Prosecuting Poverty, Criminalizing Care
Wendy A. Bach
Sept 2022 · Cambridge University Press
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237
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About this eBook
At the height of the opiate epidemic, Tennessee lawmakers made it a crime for a pregnant woman to transmit narcotics to a fetus. They promised that charging new mothers with this crime would help them receive the treatment and support they often desperately need. In Prosecuting Poverty, Criminalizing Care, Wendy Bach describes the law's actual effect through meticulous examination of the cases of 120 women who were prosecuted for this crime. Drawing on quantitative and qualitative data, Bach demonstrates that both prosecuting 'fetal assault', and institutionalizing the all-too-common idea that criminalization is a road to care, lead at best to clinically dangerous and corrupt treatment, and at worst, and far more often, to an insidious smokescreen obscuring harsh punishment. Urgent, instructive, and humane, this retelling demands we stop criminalizing care and instead move towards robust and respectful systems that meet the real needs of families in poor communities.
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Cayman, Winter
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12 December 2024
This book was incredibly eye-opening, and I would recommend it to anyone wishing to learn more about the legal challenges and barriers to health care/ treatment faced by those who are impacted by laws such as Tennessee's fetal assault law. Bach does a great job of presenting data that tells the story of how access to care is too often intertwined with the criminal justice system. I learned a lot and appreciate the hopeful message that the book closes on.
About the author
Wendy A. Bach is a Professor of Law at the University of Tennessee where she teaches primarily in the clinical program. Over the last 25 years, first as a practicing public-interest lawyer, and for the last 17 years as a Law Professor, Bach has represented poor clients in the courts and systems highlighted in Prosecuting Poverty, Criminalizing Care. She is a nationally recognized scholar in the field of poverty law and has published several law review articles on the relationship between social support and punishment.
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