Oklahoma’s governor, Kevin Stitt, signed Senate Bill 1835 at the end of last month – marking a radical change for incarcerated domestic violence survivors in the state.
Also known as Oklahoma’s Survivors Act, the law will be signed into effect on 1 September and will grant hundreds of people who experienced abuse the opportunity to be resentenced with more leniency in what is one of the most extensive reforms to the state’s justice system following years of advocacy.
Incarcerated people in Oklahoma, like Shari McDonald and April Wilkens, whose crimes were motivated by domestic violence, can file for resentencing when the law is signed. Going forward, courts can impose lesser sentences under certain circumstances if abuse is substantiated, and survivors can be considered for a lesser prison range than they were initially eligible for.
Crucially, the legislation will also ensure that future survivors are not judged so harshly by the justice system for acting in self-defense.
Wilkens was 28 years old when she killed her fiance. She alleged he raped, threatened and abused her for years, and that behavior had been happening on the night of the murder. She claims that pulling the trigger had been an act of retaliatory self-defense and never imagined it would be repudiated by the police who arrested her. Over the years, Wilkens had three past protective orders against her fiance and had filed 14 police reports.
“What use is a piece of paper, though,” she said, “if you’re dead.”
For McDonald, who was 19 years old at the time of her crime, the circumstances were different. She testified at trial that her husband forced her to participate in an attempted armed robbery at a restaurant, one that resulted in a death. McDonald claims she had no idea that he had beaten the two employees until after they left. She was given life in prison – the same sentence as her husband.
“I did it because I felt like I didn’t have any choice that day, and I knew what he would do,” she said. “I was devastated and hurt, and the system failed me.”
Wilkens and McDonald say they will be among the first to file when the new law comes into practice.
“This is a historic, transformative time for the state of Oklahoma,” Colleen McCarty, co-founder of the OK Survivor Justice Coalition, said.
“Now, it’s time to reunite domestic abuse survivors with their families and ensure that future survivors are not punished for defending themselves.”
Historically, Oklahoma has the largest population of incarcerated women in the US – almost twice the national average. In February, a WalletHub survey ranked it as the worst state for women, with the highest rates of domestic violence in the country.
Dr David McLeod, a professor at the University of Oklahoma, has spent decades compiling research on this area.
“Seventy per cent of the incarcerated women in Oklahoma were in a violent relationship at the time they received the charge that led them to prison,” he said. “The fact that women could not incorporate that reality into their defense was a blatant marker of the institutionalization of patriarchy. Domestic violence is about the enforcement of systemic behavioral control in a relationship, and when women dared to push back against that control, in Oklahoma, we incarcerated them.”
Wilkens and McDonald are both from outside of Oklahoma but have now spent most of their lives there behind bars, with little to no hope of parole or early release. Wilkens says she spent a significant part of her 20s wearing a panic button around her neck, losing track of the number of times she had to call the police. McDonald, who had her second child just before she was sentenced, grew up in foster care and said she felt safer as an abused child because she had somewhere to go at that time.
“The Oklahoma Survivors Act feels like coming up for air after drowning for 26 years,” said Wilkens, reflecting on her incarceration during a prison phone interview. “It is hope and bloom and it’s restored my faith in humanity, not just for me, but for the women around me here.”
For McDonald, who has spent two-thirds of her life incarcerated but describes herself as “62 years young”, the excitement is palpable. She hopes to build on her passion for working with animals and will volunteer with at-risk youth so they don’t end up in the same situation. “‘Relief’ was the first word that came to mind when asked about the passing of the new law.
“Somebody hurt us, and our cries have been silent for so long,” she said. “Now they’ve heard us. So many women need this help, need to know that the world isn’t against them, and they won’t just rot in prison.”
While the impending law offers some promise, Alexandra Bailey, the senior campaign strategist at The Sentencing Project, an organization working with the US justice system, still believes there are obstacles ahead.
Bailey recounted working with women who were pregnant and hurt by their abusive partners, only to end up behind bars for defending themselves and their children.
“The fact that opportunity is on the table is extraordinary,” she said, “but there is a long way to go. People will fight to keep these people in prison. We are prepared to fight for survivors and bring them home.”
• This article was amended on 20 June 2024 to correct misspellings of April Wilkens’ name, and the age when she shot her fiance: she was 28, not 25. In addition, Wilkens said “it’s restored my faith in humanity”, rather than “it’s restored my humanity” as an earlier version said.
