When Mothers Kill

Interviews from Prison

Cheryl L. Meyer, Michelle Oberman

• Publisher: NYU Press
• Year: 2008
• ISBN:
  9780814762196
• Topic: Psychologie
• Subtopic: Sozialpsychologie

Winner of the 2008 Outstanding Book Award by the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences

Michelle Oberman and Cheryl L. Meyer don’t write for news magazines or prime-time investigative television shows, but the stories they tell hold the same fascination. When Mothers Kill is compelling. In a clear, direct fashion the authors recount what they have learned from interviewing women imprisoned for killing their children. Readers will be shocked and outraged—as much by the violence the women have endured in their own lives as by the violence they engaged in—but they will also be informed and even enlightened.

Oberman and Meyer are leading authorities on their subject. Their 2001 book, Mothers Who Kill Their Children, drew from hundreds of newspaper articles as well as from medical and social science journals to propose a comprehensive typology of maternal filicide. In that same year, driven by a desire to test their typology—and to better understand child-killing women not just as types but as individuals—Oberman and Meyer began interviewing women who had been incarcerated for the crime. After conducting lengthy, face-to-face interviews with forty prison inmates, they returned and selected eight women to speak with at even greater length. This new book begins with these stories, recounted in the matter-of-fact words of the inmates themselves.

There are collective themes that emerge from these individual accounts, including histories of relentless interpersonal violence, troubled relationships with parents (particularly with mothers), twisted notions of romantic love, and deep conflicts about motherhood. These themes structure the books overall narrative, which also includes an insightful examination of the social and institutional systems that have failed these women. Neither the mothers nor the authors offer these stories as excuses for these crimes.

PART 1

The Stories

The following five chapters are organized around the central themes that emerged from our conversations with women incarcerated for killing their children. We have tried, insofar as possible, to represent their stories as they told them to us, inserting our personal perspectives only when it seemed important for reasons of clarity and honesty. The structure of these chapters, and the ideas around which they are framed, only emerged after our interviews with the women. Indeed, after we finished speaking with them, the themes underlying each chapter seemed almost obvious to us, and we felt as if there was no other way to tell these stories. This first part of our book, then, is devoted to a discussion of these themes. The second part undertakes the task of considering these stories as a whole, reflecting on their broader meaning and implications.

1

The Saddest Stories

THE CONVERSATIONS WE had with these women were emotional for all of us. The women often told us that this was the first time they had attempted to talk to anyone about the events surrounding their children’s deaths. All the interviews took place at the Ohio Reformatory for Women (ORW). The women with whom we spoke represent a broad cross section of the U.S. population.

As is common in the U.S. prison population, women of color were overrepresented among the ORW population, when compared with their overall numbers in society. Indeed, of the forty women we interviewed, approximately 40 percent were women of color. For several reasons, we elected not to ask the women questions about their race, nor to focus on race in our analysis of our findings. In our sample, class, or socioeconomic status, was a far more salient factor in contributing to our understanding of this crime than factors such as race, ethnicity, or culture. In addition, a focus on race might have eclipsed the considerable diversity within the Caucasian population at the ORW, many of whom were from poor, rural Appalachian families.

Because the ORW is the only women’s prison in Ohio, the women we met came from a wide range of communities, from rural Appalachia to large, inner-city housing projects. In addition, many of the women with whom we spoke lived significant portions of their lives, as children and as mothers, in other states. Their residence in Ohio at the time of their crimes was, in many cases, simply a coincidence.

In order to assist the reader, we have summarized in this first chapter the life stories told by these eight women. To insure anonymity, however, we have altered some of the details and have changed their names, and in some cases have paraphrased their actual words. We crafted the scenarios that follow by using information the women provided to us in both of their interviews. We chose not to add third-party information, such as official court records, but rather, to present their stories as they told them to us.

In addition to the eight stories told by these women, the chapters that follow include numerous comments and quotes drawn from the first set of interviews we conducted with the other thirty-two women. For simplicity’s sake, we have not given these other women pseudonyms; we instead refer to them only as “one of the women with whom we spoke.”

Nancy

Nancy’s biological parents separated soon after her birth. Nancy’s mother remarried and she had four half siblings. Nancy did not know until she was in her teens that her stepfather was not her biological father, although she had suspected it. As a child she was verbally and physical abused by her parents, and she was sexually molested until the age of ten by a male relative. When she told her mother about the abuse, her mother minimized and ignored her complaints.

Nancy did not get along well with her mother and stepfather. She frequently was blamed for any problems in the home. She described the environment in her home as unstable, with frequent fighting and arguing. Her mother often asked, or even forced her to leave home.

By the time she was in her teens, Nancy had many sexual partners. Her relationships were marked by domestic violence. Eventually, she became pregnant and had a child. Her relationship with her baby’s father ended. She still lived with her mother and stepfather, although she fought with them constantly. For the next year and a half, she and her son moved from place to place. During this time, she became pregnant again.

After the birth of her second child, nineteen-year-old Nancy and her babies still did not have a stable home. During the first eight weeks after her second child was born, they lived in eleven different places, including a homeless shelter. Nancy thought that it was the time in the homeless shelter that was “the straw that broke the camel’s back.” She had no support, her baby was colicky, and Nancy felt that she did not know how to be a mother. On the day she smothered her child, Nancy said she just snapped. The baby was crying incessantly, and in an impulsive effort to quiet her, Nancy smothered her. She said that the baby’s screaming reminded her of being screamed at by her parents, and she felt like she turned into her mother.

Nancy cries when she talks about her family and her surviving child. She said she talks to her son as a friend, because she feels that she does not have the right to be a mother. When we first interviewed Nancy, she worried about what she would tell him when he asked why she was incarcerated. Now, five years later, he knows. His approach to her is combative, and he has asked her, “What are you going to do, kill me too?”

Nancy says people have told her she could have more children when she is released, but she says she is not sure she is mentally stable enough to do so. She also feels that, even though she has completed parenting classes in prison, she still does not know how to be a mother. She says that she cries every day for her child and that it is especially hard during the holidays. Nancy said, “I think the hardest thing is forgiveness. I can forgive anyone else in a heartbeat. I am not a vicious person but I did this with my own hands.”

Laurie

Laurie became pregnant during her freshman year of high school. By the time she was seventeen, she had two more children and had married their father. The relationship was abusive and ended suddenly when her husband died in an accident on Laurie’s eighteenth birthday.

Soon after he died, Laurie learned she was pregnant again with his child. She felt she would be unable to handle another child, but she did not believe in abortion, so she decided to relinquish the child for adoption. Afterward, Laurie went on with her life, residing with her mother and stepfather, and enjoying her children. She recalls that they would walk to the park and go to the playground. One evening when her parents were out and while her children were asleep, a married friend of her parents dropped by for a visit and raped Laurie. Laurie never told anyone about this encounter because she was afraid, humiliated, and felt she should have fought back more.

Sometime later, Laurie realized that her rapist had impregnated her. Laurie concealed the pregnancy, and when she reflected on it during her first interview, she said, “That was the hardest part, ignoring my pregnancy. I had no medical care. I kept thinking ‘This can’t be true, this isn’t happening to you.’ Several times I tried to talk to my parents but I was too scared. I thought they would lose love for me or feel ashamed of me or think it was my fault.” Laurie said she did not consider adoption because she would have had to reveal the pregnancy to her parents.

Laurie went into labor at home and delivered her baby in the bathroom. She doesn’t remember what happened after she gave birth, but her newborn was dead. She was convicted and sentenced to fifteen years to life in prison.

She misses her children, who are being raised by her parents. Laurie sobbed during the entire interview on both occasions. Almost a decade after the death of her child, she remains emotionally raw. She frequently used the words “ashamed,” “scared,” “humiliated,” and “guilty.”

Nadine

Nadine was the older of two children, and her parents divorced when she was in fourth grade. Her mother went to live in another state with a new boyfriend, leaving her children behind with their abusive father. Nadine did not see her mother or know of her mother’s whereabouts until she was nineteen. Nadine describes her father as frequently doing “disappearing acts.” Whenever he reappeared, things would be okay for a short period, but then he would begin using alcohol and drugs and physically abusing her. When she entered puberty, he began sexually abusing her as well.

Eventually her father “dumped the kids” with their maternal grandparents. Nadine’s grandmother was not well, so her grandfather was the main caretaker for the children. Over the next five years, Nadine moved frequently. She lived with her grandparents, her father, a foster family, and a couple for whom she worked as a nanny. She was pregnant by the time she was fourteen, but the pregnancy ended in a miscarriage. She gave birth to her first child when she was sixteen. The baby’s father was the married man who had employed her as a nanny, who Nadine describes as having been a “kind man.”

When she became pregnant, Nadine lost her job as a nanny and returned to her grandfather’s home to have her baby. Within a year, she became pregnant with her second child and moved in with her boyfriend, Rusty. The relationship was marked by physical abuse and drug usage. Eventually the state Department of Children’s Services removed the children from Nadine and Rusty’s home because of neglect. In order to be reunited with her children Nadine had to follow a plan. She left Rusty, quit using drugs and alcohol, took parenting classes, and found a job. She was also seeking stable housing. That is when she met Mack.

Mack appeared to provide the stability Nadine needed in a relationship. Eventually they married, regained custody of Nadine’s children, had two additional children of their own, and moved to Ohio to be closer to Mack’s parents. After the move, Nadine began to notice erratic behavior from Mack. He became physically abusive toward her and verbally abusive toward the children. Nadine indicated that everyone in the small town in which they lived knew about the abuse but turned a deaf ear. She said that Mack’s mother told her that if she “got an ass whipping, she deserved it.” When Nadine found drug paraphernalia in their home, she decided to leave and began saving money to travel to another state.

One day Nadine’s seven-year-old son, Josh, was cleaning the house when Mack began to berate him. Josh’s paternal grandfather had told him that because Mack was not his father, he should just tell Mack that he did not have to listen to anything Mack had to say. When Josh said this, Mack erupted and beat Josh. Josh was rendered unconscious. When Nadine returned home, Mack told her if she called the police he would make her watch while he killed the rest of the children. Instead, Nadine watched while Josh slowly died. They buried Josh in the basement crawl space and told his siblings that he’d gone to stay with his father’s family. Nadine and Mack were arrested when school officials questioned Josh’s whereabouts and alerted the police, who ultimately found his body. Mack pled guilty to murder and received a fifteen-year mandatory sentence. Nadine went to trial and was sentenced to twenty-five years for her role in hiding and failing to prevent the crime.

When we interviewed Nadine the first time, her wishes for the future focused on love. She said she did not know what was stronger, a mother’s love or God’s love, but one of her wishes was that everyone could know the joy and happiness of God’s love. She also wished that everyone could grow up happy and healthy and loving one another, “like it says in the Bible.”

Celina

When we first interviewed Celina, she said she had been trying to focus on the good times she had growing up, when her family would travel. That was before her father started drinking and doing drugs. After that she mostly remembers him tearing up the house and beating her mother and all the children. Celina said she still has visions of him “pounding her in the face.” She recalled that on one occasion, after she and her siblings had worked in the hot sun all day, her father still demanded more work. When her sister refused, Celina’s father beat her so badly that she was hospitalized for two months. When Celina was about eight, her uncle began sexually abusing her until “I knew better.”

Celina identifies an experience she endured at age seventeen as a turning point in her life. She was attacked by a gang of adolescents and spent months in the hospital recovering. After this attack, she had what she described as fits of rage and post-traumatic stress disorder. Celina became involved in a relationship and had four children; eventually, however, the relationship became abusive and she left her partner and moved to another city.

Celina’s seven-year-old daughter, Sabrina, had been having difficulties in school since kindergarten. She was expelled from several schools for behaviors ranging from stealing from the teachers to hitting other children. Celina also reported that at home Sabrina would “cut up things like the sofa, play with the dog’s private parts, and take food out of the refrigerator and line it in rows.” Celina later learned Sabrina was being molested by her grandfather.

Celina said that during the whole time she had children she never “whooped” them; she tried to punish them by taking away privileges. She did not want to repeat the “generational curse” of child abuse. With Sabrina this tactic did not work, she said, and Celina began to punish her with “licks” on her hand. Eventually she progressed to “licks” on the backside.

A single parent with four young children, Celina began to drink excessively. Several times, she called a community organization to ask for help, but she never followed through with a support program. The night before Sabrina died, Celina called her mother and told her that “something strange is going on with me.” Then she spent the night drinking. In the morning, a teacher came to Celina’s home to discuss Sabrina’s behavior. After the teacher left, Celina began to punish Sabrina. Celina said she doesn’t remember exactly what happened, but she had visions of being attacked by the gang of adolescents. The next thing she remembers is Sabrina lying on the ground sleeping. Later that day, friends came over and Celina began drinking again. Eventually she realized that Sabrina was not waking up. She took her to the hospital but it was too late, and Sabrina was pronounced dead.

Since she has been in prison, Celina has embraced Christianity. She said she talks to Sabrina every day. Perhaps most important, she feels that she has broken the “generational curse” (abusive patterns) and that her life and her children’s lives will be alright because she is “paying for the sins of her fathers.”

Julie

Julie’s sister was born on Julie’s first birthday. Shortly after that, Julie’s mother began drinking heavily and her father left home, leaving no forwarding address. When Julie was two, her grandparents came to her mother’s home to visit and found there was no food in the house and the children were playing on the roof. They reported her mother to the state Child Protective Services. Julie’s mother lost custody due to neglect, and Julie and her sister were placed in foster care. They remained there until Julie was five, when they were adopted as a sibling set.

Julie’s adopted parents expected her to “watch over” her sister. Her adoptive father ran the local chapter of Big Brothers/Big Sisters and Julie maintains that he cared more for those kids than he did for her or her sister, acting primarily as a disciplinarian with them. She describes herself as a good child, however, who never got into trouble. She said she cooked, cleaned, and did her homework. Julie said her childhood wasn’t that bad, but that the only time she was happy was when she was with her grandmother.

Julie had her first child when she was twenty-one. She said the father of her child was never interested in him and tried to fake paternity tests in order to avoid child support. Eventually Julie had three more children, all by separate fathers.

Julie was living with the father of the last child when a fire broke out in their home and three of the children perished. It is unclear to her how the fire started. She maintains it could have been that the children were playing with matches or that perhaps her boyfriend left a cigarette smoldering in the bedroom. Julie was the only adult in the home when the fire started. All the children were upstairs and she was downstairs. She did not go upstairs to attempt to save them. She wondered aloud about why her surviving child, who was ten, had not managed to save the younger children.

Julie was convicted of fatal child neglect in the deaths of her three children.

Marlene

Marlene describes herself as having been a “holy terror” while growing up. She said she was diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder when she was in kindergarten and has been medicated for it her whole life. Marlene was three years old when her parents divorced. When she was seven, her life changed dramatically. Her father, whom Marlene called a “career criminal,” was incarcerated, and Marlene’s mother married her biological father’s half brother. Suddenly there was a new man and soon after a new baby, and in retrospect, Marlene notes that the transition was difficult for everyone. Despite the fact that she did not get along with her stepfather, she said no one hurt or abused her, and all in all it was a good childhood. She said she and her stepfather largely ignored each other.

As an adolescent Marlene was “always in trouble,” though not with the legal system. She also reported she was never interested in drugs or alcohol because they made her feel out of control. Most of her “trouble” seems to revolve around breaking the rules around the house. By nineteen she had a daughter, and fifteen months later she had another daughter, Dakota, by a different father. She was still living with her parents at that time, and everyone agreed that Marlene should relinquish Dakota for adoption. After one week, Marlene changed her mind and retrieved the infant from the adoptive parents.

Marlene said her mother was tired of having to take care of Marlene and her babies, so she helped Marlene to secure her own home in a public housing project. Marlene described this time period as follows: “I wouldn’t say I was a terrible parent, but I wasn’t a good parent. I am too scatterbrained. I don’t think about things a lot. I wasn’t abusive but I was neglectful. I would give them a cup of Cheerios and have them go about their business. There were things I should have done more that I didn’t.… The house was always a mess and I didn’t care.… I didn’t pay much attention to the kids.” Marlene stated she just wanted to be a teenager, not a parent.

It is unclear how Dakota died. Marlene asserted that the ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• PART 1 The Stories
• PART 2 Making Sense of the Stories
• Appendix A Methodology
• Appendix B Neonaticide
• Appendix C Mothers Who Purposely Kill Their Children
• Notes
• Index
• About the Authors