Feminists Around the World: Teodora del Carmen Vasquez

After a traumatic incident led to imprisonment, Teodora del Carmen Vasquez became an advocate for reproductive rights in El Salvador, and around the world.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hey, this is Andy and Samantha and welcome to stephone
Never told Your Prediction off by hurt Rightio.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
And we are back with a new episode of Feminist
Around the World. Before we start, let's go ahead and
put this content warning and trigger warning about loss and pregnancy, stillbirth,
and anti reproductive health laws. There's a lot going on
here in the US if you didn't know. We have
elections and obviously a continued fight for equal rights, including

(00:40):
women's rights for reproductive health, and the aftermath of the
repeal of Roe v. Wade has been pretty intense, with
women being jailed and charged for neglect or even murder,
and some who had to risk their help and lives
because of the restrictions of the repell and those who
are taking advantage of how to use it in order

(01:01):
to strip away pregnant people's rights. Yes, that's a very
big topic right now. I know most of you know,
and with that, we know there are testimonies all around
the world who will understand the repercussions of all of this.
So today we are talking about a specific incident and
the advocacy work of activists. Theodora Deale's Carmen Vasquez Vasquez's

(01:23):
life changed drastically when her pregnancy became an emergency situation.
So after being in pain for several days, she tried
to ask for help from her management while she was working,
and at the time, she was working at a school
in the cafeteria and she was around nine months pregnant
with her second child. After her supervisors refused to help
her or get help for her, Vasquez was found passed

(01:45):
out in the bathroom with her stillborn and instead of
getting help after the incident, Vasquez was arrested and charged
with aggravated homicide.

Speaker 1 (01:54):
Here's her own words about that traumatic day from Global
citizen dot org. On Friday, July thirteenth, two thousand and seven,
I was living a desired and full term pregnancy. It
was a Friday the thirteenth that I will remember forever
a belief that what I lived through was part of
my destiny. I was nine months pregnant and getting ready
for my baby to be born. I was working in

(02:15):
a school coffee shop. It was the last day of
the week and I was getting ready to deliver my
baby on Saturday. However, that Friday, around five o'clock in
the afternoon, I began to feel pain, a very strong
labor pain. Since it was Friday, my colleagues had left early,
so I was alone. The pain started and I had
to stay there because it was a four hour drive
from sansalthdoor to my house. I grabbed the phone and

(02:38):
started making emergency calls. I called nine one one, because
in my agony, I only remembered that number, and asked
for an ambulance. I explained that I was pregnant, that
I was expecting my baby and I was in labor,
that I couldn't stand the pain, that I needed the
doctors to come urgently. They didn't come. They never came,
and since they never came, my baby had to be

(03:00):
born where I was. I had horrible bleeding and I fainted.

Speaker 2 (03:04):
Vasquez lived in Elsavador, and at the time and even today,
they have a complete abortion ban without any exceptions. With
this abortion ban, a pregnant person can be imprisoned for
up to eight years for many cases that they classify
as an abortion, whether it's still born or miscarriage of fetuses.
But for Vescuez, she was charged in sentenced with a
minimum of thirty years in prison. Here's some more information

(03:26):
about the abortion laws in El Salvador from Progressive International.
El Savador has some of the world's harshest anti abortion laws.
Not only is abortion prohibited in all circumstances, including in
cases of rape, incest, or when the life of the
pregnant person is at risk, it is also severely punished,
with up to eight years in prison. But women who

(03:46):
suffer an obstetric complication such as miscarriages or still birth
are punished even more harshly. They can be prosecuted for
a murder or aggravated murder and face up to fifty
years inside. Hundreds of women, most of them poor, have
been sentenced to long prison terms. And that's a big
conversation about how most of the women who are in
prison are probably classified as poor or low income social status.

(04:10):
So there's definitely a level here. And a bit more
from Foreign policy dot Com twenty five years ago this April,
and this was written in twenty twenty three, El Salvador
passed a total ban on abortions, no exceptions for rape, incest,
or the health or life of the mother, transforming society
in this Central American nation. Now the ban might finally
be overturned the Inter American Court of a Human rights

(04:32):
has begun hearing Beatrice versus El Savador, investigating the case
of a woman who was seriously ill from lupus arthritis
and renal failure, but denied an abortion, even though the
fetus would not survive outside of the uterus. The woman
died not long after. With this court case, the court
will rule for the first time on whether the absolute
prohibition of abortion rights violates a woman's right to life

(04:53):
and health. Spoiler alert, They did not. They did not
pass this If I remember correctly, it is still intact.

Speaker 1 (05:00):
And the article continues quote. With over fifty women incarcerated
since the band was passed, El Salvador is one of
the most widely documented examples of a country imprisoning women
for abortion. The Fuller Project and Foreign Policy have reviewed
court documents or pardon request related to twenty five cases
from nineteen ninety nine to twenty eighteen a pregnant women

(05:20):
accused of aggravated homicide, attempted aggravated homicide, and abortion. They
reveal how the country's abortion band made neighbors, doctors, police
and judges, the very people meant to help these women
turn against them instead. The system doesn't seek the truth.
It seeks to blame these women, Cortes.

Speaker 2 (05:38):
Said, right, And Abigail Cortez is actually one of the
women with the Citizens Group for the Decriminalization of abortion
in El Savador, so she's been working quite hard in
overturning this laws. But I think that last statement was
really really important to have that, Yes, they don't care,
they don't care to say the truth, and we know
what's happening in the US. It's kind of the similar
level where they use misinformation and disinformation to try to

(06:00):
say that people are killing babies because they're fetuses anyway, whatever.
Moving on. So, though the records showed that Vasquez is
stillborn had not taken a breath, the courts refused to
hear her out, and even in twenty seventeen, ten years
after her being in prison, they wouldn't. In an article
written in univision dot Com in twenty seventeen, they report

(06:21):
a court in El Salvador decided late Wednesday to uphold
a thirty year prison sentence for Theodora del Carmen Vasquez,
who gave birth to a stillborn baby in two thousand
and seven. Prosecutors accused her of killing her newborn and
charged her with homicide. After the verdict was announced, the
room fell silent, except for the cries of Vasquez's mother.
Vesquez turned to her lawyers in shock and frustration. Theodora

(06:44):
was shocked, says her lawyer, Katie Rossinos. She said, I'm
innocent and I need to keep going.

Speaker 1 (06:50):
The article goes on. Prosecutors did not elaborate on their
reasoning Wednesday, only stating that evidence was not sufficient to
clear Vesquez of charges. The judges who decided to uphold
the Senates were the same judges who sentenced her ten
years ago.

Speaker 2 (07:04):
Right, and she wasn't the only one to go through
similar ordeals. Vasquez was one of seventeen who were all
sentenced to aggravated homicide from nineteen ninety nine to twenty eleven.
The women were actually referred to as last seventeen. I
know that's going to be in Spanish and I can't
remember the seventeen Spanish apology shawl. But yeah, so they
are referred to as that.

Speaker 1 (07:35):
And it was in prison that Vasquez realized she needed
to do something to not only advocate for herself, but
others in situations similar to her. Here's some more from
her article in Global citizen quote. While I was in prison,
I started working with an organization called Timpo's Nuevos Tiatro.
I started doing theater and then they asked me if

(07:56):
I wanted to work with them because I liked reading
books and empowering women. I really started my activism from
the inside. Then I met women prisoners accused of a
crime similar to mine. I realized that the only way
out is to take strength from ourselves to be united.
At the beginning, the discrimination that a company does was
very strong, and many times we did not have access

(08:18):
to anything. Even if we went to serve our food
at lunchtime in the prison, other women who were there
would take it away from us because they said that
we deserved to die slowly. We were twenty four women
in there who were in prison for a situation just
like mine. But we were very strong, united in a
very good circle. We had decided to fight together. Despite

(08:39):
so much pain and so much injustice, I moved forward.
The truth is that when I think about everything we
have been through together and how we are now, what
we have achieved is very nice. The situation forces you
to bring out the lioness in you.

Speaker 2 (08:55):
In twenty eighteen, she was finally able to be released
with the help of outside campaigns and organizations on the world.
It took almost eleven years, but she was finally freed. However,
she was freed with her sentence commuted and not overturned.
She was the sixteenth woman to be released after the
different organizations or the cases of these different women. So
here's what she had to say in the Global Citizen

(09:16):
about her release. I regained my freedom on February fifteenth,
twenty eighteen, after being sentenced to thirty years in prison.
I was released after ten years and seven months. I
really managed to get out thanks to the campaigning efforts
of different organizations and because of my good behavior. I
adapted to the space and the place. In order to survive,
I had to learn to live with all the bad
things around me, even though I was not guilty of

(09:38):
what they were accusing me of. I always knew that
even though I was inside the jail, the jail was
not inside me. That is something that separated me from jail.
I was deprived of my freedom, but at the same time,
I was mentally building a life out here, a life
that is now becoming a reality.

Speaker 1 (09:52):
However, it wasn't so easy to readjust and she continues,
it is difficult to be released because it is difficult
to reintegrate into society, to deal with the social stigma,
the lack of integration, the lack of opportunities. My first
day of freedom was hard, sad, difficult. I've been deprived
of my freedom, but I had a group of women
I was working with. I wanted to get out, but

(10:13):
I was split in two because I was very sad
to leave the rest of the women in there. I
had to level everything. I had to think about the
women inside and think about my family. The day I
was free again, I was very happy because I saw
my son again, my parents, my brothers, and my nephews
and nieces. We are a very big family. I have
eleven siblings and they were all there. But I was

(10:34):
also afraid for the future, and I didn't know where
to start.

Speaker 2 (10:38):
However, again this didn't stop her. She would go on
to work with a Tempos Nuevo Tietral and also go
on to study and go to the university, and it
was then she started her own project moheris libres al savador.
So here's some information from the Progressive International on the
organization on regaining their freedom. She and Alberodo founded the
nonprofit organization Moheres Libres el Salvador. The group provides training

(11:02):
and support for women who, like them, have been deprived
of their liberty to enable them to reintegrate into society.
The training is focused on personal growth and covers legal issues,
human rights, gender and sex, and reproductive of health. For Vasquez,
activism is her daily work. When she or her colleagues
here via social media or word of mouth that a
woman has been in prison for an obstetric emergency, they

(11:24):
get to work. They meet her in prison and work
with the lawyers who offer free legal support and representation.

Speaker 1 (11:30):
And she goes on to explain the project with global
citizen quote. Our project has several pillars. The first component
is health because when we leave prison, health is a
priority since we do not receive any follow up care
there and with all the difficulties we experience, we come
out sick. The second is psychological support. The third is
legal support to follow up the women who are still
in open process. The fourth is scholarship so that they

(11:53):
can study. The fifth is employment, and the sixth is housing.
We have built these six pillars as results of every
need that the women have expressed throughout the project. Step
by step we have been covering all these needs. The
important thing has been to see how the women are
becoming empowered. They are talking about their rights, they are
learning things. Some are already studying at universities. Some have

(12:15):
graduated as nurses. We have women who graduate tourism, law teachers, communicators.
It has taken a lot of work, but each of
my colleagues has put a lot of effort and determination
into believing in the projects and saying yes, you have
to be encouraged. It is not the same to have
someone speak for you as it is for you to
say directly how you feel.

Speaker 2 (12:35):
And she and her crew continue to fight for their
rights and vindication. She talks about her goals and her dreams,
and she writes in the Global Citizen, I want my
story to be known. There is a way to change
the world if you speak out. I want women to
know that after present, there is also hope. There's no
way to turn back time. But coming together has given
us opportunities and empowered us. We women have to open doors,

(12:58):
open roads for ourselves, pass through. Although I'm free, I
still feel I am in the process of reintegration because
there are things that are still difficult. I have a
university degree, I have won different awards for all my
work and for my preservance and struggles. The opportunities to
have a legally constituted organization gives me a lot of
hope because that opens doors for us. But there's still

(13:20):
a lot to do, and one of my biggest goals
is to help these women find ways to survive and
be independent. The independence of each woman is what interests me.
To achieve that, I need to make sure that every
woman receives moral and psychological support within the spaces of
Moheres libres. That is one of my dreams and objectives.
I will continue working to achieve it, and that's exactly

(13:42):
what she's been doing. I think it's interesting because there's
also an article from many human rights lawyers as well
as activists from El Salvador trying to tell the us
this is what's going to happen, giving us a cautionary
tell about what is happening in the slippery slope that
happens through the as. In fact, there wasn't one article
and I'm not going to give you complete quotes, and

(14:03):
it's not necessarily talk about because it's not about us necessarily,
but where One El Salvadorian lawyer says that it is
known that some of the authorities in El Salvador are
actually talked to the US authorities and talk about how
to make these changes happen. So just as the word
think about, but also to remember people like Theodora, who

(14:25):
has done the work even though she has gone through
so much, and who continues to do the work to
help others through these paths.

Speaker 1 (14:32):
Yes, and finding that camaraderie with other women and other
people have gone through similar things. Because yes, this is
something we're gonna be talking about a lot I feel
in the future. But yes, as always, if you have
any suggestions for this segment or anything at all, please

(14:54):
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(15:15):
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