But age 37 has been different. Jurik is working and staying clean. She is going to school and learning there are people in the world who care about her. Report by LJWorld.com.

“I feel like somebody worth something,” she said, sitting between the two women she credits with much of her success.

The women are Dot Fernandez and Cindy Manske, co-founders of Freedom Foundation Ministries. Since last June, they have been holding life-skills classes for women in Topeka Correctional Facility and pairing them with mentors for when they are released. The group also offers optional religious services.

“It’s important for them to have that support from somebody who doesn’t want anything from them,” Fernandez said.

After Jurik was released from prison last April, Fernandez helped her get a job at a restaurant and enroll in cosmetology school in Topeka. She has also helped Jurik avoid her old way of life, which included alcohol abuse and bad relationships. She was convicted multiple times for forgery and drug possession.

Jurik said she has had one addiction relapse since being released from prison. In the past, that would have been the beginning of a downward spiral that likely would have ended in another prison cell. This time she called for help, and Fernandez spent an emotional hour in a cafe counseling Jurik.

Jurik said she has been clean since.

“I’ve used her to pick me up when I’ve fallen,” Jurik said.

Progress lost

Kansas was recently a model for helping people like Jurik.

In 2007, former Gov. Kathleen Sebelius signed legislation to grant up to 60 days in reduced sentences for inmates who attended offender re-entry programs and appropriated $4 million in grants for communities with plans to reduce recidivism.

Kansas was among the top three states with the largest improvement in its recidivism rate from 2004-2007, according to a 2011 Pew Study, and its inmate population fell 5 percent from fiscal year 2006 fiscal to year 2009, according to the Kansas Legislative Research Department.

Gov. Sam Brownback, then a U.S. senator, championed a bipartisan bill inspired by the Kansas law. It was later signed by President George W. Bush and became the Second Chance Act, which awarded grants to governments and organizations that helped offenders better return to society.

But Kansas’ fiscal woes have taken a toll on such programs, and the Kansas inmate population has been back on the rise. Every year since fiscal year 2009, there have been more people in Kansas prisons and jails than the year before. There were 9,186 prisoners in September 2011, the highest number in a decade.

It’s a trend the Department of Corrections worries will continue given current funding levels for offender programs. The Kansas Legislative Research Department included that concern in its 2012 legislators’ briefing book, a guide of issues provided to state lawmakers.

Fernandez believes her program is allowed access to the prison because of the state’s diminished ability to provide such services. But she praised Brownback, who has called for every Kansas inmate to have a mentor during the months before and after they are released.

“I know he (Brownback) isn’t always the most popular, but that’s something very positive he’s done,” Fernandez said.

As of December, 500 volunteers have been recruited for Brownback’s Mentoring 4 Success initiative.

Manske, the other Freedom Foundation co-founder, acknowledges the teaching and the mentoring is time intensive and affects relatively few. They have resources to help just 10 women each year. To her, it’s still progress.

“It’s one woman at a time,” Manske said.

Hope

Jurik has 12-year-old twins, a boy and a girl. They live in Louisiana, and she hasn’t seen them since they were 3.

A few weeks ago, their father unexpectedly emailed her a link to a Facebook page he had created. She opened it up and saw pictures of her twins, happy and doing well. She hopes she will get to see them again.

“It’s just one little step,” Jurik said. “Now I’m being reunited with my children slowly. It’s just a lot of good things.”

State Rep. Betty Reed, D-Tampa (Pic by Meredith Geddings, via myfloridahouse.gov)

State Rep. Betty Reed, D-Tampa, says she is getting ready to re-introduce legislation that would create humane rules for the shackling of pregnant women who are incarcerated.

Last session, the bill almost made it to a final vote, but it eventually died in early May. Reed tells The Florida Independent she is not sure why House Speaker Dean Cannon did not move the bill forward, but says she is ready to try again. Report by The Florida Independent.

In 2010, the state of Florida received an “F” for its shackling policies in a report compiled by the Rebecca Project for Human Rights. The report (.pdf), “Mothers Behind Bars: A state-by-state report card and analysis of federal policies on conditions of confinement for pregnant and parenting women and the effect on their children,” analyzes whether a state’s policies harm pregnant women who are incarcerated. It was also “intended to help advocates assess their own state’s policies affecting these significant phases of pregnancy, labor and delivery, and parenting.”

The report gave a failing grade to any state that failed to “comprehensively limit, or limit at all, the use of restraints on pregnant women during transportation, labor and delivery and postpartum recuperation.” Thirty-six states, including Florida, received failing grades.

According to the report, of the states that received failing grades:

Twenty-two states either have no policy at all addressing when restraints can be used on pregnant women or have a policy which allows for the use of dangerous leg irons or waist chains.

When a pregnant woman is placed in restraints for security reasons, eleven states either allow any officer to make the determination or do not have a policy on who determines whether the woman is a security risk.

Thirty-one states do not require input from medical staff when determining whether restraints will be used.

Twenty-four states do not require training for individuals handling and transporting incarcerated persons needing medical care or those dealing with pregnant women specifically, or have no policy on training.

Thirty-one states do not have a policy that holds institutions accountable for shackling pregnant women without adequate justification.

Thirty-four states do not require each incident of the use of restraints to be reported or reviewed by an independent body.

With help from the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida, Reed and state Sen. Anthony Hill, D-Jacksonville, introduced House Bill 779 this past session. The bill would have put policy in place specifically regarding the restraint of incarcerated pregnant women in Florida.

According to a summary, the bill:

Prohibits use of restraints on prisoner known to be pregnant during labor, delivery, & postpartum recovery unless corrections official makes individualized determination that prisoner presents extraordinary circumstance requiring restraints; provides that doctor, nurse, or other health care professional treating prisoner may request that restraints not be used, in which case corrections officer or other official accompanying prisoner shall remove all restraints; requires that any restraint applied must be done in least restrictive manner; requires corrections official to make written findings within 10 days as to extraordinary circumstance; provides that use of restraints at any time after it is known that prisoner is pregnant must be by least restrictive manner necessary; requires findings be kept on file; authorizes woman restrained in violation of act to file grievance within specified period; provides that these remedies do not prevent complaint under any other law; requires facilities to inform female prisoners of rules; requires reports.

Reed says she was disappointed the bill did not make it to a final vote, and was surprised it did not get more momentum from Cannon, considering the priority state legislators gave a slew of anti-abortion bills that session.

“I thought that was the perfect time,” she says. “They said they were going to protect babies, and I was hoping they would protect women, too. I don’t understand why they did not push this to pass.”

Reed says another obstacle was the the Department of Corrections’ reaction to the bill.

A response (.pdf) from the department posted on the website of the Association of State Correctional Administrators, claims that the Rebecca Report was “misleading.”

According to the agency’s statement:

The Florida Department of Corrections does not shackle or otherwise restrain female inmates in any stage of labor. As per the accompanying procedures pregnant inmates are restrained in wrist restraints in front of their body during transport outside the facility for medical appointments and closely escorted by a corrections officer utilizing a ‘custodial touch’ to insure that the officer can provide assistance should the inmate stumble or otherwise become unstable so as to assist her in preventing a fall. A pregnant woman, who is being transported, may be restrained in this manner, depending upon her custody level and behavior. If the inmate is already in labor during transport, she will not be restrained. In the hospital after delivery is complete, inmates are tethered to their beds by one ankle. This is the department’s standard restraint practice for inmates in outside hospitals to provide security for the hospital and to prevent escapes. Additionally, there is a correctional officer in the room with them at all times, to be sure they have access to the bathroom or any other needs they may have.

Reed, along with civil liberties and reproductive rights advocates, believe each state should have specific policy in place that would deter bad practices.

“I know the Department of Corrections wasn’t happy,” Reed says, “but I am going to keep on filing [the bill].”

Reed says she “in no way supports the criminal behavior of the women.” However, she does believe that they should receive humane treatment.

“We are not telling [the Department of Corrections] how to do their job,” she says. “This is a human issue.”

Chief U.S. District Judge Rudolph Randa’s order came in response to an American Civil Liberties Union motion for an injunction forcing the state to make changes.   The action is part of a federal class-action lawsuit the ACLU filed in 2006 on behalf of inmates at the state’s largest women’s prison.   The ACLU contends the state is violating the rights of Taycheedah prisoners by having guards without medical training dispense drugs to inmates, routinely resulting in the wrong medications or wrong dosages being given to inmates.

The state admits there are problems but says it is working to fix them. It argued that it has a plan to hire nursing assistants to hand out drugs and that the ACLU’s timetable was unreasonable.   Randa disagreed, writing that “matters of administrative convenience must ultimately give way when constitutional rights are in jeopardy.”  Randa ordered the state to draw up a plan to hire licensed practical nurses for Taycheedah within a week and have them in place in 60 days. In the issue of computerizing the prescription system, Randa gave the state two months to take “interim steps” to improve drug distribution accuracy …

Department of Corrections spokesman John Dipko said he did not know how many nurses would be hired or how much it would cost … Dipko said agency officials had not determined whether they will appeal the order, but even if they do, they will comply with the order in the meantime.

Larry Dupuis, legal director for the ACLU of Wisconsin, said, “Judge Randa has taken a huge step toward alleviating the needless pain and suffering caused by Taycheedah’s failed medication system.”

A groundbreaking ceremony was held Wednesday for [Alabama]’s first all-female federal prison.  The prison will be built on 120 acres in Pickens County near Aliceville.  It will house 1,300 medium security inmates and have 350 employees at a price tag of $185 million dollars.  It will open in 2011.

Right now, the Industrial Home for Youth has juvenile prisoners along with members of the adult population, ranging in age from 18-21 … They are considering a move that would put all 18-21 year old offenders at the Donald R. Kuhn Center in Boone County … Right now, that facility is a diagnostic center treating offenders …

Department of Military Affairs and Public Safety Spokesperson Joe Thornton said when they looked at their options, separating the adults from the juveniles was the best option, and DRK was the best place to move the adults. The juveniles currently housed there will go to the facility that best suits them somewhere else in the state. It’s not clear just how much it’s going to cost to upgrade the security at the DRK facility, but Thornton says in the end, safety of inmates outweighs the cost. He also says the folks who work at DRK are trained in all levels of security, so the fact that a more violent population is coming to Boone County doesn’t mean changes when it comes to personnel.

Women will also be moved to an all-female facility as a result of these proposed changes.

The work center, however, did not solve Deschutes County’s long-term need for more jail space, and Sheriff Larry Blanton said the jail could soon run out of beds for inmates.   If the inmate population outgrows the Deschutes County jail in the next year, Blanton is considering sending offenders to Jefferson County’s jail, which would allow Deschutes County to avoid early releases for some inmates. Blanton set aside about $300,000 to pay for as many as 20 beds in Jefferson County’s jail in his budget for the upcoming fiscal year that starts in July.

Deschutes officials have known for several years that the jail — which has 228 beds — needed to be expanded, but a lack of funding has held up those plans … In 2006, a consulting group hired by the county recommended adding beds and staff, but the county has been unable to  pull together the estimated $44 million it will cost to expand the jail.  “I would be surprised if between now and when we get the jail built, we don’t have to exercise an option to put people somewhere else,” Blanton said. The last thing he wants to do is “matrix” inmates, he said …

Deschutes County’s work center provides 90 additional beds for male inmates who can work on projects in the community, but a county policy limits the work center to inmates who meet certain criteria, such as showing good behavior in custody and being at the jail on less-serious charges. The Sheriff’s Office already has revised the policy several times, Blanton said, to allow more inmates to qualify for the work center.   “In a perfect world, the people you would have in the work center would be the ones you would not worry about having out in the community,” Blanton said. “Essentially, what it’s turned into now is a default jail” …

Another factor in the shortage of jail beds is an increase in the number of female inmates, said Blanton and Capt. Ruth Jenkin, who oversees the jail. The county recently set aside 12 more beds for women, which brought the total number available for women to 40 beds. That means 12 fewer beds for men.  “The female population has increased dramatically,” Blanton said. “We were out of female beds to the point where we were going to have to matrix a lady.”

There is a lot more background in the article at the Bend Bulletin.

The counties with the highest per capita rates of women in prison were Stephens, Grady, Pittsburg and Custer. The figures are based on the number of women going to prison for more than a year compared to the female population in each county.

In many cases, nonurban counties had a higher rate because they have fewer alternatives to incarceration, said Laura Pitman, female offender operations deputy director.   “It certainly has an impact on a county’s ability to divert offenders,” Pitman said.    Access to more community mental health and substance abuse treatment services could also cut down on the number of women going to prison, Pitman said …

While the smaller counties had a higher rate of incarceration based on population, Oklahoma, Tulsa and Comanche counties still sent the largest overall total number of women to prisons, according to the report.  Oklahoma leads the nation in the per capita number of women in prison — Oklahoma imprisons 131 women per 100,000 women. The national average is 69, according to U.S. Department of Justice statistics … In the past three years, the number of women in prison has grown steadily by at least 10 percent each year, according to the report. Without significant changes, the female prison population could grow to as high as 3,028 by 2013, according to the report. In 2008, there were 2,721 women in prison, DOC records show.

[T]he findings in the report provide the most detailed examination yet of women in the nation’s largest women’s jail facility. According to a survey of inmates, 81% of women in custody have served time behind bars in the past — most of them in Los Angeles County. The report predicted that most of the inmates were likely to come back in the future. “Many of them report that they cycled in and out of the criminal justice system for years,” Merrick Bobb, special counsel to the county supervisors, wrote in his semiannual report on the Sheriff’s Department, which operates the jails …

Bobb surveyed 330 of them in September and found that 45% were on probation and 22% on parole at the time of their arrests. Nearly six out of 10 had a history of substance abuse, and slightly more than half were unemployed or disabled when they were arrested. The inmates were disproportionately African American — 43% of the jail population, compared to 10% in the county.   Most were single women with children under 18 years old. Most were awaiting trial and could not afford the bail to get out.  Roughly 32,000 women pass through the women’s jail system annually…

Because of jail overcrowding, most women serve just 10% of their sentences — compared to slightly less than 70% for men. Overcrowding has forced the department to immediately release “any inmate whose sentence is less than 180 days,” Bobb wrote.

The U.S. Justice Department in 2006 declared the lack of mental health care at Taycheedah Correctional Institution, the state’s largest women’s prison in Fond du Lac, violated inmates’ constitutional rights. The state agreed this past September to make improvements or face a U.S. Justice Department lawsuit. “These investments will help us improve the continuity of care for women who have mental illnesses in our prison system,” Corrections Department spokesman John Dipko said in a statement.  Part of the state’s plan calls for building a 45-bed women’s-only wing at the Wisconsin Resource Center, a mental health facility for male inmates in Winnebago. The $11 million project was approved as part of the state’s 2007-2009 capital budget. It’s set to open in 2011.

Doyle’s spending plan sets out $4.6 million in taxpayer dollars for the Department of Health and Human Services to hire 113 workers at the facility in 2011. The governor’s budget also devotes another $4.2 million in taxpayer dollars to hire 15 guards for the female-only wing and another 40 mental health workers at Taycheedah.  The spending proposals come despite the state’s massive $5.7 billion deficit

Staff at HMP Styal, in Cheshire, lack training and support to deal with the most “damaged” women, said Anne Owers … But the National Offender Management Service said “innovative” work at the prison had also been recognised … The announced inspection was carried out in September at the prison, which has 460 inmates – half of whom have issues with drugs.  The report said that prisoners’ level of vulnerability compared with other women’s jails was “extremely high”.  It concluded that HMP Styal “was not able to meet the scale and complexity of the needs of the women it held”.

On the Keller unit, for women with mental health issues, inspectors found the use of force by prison staff had “increased significantly”.  These inmates, some of whom had serious self-harming issues, were often forced to strip as part of the prison’s care plan.  The Keller prisoners were also locked up for most of the time …

Campaigners from Inquest, a charity which works with families of those who die in custody, have repeatedly protested outside the prison over the same issues.   Co-director Deborah Coles said: “As the report demonstrates, the response of the Prison Service does not reflect the seriousness of the failings that have been exposed both by inspection reports and inquests into the deaths of vulnerable women.  “What is needed is a fundamental rethink, not only about Styal but in the whole approach to women who offend, and the provision of alternatives to custody.”