This message was in part a continuation of a message Native-L carried a
year and a bit ago, "send greetings to sisters in prison". A
disproportion of the prison population in Canada is Native, and a further
disproportion of those classified as maximum-security are also. Of the
seven women so far identified for transfer to Kingston Pen, six are
Native. The message was prompted by a rally called by people at the
Native Friendship Centre in Kingston.
Not all those affected are Native women, of course. In fact a number of
non-Native women in P4W participate in traditional ceremonies, like
sweats, and have access to a Native counselor who visits, and, i'm told,
receive much healing from them. But the group most strongly affected are
Native. As the previous message of a year ago November explained, six (if
i recall) Native women took their own lives in P4W or immediately after
leaving. Conditions in KP can only be worse.
[ Steve has kindly sought out the previously-posted articles referred to
above in the NATIVE-L archives and provided the URLs of those articles:
"http://bioc09.uthscsa.edu/natnet/archive/nl/9603/0090.html" - entitled
"send greetings to sisters in prison for women" (13 March 1996) and
"http://bioc09.uthscsa.edu/natnet/archive/nl/9606/0007.html" - entitled
"sisters in Prison for Women: Wanda's talk" (31 May 1996). --Gary ]
Three years ago this April a disturbance took place at Kingston's Prison
for Women in Ontario (Canada). It resulted in the strip-search, by a male
response team, "body cavity search", and shackling of the six women
prisoners involved, and their detention in solitary for many months. The
case developed into a major news item, culminating in the Arbour Commission
of Inquiry, which was generally commended for taking a principled stance on
the matter. After publication of the commission's report last year, P4W and
the conditions within slipped from the public's awareness again. The prison
was supposed to be closed, and the women sent to regional centres. It was
believed that that particular sore spot would no longer be a problem.
Such hopes have turned out to be premature. Vague motions are being made
in the direction of closing Prison for Women, but what will happen to some
of the women there is no improvement. Corrections Canada has decided to
send several of them, who are classified as maximum-security risks, to
Kingston Penitentiary, one block away. (Kingston has five prisons within
town limits, and another five within a 45-minute drive.) Kingston Pen is
itself a maximum-security institution, heretofore entirely populated with
male offenders - many of them violently so.
The space being prepared for the women is currently used by a psychiatric
treatment centre located in the prison. The space is on the top floor of
the building, and a fenced exercise area is also to be prepared.
Kingston Pen is only one block from the P4W, but is a world away in
function and intent. It houses some of the worst of Canada's criminals:
murderers, wife-batterers, pedophiles, child molesters, serial killers and
serial rapists. All are a danger to women. KP did, in fact, house female
inmates until they were moved to the P4W in 1935 on the grounds that it was
inappropriate for women to be housed with abusive men. Margaret Atwood
describes the place in her current best-seller `Alias Grace'.
The move, given the reputation of KP and its inmates, has made the women
extremely anxious. One visitor said the women are "a wreck." Two in the
past week have threatened suicide. The reasons for their concern can be
expressed no more clearly than by Karen Dodd, herself one of the women
facing possible transfer:
Studies show that most women in prison have had crimes committed
against them, both as women and as children. So why are we being
moved to a prison which holds these types of men? I ask you,
where is the rehabilitation in this picture? I see only
punishment.
Another woman prisoner said,
I was raped and my daughter has also been abused. ... I don't
want to be around rapists and pedophiles.
Shortly after the April 1994 incident, several women were in fact moved
temporarily to KP. Here are a couple of descriptions of their reception:
We were in the yard one day and a bunch of guys came up to the
fence and started yelling at us. They started shaking the fence
so hard the guards came out of the towers with their guns. We got
scared and tried to get back inside the building but no-one would
let us in.
- a woman from P4W who had been in KP
The men would yell things like, 'show us your tits, bitch,' call us
sluts, tell us to go back to P4W.
- a woman from P4W who had been in KP
And Marjorie Beaudry, another woman in P4W, points this out:
A year and a half ago a woman, a clerk at KP, was raped and held
hostage. If they can't ensure the safety of their own female
workers, how the hell are they going to ensure my safety?
Male inmates presently resident on the third floor are being moved to
make room for the women. Furthermore, KP administration says the men will
be locked down any time the women are moved - two measures certain to
aggravate the resentment the men can be expected to feel.
A citizen's advisory committee has written to Solicitor-General Herb Gray
and other officials, to say that the move to KP is "a very poor idea, and
will be very costly in human and financial terms." The chair of the
committee, who has worked with the inmates in various capacities since
1981, found "a tremendous amount of insecurity" in the treatment centre in
KP. The letter has apparently had no effect.
Low-security facilities are being built or have been built to take some
of the female prison population as Prison for Women is closed. A healing
lodge in Saskatchewan, which follows traditional Native healing practices
and accepts Native and non-Native women, seems to be doing good work. There
is another in Kitchener. Unfortunately, these are for people classified as
minimum security risks. The advisory committee's unanimous recommendation
was that the maximum-security women be kept in P4W until new facilities can
be built, but such a move is apparently not being contemplated. Corrections
Canada calls its move an "interim measure", but it has revealed nothing in
the nature of an alternate long term plan, or a timetable for change.
At the time of the 1994 incident, some 8 women were classified maximum-
risk. This number has been rising: it is now 20 or 25, meaning that many
more people ready to be injected into a population of violent males.
Melissa Stewart, Director of Project Another Chance, says that Corrections
Canada currently has more than 39 women slated for eventual transfer to KP.
The classification process itself has made the women feel quite insecure.
Upon entry into the prison system one is automatically classed as a
maximum-security risk. Pat Tate, who works at the Kingston Native
Friendship Centre, points out that anyone could become involved in a
confrontation, willingly or not, and find herself reclassified as a result.
One woman, she says, went to bed as a Medium risk and woke up as a Maximum.
More unfortunately still, it seems that a disproportion of Native women
are classed as high risk. Apparently the first seven women targeted for
transfer have been identified, and it is also worth noting who they are.
Six of the women are Native, and the seventh is Black. Pat Tate asks, "If
this isn't racism, what is?"
The first move is scheduled for April. One woman destined for KP, unless a
halfway house can be found for her, is 7 months pregnant. Your response
needs to get out soon.
What you can do: write Solicitor-General Herb Gray and PM Jean Chretien.
This is likely to be an election year, and Ottawa should be sensitive to
public comment. A Habeas Corpus process is underway in court, but such
actions are expensive and uncertain.
Herb Gray's address is:
Sir Wilfrid Laurier Bldg, 13th flooor
340 Laurier Ave W. Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0P8
tel 613-991-2924, fax 613-952-2240
http://www.sgc.gc.ca/
Prime Minister Jean Chretien can be reached at
Prime Minister's Office, Langevin Block
80 Wellington St.
Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0A2