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Pregnant inmate asks court for compassionate release
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Posted on Apr 22 2022
U.S. District Court Chief Judge Ramona V. Manglona has agreed to hear the petition of a pregnant woman who has asked to be released from prison early as she is due to give birth soon.
Manglona scheduled to hear the petition of Vickilyn Manglona Teregeyo on April 27, Wednesday.
Teregeyo, who is eight months pregnant, asked the court through her lawyer, Richard Miller, last Monday for compassionate release and for her sentence to be modified to home confinement.
Manglona’s order states that the court will respond to Teregeyo’s motion for compassionate release on shortened time, meaning it will be heard promptly by the judge no later than next Monday, April 25, and Teregeyo may reply by April 26. The court will then hear Teregeyo’s requests on Wednesday, April 27.
Currently, Teregeyo is serving a three-month prison sentence in the CNMI Department of Corrections. The sentence was imposed last March 25. Teregeyo’s lawyer asked for her compassionate release, saying there is “no nursery or mother-infant program, such as the one the [federal] Bureau of Prisons provides its expecting inmates. Without compassionate release, Vickilyn will be separated from her newborn almost immediately after she gives birth, and mother and newborn will have no contact during the first several weeks of the newborn’s life.”
Teregeyo requests that she be released no later than May 1, 2022, “to provide for the possibility she may go into labor early” and requests that “she be permitted to serve her three months’ home confinement starting May 1 and to report back to DOC on Aug. 1 to serve the remainder of her prison sentence.”
If released, she would serve her home confinement and live with her companion and the father of the child, Raymond Roberto, under electronic home monitoring by the Office of Adult Probation. “The office has already inspected Mr. Roberto’s home and determined that it is suitable,” said Miller.
Saipan Tribune archives state that Teregeyo was convicted in Guam for the offense of drug user in possession of a firearm and ammunition, but was allowed by the federal court system to serve her probation—later revoked— in the CNMI.
