We take care of the babies born to women in incarceration including children left children behind. Sometimes the children left behind are stigmatized, abused and neglected. We ensure these children attend school, eat regularly, get medical help and live in favorable conditions. Vulnerable children will be reported to the Child Welfare Service. In extreme cases the children will be extracted and placed in our facility or another facility awarded by the state.
Children left behind by female inmates are usually not a priority to many organizations and agencies. They are sometimes stigmatized, abused or neglected by the relatives of the inmates. Unfortunately the culture equally punishes the children that are innocent and have nothing to do with the crimes their mothers committed. It is important that the welfare and protection of these children are considered. In extreme cases they must be extracted from the abusive environment and placed in homes.
Creating awareness of our cause to low income communities, agencies, and partners; and fight for better policies to protect vulnerable children. We will partner with the female prison wards in the state and get access to the female inmates that fit our criteria. We will take on cases and visit the children left behind on a monthly basis and take care of their welfare. The concerned agencies will be informed if a child needs to be extracted and placed in our care or another home in the state.
Ruthsville seeks to offer free legal aid to these groups of women who have committed minor offences and get them out of prison as quickly as possible. Our fight is to make mothers who have committed minor crimes get priority trials in the system so that they are able to reconcile with their children. There must be policies to give alternative punishments through community service and other vices so mothers don't have to be separated from their children for long periods of time.
This project has provided additional documentation in a Microsoft Word file (projdoc.doc).
