WW News Service Digest #280
1) Court uses welfare 'reform' to bar prenatal care funds
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
2) Florida: Brazill case draws national attention
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3) Berrios, Sharpton jailed: actions hit sentences for Vieques protesters
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the June 7, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
COURT USES 1996 WELFARE "REFORM" TO BAR PRENATAL CARE FUNDS
By Ellen Catalinotto,
Certified Nurse-Midwife
New York
Pregnant women who are in this country without legal
immigration status are to be denied prenatal care under
Medicaid, ruled a federal court May 22 here in Manhattan.
The 1996 welfare laws explicitly bar such care, said the
Second Circuit Court of Appeals in making its ruling, even
as it acknowledged that providing prenatal care would reduce
government costs.
With the so-called welfare reform act of 1996, Democrats and
Republicans made a bi-partisan attack on the poor, targeting
women and children, especially women of color. The act was
also meant to discourage immigration by denying benefits to
undocumented immigrants even as businesses, large and small,
were profiting from exploiting immigrant labor and many
professional families depended on immigrant women to care
for their children.
In recent years, despite the economic boom of the late
1990s, increasing numbers of working people are without
health insurance as companies cut benefits. Young adult
women-the group most needing prenatal care-are among those
least likely to be insured.
Advocates for women, children, public health, and the right
of choice in reproductive decisions can all gain by uniting
to fight this latest anti-immigrant ruling. The court's
ruling is a challenge to these progressive movements to
develop a united struggle.
The birth of a healthy baby costs $1,200 according to the
New York State Department of Health. Prenatal care is
economically sound preventive medicine, which screens for
infections and other conditions in mothers to avoid tragic
outcomes and life-long disabilities for their babies.
Lack of prenatal care puts a woman at increased risk of
delivering a low birth-weight infant, whose care costs
$10,000 to $65,000 in the first weeks of life alone, in
addition to the poor quality of life such children may
suffer. These babies, if born in the United States, are
eligible for Medicaid as U.S. citizens no matter what the
status of their parents. Thus the court ruling spends more
government funds to deliver less care.
NEW YORK STATE'S PROGRAM
New York State spends $15.5 million on prenatal care for the
13,000 undocumented women who give birth in the state each
year, a tiny fraction--one two-thousandths--of the $30
billion state Medicaid budget. The state's Prenatal Care
Assistance Program provides care, regardless of legal
status, to women whose income is less than twice the poverty
line. Thousands of uninsured women, working and unemployed,
citizens or not, benefit from this program.
Many hospitals depend on PCAP to pay for prenatal care and
delivery for women without other health insurance. The
federal government reimbursed half of these costs under a
1987 injunction, which was reversed by the May 22 court
ruling.
The only government health programs remaining for the
undocumented in this state are Child Health Plus, a state-
financed sliding-scale insurance for children, and care at
hospital emergency rooms. Uninsured citizens and documented
residents also depend on these programs to access health
care.
While a lower court decides how to implement the court's
ruling, prenatal care for undocumented women under PCAP will
continue. State legislators are also considering ways of
providing prenatal care even without federal assistance.
In deciding whether or not to appeal the federal court
decision, Legal Aid lawyers must consider the danger that
such an appeal could allow the Supreme Court to re-open Roe
v. Wade, the 1973 decision that made abortion legal by
ruling that a fetus is not a person protected by the
Constitution.
The Second Circuit referred to the landmark abortion ruling,
stating, "if a fetus lacks constitutional protection to be
born, we see no basis for according it constitutional
protection to assure it enhanced prospects of good health
after birth."
It is interesting to note that so far none of the so-called
"pro-life," that is, anti-abortion, groups have come forward
to defend prenatal care, although they claim to be champions
of the "unborn child."
- END -
(Copyright Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to
copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
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From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: keskiviikko 6. kes�kuu 2001 09:51
Subject: [WW] Florida: Brazill case draws national attention
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the June 7, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
FLORIDA: BRAZILL CASE DRAWS NATIONAL ATTENTION
By Linda Breed
West Palm Beach, Fla.
The national media have returned to West Palm Beach, this
time highlighting the racist criminal justice system and the
media's obsession with school violence.
Television studios re-broadcast reports of last year's
shooting of a teacher over and over to demoralize and
frighten the masses. Meanwhile, the local Palm Beach Post
runs stories daily to demonize Nathaniel Brazill, an honor
student with no previous criminal record found guilty of the
shooting. He is up for sentencing July 29.
What is not so widely reported is the daily picket lines and
community support for Nathaniel Brazill against a racist and
repressive Palm Beach County, an area the picketers feel has
never known real justice. They believe the racist handling
of the Brazill case creates an atmosphere similar to that in
Cincinnati, where a rebellion against police brutality
recently broke out.
State Attorney Barry Kirscher has a track record for
disproportionately arraigning Black youth for the harshest
maximum charges possible. The May 17 Palm Beach Gazette, a
Black community newspaper in Palm Beach County, reported:
"Hard-hearted Barry Kirscher wants to send Nathaniel
Brazill, 13, to the electric chair, but the record shows
he's not so hard on renegade cops or young white folk.
"The following cases illustrate Kirscher's record. On April
20, 2000, Ashley Smith, 15, threatened that he was going to
bomb his school, Palm Beach Lakes High. Apparently this was
his idea of 'commemorating' the Columbine massacre that took
place in Colorado some time ago. Unbelievably, the young man
was charged as a juvenile by the state attorney and his
sentence, which was left open-ended, was to attend a daytime
delinquency program for juveniles. "
Another example of Kirscher's over zealous approach to
charging youths of color is from a 1999 case involving
Anthony Laster, a Black teenager with no criminal history
and the mental capacity of a 5-year-old.
Laster, 15 and hearing-impaired, snatched two dollars in
lunch money from the pocket of a classmate. Kirscher charged
him with strong-arm robbery, which carries a life sentence;
and extortion, which is punishable by 30 years in prison.
Kirscher has a record of soft treatment for law-breaking law-
enforcement officials.
Authorities recommended that Lake Worth cop Stuart Dimbert
be fired for breaking a number of police department
policies. But it wasn't until he was videotaped beating a
handcuffed suspect with a baton 16 times that he was finally
let go.
Despite all the evidence, Kirscher saw fit to charge him
only with misdemeanor assault.
When asked about the Nathaniel Brazill case, Monica
Moorehead, Workers World Party year 2000 presidential
candidate, said: "It is totally outrageous that a juvenile
like Nathaniel Brazill should be put on trial for his life.
He is not a criminal. Rather, he is a victim of this unjust
criminal-justice system that glamorizes and promotes violent
behavior day in and day out.
"If the leaders of the National Rifle Association are not
put on trial, why should someone like Nathaniel? Nathaniel,
and millions of youth like him, deserves the best medical
and psychological attention, not repression and
imprisonment," said Moorehead.
All eyes will be on be on West Palm Beach on June 29, when
Palm Beach County Circuit Judge Richard Wennet will sentence
Brazill.
- END -
(Copyright Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to
copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
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From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: keskiviikko 6. kes�kuu 2001 09:51
Subject: [WW] Berrios, Sharpton jailed: actions hit sentences for Vieques
protesters
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the June 7, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
BERRIOS, SHARPTON JAILED: MASS ACTIONS HIT SENTENCES FOR VIEQUES PROTESTERS
By Leslie Feinberg
Tens of thousands of people demonstrated in Guaynabo, Puerto
Rico, on May 28 to demand the release of protesters held
behind bars for demonstrating against the U.S. naval bombing
of the Puerto Rican island of Vieques.
Hundreds of thousands of Cubans had demonstrated two days
earlier outside the U.S. Interests Section in Havana
demanding the U.S. Navy stop bombing Vieques.
Washington's severe repression of protesters has broadened
the support for those opposing the U.S. Navy's occupation
and bombing of Vieques.
"If Martin Luther King were alive, he would have come to
Vieques and raised these issues," the Rev. Al Sharpton told
Judge Jose A. Fuste in San Juan May 23. Sharpton was
arrested May 1 with 12 other protesters.
All told, some 180 people were reportedly arrested while
trying to stop the Navy from carrying out military "war
games" on the island April 27 to May 1.
Sharpton was sentenced to 90 days in jail, the longest
sentence--supposedly because he had prior activist arrests
for civil disobedience in New York. He was also slapped with
a $500 fine.
Eleven other activists appeared in court the same day as
Sharpton. Two defendants received probation because of
illness. Each of nine others was sentenced to 40 days in
prison and $500 fine.
They included New York City Councilmember Adolfo Carrion and
New York state legislators Roberto Ramirez and Jose Rivera.
OnMay 25 Sharpton, Carrion, Ramirez and Rivera won a
transfer from the Metropolitan Detention Center in Guaynabo
to the MDC in Brooklyn, N.Y. Daily demonstrations are taking
place outside the federal prison there to demand their
freedom.
Fifteen members of the U.S. Congress have written a letter
to Attorney General John Ashcroft protesting the harsh
sentences.
Those arrested included 1199 Service Employees union
President Dennis Rivera, actor Edward James Olmos, U.S. Rep.
Luis Gutierrez of Illinois and lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Earlier in May, Puerto Rico Independence Party President
Rub�n Berr�os was hit with the stiffest sentence handed down
to anti-Navy protesters so far, four months. He had refused
to recognize the jurisdiction of the U.S. court and
therefore would not mount a defense.
Vieques local protest leader Ismael Guadalupe was released
from his sentence toward the end of May. Guadalupe, who
suffers from mercury poisoning, faced serious health
problems while in custody.
The U.S. Navy claims demonstrators were trespassing on its
land. But it is the U.S. Navy that has illegally occupied as
much as one-third of the island for 60 years.
The movement to oust the Navy charges that these six decades
of "mock" air, land and sea assaults on Vieques with bombs
and other weaponry have created a serious health and
environmental risk for the entire island and its 9,400
inhabitants.
Activists have been struggling to get the U.S. Navy off the
island of Vieques since the Navy's occupation began. But
that fight has broadened and deepened dramatically since
April 1999, when a Navy bomb killed Puerto Rican civilian
David Sanes.
The killing brought a new level of unity to those waging the
very courageous battle to demand that U.S. Naval brass
immediately cease and desist their war games and retreat
from Vieques.
- END -
(Copyright Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to
copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message to:
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