In July of last year, state lawmakers set aside $10 million to compensate people like Mary English, who were sterilized either without their knowledge or against their will.

The decision was bipartisan and hailed by many as a significant, if belated, way for the state to make up for one of its great moral crimes.

But for English and other victims, getting that money has proven to be difficult. The N.C. Industrial Commission, which evaluates claims, has approved 213 of 751, about one-third, even as the first checks are set to go out by month's end.

Many claimants have been rejected because of a hole in the law, which calls for compensating only those victims who were sterilized by order of the Eugenics Board of North Carolina. That leaves out people sterilized on the order of county officials.

English was 22 and a divorced mother of three in 1972 when she says a Cumberland County doctor sterilized her. She did not find out until another doctor's visit in 1976.

She had been victimized by eugenics, a now-discredited movement that called for stopping "undesirable" people from having children. The poor and disabled were victimized in disproportionate numbers. North Carolina's program lasted from 1929 to 1974, continuing long after most other states had stopped.

English has been outspoken about what happened to her, and she started speaking before any serious talk of compensation. She has appeared before a panel of the General Assembly. She says she knows there are other Fayetteville victims who have applied for compensation, but they have not reached out to her.

"I think they're just embarrassed about it," she says.

In early September, English made her case before the Industrial Commission. A week later, she received a rejection letter, her second.

She points out two lines:

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Pitts: Fayetteville woman still fights for compensation from state in eugenics case