Question

In 1976, 14-year-old Trina Garnett was living on the streets of Chester, Pennsylvania. She was the youngest of 12 children. Her father (Walter Garnett) was a former boxer; his failed career transformed him into a violent and abusive alcoholic. Trina's mother (Edith Garnett) became ill after bearing so many children. Some of her children were conceived during rapes by her husband. The older and sicker Edith became the more she found herself Walter's. Walter regularly punched, kicked, and verbally abused her in front of the children. Often, Walter stripped Edith naked and beat her until she writhed in pain, while her children looked on fearfully. When Edith lost consciousness Walter would shove a stick down her throat to revive her for more abuse. Trina could find no safety in her home. Once she watched her father strangle her pet dog for barking. He beat the puppy to death with a hammer and throw its body out of a window. Trina's twin sisters Linda and Lynn were a year older than her. Her sisters taught her to play invisible when she was a small child, to shield her from their father when he was drunk. When he was drunk, Walter would prowl their apartment with a belt, stripping the naked children and beating them randomly. Trina was taught to hide under a bed or in a closet and remain as quiet as possible. Trina showed signs of intellectual disabilities and other troubles at a young age. When she was a toddler she became seriously ill after ingesting lighter fluid, while she was left unattended. At the age of five Trina accidentally set herself on fire. Resulting in severe burns covering her chest, stomach, and back. She spent weeks in a hospital enduring painful skin grafts. That left her terribly scarred. When Trina was 9-years-old her mother died. Trina's oldest sisters tried to care for her, but when their father began to sexually abuse them they fled. After her older siblings left home, Walter's physical and sexual abuse focused on Trina, Lynn, and Linda. The girls ran away from home and began roaming the streets of Chester. Trina and her sisters ate out of garbage cans. Sometimes they would not eat for days. They slept in parks and public restrooms. The girls stayed with their older sister Eddy until Eddy's husband began to sexually abuse them. Their older siblings and aunts would sometimes provide temporary shelter, but the living situation would get disrupted by violence or death, so Trina would find herself wandering the streets again. Her mother's death, the abuse, and desperate circumstances all exacerbated Trina's emotional and mental health problems. At times, she became so distraught and ill that her sisters would have to find a relative to take her to the hospital, but because she was penniless she was never allowed to stay long enough to become stable or recover. Late one evening in August of 1976, 14-year-old Trina and her 16-year-olf friend (Francis Newsome) climbed through a window of a rowhouse in Chester. The girls wanted to talk to the boys who lived there. The boy's mother had forbidden her boys from playing with Trina, but Trina wanted to see them. Once she climbed into the house she lite matches to find her way to the boy's room. The house caught fire. The fire spread quickly, and two boys who were sleeping in the home dies from smoke asphyxiation. The boy's mother accused Trina of started the fire intentionally, but Trina and her friend assisted that it was an accident. Trina was traumatized by the boy's deaths, and could barely speak when the police arrested her. She was so nonfunctional and listless that her appointed lawyer thought she was incompetent to stand trial, she failed to receive treatment and services because Train's attorney failed to file appropriate motions or present evidence to support incompetency. He also never challenged the state's decision to try 14-year-old Trina as an adult. The lawyer, who was subsequently disbarred and jailed for unrelated criminal misconduct. Trina was stood trial for second-degree murder in an adult courthouse. At trial, Trina's friend agreed to testify against Francis Newsome agreed to testify against Trina in exchange for the charges against her being dropped. Trina was convicted of second-degree murder. Delaware County Circuit Judge Howard Reed found that Trina had no intent to kill. But under Pennsylvania law, the judge could not take the absence of intent into account during sentencing. He could not consider Trina’s age, mental illness, poverty, the physical and sexual abuse she had suffered, or the tragic circumstances surrounding the fire. Pennsylvania sentencing law was inflexible: For those convicted of second-degree murder, mandatory life imprisonment without the possibility of parole was the only sentence. Judge Reed expressed serious misgivings about the sentence he was forced to impose. “This is the saddest case I’ve ever seen,” he wrote. For a tragic crime committed at 14, Trina was condemned to die in prison. After sentencing, 16-year-old Trina was immediately shipped off to an adult prison for women in Muncy. Trina was terrified, still suffering from trauma and mental illness and intensely vulnerable - with the knowledge that she would never leave Muncy. Not long after she arrived at Muncy, a male correctional officer pulled Trina into a secluded area and raped her. The crime was discovered after Trina became pregnant. The officer was fired but not criminally prosecuted. Trina remanded in prison and gave birth to a son like hundreds of women who give birth while in prison, she was completely unprepared for the stress of childbirth. She delivered her baby while handcuffed to a bed. Trina's baby boy was taken away from her and placed in foster care. After this series of events: the fire, the imprisonment, the rape, the traumatic birth, and the seizure of her son Trina's mental health deteriorated further. Over the years, she became less functional and more mentally disabled. her body began to spasm and quiver uncontrollably until she required a cane and then a wheelchair. By the time Trina turned thirty prison doctors diagnosed her with multiple sclerosis, intellectual disability, and mental illness related to trauma. Trina filed a civil suit against the correctional officer who raped her, and the jury awarded her $62,000. The correctional officer appealed and the court reversed the verdict because the correctional officer had not been permitted to inform the jury that Trina was in prison for murder. Consequently, Trina never received any financial aid or services from the state compensate for her being violently raped by one of the state's correctional officers. In 2014, turned 52 and has been in prison for 38 years.

Make-believe that you also used an eco-map to assess Trina’s level of social support.

1) explain the importance of using an eco-map

2) describe the results of Trina’s eco-map.

Answer 1

1. Trina is the central character in the report presented here. In this eco map Trina is the main character and around her there are father Walter, mother (who is dead), Eddie, Eddie's husband, aunts, attorney, judge, Francis, correctional officer, judge Reed, her attorney and her new born son.

2. In Trina's eco map it appears that no one helps Trina to live. She fails to get any compassionate person or friends. She is sexually abused in almost everywhere. She never gets justice. In the eco map there are our well wisher. But here we find that every where Trina has been deprived and abused. Her tragedy has no end.