Blame her
Four years in prison for having a miscarriage.
On Tuesday, October 5, Brittney Poolaw, a 20-year-old Oklahoma woman, was convicted of manslaughter in the first degree for experiencing a miscarriage at 17 weeks and sentenced to 4 years in state prison.
Last year, Ms. Poolaw experienced a miscarriage and went to Comanche County Hospital for medical help. On March 17, 2020, she was charged with Manslaughter in the First Degree, arrested and incarcerated. The court set a $20,000 bond, an amount she could not afford. Ms. Poolaw has been incarcerated since her arrest over 18 months ago.
…
Contrary to all medical science, the prosecutor blamed the miscarriage on Ms. Poolaw’s alleged use of controlled substances. Not even the medical examiner’s report identifies use of controlled substances as the cause of the miscarriage. Even with this lack of evidence, the prosecutor moved forward with the charge. On October 5, after just a one-day trial, Ms. Poolaw was convicted and sentenced to a four year prison term.
You’ll be astonished to learn that Ms. Poolaw is not white.
Ms. Poolaw’s case is just one example of the troubling trend we are documenting in Oklahoma that replaces compassion and respect with criminal prosecution. In recent years, Oklahoma prosecutors, especially in Comanche and Kay Counties but also in Craig, Garfield, Jackson, Pontotoc, Payne, Rogers, and Tulsa counties have been using the State’s felony child neglect law to police pregnant women and to seek severe penalties for those who experience pregnancy losses. This use of prosecutorial discretion directly conflicts with the recommendations of every major medical organization, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, all of which know that such prosecutions actually increase risks of harm to maternal and child health.
Those risks are already shamefully high: the US has terrible stats on maternal health compared to other developed countries.
This report comes from the National Advocates for Pregnant Women. Women! Right there in the name of the group! It’s like spotting an Ivory-billed Woodpecker.
The elements of a crime are (supposed to be) motive, means, and opportunity. I don’t know how the judge can have found her guilty on those three elements alone, let alone contra medical evidence that the death does not match the crime.
These people hate women, especially native women. I don’t think it right to impune strangers, but I can see no other explanation.
Not only is that barbaric, it’s also contrary to Oklahoma law (assuming the article has the law right):
Meanwhile, if a woman failed to get treatment because of religion, and miscarried, she would be exempted because…well…religion.
What A Maroon, the law has an exception of the mother committed a crime that caused the miscarriage, so the prosecutors latched in to her substance use, although I’ve read elsewhere that the fetus had congenital deformities.