Judge jails HIV positive woman to "protect" her fetus

BANGOR, Maine — A woman from the African nation of Cameroon could give birth in a federal prison because she is HIV-positive.
U.S. District Judge John Woodcock last month sentenced Quinta Layin Tuleh, 28, to 238 days in federal prison for having fake documents. Woodcock said the sentence would ensure that Tuleh’s baby, due Aug. 29, has a good chance of being born free of the AIDS virus.

Both the federal prosecutor and the defense attorney urged the judge to sentence Tuleh to 114 days, or time served, according to a transcript of the sentencing hearing. Woodcock instead ignored the federal sentencing guidelines and calculated her sentence to coincide with her due date.

Federal prosecutors have appealed the sentence to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston. The court has agreed to deal with the case on an expedited schedule and could hear oral arguments in late July.

Woodcock told Tuleh at her sentencing on May 14 in U.S. District Court that he was not imposing the longer prison term to punish her further but to protect her unborn child. He said that the defendant was more likely to receive medical treatment and follow a drug regimen in federal prison than out on her own or in the custody of immigration officials. The judge also said that his decision was based entirely on her HIV status. If Tuleh were pregnant but not infected with the AIDS virus, he would have sentenced her to time served.

http://www.bangordailynews.com/detail/107508.html

personally, I haven't had health insurance since 2003.

I can imagine circumstances like this woman's case where no way would she
get the treatment she needed.

Sadly, I think the judge did the best thing for the woman and her baby.

she's got housing and medical care lined up if she were released.

The judge is playing Big Brother. It sucks.......................

So I have to agree with the judge.

None of that would have been introduced had not a deal been worked with the Immigration folks to delay her deportation hearing until after the birth, in the interests of the best health of her child.

No one is ever going to go on record as deporting a sick woman, endangering the life of her unborn child. Even ICE has a heart in situations like this .......................

What?

There is?

Oh, never mind.

At first I thought it was a kind of cookie.

This is wrong from so many damn angles.

Just wrong.

An HIV-positive man would have been treated quite differently, and the fact that she's pregnant shouldn't even come into the judge's notice when imposing sentence. This just sucks, sucks, sucks.

While there's a sentimental element to it - ah, isn't it wonderful that the judge is taking into consideration the health of the unborn child? - it's a dangerous and seductive road down which that kind of logic travels, veering too close to giving a fetus the status of "person" than I care to consider.

She's got housing arrangements made, and her medical care is guaranteed, provided she's sentenced to time served, but the judge is playing Big Brother, determining that the pregnant woman isn't competent to take care of herself or her pregnancy.

The ACLU is making all the right noises. This will be interesting .................................

frequently sentenced to time served, and then turned to immigration officials for deportation.

they had worked a deal, it would appear, since her attorney had made plans for her residence and treatment. So, clearly, a deal on the deportation matter had been reached. Looks like the judge just turned down the whole plea deal. This happens - not often, but it happens.

Compassion can be exercised without her staying the slammer ................

The article says defense attorney arranged for her to stay somewhere. It says nothing about any deals, or prosecution approving of it.

that's how these hearings are done. Before the actual hearing takes place, a plea deal is worked out between the US attorney on the case and the defense attorney, and, providing the defendant is willing to go along with it (they almost always are), the deal is then presented to the judge, who has the authority to accept or reject it.

Judges almost always accept plea deal, for a variety of reasons, the most compelling is that the judge assumes that the US attorney is more familiar with the case and has a better grasp of what would be a proper disposition. Yet, the judge retains the power to reject the proffered plea deal.

If you check the last few paragraphs in the article, you'll see that the US attorney on the case, a guy named Todd Lowell, objected to the judge's disposition of the case. That's almost unheard of, to have the prosecutor speak out against what the judge did, so that's how you can see that a plea deal was worked out, and then rejected.

Sometimes you have to be familiar with the system in order to be able to read between the lines.....................

it has implications for other people with medical conditions, and he doesn't think prison should be the place providing the defendant with medical care. It doesn't say he objected because he felt the defendant would be better off somewhere else.

That was his reason for agreeing to the plea deal that was rejected.....................

Would you trust immigration officials to administer the medication(s) she requires in a timely manner, consistent with the prescription issued by the doctor?

If your answer is no, then this decision is actually the correct one. If your answer is yes, you trust the INS to properly administer prescriptions to 'illegals'.

Was that helpful? I'm really not trying to be an ass- I merely wanted to put it into starker terms.

as I responded in another post in this thread, it looks to me like a plea deal was worked out so that the defendant would be released, sentenced to "time served," and living and medical arrangements had been made for her to ensure proper care for her until her baby was born.

Presumably, after that, deportation proceedings would take place. Not even the ICE wants to be held responsible for deporting anyone here illegally if she's an HIV-positive pregnant woman.......................

way...

am I the only one who thinks part of the Judge's underlying problem may be that his name is "John Woodcock"? :shrug:

Judge jails woman until baby is born
HIV-positive diagnosis spurs extended sentence
By Judy Harrison
BDN Staff

... Zachary Heiden, legal director for the MCLU, said ... “Federal immigration law has developed in truly arbitrary and punitive ways. Here, even a federal judge could not get assurances that Ms. Tuleh would not be deported before the end of her pregnancy. He could not get assurances she would not have her medical care arbitrarily cut off. That is wrong ...

Tuleh faced up to 10 years in prison, a fine of up to $250,000 and mandatory deportation ...

In sentencing Tuleh, Woodcock said that the law required he take into account a defendant’s medical condition in fashioning a sentence. Although a defendant’s medical condition most often is used to lower a sentence, the judge found that there was nothing in the federal sentencing guidelines to prevent him from imposing a sentence longer than the guidelines recommended because of Tuleh’s HIV status ...

“My obligation is to protect the public from further crimes of the defendant,” he said at Tuleh’s sentencing, “and that public, it seems to me at this point, should likely include that child she’s carrying. I don’t think that the transfer of HIV to an unborn child is a crime technically under the law, but it is as direct and as likely as an ongoing assault ...

http://www.bangordailynews.com/detail/107508.html

they become victims on all kinds of levels -- and even to the point of an uncaring immigration system
that would send this hiv+ and pregnant woman back to camaroon.

even if they did not deport -- it looks like she would have returned to using drugs.

this is sad all the way around -- but it looks like this was the smart and compassionate thing to do.

what else will they decide they can jail women for to protect TEH BABEEEEEZ!!!11eleventy