Last weekend, Qiana Johnson spent much of her time with friends, family and comrades during what turned out to be another Mother’s Day where she didn’t have to bail a Black mother out of a Prince George’s County detention facility.
With newly formed Mother’s Day memories on her mind, Johnson beamed as she spoke about several dozen local mothers she’s met since 2017, when she launched the Black Mamas Bailout DMV movement. Some of those women, she said, could speak to the movement’s impact and what Johnson described as the overall absurdity of pre-trial detention.
“When we first started doing this, we were bailing women out for $50 and $100 and women were languishing in jail for those dollar amounts,” Johnson told The Informer. “Because of the work that we’ve been doing on the ground working with Aisha Braveboy and the state’s attorney’s office, placing demands on them and doing our court watching work, we can honestly say that we don’t have those types of problems anymore in Prince George’s County.”
In Prince George’s County, those who are detained in the county’s Department of Corrections— with or without bond— are placed there by order of a judge. Those who are held after their initial appearance before a commissioner may later appear in a bond review hearing during which the judge or commissioner may set the amount needed for a defendant to be released.
Those who are released on bond often make it happen with support of a bail bond agent— but only if they or their family can cover 10% of the bond.
Amid court challenges and allegations that Prince George’s County court officials made improper deferrals and delayed pre-trial releases, Johnson and other members of Court Watch P.G. lobbied what was then the Office of Maryland State’s Attorney Aisha Braveboy to release defendants struggling under the weight of small bail amounts.
Every court appearance, Johnson said, gave her the visibility and leverage to effect change.
“They knew that if we find that a woman is being held for $50, instead of being released on her own personal recognizance, that we are going to have a situation,” Johnson said. “Women are getting released on their own personal recognizance…with a promise to return to court. And that’s what we’ve been fighting for. That’s the whole entire purpose of the campaign.
Court Watch P.G. reached another level of distinction this past Mother’s Day when singer-songwriter Fiona Apple released “Pretrial (Let Her Go Home), a song inspired by her participation in the movement.
The accompanying four-minute video features photos and footage of Black mothers from the D.C. metropolitan area and other parts of the U.S. who’ve experienced pre-trial detention.
Johnson said she met Fiona Apple, a three-time Grammy winner, through their work on the Gasping for Justice Campaign, a COVID-era campaign that centered the stories of mothers experiencing pre-trial detention. As Johnson recounted, Fiona Apple, upon learning about Court Watch P.G., participated in a virtual training and remained a constant supporter, to the point that, when she missed the Grammys in 2021, she circulated a petition in support of virtual access to Prince George’s County court proceedings.
“It’s a depiction of our friendship and the fact that she wants to share and to give us a platform to share in our struggle,” Johnson said about Fiona Apple. “That’s what it looks like to be really in community. I think a lot of other celebrities should, should take a page out of Fiona’s book because she’s using her voice to amplify causes and.. give life, beauty and art to very serious movement issues.”
Black Mothers March on the White House
In the U.S., Black mothers, particularly those experiencing poverty, often come into contact with the legal system through child protective services.
According to the National Institutes of Health, nearly 53% of Black children are investigated by a child protective service agency as victims of maltreatment before their 18th birthday. Meanwhile, their white counterparts, who experience extreme poverty at one-third the rate of Black children, only receive this designation 28% of the time.
That’s why, on Mother’s Day, Black maternal figures and allies participated in the fourth annual Black Mothers March on the White House to challenge prevailing racial disparities in child and family service agencies’ engagement with Black families.
Every year since 2022, organizers have converged on the District to educate families about their parental rights and intensify resistance to a system that regulates familial relationships.
“African children have been stolen physically, culturally, spiritually [and] economically,” family defender and activist Keshia Dorsey said to protesters on May 11. “We still thrive in these areas once we realize the power is in you, in unity. We will march… and demand that our children be returned to their birth families.”
For another year, Operation Stop CPS, the African People’s Socialist Party, and other organizations provided Black mothers a space to share experiences and build community. Amid the comradry, organizers’ gave a call for: repeal of the Child Abuse and Prevention Treatment Act and the Adoption and Safe Families Act, the latter of which outlines circumstances — including those connected to family culture — that allow the states to terminate parental rights.
Some mothers, like Keke Woods, who visited Lafayette Square, just feet from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, said that those types of changes won’t happen without constant motion.
“We are still raising awareness,” said Woods, a Durham, N.C. resident and co-organizer of Operation Stop CPS and Rootz. “But it’s not enough to just raise awareness. We have to also be in action. We cannot stay still. We cannot stay where we are. We have to take this torch and keep moving forward.”
For Wilmington, North Carolina resident Yvonne Pollard, the annual trips to D.C. have served as an opportunity to tell people about Ty’Ava, her granddaughter.
“This [march] opens people’s eyes to what’s going on right under their noses,” Pollard said.
Pollard told The Informer that she took custody of Ty’Ava during her mother’s struggle with depression, anxiety and addiction. As she recounted, the Wilmington Police Department took Ty’Ava, then two years old, from her daycare and into the custody of New Hanover County Department of Social Services, who then refused to consider any kinship placement options.
Even though Ty’Ava’s mother has been sober since 2021, her parental rights were terminated in May 2022 and she was adopted, Pollard told The Informer.
“I don’t know how you terminate rights that are God-given,” she said. “People are conditioned to believe that you must have done something to your offspring in order for these agencies to step in, but that’s not true.”
To this day, the Pollard family continues to fight for the reversal of Ty’Ava’s adoption, even with the mental and physical toll it takes on her. Pollard admitted not initially planning to attend this year’s Black Mothers March, due to what she called the time-consuming nature of her struggle. However, she ultimately expressed gratitude for the fellowship the event’s provided for four years.
“They say Happy Mother’s Day, but it’s not really much to be happy about when there’s a piece missing,” Pollard told The Informer. “We’re here to hold each other up…, support each other, get those feelings out and keep each other strong enough.”
Angel Cook, a Baltimore resident and returning citizen, said she attended the annual Black Mothers March on the White House to cope with the termination of her parental rights.
Nearly a decade ago, Cook started serving a four-year prison sentence for stealing baby food. As Cook explained, Maryland state authorities placed her then-18-month-old daughter Destiny in foster care before petitioning for termination of parental rights more than a year into Cook’s sentence.
“When I came home, she was already adopted,” Cook said about her daughter Destiny. “She was four when I got out. She’s 10 now, but I haven’t seen her since she was five [and] they just cut off all communication.”
Cook told The Informer that, despite the circumstances, she has some semblance of hope being in the District with mothers of like mind.
“I want to connect with other women – other mothers – because I’m grieving a child that’s alive and I don’t know how to deal,” Cook said.. “I’m headed to the Supreme Court in hopes that I’ll be one of the first people to get an adoption overturned because I will not give up.”
On Sunday, hundreds of mothers, mother figures and allies listened to remarks from a bevy of speakers — including Woods and Keshia Dorsey — who reminded them about the power and voice deemed crucial in combating inequity in the child welfare system.
While speaking to The Informer, APSP’s Ericka Nunn spoke about the potential for dismantling a system that’s existed in various manifestations.
“They’re stealing our children, which is a reflection of history and slavery, where they were just separating our families, so demonstrations like this are denying that,” Nunn said. “We’re not going to allow you to disrupt our families and cannibalize our cultures and destroy our lives.”
