People v. Pointer

151 Cal.App.3d 1128 (1984)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Pointer (D) was devoted to a macrobiotic diet. She was the mother of two children, 2 and 4, and imposed her macrobiotic diet on them. She was given repeated advice by her physician that such a diet was not appropriate and was unhealthy for young children. The father of the children sought assistance from CPS, and the children were examined and found to be severely undernourished. Eventually, emergency procedures were initiated to save the life of one of the children. Upon discharge, the child was placed in foster care. D took the child and fled to Puerto Rico. D was located by the FBI and arrested. D was found guilty of violations of the penal code sections 273a and 278.5 and sentenced to five years probation on the condition that she serve one year in county jail, participate in appropriate counseling, and not be informed of her child's whereabouts and have no unsupervised visits, have no custody of any children including her own, and she not conceive during the probationary period. D challenges this last condition as an unconstitutional restriction of her fundamental rights to privacy and to procreate.