La adicción de los Estados Unidos a encarcelar a mujeres por casos de drogas

Noticias

La adicción de los Estados Unidos a encarcelar a mujeres por casos de drogas

20 octubre 2014

Las draconianas leyes del estado de Tennessee que criminalizan a las usuarias de drogas embarazadas podrían ayudar al país a mantener su título de principal encarcelador de mujeres del mundo, una infamia alimentada en gran parte por la guerra contra las drogas. Más información, en inglés, está disponible abajo.

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While drug reform initiatives are taking root across the United States, Tennessee’s draconian law criminalizing pregnant drug users could help the country keep it’s notorious title as the world’s largest incarcerator of women, an infamy fuelled largely by the war on drugs.

On July 1, a controversial new piece of legislation (SB1391) came into force in the US state of Tennessee meaning women can be imprisoned “for the illegal use of a narcotic drug while pregnant, if her child is born addicted to or harmed by the narcotic drug.”

Two women were charged with assault within the first month of the new law after their newborn babies tested positive for illicit substances, reported Al Jazeera. Though neither woman was ultimately sentenced to prison, instead being sent to attend court-ordered rehab, SB1391’s harsh penalties mean that judges have the scope to hand down a maximum prison term of 15 years.

As one Tennessee woman who suffers from problematic drug use told Al Jazeera, if SB1391 had been in place when she had given birth to her child it would have deterred her “from going to the hospital and seeking care” for her baby, as she “wouldn’t want to end up in jail.”

The disastrous consequences of this new law – one in a state where harm reduction programs are neither ubiquitous, nor easily accessible -- are manifold. When looking at the role of drug prohibition in driving female incarceration rates, SB1391 sadly does little to buck the historical trend in the US.

Click here to read the full article.

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