Health & Fitness
Tampons Are A Civil Right, Says Former Detainee Suing City
A Queens woman is arguing that the lack of tampons or pads at the city's 77 police precincts violates detainees' civil rights.
LONG ISLAND CITY, QUEENS — A Queens woman allegedly forced to bleed through her clothes while awaiting arraignment has filed a class action suit claiming the city's 77 police precincts don't carry tampons or pads for detainees, violating their constitutional rights.
Jennifer Flores, 24, was on her period when she was arrested on Oct. 12, 2016 for obstructing governmental administration, according to the complaint filed in Brooklyn federal court Friday.
As Flores waited for her arraignment in detention at the NYPD's 108th Precinct in Long Island City, she bled through her sanitary pad — but officers told her they didn't have any menstrual products they could give her and told her to use toilet paper, according to the suit.
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Flores finally had to call her lawyer to buy her tampons and bring them to the precinct, the suit says.
She was stuck in her soiled underwear and clothes until she was arraigned the next day and her case was dismissed, according to the complaint.
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Flores' lawyer, Kenneth Belkin, is arguing that the city's failure to provide detainees with menstrual products is part of a "pattern of deliberate indifference" to women's medical needs that violates their rights to due process and equal protection under the law.
"Under our constitution, the government cannot deny you reasonable medical care while you're in their custody," Belkin said in a phone interview. "Feminine hygiene products have been interpreted to be medical care."
Belkin said when he told other defense attorneys what had happened with Flores, he "couldn't believe" how many said their clients had experienced the same thing.
Nicholas Paolucci, a spokesperson for the city's Law Department, said the agency will look into the claims once served.
In 2016, the City Council passed a law requiring city jails to provide inmates with free feminine hygiene products, but it includes no enforcement mechanism, according to The New York Times.
It also doesn't appear to apply to detainees awaiting arraignment in holding cells.
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