In an unprecedented case involving the rights of an intersexual prison inmate, a Denver federal appeals court found that even though Wyoming officials could have done a better job of safely confining Miki Ann DiMarco, the state did not violate her rights by holding her in Spartan solitary confinement. DiMarco was sent to state prison for a probation violation on a non-violent conviction. DiMarco was sentenced to confinement at the Wyoming Women's Center after her probation on check fraud charges was revoked due to lack of verifiable identification and positive drug tests. She had been held in the Laramie County jail for over a month in the women's section without incident, but on arrival at the state women's prison, a complete medical exam …show more content…
Miki DiMarco was born with a tiny penis, no testicles, and no female reproductive organs. The absence of testicles means that her body does not naturally produce the hormones that lead to masculinization (body shape, body hair), and since puberty she has lived as a woman, despite the lack of female reproductive organs. She has never had surgery to remove her penis, however. Her condition was diagnosed as being congenital, as a result of disruption of gonadal development in the womb. She had her testicles surgically removed, but there was no indication in the court's opinion about what if any hormonal treatments she had undergone to adapt her appearance.
The story of DiMarco's imprisonment is a tale of ignorance and fear, demonstrating the long road ahead of the intersexual rights movement in educating American society to understand the reality of intersexuality so that persons born with such a condition enjoy appropriate respect for their human rights. Intersexuals, sometimes called hermaphrodites, are individuals who are born with both male and female characteristics. This condition is usually the result of an abnormality of the sex chromosomes or a hormonal imbalance during the development of the …show more content…
For the length of her confinement, DeMarco had no contact with other prisoners and limited contact with prison staff, living essentially isolated from human contact. She had to consume all her meals in her tiny cell, with cement block walls, solid steel doors, and access to a tiny day room with a TV high up on one wall (controlled remotely by a guard) and a steel table and bench set bolted to the floor. Unlike general population, she had no assigned place to store personal effects and was given only two sets of prison clothing (unlike five sets assigned in general population). Since she was in maximum security, she was not allowed to work for an allowance to buy personal items, could only use the exercise area when no other prisoners were there for brief periods of time. She was not allowed to have her hair cut for 14 months. She could select books from a limited selection on a library cart occasionally brought around. Although one officer gave her a deck of playing cards, they were confiscated after three days. If she tried to converse with other inmates in the segregation wing, she received disciplinary write-ups for violating the no-communication rule. Only when other prisoners were not