International Women's Day & Giving Voice to Women Not Often Seen or Heard

Today we celebrate International Women’s Day and as someone pointed out, what about the women we don’t see or hear about? What about the women who have been locked away for decades now and decades to come? How are we celebrating them? As a statistic?

Today, while collectively the U.S. accounts for 4% of the world’s women, it is holding 25% of the women incarcerated on a worldwide scale.

According to the most recent report released by The Sentencing Project, the female incarceration rate has increased by over 600% since 1980. Over 62% of women in state prisons have a child under the age of 18. According to the Wilson Center for Science & Justice at Duke Law have a Life Sentences Dashboard that reports as of 2024, 7% of Kentucky incarcerated persons are serving a life sentence. 44% of those folks are currently over the age of 55.

The incarceration rate of women in the U.S. is in crisis and at an all-time high with every U.S. state incarcerating at a higher rate than most of our closest international allies. In Kentucky, women face almost the same rate of incarceration as women in El Salvador, a country that has been described as an authoritarian police state.

As we highlight women on this day, I ask what about the broken system of second chances in Kentucky? In particular, the women, who at the discretion, and I use that term literally, of the Kentucky Parole Board which has stolen the opportunities a judge and jury granted these women of hope, rehabilitation, and restoration for a second chance some day to return to society?

This fight is personal. That fight? The Kentucky Parole Board has given roughly 7 women to date at KCIW a death sentence that even a judge and jury at the time of trial refused to give. This not only has the taxpayers of Kentucky caring for these aging women, but it’s also robbing them of the opportunities afforded if they pay their debt to society and do all that has been asked of them. I challenge them with serious humanitarian concerns with this move as it comes across as political, dysfunctional and downright immoral. What faith is Kentucky leading with that it so proudly claims?

According to a Lexington Herald Leader article from Bill Estep in May 2021, the Kentucky Parole Board issued an average of 3-serve-outs per year from 1992 to 2020. By November of 2020, the Kentucky Parole Board had already issued 19 serve-outs during an 11-month period! The problem? In the midst of their ‘serve-out’ frenzy they began giving serve-outs to women who were sentenced to life with the possibility of parole. Up to that point, none of the serve-outs were given to any woman who was serving a life sentence with the possibility of parole at KCIW. For those women who were given an opportunity to earn their freedom, the Kentucky Parole Board has now stripped them of their original sentence and in essence given them a death sentence that their own judge and juries had refused to give.

On April 18, 2024, the Kentucky Supreme Court issued a ruling in Conn et al, v. Kentucky Parole Board. The Kentucky Parole Board has sole responsibility for determining parole eligibility. The legislature has set the rules that the parole board must follow when making decisions if someone is released on parole. The issue that arose was the parole board was changing the sentence of folks who had the possibility of parole to one in which they are now given a death sentence, aka ‘serve-out’. So, someone could have an excellent institutional record, rehabilitated, educated, assessed to be a low-risk, have an excellent re-entry plan and exceptional community support and still be given a ‘serve-out’ (to die) due to the nature of the crime that may have occurred decades ago. The Kentucky Parole Board only needs “one” factor to be met to deny parole and/or give a serve-out.

It was Justice Michelle Keller who issued a detailed opinion on Conn et al., that clearly questions the appropriateness of how the parole board in Kentucky goes about determining when serve-outs are imposed. Keller wrote “the board wields significant power over the life and future of Kentucky inmates” “It is clear that the board’s internal policies lack any compulsory review processes to check against the board’s unfettered discretion to grant serve-outs of life sentences”. It has been documented that the parole board spends roughly 25 minutes each or less on typically 85 parole-related decisions they make on a weekly basis. This is alarming and concerning to Keller as well, concerning any decision to serve out a life sentence given the high interests at stake in those decisions.

Keller further writes “Board members have access to an abundance of information about an inmate but are provided no guidance on how to weigh that information in making their parole decisions. Even if board members wanted to review all of the information provided to them and carefully weight it, they likely would not have enough time to do so, given their burdensome workload.”

Kentucky law requires the Department of Corrections to provide specific information about the incarcerated individual to the parole board. However, it does not require the parole board to use all the information or at least doesn’t instruct the board how much weight should be given for each piece of information. Keller writes further that the parole board’s own regulations “provide no guidance as to when a serve-out of a life sentence is appropriate or what information the board should consider in making that life-altering decision” and that “he could even be denied any further opportunity at parole based solely on the seriousness of his offense, which, I must emphasize, was already taken into consideration when the judicial branch chose to sentence him to life in prison while still allowing the possibility of parole”. In an October of 2020 ruling, Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd had a similar concern, writing “the board’s practices in processing the enormous volume of parole reviews raise questions in terms of whether the board’s policies and procedures are governed by objective criteria, and whether they provide for fair consideration of the issues”.

The Kentucky Supreme Court basically concludes that the present form is not perfect and that “it’s defects will doubtless be remedied by further legislation, and it is not in our opinion justly open to the criticisms made upon it.” They suggest that any concerns regarding parole guidelines would be more effectively resolved through the legislature and in the meantime the Governor can exercise his constitutional power to commute sentences or grant reprieves and pardons.

Talk about kicking the can down the road! The message this sends is that good behavior and doing the right thing mean absolutely nothing and it puts an irrevocable judgement on someone’s value and place in society. Justice Kelly wrote “although I agree with the Majority’s ultimate disposition in this case, I concur in result only and write separately to emphasize the significant interests at stake in every parole decision, but especially in those which serve-out a life sentence. I also write to express my concerns with the parole process itself and the lack of checks on the significant power wielded by the Board.” This decision “alters the offender’s life by a forfeiture that is irrevocable. It takes all hope away from an inmate and quashes any incentive he may have to better himself, to behave well, or to contribute to the community in any meaningful way. It provides ‘no chance for reconciliation with society’ or meaningful contrition or forgiveness”.

There are now approximately 7 women who are currently incarcerated at the Kentucky Correctional Institution for Women who's sentence and sense of hope for a second chance have been destroyed. There are no women currently on Death Row and 4 women who were sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. Up until 2020, none of those women had been given a “serve-out”. The Kentucky Parole Board has now resentenced them to death, more specifically, ‘Death by Incarceration’ or DBI. Several of these women have been locked up for 40 years or more and a few were given “serve-outs” at their very first parole board hearing...keep in mind how much time is given to each case and only needing to have one of 16 criteria that needs to be met in order to serve-out which could be the crime itself, no room or guideline to consider rehabilitation, redemption or restoration.

Karen Brown, currently incarcerated at KCIW in Pewee Valley, Kentucky.

As we embark on this celebration of International Women’s Day during Women’s month, and the women who have been recently stripped of opportunity of hope, redemption or second chance I would like to bring up a case in point.

Karen Brown, seen here at KCIW in Kentucky, has been locked up since early February of 1986, given a life sentence with a possibility of parole after 25 years with the presumption of rehabilitation, or so one would think, including Karen.

No prior record, no history of violence, good reports from staff, 100+ programs completed, 7 advanced degrees, including a master’s in education, 100+ letters of support both locally and nationally including faith leaders, politicians, former parole board members, former prison staff/volunteers/educators, friends, family as well as others who returned back to society thanking her for the guidance she provided. Karen has lead the prison music ministry and worship services for over a quarter century with an impeccable institutional record and a solid reentry plan. One parole board member during the hearing where she received the ‘serve-out’, noted the impressive community support and solid re-entry plan presented which can be heard in it’s entirety at https://www.kyfreekarenbrown.com/about.

Did the Ky Parole Board believe no one who has committed a violent crime deserves parole? No, in fact double murderers with poor institutional records were released that same year. Is the Ky Parole Board saying that every new hearing brings only one matter, the seriousness of the crime? The Ky Parole Board released a woman in 2020 sentenced in 1987 to life with parole for a robbery, burglary and double murder of her mother and stepfather. Also releasing a woman in 2018 with a sentence to life in prison without the possibility for parole for 25 years for kidnapping, robbery, rape and strangulation. There was another particular case that was promoted and given parole. A woman who gave birth, stuffed toilet paper in the baby’s mouth, put that infant in a trash can, and proceeded to go into the prison to visit her boyfriend. She received the privilege of parole the first time up, while having a terrible behavior record in prison with tickets of drug use, fighting and more. There are other comparison cases like this. If the seriousness of the crime and victim impact are not applied here, why not?

Karen Brown is a humble, 62-year-old aging woman who continues to live her life according to her faith. She holds the title no one wants, the longest continuously incarcerated woman in Kentucky. Let’s talk about what that means for people and for the state…it’s about public safety, it’s about accountability, but it’s also about what we believe change looks like. Can someone who was locked up at age 21 be the same at age 62? Karen’s record says she tried to make everyday count-studying, mentoring, ministering, repairing what can be repaired on the inside. Supporters point to her decades of good conduct and education as proof of rehabilitation and they’re calling for commutation. We don’t have to agree on the answer, but we should agree on the question. What is prison for after 40 years? Punishment only or punishment plus the possibility of redemption? Time just doesn’t pass, it shapes us. It’s time for Governor Beshear and Kentucky to free Karen Brown and take a serious look at this broken system. We need to celebrate the lives of women and give light to this injustice as we move towards April, which is considered Second Chances month. If you want to learn more, please check out the rest of this website where this article took you.