Children Do Hard Time for Their Parents’ Crimes: Mothers and Prison

I have been an addict for the past seventeen years, which is a shorter time than my children have been alive. I was sent to prison four different times between 1995 and 2000, serving a total of four years. Presently, I am serving a fourteen-year federal sentence on a non-violent drug conspiracy charge. My sentence began October 2004. Looking back, I realize I have served all these years in prison due to my addiction and not having known how to live differently.

Current statistics cite about 92 percent of incarcerated persons are serving time in prison on drug-related charges. Of that population who is female, 75 percent are mothers, who, before they were incarcerated, were their children’s primary caretaker.

Children pay the price for their parents’ crimes. In addition to suffering emotionally from having had their mothers taken from them, children are sometimes separated from all family at the time of their mother’s incarceration, when they are placed into foster care.

After a parent is incarcerated, children may feel victimized and begin to react negatively toward authority. Due to low self-esteem and understandable depression, their grades in school may suffer. Eventually, children may seek acceptance by people in the drug/criminal world because these are the people with whom they are familiar. All of these behaviors separate a child from mainstream society, making them vulnerable to “the system” at an early age. Without intervention, these patterns are difficult to change.

Perhaps to avoid the emotional suffering that has resulted from losing a parent, first, to addiction, then, to the system, our children may engage in negative, hurtful, and even criminal behavior. According to statistics, children of incarcerated parents are 85 percent likely to go to prison as adults.