Organizing News, Action Alerts and Updates on Women's Prisons
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Victims of Forced Sterilization in California Are Fighting for Reparations
In the mid-2000s, Moonlight Pulido experienced a bout of hot flashes, emotional ups-and-downs, and other symptoms of menopause that confused her — after all, she was in her 30s and far too young to be experiencing these kinds of hormonal changes. Days before the symptoms set in, she had undergone what she believed to be a procedure to remove cancerous growths on her internal reproductive organs at the hospital at Valley State Prison for Women in Chowchilla, California, where she was incarcerated. Instead, she had been forcibly sterilized.
‘IT’S FINALLY OVER.’ SAN DIEGO DA DROPS 22-YEAR-OLD MURDER CASE AGAINST JANE DOROTIK
The San Diego County District Attorney’s Office moved to dismiss a murder case against a woman who served nearly 20 years in prison for her husband’s death, citing insufficient evidence for a retrial.
Organizing & Action Updates
Dozens of women at FCI Dublin detail rape and retaliation – real reform is questioned
Dozens of women detail rape and retaliation at Dublin prison
Over the course of eight months, KTVU has spoken with more than three dozen women who say they have been sexually assaulted or witnessed such abuse at FCI Dublin. Many who spoke up were retaliated against.
PRESS RELEASE ON FCI DUBLIN SEXUAL ABUSE
Over one hundred advocacy organizations from across California and the United States have sent a public letter to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) demanding that the agency take immediate steps to address systemic abuse at the Federal Correctional Institute at Dublin (FCI Dublin), a federal women’s prison in Dublin, California.
DV and LWOP Survivor Marisela Andrade testifies at Immigration Hearing.
6/16/22 UPDATE
Marisela Andrade maintained her dignity, courage, and strength during a grueling 4-hour immigration court hearing on June 15, 2022. With more than 50 community supporters on the phone, Marisela made her case for asylum based on the Conventions Against Torture (CAT) and then was questioned by Immigration Judge Elizabeth McGrail and Dept. of Homeland Security (DHS) attorney Matt Richardson.
CCWP in the News
Aging in Prison: How Older Generations Fight for Dignity and Release
Chyrl Lamar is an advocate with the California Coalition for Women Prisoners, an organization with chapters in the Bay Area and Los Angeles. Lamar was incarcerated in September 1986. For the next 34 years she lived at the Central California Women’s Facility, a prison in Central Valley’s Madera County. Lamar was released December 2020, at age 69. On Jan. 17, 2022, she was discharged off parole.
Prison Pen Pals Chip Away at the Prison-Industrial Complex One Letter at a Time
On April 4, 2022, the state of Delaware is set to join dozens of prisons in 18 other states in ending physical mail sent inside the prison system. The policy would force loved ones, activists, and others to communicate only via costly digital platforms.
‘There’s no amount of money that can take away how I felt’: California pays reparations to survivors of state-sanctioned sterilizations
It’s been almost 20 years since a botched surgery while she was incarcerated, but Gabby Solano still mourns the bleak consequences of losing an ovary after her other ovary had already been compromised.
Updates on Prisons
Policies to roll back abortion rights will hit incarcerated people hard
Policies governing abortion and reproductive health care services in U.S. prisons and jails were restrictive and often hostile even before the Supreme Court removed Roe vs. Wade’s constitutional protections for abortions. After the June ruling, many reproductive services stand to be prohibited altogether, putting the health of incarcerated women who are pregnant at risk.
Formerly Incarcerated Women in Tennessee Win Reforms Ending Shackled Births
Advocates for reproductive rights in Tennessee won an important concession — an end to pregnancy in cuffs and chains.
She was jailed for losing a pregnancy. Her nightmare could become more common.
On 4 November 2019, TV stations across California blasted Chelsea Becker’s photo on their news editions. The “search was on” for a “troubled” 25-year-old woman wanted for the “murder of her unborn baby” …
