Mothers with Incarcerated Sons Allege Prison Abuse

Photo by RODNAE Productions from Pexels

This story is part three in a three-part series, detailing the allegations and complaints families of the incarcerated have against the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

By Anissa Durham

Two mothers allege horrific abuse, neglect and harm done to their sons who are incarcerated at Salinas Valley State Prison. COVID-19 has only exacerbated the situation and left these two mothers scrambling to connect with their sons.

In March of last year, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation canceled all in-person visits to its 35 prisons, due to the coronavirus pandemic. In place of in-person visits, the Department of Corrections implemented in December 2020, a 30-minute video conference call once every 30 days for families. But, as this series has described, many wives, mothers and loved ones have found the calls to be less than adequate.

Terri Hardy, a spokeswoman for the prison said via email, “Hundreds of visits have been successfully completed at Salinas Valley State Prison.”

The Department of Corrections announced on March 23 that they will begin a phased reopening of in-person visitation beginning April 10. But, it’s left to the discretion of each warden and chief executive officer of each institution to determine if the facility is safe enough to conduct in-person visiting. As of now, Salinas Valley State Prison will not be part of this phased reopening plan after the fifth man at the prison died of COVID-19 on March 25.

Deborah Rohr

“Even if they are some type of monster… they are still a human being,” Rohr said. “They are still somebody’s family member, they’re not just some animal that should be left to die.”

Rohr can not imagine a life without her twin son. Her son is currently incarcerated at Salinas Valley State Prison and is scheduled to be released in 2032, with nearly 4 years served, Rohr is hoping to get her son out sooner. Before the pandemic she was able to see her son almost every weekend, now she is lucky to get a phone call from him.

“I feel that you need your family and if you don’t have your family and you can’t talk to them, it’s hard for you to survive,” she said. “I miss seeing him.”

Rohr said she worries about the time her son spends idle, hoping his mind does not start turning.

“It’s like an animal in a cage... before they were getting out to see their family members,” she said. “Now they are just stuck.”

Immediately after his incarceration he got his GED and started in the Youth Offender Program (YOP), this allowed him to take welding and plumbing classes while simultaneously knocking time off of his sentence. This program like many others has been discontinued until further notice.

She said when her son was charged for his crime on Oct 3, 2017, the state added three additional enhancements, one for the possession of a firearm. On Oct 11, 2017, former CA Gov. Jerry Brown signed Senate Bill 620 which leaves it up to the discretion of the judge to strike or dismiss an enhancement that would otherwise be automatically added.

Rohr said had she known this bill was going to get signed, she would have tried to delay her son’s sentencing so this bill could be applied. She says she is working with the Ella Baker Center resource to try and get two of the enhancements dropped. Rohr said he has already served his time for the actual crime committed and is now serving enhancement time.

She has written CA Gov. Gavin Newsom 11 times and emailed him 15 times to get the gun enhancement charges dropped against her son, she said.

“To this day I never heard anything from Newsom and that is so disheartening... I know my name went across his desk more than once,” she said. “That just told me… he could care less.”

Despite not hearing back from Gov. Newsom, she said she is doing what any mother would do for their child.

She said people have no idea about the dark days that she experiences, grieving and worrying about the loss of her son to the prison system. Every Sunday she writes him a ‘thinking of you’ card to make sure he knows he is not forgotten and is loved.

She wants others to know that the decisions your children or loved ones make, not only impact their life but the lives of everyone around them. She is grateful her son maintains a positive attitude in prison and said this helps her stay hopeful.

“He’s still my child regardless, I can’t just forget him,” she said. “I think people need to be more compassionate.”

Ivette Godinez

“Some of you guys are worse criminals than the ones that are already in there, the only difference is that you have a badge to back yourself up,” Godinez said about the corrections officers at Salinas Valley State Prison.

Godinez's son is currently incarcerated at Salinas Valley State Prison and said it has been a rough experience. In November 2019, she said her son was horrifically beat, while handcuffed, by several guards who were trying to get him to snitch. She said her son refused and was beaten black and blue twice in one day.

She said none of the prison staff notified her that her son was in an incident with prison guards. An inmate notified Godinez that her son had been in the medical facility days after not hearing from him.

“For the safety and security of staff, the incarcerated population, all those at outside health care facilities and the community at large, CDCR does not disclose when an incarcerated person has been sent out for medical care in the community,” Hardy, a spokeswoman for the prison said via email. “However, CDCR and CCHCS medical staff make contact with an incarcerated patient’s identified medical surrogate in situations where the patient requires an alternative medical decision-maker due to incapacitation, or where a patient’s prognosis is critical.”

“Guards are really rough, they choose to look and turn their face to what they want, they feel because they are inmates they have no right,” Godinez said. “So they abuse their authority.”

Like everything else put to a startling halt because of COVID-19, Godinez last saw her son in person on Jan. 18, 2020, two months after the alleged incident. The last image she has is him riddled with bruises.

“It’s like they are… being incarcerated twice,” she said.

When Godinez asked for his medical report from the alleged altercation, she said it “mysteriously” disappeared. The only thing she was given was the incident report. After emailing several corrections officers, sergeants and lieutenants, Godinez received a call back from a higher up. She says he told her he would not be emailing her back because he was not going to leave a paper trail.

She said she would not be giving up on finding out who did this to her son. After multiple complaints to the prison, she said he has not been bothered since.

Sentenced to 35 years to life for aiding and abetting, Godinez is hoping with the recent changes to the law, her son's sentence can be retroactively amended. The state recently changed the felony murder rule under Senate Bill 1437, Godinez is hoping this new law will be applied to her son’s sentence.

She says he has already appealed once and was denied, but is planning on appealing again. Despite all of the expenses involved, she misses seeing her son, even if it was only through the prison glass.

“As a mother, you never want to have your child there,” she said.