When U.S. domestic violence survivor Keshia Golden stood in a Cook County courtroom on Aug. 24, 2026, her choices were stripped down to an agonizing binary: face up to 60 years in state prison or plead guilty to involuntary manslaughter for defending her own life. Golden, a 31-year-old Black mother from Chicago, accepted a plea agreement securing 24 months of probation without jail time.
Yet behind this legal resolution lies an unsettling question about American justice: What happens when a Black woman who has survived intimate partner violence is prosecuted for the act that allowed her to survive?
In October 2022, while eight months pregnant, Golden stabbed her abusive partner, Calvin Sidney, in their home after he physically attacked her. The blade severed his femoral artery, resulting in his death. Despite a documented history featuring more than 50 police calls, four prior arrests of Sidney, and hospital records documenting Golden’s immediate severe injuries, the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office pursued first-degree murder charges. For four years, Golden remained in legal limbo before accepting a felony record to ensure she would not be taken from her now 3-year-old daughter.
Why Does the Legal System Criminalize Survivor Self-Defense for Black Women?
Golden’s case raises a larger question about how the legal system evaluates self-defense when the person fighting back is a Black woman who has endured prolonged intimate partner violence. Instead of recognizing the complexity of surviving chronic abuse, prosecutors can be left to determine whether a survivor’s response meets narrow legal definitions of an immediate threat.
In Golden’s case, the state argued that because she briefly separated from Sidney before retrieving a knife, she escalated the conflict rather than acted in necessary self-preservation, according to 19th News.
“This is not the outcome we wanted,” said Julie Koehler, an attorney with the Cook County Public Defender’s Office. “She is not guilty of these charges. But there isn’t a woman or mother alive that, when faced with spending 20 to 60 years in prison, wouldn’t take a plea to probation.”
Legal scholars and advocates have long examined how traditional self-defense standards can fail to account for the realities of prolonged domestic violence, including the ways survivors assess danger, respond to escalating violence and attempt to protect themselves and their children.
In Golden’s case, the legal question was not simply whether Sidney was killed. It was whether the circumstances surrounding that killing could be understood through the reality of the violence Golden says she had endured.
The State’s Failure: Institutional Abandonment Before Criminalized Survivor Prosecution
Golden’s case illustrates the irony of institutional abandonment. Over the course of her relationship, Golden reached out to the police for help more than 50 times. She secured a protective order after Sidney punched her in the face during her second trimester, though she later dismissed it under severe coercion. Despite those repeated opportunities for intervention, the violence continued.
That history matters.
When institutions fail to protect survivors, the moment they fight back can become the moment the state turns its attention toward prosecuting them. Golden’s case forces a difficult examination of what happens when repeated attempts to seek protection fail to provide safety.
“What exactly is the criminal system accomplishing by saddling Keshia with a felony conviction that will have profound consequences for the rest of her life?” asked Professor Leigh Goodmark.
The question is particularly consequential for Black women, whose experiences with domestic violence exist within broader histories of racial bias, unequal access to protection and distrust of institutions.
Golden was not simply confronting an abusive partner. She was also navigating a system that, despite repeated calls for help, did not ultimately prevent the violent encounter that brought her before a judge.
Probation, Systemic Harm and the Fight for Full Clemency
While probation avoids immediate incarceration, a felony conviction can create lasting barriers to employment, housing and economic stability. Those consequences extend well beyond the courtroom and can follow a person for years.
For Golden, the plea agreement means she remains home with her daughter. But it also means carrying a felony conviction tied to an act she maintains was an effort to survive an abusive relationship.
Community organizers reporting through The 19th are calling on Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker to issue a full pardon, arguing that a survivor should not carry state punishment for enduring intimate partner violence.
“All she got is me,” Golden said following her hearing, expressing relief that she remains home with her child while pledging to advocate for other abused women.
That sentence may be the clearest window into what was at stake.
Golden avoided prison. But probation is not the same as vindication. She leaves the courtroom with a felony conviction attached to a story that began with repeated attempts to get help and ended with her fighting back.
Her case leaves behind a question that reaches far beyond one Chicago courtroom: What does justice look like when the person who survived the violence is the one standing before the judge?
For Black women living through intimate partner violence, survival should never become the evidence used to punish them.
RELATED CONTENT: A Memphis Man FAFO Why Messing With An Underage Girl Is Dead Wrong
