[0:11]What was the hardest thing to adjust to when you first came into this prison? I've always naively I guess, thought that women were the gentler sex, that the weaker sex, that's what society wants us to believe. And the fact that women can stab a man to death 40 times, I find that incomprehensible.
[0:42]South of Chicago in the state of Indiana, two prisons hold some of America's most dangerous female criminals. The Rockville Correctional Facility and Indiana Women's Prison house over 1,800 offenders. Many are serving long sentences for extremely violent crimes. Some will end their days here. How severely was the victim hurt? The bullet came into close contact with his eye and it It struck him in the face? Yes. For four weeks, I was given access to a world and a culture, the like of which, I've never known. So you were classed as a baby killer. I was that. I am that. I'm a lot more than that as well, but that's who I am.
[1:38]America imprisons more women than anywhere else in the world.
[1:57]My second visit to Indiana Women's Prison began in its segregation unit. The prisoners here are among the most dangerous and some have been punished for breaking the rules. They're locked down for 23 hours a day and have no contact with the rest of the institution. Miss Boyd? Some people here would like to meet you. Okay. Thank you very much for coming out of your cell to talk to us. No problem. How long have you been in this segregation unit? In about a week it'll be four months. So. What's that like? It's hard, especially being pregnant. You're pregnant? Yeah. When when did you find out you're pregnant, where? Um, when I got arrested, they gave me a pregnancy test at um, the County Jail. While I was there, and I found out there, and I was already like a month in my pregnancy, because I'm five months right now. It's one thing to be pregnant in in any general prison population. It must be particularly agonizing to be pregnant and to be in a segregated cell. Yeah, like I said you feel alone, you feel like, I mean, it's so depressing to where like, every day at six o'clock, we're when we get mail, you sit there on your bed and you look under your door to see if you get mail, and when you don't, like I sit there and I cry, because I feel like, everybody just forgot about me. And being pregnant is even worse because my hormones are drive me crazy. One minute I'm mad, one minute I'm even madder, one minute I'm really upset. It's just an emotional rollercoaster in this little room by myself. When was your last communication with the father of your child? Before we came here. Is this your first baby? No, I have a daughter. She's five. She's with my mother right now. What does your five-year-old make of uh of your situation, because she is probably up the age where she's just about beginning to comprehend that her mother is not around. Oh, yeah. I talk to her. She knows that I've been in trouble and she tells me like it is. I'll call her at home and she'll tell me, why can't you just stop being in trouble and be home with me and you know, she tells me, she's she's like the mom and I'm the child. That's what it seems like right now.
[4:54]Boyd escaped from a prison work program, which was based in the local community. Her punishment is six months in this unit.
[5:09]Pregnant women who do follow the rules and who have committed less serious crimes are put in a separate wing. Once they're about to give birth, they are taken to a local hospital. Their babies will then spend the first months of their lives back here.
[5:36]Brooke, how long have you been in prison? I've been here since September. And when was your? He was born December 6th. What's his name? Zaden. Zaden. How well did they look after you in this facility, when when you were in the advanced stages of your pregnancy? They looked out for us really well once, I had to go and be induced. So they took me out, uh, Wednesday evening and I went to the hospital, got induced and I had him later on that night. And we get to stay there 24 to 48 hours depending on whether you bottle feed or breastfeed. How does that work in hospital? Are you, do you have a somebody looking over you? You have a guard there while you give birth? Yes, the officer usually sits in the room 24/7, and you're shackled to the bed unless you're in active labor, then they actually let you stay unshackled until you're give birth. After you give birth you have to get shackled back to the bed. You're shackled to a bed. Just your ankle. Just your ankle, but you're shackled to a bed. You're shackled, yes. It's not the most propitious. No. Circumstances in which to have something which is so intensely personal. It is very embarrassing, very embarrassing. May I see the cell where you spend most of your time? Yes. Thank you. Hi. How how different would this be in its physical surroundings if you were at home? At home he would have his own room. I wouldn't have my bed in here. He would have a dresser, changing table. What what would you tell your son when he is old enough about where he was born and the circumstances in which he was born? Um, I really haven't thought about that question yet. Um, I would just tell him that Mommy made a big mistake and it was for the better why I came here. Made mommy learn a lot and I hope he can learn from my mistakes and see how embarrassing it was to be here and hopefully he won't ever come to a place like this. You tell him he was born in prison? Yes.
[8:06]It's visiting time and Kim is preparing to take Baby Gabriella outside the unit.
[8:17]At times like these, offenders are sharply reminded of where they are.
[8:29]So you have to be a company on his visits out, Kim, do you? Um, when we have the babies, yes. Yes. Why is that? Um, just for their safety. I mean you're sexual offenders here that have done crimes like that. So that's one of the reasons why we escort them. It's difficult to to believe that people will want to do anything to a child being taken out to a visiting area. No. It might happen, yeah. And you have to make sure it doesn't. Yes, sir. This after all Kim is a women's prison, so it's rather difficult to imagine that a woman would do something against a child. Oh yeah, for me it's it's hard for me to fathom that a mother or any woman would be able to do that to a child, but it it happens and there's actually women in this prison that have hurt their children. Yeah, I couldn't imagine.
