Inmates upset by cries of woman in labour
Several inmates at the Ottawa-Carleton Detention Centre were upset by hearing the cries from a woman in labour inside a jail cell last month, according to a support group that employs a staff member at the jail.
"I can tell you that we have heard from other prisoners at the detention centre who have said they were traumatized by listening to what was going on," said Bryonie Baxter, head of the Ottawa chapter of the Elizabeth Fry Society, which advocates on behalf of women in the justice system.
Julie Bilotta gave birth on Sept. 29 to a baby boy inside a segregation cell at the jail. The baby, apparently born in the breech position, arrived about a month early.
Bilotta is being held at the jail on fraud and drug charges while she awaits trial.
Baxter said the society hopes Bilotta will be released into the care of her mother, but if not, they have offered Bilotta a bed at one of the society's community residential facilities, which is staffed 24 hours a day, every day.
"When I went to see her … she was able to maintain her composure through telling me the entire story really well, until we got to the part where I said, 'Did you get a chance to hold the baby?' And that's when she started to cry," Baxter said. "She's desperate to be with her child."
Bilotta's mother, Kim Hurtubise, said a Cornwall judge asked her to trust the system when her daughter was sent to jail when she was 36 weeks pregnant.
Bilotta has asked her mother to bring the baby to the jail on Saturday for visiting hours, where it's likely she'll only be able to see her son through a glass partition.
Correctional Services minister Madeleine Meilleur, an Ottawa-area MPP, said the ministry is reviewing what went on in the jail on the day of the boy's birth.
Meilleur also said she has a message for Bilotta and her family.
"Thank you for reporting that to us and telling us about your feeling, and the situation will be reviewed, and I hope that it will not happen again," Meilleur told Robyn Bresnahan, in an interview on CBC Radio's Ottawa Morning.
"I'm not taking this lightly. We are going to review the situation," she said.
Meilleur said an inmate should receive the same level of care inside a jail as a woman in the general population.
