Women Barred from Justice

Women barred from justice
Conditions for women in prisons in BC are deplorable and unnecessary
by Sonia Marino
Although the vast majority of women in prison are incarcerated for non-violent offences and pose no threat to the community, many women in prison in BC are held under conditions that are far more severe than their crime warrants. The closure of the Burnaby Correctional Centre for Women in 2004 has brought many changes for women in prison in BC.

Provincially-sentenced women (those sentenced to less than two years) are now mainly held in the Alouette Correctional Centre for Women in Maple Ridge. Many of the women imprisoned at Alouette are classified as minimum security but have no access to a minimum-security prison environment. The conditions at Alouette are officially said to be designed for women classified as medium security, but a full perimeter fence and other security measures suggest that the conditions are actually more like maximum security.

However, provincially-sentenced women designated as maximum security are held in virtual isolation in a maximum security unit inside the Surrey Pretrial Centre, a men’s prison. Women are serving time in men's lock-ups all over the province (including in the Prince George Regional Correctional Centre) under conditions that are not appropriate to either their gender or their security classification.

Federally-sentenced women (those sentenced to two years or more) are now held in the Fraser Valley Institution for Women in Abbotsford. Although Fraser Valley already has a maximum-security perimeter, a new Maximum Security Unit has been built (at great expense) and is scheduled to open in August 2005. Yet despite a recommendation by the Canadian Human Rights Commission, the Correctional Service of Canada has failed to build a minimum security unit at Fraser Valley outside the perimeter. Women designated as minimum security are living under maximum security conditions at this prison.

At the Burnaby Correctional Centre for Women, women with a minimum security designation had access to an open living unit which held up to 28 minimum security prisoners. When the Burnaby centre closed, the cell space for women prisoners in BC increased by over 100 beds, but women designated minimum security no longer have access to a minimum security prison.

The only real minimum security prison for federally sentenced women in Canada is the Isabel McNeill Minimum Security House in Kingston, Ontario. The Correctional Service of Canada keeps threatening to close Isabel McNeill, however, so women are hesitant to transfer there.

Having access to a minimum security prison is essential for women, as they require opportunities to leave the prison to work and to build community supports to prepare for release. Being held in a higher security prison means being subjected to much more intense surveillance, having less access to programs, and remaining more isolated from the community, all of which put women at a disadvantage when it comes to release from prison.

The Canadian Human Rights Commission recently concluded that “the lack of minimum security facilities for federally-sentenced women prevents them from being incarcerated in the least restrictive conditions possible as required by the Corrections and Conditional Release Act …

Thus, minimum security women live with physical barriers such as fences, locked gates, razor wire and cameras while their male counterparts tend to be housed in facilities that do not even have chain-link fences.”

Despite the fact that almost half of federally sentenced women are designated as minimum security prisoners, only a handful of those women have access to a minimum security facility.
With the announced closure of Kingston’s notorious Prison for Women in 1994, five regional prisons were built. These prisons were supposed to incorporate a more holistic approach to women’s imprisonment based on empowerment, meaningful and responsible choices, respect and dignity, shared responsibility, and supportive environments.

In 1996, after a walkaway escape, slashings and suicide attempts by women in the new regional prisons, the Correctional Services Commission responded by transferring all women classified as maximum security out of the women’s prisons and into isolated sections of men’s maximum security prisons. For the past nine years women have been held in isolation in men’s maximum security prisons.

On March 8 th 2001, the women in Saskatchewan Penitentiary brought a discrimination complaint against Correctional Services. The Canadian Human Rights Commission agreed to investigate. In January 2004 they found discrimination against federally sentenced women based on gender, race and disability, and made 19 recommendations for change. The report, Protecting Their Rights, can be viewed online at chrc-ccdp.ca.

Rather than moving the women out of the men’s prisons and into the existing women’s prisons, Correctional Service has started building new maximum security units within prisons that are already designed for maximum security prisoners. Some of these new maximum security units have already opened, and the conditions under which the women now live are still not equivalent to the conditions for maximum security men: they are much harsher, and more in line with the super maximum conditions at Special Handling Units in men’s prisons.

According to Filis Iverson, prison abolitionist and prison justice day organizer, women in these new “Max Units” spend their first six months locked in their cells, only to come out for doctor’s appointments and visits; they are not allowed to communicate with any other prisoners; and when they come out of their cells they are in leg shackles and handcuffs, and are escorted by two or more guards. “A woman can work her way to the next step where there are no shackles,” Filis explains, “just handcuffs and two guards. But if at any point she exhibits ‘inappropriate behaviour’ she can be sent back to the first step. When one prisoner is out of her cell, all other prisoners are locked up.”
This level of security is not justifiable in terms of women’s crime nor women’s threat to the community. Women are a low risk to re-offend and have high needs in terms of treatment and healing from physical and sexual abuse, substance abuse, employment training, and education.

The majority of maximum security classified women are First Nations women and women with mental health issues. The needs of women in society have been turned into risk factors and as a result women who are the most socially and economically disadvantaged are classified as maximum security.

Despite the fact that a new provincial prison for women at Alouette opened recently in BC, large numbers of provincial women prisoners in this province are being held in men’s lock-ups in virtual isolation. While some northern or rural women might choose this option because it is preferable to being transferred to a women’s prison so far from home and community, others are being held in the Surrey Pre-trial Centre, a men’s lock-up just a short distance away from the women’s prison. Any woman who is being held on remand or on an immigration hold or who is classified as maximum security is being held in an isolated section of the Surrey Pretrial Centre, or other men’s lock-ups in rural communities across the province.
This is unacceptable.

With ample space and a full perimeter fence at Alouette, there is no reason why these women cannot be removed from Surrey Pre-trial (or other men’s lock-ups if they so choose) and held at Alouette. There are few programs and resources available to women held in men’s prisons. The women are being held in virtual isolation, segregated from the programs and treatment that are needed for release.

We encourage you to write to Premier Gordon Campbell and Solicitor General Wally Oppal and urge them to stop holding women in men’s prisons in BC.
This article was written by the Prison Justice Day Committee. Come to the Prison Justice Day Memorial Rally on Wednesday, August 10 th at 7pm at Trout Lake Park in East Vancouver to show your solidarity and support for prisoners and prison justice. For more information, visit prisonjustice.ca
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