Procreation Bans in Parole

The_Beedle writes "A month ago the Supreme Court of Ohio didn't overturned a lower court decision to prohibit the fathering of additional children by a father on probation for failure to pay his child support charges Fox News Reference. The Court of Ohio failed dodged the issue of whether such a restriction was legal in favor of overruling this particular case on the grounds that there was no provision for the man to pay up and then have more kids.

By way of comparison, People v. Pointer (California, 1984 available at Findlaw.com, free registration required) the Supreme Court of California found that a similar prohibition for a female convicted of child abuse and neglect was too great an inhibition on her constitutional rights :

"[5d] The challenged condition was apparently not intended to serve any rehabilitative purpose but rather to protect the public by preventing injury to an unborn child. We believe this salutary purpose can adequately be served by alternative restrictions less subversive of appellant's fundamental right to procreate."

A similar ruling was handed down by the Supreme Court of California in 1992, People v. Zaring after a judge there ordered a mother of five and heroin/cocaine addict not to conceive as a term of her probation. The California Supreme Court overturned that, saying

"Recognizing that drug addiction could have an adverse impact on the unborn, we must conclude under the law that even if we were to assume arguendo that the safeguarding of the health of any yet to be conceived unborn child of appellant may properly be the subject of probation conditions, it is clear to us that other conditions, less drastic than an outright ban on pregnancy, could be used here to accomplish this objective, just as they could have been used in Pointer."

They also quoted similar rulings from Kansas, Ohio and Florida, all of which illustrates a clear double standard with respect to procreation. A woman's right to concieve is inviolate, despite convictions of child endangerment, child abuse, neglect or even kidnapping. A man's right to procreate is fair game for having incurred a bad debt."

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