Girl Scouts Behind Bars, in Moms’ Arms : Maryland: Pioneering program reunites imprisoned women with their children in effort to reduce trauma and build bonds. So far, it’s working.

Twice a month, Rochelle Gilliam’s 5-year-old daughter rides a bus to Maryland’s only women’s prison, passing through gates topped with razor-sharp wire. It’s not just any visit. It’s for her Girl Scout troop meeting.

“She looks forward to coming here, and I look forward to it,” said Gilliam, who is serving 10 years for robbery and a probation violation. “My mother tells me that she gets up on Saturday mornings and waits for the bus.”

Gilliam, 25, and about 30 other inmates at the Maryland Correctional Institution for Women are members of Girl Scout Troops 2140, 2141 and 2142.

It’s the nation’s first “Girl Scouts Behind Bars” program. Established last November, the program is designed to ease the children’s trauma and give their mothers a chance to establish closer bonds.

“Children on the outside say, ‘I’m going with my mother,’ and she always has to say, ‘I’m going with my grandmother,’ ” Gilliam said. “I know I miss my own mother, so I understand the hurt she feels.”

The program, which has won praise from Atty. Gen. Janet Reno and the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, is intended to help end the cycle of incarceration for generations of the same families.

Some children, especially younger ones, see their mothers arrested and taken away, but they don’t know what has happened to them, said Marilyn Moses, program manager for the Justice Department’s National Institute of Justice.

“Many children think their mothers are being starved, chained and beaten,” she said. “They fantasize because they have no frame of reference. They suffer anxiety, depression.”

The institute set up the program with a $15,000 grant after Baltimore Circuit Judge Carol Smith asked officials to help the children of incarcerated parents.

The program has caught the attention of corrections officials in 10 other states, and a second program is being formed in Ohio, she said.

“We were eager to try it,” said Mary Rose Main, national executive director of the Girl Scouts of the USA, which has 2.6 million girls nationwide. “These girls follow in the footsteps of their mothers too frequently and if we can help break this cycle, we would like to.”

The mothers meet every other Saturday at 9 a.m. to discuss parenting and communication skills. Vans bringing the children from Baltimore arrive about 10:30 a.m. and the girls spend about 15 minutes one-on-one with their mothers.

The troops then split into three age groups, and the inmates and their daughters meet for two hours to discuss such issues as drug use, sex, health and self-esteem. On alternate weeks, the girls hold their own troop meetings outside the prison and do traditional scouting activities.

“This is an opportunity to become reacquainted and to reconnect,” said Melanie Pereira, deputy commissioner with the state corrections department and a former warden at the women’s prison.

“It gives them the opportunity to relate and pass on positive values to their children. They want a better world for their children.”

Darlene Lawson, 33, who has four children and is serving a life sentence for murder, said she felt proud reciting the Girl Scout pledge after a recent anti-drug skit at the prison.

“We were doing it to represent the Girl Scouts, our children and ourselves,” she said. “We didn’t care what anyone said about it.”