ABBOTSFORD — When killer Kelly Ellard takes her baby to the prison playground they have a view across a field and through barbed wire to Matsqui Institution, where the tyke’s father lives.
Ellard is serving her life sentence in the minimum-security annex of the Fraser Valley Institution, where she is part of a special Federal program for incarcerated moms and their babies.
Ellard got pregnant last year after being allowed conjugal visits with her criminal boyfriend Darwin Dorozan, who’s since been sent back to jail for violating his parole conditions.
Convicted killer Kelly Ellard and her boyfriend, Darwin Dorozan.
On Thursday, Correctional Service Canada allowed journalists to tour the facility where Ellard and her new son live with 19 other inmates.
It’s up the road from the main prison building where last week Ellard told parole board members that she sees “the world with different eyes” since becoming a mother about two months ago.
“It’s very motivating for me. It’s the best therapy for me,” Ellard said as she applied for escorted temporary leaves to take her baby into the community.
The two board members were split on her application, which will now be heard at a later date.
A children’s play structure is seen outside the mother-child common room of the Annex at the Fraser Valley Institution in Abbotsford, B.C., Thursday, Jan. 26, 2017.
Ellard and other inmates were out of site during the media tour of the two-year old annex.
Warden Sav Bains guided journalists through a common living room with a baby swing, car seat, colourful quilts, an alphabet mat and toys scattered around.
Citing privacy issues, Bains would not confirm whether Ellard was the only mother in the facility with a baby. Correctional service has confirmed there are 10 children living with their mothers in prisons across the country.
“The mother and child would do some activities together including having the child play, watching TV, play various games, what any other mother and child would do,” Bains said.
A large kitchen with three fridges and two ovens is fully equipped to allow inmates to cook for themselves. Knives hanging from two magnetized strips on the wall are counted daily by staff, Bains said.
A mother-child kitchen facility is pictured in the Annex of the Fraser Valley Institution in Abbotsford, B.C., Thursday, Jan. 26, 2017.
A narrow corridor leads to private dorm-like rooms, including some complete with baby furniture.
Bains opened the door to one of the rooms, containing a bassinet, a white crib, a change table, packages of diapers and storage for baby books and clothes. Little owls dangled from the crib mobile. Stickers of elephants, giraffes and other animals brightened the beige walls.
The babies’ rooms connect to that of their mothers by an internal doorway, Bains said.
The program started nationally in 1997 and here in the Fraser Valley in 2004, when this prison opened.
Bains said mothers applying for the program are carefully screened. No one convicted of sex offences with children would be allowed to participate, he said.
Once accepted into the program, the moms “would typically take care of their children including activities of playing with them, feeding them, like any other community setting,” Bains said.
“In addition to that, they are required to do programs – vocational as well as correctional programs – and when they do need to attend, we have designated babysitters.”
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Those are other inmates who are also carefully screened, he said.
“The mother-child program is obviously based upon building a positive relationship between the mother and child,” Bains said.
Social workers from the B.C. government are involved in assessing each inmate who applies and continuing to monitor the welfare of their children, who can live inside prison full-time up to age five and part-time until they’re seven.
“Our front line staff are available 24 hours a day that would be monitoring the welfare of the child,” Bains said.
“We are seeing benefits from the program and the participation of the mother in bonding with the children and obviously we want that to continue as part of their reintegration.”
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