We need sane drug laws that do imprison those who deserve it but that do not cast such a wide net that the struggling minnows are dragged in as well.