In April of 2007, I posted a diary in Feminisms, a now-defunct and sorely missed series concerned with women’s issues. The posting was about a friend of mine, Dawn, who after a short lifetime of bad luck and social malady, shot her boyfriend to death and was sentenced to 45 years in the state women’s prison. At the time of the diary I had been out of touch with Dawn for several years and so of course did not know the circumstances leading up to the shooting. I have since re-established the friendship and have not only visited her many times at the facility she grimly calls “my house,” we have kept up a nearly weekly correspondence and racked up quite a few hours on the phone. Below I'll tell you the rest of the story and ask if any of you might have some ideas that could help Dawn and her particular friend.
Dawn has accepted her fate and her punishment even though the circumstances of her defense were rife with the kind of corruption one expects anymore from American police and criminal prosecutors. For example, the dead boyfriend Kenny (yes, she killed Kenny) is from a well-known local ranching family. His father is a retired California highway patrol officer and his first cousin was the police investigator for the prosecution, a position from which he should have recused himself but did not. Because of these connections, absolutely nothing was done to verify Dawn’s contention that she shot her boyfriend in self-defense. The substantial bruising around her neck and subsequent swelling and breathing difficulty were never entered into evidence even though the bruises were apparent in her mug shot. Dawn’s first chance for parole will come in 2020 and in more confident moments she hopes that by then most of the players in this drama will have moved on and that her good behavior will reflect on her chances.
That hope is undergoing a severe test right now due to her ongoing friendship with an inmate whose presence in Wyoming’s correctional system is turning things upside down. I have been given permission by both Dawn and her extraordinary friend to discuss this with anyone who might be able to help. 37 years ago an infant Marcy (not her real name) may or may not have been left in a Dumpster in Denver, Colorado. This is what she has told Dawn but there is no way to corroborate her story. Her mother may or may not have had a good reason to do this, as the infant was different by every standard the mother had probably ever known. Marcy’s condition used to be described as “hermaphroditic”, then later as “intersex.” Now, by a major consensus of clinicians and specialists, her condition is described as a DSD—a Disorder of Sexual Development. The Accord Alliance, formerly ISNA, (http://www.accordalliance.org/) describes this new designation:
By contrast to the older terms, the term DSD refers to a condition that a person has, not who a person is. It seeks to put the person first. Today, there is clear medical consensus that the term DSD refers to “congenital conditions in which development of chromosomal, gonadal, or anatomic sex is atypical.” This consensus around terminology is allowing clinicians to work together towards well-integrated, progressive, patient-centered care across the DSD spectrum.
Marcy has a fully-functioning set of female reproductive organs—a uterus, ovaries, fallopian tubes and vagina, plus breasts. She also has a small penis that can become erect and tiny non-functioning testes. Although she is now tall—six feet—she is slender with no trace of an Adam’s apple or even a masculine voice.
While still a baby she was adopted by a couple who were determined to help her as best they could, but up until the early years of the millennium there were few resources for parents of DSD children. Marcy herself identified as female very early on. When her parents explained some of the aspects of her condition to her and asked her how she wished to continue, she chose to continue to be raised as and perceive herself as female.
Of course nurture and family cannot turn aside the arrows of bullying and misunderstanding, and by the time Marcy was in high school she was a rather wreckless and rebellious alcoholic. I know nothing about her adolescence and little of her early adulthood aside from the fact that, with outstanding warrants for DUI and associated misdemeanors, Marcy headed west to Laramie to be present for the 10th anniversary of Matt Shepard’s murder. I know even fewer details of what happened to get her placed in the Wyoming Women’s Center instead of the Albany County Detention Center, but that is where she fought to be incarcerated instead of the state penitentiary for obvious reasons. And that is where she is now, where her presence is not only unprecedented but it is considered by the warden, who fought to keep her out of his facility, to be disruptive. Disregarding Marcy’s life history of identifying as female, the warden classifies her as a man and wants her out. Perhaps he believes Marcy to be a threat to the WWC’s status as one of the safest prisons in the country—so much of a threat she has been in some form of lockdown for about a third of her time in his facility. Dawn has found out through discussions with this ignorant man that he believes that the two are somehow able to have a sexual relationship even though there is never a time when they are not under surveillance. Dawn has told me that sexual activity goes on all the time between more favored inmates but because she and Marcy are now isolated in the “conflict” area under full-time guard it is nearly impossible for them to even say “hello” to one another without getting written up. Lately I have found myself suspecting that there is something else going on besides simply keeping the inmates safe. I believe that it is far too easy for the watchers to exploit the watched.
This isn’t the first time the WWC has been found lacking in their treatment of DSD inmates. The following text is from an ISNA write-up about Miki DiMarco’s incarceration at the WWC (http://www.isna.org/...):
The facility has already been under fire for prejudicial treatment of a DSD inmate. Miki DiMarco was born with a tiny penis, no testicles, and no female reproductive organs. The absence of testicles means that her body does not naturally produce the hormones that lead to masculinization (body shape, body hair), and since puberty she has lived as a woman, despite the lack of female reproductive organs. She has never had surgery to remove her penis, however. Her condition was diagnosed as being congenital, as a result of disruption of gonadal development in the womb.
She was sentenced to confinement at the Wyoming Women's Center after her probation on check fraud charges was revoked due to lack of verifiable identification and positive drug tests. She had been held in the Laramie County jail for over a month in the women's section without incident, but on arrival at the state women's prison, a complete medical exam led to discovery of her penis and evident consternation among the staff there. She was immediately assigned to the maximum security wing of the prison, where she was totally segregated from the general population and remained for the 438 days (about 14 months) of her prison term.
The quoted article is worth reading just so you will understand not only what a past inmate went through while at WWC, but also what Marcy is undergoing within the same institution. The officials at WWC seem not to have learned their lesson nor to have come up with humane policies applicable to the situation DSD inmates face.
Both Dawn and Marcy have written to me describing their despair at this new segregation and isolation. Because they are under extraordinary lockdown they cannot hold jobs and therefore cannot afford the amenities the rest of the inmates are able to purchase with their wages. They are allowed out of their rooms for five hours out of every twenty-four, including mealtimes, and they can only recreate in a small, segregated dayroom. They can see no other inmates except the other three in each of their “conflict” units. They can have none of their usual possessions—no CD players, no personal items such as the limited jewelry they are allowed to have in normal housing, no books from the library they may have been in the middle of reading. Although the handbook allows inmates to appeal decisions like these, so far neither Dawn nor Marcy have been allowed to do so. It is my understanding that this “conflict” designation is new and was created specifically to segregate Dawn and Marcy from the rest of the inmates and from each other.
Marcy has a case file with the Wyoming and Colorado chapters of the ACLU, who so far say they can do nothing for her. They have instructed her to keep notes on every action taken against her, which she has been doing. Although she has not intimated to me when her release date is, Dawn says it is in 2012 some time.
Ultimately my concern is that even after Marcy is released, the actions against her will continue to impact Dawn and her eventual application for parole. Presently however, I am livid at the way the Wyoming Women’s Center is handling something they have already been warned against. If anyone in the Kos community has any suggestions, I would love to hear them.